• A proposed hydrogen pipeline that would stretch 200 miles across the Navajo Nation is an environmental threat and a safety concern due to lack of regulations, a Navajo grassroots group argues in an educational campaign about the project.
• Minnesota Power now estimates a coal ash spill at a northern Minnesota power plant is five times larger than original estimates as clean up efforts continue.
• The average monthly wholesale spot natural gas price at the U.S. benchmark Henry Hub fell by 20% to $2.56 per million British thermal units (MMBtu) between January and June of this year, according to data from Refinitiv Eikon.
• Hyundai nears completion of its electric vehicle factory near Savannah, Georgia, with production expected to begin this fall, roughly two years after construction began. Hyundai already has hired more than 850 workers for its new Georgia electric vehicle factory, and now begins to ramp up hiring to fill thousands more jobs.
• Houston Mayor John Whitmire promises to hold CenterPoint Energy “accountable” for widespread outages during Hurricane Beryl, but the mayor and city have little power to regulate the utility.
• Rhode Island is now the first state to finish building out its high-speed highway charging network with funds from the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure program.• Debris from a broken offshore wind turbine has for days been washing up on the Nantucket shore, prompting beach closures and frustrating locals at the peak of the summer season. The massive turbine blade – as long as a football field – was part of the Vineyard Wind farm off the coast of Massachusetts and its islands, Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket.
• SunPower Corp. plunged to an alltime low after the solar company told dealers it would no longer support new installations and was halting shipments. The company has lost more than two-thirds of its market value this year as it contends with a decline in the rooftop solar industry as well as internal issues.
• California will be the first state to receive federal funds under a program to create regional networks, or “hubs,” that produce hydrogen as an energy source for vehicles, manufacturing and generating electricity, officials announced.
• The U.S. government announced that $325 million in federal funds will be available for solar and battery storage installations across Puerto Rico as the U.S. territory struggles with chronic power outages. The program, funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, will target community centers and healthcare facilities, as well as common areas in subsidized, multifamily housing.
• SLB and Halliburton Co., two of the world’s biggest oilfield service providers, said they see strong international demand for crude drilling after posting earnings that met or exceeded expectations, supporting their shift into overseas markets. While Halliburton met expectations with earnings per share, its sales of $5.8 billion were lower than analysts expected. World
• Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Friday called interruptions in Russian oil transit via Ukraine a “crisis” for the affected oil buyers, but said there was little scope for talks with the Ukrainian transit firms because the decision had been political.
• ExxonMobil Corp. has agreed to sell its Malaysian oil and gas assets to state energy firm Petronas, exiting the country’s upstream sector where it used to be a dominant producer, two sources with direct knowledge of the matter said.
• Chinese wind turbinemakers this month clinched their first order in Germany, as they build momentum in the European market and add to concern in the EU industry that it faces an existential threat. Tensions are high between Beijing and Brussels, the world’s two biggest wind markets, as the European Commission, the EU executive, has launched an investigation into whether Chinese players enjoy unfair subsidies reported Reuters.
• Search teams rescued nine crew members, mostly Indians, and recovered the body of another as they searched the Arabian Sea waters for others after an oil tanker capsized this week off the coast of Oman, Omani state media said.
• German Chancellor Olaf Scholz praised a tentative deal between Serbia and the European Union signed on Friday that paves the way for the disputed excavation of lithium, a mega project that could reduce Europe’s dependency on China but one that has been fiercely criticized by environmentalists and opposition groups.
• Bolivia’s embattled president last Monday announced the discovery of vast natural gas reserves, describing it as the biggest find in nearly two decades that could help the cashstrapped country reverse its falling production. President Luis Arce called the trove just north of the capital a “mega field,” saying it has some 1.7 trillion cubic meters of gas at a likely market value of $6.8 billion.
• Slovakia and Hungary said they have stopped receiving oil from key supplier Lukoil, after Ukraine imposed a ban last month on the transit of resources from the Russian energy company via its territory.
• Ford Motor Co. last Thursday outlined plans to use a Canadian plant it had earmarked for a future electric vehicle to instead build larger, gasoline- powered versions of its flagship F-Series pickup truck.
• Rosneft PJSC’s major Tuapse refinery in southern Russia caught fire after a Ukrainian drone attack early Monday, regional authorities said. This is the first successful Ukrainian attack on a major Russian refinery since mid-May, and it comes just as Russia’s oil-processing industry is on track to raise its runs to a six-month high to meet growing domestic fuel demand.