Around the world, cheaper renewables, improved technology, and risks over reputation, financial performance and the environment are driving finance away from coal. In the early days it sometimes looked like “greenwash”, but over time commitments have ratcheted up to make it a reality. Europe and the U.S. have already made a good start, and Asia is now catching up. As renewables get cheaper nobody wants to be left holding billions in stranded … [Read more...]
IEA: Global energy investment stabilises at $1.8tn after 3 years of decline
Three consecutive years of declining global energy investment has ended. But it’s not risen, just stabilised at $1.8tn, according to the IEA’s latest report World Energy Investment 2019. To meet the Paris targets investment in efficiency needs to rise substantially, and double by 2030 for renewables: they have stalled for both. To meet soaring global energy demand oil and gas investments need to rise too. That demand is seeing cheap coal still … [Read more...]
Grid Asset Management 2019
Grid Asset Management 2019 Data-Driven Asset Management to Support Smart Investment Planning and Optimised Lifecycle Management 3-Day Conference, Exhibition & Networking Forum 14-16 May 2019, London Drawing together 120+ smart grid asset management professionals, this 3-day case-study driven programme provides an intensive review of 14+ next generation asset management digitalisation programmes. As regulatory pressures and smart … [Read more...]
Biogas and Biomethane in Europe: Denmark, Germany, Italy lead
Over and again, legislators worldwide are confronting the same question: which technologies do we subsidise and support, when, by how much, and for how long. Get it right and those costs will reduce and should disappear once scale is reached. Solar and wind are on their way to proving that. What about biofuels? Marc-Antoine Eyl-Mazzega and Carole Mathieu of the Institut Français des Relations Internationales (IFRI) look at the last 10 years. The … [Read more...]
IEA: Renewables growth worldwide is stalling
It’s bad enough that 2018 net capacity additions did not exceed 2017’s after two decades of strong growth. It is far more troubling that nobody saw it coming, says the IEA, who have laid out the data and main cause: stop-go policies. 2018's 180 GW is only 60% of what needs to be added each year to meet climate goals. China, the EU, India and Japan all fell back. Only emerging economies, developing countries and the US (slightly) saw growth. … [Read more...]
EU oversight of foreign investment in energy projects lacking
At the 21st EU-China Summit on 9 April, both sides hailed a new era in the trade relationship. Increasingly confident of its domestic technological capabilities, China will soon no longer oblige foreign companies active in China to share their tech know-how. And a new Foreign Investment Law in China allows for greater inward investment to the country, but maintains restrictions and scrutiny mechanisms on 48 sectors of key strategic interest (the … [Read more...]
PPA 2.0: future-proofing corporate energy funding
Power purchase agreements (PPAs) are a significant tool for funding the energy transition. Research by DNV GL suggests that, as renewable energy becomes more widespread, its price dynamics becomes more complex, and that matters to PPAs. Some governments are looking to phase out subsidies and feed-in tariffs, effectively softening their price guarantees. Also, as renewables generation grows, market prices can fall. Martijn Duvoort, Director Energy … [Read more...]
“Responsible” ESG investments hit $20tn, a quarter of the world’s professionally managed total
ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) factors measure the sustainability and ethical impact of an investment. ESG includes the energy sector, and the amounts spent show it’s no longer just an ethical choice, says The Rocky Mountain Institute’s Todd Zeranski. It doesn’t just save the planet, it saves our pensions. Why? From regulatory penalties to the cost of climate clean-up, fossil fuel investments are getting too risky and expensive. Those … [Read more...]
Why does coal survive? A detailed real-world cashflow analysis
Everyone knows coal plants are bad for the environment. So why do countries still use them? Coal’s attractiveness comes from the relatively low up front capital investment required to start generating energy. On top of that, the rapid rise of variable renewables (solar, wind) need something to rise with it to fill the generation gap when the sun doesn’t shine and the wind doesn’t blow. In his final instalment - after his similarly detailed … [Read more...]
“Energy Charter Treaty review should end protection for fossil fuels”
In her previous article Sarah Keay-Bright said the outdated Energy Charter Treaty protects old world fossil fuel investments over the wide range of new green investments now being made. The treaty is being reviewed by its signatories this year. In a concluding article, she and Steivan Defilla warn that the terms of reference for the ECT review don’t even mention the need to align the treaty with the Paris Agreement. They say the revised ECT must … [Read more...]
U.S. innovative financing makes buildings energy efficiency affordable even to poor communities
Buildings energy efficiency is not moving fast enough to meet the Paris Agreement goals. Retrofitting old buildings is extremely costly and needs much more investment, as our previous articles have detailed. Innovative models of financing are urgently needed. In an article for Ensia, Nate Berg explains how by rolling upgrade costs into monthly bills for poorer communities, U.S. utilities are helping customers save energy and money at the same … [Read more...]
Climate Auctions can reduce emissions and accelerate regulatory, financial and infrastructure goals
Auctions for delivering an amount of power at a defined price are already well established for renewables. “Climate Auctions” do the same with carbon emissions: a carbon price is guaranteed to the winning bidder, but only paid on delivery of the emissions cut. Tyeler Matsuo and Julia Meisel at Rocky Mountain Institute say this is proving particularly useful in emerging and developing countries where progress in building up their climate laws is … [Read more...]
GGFI: “Avoid carbon bubble, choose financial centre wisely”
We already have indexes that pick green stocks, and rank nations by their policies. The Global Green Finance Index (GGFI) ranks the world’s financial centres – London, New York, Singapore, Shanghai, etc. – by the policies and support they give to green investments. Old ways of valuing assets, particularly in fossil fuel companies, are being questioned say Mike Wardle and Michael Mainelli of the think tank Z/Yen, one of the creators of the index. … [Read more...]
Investing in gas: the effect of carbon taxes, gas prices, and the growth of renewables
Schalk Cloete presents his latest article looking at what affects the profitability of an investment in a specific power sector. After reviewing onshore wind, nuclear and solar, he now looks at gas. His analysis of coal is to come. The major variables are increasing CO2 prices, and natural gas pricing. He adds that the growth of wind and solar should benefit load-following gas power plants: they are plugging the intermittency gap when electricity … [Read more...]
IEA: solar’s exponential growth could make it less competitive, not more
Solar’s current growth trajectory means a doubling of annual deployment every three years. But despite further expected reductions in some cost areas (e.g. cheaper tech and economies of scale), the IEA’s new VALCOE (value-adjusted levelised costs of electricity) metric calculates that solar’s relative competitiveness per unit added will actually decline as its inherent demand-matching issues scale up with the growth. Brent Wanner, WEO Energy … [Read more...]
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