The U.K. risks power shortages because utilities may react to Europe’s toughest carbon emissions rules by closing plants without replacing them.

Talks between Germany and Norway about how to boost the trading of electricity from renewable sources are being held up by concerns that the power cable running under the North Sea won’t ever make money.

U.K. renewable power generation rose 28 percent last year as more wind farms and solar plants came online, the Department of Energy and Climate Change said.

Three G-20 nations saw an increase in clean-energy investments last year even as funding declined globally for the second consecutive year, according to The Pew Charitable Trusts.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s government stopped short of setting goals for renewable energy in the final version of a draft plan that reinforces atomic power’s role in Japan’s energy future, calling it a vital source of generation.

Technology is catching up with Thomas Edison’s electricity industry, eating away at the utility business model that hasn’t changed much in a century.

Simplifying finance vehicles for renewable energy will lure more investors and lower the costs of capital.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is pushing Japan’s coal industry to expand sales at home and abroad, undermining hopes among environmentalists that he’d use the Fukushima nuclear accident to switch the nation to renewables.

The world needs to triple the energy it gets from renewables, nuclear reactors and power plants that use emissions-capture technology to avoid dangerous levels of global warming, United Nations scientists said.

What’s a beleaguered utility to do when forced by the government to close its profitable nuclear power plants?

Clean energy investment rose by 9 percent in the first quarter from a year earlier on surging demand for rooftop solar panels from the U.S. to Japan.

Germany’s biggest utilities face dwindling market shares as the shift to renewable energy spurs regional power generation and storage technology, a senior member of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s party said.

General Electric Co. is in talks to buy Alstom SA, the French builder of trains and power plants, people with knowledge of the matter said, in what would be GE’s biggest acquisition ever.

Africa’s renewable energy capacity is expected to quadruple to about 120 gigawatts by 2030 if investors dedicate “substantial flows” of funds to the region, the InternationalRenewable Energy Agency said.

The Obama administration is considering cutting greenhouse-gas emissions from power plants by reaching beyond the plants themselves — an unusual approach that could run afoul of anti-pollution laws.

Bracing for greenhouse-gas rules from the Obama administration, two industries are staking out different positions. Coal companies are pledging to sue. Electric utilities are ready to talk.

Vestas Wind Systems A/S said scaling back Australia’s renewable energy target would cut the value of more than A$10 billion ($9.4 billion) in large projects across the industry and discourage international investors.

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Ohio is debating the sharpest break from a three-decade campaign by 29 U.S. states to reduce reliance on fossil fuels by promoting power from renewable sources.

IHI Corp., a maker of everything from aircraft jet engines to gas turbines, expects the market for small-scale geothermal projects to take off in Japan as the country seeks cleaner sources of energy.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi appointed a former banker to oversee coal, power and clean-energy reforms in a move aimed at resolving fuel bottlenecks and chronic blackouts hampering economic growth.

U.S. President Barack Obama says natural gas can be a bridge from coal to a cleaner energy future. Investors are showing it’s more likely a bridge to nowhere.

Iceland is moving closer to plugging European homes into the volcanic island nation’s geothermal and hydropower reserves via what would be the world’s longest power cable, according to the country’s largest energy producer.

Japan said the U.S.’s proposed cuts in greenhouse-gas emissions from its power plants is a bold step to tackle climate change.

Meeting the world’s energy supply needs by 2035 will require $40 trillion of investment, as demand grows and production and processing facilities have to be replaced, the International Energy Agency said.

The United Kingdom is known for its pioneering work in wave, tidal and ocean current energy. The U.S. and Canada have vast marine resources and would benefit from partnerships with UK companies in a number of ways, including building expertise, sharing lessons learned and fostering industry growth.

A first-of-its-kind study of net evaporation at a hydroelectric facility reveals that the project has very little effect on the loss of water to the atmosphere as compared with pre-impoundment conditions.

The European Union needs an ambitious emissions-reduction goal, targets for energy- efficiency and renewables as well as tools to foster investment under its planned 2030 policies, an advisory panel to 14 ministers said.

Caisse des Depots et Consignations, a French state bank, is setting aside 5 billion euros ($6.8 billion) for green projects after the government proposed a law to spur use of renewable electricity and boost efficiency.

U.S. Export-Import Bank Chairman Fred Hochberg mounted a defense of the 80-year-old agency as Republicans weigh eliminating the lender they say backs major corporations with political connections.

Renewable energy may reap as much as two-thirds of the $7.7 trillion in investment forecast for building new power plants by 2030 as declining costs make it more competitive with fossil fuels.

Turbine rehabilitation at the 112 MW Ohakuri Hydro Power Station in New Zealand was owner Mighty River Power's most complex program of works of any it had previously performed.

Shinsei Bank Ltd., a lender for Goldman Sachs Group Inc.’s clean-energy projects in Japan, plans to provide as much as 200 billion yen (US $2 billion) in loans for renewable developments.

To help ensure the safety of fish passing through the new turbines at 912-MW Priest Rapids, Public Utility District No. 2 of Grant County is employing the BioPA method to analyze the biological performance of proposed designs - and to choose an improved one for this facility.

Orix Corp., a Tokyo-based finance and leasing company, plans to build as many as 15 geothermal power stations in Japan in the next five years.

France’s planned energy law will mobilize about €10 billion (US $13.4 billion) in investment through tax credits and low-interest loans to spur efficiency and renewable power, Environment Minister Segolene Royal said.

India will begin construction this year on an $8 billion project backed by Germany’s development bank to upgrade its grid to handle a more than doubling of renewable power capacity by 2022.

Australia is frightening developers away from renewable energy even before the government decides whether to overhaul targets for the industry’s growth.

South African Energy Minister Tina Joemat-Pettersson said her department wants to address weaknesses in the process of commissioning renewable-power projects.

Investments in new clean-energy capacity will total $1.61 trillion through 2020 even as the expansion of renewables is expected to slow, the International Energy Agency said.

A government-appointed panel gave Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott two options to cut emissions more cheaply: either scrap or weaken its main clean energy program.

In the midst of a suburban sprawl halfway between the Eiffel Tower and Paris’s busy Orly airport, a drilling crew works night and day burrowing deep into the Earth’s crust in search of underground heat.

The threat of climate change is driving China and the U.S. — frequent rivals and the world’s two largest greenhouse-gas emitters — to collaborate on dozens of potential clean-energy breakthroughs.

Kyushu Electric Power Co. will suspend responding to applications from renewable-energy producers applying to access its grid while it reviews how much more clean energy it’s capable of handling.

California and Quebec, which together created the largest carbon market in North America this year, may come away empty-handed as they woo northeastern U.S. states to join their system.

Europe’s concern about its reliance on Russian fossil fuels may spur governments to prioritize alternative energy, the head of Neste Oil Oyj said.

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Japan has added 11,090 megawatts of clean energy capacity since July 2012, when it began an incentive program to encourage investment in renewables, according to the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry.

The European Union is seeking to speed up the creation of a common energy market to help its shift to a low-carbon economy and boost security of energy supplies amid a natural-gas dispute between Russia and Ukraine.

Kenya Electricity Generating Co., the East African nation’s biggest power producer, plans joint ventures to complete its geothermal projects in Olkaria, Chief Executive Officer Albert Mugo said.