The Stratawire
Original reporting and analysis from the field: energy, water, infrastructure, industrial technology and AI. Every card shows what the story rests on.
Delegates in Aberdeen passed Energy Minister Stephen Gethins' resolution declaring domestic oil and gas production, reviewed by climate compatibility assessments, "clearly preferable to importation", after he urged them to vote down a trade union amendment asking Westminster to raise profit levies on fossil fuel extractors.
Photo: Øyvind Knoph Askeland / Norsk olje og gass
Europe's benchmark gas price this week reached its highest level since December 2022, before a one-day Norwegian supply scare unwound. Underground storage is at its lowest for the time of year since records began in 2011, the EU has paid €7.88bn for Russian Arctic LNG in nine months this year, and the EU ban on the remaining long-term-contract trade arrives on 1 January. The numbers, the region's voices, and what moves next.
Photo: Grahamec
Final investment decisions on large-scale renewables reached 5 GW by the end of September, past the previous best of 4.9 GW, as home battery approvals tripled and renewables out-generated fossil fuels in the national grid for the month. The same fortnight delivered record curtailment, negative midday prices and a near-cap A$23,107/MWh spike in New South Wales: abundance at noon, scarcity in the afternoon.
Photo: Bachelot Pierre J-P
Supervisors at Escondida voted 64% to 35% on 14 October to accept BHP's improved offer, hours after their strike was to begin and a day before its extended deadline. The deal pulls a supply threat out of a copper market trading near records — but settles only one of the disruptions running through Chile's copper belt. The numbers, the voices and what it means for energy buyers.
Photo: Mr. Matté
The grid serving 67 million people across 13 US states and Washington, DC was forecast to come within 900 megawatts of its reserve margin this week — roughly one large power plant — as an October heatwave collided with the maintenance season. The government's emergency order lets PJM run plants past their pollution limits and call on data centres' own backup generators. Reporting on 14 October said no rolling blackouts had been announced, and PJM said it anticipated no customer impacts; the forces behind the squeeze have not gone away.
Photo: Mettle30
September brought India's worst power shortages since August 2023, and on 13 October the head of its electricity planner said the coal capacity now needed could reach "105 GW or even 150 GW" against the 97 GW in last year's plan. The coal ministry says supplies are strengthening and stocks have held above 18 million tonnes; steel mills and farmers say the cuts are biting anyway. The numbers, the regional voices, and what it means for anyone exposed to India's grid.
Photo: FrankvEck
Fuel is selling above ₦1,400 in Abuja even as NNPC offers an advertised ₦66-per-litre app discount until 31 October, although station checks found smaller differences. The Nigeria Labour Congress has put the government on a two-week clock, the IMF said on 14 October not to bring the subsidy back, and the Dangote refinery — posting a $4.73 billion profit and exporting record volumes to West Africa — has extended Africa's biggest IPO. The evidence behind each claim, and what it means for anyone buying fuel, crude or naira assets.
Photo: Hawkeye7 (Wikimedia Commons)
Dubai Airports' chief said it as Houthi strikes shut Riyadh's airport. WETEX opens in Dubai on Tuesday and ADIPEC follows in Abu Dhabi on 2 November. No strike on the UAE has been reported in the past month, but 15 foreign airlines still have Dubai flights suspended and the US tells its citizens to reconsider travel. The evidence on risk, insurance and flights, and what the region's leaders are saying.
Trump announced an energy truce on 11 October. Since then Russia has hit Ukraine's grid and gas assets again and Moscow has confirmed no agreement.
Photo: Inese Pritchard · Recorded on site
A UAE government report projects data-centre water use roughly doubling to 9.32 trillion litres by 2030, with the water attributed to AI workloads roughly quadrupling, and finds that electricity generation accounts for about half of water use across the data-centre value chain. It calls on the UN Water Conference in Abu Dhabi in December to advance a global declaration.
The Lamu County Government-led Kiunga solar desalination and Water-for-Peace initiative has won gold in the Governance, Institutions and Social Enterprise category at the IWA Project Innovation Awards.
Photo: Stablenode
The 2026 IWA World Water Congress reaches its final day in Glasgow. Here is what the week told the water sector, from awards to regulation, and what is still on today's programme.
The £35 million Nereda-based plant took bronze in the Performance Improvement and Operational Solutions category at the IWA Project Innovation Awards ceremony in Glasgow.
China's Zhengzhou Xinqu 'Megacity-Scale Water-Energy Nexus Model' has won the Grand Innovation Award at the IWA Project Innovation Awards 2026, topping 320 entries from 65 countries.
The 2026 IWA World Water Congress & Exhibition opened in Glasgow on 4 October. Clarissa Brocklehurst received the IWA Global Water Award and Professor Katherine Richardson urged delegates to turn connections into action.
Dubai's Hassyan 180 MIGD seawater reverse osmosis independent water project has taken gold in the Exceptional Project Execution and Delivery category at the IWA Project Innovation Awards 2026.
EMASESA's cyber-physical water cycle project for Seville took gold in Smart Systems and the Digital Water Economy at the IWA Project Innovation Awards 2026, presented during the World Water Congress in Glasgow.
The former chair of the Independent Water Commission addressed IWA delegates in Glasgow as the government prepares to replace Ofwat with a single regulator — and as England remains in drought.
An IWA forum compared rainwater policy in Australia, Flanders, San Francisco and Hamburg, as Professor Han Mu-young was honoured for his rainwater work — with England still in drought.
In a Glasgow keynote, Buisman argued that water innovation has to move beyond producing new ideas to making a meaningful difference in practice — a challenge for a sector where new technology can take more than a decade to reach the mainstream.