Renewable energy firm Ocean Power Technologies has won a $66.5 million (US$61 million) grant from the Australian government for a project set to be one of the first to generate power from waves on a utility scale.
Ocean Power said work on the 19 megawatt project, enough to power 10,000 homes, was expected to begin by the second quarter of 2010.
The company uses buoys floating up and down to drive an electrical generator, with the power generated being transmitted onshore via an underwater cable.
The project off the coast of Victoria is being carried out in conjunction with Leighton Contractors, a unit of Australian mining contractor Leighton Holdings.
The Australian government is aiming to generate 20 percent of the country's electricity from renewable sources by 2020 and the grant awarded to Ocean Power forms part of funding totaling $235 million for four renewable energy projects.
Ocean Power said, however, further funding would be needed to complete the wave power station.
Global Renewable LCOE Trends reveal offshore wind costs down 32%, with 10MW turbines, lower CAPEX and OPEX, and parity for solar PV and onshore wind in Europe, China, and California, per BloombergNEF analysis.
Key Points
Benchmarks showing falling LCOE for offshore wind, onshore wind, and solar PV, driven by larger turbines and lower CAPEX
✅ Offshore wind LCOE $78/MWh; $53-64/MWh in DK/NL excl. transmission
✅ Onshore wind $47/MWh; solar PV $51/MWh, best $26-36/MWh
✅ Cost drivers: 10MW turbines, lower CAPEX/OPEX, weak China demand
World offshore wind costs have fallen 32% from just a year ago and 12% compared with the first half of 2019, according to a BNEF long-term outlook from BloombergNEF.
In its latest Levelized Cost of Electricity (LCOE) Update, BloombergNEF said its current global benchmark LCOE estimate for offshore wind is $78 a megawatt-hour.
“New offshore wind projects throughout Europe, including the UK's build-out, now deploy turbines with power ratings up to 10MW, unlocking CAPEX and OPEX savings,” BloombergNEF said.
In Denmark and the Netherlands, it expects the most recent projects financed to achieve $53-64/MWh excluding transmission.
New solar and onshore wind projects have reached parity with average wholesale power prices in California and parts of Europe, while in China levelised costs are below the benchmark average regulated coal price, according to BloombergNEF.
The company's global benchmark levelized cost figures for onshore wind and PV projects financed in the last six months are at $47 and $51 a megawatt-hours, underscoring that renewables are now the cheapest new electricity option in many regions, down 6% and 11% respectively compared with the first half of 2019.
BloombergNEF said for wind this is mainly down to a fall in the price of turbines – 7% lower on average globally compared with the end of 2018.
In China, the world’s largest solar market, the CAPEX of utility-scale PV plants has dropped 11% in the last six months, reaching $0.57m per MW.
“Weak demand for new plants in China has left developers and engineering, procurement and construction firms eager for business, and this has put pressure on CAPEX,” BloombergNEF said.
It added that estimates of the cheapest PV projects financed recently – in India, Chile and Australia – will be able to achieve an LCOE of $27-36/MWh, assuming competitive returns for their equity investors.
Best-in-class onshore wind farms in Brazil, India, Mexico and Texas can reach levelized costs as low as $26-31/MWh already, the research said.
Programs such as the World Bank wind program are helping developing countries accelerate wind deployment as costs continue to drop.
BloombergNEF associate in the energy economics team Tifenn Brandily said: “This is a three- stage process. In phase one, new solar and wind get cheaper than new gas and coal plants on a cost-of- energy basis.
“In phase two, renewables reach parity with power prices. In phase three, they become even cheaper than running existing thermal plants.
“Our analysis shows that phase one has now been reached for two-thirds of the global population.
“Phase two started with California, China and parts of Europe. We expect phase three to be reached on a global scale by 2030.
“As this all plays out, thermal power plants will increasingly be relegated to a balancing role, looking for opportunities to generate when the sun doesn’t shine or the wind doesn’t blow.”
Shell's Industrial Electricity Supply Strategy targets UK and US industrial customers, leveraging gas-to-power, renewables, long-term PPAs, and energy transition momentum to disrupt utilities, cut costs, and secure demand in the evolving electricity market.
Key Points
Shell will sell power directly to industrial clients, leveraging gas, renewables, and PPAs to secure demand and pricing.
