Management at BYD, which already exports cars to more than 70 countries, has told investors that they believe they can increase overseas sales from nearly 250,000 cars in 2023 to between two to three million cars in the coming years, reflecting around 10 per cent of the market, excluding Europe and the U.S. “They are strategically farsighted,” says Tim Buckley, director of Climate Energy Finance, an Australian think-tank. “They don’t have the myopic short-termism of western capitalism.” Despite the protectionist trade landscape under U.S. President Joe Biden, BYD is also finding new ways to operate in the American market. Read more

Australian renewable energy finance expert Tim Buckley was not convinced the takeover bid was a wise move. “I question what the takeover brings aside from complexity,” he told AFP before the bid was confirmed. Read more

This week’s voting down of Woodside Energy’s misnamed Climate Transition Action Plan at the oil and gas giant’s 70th annual general meeting is historic. It represents a milestone in shareholder activism – and a clarion call that the tide is turning on laggard fossil fuel majors that fail to responsibly and credibly address the greatest single risk they face: climate change. A credible and accelerating diversification and pivot of Woodside’s investment strategy to zero-carbon opportunities is critical to preservation of shareholder value. Alternatively, an accelerated return of capital to shareholders is an obvious option, allowing them to reallocate their investment to solutions rather than remaining beholden to the unwillingness of recalcitrant leadership to embrace technologies in which they demonstrably lack expertise. It is past time for board renewal. Read more

Please use the sharing tools found via the share button at the top or side of articles. Copying articles to share with others is a breach of FT.com T&Cs and Copyright Policy. Email licensing@ft.com to buy additional rights. Subscribers may share up to 10 or 20 articles per month using the gift article service. More information can be found at https://www.ft.com/tour. https://www.ft.com/content/b8bde0b5-7484-45bf-a1e0-475a3ac91bd6 Despite auto market pressures, China’s slowing economic growth and western trade protectionism there are no signs that BYD is rethinking its plans for global expansion. Management at BYD, which already exports cars to more than 70 countries, has told investors that they believe they can increase overseas sales from nearly 250,000 cars in 2023 to between 2mn-3mn cars in the coming years, reflecting around 10 per cent of the market, excluding Europe and the US. “They are strategically farsighted,” says Tim Buckley, director of Climate Energy Finance, an Australian think-tank. “They don’t have the myopic short-termism of western capitalism.”  Read more

The opportunities are enormous for Australia, says Tim Buckley, a director at think-tank Climate Energy Finance in Sydney. “Australia has always been a lucky country. We are blessed. We supply half of the world’s iron ore and lithium. We also have the best wind and solar resources in the world,” he says. Potentially, Australia could not only export the raw minerals and materials needed for the green transition, but also do the value-added processing, Buckley suggests. However, that hinges on international collaboration with key partners, including China, which not only has the best technology when it comes to solar, but is also the biggest buyer of critical raw materials from Australia. “As the buyer, they want a lower price. We’ve got a disproportionate power relationship,” says Buckley. “China’s got the value-add. Australia needs to reset the bar.” Read more

Climate Energy Finance (CEF) says buildings are the “low-hanging fruit” that make up the lion’s share of the big four banks’ sustainable finance target (SFT) of $385 billion by 2030 – while just 7% flows to financing clean energy and hard-to-abate sectors. There is a green financing shortfall across key sectors including energy, transport and cleantech, the independent think tank says. Report author, CEF analyst Nishtha Aggarwal says the banks’ current strategies rely on investing in “business-as-usual” real assets that “meet minimum energy efficiency regulations” – leaving the banks “open to accusation of greenwashing”. Read more

The story quotes CEF partner – the Clean Energy Investor Group, representing developers and investors with a combined $38 billion renewable energy portfolio and a project pipeline of almost 50 gigawatts, welcomed the policy, saying it could unlock significant investment through the superannuation system. Read more

The clean energy industry is urging the federal government to “hold its nerve” and deliver an ambitious and coordinated package of budget incentives to win back investors. Responding to criticism of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s Made in Australia Act, a group of energy and finance leaders joined forces on Thursday to call for the scale of budget support required for decarbonisation. Climate Energy Finance think tank director Tim Buckley said the “ambitious and visionary” Made in Australia Act sets the nation up for the speed and scale of investment for a place in the global net-zero economy. “We urge the government to hold its nerve and deliver an ambitious and coordinated package of budget incentives,” Mr Buckley said. This would enable Australia to pivot from the “historic over-dependence on fossil fuels” to a zero-emissions global trade and investment leader, he said. Read more

Syndicated across News Corp mastheads. The head of the Climate Energy Finance think tank, former Citigroup managing director Tim Buckley said the government’s assertion that state intervention “is the new competition’’ was correct. “We can’t afford to ‘sit it out’,’’ Mr Buckley said. “The Koreans, Japanese, EU, Indian and Canadian governments have all responded at scale to the massive once in a century challenge and opportunity of global decarbonisation with huge strategic public funding programs. “The ‘Future Made in Australia Act’ puts Australia into the global race already underway. “Public capital is the investment signal and de-risking that private capital needs to flood into domestic zero-emissions economic opportunities.’’ Read more

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese unveiled the “Future Made in Australia Act” to help compete with global partners who are providing massive subsidies to new industries. The act, to be discussed by parliament this year, would mark a departure from Australia’s decades-old free market policies on trade and investment. Tim Buckley, director of independent public interest think tank Climate Energy Finance, said the act would lay the foundations to make Australia a zero-emissions trade and investment leader and global clean energy “superpower”. About 27 percent of the Australian economic output came from exports to international partners and this new act would have flow-on effects and help them decarbonise as well, Buckley told AFP. “State intervention is the new competition. We can’t afford to ‘sit it out’. The Future Made In Australia Act puts Australia into the global race. It is the investment signal and de-risking private capital needs,” he said. Read more

As Yellen laid out plans to formalise dialogue with China over excess industrial capacity in electric vehicles (EVs), solar panels and batteries, saying Washington would not accept U.S. industry being “decimated”, the Chinese finance ministry issued a statement saying it had already “fully responded” to her concerns. One industry where global demand does not keep up with Chinese production, though, is solar. Xuyang Dong, China energy policy analyst at Climate Energy Finance in Sydney, estimates China’s wafer, cell and module capacity coming online in 2024 is sufficient to meet annual global demand now through to 2032. Read more

In 2023, China’s exports of the “new three” totalled 1.06 trillion yuan ($146.6 billion), up 29.9% year-on-year, official data showed. But they accounted for only 4.5% of China’s total yuan-denominated exports last year, so those on Beijing’s side of the debate see the West’s focus on them as hypocritical. Xuyang Dong, China energy policy analyst at Climate Energy Finance in Sydney, estimates China’s wafer, cell and module capacity coming online in 2024 is sufficient to meet annual global demand now through to 2032. (This is also republished on Business World) Read more