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The British Office of Gas and Electricity Markets (Ofgem) has set the final level of the price cap for the domestic default tariff. The cap has been set at £1,137/year (€1,301/year) for a dual fuel bill, in line with the indicative level announced in September 2018. Price protection on poor value default tariffs will come into force in January 2019 for 11 million customers. The Ofgem expects the cap to save the average customer around £76/year (€87/year). The price cap level will be updated every year in April and October to reflect the latest estimated costs of supplying electricity and gas, including wholesale energy costs.

The tariff cap came into force with the Domestic Gas and Electricity Act in July 2018 and required Ofgem to implement a temporary cap on standard variable tariffs and fixed-term default tariffs.

US-based power utility Southern Company will sell the 720 MW Mankato Energy Center located in Minnesota (United States) to the US utility holding Xcel Energy for a total consideration of US$650m, in order to consolidate its balance sheet. The sale is expected to be completed by mid-2019 and comes two years after Southern Energy acquired the power plant from Calpine,…

Voters from the US State of Washington have rejected the Initiative 631 (I-1631), which proposed to introduce a US$15/tCO2 carbon tax that would have raised more than US$1bn/year by 2023. It was meant to rise by US$2/tCO2 each year until the state’s annual emissions fell 25% below their 1990 levels.

The Indonesian government has decided to award 20-year contract extensions to three oil and gas block operators starting from 2022. The concerned assets are the Tarakan block awarded to Medco Energi Internasional’s subsidiary Medco E&P Tarakan with a 100% operating interest, the Coastal Plains and Pekanbaru (CPP) license awarded to Bumi Siak Pusako with a 100% stake and the Tungkal block,…

The Bulgarian Ministry of Energy forecasts that gas imports from Azerbaijan will cover approximately 30% of its gas consumption beyond 2020 and thus help reduce its almost entire dependence on Russian gas imports, which currently cover more than 90% of the country’s gas needs.

The German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWi) has unveiled the Energiesammelgesetz, a draft law which would amend the existing regulations for renewable energies and CHP power plants. The Federal Cabinet passed the draft law in early November 2018. The draft foresees that 4 GW of solar and onshore wind power would be tendered until 2021, of which 1 GW in 2019,…

The South Korean government has unveiled plans for the development of the Saemangeum Renewable Energy Project, which will be built alongside the existing Saemangeum Seawall dyke in the North Jeolla Province (South Korea). The project will entail 4,000 MW of power generation capacity, of which 2,800 MW for solar power generation facilities,…

The Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) has signed a JPY29.42bn (approximately US$260m) loan agreement with the Indian government for the development and construction of the 1 GW Turga pumped-storage hydropower project at Purulia, in West Bengal (India).

The Lebanese authorities expect the upcoming offshore gas exploration programme to start by the end of 2019 and to take up to 3-4 years to complete. In February 2018, contracts were signed with a Total-led consortium (Total 40%, Eni 40%, Novatek 20%) covering Blocks 4 and 9 located offshore Lebanon, in the eastern part of the Mediterranean Sea.