so i recently sold some stock from my old company and had to figure out how to re-invest it. its a relatively unpleasant task. as most of you know, i am a card-carrying tree hugger so investing in companies who are doing work that is socially and environmentally important (and also at the same time profitable) is a difficult thing to achieve. there are some socially-responsible (SRI) mutual funds out there but they are ultimately expensive and underperform the S&P. Being "good" doesn't have to entail unprofitability! i did end up settling on some interesting stocks that i figured i would share, since the research was a bit of work. please note that my method of investing is to buy and hold for the long term.
Startech (STHK): This company uses plasma guns to liquefy and vaporize trash! How cool is that? The output of the process is heat (of course), a glass that can be used in construction, and a gas that can be converted into hydrogen fuel. the whole thing is essentially self running once you get it started on trash. They were just covered in popular science magazine.
Whole Foods (WFMI): You all know Whole Foods. Basically, despite Michael Pollan's taking them to task on not being exactly as wholesome as advertised, I still think this is a great company, with a great product, and a great future. I think they're going to be the next Starbucks. Whenever I shop I vote with my money and I buy organic, as local as possible. Did you know organic produce may have 5 times the nutrients that non-organic do?
Linear Technologies (LLTC): Linear Technologies is a company that makes analog circuits, mostly in the arena of power management. I had a whole lot of experience with LTC at my previous engineering jobs and they have the most talented engineers working for them. They are a 5-star morningstar stock and are on the new clean energy index (CLEN) that was just introduced last week. They have an awesome profit sharing and employee ownership policy, which I'm all for.
Energy Conversion Devices (ENER): another CLEN stock. these guys sell solar in the european and north american markets as well as batteries for hybrids and lower-power memory chips for computing. the outlook for the next 5 years looks really good for this company. i love solar because it has minimal impact and eventually pays for itself. 4-stars on morningstar.
Advanced Analogic Technologies (AATI): these guys are similar to Linear Tech, and are also a 5-star stock on the CLEN. the big difference is that they are a much smaller company but focus on the consumer electronics market quite a bit more: cellphone backlighting. so the potential upside is huge.
