Joining William Powell and Joseph Murphy of Natural Gas World, Lewis McDonald discusses what the future now looks like in terms of investments in energy, namely oil and gas. Given the burgeoning global population, rising standards of living and climate goals, there has been a serious increase in awareness and concern in global climate change around the world.
The environmental, social and governance (ESG) agenda is now at the top of many companies’ priorities though currently appearing to mainly affect companies in Europe and less so in Asia. Prior to the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, ESG was the major issue being discussed in board rooms. With about 12,000 entities, together controlling around $14 trillion, divesting or wanting to divest from fossil fuels primarily based on consumer demand and consumer sentiment and where the laws and regulation are heading, we have seen rather a chilling effect on investment in the oil and gas sector – and the big question is ... where does it all go from here… Read more
We are well into the pandemic and lockdown in many regions, so it is natural to ask the question, “when will this end and when will we return to normal”... The problem is, “normal” was not sustainable, in so many ways. Those of us in the energy industry particularly know that to be true.
The “business as usual” scenario put out by the International Energy Agency in its 2019 World Energy Outlook does not make for happy reading. It had us on a crash course towards over three degrees of temperature increase due to carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuel consumption. The IEA also has a “sustainable development scenario” which keeps us within the Paris limits of 1.5 degrees. The only problem is that, according to the OECD, we would need to spend €6.3 trillion per year globally in each of the next 10 years for us to get there. To give you a feeling for how much money that is, the total size of the global economy is estimated at around $86 trillion. And so the challenge seems virtually impossible. Read more
If we look at the last few months, the energy markets have been hit by two crises. The first one, the most obvious, due to a slump in demand as a result of the lock-down and the halt in... Read more
The Commercial Court recently dismissed a claim to recover the cost of repairs to two offshore transmission cables linking the Gwynt Y Môr offshore wind farm in North Wales with the National Grid, which the claimant had sought to recover under an indemnity for “Pre-Completion Damage” in a business sale agreement: Gwynt Y Môr OFTO PLC v Gwynt Y Môr Offshore Wind Farm Ltd [2020] EWHC 850 (Comm).
Although the indemnity did not expressly state that “Pre-Completion Damage” was limited to damage occurring after the agreement was signed, the court... Read more
