Category: News

August 9 2017

Nissan Selling Battery Business to GSR for $1 Billion

By Jonathan Browning and Jie Ma Nissan Motor Co. is selling its battery business to Chinese private equity firm GSR Capital for about $1 billion, a person with knowledge of the matter said, as the Japanese carmaker seeks ways to improve competitiveness of its Leaf electric cars while reining in costs. The deal covers Nissan’s battery […]

August 8 2017

Oklahoma’s $100 Electric Car Fee Challenged by Sierra Club

By Ryan Beene and Dana Hull Oklahoma’s bid to help close a budget shortfall with a new $100 fee on electric vehicles drew a court challenge from the Sierra Club, which argues the state didn’t follow the correct procedures for enacting a tax or properly measure the benefits of having those cars on the road. […]

August 8 2017

Musk Revs Up Tesla Bond Buyers by Selling Them Debt With a Dream

By Nabila Ahmed, Sridhar Natarajan and Molly Smith Tesla Inc.’s Elon Musk is selling his dream. Bond investors seem to be closing their eyes and buying it. Musk brought his charm offensive to the debt market at a meeting for bond buyers in Manhattan on Monday and came away with orders for $600 million after […]

August 8 2017

Billionaire Who Made Killing on Cobalt Bets on Electric-Car Fund

By Mark Burton and Javier Blas An investment firm founded by Russian billionaire Vladimir Iorich is following its winning bet on cobalt this year by creating a $150 million fund to buy into metals used in electric cars. Pala New Energy Metals will invest in cobalt, lithium, vanadium, rare earths, nickel and tin. Pala Investments Ltd. […]

August 8 2017

Warren Buffett Likes Solar, but Not the Price Tag

By Brian Eckhouse and Noah Buhayar Warren Buffett has called global warming a “major problem” and put his company’s money where his mouth is, spending billions to develop solar and wind power. Yet he’s no hero to some renewable energy proponents. Their beef: They say the utility arm of Berkshire Hathaway Inc., his conglomerate, has […]

August 8 2017

Outsmarting Sunshine in Europe’s Cloudiest Corner

By Kelly Gilblom Five years ago, commodities trader Wayne Bryan hardly considered Britain’s famously overcast skies when buying and selling U.K. natural gas. Now he can’t afford to ignore them. Within the last year, the sun has taken on new-found importance across the cloudy island nation with photovoltaic cells providing as much as a quarter of the U.K.’s […]

August 7 2017

Trump Might Start an Ethanol Trade War With Brazil

By Mario Parker and Fabiana Batista President Donald Trump’s America First rhetoric is doing no favors for U.S. ethanol producers, who are hoping to avoid a trade fight with fuel buyers in Brazil. The administration has started making noise about rising imports of Brazilian biofuel made from sugar. That’s got the South American producer mulling […]

August 7 2017

Tesla Planning $1.5 Billion Bond Offering to Support Model 3

Tesla Inc. is selling bonds to bolster its balance sheet and support spending on the Model 3 sedan. The company plans to offer $1.5 billion in senior unsecured notes due in 2025, according to a statement. Tesla said it intends to use the proceeds to produce its most affordable model and for general corporate purposes. […]

August 7 2017

Spurned by Trump, Can Green Energy Count on Big Tech?

By Mark Bergen Before June, I will admit I had never heard of ARPA-E. Have you? The Department of Energy wing, formed in 2009, is charged with investing in new approaches to power energy. Its model agency is DARPA, the wacky Defense unit that birthed many things (GPS, advanced aircraft, the internet) that are now central to […]

August 7 2017

Saudi Arabia Builds Cities in the Sand to Move Beyond Oil

After relying on oil to fuel its economy for more than half a century, Saudi Arabia is turning to its other abundant natural resource to take it beyond the oil age — desert. The kingdom is converting thousands of square kilometers of sand into new cities as it seeks to diversify away from crude, create […]