Thursday, 10 September 2026

Chile curtailed a record 2,680 GWh of solar and wind generation in the first seven months of 2026, according to pv magazine.

The full-year comparison is larger. Renewable curtailment reached 6,084 GWh in 2025, up 7.8% from the prior year, on annual figures from Acera cited by pv magazine.

That lost output moved the generation mix. Acera said wind and solar would have supplied 49.4% of Chilean electricity in 2025 without curtailment, against the 42.4% actually recorded.

Acera attributes the increase to transmission constraints, electricity demand that is insufficient during periods of high renewable output, and the need for greater flexibility in Chile's national electricity system.

Storage capacity is being added against that backdrop. Chile had 2,655 MW/11,250 MWh of battery energy storage systems in operation at the end of July, pv magazine reported.

Wind and solar produced 3,058 GWh in July, or 38.6% of Chilean electricity generation for the month, according to pv magazine.

India's state-owned power utility NTPC has invited expressions of interest for grid-connected battery energy storage systems built on sodium-ion technology, to be installed at its existing thermal power plants and office buildings, according to pv magazine.

The pilot program is designed to test how the chemistry behaves in service. Per pv magazine, NTPC will assess technical performance, safety, reliability, degradation, operational characteristics and techno-commercial viability of sodium-ion batteries under Indian grid and climatic conditions.

One pilot configuration specifies a BESS with 100 kWh of usable energy capacity, a size chosen to give NTPC a common basis for comparing the technologies that bidders put forward, pv magazine reported.

Cost-sharing turns on how far a bidder's technology has advanced. Applicants offering technologies at Technology Readiness Level 4 (TRL 4) or TRL 5 must fund at least 50% of total project cost, according to pv magazine. At TRL 6 and above, no minimum financial contribution is required from the applicant.

NTPC will supply land inside its own premises for installation and commissioning of the storage system, and will provide support for operation and maintenance of the pilot, pv magazine reported.

Solar developers connected 11.4 GWdc of new generating capacity in Q2 2026, according to Solar Builder. That is a 45% increase over the same quarter a year earlier and 43% above Q1, Solar Builder reported.

Utility-scale projects carried the quarter, with 9.6 GWdc installed and growth of 61% year over year, according to Solar Builder.

Solar Builder attributed the strong quarter to developers moving quickly to bring projects online ahead of the July 2026 safe harbor deadline for tax credit eligibility.

Across the first half of 2026, solar and storage together made up 70% of all capacity added to the grid, Solar Builder reported. States won by President Trump in 2024 accounted for 71% of solar capacity installed over that period, according to the same report.

European and Asian gas benchmarks are trading 40% to 60% higher than before the conflict in Iran began in late February, according to pv magazine.

Crude has moved less. Brent sits roughly 20% above pre-crisis levels over the same period, pv magazine reported.

The pressure runs through the shipping lane. pv magazine reported that traffic through the Strait of Hormuz has been severely disrupted by the conflict, and that war-risk terms have tightened for voyages in the Middle East as a consequence.

That split between gas and oil is the detail worth holding onto: pv magazine records the sharpest reaction in the gas benchmarks rather than in the crude marker.

Environmental and environmental justice groups have sued the City of Los Angeles over the CEQA review of a USD 800 million hydrogen-ready retrofit at the Scattergood plant, according to Hydrogen Fuel News.

The litigation cites health, NOx and water risks tied to the project, Hydrogen Fuel News reported.

The retrofit is part of a Los Angeles Department of Water and Power plan to convert the Scattergood Generating Station into a hydrogen-ready combined-cycle plant.

Five organizations are named in the coalition challenging the plan: Food & Water Watch, Physicians for Social Responsibility - Los Angeles, the Sierra Club, Communities for a Better Environment, and Los Angeles Waterkeeper, according to Hydrogen Fuel News.

Environmental activists from across Indiana handed more than 1,300 petitions to Governor Mike Braun and Attorney General Todd Rokita, asking the two officials to challenge President Trump's latest emergency energy order, according to CleanTechnica.

The order would keep coal burning units running at two Indiana plants, CleanTechnica reported: NIPSCO's Schahfer station and Centerpoint's Culley station.

The petition drive targets state legal authority rather than federal rulemaking, directing its demand at the governor's office and the attorney general.

Hyundai Motor Group and the African Development Bank (AfDB) have signed a Letter of Intent for long-term strategic collaboration aimed at accelerating sustainable development across Africa, according to CleanTechnica.

The agreement spans six areas of cooperation, CleanTechnica reported, among them the clean energy transition, transport infrastructure, and development of the electric vehicle value chain.

