Quarterly results were issued after the close of the trading day. Ormat shares finished at $36.65 on the New York Stock Exchange.

The Reno, Nevada,-based company, a bellwether in the global geothermal industry, says sales were up 65.5% in its Product Segment, which designs, develops and builds turbines and power units to supply energy from geothermal fields and other alternative energy sources.

In a statement, chief executive Dita Bronicki says the company benefited from “the record backlog that we had at the beginning of 2009”. Specifically, the company has engineering, procurement and construction contracts for large binary geothermal plants: the Nevada Geothermal’s Blue Mountain project in Nevada; the Centennial plant of Contact Energy in New Zealand; and Costa Rica’s Las Pailas plant, a project of national utility ICE.

As the company works through that backlog, sales and profit margins are expected to return to previous levels next year, Bronicki adds.

The company’s Electricity Segment, which sells energy from its own plants, grew its total generation 19% from the third quarter last year to 799,000 megawatt hours. Revenues in the segment, however, were flat at $68.7m. Lower oil prices dragged down its average revenue per megawatt hour from $103 to $86.

The company recently announced it is expanding its electricity business to own and operate solar photovoltaic systems. In October, it entered a joint-venture agreement with Sunday Energy to develop up to 36 megawatts of solar in Israel.

Ormat’s board of directors also approved a quarterly dividend of $0.06 per share, payable 1 December to shareholders of record as of 18 November.

The company intends to discuss its results in greater detail during a conference call at noon, US Eastern Standard Time on 5 November, which can be accessed online at www.ormat.com.