Oil & Energy
Space-Based Solar Power Finally Ready to Shine?
Scientists have dreamed of putting solar panels in outer space since the late 1960s, and have known that space-based solar power was technologically feasible since the 1970s. But the true race for space-based solar has only just begun, driven by the intensifying need to produce more electricity to meet rapidly growing energy demand. As more of the world becomes electrified, big data and AI become omnipresent, and decarbonization deadlines draw closer, innovative energy solutions are needed more than ever. As a result, space-based solar power is finally ready for its day in the sun.
This nascent technology employs enormous satellites to collect high-intensity sunlight and beam it down to Earth, either through microwaves or lasers. A receptor on Earth receives that energy and converts it into electricity to be fed into the grid. This energy would be dispatchable, as satellites would have gargantuan range and could flexibly beam energy to where the demand is greatest.
The production potential of space-based solar power is enormous. Because the panels are situated beyond clouds and the atmosphere, and are not impacted by the rotation of the earth, they receive high levels of unadulterated sunlight 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. As a result, these systems are capable of producing a potentially game-changing amount of clean energy.
According to calculations by researchers from King’s College London, space-based solar power could reduce Europe’s need for land-based renewable energy by as much as 80 percent, and reduce battery-based energy storage needs by more than two-thirds. The kicker? It would reduce the cost of Europe’s energy system by as much as 15 percent. The researchers found that the associated savings in terms “energy generation, storage and network infrastructure costs” would save an estimated 35.9 billion euros (41.7 U.S. Dollars) per year.
The higher energy density of space-based solar means that energy systems would need far fewer costly resources. Such a system “requires orders of magnitude fewer critical minerals to provide the same continuous power as a terrestrial solution with large-scale energy storage,” reads a recent article from the World Economic Forum. “This offers a more sustainable path, alleviating the strain on resources that the International Energy Agency (IEA) has identified as a key challenge,” the report continues.
Critically, these systems would also require far, far less land than Earthbound solar farms. Not only would we be outsourcing solar panels to outer space, the receptors that receive the solar energy here on Earth would be relatively small and mostly transparent, meaning that they would be well-suited to mixed-use spaces. This would alleviate intensifying issues of land scarcity faced by utility-scale renewable energies.
As the considerable benefits of space-based solar gain more attention, investment in their development has ramped up considerably. Labs in the United States, the United Kingdom, China, Japan, Europe, and other locations around the globe are all accelerating their research programs to advance space-based solar power, and high-profile private investors are now joining the trend as well. Big tech bigwig Baiju Bhatt, a co-founder of Robin Hood, launched the space solar startup called Aetherflux last year.
But space-based solar power still faces some key hurdles before it can be scaled for commercial use. The most significant of these, according to the World Economic Forum, is the way that private finance is structured around early-stage startups and not long-term infrastructure projects. While space-based solar power will be a big money saver in the long term, it will not provide quick or necessarily predictable returns on investment.
For this reason, startups are looking to government contracts to get space-based solar power off the ground. “We think that the military customer is large enough — and for lack of better word, difficult enough — of a customer that if we can serve, we can build a constellation and we can be at scale, Christian Garcia, managing partner at Breakthrough Energy Ventures, one of Aetherflux’s backers, told CNBC. “And at that point, we will have dropped the cost of the technology such that we can expand into other customers.”
By: Haley Zaremba
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The world’s largest international oil firms are ramping up production even as crude prices have weakened this year and global supply growth continues to outpace the demand increase, setting the stage for a glut in the coming months.
The European majors are back to investing in exploration and new oil and gas field developments after years of trying – and mostly failing – to generate profits and good returns from low-carbon energy projects, including renewable electricity, green hydrogen, and biofuels.
The U.S. supermajors, ExxonMobil and Chevron, are pumping record oil volumes in the top shale region, the Permian, while betting on international project expansions in Guyana and Kazakhstan, for example. The U.S. giants both reported in the second quarter record-high production in the Permian and worldwide, following Exxon’s acquisition of Pioneer Natural Resources and Chevron’s buying of Hess.
