No doubt the Energy and Utilities industry has witnessed increasing complexity and significant challenges in recent years, centering around compliance issues, competitive pricing pressures, and business continuity. These issues, amongst others, will remain the focus for Board and Management’s corporate strategy and 2014 planning meetings around the world. Looking back on year 2013, and ahead… Keep reading →
US independent EOG has urged its stakeholders to reject a share purchase offer by TRC Capital, which has made a name for itself – not necessarily a good one – for its unsolicited “mini-tender” bids in a range of industries, including energy. EOG is the latest in a laundry list of large energy companies that… Keep reading →
Bad day for Venezuela, and for former president Hugo Chavez’s legacy: A massive power outage cut off electricity for almost 70% of the country’s population yesterday. “A lack of investment and training in the electric grid has contributed to more than 500 blackouts registered in Venezuela as of June this year.” [Christian Science Monitor] And… Keep reading →
Total has agreed to pay more than $398 million to settle Securities Exchange Commission and Department of Justice charges for violation of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. Total will pay the SEC $153 million and the DOJ $245.2 million related to charges that the French oil major paid $60 million in bribes related to the… Keep reading →
Power prices are too low. That’s what utility executives believe. They need prices to increase for their generators to return healthy earnings. Otherwise, they will have to retire plants and exit the market.
Dominion Resources decided not to wait. They recently announced plans to retire their Wisconsin-based Kewaunee Nuclear Power Station 21 years early. Dominion concluded they would not be able to achieve any earnings for their 556-megawatt unit, they might even lose money and they could not find anyone to buy it. They had no choice but to shutter and decommission Kewaunee. Keep reading →
An 11th hour withdrawal from a long-anticipated initial public offering could be a potentially damaging blow for a cleantech startup trying to raise additional capital from the public markets.
But BrightSource, the concentrating solar power startup with 9 GW of projects in the pipeline, has not ruled out another attempt at a public launch. Keep reading →
Financing is the first and final word on solar projects. And in these straitened economic times, one company in San Francisco’s Bay Area is aiming to spark a rooftop solar revolution–one tile at a time.
Solar Mosaic, based in Berkeley, will this week unveil its pilot community PV program in neighboring Oakland. Instead of turning to expensive lending rates at major banks, Solar Mosaic’s financing adopts a crowd-sourcing model through the sale of “tiles,” each worth $100. Keep reading →