The EU's new "Made in Europe" guidelines landed without binding quotas, and Semafor Net Zero reported that some observers worried the omission would undermine their efficacy.

Quotas are not off the table elsewhere. A separate proposal to boost European industry does include them, and it has split France and Germany, according to Semafor Net Zero.

The reach of Chinese exporters into European product niches runs deep enough to include garden equipment. Nine Chinese companies selling robotic lawnmowers are targeting the EU, given China's lack of lawns, Semafor Net Zero reported.

The United States and Colombia signed an agreement covering minerals and civil nuclear cooperation during a visit by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, with both governments framing the pacts as part of a wider push on economic and security ties, Inside Climate News reported.

Rubio traveled to South America carrying a message that the United States wants access to minerals and an expanded military presence in the region, according to Inside Climate News.

The minerals agreement commits the two countries to finance mining and processing projects within six months, according to the US State Department.

Colombian President Abelardo de la Espriella used the meeting to press his own request, asking Rubio for aircraft, drones, radar, intelligence and other tools to fight armed groups, per Inside Climate News.

The security backdrop is what worries environmental campaigners. Global Witness verified the killings of 48 environmental defenders in Colombia in 2024.

Array Technologies has opened a 216,000-square-foot manufacturing facility in Albuquerque, New Mexico, according to Solar Builder. The company marked the opening of the plant, which cost more than USD 50 million, on Sept. 9.

Solar Builder reported that the site is roughly three times the size of Array's previous Albuquerque location and supports approximately 300 jobs across production, assembly, design, engineering, customer service and other functions.

Array has more than 100 GW of tracker deployments worldwide, according to Solar Builder.

Valencian authorities have approved EUR 76 million for a green hydrogen demonstrator and a sustainable fuel pre-treatment plant at bp's Castellón refinery, according to Hydrogen Fuel News.

The larger share goes to the hydrogen side. Hydrogen Fuel News reported that around EUR 66.3 million is set aside for the demonstrator under the FEDER Comunitat Valenciana 2021-2027 program, which is managed by Ivace+i.

That project is being developed through Castellón Green Hydrogen Phase 2 S.L., per the same report.

The balance of the package, EUR 9.7 million, backs the pre-treatment facility for sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) and hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO), according to Hydrogen Fuel News.

US crude oil production is set to average a record 13.8 MMbpd in 2026, according to the Energy Information Administration's latest Short-Term Energy Outlook, reported by World Oil. That would beat the previous annual record of 13.7 MMbpd set in 2025.

Output has already run at that record pace. Production averaged 13.7 MMbpd during first-half 2026, up roughly 300,000 bpd, or 2%, from the same period a year earlier, World Oil reported.

The Permian basin remains the largest single contributor. EIA forecasts Permian crude production will average 6.8 MMbpd this year, a 3% gain on 2025, supported by higher oil prices and continued oil-directed drilling.

Prices have moved in the producers' favor. WTI crude averaged USD 84 per barrel through August, against USD 65 per barrel in 2025, according to World Oil.

Offshore volumes grew faster in percentage terms than the national total. Federal offshore crude production rose by about 200,000 bpd, or 10%, in first-half 2026 versus the same stretch of 2025. For the full year, EIA expects Gulf production to add 3%, or roughly 100,000 bpd.

New deepwater capacity is behind part of that gain. The Shenandoah floating production unit has averaged approximately 70,000 bpd since coming online in July 2025, World Oil reported.

TotalEnergies is accelerating development of the Acacia-5 oil discovery offshore Angola and targeting first production three months after the find, according to World Oil.

The well was drilled on Block 17, where the company holds a 38% operated interest, and the discovery dates to June 2026, World Oil reported.

Rather than build new facilities, the operator will tie the discovery into spare capacity on the existing Pazflor floating production, storage and offloading vessel. World Oil put the expected contribution at approximately 6,000 bpd of additional Block 17 output.

Separately, TotalEnergies signed agreements with Angola's Agência Nacional de Petróleo, Gás e Biocombustíveis (ANPG) to take 40% operated interests in exploration Blocks 17/25 and 32/21 in the Lower Congo basin, per World Oil.

Chief executive Patrick Pouyanné said exploration is a key pillar of the company's ambition in Angola, supported by incentives introduced to encourage investment.

Saipem and Jan De Nul have signed a letter of intent with ExxonMobil covering preliminary work on the offshore portion of the Rovuma LNG Phase 1 development in Mozambique, ahead of a possible engineering, procurement, construction and installation (EPCI) contract, according to Offshore Engineer OEDigital.