France’s TotalEnergies expects higher oil and gas production to have boosted earnings for the third quarter, despite a $10 per barrel decline in oil prices since last year.
Production at the other European supermajors, Shell and BP, is also rising as the European giants shifted focus back to their core oil and gas business. The pivot took place after the energy crisis made energy security and affordability more important than sustainability, while high interest rates and supply chain issues further reduced already meager returns from clean energy projects and made many new energy ventures uncompetitive.
The supermajors are confident they can withstand the current weaker prices and the surplus on the market, to which they have contributed, alongside the national oil companies of the OPEC+ producers, which have been reversing the production cuts this year.
Big Oil is looking beyond the short-term fundamentals and glut noise, having decided to invest more in oil and gas to meet solid demand until at least the mid-2030s.
Unlike the International Energy Agency (IEA), which earlier this year doubled down on its forecast of peak oil demand by the end of this decade, Big Oil companies don’t see any peak by 2030.
BP, which said last year that global oil demand would peak as early as this year, ditched this view in its new annual Energy Outlook last month, in which it now expects oil demand to rise through 2030 amid weaker-than-expected efficiency gains.
Most majors have put the peak at some point in the 2030s, but none expect a rapid decline afterwards, and all say that oil and gas will remain essential for global economic growth and development in 2050.
“Oil and natural gas are essential. There’s no other viable way to meet the world’s energy needs,” ExxonMobil said in its 2025 Global Outlook.
“Our Global Outlook projects that oil and natural gas will make up more than half of the world’s energy supply in 2050. We project that oil demand will stabilize after 2030, remaining above 100 million barrels per day through 2050,” the U.S. supermajor reckons.
“All major credible scenarios include oil and natural gas as a dominant energy source in 2050.”
All three scenarios analyzed in Shell’s 2025 Energy Security Scenarios found that upstream investment of around $600 billion a year “will be required for decades to come as the rate of depletion of oil and gas fields is two to three times the potential future annual declines in demand.”
Exxon and now the European majors are playing the long game—invest in new oil and gas supply, at the expense of renewables, to offset with new production the accelerating natural decline of producing oil and gas fields.
Even the IEA admitted last month that the world needs to develop new oil and gas resources just to keep output flat amid faster declining rates at existing fields, in a major shift in its narrative from 2021 that ‘no new investment’ is needed in a net-zero by 2050 scenario.
Exploration is also back at the top of the agenda for Big Oil, as the companies appear confident their product will be in demand for decades to come.
The expected massive overhang later this year and early next year is not putting off the supermajors’ plans to increase production. They are slashing costs via cutting thousands of workforce numbers to protect shareholder payouts at $60 per barrel oil. Companies have pledged billions of U.S. dollars in cost savings and slimmer corporate structures. That’s to eliminate inefficiencies and excessive costs while keeping payouts to shareholders at much lower prices compared to the 2022 highs.
This year, higher oil and gas production is partly offsetting the weaker prices.
Increased output also positions the world’s biggest companies for rising profits when the glut clears within a year or so, analysts say.
“All the supply coming to the market is shrinking OPEC’s spare capacity — so there’s a light at end of the tunnel,” Barclays analyst Betty Jiang told Bloomberg this week.
“Whether that’s second half of 2026 or 2027, the balance is going to tighten. It’s just a matter of when.”
By Tsvetana Paraskova
Oil & Energy
Stakeholders Lament Poor Crude Oil Supply To Indigenous Companies …..Urges President To Pressure NNPCL To Prioritise Local Refineries
Stakeholders in the Downstream oil sector in collaboration with Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) have called on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to create an enabling environment for all oil refining companies to thrive without fear or pressure of any kind.
They also want the President to mandate the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited to prioritize crude oil supply to local refineries over foreign partners.
The groups made the call during the Mega Rally against economic sabotage in the Nigerian Petroleum sector with the theme ‘National Unity Against sabotage: Reclaiming of Petroleum Sector for the People’, held in Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital.
Addressing journalists during the rally, the Convener of Partners for National Economic Progress, Olamide Odumosu, insisted that it was unacceptable that government agencies hide under the “willing supplier, willing buyer” clause to frustrate the supply of crude to local refineries.