✅ Direct power sales to industrials in UK and US
✅ Leverages gas-to-power, renewables, and flexible sourcing
✅ Targets long-term PPAs, price stability, and demand security
Royal Dutch Shell’s decision to sell electricity direct to industrial customers is an intelligent and creative one. The shift is strategic and demonstrates that oil and gas majors are capable of adapting to a new world as the transition to a lower carbon economy develops. For those already in the business of providing electricity it represents a dangerous competitive threat. For the other oil majors it poses a direct challenge on whether they are really thinking about the future sufficiently strategically.
The move starts small with a business in the UK that will start trading early next year, in a market where the UK’s second-largest electricity operator has recently emerged, signaling intensifying competition. Shell will supply the business operations as a first step and it will then expand. But Britain is not the limit — Shell recently announced its intention of making similar sales in the US. Historically, oil and gas companies have considered a move into electricity as a step too far, with the sector seen as oversupplied and highly politicised because of sensitivity to consumer price rises. I went through three reviews during my time in the industry, each of which concluded that the electricity business was best left to someone else. What has changed? I think there are three strands of logic behind the strategy.
First, the state of the energy market. The price of gas in particular has fallen across the world over the last three years to the point where the International Energy Agency describes the current situation as a “glut”. Meanwhile, Shell has been developing an extensive range of gas assets, with more to come. In what has become a buyer’s market it is logical to get closer to the customer — establishing long-term deals that can soak up the supply, while options such as storing electricity in natural gas pipes gain attention in Europe. Given its reach, Shell could sign contracts to supply all the power needed by the UK’s National Health Service or with the public sector as a whole as well as big industrial users. It could agree long-term contracts with big businesses across the US.
To the buyers, Shell offers a high level of security from multiple sources with prices presumably set at a discount to the market. The mutual advantage is strong. Second, there is the transition to a lower carbon world. No one knows how fast this will move, but one thing is certain: electricity will be at the heart of the shift with power demand increasing in transportation, industry and the services sector as oil and coal are displaced. Shell, with its wide portfolio, can match inputs to the circumstances and policies of each location. It can match its global supplies of gas to growing Asian markets, including China’s 2060 electricity share projections, while developing a renewables-based electricity supply chain in Europe. The new company can buy supplies from other parts of the group or from outside. It has already agreed to buy all the power produced from the first Dutch offshore wind farm at Egmond aan Zee.
The move gives Shell the opportunity to enter the supply chain at any point — it does not have to own power stations any more than it now owns drilling rigs or helicopters. The third key factor is that the electricity market is not homogenous. The business of supplying power can be segmented. The retail market — supplying millions of households — may be under constant scrutiny, as efforts to fix the UK’s electricity grid keep infrastructure in the headlines, with suppliers vilified by the press and governments forced to threaten price caps but supplying power to industrial users is more stable and predictable, and done largely out of the public eye. The main industrial and commercial users are major companies well able to negotiate long-term deals.
Given its scale and reputation, Shell is likely to be a supplier of choice for industrial and commercial consumers and potentially capable of shaping prices. This is where the prospect of a powerful new competitor becomes another threat to utilities and retailers whose business models are already under pressure. In the European market in particular, electricity pricing mechanisms are evolving and public policies that give preference to renewables have undermined other sources of supply — especially those produced from gas. Once-powerful companies such as RWE and EON have lost much of their value as a result. In the UK, France and elsewhere, public and political hostility to price increases have made retail supply a risky and low-margin business at best. If the industrial market for electricity is now eaten away, the future for the existing utilities is desperate.
Shell’s move should raise a flag of concern for investors in the other oil and gas majors. The company is positioning itself for change. It is sending signals that it is now viable even if oil and gas prices do not increase and that it is not resisting the energy transition. Chief executive Ben van Beurden said last week that he was looking forward to his next car being electric. This ease with the future is rather rare. Shareholders should be asking the other players in the old oil and gas sector to spell out their strategies for the transition.
Utility Renewable Investment Gap highlights Oxford study in Nature Energy: most electric utilities favor fossil fuels over clean energy transition, expanding coal and gas, risking stranded assets and missing climate targets despite global decarbonization commitments.
