Thursday, 13 August 2026

Three Mireo Plus H hydrogen trains will start regular passenger service on a non-electrified line in Bavaria in December, according to Hydrogen Fuel News. The rollout is a joint deployment by Südostbayernbahn and Siemens Mobility.

The report describes the three sets as two-car units, each replacing diesel multiple units currently working the Mühldorf-Burghausen route from December.

Hydrogen Fuel News characterised the deployment as pioneering zero-emission regional service on the line.

Two Letters of Award from Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Limited (ONGC) have gone to Shearwater Geoservices for large offshore 3D seismic surveys in India, according to Offshore Engineer OEDigital.

The East coast work runs six months. A separate campaign off India's West coast is set at nine months. Together the two awards represent roughly 15 vessel months of backlog for the contractor, OEDigital reported.

Work on both surveys is due to begin in the opening weeks of the fourth quarter of 2026. Neither award has reached contract signature yet: the projects sit at Letter of Award stage, and OEDigital reported that execution of the final contracts is anticipated in the third quarter.

Shearwater chief executive Irene Waage Basili pointed to the company's record in the country, saying it has "built a strong position in India with continuous presence since 2016".

China has published a five-year plan devoted specifically to climate change, according to CleanTechnica.

The document, the 15th five-year plan for a national response to climate change, sets out climate and energy targets for the 2026-2030 period, CleanTechnica reported. It follows a series of earlier plans that laid out in-depth targets across the same policy areas.

Chevrolet is pulling out of China after 21 years of selling vehicles there, according to CleanTechnica.

The US-based automaker's decision comes after what CleanTechnica described as a steep fall in sales and an erosion of the brand's competitiveness in the Chinese market.

CleanTechnica characterized the position as one in which Chevrolet had become uncompetitive to the point that departure was the conclusion the automaker reached.

Criticality benchmarks for shipping high-assay low-enriched uranium sit on the licensing path for advanced reactor startup, and the federal program producing them is funded through the Inflation Reduction Act, according to Neutron Bytes.

That program, the DOE/NRC Criticality Safety for Commercial-Scale HALEU for Fuel Cycle and Transportation program, or DNCSH, exists to publish criticality benchmarks so the NRC can license commercial-scale HALEU facilities and transport packages with confidence, Neutron Bytes reported.

Its opening round came in August 2024 and directed USD 17 million to 16 national lab-led projects, each aimed at the data gaps that matter for transport, according to Neutron Bytes.

HALEU is defined as uranium enriched above 5% and up to just under 20% U-235. That threshold matters for what a shipment is and how it must be packaged, and it separates the advanced reactor fuel supply question from conventional light-water fuel.

One prototype already moved without crossing that line. Deployable Energy's Unity prototype microreactor runs on uranium oxide fuel enriched to 4.95% U-235, below the HALEU band, and Neutron Bytes reported that the fuel traveled separately from the reactor itself. Loading happened on site, only after the reactor was in place and checked out.

The sequencing is a practical detail with regulatory weight: a reactor shipped unfueled is a different transport problem from a reactor shipped loaded, and fuel moved on its own falls under package licensing rules that the DNCSH benchmarks are meant to underpin.

Australia's Tomago aluminium smelter will not run on 100 percent renewable supply until 2033, according to RenewEconomy.

The timeline puts full renewable coverage for the smelter years out, on the date reported by the specialist outlet.

Squadron and other parties want the smelter's future power needs covered by multiple supply deals rather than a single arrangement, RenewEconomy reported.

DNO reported record second quarter revenue of USD 761 million, up 21 percent quarter-on-quarter, according to the company's results statement carried by GlobeNewswire. Operating profit rose 55 percent quarter-on-quarter to USD 439 million.

Net profit climbed 65 percent to USD 83 million over the same period, the company said.

Net production averaged 88,400 barrels of oil equivalent per day during the quarter. DNO also lifted its 2026 North Sea production guidance to 85,000 boepd, 3,000 boepd above the projection it set at the start of the year.

The Board approved a quarterly dividend of NOK 0.375 per share, payable in September 2026. That keeps the payout at the same level as the previous four quarters.

On the acquisition front, DNO announced a possible offer for Genel Energy plc at 69 pence per share. The indicative price is a 38 percent premium to Genel's closing price on 6 August 2026, per the DNO statement.

DNO said it halted production and drilling on its operated Tawke license in Kurdistan as a precautionary safety measure following U.S.-Israeli air strikes against Iran in late February.

Mauritius, Mozambique and the Republic of the Congo declared support for a precautionary pause on deep-seabed mining at the annual meeting of the International Seabed Authority (ISA) in Kingston, Jamaica, in July, according to Mongabay. Their announcements bring the number of African countries backing a pause to six.

The three joined Malawi, Kenya and Madagascar. Malawi was the first African country to endorse a precautionary pause, in May 2026, with Kenya and Madagascar following in June, Mongabay reported.

Globally, the six African states sit within a group of 46 countries supporting either a moratorium or a precautionary pause on extraction of minerals from the seabed, according to Mongabay.

The position matters inside the ISA's own decision-making structure. Kenya, which backs a moratorium, was allocated a seat for the first time on the 36-member ISA Council during the two-week meeting, the body where rules governing deep-seabed mining exploitation are negotiated. Africa holds 10 seats on that council, giving the continent a strong voice in shaping the rules, according to the Deep Sea Conservation Coalition.

