In a radical strategy to contain power bills, households would get lower rates in return for enduring short, but sharp, price increases when demand is at its highest. They could also be paid to go without air-conditioning. EnergyAustralia, which has 2.8 million customers in southeast Australia, is trialing charging households more than 12 times the normal price of power up to 14 times a year in two-hour "dy ...

Tata Power Solar, the leading Indian solar company, has won a prestigious 50 MW solar photovoltaic project from NTPC as part of their mandate to expand their renewable energy portfolio to 1,000MW by 2017. The new flagship 50MW project, at Rajgarh, Madhya Pradesh, will double NTPC’s solar capacity. Once commissioned in March 2014, the project is expected to generate 78.66 million units (Kwh) of energy each y ...

German solar panel manufacturer Conergy said it will file for insolvency, the latest victim of ferocious competition from Asia in the industry. Conergy, which has workforce of around 1,200, said it would file an application for the opening of insolvency proceedings at a court in the northern city of Hamburg but remained "confident" of finding an investor. "The management remains confident of achieving a con ...

Three deals in the last week marked a high point of activity in the secondary market for Chinese water and wastewater treatment plants. On 2nd July, Beijing Enterprises Water Group (BEWG) announced it had agreed to acquire 60% of Beijing Construction Engineering Group’s Environmental Development Company subsidiary. The RMB270 million ($43.6 million) purchase will bring a portfolio of 26 wastewater treatment ...

Marubeni Corporation together with Korea Electric Power Corporation (KEPCO) on a 50%:50% shareholding ratio, have jointly received the notification of an award for the development of a project to construct, own and operate a 1,200MW (600MW x 2 units; 1,200,000 kW) coal-fired power plant for electricity sales to Vietnam Electricity Holding Company (“EVN”) in Nghi Son, Thanh Hoa province, in the central area ...

ABB Ltd recently received an order from Rio Tinto plc to upgrade an existing power substation at the Cape Lambert port in Western Australia's Pilbara region. The order, booked in the first quarter, is worth approximately $27 million and is expected to be completed by early 2014. The main objective of the contract is to upgrade and increase port power supply to catch up with the incremental exports from Pilb ...

Bangladesh is a country technologically undeveloped. We are not aware of ways to contain nuclear radiation from a conventional U236 nuclear power plant we propose to buy from Russia and install it at Rooppur. Russia itself is the most unsafe nuclear power country in the world. This is a bitter truth irrespective of any opinions and convincing statements to the contrary. We must not make the people of Bangla ...

The much-delayed Kudankulam nuclear power project will become operational soon, India's principal scientific adviser said on Saturday. "The decision will come anytime now. Reactor is a safe reactor... no question about it... it is designed with safety features. It depends on the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) to examine the test results and decide," R Chidambaram told reporters on the sidelines of th ...

Veolia Environnement, Europe’s biggest water company, won a contract to build a desalination plant in Saudi Arabia that will supply a petrochemicals factory. The design and construction will generate $310 million in revenue, and operations will deliver $92 million over 10 years, the Paris-based company said today in a statement. The order, awarded by Saudi utility Marafiq, may be extended by 20 years. Saudi ...

India promised to protect key industries from the full impact of higher gas prices last week, taking the shine off a reform which may bring in more investment to the gas sector but could hike costs for consumers by around 50 percent from next year. Asia's third-largest economy took the unpopular step of approving a gas hike for the first time in three years on Thursday to encourage investment in domestic ou ...