Key Points
Most utilities grow fossil capacity over renewables, slowing decarbonization and jeopardizing climate goals.
✅ Only 10% expand renewables faster than coal and gas growth
✅ 60% still add fossil plants; 15% actively cut coal and gas
Only one in 10 of the world’s electric utility companies are prioritising clean energy investment over growing their capacity of fossil fuel power plants, according to research from the University of Oxford.
The study of more than 3,000 utilities found most remain heavily invested in fossil fuels despite international efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and barriers to 100% renewables in the US that persist, and some are actively expanding their portfolio of polluting power plants.
The majority of the utility companies, many of which are state owned, have made little change to their generation portfolio in recent years.
Only 10% of the companies in the study, published in the research journal Nature Energy, are expanding their renewable energy capacity, mirroring global wind and solar growth patterns, at a faster rate than their gas- or coal-fired capacity.
Advertisement
Of the companies prioritising renewable energy growth, 60% have not stopped concurrently expanding their fossil fuel portfolio and only 15% of these companies are actively reducing their gas and coal capacity.
Galina Alova, the author of the report, said the research highlighted “a worrying gap between what is needed” to tackle the climate crisis, with calls for a fossil fuel lockdown gaining attention, and “what actions are being taken by the utility sector”.
The report found 10% of utilities were favouring growth in gas-fired power plants. This cluster is dominated by US utilities, even as renewables surpass coal in US generation in the broader market, eager to take advantage of the country’s shale gas reserves, followed by Russia and Germany.
Only 2% of utilities are actively growing their coal-fired power capacity ahead of renewables or gas. This cluster is dominated by Chinese utilities – which alone contributed more than 60% of coal-focused companies – followed by India and Vietnam.
The report found the majority of companies prioritising renewable energy were clustered in Europe. Many of the industry’s biggest players are investing in low-carbon energy and green technologies, even as clean energy's dirty secret prompts debate, to replace their ageing fossil fuel power plants.
Sign up to the daily Business Today email or follow Guardian Business on Twitter at @BusinessDesk
In the UK, amid UK renewables backlog that has stalled billions, coal plants are shutting at pace ahead of the government’s 2025 ban on coal-fired power in part because the UK’s domestic carbon tax on power plants make them uneconomic to run.
“Although there have been a few high-profile examples of individual electric utilities investing in renewables, this study shows that overall, the sector is making the transition to clean energy slowly or not at all,” Alova said.
“Utilities’ continued investment in fossil fuels leaves them at risk of stranded assets – where power plants will need to be retired early – and undermines global efforts to tackle climate change.”
ITER Nuclear Fusion advances tokamak magnetic confinement, heating deuterium-tritium plasma with superconducting magnets, targeting net energy gain, tritium breeding, and steam-turbine power, while complementing laser inertial confinement milestones for grid-scale electricity and 2025 startup goals.
Key Points
ITER Nuclear Fusion is a tokamak project confining D-T plasma with magnets to achieve net energy gain and clean power.
✅ Tokamak magnetic confinement with high-temp superconducting coils
✅ Deuterium-tritium fuel cycle with on-site tritium breeding
✅ Targets net energy gain and grid-scale, low-carbon electricity
It sounds like the stuff of dreams: a virtually limitless source of energy that doesn’t produce greenhouse gases or radioactive waste. That’s the promise of nuclear fusion, often described as the holy grail of clean energy by proponents, which for decades has been nothing more than a fantasy due to insurmountable technical challenges. But things are heating up in what has turned into a race to create what amounts to an artificial sun here on Earth, one that can provide power for our kettles, cars and light bulbs.
Today’s nuclear power plants create electricity through nuclear fission, in which atoms are split, with next-gen nuclear power exploring smaller, cheaper, safer designs that remain distinct from fusion. Nuclear fusion however, involves combining atomic nuclei to release energy. It’s the same reaction that’s taking place at the Sun’s core. But overcoming the natural repulsion between atomic nuclei and maintaining the right conditions for fusion to occur isn’t straightforward. And doing so in a way that produces more energy than the reaction consumes has been beyond the grasp of the finest minds in physics for decades.