The initial scope is worth about USD 12.7 million (EUR 11 million) and covers limited preliminary engineering and procurement plus other technical services aimed at advancing project definition and execution planning, Offshore Engineer OEDigital reported.

ExxonMobil Moçambique Limitada signed the letter of intent on behalf of Mozambique Rovuma Venture, which represents the Area 4 partners ENH, CNPC, ENI, KOGAS and XRG.

A final EPCI award to the Saipem-Jan De Nul consortium depends on a positive final investment decision by the Area 4 partners, together with government and regulatory approvals, which Offshore Engineer OEDigital said are expected in 2026.

The planned development would produce gas from 18 subsea wells, moved through a network of subsea pipelines and manifolds.

Swedish thin-film solar equipment maker Midsummer AB and Indonesian industrial group PT Metalogika Rekayasa Sistem have signed a binding investment and industrialization agreement to establish flexible CIGS solar cell and module manufacturing in Indonesia, according to pv magazine.

Metalogika plans to build the production facility with initial capacity of 20 MW per year and potential expansion to as much as 200 MW annually, pv magazine reported, with output aimed at the Indonesian market and at export.

Midsummer's role is equipment and services, including its proprietary DUO thin-film production system, alongside a minority equity stake in the joint venture, according to pv magazine. That splits the capital burden: the Indonesian partner builds and owns the plant, the Swedish supplier books the machinery order.

Metalogika president director Firrisky Nurtomo tied the project to Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto's program targeting 100 GW of solar capacity nationwide and electrification of 80,000 rural areas, pv magazine reported.

The structure repeats one Midsummer has already used in Colombia, where it is supplying equipment for a CIGS factory rated at least 100 MW per year. Cumulative machinery orders for that project were reported at about SEK 380 million, according to pv magazine.

The licensing-and-equipment route replaced an earlier plan to manufacture at home. Midsummer said it would abandon plans for a 200 MW factory of its own in Sweden and decline an available EU grant, pv magazine reported.

EVgo and Regency Centers are widening their US charging partnership to bring more than 400 new fast charging stalls to Regency retail sites nationwide, according to electrive.

The charge point operator runs over 150 stalls across Regency locations today, electrive reported. Each new site built under the arrangement will hold as many as 24 high-powered chargers, according to the same report.

The build-out targets retail centres in metropolitan areas in Colorado, Florida, Illinois, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Texas and Virginia, along with other sites, electrive said.

The two companies first worked together in 2020, when EVgo installed its initial charger at a Regency shopping centre, according to electrive.

Current and pending Puerto Rico government contracts would add more than 5,200 MW of generation capacity, according to IEEFA. The island's electrical system peaked at less than 3,200 MW in 2024, IEEFA said.

The largest single piece is an outstanding procurement for 3,000 MW of new generation, which IEEFA describes as likely gas-fired and as including as much as 600 MW to replace the Costa Sur power plant.

That procurement has drawn scrutiny from the Financial Oversight and Management Board, which has raised questions about the process and says its concerns are being ignored, per IEEFA.

The FOMB has already unwound one deal. IEEFA reported that Enchanted Rock alleged Power Expectations had fraudulently signed a 400 MW emergency generation contract on its behalf; once notified that Enchanted Rock was not participating, the board canceled the contract.

Beyond the pending procurement, approved contracts cover more than 1,000 MW of utility-scale battery storage, the 528 MW Energiza gas plant, 244 MW of new fossil-fueled peaker units, and more than 1,500 MW of utility-scale solar, according to IEEFA.

Distributed generation is expanding alongside those contracts. As of June 2026, more than 1,600 MW of rooftop solar had been installed on the island, IEEFA said, a 28% year-over-year increase.

Boskalis has put its newly commissioned subsea rock installation vessel Windpiper to work for the first time, laying rock to protect export cables at the Bałtyk 2 and Bałtyk 3 offshore wind farms in the Baltic Sea, according to Offshore Engineer OEDigital.

The vessel loaded nearly 45,000 tons of rock in Norway before sailing to the installation campaign, and Boskalis said that cargo is a record, with no single subsea rock installation vessel previously carrying such a volume for one installation project, OEDigital reported.

Equinor and Polenergia are developing Bałtyk 2 and Bałtyk 3, with Boskalis working alongside Van Oord on the projects, according to OEDigital.

Windpiper was christened on July 3 after an 18-month conversion carried out under Boskalis' supervision.

The ship measures 227 meters long and 40 meters wide, and carries a total rock cargo capacity of 45,500 tons split across two holds, per OEDigital. It has more than 31,000 kW of installed power, seven thrusters and DP2 certification, and Boskalis describes it as the world's largest subsea rock installation vessel.