Battery storage on the US power grid reached nearly 52 GW of nameplate capacity by mid-2026, after developers commissioned 8.3 GW in the first six months of the year, according to pv magazine.

The grid had closed 2025 with 43.6 GW of operational battery capacity, pv magazine reported. Averaged across the last three years, utility-scale battery capacity has expanded at 70% annually, according to the latest Preliminary Monthly Electric Generator Inventory report from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) cited by pv magazine. The EIA report attributes that pace to rapid utility-scale solar deployment and wholesale price arbitrage.

Project developers have told the EIA they plan to connect a further 54 GW over the next two and a half years, pv magazine reported. The pipeline splits into 14 GW scheduled for the second half of 2026, 26 GW for 2027, and 14 GW for 2028. On that schedule, national operational storage capacity is expected to pass 105 GW by the end of 2028, according to pv magazine.

Texas carries a large share of the build. The ERCOT territory battery fleet is projected to grow from 15 GW in 2025 to 37 GW by the end of 2027, pv magazine reported, to manage surging solar generation in the state.

The near-term concentration is visible in the numbers: the 26 GW slated for 2027 alone is roughly half the 52 GW installed base reported for mid-2026. The 14 GW planned for the second half of this year would also exceed the 8.3 GW added in the first half.

Myanmar's military government has stepped up efforts since June to restart the China-backed Myitsone Dam, a hydropower scheme that has sat suspended for 15 years, according to Mongabay.

The push became public at a June 30 press conference in Naypyidaw, where junta spokesperson Khaing Khaing Soe said the Myitsone project would be resumed to generate electricity for Myanmar, Mongabay reported.

The scheme dates to 2009, when it was estimated to cost USD 3.6 billion, per Mongabay. It was planned along the Mali and N'mai Rivers in Kachin state, northern Myanmar.

Mongabay reported the dam was designed to run 1,310 meters long and stand 139.6 meters high.

Construction stopped in 2011, when then-President Thein Sein suspended the project following widespread public opposition over its environmental and social impacts, according to Mongabay. That suspension has now run for 15 years.

On timing, Kachin state chief minister Khet Htein Nan said the project could be completed within 8.5 years if construction begins this year, Mongabay reported.

The head of the junta's Myitsone Project Implementation Committee said authorities held 38 meetings with local communities about the project between January and the end of July 2026, according to Mongabay.

Iran is responding to an oil spill off Qeshm Island in the Persian Gulf, according to World Oil, which said the incident underscores the environmental risks of attacks on tankers in the waterway.

Satellite images show a dark, elongated trail in the water off the coastal village of Shib Deraz, with black deposits visible on the beaches, World Oil reported. The semi-official Iranian Students' News Agency reported that a cleanup was underway, using absorbent sheets to contain and collect the pollution.

The cause has not been established. TankerTrackers.com suggested in a post on X that the slick resulted from an Iranian attack on a bulk carrier earlier this month. Qeshm itself has repeatedly been hit by U.S. airstrikes during the conflict.

The International Maritime Organization, which keeps a tally of damage to ships, counts 65 confirmed incidents in the Strait of Hormuz and across the Middle East since the beginning of March. That figure sets the backdrop for a shipping corridor where hull damage now translates directly into coastal pollution.

Iran is not the only Gulf state cleaning oil off its shoreline. Oman is dealing with a separate slick near its southeastern coast after a tanker ran aground, according to World Oil.

A framework agreement covering the first-of-a-kind deployment of an ARC-100 small modular reactor at Idaho National Laboratory has been signed by ARC Clean Technology, World Nuclear News reported.

The deal runs multi-year and was struck with Battelle Energy Alliance, the contractor that manages and operates the laboratory. ARC Clean Technology also holds an award under the Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program run by the US Department of Energy, which supports faster development of advanced SMRs.

The ARC-100 is a sodium-cooled fast reactor rated at 100 MWe, which World Nuclear News describes as designed for "safe, flexible, and economical operation".

Its lineage runs through the Experimental Breeder Reactor-II, an integral sodium-cooled fast reactor prototype. That unit started up at Argonne National Laboratory in 1961 and was shut down for good in 1994.

Irfan Ali, President and Chief Strategy Officer at ARC Clean Technology, tied the deal to the company's work on advanced nuclear, calling it a step in bringing that technology to market.

Commissioning of the demonstration unit at Point Lepreau was being targeted for 2029, subject to approvals and licensing, according to World Nuclear News.

A project in Victoria, Texas, will deploy GE Vernova 7HA.02 gas turbines alongside GVH BWRX-300 small modular reactors (SMRs), subject to a final investment decision in 2027, according to the GE Vernova Newsroom.

The agreement announced by the GE Vernova Newsroom advances engineering design, licensing and safety analysis for the site.

On the reactor side, the GE Vernova Newsroom said the first BWRX-300 is under construction at Ontario Power Generation's Darlington site in Canada, with completion expected by the end of the decade. That unit will be the first grid-scale SMR in the Western world, according to the same release.

Federal regulators have cleared a path for virtual power plants to serve rising electricity demand in PJM, described by Canary Media as the biggest energy market in the country.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission ordered PJM Interconnection to treat statistical sampling as a valid method for measuring the reliability of programs, according to Canary Media.

Measurement method is the pivot. Aggregators that pool thousands of distributed devices, from home batteries to smart thermostats, have argued that verifying performance device by device is impractical at scale. Sampling lets an aggregator measure a representative subset and extrapolate across the fleet, and the FERC order requires PJM to recognize that approach.

