Dive Brief: Airloom Energy has broken ground on a utility-scale pilot of the novel wind power technology that it says offers better energy density and siting flexibility at significantly lower capital cost. The Bill Gates-backed startup says the southeastern Wyoming project will validate its low-slung turbine design, which captures wind energy using 30-foot, vertically oriented airfoils that move around an ovular trackway about 80 feet above the ground. Airloom plans to begin generating power at the site near Rock River later this year, and begin commercial-scale demonstrations in 2027, according to a timeline posted on its website. Dive Insight: The Wyoming Energy Authority awarded Airloom $5 million in November to “design, build and test a 1 MW demonstration device that validates the company’s innovative, low-profile design.” That description matches what Airloom said about the pilot project in its announcement last week, but Airloom CEO Neal Rickner told TechCrunch on June 25 that the pilot would generate about 150 kW of electricity while using the same parts as future megawatt-scale turbines. Airloom did not respond to requests for comment. The key difference between the pilot- and commercial-scale plants, Rickner told TechCrunch, is the physical footprint: The straightaways run about 100 meters on the former and 500 meters on the latter. Despite the relatively large area inside the trackway, Airloom says its technology offers higher energy densities than traditional wind, which the U.S. Department of Agriculture says requires about 10 times less land per megawatt than solar PV. Whereas a traditional wind turbine has a circular swept area, Airloom’s design sweeps a rectangular area, capturing more wind and conserving more energy, it says. Airloom touts the undisturbed land inside the trackway as fit for complementary uses like livestock grazing, crop production or solar arrays. The design has other advantages over traditional turbines,

Trinidad and Tobago is working to reverse a major slump in gas production and revive a key export industry in the Caribbean nation to boost its economic growth. Energy Minister Roodal Moonilal sees strong potential in the country’s offshore waters at a time when auditors said more gas output must be added to satisfy demand. During the opening of the Society of Petroleum Engineers 2025 Mature Basin Energy Symposium Tuesday, Moonilal said Woodside Energy’s Calypso offshore project is expected to add 700 million standard cubic feet per day to domestic gas production.  “The current and upcoming gas projects will, however, only provide relief in the short to medium term,” he added. Calypso, with reserves of 3.5 trillion cubic feet, is “one of the main projects we would be seeking to accelerate,” Moonilal told Bloomberg in an interview on June 27.  Trinidad and Tobago has seen a 33 percent drop in gas output since 2015. The need to ramp up production comes as the country aims to fill a supply gap and deals with a crippling shortage of foreign exchange.  Natural gas reserves auditors DeGoyler and MacNaughton estimated in its latest report that 58.25 trillion cubic feet of prospective resources were offshore at the end of 2023. The country’s gas production has been declining, and it produced 3.8 billion cubic feet in 2015, Moonilal said. Trinidad and Tobago produced around 2.5 billion cubic feet in the first quarter of 2025, 46 percent of which is exported as liquefied natural gas, the energy minister told Bloomberg Wednesday. The auditors advised the country to fast track gas projects and exploration efforts to “convert prospective resources into reserves and contingent resources, to meet gas demand,” he added. Several projects from BP’s subsidiary in Trinidad and Tobago are planned with the oil and gas major set to

Mozambican President Daniel Chapo said his government and private companies will have to collectively ensure the necessary security is in place to enable TotalEnergies SE to restart construction of a $20 billion gas project that has stalled due to a militant insurgency — and even then risks will remain. The project in the northern Cabo Delgado province along with others that are at earlier stages of development are seen as crucial to the future of the southern African nation, which ranks among the world’s poorest. The French oil major halted work, evacuated workers and declared force majeure in 2021 following an escalation in attacks by Islamic State-linked militants. “Regarding security, it’s relatively stable compared to this past four years, but continuity of this stability doesn’t depend only on the government of the republic but on all partners in that area,” Chapo said in an interview with Bloomberg in Seville, Spain, on Tuesday. “If we’re waiting for Cabo Delgado to be a heaven, we won’t lift force majeure.”  Total’s facility, which will take another four years to complete, will liquefy and export the extensive gas reserves off northeast Mozambique that were discovered 15 years ago. Since then, only one floating plant operated by Eni SpA has come on line. A final investment decision on a third planned venture, Exxon Mobil Corp.’s $27 billion Rovuma LNG project, is expected next year. Mozambique called on nations in the region to help secure Cabo Delgado after its attempts to use mercenaries to halt the violence failed.  Rwandan troops, brought in months after the attacks that led to Total’s evacuation, provided an effective response. The European Council gave the Rwanda Defence Force additional funding in November to help fight the insurgency, but the terms of its deployment remain uncertain. “How long will depend a lot on security