A single oil producer accounted for close to half of Gulf corporate earnings last quarter. Aramco reported net profit of USD 32.3 billion in the second quarter, roughly 43% of the USD 74.8 billion in profits posted by listed companies across the region, according to KAMCO Invest, a Kuwait-based asset manager, cited by Semafor.

The concentration figure came in a comparison of earnings across Gulf economies. KAMCO Invest put regional listed-company profit at USD 74.8 billion for the quarter.

Kuwait offers the sharpest contrast in that comparison. Semafor reported that the country has been hit hard by Iranian strikes and has not exported much oil since March. Earnings growth there still rose sharply, which Semafor attributed to a lower base and one-off gains in banking and telecoms rather than broader economic strength.

Researchers at Germany's Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing (BAM) have tied the distribution of two lithium isotopes inside battery cells to degradation processes, describing the pattern as a fingerprint, electrive reported.

Fresh cells carry the isotopes in their natural ratio: 2.4% lithium-6 against 97.6% lithium-7, according to electrive.

That balance breaks with use. In a test cell built with an NMC cathode and a graphite anode, lithium-6 started collecting at the anode after only the first few charge cycles, electrive reported. A further 280 cycles sharpened the separation, and the cathode showed a raised lithium-7 content.

The isotope split therefore offers a read on how far a cell has aged, rather than an inferred estimate from voltage or capacity alone.

Fidra Energy has divided its Thorpe Marsh battery storage project in the UK into five 290 MW units, each with its own offtake arrangement, according to ESS News. The site totals 1.45 GW/2.9 GWh.

One unit runs on a tolling agreement with Octopus, three carry floor contracts, two with EDF and one with Statkraft, and the fifth is uncontracted, ESS News reported.

The project secured GBP 445 million at financial close in September 2025, with the UK government's National Wealth Fund among the major backers, according to ESS News. Commissioning is scheduled for 2027, and Thorpe Marsh is on course to be Great Britain's biggest battery at that point, per the same report.

Beyond Thorpe Marsh, Fidra Energy's pipeline covers the 500 MW/1 GWh West Burton C BESS and the 1,025 MW Enderby BESS, which the developer bought from UK developer Innova, ESS News reported.

Chief executive Chris Elder said two acquisitions in progress would take the total pipeline to between 4 GW and 4.5 GW in power terms, according to ESS News. The company's stated ambition is 5 GW of deployed UK battery storage by 2030.

Flex has signed a definitive agreement to buy EPC Power, a California-based manufacturer and inverter brand, for USD 4.4 billion, according to Solar Builder. Flex representatives said the transaction is expected to close during Q4 2026.

EPC Power will generate about USD 800 million in revenue in the 2026 calendar year, Flex representatives told Solar Builder. Flex officials expect the company's EBITDA margin to widen by double digit percentage points, reaching roughly 30% by 2027.

The purchase sits alongside a separate corporate restructuring. Flex intends to spin off its Cloud and Power Infrastructure unit as an independent, publicly traded company during Q1 2027, Solar Builder reported.

Romania has approved two subsidy programs worth a combined EUR 650 million for solar and storage installations on public buildings, pv magazine reported.

The schemes were signed off by Ilie Bolojan, who serves as Romania's prime minister in a caretaker capacity, and will be financed through the Modernisation Fund, according to pv magazine.

One of the two programs, budgeted at EUR 150 million, is reserved for public institutions that already own renewable generation assets, pv magazine reported. It funds behind-the-meter battery systems to store output from their existing self-consumption installations.

Beneficiaries can apply for support covering up to 100% of eligible costs, with a ceiling of EUR 10 million each, according to pv magazine.

The call for proposals opens on September 11 and closes on November 6, or earlier if the budget runs out, pv magazine reported. Projects that win funding must be completed and commissioned by the end of 2029.

Romania passed 8.5 GW of installed solar capacity recently, with roughly 1.8 GW of that added during the first six months of 2026, according to pv magazine.

Vår Energi has awarded Odfjell Drilling a multi-year drilling contract for the semi-submersible rig Deepsea Bergen, with firm backlog valued at about USD 518 million, according to Offshore Engineer OEDigital.

The work pushes the rig's firm contract backlog out to the first quarter of 2031, OEDigital reported.

The award lands less than 12 months after Odfjell Drilling bought the Deepsea Bergen, per the same report. OEDigital put the firm portion of the contract at roughly USD 518 million.

The rig was delivered in 2019, has a maximum drilling capacity of 12,000 m and berths for 180 people, according to OEDigital.

