Switched On

The US power grid is under mounting strain from aging infrastructure, slow interconnections and regional bottlenecks, while demand, complexity and variability are on the rise. Building a future-ready grid will require major investment, smarter infrastructure and policy reform. So just what can be done to expand transmission capabilities to meet oncoming energy challenges in the US? At the Bloomber...

Copper is a cornerstone of the world’s infrastructure. From transportation to the energy transition to massive new data centers, demand for the metal is everywhere, and supply is feeling the crunch. Copper demand is forecast to outstrip supply by 6 million metric tons a year come 2035, but at the same time, market economics are limiting exploration and some mines are even closing up shop. So...

Despite the gloomy headlines in the US, global investment into clean energy technologies is still rising. The first half 2025 saw a record $386 billion flowing towards clean tech, a 10% rise from the same period last year. Yet despite the continuing rise in investment numbers, the devil lies in the details. For instance, solar was propelled by small-scale installations, while utility-scale investm...

Artificial intelligence needs power, and lots of it. If all the data centers in the current US pipeline get built, they could suck up the electricity from 100 nuclear power plants and still be left wanting more. One obvious solution for supplying this massive demand is natural gas, which is plentiful and cheap in the Lower 48, and now has the enthusiastic backing of the Trump administration. But w...

The One Big Beautiful Bill Act has reshaped the US clean energy landscape. Designed to scale back major US decarbonization programs while promoting fossil fuels, the OBBBA has severely restricted the rollout of solar, wind and energy storage projects while also taking direct aim at electric vehicles. The impact of the new law has been dramatic, but could it have been worse? And what does the whipl...

Right now, there are technologies that can pull carbon dioxide directly out of the air. That could be a critical tool in a world where climate change is rampant. Yet to fulfill this carbon removal potential, the sky-high costs of direct air capture need to fall. Today, capturing a metric ton of carbon dioxide with DAC costs around $900 on average, presenting a huge challenge to scaling the technol...

The Trump administration’s ‘Liberation Day’ tariffs are reshaping global trade flows. With the US currently renegotiating its trade positions with traditional partners and rivals alike, the tariffs’ true impact is yet to be fully understood. Even the handful of new deals that have been struck offer little guidance, as they break from the legally binding forms that internati...

Cutting industrial emissions has long been one of the most intractable hurdles in the energy transition. That may finally be changing, as a new generation of smart technologies not only paves the way for abating industrial emissions but promises to do so at scale. Four companies emerged victorious in this year’s BloombergNEF Pioneers challenge dedicated to decarbonizing heavy and light indus...

With air travel on the rise, the need for cleaner aviation is growing. Sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) presents the simplest means of decarbonization, but it’s expensive. Aircraft that burn less fuel, engines powered by hydrogen, and even electric air taxis are all potential means of decarbonizing air travel, but none are the silver bullet. So what will it take to green the aviation sector,...

Agriculture is responsible for around a third of global emissions. Yet investment in low-carbon means of growing food has stalled. Venture capital and private equity funding has declined by a massive 76% since 2021, ag-tech firms have declared bankruptcy, and large companies are backtracking on their green ambitions. So are there any “good news” stories about the food of the future? An...

When the Iberian electrical grid blacked out earlier this year, there were real-life consequences. Widespread disruption of transportation, communication networks and essential services left Spain and Portugal temporarily paralyzed. Following the event, two separate reports were released by the Spanish government and the grid operator, Red Electrica de Espana, where both agreed that voltage fluctu...

This week, we explore how the legislation’s attack on renewable energy may push up electricity bills and damage US competitiveness in AI. The tax credits in President Joe Biden’s sprawling Inflation Reduction Act were introduced to help the US keep up with rising electricity demand by making clean power sources cheaper. But now the big bill has changed all that, and an executive order...