But perhaps not for much longer. Some major technical challenges have been overcome in the past few years and governments around the world have been pouring money into fusion power research as part of a broader green industrial revolution under way in several regions. There are also over 20 private ventures in the UK, US, Europe, China and Australia vying to be the first to make fusion energy production a reality.
“People are saying, ‘If it really is the ultimate solution, let’s find out whether it works or not,’” says Dr Tim Luce, head of science and operation at the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER), being built in southeast France. ITER is the biggest throw of the fusion dice yet.
Its $22bn (£15.9bn) build cost is being met by the governments of two-thirds of the world’s population, including the EU, the US, China and Russia, at a time when Europe is losing nuclear power and needs energy, and when it’s fired up in 2025 it’ll be the world’s largest fusion reactor. If it works, ITER will transform fusion power from being the stuff of dreams into a viable energy source.
Constructing a nuclear fusion reactor ITER will be a tokamak reactor – thought to be the best hope for fusion power. Inside a tokamak, a gas, often a hydrogen isotope called deuterium, is subjected to intense heat and pressure, forcing electrons out of the atoms. This creates a plasma – a superheated, ionised gas – that has to be contained by intense magnetic fields.
The containment is vital, as no material on Earth could withstand the intense heat (100,000,000°C and above) that the plasma has to reach so that fusion can begin. It’s close to 10 times the heat at the Sun’s core, and temperatures like that are needed in a tokamak because the gravitational pressure within the Sun can’t be recreated.
When atomic nuclei do start to fuse, vast amounts of energy are released. While the experimental reactors currently in operation release that energy as heat, in a fusion reactor power plant, the heat would be used to produce steam that would drive turbines to generate electricity, even as some envision nuclear beyond electricity for industrial heat and fuels.
Tokamaks aren’t the only fusion reactors being tried. Another type of reactor uses lasers to heat and compress a hydrogen fuel to initiate fusion. In August 2021, one such device at the National Ignition Facility, at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, generated 1.35 megajoules of energy. This record-breaking figure brings fusion power a step closer to net energy gain, but most hopes are still pinned on tokamak reactors rather than lasers.
In June 2021, China’s Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST) reactor maintained a plasma for 101 seconds at 120,000,000°C. Before that, the record was 20 seconds. Ultimately, a fusion reactor would need to sustain the plasma indefinitely – or at least for eight-hour ‘pulses’ during periods of peak electricity demand.
A real game-changer for tokamaks has been the magnets used to produce the magnetic field. “We know how to make magnets that generate a very high magnetic field from copper or other kinds of metal, but you would pay a fortune for the electricity. It wouldn’t be a net energy gain from the plant,” says Luce.
One route for nuclear fusion is to use atoms of deuterium and tritium, both isotopes of hydrogen. They fuse under incredible heat and pressure, and the resulting products release energy as heat
The solution is to use high-temperature, superconducting magnets made from superconducting wire, or ‘tape’, that has no electrical resistance. These magnets can create intense magnetic fields and don’t lose energy as heat.
“High temperature superconductivity has been known about for 35 years. But the manufacturing capability to make tape in the lengths that would be required to make a reasonable fusion coil has just recently been developed,” says Luce. One of ITER’s magnets, the central solenoid, will produce a field of 13 tesla – 280,000 times Earth’s magnetic field.
The inner walls of ITER’s vacuum vessel, where the fusion will occur, will be lined with beryllium, a metal that won’t contaminate the plasma much if they touch. At the bottom is the divertor that will keep the temperature inside the reactor under control.
“The heat load on the divertor can be as large as in a rocket nozzle,” says Luce. “Rocket nozzles work because you can get into orbit within minutes and in space it’s really cold.” In a fusion reactor, a divertor would need to withstand this heat indefinitely and at ITER they’ll be testing one made out of tungsten.
Meanwhile, in the US, the National Spherical Torus Experiment – Upgrade (NSTX-U) fusion reactor will be fired up in the autumn of 2022, while efforts in advanced fission such as a mini-reactor design are also progressing. One of its priorities will be to see whether lining the reactor with lithium helps to keep the plasma stable.
Choosing a fuel Instead of just using deuterium as the fusion fuel, ITER will use deuterium mixed with tritium, another hydrogen isotope. The deuterium-tritium blend offers the best chance of getting significantly more power out than is put in. Proponents of fusion power say one reason the technology is safe is that the fuel needs to be constantly fed into the reactor to keep fusion happening, making a runaway reaction impossible.
