ENI - Eni will invest €7 billion in Italy over the next four years, including €1 billion in green activities

PENNENERGY - Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy has secured orders for the supply of 39 onshore wind turbines in France, with aggregate capacity of 104 MW, at five wind farms being developed in the regions of Hauts de France, Grand Est, Burgundy and in Western France.

EIA - South Africa is one of the world’s leading emitters of energy-related carbon dioxide (CO2), ranking fifteenth globally in 2015 and accounting for more than any other country in Africa. In an effort to reduce CO2 emissions, South Africa is planning to diversify its energy portfolio, replacing coal with lower CO2-emitting fuels such as natural gas and renewable sources. The country’s Intended National Determined Contribution, submitted as part of the Paris Agreement, plans for CO2 emissions to peak by 2025, remain flat for a decade, and begin to decline around 2035.

PLATTS - South Korea aims to boost the portion of LNG in its electricity generation mix to 18.8% in 2030 from an estimated 16.9% this year as part of efforts to reduce its heavy reliance on coal and nuclear, the energy ministry said.

EIA - North Sea Brent crude oil spot prices averaged $63 per barrel (b) in November, an increase of $5/b from the average in October. EIA forecasts Brent spot prices to average $57/b in 2018, up from an average of $54/b in 2017.

Bob Dudley, BP group chief executive, said: “Global energy markets are in transition. The longer-term trends we can see in this data are changing the patterns of demand and the mix of supply as the world works to meet the challenge of supplying the energy it needs while also reducing carbon emissions. At the same time markets are responding to shorter-run run factors, most notably the oversupply that has weighed on oil prices for the past three years."

Specifically, a plan to boost wind and solar energy capacity in coming years was likely to bring in $13 billion in investment, Procaccini said. There also is potential for $30 billion in mining investments to help Argentina catch up to neighboring Chile, and efforts to cut labor costs will help attract investment in oil and gas.

Peak electricity demand has grown nearly 13% over the past two years as a growing middle class seeks new services, such as air conditioning, which continue to place higher demands on the system. Over the next 25 years, energy demand is expected to more than double as a result.

The growing world economy will require more energy, but consumption is expected to grow less quickly than in the past - at 1.3% per year over the Outlook period (2015-2035) compared with 2.2% per year in 1995-2015.

China will launch the trading of green certificates for solar and wind power on July 1 in a bid to help reduce government subsidies to the renewables sector, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) said.

OPEC’s biggest crude producer is embarking on a domestic renewable-energy program costing $30 billion to $50 billion. The country’s only solar plant in operation, aside from a limited pilot project, is a 10-megawatt facility on top of a parking lot at Saudi Aramco’s headquarters. The national utility, Saudi Electricity Co., is seeking bids for two solar plants to generate a combined 100 megawatts.

We expect global GDP to more than double over the next 20 years, while energy demand increases by only 30%. The difference between those two things is improving energy efficiency or declining energy intensity. That is critical in underpinning the shift we expect to see in the rate of growth of carbon emissions. We think the energy intensity of GDP will decline much more rapidly than we’ve ever seen before.

The U.S. and Mexico will commit to joining Canada in boosting their use of wind, solar and other carbon-free sources of electricity, helping North America meet an ambitious goal of generating at least 50 percent of its energy from “clean” sources by 2025.