Energy

Stephen King Falling oil prices and a darker global economic outlook

| Jan 08 06:00 | Comments |

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Nicholas Stern Public-private collaboration key to climate targets

| Dec 14 2015 13:22 | Comments |

Governments, local and national, must work with private sector Read more

Nicholas Stern Action on fossil fuel subsidies must be accelerated

| Nov 13 2015 05:30 |
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Smog in Harbin, northeast China  © Getty Images

When the leaders of the world’s biggest economies gather this weekend at the G20 summit in Antalya, Turkey, they must recognise the real scale of subsidies for fossil fuels and accelerate their eradication.

In 2009, G20 leaders agreed to “phase out and rationalize over the medium term inefficient fossil fuel subsidies while providing targeted support for the poorest”. They acknowledged that “inefficient fossil fuel subsidies encourage wasteful consumption, reduce our energy security, impede investment in clean energy sources and undermine efforts to deal with the threat of climate change”.

While that commitment has been restated at many summits since, action to implement it has been unacceptably slow. Read more

Dambisa Moyo Regulation will drive commodity prices up regardless of global outlook

| Jul 15 2015 05:30 | Comments |
Electronics Scrap Recycling At Aurubis

Copper smelting  © Getty Images

Over the past year, virtually every commodity across the composite index — metals, minerals, energy and foodstuffs — has suffered a notable decline in price. The one-year return on gold is down roughly 8 per cent, copper prices have declined more than 13 per cent and oil has fallen nearly 50 per cent.

Every year since 2011, the worst-performing asset class has been commodities — under-performing stocks, bonds, real estate and even cash. And they are down once again in 2015. Moreover, mining and oil companies have sustained enormous losses and writedowns — the mining sector alone, led by the poor performance of gold, copper and iron ore, posted impairments of close to $100bn for 2014. Recent performance is a far cry from the 150 per cent surge in 2009 in the aftermath of the financial crisis.

Now, however, commodity prices are poised for an appreciable rise due to changing regulation rather than traditional supply and demand dynamics. Read more