Deuterium can be extracted from seawater, so there’s a virtually limitless supply of it. But only 20kg of tritium are thought to exist worldwide, so fusion power plants will have to produce it (ITER will develop technology to ‘breed’ tritium). While some radioactive waste will be produced in a fusion plant, it’ll have a lifetime of around 100 years, rather than the thousands of years from fission.
At the time of writing in September, researchers at the Joint European Torus (JET) fusion reactor in Oxfordshire were due to start their deuterium-tritium fusion reactions. “JET will help ITER prepare a choice of machine parameters to optimise the fusion power,” says Dr Joelle Mailloux, one of the scientific programme leaders at JET. These parameters will include finding the best combination of deuterium and tritium, and establishing how the current is increased in the magnets before fusion starts.
The groundwork laid down at JET should accelerate ITER’s efforts to accomplish net energy gain. ITER will produce ‘first plasma’ in December 2025 and be cranked up to full power over the following decade. Its plasma temperature will reach 150,000,000°C and its target is to produce 500 megawatts of fusion power for every 50 megawatts of input heating power.
“If ITER is successful, it’ll eliminate most, if not all, doubts about the science and liberate money for technology development,” says Luce. That technology development will be demonstration fusion power plants that actually produce electricity, where advanced reactors can build on decades of expertise. “ITER is opening the door and saying, yeah, this works – the science is there.”
California Renewable Energy Record highlights near-100% clean power as CAISO reports solar, wind, and storage meeting demand, with Interstate 10 arrays and distributed rooftop photovoltaics boosting the grid during Stagecoach, signaling progress toward 100%.
Key Points
CA Renewable Energy Record marks CAISO's peak when renewables nearly met total load, led by utility solar and storage.
✅ CAISO hit 99.87% renewables serving load at 2:50 p.m.
✅ Two-thirds of power came from utility-scale solar along I-10.
Renewable electricity met just shy of 100% of California's demand for the first time on Saturday, officials said, much of it from large amounts of solar power, part of a California solar boom, produced along Interstate 10, an hour east of the Coachella Valley.
While partygoers celebrated in the blazing sunshine at the Stagecoach music festival, "at 2:50 (p.m.), we reached 99.87 % of load served by all renewables, which broke the previous record," said Anna Gonzales, spokeswoman for California Independent System Operator, a nonprofit that oversees the state's bulk electric power system and transmission lines. Solar power provided two-thirds of the amount needed.
Environmentalists who've pushed for years for all of California's power to come from renewables and meet clean energy targets were jubilant as they watched the tracker edge to 100% and slightly beyond.
"California busts past 100% on this historic day for clean energy!" Dan Jacobson, senior adviser to Environment California, tweeted.
"Once it hit 100%, we were very excited," said Laura Deehan, executive director for Environment California. She said the organization and others have worked for 20 years to push the Golden State to complete renewable power via a series of ever tougher mandates, even as solar and wind curtailments increase across the grid. "California solar plants play a really big role."
But Gonzales said CAISO double-checked the data Monday and had to adjust it slightly because of reserves and other resource needs, an example of rising curtailments in the state.
Environment California pushed for 1 million solar rooftops statewide, which has been achieved, adding what some say is a more environmentally friendly form of solar power, though wildfire smoke can undermine gains, than the solar farms, which eat up large swaths of the Mojave desert and fragile landscapes.
Want more climate news? Sign up for Climate Point once a week in your inbox
What's everyone talking about? Sign up for our trending newsletter to get the latest news of the day
'Need to act with that same boldness':A record 10% of the world's power was generated by wind, solar methods in 2021
Deehan said in a statement that more needs to be done, especially at the federal level. "Despite incredible progress illustrated by the milestone this weekend, and the fact that U.S. renewable electricity surpassed coal in 2022, a baffling regulatory misstep by the Biden administration has advocates concerned about backsliding on California’s clean energy targets."
Deehan said a Department of Commerce inquiry into tariffs on imported solar panels is delaying thousands of megawatts of solar-storage projects in California, even as U.S. renewable energy hit a record 28% in April across the grid.