The ruling applies to demand-side resources competing in a market that Canary Media identifies as the largest in the country, where load growth has become the central planning question for grid operators.

Canary Media reported the decision as a win for virtual power plants in PJM.

BW ESS has bought the ready-to-build Yanco battery energy storage system in the Riverina region of New South Wales from ACEnergy, a 250 MW / 1,000 MWh project the Swiss owner-operator plans to bring into operation by 2028, according to ESS News.

Construction is set to start in late 2026, ESS News reported, following the transfer of the project from the Melbourne-headquartered developer ACEnergy.

Before the sale, ACEnergy locked in the delivery chain. It appointed China-headquartered CATL as system integrator and the Australian engineering, procurement and construction firm ACLE Services as Balance of Plant contractor, ESS News said.

Yanco lifts BW ESS's Australian holdings, held wholly or jointly, to 1.3 GWh in commissioning and 1 GWh entering construction, alongside a greenfield pipeline of roughly 2 GW, per ESS News.

Separately, Edify Energy reached financial close on the co-located Ganymirra and Majors Creek hybrid projects in north Queensland, which together will supply 360 MWp of solar and 1,200 MWh of lithium-ion battery storage, ESS News reported.

The financing pool behind Edify's Queensland build-out runs wider than those two assets. Fourteen domestic and international lenders have committed AUD 3.2 billion, or USD 2.25 billion, across a group that also takes in the 720 MWp / 2,400 MWh Smoky Creek and Guthrie's Gap projects, which closed in May 2026, according to ESS News.

Both Edify projects are backed by Australia's Capacity Investment Scheme and are due to be operational in 2028, ESS News said, putting them on the same commissioning year as Yanco.

The UK Department for Energy Security and Net Zero updated its Renewables Obligation certificates and generation tables on 13 August 2026, according to the department's Energy Trends: UK renewables release.

The publication covers the renewables sector, with data on capacity, electricity generation and liquid biofuels consumption, per DESNZ.

DESNZ states that the Renewables Obligation monthly data runs three months in arrears, and that the monthly table appears on the second Thursday of each month. That schedule means the certificates figures released alongside a given update describe generation from an earlier reporting period rather than the month of publication.

The Renewables Obligation issues certificates to accredited generators for eligible renewable output, and the monthly table pairs those certificate counts with generation data.

AI tools deployed by oil and gas companies add between 0.47 and 1.8 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide to global emissions annually, according to a study by former Microsoft employees published in Nature and reported by Inside Climate News. The study put that range at 1.2 to 4.8 percent of global energy-related emissions in 2024.

The upper end of that estimate is as much as 13 times the emissions the International Energy Agency attributed to data centers in 2025, according to Inside Climate News. The comparison reframes the climate debate around AI: the electricity drawn by the models is smaller than the fossil output the models help unlock.

The production mechanism is quantified. Consultancy Wood Mackenzie estimates that oil and gas companies using AI tools could reach an additional 470 billion barrels of oil in fields already in production.

Speed is one route to those barrels. Boston Consulting Group said processing 3D seismic data once took a year, and that AI can compress it to roughly two weeks.

The corporate accounting sits awkwardly beside the study's authorship. Microsoft reported in 2025 that it matched all of its global electricity consumption with renewable energy. That matching covers the company's own power draw, not the downstream emissions from customers using its tools to lift more hydrocarbons, which is the category the Nature study measures.

The study's framing places AI-enabled upstream production, rather than model training and inference load, as the dominant climate exposure in the sector, on the figures Inside Climate News reported.

Scatec has brought online the final 564 MW phase of its Obelisk solar-plus-storage development near Nagaa Hammadi in Upper Egypt, completing what the company describes as Africa's largest project of its kind, according to ESS News.

The hybrid plant pairs 1.1 GW of solar photovoltaic capacity with a 100 MW / 200 MWh battery energy storage system, ESS News reported.

Scatec said Obelisk will generate more than 3,000 GWh of clean electricity a year and reduce emissions by over 1.2 million tonnes annually. Output is contracted to the Egyptian Electricity Transmission Company (EETC) under a 25-year power purchase agreement.

The capital structure leans heavily on development finance. Total project cost is around USD 590 million, of which USD 479 million came as senior debt from a consortium comprising the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), the African Development Bank (AfDB), British International Investment (BII) and the European Investment Bank (EIB), according to ESS News. That leaves more than 80% of the cost classified as non-recourse debt.

"Reaching full commercial operations at Obelisk marks a defining milestone for Scatec," said Scatec CEO Terje Pilskog. He said the project demonstrates the company's ability to develop, finance and deliver large-scale renewable projects in emerging markets, and called it a tangible contribution to Egypt's energy security.

Obelisk lifts Scatec's operational solar fleet in Egypt to roughly 1.5 GW, joining its existing 380 MW BenBan portfolio, ESS News reported.

The plant feeds into Egypt's national goal of sourcing 42% of its electricity from renewables by 2030, rising to 60% by 2040.

Norwegian oil and gas companies have raised their planned 2026 spending to 275 billion Norwegian crowns, up from the 266 billion crowns they projected in May, according to a survey by the statistics office SSB reported by Offshore Engineer OEDigital.

