In Focus

Vietnam's president agreed on greater cooperations with South Korea on nuclear power plant construction.

CECEP Solar has put a planned $500 million U.S. project on hold over an anti-dumping trade dispute The company's general manager said that a planned installation of China-made panels to generate solar power in California, New Jersey and Texas would be made uneconomic by U.S. anti-dumping moves. "If the solar panel prices increase by, say 30 percent, in the United States, following the move, then we would certainly drop the plan because there's no profit to be made," Cao Huabin, the general manager of CECEP Solar Energy, told a news conference in Beijing. Prices of solar panels in the project, which account for about 70 percent of the costs, are set to jump if Washington imposes duties on imported Chinese products that U.S. rivals say breach agreed global trade rules. "I don't see any alternatives to Chinese solar panels," Cao said, who described Chinese products as having "low prices but good quality." For the source of this story, click here.

J-Power will start work on the 1,600 megawatts scheme by year-end.

The United States will push China to take "concrete and measurable" steps to boost U.S. exports. The annual U.S.-China Joint Commission on Commerce and Trade, or JCCT, meeting on Nov. 20-21 "is an important opportunity to address and resolve key trade concerns with China," U.S. Commerce Secretary John Bryson said in a statement. U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack will travel with Bryson to Chengdu for the talks just a week after President Barack Obama hosts Chinese President Hu Jintao and other Asia-Pacific leaders in Honolulu for an annual summit meeting. Obama is expected to press Hu on China's currency practices, which many U.S. lawmakers believe give Chinese companies an unfair trade advantage and has become an issue in next year's presidential election. "Through this year's JCCT, we are pressing China for concrete and measurable results on a number of significant issues including China's policies on intellectual property rights, investment and innovation, as well as a range of sector-specific industrial policies," Kirk said. Last month, the Democratic-controlled U.S. Senate passed a bill to crack down on the practice, but the Republican-run House of Representatives has refused to take up the measure on the grounds it could start a trade war. House Democrats waged another effort on Thursday to force action on the bill, but were turned back. "We will continue to press for action on this measure until the House is allowed to work its will," Representative Sander Levin, a senior Democrat, said after the effort failed. At the 2010 JCCT, China promised action on a long list of U.S. concerns, including the development of "smart grid" standards that threaten to prevent U.S. sales. Administration officials said they believed the JCCT dialogue had opened up significant commercial opportunities in areas such as smart grid electric power transmission systems.

Biorenewables will greatly impact several billion dollar markets and revenues can grow to as much as EUR 450b by 2020.

US Nuclear Regulatory Commission chairman Gregory Jaczko is expected to tell Indian representatives when they meet next month that its civil nuclear liability law would not pass muster in the US.

Japan Foreign Minister Koichiro Gemba and his Indian counterpart, SM Krishna, agreed to move ahead with talks toward a civilian nuclear power agreement. This serves as a precondition that would enable Tokyo to export nuclear power plant technology to the South Asian nation. Meanwhile, Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda and his Vietnamese counterpart, Nguyen Tan Dung, will likely discuss nuclear power cooperation when they meet Monday, a government official said.

Good thing the government is keen to help the company that supplies power to 29m customers in Japan.

There is increasing safety risks from Chinese nuclear power plants as existing facilities age and a large number of new reactors go into operation, according to the country's environmental minister.

Moody’s sees a stable outlook for Indonesian coal industry, but negative rating implications would arise if issuers use their surplus to the benefit of key shareholders.

Global Wind Energy Council says Asia can beat Europe for the first time next year.

Information on nuclear power plants along with military data on weapons including warplanes may have been stolen during the cyber attack against Mitsubishi Heavy Industries.

Seven US solar manufacturers clamored to impose more than 100% duties on China solar imports.

China issued a harsh rebuke of an anti-dumping complaint filed by U.S. solar firms and warned not to take protectionist measures that could harm the global economy. Seven U.S. solar manufacturers on Wednesday asked the Obama administration to impose duties of more than 100 percent on China solar imports, which they said were unfairly undercutting U.S. prices and destroying American jobs, according to a Reuters report.

Japanese cabinet ministers will pursue an easing of rules on building geothermal, wind and hydraulic power plants to boost renewable energy use after the Fukushima nuclear crisis, according to Reuters, citng a Nikkei report.

It was only $33 billion in the same quarter last year.