Green Markets - June 17, 2024

Jun 18, 2024

Green Markets is a daily series dedicated to highlighting events of interest that could impact investments within environmental markets.

The Norwegian government has approved 35B NOK in state aid for offshore wind and an increase in the nation’s CO2 tax.

The government of Quebec, Canada has announced $200M in funding to support agricultural businesses. Aid benefits include direct financial aid, interest rate protection, and climate change adaptation support.

The Canadian government blocked the sale of Vital Metals’ rare earth element (REE) stockpiles to a Chinese buyer. Instead, the Saskatchewan Research Council is buying them for $2.2M.
Serbia is set to give Rio Tinto approval to develop Europe’s largest lithium mine, the Jadar project.
Copper prices have dropped to an eight-week low thanks to weak demand out of China. Growth in industrial output and other investments is slowing while the housing market continues to worsen in the country. Via mining.com:

Empati, a renewable energy technology firm, and TNE, a provider of energy solutions, have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to boost the production of green hydrogen, ammonia, and biofuels.
Vast Renewables (VSTE) and Mabanaft have signed a joint agreement to develop a green methanol plant in Australia. The project, Solar Methanol 1, is expected to produce 7,500 tonnes of green methanol.

ADNOC has chosen Celeros Flow Technology for a contract on two high-pressure injection packages for a carbon capture and storage project at the Habshan gas plant. This project is part of ADNOC’s planned $15 billion decarbonization investment in low-carbon solutions with the aim of decarbonizing by 2050.

Tesla is suing a former supplier, Matthews International, for allegedly stealing battery technology trade secrets. The company believes that Matthews shared secrets about their process with other EV competitors. Damages are estimated to exceed $1B.
Chilean lithium mining firm SQM has entered a supply agreement with Hyundai and Kia for future lithium hydroxide production.
Berkshire Hathaway has trimmed its stake in BYD, selling approximately 1.3M shares of the company for $40M. Berkshire now owns 6.90% of BYD, in comparison to the previous 7.02%.

Nova Scotia, Canada, has approved NS Power’s project to build three new large-scale battery storage facilities. Each BESS site is estimated to store 200 MWh at an output of 50 MW, so they will last four hours.
OnePlus has announced a partnership with one of the world’s largest battery suppliers, Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. Limited (CATL) to create a new technology called OnePlus Glacier Battery.

Tesla unveils plan to create a new hydrogen-powered car by 2026.
Essar Group, a global infrastructure and resource firm, plans to invest $3.6B over the next four years in the renewable energy sector, particularly in building a 1 GW green hydrogen plant in India.

LNG imports into India fell over 7% year-over-year in May due to stagnant demand in the country.
The O&G company Perenco has bought up an approximate 10% stake in the floating LNG company Golar LNG (GLNG).
Russian LNG company Nobatek is confident that, despite Western sanctions, it’ll complete its Arctic LNG 2 plant by H2 2026.

The Biden administration is providing up to $900M in federal funding for the initial deployment of small modular reactor (SMR) technologies.
Ukrainian parliament is supporting a bill to complete the construction of two new reactors at the Khmelnytskyi Nuclear Power Plant.
Westinghouse, Cameco, and Saskatchewan Power have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to evaluate Westinghouse’s nuclear reactor technology, along with the nuclear fuel supply chain requirements that Saskatchewan would need for said technology.
Bill Gates is planning to invest billions of dollars into nuclear energy technology via his nuclear startup TerraPower. The company recently broke ground on a new advanced nuclear power facility in Wyoming.
Kazakhstan’s nuclear power company Kazatomprom has signed a new subsoil use agreement with the government for pilot production at its Inkai 3 uranium deposit.

The U.S. Plastics Pact, representing over 80 large corporations, including Coca-Cola, Nestlé, and Danone… has moved its plastic economy circularity goals from 2025 to 2030. A large blow to social pressures on plastic producers and consuming companies to seek out new recycling solutions.

Google has signed an agreement with NV Energy to buy 115 MW of geothermal power from Fervo Energy for data centers in Nevada.
Iberdrola, a renewable energy utility company, has obtained environmental approvals from the Portuguese government to build the largest wind farm in the country, estimated to have a capacity of 274 MW.
Power utilities NextEra and Entergy are collaborating to deploy 4.5 GW of solar and battery storage projects over the next five years.

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