2024-12-18 12:25

MILAN, Dec 18 (Reuters) - Italian engineering group Maire (MTCM.MI) , opens new tab and Newcleo have signed an agreement to set up a joint venture aimed at building power plants based on the nuclear firm's technology for advanced modular reactors, the two companies said on Wednesday. Newcleo will partner with Maire's unit NEXTCHEM to accelerate the development and the commercialization of its lead-cooled fast reactor powered by reprocessed nuclear waste. Advanced modular reactors powered by nuclear waste have attracted interest by investors because they promise to reduce the costs and the risks stemming from atomic waste handling. Under Wednesday's agreement, Newcleo is due to take a 40% stake in the joint venture. NEXTCHEM will be granted newly issued shares up to 5% of Newcleo's share capital at pre-money valuation, subject to the achievement of certain milestones, including the announcement of a final investment decision by the first client. According to Newcleo's plan, the first operational reactor in France is expected as of end 2031, while the final investment decision for the first commercial power plant is expected around 2029. The Italian government will draft, by early 2025, rules to allow the use of new nuclear power technologies, the energy minister said last week, signalling a potential reversal of the current ban on nuclear power generation. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/maire-newcleo-team-up-develop-power-stations-based-advanced-modular-reactors-2024-12-18/

2024-12-18 12:25

RIYADH, Dec 18 (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia has successfully extracted lithium from brine samples from national giant Aramco's oilfields and plans to launch a commercial pilot programme for direct extraction soon, the Saudi vice minister of mining affairs said on Tuesday. Lithium Infinity, also known as Lihytech, a start-up launched out of King Abdullah University for Science and Technology, will lead the extraction project with cooperation from Saudi mining company Ma'aden and Aramco, Khalid al-Mudaifer told Reuters. "They are extracting lithium through their new technology they have developed in King Abdullah University for Science and Technology and they are in accelerated development in this regard," he said. "They're building a commercial pilot at the oil fields. So the brines that come out of the field will feed into this commercial pilot on a continuous basis,” added Al-Mudaifer. Lithium is a key component in the batteries of electric cars, laptops, and smartphones. Reuters previously revealed that Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates' national oil companies planned to extract the mineral from oil runoffs. Other oil companies, including Exxon Mobil (XOM.N) , opens new tab and Occidental Petroleum (OXY.N) , opens new tab, plan to take advantage of emerging technologies to filter lithium from brine, as the world seeks to move away from fossil fuels. The vice minister said that while the cost of extracting lithium from the brine runoffs from oil fields remained higher than the traditional method of extraction from salt flats, he expected that if lithium prices grew the project would soon be commercially viable. In a statement to Reuters on Wednesday in response to the story, Aramco said lithium was "an area of interest" for the company and that it was evaluating the presence of the metal in its fields and its extraction. It did not give further details. KAUST and Ma'aden - which is majority owned by the kingdom's sovereign wealth fund - did not immediately reply to Reuters' requests for comments. Saudi Arabia, whose economy for decades has relied on oil, has spent billions on trying to turn itself into a hub for EVs as part of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman's attempts to find alternative sources of wealth. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/saudi-arabia-has-extracted-lithium-oilfield-runoffs-vice-minister-says-2024-12-17/

2024-12-18 12:06

Deep Sky to host eight companies for DAC technology testing Breakthrough Energy Catalyst aims to reduce green premium for climate tech UN says needs to remove billions of tons of CO2 from atmosphere annually Dec 18 - Bill Gates's Breakthrough Energy is giving a $40 million grant to a startup aiming to create a Canadian testing ground for technologies that suck carbon directly from the air, in an effort to speed up their rollout, the firms said on Wednesday. U.N. scientists say the world needs to remove billions of metric tons of previously emitted CO2 from the atmosphere each year, in addition to slowing current emissions, and firms around the world are trying to find ways to respond. Direct Air Capture, or DAC, is seen as a way to suck up vast amounts of carbon dioxide since it works with ambient air, but the technology has so far been energy-intensive, expensive and slow to reach the necessary scale. To help accelerate development efforts, startup Deep Sky said it is creating the "Alpha" DAC test ground in Alberta, which will initially have room for eight companies to try out their technologies and tune them up on the way to developing commercial-scale plants. The first will start removing carbon next spring, it said. Deep Sky also will help test how DAC works in the cold climate of Canada, which is a major oil producer and last week raised its goal of cutting greenhouse gas emissions by up to 50% by 2035. Breakthrough Energy, founded by Bill Gates, invests and funds climate-focused startups. Its Catalyst unit focuses on early-stage firms and made the Deep Sky grant. "The overall mission of Catalyst is to drive down the green premium and move these technologies towards profitability," Breakthrough Energy Catalyst head Mario Fernandez said in an interview, adding that DAC was currently "very challenging". Deep Sky CEO Damien Steel said the company was starting to develop commercial scale direct air capture plants in Canada and aimed to use the Alpha test ground to find efficient new technology to use. The development has started before Deep Sky has picked the technology for the project, which increases speed but also carries risks. Steel said that Deep Sky was running multiple development steps in parallel that normally would be done sequentially. "The reason they're done in a sequential order is because nobody ever wants to take on any risk," he said. "We don't have the time." The first seven of the eight DAC companies are Airhive, Mission Zero, Skyrenu, Skytree, NEG8 Carbon, Greenlyte and Phlair. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/climate-energy/bill-gates-firm-gives-40-mln-canadian-carbon-tech-test-bed-2024-12-18/