Just how green are the investment portfolios of credit, equity and multi-asset funds? Building on its existing suite of banking and investment ratios, BloombergNEF has introduced the Energy Supply Fund-Enabled Capex Ratio, which assesses how much a given investment portfolio is contributing to low-carbon capital expenditures for every dollar directed to fossil fuels. Worldwide, low-carbon energy g...

Everyone is talking about how much energy data centers and artificial intelligence will gobble up in the coming years. Yet AI is just one part of a vast, complex and constantly evolving energy landscape. So how will the AI revolution fit into a world where electric vehicles are displacing liquid road fuels, renewable-power projects are stuck in grid queues and big tech is investing in nuclear? On...

Sales of electric vehicles are set for another record-breaking year. Thanks to falling battery costs and a rise in affordable models, plug-in EVs will represent a quarter of global passenger car sales in 2025. And while a rollback in government support has taken a bite out of EV uptake in the US, other countries are more than making up for this setback. Chinese automakers have been growing their f...

The Trump administration has made no bones about its desire to revitalize the US’s nuclear power industry. With four new executive orders hot off the president’s desk, nuclear is being treated as a silver bullet, capable of meeting AI power demand while shoring up the country’s energy independence. The US is also looking to counter China and Russia, which in recent years have led...

Solar module prices have been cratering in recent years, dragged down by global oversupply. Yet while this glut of photovoltaics has hammered manufacturer profits, it has also allowed emerging economies that are hungry for affordable energy to get into the solar game, and demand growth is still strong this year. So what lies ahead for this notoriously tricky market, could energy storage help mitig...

The oil and gas sector invested $33.4 billion in the energy transition last year. Yet while this figure suggests that decarbonization is a serious consideration for some fossil-fuel majors, just seven companies accounted for 85% of the sector’s low-carbon spend in 2024, and only 13 of 41 companies assessed raised low-carbon investment as a share of capex. So what are the different strategies...

Europe is making quick work of executing large industrial decarbonization infrastructure projects. The continent now boasts large-scale facilities for carbon capture, storage and transit in the UK, Denmark, the Netherlands, Italy and Norway. But how have policymakers managed to incentivize and facilitate the installation of these massive projects, and what’s required to push the sector...

Extreme weather has always meant extreme risks for businesses and investors. Yet climate change has varied the calculus, and many businesses are facing new, potentially existential risks as the world and the energy transition heat up. As such, central banks and financial supervisors have begun conducting climate risk stress tests, to ensure these institutions are capable of mitigating the potentia...

A United Nations-led aviation decarbonization scheme could offer some respite for carbon credit markets mired in controversy. With the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation, also known as CORSIA, the UN is looking to offer legitimacy for carbon credits, to help tackle emissions at scale. The scheme has a global footprint, with a roster of 126 markets set to expand to 13...

The rise of AI data centers is reshaping the outlook for US power markets. Forecast to account for nearly a 10th of all US electricity demand by 2035, data centers are gobbling up power more quickly than electric vehicles, hydrogen or any other demand class this decade. A profound concentration of capital has allowed for this rapid expansion, which is now exerting influence over energy infrastruct...

Clean energy investment in the US grew $50 billion last year. With interest rates easing and inflation in decline, the market appears to be well positioned to meet skyrocketing power demand from sources like artificial intelligence and data centers. Yet it’s not all smooth sailing: price cannibalization, curtailment risks, tariffs and clean energy policy shifts from the new Trump administrat...

One hundred days of the second Trump presidency have passed, and the impact has already been significant. While running for president, Donald Trump put the Inflation Reduction Act, ESG investing and clean energy policy in his crosshairs, only to have been held up once in office by courts, members of Congress and some states. The “Liberation Day” tariffs created turmoil on global market...

Oil demand growth outlooks have taken a heavy hit in recent weeks. In the wake of the Trump administration’s “Liberation Day” tariff announcements, US business and consumer sentiment tanked and global GDP expectations were trimmed, with knock-on effects for oil demand. On the other side of the globe, China’s demand for gasoline is falling fast, with domestic policy stimulat...