Still, Deehan said, “California has shown that, for one brief and shining moment, we could do it! It's time to move to 100% clean energy, 100% of the time.”
Yukon Electricity Demand Record underscores peak load growth as winter cold snaps drive heating, lighting, and EV charging, blending hydro, LNG, and diesel with renewable energy and planned grid-scale battery storage in Whitehorse.
Key Points
It is the territory's new peak electricity load, reflecting winter demand, electric heating, EVs, and mixed generation.
✅ New peak: 104.42 MW, surpassing 2020 record of 103.84 MW
✅ Winter peaks met with hydro, LNG, diesel, and renewables mix
✅ Customers urged to shift use off peak hours and use timers
A new record for electricity demand has been set in Yukon. The territory recorded a peak of 104.42 megawatts, according to a news release from Yukon Energy.
The new record is about a half a megawatt higher than the previous record of 103.84 megawatts recorded on Jan. 14, 2020.
While in general, over 90 per cent of the electricity generated in Yukon comes from renewable resources each year, with initiatives such as new wind turbines expanding capacity, during periods of high electricity use each winter, Yukon Energy has to use its hydro, liquefied natural gas and diesel resources to generate the electricity, the release says.
But when it comes to setting records, Andrew Hall, CEO of Yukon Energy, says it's not that unusual.
"Typically, during the winter, when the weather is cold, demand for electricity in the Yukon reaches its maximum. And that's because folks use more electricity for heating their homes, for cooking meals, there's more lighting demand, because the days are shorter," he said.
"It usually happens either in December or sometimes in January, when we get a cold snap."
He said generally over the years, electricity demand has grown.
"We get new home construction, construction of new apartment buildings. And typically, those new homes are all heated by electricity, maybe not all of them but the majority," Hall said.
Vuntut Gwitchin First Nation's solar farm now generating electricity In taking action on climate, this Arctic community wants to be a beacon to the world
Efforts to curb climate change add to electricity demand There are also other reasons, ones that are "in the name of climate change," Hall added.
That includes people trying to limit fossil fuel heating by swapping to electric heating. And, he said some Yukoners are switching to electric vehicles as incentives expand across the North.
"Over time, those two new demands, in the name of climate change, will also contribute to growing demand for electricity," he said.
While Yukon did reach this new all time high, Hall said the territory still hadn't hit the maximum capacity for the week, which was 118 megawatts, and discussions about a potential connection to the B.C. grid are part of long-term planning.
Yukon Energy's hydroelectric dam in Whitehorse. Yukon Energy's CEO, Andrew Hall, said demand of 104 megawatts wasn't unexpected, nor was it an emergency. The corporation has the ability to generate 118 megawatts. (Paul Tukker/CBC) Tips to curve demand "When we plan our system, we actually plan for a scenario, guided by the view that sustainability is key to the grid's future, where we actually lose our largest hydro generating facility," Hall said.
"We had plenty of generation available so it wasn't an emergency situation, and, even as other provinces face electricity shortages, it was more just an observation that hey, our peaks are growing."
He also said it was an opportunity to reach out to customers on ways to curve their demand for electricity around peak times, drawing on energy efficiency insights from other provinces, which is typically between 7 a.m. and 9 a.m., and between 5 p.m. and 7 p.m., Monday to Friday.
For example, he said, people should consider running major appliances, like dishwashers, during non-peak hours, such as in the afternoon rather than in the morning or evening.
During winter peaks, people can also use a block heater timer on vehicles and turn down the thermostat by one or two degrees.
'We plan for each winter' Hall said Yukon Energy is working to increase its peak output, including working on a large grid scale battery to be installed in Whitehorse, similar to Ontario's energy storage push now underway.
When it comes to any added load from people working from home due to COVID-19, Hall said they haven't noticed any identifiable increase there.
"Presumably, if someone's working from home, you know, their computer is at home, and they're not using the computer at the office," he said.
Yukon Energy one step closer to having largest battery storage site in the North He said there shouldn't be any concern for maxing out the capacity of electricity demand as Yukon moves into the colder winter months, since those days are forecast for.
"This number of 104 megawatts wasn't unexpected," he said, adding how much electricity is needed depends on the weather too.
