Game-changing moves in green economy

In the week the new parliament building of the world’s most populous country was inaugurated, the energy-transition headline came from India’s top oil explorer — Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) plans to invest Rs 1 trillion ($12.1 billion) in clean-power projects by 2030.

It aims to grow its renewables portfolio from less than 200 megawatts to 10,000 megawatts by the end of the decade, stated ONGC Chairman Arun Kumar Singh. “India will continue to grow in fossil fuel demand until 2040, but at the same time we have to step up our efforts for green energy. We have to do this so that both the worlds can co-exist,” he said.

Investors are set to pour more money into solar power than in oil production this year for the first time, according to the International Energy Agency. Overall too, “for every dollar invested in fossil fuels, about 1.7 dollars are now going into clean energy. Five years ago, this ratio was one-to-one,” Fatih Birol, IEA executive director, said in a statement.

Of the $2.8 trillion expected to be invested globally in energy this year, clean technologies will likely absorb more than $1.7 trillion. This includes renewables, electric vehicles, nuclear power, grids, storage, low-emissions fuels, efficiency improvements, and heat pumps. Slightly more than $1 trillion will flow to coal, gas, and oil.

Some governments are choosing to have strategic stakes in clean-energy assets, akin to what was typically done in the oil sector. Denmark said it would take 20 per cent stakes in new offshore wind projects. The plan is part of a wider deal between the government and most of the Opposition parties to build as much as 14 gigawatts of new offshore wind capacity.

Ford-Tesla deal
 

The uptake of EVs depends to a large extent on the charging infrastructure available. The Ford-Tesla deal on sharing EV chargers is a game changer.

“Ford EV customers will have access to more than 12,000 Tesla Superchargers across the US and Canada, in addition to the over 10,000 DC fast-chargers that are already part of the BlueOval Charge Network. This will give Ford EV customers unprecedented access to fast-charging,” a statement from Ford said.

A Tesla-developed adapter will enable Ford EVs fitted with the combined charging system, or CCS, access to Tesla’s superchargers. In 2025, Ford will offer EVs with the North American Charging Standard (NACS) connector built in.

The number of public EV-charging connectors at the end of 2022 totalled 2.7 million, according to BloombergNEF estimates. Almost 80 per cent of the investment last year went to ultra-fast chargers.

Billionaire’s solar bet down under
 

An ambitious $20-billion project to export solar power from Australia to Singapore via a submarine cable is set to be revived with billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes acquiring the assets of the failed Sun Cable project.

“We’ve always believed in the possibilities Sun Cable presents in exporting our boundless sunshine, and what it could mean for Australia,” said Mr Cannon-Brookes.

The deal gives Mr Cannon-Brookes and Quinbrook Infrastructure Partners control of a vast renewable energy development in northern Australia, which went into voluntary administration in January following a dispute among the key investors on the plan to transport electricity to Asia through a 4,200-km (2,600-mile) submarine cable.

Green hydrogen bump
 

US-headquartered Plug Power announced plans to build three green hydrogen production plants in Finland at an estimated investment of $6 billion.

A statement from the company said it was working “with financial partners to secure optimal capital solutions, and industrial partners to secure offtake commitments from creditworthy counterparties before these projects get to final investment decision by 2025-2026”.

The company is building a global green hydrogen generation network, and is trying to tap funding from the US Department of Energy’s Loan Programs Office, in addition to other entities. “Plug continues to receive interest from strategic partners and infrastructure funds,” it said last month.

A fee for fashion
 

Regulators are considering programmes that would require fashion companies to pay a fee linked to production volumes to tackle the rising amounts of textile waste.

Under rules that have been separately proposed in California, New York, Sweden, the Netherlands, and Italy — and are also under discussion in the UK and the EU — fashion companies would have to fund textile-recycling programmes. These schemes on “extended producer responsibility”, or EPR, require brands to pay fees based on their product output or to set up recycling programmes.

Supporters of EPR programmes for textiles hope they will curb overproduction, lead to recycling innovations, and encourage companies to make higher-quality products.
 

The writer is New York-based senior editor – global policy – for BloombergNEF, vgombar@bloomberg.net