UAE to invest $163 billion to diversify energy
The United Arab Emirates announced today plans to invest 600 billion dirhams ($163 billion) in projects to generate almost half the country’s power needs from renewables. “Our aim is to balance our economic needs with our environmental goals,” Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum said on Twitter as the Gulf state unveiled its “Energy Strategy 2050”. The UAE is a top oil exporter, but has taken steps to reduce its dependency on fossil fuels to generate power, including building nuclear facilities. The country’s energy mix by 2050 will comprise 44 per cent from renewables, 38 per cent from gas, 12 per cent from clean fossils and six per cent from nuclear energy, said Sheikh Mohammed, who is also the UAE’s vice president and the ruler of the emirate of Dubai. “The plan aims to increase usage efficiency by 40 per cent and increase clean-energy contributions to 50 per cent,” he wrote. In June, Dubai announced plans to build a 1,000-megawatt solar power plant by 2030, the year it aims to turn to renewable energies for 25 percent of electricity needs. In 2014, Abu Dhabi opened the world’s largest operating plant of concentrated solar power, which has the capacity to provide electricity to 20,000 homes. South Korean firms are also building four nuclear reactors west of Abu Dhabi, which are expected to generate 1,400 megawatts by 2020. The Gulf states are located in one of the world’s sunniest regions but they are far from being world leaders in solar energy. Mitchell Trubisky Womens Jersey
How solar rooftop plants are cheaper backup than DG sets
Solar rooftop units could be a much cheaper option for large apartment complexes, which usually depend on polluting diesel generator sets for power backup. A new study by the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) has found that the cost of using solar plants is less than half of what one would spend on a DG set. The study released on Tuesday reveals that the cost of power generation from a DG set, including the capital cost, is Rs 27-33 per unit, compared to rooftop solar tariff of Rs 10 per unit. Though most consumers perceive solar power to be expensive, prices of panels have fallen sharply in the past few years, thus bringing down the cost of rooftop projects.The cost of solar panels account for 50-55% of the total project cost. The photo voltaic module prices have fallen from 1.95 euros per watt in March 2010 to 0.53 euros in July 2016. “The cost of electricity generation through solar rooftop with battery backup comes to around Rs 7-8 per unit, which is half the cost of electricity supplied through DG sets. In addition, rooftop plants can reduce the monthly bill of the consumers as the extra units generated through these plants can be supplied to the grid,“ the report said. To compare the costs of solar rooftop and DG sets, CSE, along with cKinetics–an advisory firm–conducted a feasibility study of five housing societies in Delhi, Haryana, UP and Rajasthan. Two of these are Satisar in Dwarka, which has 245 flats and a 112 KW DG set (partial backup).Satisar faces an outage of about 48 minutes per day . The other is ICON in Gurgaon, which has 344 flats with a1,112 KW DG set (full backup). ICON faces about 16 minutes of outage per day . The team assessed the feasibility based on various parameters such as rooftop area, load needs and average outages. Two models were considered–Capex–the residential society pays for the capital costs of installing the solar rooftop and RESCO, under which installation is done by a developer. Societies pay a pre-decided tariff on a monthly basis. Under both models, the cost of supply of power was between Rs 6 and Rs 9 for all the societies. As a backup system for outages, a rooftop plant will work only if it has battery storage. In other words, it’s like an inverter fuelled by clean energy , experts explained. A BSES Rajdhani Power Limited official has clarified that solar rooftops will have to work with reliable grid supply since they cannot provide full backup unlike DG sets. “Solar rooftop can meet basic needs during brief outages but cannot provide full backup (power to run energy-intensive appliances like ACs),“ he said. The report reasons that with the decrease in duration of outages, the use of DG sets in residential societies has declined to only 200-300 hours per year. The BSES official highlighted that there were other benefits of having a solar rooftop plant–they could bring down power bills apart from providing backup during outages. Julius Peppers Authentic Jersey
Saudi cuts February oil exports to some buyers in India, Malaysia to meet OPEC deal