The survey also lifted the outlook for the following year. Investments are expected to fall to 227 billion crowns, but that is above the 207 billion crowns previously indicated, as a wave of major offshore developments approaches completion and starts production, OEDigital reported.

SSB attributed the upward revision for 2027 primarily to higher cost estimates in production drilling, particularly at operating fields, and also in field development.

Norway produces more than 4 million barrels of oil equivalent per day, split almost equally between crude and natural gas, according to the same report.

A four-hour battery in Sicily and Sardinia will be rated at 31% in Italy's 2028 Capacity Market auction, down from 67% in the previous auction, according to ESS News. The change follows an August 6 decree by Italy's Ministry of the Environment and Energy Security (MASE).

The decree sets battery rating coefficients that differ by zone for the first time in the Capacity Market, with northern zones favoured, ESS News reported. The stated aim is to provide more locational development signals.

The final figure for the two island zones landed well below the level floated earlier in the process. ESS News reported that 31% is much lower than the 51% proposed during the consultation phase.

For developers holding four-hour projects in Sicily and Sardinia, the arithmetic is direct: the final values imply battery remuneration 50% lower than in the previous auction, according to ESS News.

The localised approach means developers must re-evaluate project pipelines and expected returns across the country, ESS News reported.

Finland brought 478 MW of utility-scale solar capacity online in the first half of 2026, according to figures from Renewables Finland cited by pv magazine. The addition more than doubled the country's cumulative large-scale solar fleet, which now stands at 842 MW across 45 operational PV farms larger than 1 MW.

Eight new solar plants entered production so far this year, pv magazine reported. The largest is the Kalanti solar park at 204 MW, the biggest operational PV site in Finland to date.

Solar remains a small share of Finnish renewable capacity. Total renewables capacity passed 10 GW during the first half, with wind power at 9,535 MW, according to the same figures.

The pipeline continues into the second half. One 100 MW solar park is expected to start electricity production by the end of the year, with a few smaller projects under construction and expected to be ready at some point during 2027, according to the comments carried by pv magazine.

The near-term additions sit well below what researchers see as the country's technical ceiling. Research from LUT University found Finland has the potential to build out up to 68 GW of PV capacity by 2050.

Australia's plug-in vehicle penetration rate regressed slightly in July 2026, ending three months of slow but steady gains, according to CleanTechnica.

The specialist outlet put the Australian car market at almost 108,000 vehicles for the month.

CleanTechnica characterised the preceding stretch as slow but steady progress in the plug-in share, making July the break in that run rather than a reversal of trend on its own.

General Motors and LG Energy Solution will restart battery cell output at their Ultium Cells joint venture plant in Ohio after a pause of around seven months, electrive reported.

Production at the site in north-eastern Ohio resumes next Monday, and around 1,400 people are expected to work there again, according to Reuters as cited by electrive. Most of the temporarily laid-off workers are set to return.

The partners stopped cell production at the plant in January 2026, citing declining demand for EVs. Demand expectations weakened after the US tax credit of USD 7,500 for new EVs ended in September 2025.

The restart lands alongside a shift in LG Energy Solution's product mix toward stationary storage. The company plans to lift its global production capacity for energy storage systems to more than 60 GWh by 2026, with more than 80% of that capacity in North America, per electrive.

GM's own battery joint venture footprint is narrowing at the same time. Samsung SDI acquired GM's stake in the joint venture for a battery cell factory still under construction in Indiana earlier this week, Reuters reported.

Japan's Renewable Energy Foundation has rejected a proposed 30% maximum shading rate for agrivoltaic installations, arguing the limit is contradicted by real-world sites where panel shade has helped produce high-quality crops, according to pv magazine.

The Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries is taking public comments on the proposal until August 22, with implementation planned before the end of September, pv magazine reported.

Shading is not the only screen applied to farm-mounted solar. Updated guidelines give authorities the power to refuse approval where crop yields fall by 20% or more, where agricultural activity is neglected, or where panel height and spacing block farm machinery, according to pv magazine.

The rule change lands in a market that has already crossed a symbolic threshold. Japan's cumulative solar capacity likely passed 100 GW by the end of last year, with roughly 5.8 GW added in 2025, pv magazine reported.

Limes Renewable Energy has secured Ready-to-Build (RTB) status for Huañil, a 200 MW / 1,000 MWh standalone battery project in the Coquimbo region of Chile, ESS News reported. It is the Italian developer's first RTB asset in Chile and its first anywhere outside Italy.

The lithium-ion installation is sized to deliver 200 MW of continuous output for up to five hours, at an estimated investment of approximately USD 188 million, according to ESS News.

Huañil is designed as a standalone storage asset rather than a generation hybrid. It will draw and store electricity from Chile's National Electric System (SEN), providing up to 1,000 MWh of capacity, per the ESS News report.

The developer's maturing Chilean portfolio extends beyond the single site. ESS News put that pipeline at roughly 180 MWp of solar PV and 620 MW of battery capacity.

Counting both markets, Limes' fully authorized and RTB pipeline across Chile and Italy now exceeds 600 MW, according to the same report. That total sets the RTB milestone in Coquimbo against the company's stated push into markets outside its home country.

Fraunhofer EMI has built an X-ray technology that shows dynamic processes inside large-format prismatic battery cells in real time, and one such system is set for installation at PowerCo's Salzgitter site in 2028, according to electrive.

The setup records up to 1,000 images per second, electrive reported, exposing gas formation, material displacement and crack propagation inside the cell at extremely high resolution.