Swedish battery storage startup Rebaba has raised just under EUR 4 million in a seed funding round, according to electrive. The round totalled SEK 44.1 million, was oversubscribed, and was led by Sistafund and EIT Urban Mobility, with existing shareholders and new European investors taking part.

The company was founded in Stockholm in 2023 and builds its business on second life, taking decommissioned EV batteries and reusing them in stationary energy storage systems, electrive reported.

Rebaba plans to raise the capacity of its CircularHub production facility in Stockholm to 40 MWh per year, which according to electrive could avoid approximately 4,000 tonnes of CO2 annually.

Its product line includes Companion, a compact cabinet-based 40-kWh system aimed at private and small commercial applications.

Sonnedix has raised USD 1.3 billion in a refinancing covering roughly 1 GW of operating solar and wind capacity in Chile plus a 117 MW battery energy storage system still under construction, the company said in reporting by ESS News.

Seven commercial banks backed the deal, according to ESS News. BNP Paribas, Bank of America, Credit Agricole CIB and Santander acted as joint lead arrangers and joint bookrunners.

The company's website lists about 1.18 GW in operation across 41 projects in Chile.

ESS News identified the storage component as the Librillo project in the municipality of Taltal, in the Antofagasta region, which is expected to enter commercial operation in April 2027.

Atlas Renewable Energy is planning a 1 GW data center in the municipality of Paracatu, Brazil, a single site larger than every data center already operating in the country combined, Mongabay reported.

Installed Brazilian data centers draw around 800 MW in total, according to Mongabay. Atlas Renewable Energy is owned by an arm of the global asset manager BlackRock and already operates solar farms in the municipality, Mongabay reported.

Water is the constraint. Around 80% of Paracatu's territory faces water conflicts, and demand there already exceeds 100% of available groundwater reserves, per Mongabay. Mongabay reported that the project risks depleting fragile Cerrado springs.

Local authorities and residents say they were never consulted about the multi-billion-dollar investment and learned of it only through inquiries from reporters, according to Mongabay.

The Paracatu plan sits inside a much wider buildout. Data analyzed by Mongabay and Intercept Brasil indicate at least 68 data centers are planned across 37 Brazilian municipalities.

Senegal will offer 109 oil and gas blocks to local and foreign investors at a roadshow, energy minister El Hadji Abdourahmane Diouf said, according to Offshore Engineer OEDigital.

The offer covers almost the entire national acreage. Diouf said Senegal holds 113 blocks in total, and only four of them are currently under contract, Offshore Engineer OEDigital reported.

Diouf tied the opening to domestic industrial policy, saying the president's plan is to create local leaders in the energy, oil and gas sectors.

Global cleantech investment dropped by $151.1 billion, or 28%, in Q1 2026 against the elevated levels recorded at the end of 2025, according to ESS News.

The second quarter recovered part of that ground. Investment rose 5% to $395.4 billion, still 25% below the Q4 2025 figure, ESS News reported.

China's share of global cleantech manufacturing and industry investment dipped below one-third for the first time, per the same report.

Utility-scale storage ran against the flow of the headline rebound. Investment in the segment fell 14% from H2 2025 and 16% from H1 2025, ESS News said.

Battery factory commitments proved steadier. Global battery manufacturing announcements held at roughly $23 billion in both Q1 and Q2 2026, matching Q4 2025 levels, according to ESS News.

That stability was not evenly distributed. US battery announcements hit a record low in H1 2026 at $915 million, the weakest since the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act in 2022, ESS News reported.

Japanese petroleum company Idemitsu Kosan Co., Ltd. has set up a development laboratory in the United States for space-grade copper indium gallium-selenide (CIGS) solar cells, according to pv magazine.

The lab sits at the University of California, Santa Barbara's Oasis facility, and pv magazine reports Idemitsu describes it as the first of its kind.

Work on manufacturing is running in parallel at home. Idemitsu is advancing a bench manufacturing plant in Japan with the aim of establishing mass production technologies by 2027, according to pv magazine.

The laboratory follows a partnership announced late last year with U.S.-based Source Energy Company covering the development of CIGS solar modules for satellite and space applications, pv magazine reported.

Flower has begun construction on a 100 MW / 400 MWh utility-scale battery energy storage system in the Bergedorf district of Hamburg, according to ESS News.

The system is expected to come online by the end of 2028, ESS News reported.

Flower says the installation is the largest of its kind within a major German city, and its largest self-developed project to date.

Commercial operation of the asset has been contracted ahead of grid connection. A Flexibility Purchase Agreement structured as a virtual tolling agreement puts Engie in charge of market trading and dispatch of the battery once it connects to the grid, per ESS News.

Flower's development pipeline in Germany exceeds 300 MW of battery storage projects, according to ESS News.

