U.S. Takes Stake In Battery Metals Miner To Counter Chinese Control

The US government is taking a $25 million equity stake in Dublin-based battery metals miner TechMet, as part of a push by President Donald Trump to reduce the country’s reliance on supply chains dominated by China. The backing from the $60 billion US International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) will help TechMet develop a nickel and cobalt mine in Brazil. Both…

Read More

Tighter Markets Cause Natural Gas Prices To Jump Almost 10%

Natural gas prices on Monday rose nearly 10 percent as lofty hopes of an economic stimulus deal in the United States persist, an increase in LNG exports, and positive reports of President Donald Trump’s bout with the coronavirus reinvigorates the markets after traders were spooked last week. At 1:50 p.m. EDT, natural gas spot prices were trading up $0.241 MMBtu (+9.89%) at…

Read More

Deadly Armenia-Azerbaijan clashes unlikely to cause an oil spike, analyst says

Deadly clashes between Armenia and Azerbaijan are unlikely to result in major disruptions to energy production and supplies, analysts say, despite the region being a critical corridor for pipelines transporting oil and gas to the global markets. “There is not really much anticipation that this will boil over into something more serious for oil and commodity markets,” Edward Bell, a…

Read More

NEPRA’S Non-Regulatory Operation

More than its quasi-judicial muscle, the power-sector regulator has started operating through backchannels to challenge the bureaucracy’s entrenched practices that have resulted in a black hole of more than 30pc in electricity generation through transmission, distribution and cost recovery. In February this year, a team of the National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) led by its top officials reached out…

Read More