That frame rate is the point of the instrument. Failure inside a prismatic cell happens faster than conventional inspection can follow, and the Fraunhofer EMI method is aimed at capturing it while it unfolds rather than after the fact.

The institute said it has already characterised material ejection during thermal runaway, along with propagation behaviour in multi-cell setups, for several German car manufacturers including VW and Audi.

PowerCo, founded by Volkswagen Group in 2022, is based in Salzgitter and is building three cell factories with a combined capacity of up to 200 GWh per year, according to electrive: Salzgitter in Germany, Valencia in Spain and St. Thomas in Canada.

The Salzgitter installation therefore lands inside the group's own cell manufacturing base rather than in a standalone laboratory, placing the imaging capability at the same address as the company's headquarters and its first plant.

Fire crews in the UK attended 212 blazes involving photovoltaic installations during 2025, against 91 in 2022, an increase QBE puts at 133%. The insurer's findings were reported by pv magazine.

The fleet behind those callouts is expanding. QBE counted roughly 1.93 million photovoltaic systems running in the UK in 2025, with the tally crossing just over 2 million as of June 2026.

Modules are not where QBE locates the problem. The cause often sits in "faulty cable connections, connectors, or other electrical components" rather than the panels, said Tobias Mehl, risk manager at QBE Germany. Mehl's assessment points to direct-current wiring and plug connections as the recurring failure point.

QBE also logged battery incidents on a different scale: 1,760 lithium-ion fires handled by UK fire services in 2025. E-bikes accounted for 520 of those callouts, electric cars for 279 and e-scooters for 182.

Seatrium Limited has signed a Letter of Intent with Golar LNG Limited covering a potential third floating liquefied natural gas conversion, with Seatrium carrying out the work for Golar, according to Offshore Engineer OEDigital.

The two companies plan to run technical design development and project definition work together, targeting a signed Engineering, Procurement and Construction contract in the second half of 2026. The LOI itself commits only to advancing the project, not to building it.

The pairing has two completed conversions behind it. Offshore Engineer OEDigital reported that Seatrium delivered FLNG Hilli Episeyo, rated at 2.4 mtpa, in 2017, followed by FLNG Gimi at 2.7 mtpa in 2023.

Hilli is heading back to the yard. Golar chief technology officer Morten Skjong said the vessel is "on its way to Seatrium for vessel upgrades ahead of its 20-year charter in Argentina," and that the LOI is intended to widen the FLNG collaboration further.

The 20-year charter term sets the commercial frame for that upgrade scope, and the sequencing matters: Seatrium takes on upgrade work on an existing unit while defining the engineering package for a third conversion in parallel.

The capacity step between the two delivered units, from 2.4 mtpa to 2.7 mtpa, is the only published guide to how the pair have scaled the design between projects. Whether the third unit follows that trajectory depends on the design development stage now beginning.

North Korea launched a missile into the sea for the second time in a week, ahead of US-South Korean military exercises that Pyongyang describes as a rehearsal for invasion, according to Semafor Net Zero.

The same Semafor report set that launch alongside two other regional disputes. Taiwan attacked planned joint naval exercises by Chinese and Indonesian forces off its coast, calling them "wilful and irresponsible."

Japan, separately, criticized Russian President Vladimir Putin over his visit to the Kuril Islands, a trip that took in one island Tokyo claims as its own.

The energy link runs through the Gulf. The Diplomat argued that friction across East Asia has been exacerbated by the war in the Middle East, with regional nations heavily reliant on Gulf energy imports now facing what it called "hard choices they have long deferred."

The missile launch was the second inside a week, per Semafor, and was timed to the imminent US-South Korean drills.

Taiwan's objection concerns exercises staged off the coast of the self-ruled island by two navies operating together. Japan's complaint centers on a territorial claim rather than a military manoeuvre.

Trina Solar has introduced a line of typhoon-resistant photovoltaic (PV) modules carrying mechanical load ratings of up to 8,000 Pa, aimed at solar projects in areas exposed to extreme winds, according to pv magazine.

The standard version of the product is built to take a rear-side mechanical load of 4,500 Pa, against 2,400 Pa for conventional modules, pv magazine reported. Rear-side loading is the pressure regime that governs uplift during high-wind events, when suction rather than downward force tends to strip modules from their mounting rails.

The top configuration, branded MAX, is derived from Trina's Vertex N Shield module. Trina lists a static mechanical load capability above 8,000 Pa for that version, with a reworked frame delivering 30% higher downward and 67% higher upward load capacity, per pv magazine.

The frame itself is 10% wider and 11% thicker, a change Trina attributes to improved load transfer into the supporting structure, according to pv magazine. Heavier extrusion adds mass per module, which shifts the balance of racking and foundation design on wind-exposed sites.

Mounting hardware has been reworked alongside the frame. Trina claims that its patented slot-based, self-locking clamp design can cut installation time by about 25%, pv magazine reported. Labour hours per megawatt are a live cost line for developers in coastal and island markets, where crews often work around narrow weather windows.

Hail resistance is specified separately. Trina's official product data states that the Vertex N Shield can withstand 75 mm hailstones at a 60-degree tilt, according to pv magazine. Steeper tilt angles reduce the effective impact energy on the glass by lowering the angle of incidence, so tilt is a material qualifier on any hail rating.