U.S. commercial crude oil inventories, excluding those in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), increased by 3.8 million barrels from the week ending June 20 to the week ending June 27, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) highlighted in its latest weekly petroleum status report. That report was released on July 2 and included data for the week ending June 27. It showed that crude oil stocks, not including the SPR, stood at 419.0 million barrels on June 27, 415.1 million barrels on June 20, and 448.5 million barrels on June 28, 2024. The EIA report highlighted that data may not add up to totals due to independent rounding. Crude oil in the SPR stood at 402.8 million barrels on June 27, 402.5 million barrels on June 20, and 372.6 million barrels on June 28, 2024, the report revealed. Total petroleum stocks – including crude oil, total motor gasoline, fuel ethanol, kerosene type jet fuel, distillate fuel oil, residual fuel oil, propane/propylene, and other oils – stood at 1.642 billion barrels on June 27, the EIA report pointed out. Total petroleum stocks were up 9.6 million barrels week on week and down 12.8 million barrels year on year, the report showed. “At 419 million barrels, U.S. crude oil inventories are about nine percent below the five year average for this time of year,” the EIA said in its latest weekly petroleum status report. “Total motor gasoline inventories increased by 4.2 million barrels from last week and are about one percent below the five year average for this time of year. Both Finished gasoline inventories and blending components inventories increased last week,” it added. “Distillate fuel inventories decreased by 1.7 million barrels last week and are about 21 percent below the five year average for this time of year. Propane/propylene inventories increased

TotalEnergies SE said Wednesday it had completed the purchase of a 50 percent stake in AES Corp.’s renewable energy and battery energy storage system (BESS) portfolio of over one gigawatt in the Dominican Republic. Last year the French energy giant acquired a 30 percent stake in Arlington, Virginia-based AES’ renewables portfolio in Puerto Rico. “The combined portfolio now exceeds 1.5 GW of renewable energy and BESS capacity across the Caribbean”, TotalEnergies said in an online statement. The Dominican portfolio includes wind, solar and BESS projects, 410 megawatts of which are operational or under construction. Under-development wind and solar total over 500 MW. The BESS projects will be integrated into solar plants to mitigate intermittency, according to TotalEnergies. The company already owns a 103-MW solar plant under construction and a partially solarized network of 184 service stations, as well as operates natural gas distribution, in the Dominican Republic. The Puerto Rican portfolio includes 200 MW of solar and 285 MW/1,140 MW hours of BESS projects under construction. “TotalEnergies is pursuing deployment of its multi-energy strategy on the island, where it is already active in the fuel, lubricants, and aviation sectors, and operates a network of 200 service stations between Puerto Rico and the island of St Thomas”, the company said. Stephane Michel, TotalEnergies president for gas, renewables and power, said, “We are pleased to expand our multi-energy strategy through this partnership with AES, focusing on renewables and battery storage in a region where TotalEnergies is already a leading supplier of LNG, notably for power generation. Since 2018, we have been supplying LNG to AES’s subsidiaries in Panama and the Dominican Republic”. On April 15, 2025, TotalEnergies announced a heads of agreement with Energia Natural Dominicana (EnaDom), the joint venture between AES and Energas in the Dominican Republic, for the supply of 400,000 metric tons a year of LNG for 15 years from 2027. The

The European Commission rolled out Wednesday a mechanism for coordinated purchases of hydrogen, the first mechanism under the EU Energy and Raw Materials Platform. The online platform allows EU buyers to offer demand for biomethane, natural gas, hydrogen and raw materials. It seeks to give EU companies a cost-effective and efficient access to such commodities by enabling negotiations with competing suppliers. The Commission’s Directorate-General for Energy said more products may be covered in the future. The Hydrogen Mechanism is “designed to support the market development of renewable and low-carbon hydrogen and its derivatives (ammonia, methanol, electro-sustainable aviation fuel)”, the Directorate said in an online statement. “The first round of matching demand and supply is planned for September 2025”, it added. The Hydrogen Mechanism will operate until 2029 under the European Hydrogen Bank, as specified under the European Union’s “Regulation on the Internal Markets for Renewable Gas, Natural Gas and Hydrogen”. The Hydrogen Bank is an EU Innovation Fund financing platform to scale up the renewable hydrogen value chain in the 27-nation bloc and partner countries. Energy and Housing Commissioner Dan Jorgensen said, “With the Hydrogen Mechanism launched today, we empower the European industry to seize competitive opportunities while advancing towards greater security of supply and decarbonization”. A Commission information page about the platform says, “The EU Energy and Raw Materials Platform enables the collection and exchange of market data, information about demand and supply, demand aggregation, and joint purchasing of energy-related products and raw materials. The Platform fosters collaboration, efficiency, and transparency in finding counterparts”. “It does not directly provide financing or support negotiations which may take place, outside of the Platform, between Participants following their connections through the Platform”, the page says. However, financial institutions may participate in the platform to publish information about their financing offers, the page says.