Odumosu called on president Tinubu to ensure that crude oil supply to the dangote refinery is not debatable.
Odumosu described the recent expansion of the Dangote refinery from 650,000m bpd to 1.4m bpd as not just a national glory but a continental and global one expressing regrets however, that the Dangote refinery now rely on the international scene for crude .
In his words “As an oil producing country, the matter of supply of crude to local refineries (in this case, the Dangote Refinery) is not only a matter of Law as stated in the Petroleum Industry Act, but a manner of patriotic duty, national consciousness and economic prosperity drive. It is very sad, unfortunate and embarrassing that Dangote Refinery imports crude from other countries due to his inability to source it at home.
“It is for this reason that the PIA encourages regulatory agencies to formulate policies that will ensure the supply of crude to local refineries, including imposing sanctions where necessary”.
On his path, the convener of Niger Delta Youth council, comrade Danielson Prince, condemned the practice of importing crude oil from outside the shores of the country.
Prince noted that such was detrimental to Nigeria’s economy while calling on the President to pressure NNPC to sell crude oil to Nigerian companies within Nigeria.
“However, this is both a journey and a struggle. And we will not rest, will we get to the desired destination and victory achieved. There are still very important issues to address”, he stated.
Prince described the situation as sad stating that it was unfortunate and embarrassing that Dangote Refinery imports crude from other countries due to his inability to source it at home.
Odumosu also emphasized that it is unacceptable for government agencies in the country to hide under the willing supplier clause to frustrate the supply of crude oil to local refining companies in the country.
TheTide learnt that similar rallies were recently organized in Abuja, Kaduna and Asana respectively.
By: King Onunwor
The Federal Government, in partnership with state governors and private investors, has secured nearly $500m to establish solar manufacturing plants across Nigeria.
Minister of Power, Adebayo Adelabu, disclosed this at the just concluded Nigeria Energy Conference, in Lagos.
Recall that the minister had announced that Nigeria had begun exporting locally manufactured solar panels to Ghana, marking a milestone in the country’s renewable energy drive.
According to him, following the recently concluded Nigerian Renewable Energy Innovation Forum organised by the Rural Electrification Agency, the government secured agreements worth nearly $500m with state governors and private investors.
The initiative, he said, would add close to 4 gigawatts of solar manufacturing capacity per annum, almost 80 per cent of Nigeria’s current total power generation capacity.
“At the recently concluded Nigerian Renewable Energy Innovation Forum, we successfully activated agreements totalling almost $500m with state governors and investors. What will this do? It will bring on stream nearly 4 gigawatts per annum of solar manufacturing capacity, equivalent to almost 80 per cent of our current national generation capacity,” he stated.
He explained that the deals would support local production of solar panels, batteries, and meters, reducing dependence on imports and positioning Nigeria as a key player in the regional energy market.
“Companies that will manufacture solar panels here and that will manufacture batteries and meters here, we can give them deposits. With this scale of renewable energy production coming online, Nigeria is not only positioned to achieve its domestic renewable energy transition targets but also to serve as the regional power market,” Adelabu said.
He said this would strengthen the export of renewables, a feat he said was achieved recently with Ghana.
“Nigeria will serve as the regional power market in terms of the hub, which we recently started doing with the export of Nigerian-based solar panels to Ghana just last month. Yes, we exported solar panels manufactured in Nigeria to Ghana, and we will not stop. We will be the hub for this, not just for West Africa, but for the entire African market,” he stated.
The minister noted that the move would have far-reaching benefits for the economy, including job creation, foreign exchange earnings, and faster deployment of solar energy infrastructure.
He added that training and empowering Nigerian youths in renewable energy technologies would be key to sustaining the progress.
Adelabu assured investors that the government was creating an enabling environment for private sector participation across the power value chain, particularly in transmission.
“Nigeria’s power sector remains open and ready for business more than ever before. The government is ready to provide the right and conducive atmosphere to make this environment investor-friendly.
“As rational investors, recovery of your principal and margin on principal are very important, and the way the power sector is configured, you will never lose your investment; you will be proud to be an investor in Nigeria,” he added.