The UK government's revised aviation forecast puts emissions in 2050 nearly 50% above the level expected under the jet-zero strategy launched by the previous Conservative government, according to Carbon Brief.

The jet-zero strategy had aviation emissions peaking at 38.2m tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (MtCO2e) and falling to 19.3MtCO2e by 2050. The government's new technology development pathway, which assumes ambitious carbon abatement measures, brings emissions down only to 28.1MtCO2e in that year, Carbon Brief reported.

Two assumptions carry most of the change. Sustainable aviation fuels are now expected to supply 30% of aviation fuel by 2050 rather than 50%. Fuel-efficiency gains have been marked down to 1.3% per year in the technology development scenario, from 2% per year in the jet-zero strategy.

A separate current trends pathway, which assumes no new policies, has emissions rising to 41.1MtCO2e by 2050, according to Carbon Brief.

The Labour government has signalled support for a contentious third runway at Heathrow airport, with a final planning decision expected by 2029.

Deputy Ministers David Mahlobo and Jack Bloom called an urgent stakeholder meeting on Tuesday evening, acting on a request from Water and Sanitation Minister Pemmy Majodina, and the meeting settled on a new joint working committee. South Africa's Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS) will chair that committee, which is to work out fixes for the electricity supply problems hitting Rand Water's water systems and causing disruptions in parts of Gauteng and the North West, according to SAnews.

Rand Water's Eikenhof system drew particular attention at the meeting, where stakeholders raised concern about repeated electricity supply failures there, SAnews reported.

Municipal water supply in Emfuleni, the City of Johannesburg and the West Rand has been affected by the power interruptions, as have parts of Madibeng and Rustenburg in the North West.

SAnews said the committee pairs the water utilities with the electricity suppliers they depend on: Eskom and City Power sit alongside Rand Water and Johannesburg Water, with DWS and the Gauteng Provincial Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (CoGTA) representing government.

Suriname's national public utility EnergieBedrijven Suriname (EBS) has opened a tender for the design, supply and installation of solar-storage minigrids and water infrastructure serving rural communities, according to pv magazine. Bids are due by October 30.

The tender is split into two lots. The first covers minigrids combining solar PV with battery energy storage systems (BESS) in ten indigenous communities, together with eleven energy and water systems, and is expected to take 30 months to complete, pv magazine reported. The second lot groups solar-BESS minigrids and water infrastructure into five clusters spanning 16 Matawai communities, with a shorter expected build period of 24 months.

The work sits under the Bio-Sweet project, jointly managed by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and the government of Suriname, with the IDB partly financing project costs, per pv magazine.

Solar capacity in the country remains small. Cumulative installations reached 16 MW by the end of last year, up from 13 MW at the end of 2024, according to International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) figures cited by pv magazine.

Pennsylvania has spent $16.2 million in National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) money by the end of 2025, more than any other state, according to the Sierra Club, as cited by Inside Climate News.

The commonwealth has drawn $77 million in NEVI funding in total, the largest share of any state, Inside Climate News reported. Those dollars underwrite 40 charging stations already operating along highway corridors in the commonwealth, with another 39 under construction.

NEVI itself was set up with $4.5 billion to install thousands of EV fast chargers nationwide, according to Inside Climate News. Federal lawmakers have already rescinded $500 million from the program and do not plan to add new money during the next five-year transportation funding cycle, the outlet reported.

Deployment was slow at the outset. Only 25 chargers were installed nationwide between the program's creation in 2021 and the time Biden left office in early 2025, according to Inside Climate News.

Demand in Pennsylvania trails the buildout. The state ranks 29th in electric vehicle ownership per capita and 32nd in public chargers per capita, Inside Climate News reported.

The stakes for emissions are large. Pennsylvania has the fourth-highest greenhouse gas emissions nationally, and its transportation sector accounts for about a quarter of that total, according to Inside Climate News.

The average US price of diesel stood at $5.98 per gallon as of September 10, according to AAA figures cited by Grist. That is roughly $2.31 above the level of late February, when the United States and Israel launched a war against Iran.

California drivers pay far more. A gallon of diesel currently costs $7.91 in the state, Grist reported.

The war has largely closed the Strait of Hormuz, which once carried 10 percent of seaborne diesel, according to Grist.

Domestic supply has thinned alongside the trade disruption. US diesel inventories sit at their lowest level since 1982, based on Energy Information Administration data cited by Grist.

The fuel has repriced faster than gasoline. Diesel is up 61 percent against a 41 percent rise in gasoline, per Grist.

That gap carries a bill for households. A Brown University tracker cited by Grist puts the added cost to US consumers at $46 billion, or about $350 per household.