Saudi Arabia has cut February term crude supplies to refiners in India and Southeast Asia, seeking to comply with an OPEC deal, but it has held most of its exports to the rest of Asia steady for a second month, industry sources said on Wednesday. State oil giant Saudi Aramco reduced February term supplies of mainly heavy crude to Reliance Industries and Hindustan Mittal Energy Ltd (HMEL), as well as to Malaysia’s Petronas, four sources familiar with the matter said. Aramco has also cut oil supplies to another southeast Asian buyer for a second month in February, one of the sources said. That means some major oil companies in Europe and the United States could see reductions of up to 18 percent in their term volumes for February, the source said. “Saudi Arabia and Kuwait are focusing their cuts on US and European customers as they target excess inventories and protect market share in Asia,” Energy Aspects analyst Virendra Chauhan said. Saudi Aramco and the other companies could not be reached for comment. Details on the amounts of the supply reductions could not be confirmed. Saudi’s February supply reductions to a handful of Asian refiners mark the start of cuts to a region left untouched in January at the onset of the OPEC output deal. The producer maintained strong exports to Asia in January to protect its market share there and because it gets higher netbacks on sales to the East than it does for other regions. The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) agreed to cut production by 1.2 million barrels per day (bpd) in the first half of 2017 to reduce a global supply glut and support prices. World’s top exporter Saudi Arabia cut oil output in January by at least 486,000 bpd to 10.058 million bpd. Still, Saudi Aramco kept February supplies to most North Asian refiners at full volumes for a second month, trade sources said, indicating it will have to continue cutting exports to Europe and the United States to meet its OPEC commitment. “I think the Saudis won’t touch volumes to Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. Southeast Asian demand is small when compared to North Asia,” a Singapore-based crude analyst with a European oil company said. Ed Dickson Womens Jersey
Demonetisation to hold back India’s 2017 fuel demand growth
Fuel demand growth is expected to slow by as much as 40 per cent in 2017 from last year as a government-induced cash shortage hurts businesses, industry and car sales. The dent in demand growth in the world’s third-largest oil consumer is expected to be temporary, though, with India still taking up the third-biggest portion – behind China and United States – of 2017’s rise in fuel use on a barrel-per-day basis, according to energy consultancy Wood Mackenzie. Fuel demand in 2016 grew at its fastest in at least 16 years as low oil prices boosted demand for gasoline and aviation fuels, but analysts say the nation’s currency troubles will put the brakes on this year. Oil product demand growth in 2017 is expected to drop to 160,000 barrels per day (bpd), from 270,000 bpd in 2016, according to Woodmac. “We see Indian demand growth slowing … due to the recent currency demonetisation drive by the Indian government,” said Suresh Sivanandam, the consultancy’s Singapore-based senior manager of Asia Pacific refining research. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s currency crackdown has led to a cash crunch that has severely hurt overall output and consumer demand, with December factory activity contracting in its biggest monthly decline in eight years and last month’s car sales dropping the most in 16 years. Growth in both diesel consumption – used mainly for heavy industrial vehicles – and gasoline burned to power cars, is expected to slow, especially in the first quarter, traders and analysts told Reuters. And while this will dent refining margins for diesel, it is not expected to be enough to undercut a strong 2017 profit outlook for the fuel across Asia this year. “The cash crunch … is dampening growth in agricultural and other small-to-medium scale sectors, which are heavily cash-reliant,” said Sri Paravaikkarasu, head of East of Suez Oil at energy consultants FGE. “It will easily take three to six months for the dust to settle,” she said, although long-term prospects remain strong, with spending on infrastructure projects and a resumption in economic growth and freight shipments supporting diesel. Diesel demand is expected to grow only 2 percent in the first quarter of 2017 compared with a year ago, less than half of the 5 per cent growth rate seen in the first 10 months of 2016, said Tushar Tarun Bansal, director of Singapore-based consultancy Ivy Global. Actual oil demand growth may be lower than projected, though, cautioned an Indian refiner source, as consumers have been stocking fuel to take advantage of an exception given to old 500 and 1,000-rupee notes for purchases of diesel and gasoline at retail pumps. Leonard Williams Jersey