Standard utility-scale modules are typically certified well below the 4,500 Pa rear-side figure Trina cites for its base typhoon product, and the gap against the 2,400 Pa conventional benchmark is the commercial argument the company is making. For projects in typhoon corridors, the question is whether the added frame material and the higher load rating offset the price premium over a conventional module plus reinforced racking.

The 30% and 67% capacity uplifts on the MAX frame point at asymmetric engineering: uplift capacity has been raised more than twice as much as downward capacity. That prioritisation is consistent with a design brief written around wind suction rather than snow load, and it separates this product from the reinforced modules marketed for high-snow regions, where downward loading dominates.

A total of 368 utility-scale power plants entered service in the United States between January and June, according to U.S. Energy Information Administration data cited by Inside Climate News.

The largest additions were wind. SunZia Wind South and SunZia Wind North in New Mexico came online this spring with a combined generating capacity of 3,650 megawatts, making them the largest wind farms in the country, Inside Climate News reported.

Natural gas also features on the list. Trumbull Energy Center in Ohio is a 900-megawatt combined-cycle plant, and Inside Climate News described it as part of an expansion of natural gas power in the PJM Interconnection grid region.

Hybrid projects pairing generation with storage rank high as well. Green River Energy Center in Utah is the fifth-largest new plant at 800 megawatts, split evenly between 400 megawatts of solar and 400 megawatts of batteries, according to Inside Climate News.

Ford's Fathom electric pickup will start at $28,350 when it reaches buyers in early 2027, according to Electrek. Ford said the truck is on track to enter production at its Louisville Assembly plant in Q1 2027.

The plant is being retooled under a $5 billion investment that Ford says will create 4,000 new jobs and fund equipment for the UEV platform, per Electrek.

The production changes are aggressive on part count. Electrek reported that the UEV method cuts the number of parts from 146 needed to build the current Maverick down to two for the Fathom. Ford said the UEV Production System will let it assemble the Fathom 40% faster than current vehicles at the plant.

Wiring is one of the places where the redesign shows up on the line. Ford's Bryce Currie said the Fathom's wiring harness is more than 4,000 feet shorter and 22 pounds lighter than the harness in the company's first-generation electric SUV, making it much easier to install, according to Electrek.

On software, the Fathom will be the first vehicle with Apple Maps integrated directly into the navigation system, Electrek reported.

ForeFront Power has completed its first Erthos solar energy system, built for the city of Fresno, California's Northeast Surface Water Treatment Plant, officials told Solar Builder. The array reached full commercial operation status in March 2026.

As of Aug. 13, the system had delivered about 862 MWh to the city of Fresno, according to Solar Builder. ForeFront officials said the project has "consistently outperformed expectations" since commercial operation began.

The Erthos design places panels on the ground rather than on racking. Solar Builder reported that the panels can follow contours of up to a 15% slope, which let the installation adapt to the natural landscape in Fresno.

ForeFront, a commercial and industrial solar project developer, says it first approached Erthos in 2023, citing a combination of inflation and supply chain pressures.

The two companies signed an Energy Service Agreement after the project was finished, under which Erthos takes responsibility for maintaining the system. That work includes regular panel cleaning using the ErthBot PV solar array cleaner, the companies said.

The UK Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) has opened a consultation on legislative amendments to the Contracts for Difference (CfD) supplier obligation, intended to enable implementation of the British Industrial Competitiveness Scheme (BICS).

According to DESNZ, the consultation seeks views on proposed changes to the supplier obligation, the mechanism through which electricity suppliers fund CfD payments.

The consultation applies to England, Scotland and Wales and closes at 11:59pm on 9 September 2026, DESNZ said.

Menzies Distribution Solutions has begun running three 42-tonne Scania battery-electric trucks commercially in the UK, according to electrive. They are the first of ten battery-electric heavy goods vehicles the logistics operator plans to field through the eFREIGHT 2030 project under the UK government's Zero Emission HGV and Infrastructure Demonstrator (ZEHID) programme.

The remaining seven vehicles in the ten-truck deployment will include models from DAF and Renault Trucks, electrive reported.

Each Scania pairs the manufacturer's S-series sleeper cab with a 450 kW electric powertrain. MDS expects each truck to cover around 250 miles per shift, and will initially assign them to packaging and other relatively lightweight loads, according to electrive.

To support that duty cycle, MDS has invested in on-site charging at Wakefield rated for 1 MW charging capability. The operator plans to charge the trucks twice during each 24-hour operating cycle, electrive reported.

Voltempo leads eFREIGHT 2030 and acts as its charging infrastructure partner. It supported MDS on technical requirements, the grid connection and engagement with the local distribution network operator, according to electrive.

Hybrid cars are now the hottest segment on the new car market worldwide, according to a new Bloomberg report cited by CleanTechnica.

The technology behind that shift is not new. CleanTechnica describes hybrid drivetrains as a 30 year old technology, made popular by the Toyota Prius.

The Bloomberg claim, as relayed by CleanTechnica, is framed as a worldwide market observation rather than one confined to a single region.

The Junta de Castilla y León has opened public review for two renewable hydrogen electrolysis projects in Soria with combined capacity above 760 MW, according to Hydrogen Fuel News.

The larger of the pair is DH2 Energy's 460 MW facility at Los Rábanos, Hydrogen Fuel News reported.

Alkeymia Energy accounts for the remainder with a 300 MW plant at Almazán, per the same report.