The last comparable run-up came in 2022, when Russia invaded Ukraine and diesel reached $5.82 per gallon, according to Grist.

The UK Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) released its quarterly count of heat pump installations across the United Kingdom, covering the period up to the end of June 2026.

DESNZ dated the statistical release 10 September 2026.

The department flags the figures as "official statistics in development", saying they are still undergoing methodological development.

The series is issued as a quarterly statistical release on the number of heat pumps installed in the United Kingdom, according to DESNZ.

A Trump administration executive order on grid cybersecurity could slow growth in the U.S. energy storage market, according to Canary Media.

The order invokes a national security emergency, pointing to the possibility that equipment made abroad is used to break into and disrupt power grid operations in the United States, Canary Media reported.

Canary Media called the order "vaguely worded" and described the storage market it now covers as booming.

Transgrid has put up a "house full" sign for data centres in Sydney and told developers chasing grid connections to look to the regions for spare capacity, according to RenewEconomy.

RenewEconomy describes Transgrid as Australia's biggest transmission company, operating the transmission network known as the backbone of the grid.

The message redirects connection demand away from the Sydney load centre and toward parts of the network where headroom remains, per RenewEconomy.

African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) is looking at further financing in Angola's oil and gas sector after putting close to USD 2 billion into the industry, according to World Oil, with the emphasis on widening the ownership and operating roles held by local companies.

The bank set out a pipeline of Angolan energy investment opportunities: USD 2.5 billion tied to Lobito Oil, USD 1 billion for Sonangol, USD 1.4 billion for Amufert and USD 280 million for Itracom, World Oil reported.

Those plans were presented at a Local Content Development Forum in Luanda, where government agencies, financial institutions, operators and Angolan companies reviewed financing and investment options across the country's energy sector, according to World Oil.

"The next phase is about enabling more Angolan companies to move from participation and service provision towards ownership and scale," said Haytham Elmaayergi.

ONEOK, Inc. has completed a USD 9 billion minority equity investment by funds and affiliates managed by Apollo, according to a GlobeNewswire announcement from the company.

Apollo's money bought a nonvoting Class B minority interest in a newly formed holding company, ONEOK Holdings, L.L.C., ONEOK said. That interest sits structurally subordinate to the company's debt.

ONEOK said it reviewed the investment with its credit rating agencies, all of which regard the transaction as credit-enhancing.

Tesla said Thursday that its Cybertruck Powershare feature can back up a home at the same time as a Powerwall 3, according to Electrek.

Running the truck and the home battery together adds more than three days of backup power, which Tesla puts at the equivalent of nine extra Powerwalls, Electrek reported.

The arithmetic lines up with the hardware. Electrek reports the Cybertruck carries a 123 kWh pack, while a single Powerwall holds 13.5 kWh, so nine of them land close to the truck's battery size. Powershare pushes up to 11.5 kW into the home and requires a Universal Wall Connector and a Powershare Gateway.

The integration is late. Tesla first promised the Powerwall feature for 2025, and it is arriving nearly two years after Cybertruck deliveries began, per Electrek.

Tesla has been pushing the truck into grid-facing roles over the same period. It launched a Cybertruck vehicle-to-grid program in Texas in February, and in April the truck became the first AC vehicle-to-grid asset in California through PG&E, Electrek reported.

Battery storage firm NeoVolta received an initial USD 20 million funded at closing to support its continued growth, according to Power Magazine.

The credit facility can rise to USD 30 million upon mutual agreement, Power Magazine reported.

The capital came from RoHo Capital Opportunity Fund LLC, a joint venture formed by Horizon Technology Finance Corp. and CR Financial Holdings, Inc., the holding company for Roth Capital Partners, LLC.

Cyclic Materials has opened its first commercial-scale rare earth magnet recycling facility in Mesa, Arizona, according to Electrek. The plant can handle up to 25,000 metric tons of magnet-bearing end-of-life products a year, Electrek reported.

Mesa is the first commercial-scale deployment of Cyclic's proprietary MagCycle process, per Electrek. The line turns scrap into a rare earth magnet concentrate the company calls Mag-Xtract, and also recovers copper, aluminum, and steel.

Electrek reported that Cyclic finished the site 17 months after announcing it.

A second project is in development: a recycling campus in South Carolina, scheduled to open in 2028, which will put magnet recovery and rare earth refining at one site, according to Electrek.

Cyclic says global demand for rare earth elements is projected to triple by 2035.

US commercial crude oil inventories fell by 400,000 bbl in the week ended Sept. 4, excluding the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, according to data from the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) reported by Oil & Gas Journal.

