The global energy crisis has given the respective roles of renewables and fossil fuels top billing in news bulletins worldwide – and what contrasting stories they tell.
Despite a raft of economic headwinds, renewables powered ahead with record worldwide investment of $226bn in the first half of the year, said BloombergNEF, fuelled by a flight from volatile fossil supplies from unreliable sources.
Nowhere is that dash more urgent than in Germany, and Berlin this week sought to further ease the path for more new wind power when its air traffic controllers eased restrictions on turbine siting. A German study also claimed biogas is now a viable alternative to the fossil variety for up to half of power generation, opening another potential escape route from Putin’s stranglehold.
On the flipside, the bumper profits made by oil & gas firms remain the subject of intense debate as consumers and industrial users feel pain around the world.
As Recharge reported, the issue is now at the top of the international political agenda, with United Nations secretary-general António Guterres savaging the “grotesque greed” of the fossil giants and urging that their windfalls be used to help fund a just energy transition.
Siemens Gamesa is among the wind OEM giants in the epicentre of the global storm of pressures battering the industry, but this week gave a glimpse of how it plans to steer to calmer waters.
As it announced another tough set of results, the manufacturer outlined how its Mistral strategy, named after the famous European wind, would standardise and simplify its products and leave the entire company more efficient and effective.
The stakes are high, admitted CEO Jochen Eickholt as he promised to leave “no stone unturned” in the search for efficiencies, but warned that the entire wind industry will need to raise prices in the face of rampant inflation.
Away from the tough economic environment, Siemens Gamesa showed how it, like other turbine OEMs, is innovating to add value to future wind projects when its first recyclable offshore wind blade made its debut in the North Sea.
And the OEM was still in the news on Friday as its epic patent court showdown with GE over the latter's Haliade-X approached a climax in the US.
The US renewables sector this week continued to assess the implications of the surprise move by maverick Democrat senator Joe Manchin to back major climate and energy legislation, potentially breathing new life into President Joe Biden's green agenda.
Recharge took a deep dive into the 725-page Inflation Reduction Act, explaining how among the many wins for clean energy are conspicuous omissions around permitting and transmission.
Another Recharge piece looked at the implications of an entanglement between offshore wind and oil & gas as a result of the IRA's underpinning of fossil lease auctions.
What is not in doubt is the massive shot in the arm the Senate Democrats legislation could give the US sector, up to 550GW of new utility-scale battery storage, solar, and wind power projects between now and 2030, according to the American Clean Power Association.