Target of 15 million LPG connections under PMUY for 2016-17 achieved: Pradhan
The Centre has already achieved the target of 1.5 crore LPG connections for 2016-17 fiscal under a scheme for providing free cooking gas connections to BPL families, Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said today. The government had set a target of five crore connections for three years, ending 2018-19 under the Prime Minister Ujwala Yojana (PMUY) scheme, with 1.5 crore each during this and next fiscal, and two crore in 2018-19, he said here. For 2016-17 fiscal, the target had been achieved by the end of December and 10,000 more connections would be added in the remaining months, he said. He said LPG connection was not only commercial one, but a catalyst for socio-economic change and considering the deaths of five lakh women per year due to the usage of unhealthy fuels for cooking, the government decided to provide the connections free of cost. Stating that there were 13 crore LPG consumers in 2014, when NDA government took over, he said it had gone up to 19 crore and the target was 27 crore by 2020. His ministry would add 10,000 distributors to the present 80,000, to achieve this. Replying to a question, he said his ministry had records to prove that beneficiaries were using the LPG connections. On digital payments at petrol outlets, Pradhan said fifty cities, including Chennai, Coimbatore, Madurai and Tiruchirapalli, had been identified for ensuring 100 per cent digital facility. Of the 4,554 petrol bunks in Tamil Nadu, a total of 4,077 were having either Point of Sales machines or wallet facility, he said Pradhan, who was here to attend the convention of All India LPG Distributors Federation, said he had asked the gas agencies to focus on safety, by spreading awareness about preventive measures. On plans to generate alternative fuel or producing more ethanol, Pradhan said the government had decided to start 11 ethanol plants, including one in Tamil Nadu, in the next two years. Mark McGwire Womens Jersey
India’s 2016 fuel sales growth highest in at least 16 years on low crude prices
India’s fuel demand in 2016 grew at its highest pace in at least 16 years as low oil prices for most of the year boosted demand for gasoline and aviation fuels. Consumption of fuels, a proxy for oil demand, surged 10.7 percent to 196.48 million tonnes in 2016, data from the Petroleum Planning and Analysis Cell (PPAC) of the Oil Ministry showed. State polls in India in five states in February and March are likely to send thousands of voters criss-crossing vast distances, boosting gasoline demand throughout the first quarter of 2017, but analysts say growth could slow over the year as currency woes bite. Huge rallies by parties to showcase their political might among voters are a common sight before elections. Canvassing involves transportation of thousands of people from neighbouring areas to the rallies in trucks and buses. India’s refined fuel demand grew at 4.3 percent in December, its slowest pace in three months, but use of diesel-fired generator sets and vehicles by political parties for canvassing in state polls could result in higher demand this quarter. “2016 fuel consumption was high, mainly due to gasoline sales, rapid penetration of LPG (liquefied petroleum gas) in parts of the country and cheaper air travel due to low oil prices,” said Tushar Tarun Bansal, a director at Singapore-based consultancy Ivy Global Energy. Gasoline demand rose 12.2 percent in 2016 on top of strong growth in 2015, with diesel demand rising 5.6 percent, its fastest in four years, driven by a surge in domestic automobile sales. Cooking gas or liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) sales rose 11.3 percent to 21.19 million tonnes. In early November, India scrapped the 500- and 1,000-rupee notes as part of a crackdown on tax dodgers and counterfeiters but allowed the use of the banned currency for select purposes such as buying fuel for automobiles and cooking. India’s December fuel sales were dented by an end of that exemption, which was the main reason for a spike in local sales in November. Data on India’s fuel consumption is available only from April 1998 on the PPAC’s website. Bansal of Ivy Global sees India’s fuel demand growth slowing by 4.8 percent to about 4.4 million barrels per day (bpd) in 2017 as currency concerns could slow economic and industrial growth while higher oil prices could choke of the fuel demand gains. “Efforts to ban large denomination notes will have a temporary negative effect on overall economic activity, as they restrain the efficient distribution of money,” the International Energy Agency (IEA) said in a report last month. The IEA also estimated India’s fuel demand growth to ease to 6.3 percent in 2017 from an estimated 7 percent in 2016. Kenneth Acker Womens Jersey