(EnergyAsia, April 9, Wednesday) — India’s Gujarat state is planning to build small hydropower projects along major dams in its southern region. The state government has identified several potential sites in Karjan, Damanganga and Vanakbori. The projects would primarily tap excess water during the monsoon season to generate electricity. The size of the projects varies...
(EnergyAsia, April 9, Wednesday) — India’s Ministry of New and Renewable Energy said it is supporting a programme to bring solar energy to remote villages in the northern state of Assam. For the financial year to March 31 2008, it has supported efforts to install a total of 750 solar home lighting systems, 50 solar...
(EnergyAsia, April 9, Wednesday) — Investors are unlikely to follow through on their plans to build biodiesel plants as the cost of palm oil feedstock continues to soar. Crude palm oil prices have surged to record levels of more than RM4,400 per tonne, more than twice the level needed to make biodiesel profitable. (US$1=RM3.2). The...
(EnergyAsia, April 9, Wednesday) — The increased production and use of biofuels are likely to boost greenhouse gas emissions, a top environmental scientist has warned. The warning comes as European nations are pondering mandates for tough biofuels blending targets. Robert Watson, the chief environmental scientist at the UK’s Department for the Environment, has described as...
(EnergyAsia, April 9, Wednesday) — In late 1999, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the Chinese government jointly embarked on a massive $183 million programme to improve the environment in three highly polluted cities in the nation’s leading coal-producing province of Shanxi. Today, ADB said the nearly seven million residents of Taiyun, Datong, and Yangquan...
(EnergyAsia, April 9, Wednesday) — Norway’s NorSun plans to invest US$300 million in Singapore to build a plant to make monocrystalline wafers for the global solar cell industry. Earlier this year, another Norwegian firm, Renewable Energy Corporation (REC), announced plans for a giant facility produce multicrystalline wafers in Singapore. NorSun’s solar cell wafer plant will...
(EnergyAsia, April 9, Wednesday) — India’s privately held Reliance Industries is shutting down all its 1,400 downstream retail outlets as rising crude prices have made that part of its business commercially unviable in the country’s tightly regulated fuel market. The Federal government has stated it intends to continue imposing price caps on oil products. While...
(EnergyAsia, April 9, Wednesday) — The city of Sydney must take immediate measures to prepare for expected future oil shortages, said the Australian Association for the Study of Peak Oil (ASPO). One important step would be to reduce the reliance on cars by removing any tax subsidies or concession for motorised vehicles and put the...
(EnergyAsia, April 9, Wednesday) — The economic costs of addressing climate change, described as “one of the world’s greatest collective action problems” can be contained by putting in place well-designed policies that are implemented across many countries, said the International Monetary Fund (IMF). In its April 2008 World Economic Outlook chapter entitled “Climate Change and...
(EnergyAsia, April 8, Tuesday) — Malaysia’s Carbon Capital Corporation Sdn Bhd is teaming up with Japan Carbon Mercantile to build a new 240,000-tonne-per-year multi-feed biodiesel plant in Tanjung Manis in Sarawak state. Sarawak is a Malaysian state located on Borneo island. The plant will be able to use jatropha and palm oil as feedstock, and...
(EnergyAsia, April 8, Tuesday) — The Renewable Energy Development Agency of India’s West Bengal state (WBREDA) has announced plans to set up a solar energy park in Purulia district. It expects the park to generate up to 40 MW of power and attract investments worth between Rs 6billion and Rs8 billion over the next two...
(EnergyAsia, April 8, Tuesday) — IMV Projects, the Calgary subsidiary of international energy services company John Wood Group PLC, said it has been awarded a $4.5 million contract by Korea National Oil Corporation (KNOC) to provide front-end engineering and design (FEED) services for their 10,000 b/d BlackGold steam-assisted gravity drainage facility to be built in...
(EnergyAsia, April 8, Tuesday) — The Cambodian government is keen to develop the country’s hydropower potential to supply energy to Thailand, Vietnam and China, thereby creating an additional source of export earnings. Cambodia has the potential to generate some 10,000 megawatts (MW) of electricity for its domestic use as well as exports, with about half...
