Finance

In a financial world of stocks, bonds, foreign exchange, and credit cards, trillions of dollars are traded daily, with money flows handled by a bevy of databanks. In the world of cryptocurrency, billions of dollars worth of Bitcoin are traded through as many as 400,000 transactions per day, consuming the energy supply of a modernized country. The quirk is a “proof of work” feature that provides decentralized security. Is Bitcoin’s energy usage all for nothing, or is it a game-changer for renewable assets and generators? Tristan Rayner explores.

The nation announced a more ambitious climate change and renewables target at COP26 in Glasgow, and will be boosted by a $160 million funding pledge from the summit host nation.

The weighted average cost of the electricity to be generated by the latest 975 MW fleet of solar projects procured by a national tender program has fallen more than 50% from the level recorded in the last such exercise, which was abandoned six years ago.

A quarterly update top-loaded with promising business growth in the company’s residential segment revealed commercial and industrial operations supplied an $8 million loss to the three-month figures, with supply chain issues and project timetables blamed.

The U.S. manufacturer has started building its third Ohio production base and has also begun ordering equipment to kit out its first factory in India.

The Spanish company recorded more than half of its year-to-date revenue in the last quarter alone – and secured a 700 MW solar project capacity order in the U.S. in September – but still shed €100,000 in the last three-month window as its nine-month net losses hit €20 million.

The inverter and battery manufacturer said it has been sitting on a record order backlog for the current three month window and the opening quarter of the new year, which may in part be down to a long Covid shutdown at its Vietnamese production base.

“Junior” figures at state-owned Sinomec Refinery & Chemical Corp told investigators from then-GCL auditor Deloitte that most of an advance payment made for a granular silicon plant had been passed on, in a bid to dissuade GCL from halting the EPC contract, the solar manufacturer said on Friday.

Solar Philippines will tap stock market investors to back the first section of a solar project in Luzon it says will eventually be the largest in the region.

The company is planning another sell-off of solar projects, with two solar farms with a total generation capacity of 93 MW earmarked for divestment to state-owned China National Nuclear Power – provided the sites can come up with their rent arrears.