Both sit in a province that already hosts electrolysis capacity, though on a far smaller scale: the 2.5 MW H2Duero plant at Garray, according to Hydrogen Fuel News. The two projects under review together would add more than 300 times that capacity.

U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright said the Department of Energy will not proceed with designating three proposed National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors (NIETCs) that had been selected in December 2024 to advance through the review process, according to a Department of Energy announcement.

The three dropped corridors are the Lake Erie-Canada Corridor, the Southwestern Grid Connector Corridor, and the Tribal Energy Access Corridor, the department said.

Wright attributed the decision to the outcome of the department's own review. Extensive review, including public feedback and stakeholder input, made clear that the current designation process for the three proposed transmission corridors should not continue, the secretary said.

NIETC designation is the federal mechanism through which the Department of Energy identifies geographic areas where transmission constraints or congestion warrant expedited treatment. The three corridors had cleared an earlier stage of that process before the cancellation.

The UK government has published its response to a call for evidence on Hydrogen to Power and interconnectors in the Capacity Market, confirming changes to how interconnector de-rating factors are calculated.

The revised methodology will be implemented ahead of Capacity Market Prequalification 2026, according to the published update. The same document sets out the government's continuing approach to enabling Hydrogen to Power participation in the scheme.

The response summarises stakeholder feedback and sets out next steps for policy development within the Capacity Market. The underlying call for evidence ran from 2 October 2025 to 27 November 2025.

On 13 August 2026, the government updated the technical adjustment methodology document to clarify the datasets that were in place when the interconnector de-rating factors were calculated.

De-rating factors determine how much capacity an interconnector can sell into the Capacity Market auction, so the calculation method directly shapes the volume of cross-border capacity that qualifies. Prequalification is the stage at which units establish eligibility before bidding, which is why the timing of the methodology change matters for participants preparing submissions.

China's new energy vehicle exports reached 553,000 units in July, up 145 per cent year-on-year, while domestic NEV sales fell 2.8 per cent to 1,008,000 units, according to electrive.

The split widened across all powertrains. electrive reported that exports of passenger cars of every type climbed 81 per cent year-on-year to 1.043 million vehicles in July, against domestic sales of 1.541 million units, down 23.6 per cent.

Combustion-engine models carried the sharpest domestic decline, falling 45.7 per cent year-on-year, per electrive.

Factory output kept expanding despite the softer home market. NEV production hit 1.576 million units in July, a rise of 26.8 per cent from a year earlier, according to electrive.

Over the first seven months of the year, Chinese plants turned out 9.014 million NEVs, close to 10 per cent above the same period a year earlier, electrive reported.

The July production figure of 1.576 million NEVs exceeded the combined total of domestic NEV sales and NEV exports for the month, which stood at 1,008,000 and 553,000 units respectively.

Leapmotor has entered Indonesia with two SUVs launched at once, the B10 and the C10, both offered as locally assembled models from the first day of sales, according to electrive.

Assembly runs through PT National Assemblers, a subsidiary of Indomobil Group, which builds both vehicles from imported knocked-down kits at a plant in Purwakarta, West Java, electrive reported. Sales and after-sales fall to PT Indomobil National Distributor, another Indomobil Group subsidiary appointed as Leapmotor's local distributor.

Pricing sits at 499 million Indonesian rupiah (EUR 24,225) for the B10 in a single trim, according to electrive. The larger C10 is listed at 618 million Indonesian rupiah (EUR 30,002), also in one trim and one drivetrain variant.

The B10 uses a rear-mounted motor rated at 160 kW paired with a 67.1 kWh lithium iron phosphate battery, giving a range of 516 kilometres on the NEDC cycle, electrive reported. The C10 carries a 165 kW rear motor and a 69.9 kWh LFP pack, with an NEDC range of 478 km. The heavier, longer-range-on-paper split between the two models is therefore a function of pack size against vehicle class rather than a difference in battery chemistry.

Indonesia becomes Leapmotor's fourth market in the ASEAN region, after Malaysia, Thailand and Singapore, according to electrive. The company's year-to-date sales stood at 457,754 units at the end of July, an increase of 68.42% year-on-year.

Several charging network operators in Hungary have temporarily restricted their services because of high nationwide strain on the power grid, electrive reported.

One cause sits on the Danube. Hungary's only nuclear power plant, at Paks, is running at a fraction of its capacity because it lacks cooling water from the river, according to electrive.

MOL has responded by throttling its fast chargers. Since the beginning of August, the operator has limited the output of its MOL Plugee units to a maximum of 100 kW during the affected evening window, electrive reported.

Metro has gone further, switching off rather than slowing down. The retailer deactivates the charging stations at all of its stores via software daily between 16:00 and 22:00.

A third operator is using price instead of hardware. EV.app temporarily charges 420 forints, roughly EUR 1.16, per kWh for sessions started during evening peak hours, a step electrive describes as an effort to push drivers to charge at other times.

The measures share a common target: the evening peak. Metro's shutdown window opens at 16:00 and closes at 22:00, while MOL's power cap applies between 17:00 and 22:00. EV.app's surcharge is tied to the same evening peak hours rather than to a fixed technical limit.

The restrictions are framed as temporary by the operators concerned. Paks remains the pivot: until Danube water allows the plant to lift output from its current reduced level, the pressure that prompted the caps stays in place.

Nuclearelectrica set a controlled shutdown of Cernavoda unit 2 for 7.00am on 13 August. The reason is the Danube: Romania pulled the second unit at the plant out of service after the river hit a record low, World Nuclear News reported.

