Wednesday, 29 July 2026

ExxonMobil has filed a notice of dispute under an energy treaty targeting the European Union's carbon capture and storage requirements, according to Inside Climate News.

The filing puts the company in conflict with an EU climate rule built around carbon capture and storage, a technology ExxonMobil has itself promoted as a way to address global warming, Inside Climate News reported.

Inside Climate News described the move as the oil company striking back against the rule through the corporate arbitration system.

Saudi Arabia and the US carried out joint attacks on Iranian-backed militias in southern Iraq, according to Semafor Net Zero. The militias had targeted Saudi oil facilities with drones.

Semafor Net Zero reported that this was the first time Riyadh has acknowledged direct involvement in the war.

Oil prices, which had fallen during the lull in fighting, jumped 3.7% after news of the missile attack, according to Semafor Net Zero.

The missile attack was a ballistic strike by Tehran on US forces in Jordan, described by Semafor Net Zero as a surprise and as the first assault since Friday.

Iran also rejected an Omani proposal to share transit routes through the Strait of Hormuz, Semafor Net Zero reported.

A lithium sulfate processing plant built at a cost of USD 400 million has begun full operations just outside Harare, Semafor Net Zero reported, giving Zimbabwe its first facility for converting mined lithium into a processed product.

The plant was opened by China's Prospect Lithium Zimbabwe (PLZ), according to Semafor Net Zero, which described the investment as part of efforts by African governments to capture more of the added value in mining industries.

The facility reached full operation months after the government froze exports of raw minerals, a step taken ahead of a complete ban next year, Semafor Net Zero reported.

Zimbabwe is Africa's leading producer of lithium, the outlet said, describing the metal as a key ingredient in rechargeable batteries for electric vehicles.

PLZ intends to go one step further along the value chain. The company is planning a local lithium carbonate plant, the next point in the processing sequence, according to Semafor Net Zero.

The FCC Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau added foreign-produced power inverters to its Covered List, halting equipment authorizations for unapproved foreign models with immediate effect on national security and hacking grounds, according to pv magazine.

To enforce the measure, the bureau applies the domestic end product test set out in the federal Buy American Standard, pv magazine reported. The test turns on the place of assembly rather than who owns the brand, which separates suppliers that engineer hardware in one country and build it in another.

Domestic manufacturers hold seven percent of the U.S. solar inverter market, per Department of Energy data cited by pv magazine, leaving a 93% share supplied from elsewhere.

Developers plan to bring more than 58,000 MW of new solar and storage onto the grid over the next year, pv magazine reported. Those projects need authorized inverters to convert direct current output and respond to grid signals, so the authorization channel now sits between queued capacity and the network.

An emergency Conditional Approval process run by the Department of Defense or the Department of Homeland Security is the single exemption route open to foreign-produced inverters, according to pv magazine.

The restriction cuts against an earlier federal technical review. A Department of Energy analysis from January 2026 examined 30 Chinese inverters and turned up no evidence of malicious hardware, and the bureau's action effectively overrides that finding, pv magazine reported. The Covered List addition proceeded on national security and hacking concerns.

Brand ownership offers no shelter under the assembly-based reading of the Buy American Standard, and the 93% of the market not served by domestic factories sits outside the authorization path unless the Department of Defense or the Department of Homeland Security grants Conditional Approval.

The International Seabed Authority extended a deep-sea mining exploration contract for a subsidiary of The Metals Company (TMC) at its council meeting in Kingston, Jamaica, held July 13 to 24, according to Mongabay. The same council session closed without finalizing the rules that commercial seabed mining requires.

The extension hands TMC's subsidiary NORI an additional five years to explore for minerals across its contracted areas in the Pacific, Mongabay reported. The council granted it despite the company pursuing exploration and exploitation permits for the same areas through a U.S. government agency.

That parallel track runs through the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Mongabay reported that TMC applied to NOAA in 2025 for exploration and exploitation permits covering many of the same areas in international waters already held under its ISA exploration contracts.

On the regulatory side, many issues remain unresolved and the council once again failed to complete the rulebook needed before commercial extraction can start. Work on the mining code dates to 2014, and the ISA has regularly missed its own deadlines to finish it, according to Mongabay.

A legal dispute over the ISA's scrutiny of the company also moved during the session. The International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea ruled on July 18 that the ISA could continue its inquiry into TMC, but must respect the due process rights of NORI and TOML, Mongabay reported.

Opposition to the industry is not confined to the council chamber. Forty-five countries have called for a moratorium or precautionary pause on deep-sea mining, according to Mongabay.

The gap between the contract extension and the missing code defines the current position: exploration rights keep rolling forward on a five-year clock while the exploitation rulebook, in draft for more than a decade, stays open.

The Trump administration has prohibited the import and domestic use of new power inverters manufactured outside the United States, according to Canary Media, which reported the measure was justified on national security grounds.

Inverters convert direct current output from solar panels and batteries into alternating current for the grid, making them a required component in nearly every utility-scale renewable and storage build.

Canary Media reported that the restriction could disrupt gigawatts' worth of planned solar, wind, and battery installations, and that those projects account for the vast majority of new capacity.

The scope of what counts as a "new" foreign-made inverter is the central question for developers weighing whether equipment already ordered or partially installed falls inside the ban, an ambiguity flagged in the Canary Media account.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has ruled out restricting supplies of vital resources as a retaliatory tool against tariffs, according to World Oil, arguing that Canada's standing as a dependable producer matters more.

The position was set out as Trump threatened import taxes of 50% on a range of Canadian-made goods should Carney's government fail to address trade complaints over autos, alcohol and dairy, World Oil reported. Trump has set a deadline of Aug. 19 before the new tariffs would take effect.

The products named in the latest threat are consumer and building goods rather than energy: milk, hockey equipment, beer and plywood, according to World Oil. Commodities bought in large quantities, including oil and potash, are not on the list.

That carve-out frames Carney's calculation. With crude outside the tariff perimeter, curbing barrels would be a discretionary escalation rather than a defensive response, and Carney has instead tied Canada's leverage to its reliability as a supplier.

The trade complaints cited by Trump sit in autos, alcohol and dairy, sectors that overlap directly with the goods flagged for the 50% rate, including milk and beer.