(EnergyAsia, April 8, Tuesday) — Canadian bank CIBC has given a hot tip on how consumers can offset the impact of US$100 oil: buy energy stocks. While consumers feel pain at the pumps, $100 oil hasn’t quite impacted the price of energy stocks, and that signals a hidden opportunity for investors, notes a new CIBC...
(EnergyAsia, April 8, Tuesday) — Imposing a carbon tax on Chinese imports may be the only way developed nations will be able to achieve real cuts in global greenhouse gases, says a new report from CIBC World Markets. The research report notes that while governments in developed nations are taking painful steps to cut greenhouse...
(EnergyAsia, April 8, Tuesday) — Invensys Process Systems said it has won a substantial contract from the Saudi Electricity Company (SEC) to provide plant performance and monitoring solutions for use on one of the country’s most critical power plants. The PP8 plant is based in Central Province and is one of two power stations that...
(EnergyAsia, April 8, Tuesday) — NYSE-listed Yingli Green Energy Holding Company Limited, a world leading vertically integrated photovoltaic (PV) product manufacturer, said it has signed its sales contracts with Korean buyers. Korea Electric Power Industrial Development Corporation (KEPID), a renewable energy company, will purchase 1.3 MW of PV modules from Yingli while Kaycom Corporation, a...
(EnergyAsia, April 8, Tuesday) — Puda Coal Inc, a supplier of high grade metallurgical coking coal in China, said it has signed a new contract to supply up to 120,000 metric tons (MT) of cleaned coking coal to Yanzhou Liming Coke and Coal Distribution Ltd. The coal is used to make coke for the purposes...
(EnergyAsia, April 7, Monday) — With funding support from the Asian Development Bank (ADB), India’s national power grid operator is embarking on an ambitious $2.54 billion dollar plan to expand the country’s power transmission grid and link stable clean energy supplies to areas suffering shortages. ADB said it is extending a $600 million loan to...
(EnergyAsia, April 7, Monday) — NYSE-listed LDK Solar Co Ltd, a leading manufacturer of multicrystalline solar wafers, said it has signed a 10-year contract which is a blend of “take-or-pay” linked with market-based pricing to supply multicrystalline solar wafers to India-based Moser Baer Photo Voltaic Limited (MBPV), a subsidiary of Moser Baer India Limited (MBI)....
(EnergyAsia, April 7, Monday) — Signet Solar, a US-based producer of solar modules for power generation, plans to invest up to US $2 billion in India over a seven-year period starting next year. The company will start begin its Indian presence with a major production facility near Chennai to start up in 2009. The plant...
(EnergyAsia, Apriil 7, Monday) — NYSE-listed Yingli Green Energy Holding Company Limited, a world leading vertically integrated photovoltaic product manufacturer, said it has completed installing the Solar Villar De Cañas 2 Project in Cuenca. The company was also the sole supplier of 9.5 MW of PV modules for the project to Control y Montages Industriales...
(EnergyAsia, April 7, Monday) — Vancouver, Canada-based Hanwei Energy Services Corp said it has completed and delivered the first four 1.5 megawatt turbines to Daqing Deta Electric Co Ltd, which will be installed by the end user, Heilongjiang Ruihao Energy Technology Co Ltd this month. The turbines will be installed using the three blade sets...
(EnergyAsia, April 7, Monday) — China’s government plans to establish a ministry for environmental protection to raise its anti-pollution efforts. The current State Environment Protection Administration will be upgraded to ministerial rank and be given more resources and staffing. Giving the move a cautious endorsement, Greenpeace China said: “We hope the promotion will also give...
(EnergyAsia, April 7, Monday) — NYSE-listed Suntech Power Holdings Co Ltd, one of the world’s leading manufacturers of photovoltaic (PV) cells and modules, and Nitol Solar Ltd, an independent polysilicon producer, have agreed to expand the terms of their existing seven-year polysilicon supply agreement from 2009 to 2015. Nitol has agreed to “substantially” increase the...