China’s Iron Ore Demand Favouring High Grade Steel
China’s crackdown on the most inefficient steel furnaces is set to continue in a mass restructuring of China’s steel industry, which seeks to close furnaces that are inefficient or extremely pollutive in order to alleviate environmental concerns, whilst countering low prices and a slowing economy. As such, remaining furnaces are tending to use higher-grade iron ore in order to boost utilisation. This restructuring along with the continuously strong domestic growth in China is driving up demand for high-grade iron ore, further exaggerating the gap between low and high-grade iron ore. This may be a cause for concern for Australian low grade iron ore producers.
Read more at the Australian Financial Review.
China’s Oil and Gas Sector Reform
The Chinese government is seeking to increase participation within the heavily monopolised oil and gas sector in order to boost efficiency and productivity. Wang Lu of Bloomberg Intelligence stated that, “allowing new players into the industry may raise the country’s upstream capital expenditure, which would increase the workload of oilfield service companies.” As well as separating pipeline operations from the major industry monopolies, the reform plan is also set to involve opening up exploration to more companies and liberalising retail prices. Many oilfield service company stocks, including that of China Oilfield Service Ltd and Sinopec Oilfield Service Corp, surged in following the announcement of this reform plan.
Read more at China Daily
Queensland’s Move to Embrace Wind Power
Queensland, traditionally known for sunshine and solar energy generation potential, may begin to venture into the wind power generation. Efforts to diversify Queensland’s renewable energy sector may see to the increase of wind power production in the state, as it is proven to be an affordable and renewable source of energy. As such, the Queensland government has begun to implement a suite of policy initiatives with the view to developing renewable and wind farm production.
Read more at Renew Economy
China Connects – World’s Largest Floating Solar PV Plant
Committed to introducing their cutting-edge of technology, products and solutions to the world, Chinese manufacturer Sungrow president, Renxian Cao announces the launch of the world’s largest floating PV power plant. This 40MW aquaculture project, with an investment in over $20 million by multinational electronics company TDK this anechoic chamber has become professional first photovoltaic inverter laboratory in China.
Read more at Renew economy