At the end of February 2019, the Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC) released some figures for increases in wind power during 2018. (This was in advance of the release of the full annual report on 3 April) The overall increase in new installed capacity, (51.3 GW) though in line with the average figure for the [...]
On 27 December 2018, AIM-quoted Altona Energy published its latest Annual report on the financial year ending 30 June 2018. Given that Altona listed on AIM as long ago as 2005, things still seem to be at a relatively preliminary stage. The story looks much as it was: Altona is a very small company, with [...]
On Wednesday 12 December, the Financial Times carried an article from Seoul, South Korea, stating that over the next ten years Hyundai, the world’s fifth largest car manufacturer, will commit US$6.7 Billion to the hydrogen economy. The article stated that this will raise their production capacity for fuel-cell systems and cars to 700,000 units a [...]
The transition to electric vehicles (EVs) is going faster than anyone expected. Major Western car manufacturers are now regularly presiding over the launch of electric cars not least because of ever tightening emission requirements. China, too, has made clear its intention to be a world leader. In this field, improved battery performance is crucial. For [...]
In the summer, the press gave prominence to the Mayor of London’s announcement that in 2019 London would see the creationof the largest double-decker electric bus fleet in Europeas 68 new electric double-deckers came into service, thus increasing the number of electric buses ten-fold. But, in a sense, these clean buses are only a means [...]
On Thursday 15 November 2018, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) surprised some observers by its ruling in favour of a case brought by a British clean energy technology company, Tempus Energy, against the European Commission and the British Government over the UK system of managing back-up power. Tempus did not call the capacity market [...]
At the beginning of the week, Equatorial Palm Oil (EPO) released its annual financial report for the year to 30 September 2018. Since the interims (see Greenbarrel 24 May) there has been some evident progress on eg the commissioning of the palm oil mill, and on human rights. But these actions have yet to materially [...]
The market seems to have welcomed last week’s announcement that Scottish Power Ltd (wholly owned by Iberdrola, the Spanish electric utility company) was to sell all its non-wind generating capacity to Drax for a consideration of £702 million. This in pursuance of Iberdrola’s expressed intention of lowering its carbon emissions. Iberdrola shares showed a modest, [...]
On Monday 15 October Cuadrilla, having weathered a last-minute legal appeal, finally started fracking operations in the shale basin below their Preston New Road site. Fracking involves injecting liquid underground at high pressure to force open fissures and allow access to oil and gas. Experts do not yet know whether fracking in the UK is [...]
Given the recent news stories about Tesla, this is perhaps a good moment to try to assess how far the electric car has come and whether it needs to travel further before the “electric revolution” can really be said to have arrived. One of the issues is that of overall perspective. For example, Norway has [...]