Refiners drove the draw. US refineries processed 17.6 million b/d over the week and ran at 97.8% of capacity, per the EIA.

Product stocks moved the other way. Total motor gasoline inventories rose 1.3 million bbl from the prior week and sit 5% below the five-year average for this time of year, the EIA said. Distillate inventories climbed 2.1 million bbl and remain about 13% under the five-year average.

Propane-propylene stocks added 3.1 million bbl, leaving them 27% above the five-year average, according to the EIA.

Crude oil imports averaged 6.8 million b/d, an increase of 53,000 b/d week on week.

Canada has committed loan guarantees of up to CAD 757 million to the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) to back Ukraine's energy security, covering emergency natural gas purchases and strategic fuel reserves ahead of the 2026/2027 heating season, according to a joint statement published by Natural Resources Canada.

The commitment was set out after Canada's Minister of Energy and Natural Resources Tim Hodgson met Ukraine's First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Energy Denys Shmyhal on September 10, 2026, to discuss bilateral energy cooperation and ways to deepen the two countries' partnership.

Separately, Canada's total contribution to the Ukraine Energy Support Fund now stands at CAD 100 million, the statement said.

Export Development Canada has dedicated a CAD 200 million Concessional Trade Finance Envelope to priority projects in Ukraine, including a hydroelectric infrastructure opportunity that Canada intends to support, according to Natural Resources Canada.

On the nuclear fuel side, the two ministers pointed to the partnership between Ukraine's Energoatom and Cameco Corporation, which secures long-term uranium supplies and conversion services through 2035 and, in their words, underpins the energy independence of Ukraine's nuclear fleet.

Hodgson and Shmyhal also condemned Russia's ongoing attacks on Ukraine's energy infrastructure.

Eight of the ten fastest solar-building states in the United States in the first half of the year were states that voted for Donald Trump in the last presidential election, according to a Solar Energy Industries Association report cited by Grist.

The country added more than 11 GW of solar in the second quarter of 2026, Grist reported, an increase of 45% against the same quarter of 2025. States that backed Trump accounted for close to three-fourths of that growth.

Federal solar tax credits expired for most uninitiated solar farms on July 4, 2026, after passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, per Grist.

Texas held the top spot in solar development in 2024, in 2025, and again in the first half of 2026.

Michigan moved up the ranking faster, from 23rd place in 2024 to fourth in the first half of 2026. State law there requires utilities to generate 50% of their power from renewables by 2030.

Zhero has signed a framework agreement with Tesla Energy covering roughly 3 GWh of battery energy storage capacity in Italy, with H1 Holdings collaborating on the deal, according to ESS News.

The first tranche under the agreement is 200 MW of shovel-ready plants, ESS News reported. Tesla Energy is to supply Megapack batteries for the projects.

Zhero's wider utility-scale storage development pipeline exceeds 1.5 GW, according to ESS News.

Battery energy storage systems (BESS) hold a clear edge in two data center applications, contest four more, and lose two outright to rival technologies, according to a Volta Foundation report published in July 2026 and covered by ESS News.

The report, titled "Where Batteries Can Win in Data Center Applications," identifies speed-to-power and cheaper power as the strongest arguments for BESS, Volta Foundation said. The two categories where batteries lose are long-duration storage and continuous power.

Backup duty beyond four hours goes to diesel, according to the report, while continuous prime power remains primarily the domain of gas turbines and fuel cells.

Alibaba, Tencent, ByteDance, Meta, Google, and Microsoft have all been putting money into BESS, per ESS News.

NextEra Energy and the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) have agreed to a loan of up to USD 1.9 billion to fund the restart of the Duane Arnold Energy Center in Iowa, according to Power Engineering Nuclear.

The plant, rated at 615 MW, sits in Palo, Iowa, Power Engineering Nuclear reported. It ran for more than four decades before shutting in 2020.

Regulatory clearance came earlier from the state. In June the Iowa Utilities Commission issued a certificate authorizing NextEra Energy to construct and operate the facility, according to Power Engineering Nuclear.

Power Engineering Nuclear reported that the restart is expected to create thousands of construction and refurbishment jobs, plus at least 400 permanent positions once the plant returns to operation.

Supplier association CLEPA drew its conclusions on battery-electric car demand from a representative survey of more than 5,200 participants in Germany, France, Italy, Poland and Spain, according to electrive.

The sample was not restricted to buyers. CLEPA polled all adults, including people without a driver's licence, without a car of their own, and without any intent to purchase one, electrive reported.

CLEPA Secretary-General Benjamin Krieger said a high proportion of new electric vehicle sales comes from commercial fleet registrations.