2024-12-18 12:05

NEW DELHI, Dec 18 (Reuters) - India's sugar mills can easily export up to 2 million metric tons of the sweetener this season as domestic supply prospects improve and local prices show a downward trend, the head of a leading industry body said on Wednesday. "The supply situation looks better than initially expected, which is why the government should allow mills to export at least a million or a couple of million tons of sugar," Deepak Ballani, director general of the Indian Sugar Mills Association, told Reuters in an interview. Last year, India, the world's biggest sugar producer after Brazil, banned exports of the sweetener for the 2022-23 season, halting shipments for the first time in seven years, as a drought cut cane yields and hit output. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's administration extended the ban on sugar exports for the second straight season, as India, also the world's biggest consumer of the sweetener, grappled with the prospect of lower cane output. India's sugar season runs from October to September. However, India is likely to produce a record amount of sugar in the 2024-25 season after millions of farmers expanded cane cultivation, encouraged by ample water supplies and declining prices of competing crops. "Since cane planting has been strong, next year's production is expected to be quite robust," Ballani said. "In anticipation of substantially higher production, sugar prices have dropped, and the permission to export at least 1-2 million tons will help mills struggling with lower prices," he said. Sugar prices in India have fallen to their lowest level in 1-1/2 years due to ample supplies, making it difficult for mills to pay farmers the cane price. Ballani said sugar prices had dropped significantly below mills' cost of production of 41,000 rupees ($482.90) per ton. "Even if the government allows us to export 2 million tons of sugar, we will still have a surplus of 5.6 million tons at the start of the next season on Oct 1, 2025," Ballani forecast. ($1 = 84.90 rupees) Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/world/india/indian-mills-can-export-up-2-million-tons-sugar-this-season-industry-says-2024-12-18/

2024-12-18 11:34

TOKYO, Dec 18 (Reuters) - Japan's Idemitsu Kosan (5019.T) , opens new tab said on Wednesday it would increase its stake in Vecco Group to 50.1% from 14.7%, gaining a majority in the Australian vanadium developer as part of its expansion into critical minerals used in batteries. The move is aimed at capturing a chunk of the fast-growing renewable energy storage market. Idemitsu will lead the creation of an integrated vanadium supply chain, spanning mine development to electrolyte production, marking its full-scale entry into the critical minerals business, the company said in a statement. Vecco is developing the Debella project in Queensland, focusing on a vanadium mine and an electrolyte plant for vanadium flow batteries (VFBs). The project aims to establish a local supply chain for mining vanadium ore, refining vanadium pentoxide, and producing vanadium electrolyte. In 2023, Vecco began operating Australia's first commercial-scale vanadium electrolyte facility. A detailed feasibility study for the vanadium mine is planned for early 2025, with mine construction set for 2026 and operations targeted to begin in 2027, Idemitsu said. "Demand for energy storage will likely grow in developed countries as power consumption increases and the share of renewable energy rises," Idemitsu senior executive officer Yuzo Yoshida told reporters. "We want to leverage our knowledge and experience we have built over many years in coal mining in Australia," he said. Idemitsu's total investments into Vecco will reach 75 million Australian dollars ($47 million) after completing the additional purchase next month. Vanadium is seen as a technology that promises longer storage times and improved safety. VFBs, which use vanadium-based electrolytes, are suitable for power system storage due to their easy scalability, long lifespan with minimal deterioration, and no risk of ignition, according to Idemitsu. Storage is critical to help balance supply and demand when wind and solar farms produce more renewable electricity than the grid's distribution system can handle, or when a lack of sun or wind means they are generating too little power. ($1 = 1.5843 Australian dollars) Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/idemitsu-take-majority-stake-australian-vanadium-developer-vecco-2024-12-18/

2024-12-18 11:31

Dec 18 (Reuters) - A river boat sank in western Democratic Republic of Congo, killing at least 22 people after the overcrowded upper deck collapsed, a local official told Reuters on Wednesday. Boating accidents are common in Congo, where old, wooden vessels are the main form of transport between villages and are often loaded far beyond capacity. The boat was carrying as many as 100 passengers when it sank on Tuesday in western Mai-Ndombe province, the local official said. The victims included 15 women, five men and two children. "Until we have safer, metallic boats, we will continue to have shipwrecks. There are thousands of these wooden ones circulating on the waters of Mai-Ndombe," the provincial governor Lebon Nkoso Kevani told Reuters. He added that a team of provincial officials had deployed to the area to investigate and that many passengers were believed to have escaped to shore after the disaster. In October, at least 78 people drowned when a boat carrying 278 passengers capsized in Lake Kivu in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. Anicet Babanga, a senator for Mai-Ndombe province, told Reuters on Wednesday that around 30 people were confirmed to have survived the latest wreck, and that a search was underway to establish the fate of the other passengers. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/congo-river-boat-sinks-killing-least-22-2024-12-18/