Cooling water drove the decision. World Nuclear News put the river at 182 centimetres on the morning of 12 August, under the 185-centimetre threshold Cernavoda needs to run normally.

The first unit went offline weeks earlier. Nuclearelectrica disconnected unit 1 from the National Energy System on 28 July, blaming what it called the "unprecedentedly low level of the Danube, caused by severe drought".

Cernavoda is the only nuclear station Romania has. Its two Candu reactors are rated at 650 MWe each and supply roughly a fifth of national electricity.

Hungary faces the same shortage of river water at Paks, where units 1, 3 and 4 have been shut down and unit 2 is running at reduced power, according to World Nuclear News.

The Hungarian government said on 12 August it was acting to keep cooling water flowing from the Danube to the Paks reactors. The remedy is stone dumped into the riverbed. Hungary said 35,000 cubic metres in a first round, then 110,000 cubic metres, would hold the level at the plant's cooling channel above -90 cm within a few weeks and let the station run at full capacity.

Noon Energy and Sabanci Renewables have agreed to deploy up to 1 GW (100 GWh) of ultra-long-duration storage for AI infrastructure, structured as power purchase agreements or capacity offtake contracts. Commercial deployment could begin as early as 2027.

The contracting choice matters more than the headline capacity. By routing the systems through PPAs or capacity offtake agreements rather than equipment sales, the two companies shift performance risk onto the storage developer and give data-center offtakers a fixed cost per delivered block of energy.

Noon Energy's cells store energy using carbon and oxygen instead of relatively scarce metals like lithium, and are designed for durations of 100 hours and above. That duration class targets multi-day gaps in solar and wind output, a different problem from the two-to-four-hour arbitrage and frequency work that lithium-ion fleets handle today.

The company has raised more than USD 45 million in venture capital and government grants.

Sabanci Renewables is operating and constructing four power plants with a combined capacity of 790 MWdc within the ERCOT market. The developer is targeting a 3 GW renewable portfolio over the next five years.

Set against that pipeline, the storage agreement is close to a third of the portfolio target in power terms, and its energy rating of 100 GWh would exceed the daily output of the 790 MWdc already operating or under construction. The deal therefore reads less as a bolt-on to existing solar assets and more as a separate product line aimed at buyers who need firm supply rather than intermittent megawatt-hours.

AI data-center load is the stated end market. Those sites run flat around the clock, which is the profile ultra-long-duration chemistry is built to serve and the profile lithium-ion cannot cover through a multi-day lull without heavy oversizing.

The 2027 start date is framed as potential, not committed. Between now and then the technology has to move from a chemistry with 100-hour design duration to systems that can be underwritten at gigawatt scale under contract terms an offtaker will sign.

The announcement was distributed by GlobeNewswire.

The U.S. Department of Energy has issued revised operating directives governing its National Laboratories, plants and sites, moving to streamline how the laboratory complex is managed.

Congress and the Government Accountability Office have pressed for changes to the directives framework for more than three decades, DOE said, with the National Academies and other independent reviews reaching similar conclusions. Those reviewers repeatedly pointed to what the department calls "unnecessary complexity" in the framework.

The department presented the update as part of a wider modernization of operations across its laboratory complex.

Ford is recalling 86,543 Mustang Mach-E electric vehicles after determining that a rear side quarter window glass trim piece can come off while the vehicle is in motion, according to Electrek.

The action covers certain Mustang Mach-E units built across model years 2023 to 2025, Electrek reported. The defect concerns the glass trim on the rear side of the vehicle, which could fall off during driving.

Ford has logged 219 reports of loose or detached trim pieces, per Electrek. No accidents or injuries tied to the recall have been reported.

The automaker estimates that only 1% of the recalled vehicles actually carry the defect, according to Electrek. That leaves the population of affected cars far smaller than the 86,543 units drawn into the campaign.

Letters notifying owners of the risk are expected to be mailed on September 10, 2026, Electrek reported.

Blue Energy and GE Vernova Hitachi Nuclear Energy have signed an agreement opening the next phase of work on a planned 2.5-GW gas-plus-nuclear project in Victoria, Texas, according to Power Magazine.

The agreement was announced on August 13, Power Magazine reported.

Under the deal, the data-center power concept shifts from an announced collaboration into engineering, licensing, and safety analysis, according to Power Magazine.

The 2.5-GW figure covers the combined gas and nuclear project at the Victoria site.

ExxonMobil has pinpointed four fresh exploration opportunities in the Stabroek Block offshore Guyana using artificial intelligence and advanced subsurface tools, World Oil reported, as the operator widens its offshore drilling program.

The method runs historical discoveries, drilling results and subsurface data through deep learning, machine learning, high-performance computing and advanced seismic imaging to flag potential hydrocarbon prospects and sharpen exploration decisions, according to World Oil.

John Ardill, ExxonMobil's Vice President of Exploration, said the company was expanding its use of these technologies to analyze seismic data and identify prospects that had previously been harder to evaluate.

Separately, the operator sought environmental authorization for the Haimara gas-condensate development, proposing a 35-well drilling campaign running from 2028 through 2033, World Oil reported.

The drilling plans sit against national output ambitions. Guyana is targeting crude production of roughly 1.3 MMbpd by 2027 and 1.7 MMbpd by 2030, according to World Oil.