“Over the next 10 years there will be around a dozen units, which will need to be decommissioned. These are RBMK units. Some of them may have their operating loves slightly extended, but the vast majority will have to be decommissioned, as they say, in real time. Therefore, we need to build 17 units by 2035." Likhachev said

Last fall, when the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis looked into the world’s 13 “flagship, large-scale” CCS projects, representing about 55% of global carbon capture capacity, it found that seven of the 13 projects underperformed, two failed outright, and one had to be mothballed.

Wind and solar need to be backed up, close to 100 per cent, by some other means of power generation. If that backup is provided by open-cycle gas or worse, coal, net zero will never be achieved: nor anything very close to it.

"For every dollar invested in fossil fuels, about 1.7 dollars are now going into clean energy. Five years ago, this ratio was one-to-one," Birol said.

China is ranked first for the number of nuclear power reactors under construction; it has 22 reactor units under construction, concentrated along the east and south coasts.

Interpath Advisory was appointed to handle the administration and sale of Toucan last November, as Thurrock Council in Essex revealed it was owed £692 million ($857 million) by the business. Interpath, which has hired advisers from KPMG to oversee an auction of the 53 sites, is hoping to recover losses through the sale of the farms.

Voluntary production cuts by some members of OPEC is due this coming month. Russia lifts levy on Oil & Gas firms amid G7 Price cap on Crude Oil.

The recommendations come at a time when South Africa is suffering its worst ever power cuts, with blackouts of more than 10 hours a day and a slowing economy, and is opening up the electricity generation industry to private operators.

Regardless of how this breakdown occurred, it is the symptom of greater issues with South Africa’s energy infrastructure.

U.S. commercial crude oil inventories increased by 4.5 million barrels to 459.7 million barrels.