Octopus, Geothermal & Bitcoin: The Week's Top Energy Stories
1. Why Octopus is Investing US$1bn in Californian Climate Tech
Octopus has spent nearly US$1bn in California on clean tech, targeting carbon removal, heat batteries and solar storage as part of a US$2bn US push by 2030
Octopus Energy, the UK's largest energy provider, has committed close to US$1bn to a clutch of Californian clean energy companies, marking one of its most significant transatlantic investments to date.
The London-based firm, which is widely regarded as one of Europe's more active investors in renewable infrastructure, is spreading its investments across three distinct areas: carbon removal, industrial heat batteries and a utility-scale solar-plus-storage project.
The deals signal a deliberate sharpening of focus on California, a state that has become something of a proving ground for clean energy technology over the years, as well as a useful bellwether for where the rest of the world may eventually follow.
Octopus is set back two Californian carbon removal businesses focused on grassland restoration and reforestation. These firms convert degraded land into assets capable of absorbing large amounts of CO₂.
Elsewhere, Octopus has also agreed to invest in heat batteries that are being developed in the Bay Area. These batteries, the company says, are designed to replace fossil-fuel-powered industrial boilers with systems running on renewable electricity.
Lastly, Octopus is set to acquire a solar and battery storage project in California that is expected to be fully online by July next year.
2. Land, Air & Sea: DSV's Bid to Decarbonise its Logistics Work
DSV has created a decarbonisation roadmap, including the use of SAF, to help guide the transportation and logistics sector towards a net zero future
Danish company DSV is one of the world's largest transport and logistics firms. Like most firms whose business relies of transportation, DSV is currently looking to reduce the size of its carbon footprint.
To this end, the team has devised a decarbonisation roadmap, detailing how it plans to move its road haulage, cargo ships and air freight onto more sustainable fuels.
As one of the world’s largest logistics providers, DSV has a pivotal role in the energy transition of transport networks, not only because of the fuel it consumes but because of the sheer volume of partners it interacts with.
Its decarbonisation roadmap sets out how the firm plans to work with those partners, customers and industry peers to make net zero logistics a reality by the time 2050 rolls around.
3. Brazil, Bitcoin & Batteries: Why ENGIE is Exploring Crypto
French utility giant ENGIE is considering mining for bitcoin at one of its Brazil solar farms during moments when the grid cannot absorb excess energy
When ENGIE's Assu Sol solar plant in northeast Brazil switched on for the first time this month, it marked a real milestone for the French energy firm.
With an eye-watering peak capacity of 895MW, it is by far the largest solar project in ENGIE's global portfolio. The fanfare, however, has been short-lived.
Almost immediately, Assu Sol ran into one of the most frustrating problems in renewable energy today: curtailment.
Curtailment refers to periods when grid operator instruct energy providers to altogether stop generating power, not because something has gone wrong, but because the grid simply cannot absorb what is being producing. This oversaturation ultimately wastes potential profits for companies like ENGIE.
Two options are on the table: battery storage systems and bitcoin mining data centres.
The appeal of bitcoin mining, in this context, has less to do with cryptocurrency than with physics.
Mining rigs are one of the few industrial loads that can be switched on and off almost at the drop of a hat, making them uniquely suited to mopping up the variable surpluses that solar plants produce. That power, of course, would otherwise go to waste.
4. The Story of the UK's First Ever Geothermal Power Plant
Geothermal Engineering's Cornwall plant has become UK's first to generate geothermal energy, powering 10,000 homes and producing lithium for EV batteries
After nearly two decades of development and US$63m in expenditure, Britain's first deep geothermal power plant has been switched on in Cornwall, marking a small but symbolically significant moment for the country's renewable energy mix.
The United Downs plant, operated by Geothermal Engineering Ltd (GEL) near Redruth, has been almost 20 years in the making.
Ryan Law, CEO of GEL, is candid about the journey to get here. "To finally reach this point is exciting – and a bit of a relief," he says.
The plant works by circulating water through fractures in granite rock some three miles below the surface, where temperatures reach close to 200°C.
These geological conditions are not that common in the UK. In most of the country, it is generally the case that drilling down a kilometre leads to a 20°C rise in temperatures.
However, the granite on which Cornwall rests is better at retaining heat, meaning that temperatures rise by about 40°C for every kilometre drilled.
Once the hole has been bored, superheated water from its lowest point is pumped to the surface, where steam drives a turbine before the cooled water – now at around 50°C – is re-injected into the fault line to be reheated, completing the cycle.
The electricity generated has been sold to Octopus Energy, which will supply it via the National Grid to meet the needs of up to 10,000 homes.
5. Zeo & Creekstone: Powering the World's Largest Data Centre
Zeo Energy and Creekstone Energy have signed an MOU that will see them develop 280 MW of solar baseload power for the "Delta Gigasite" data centre in Utah
Something historic is taking shape in a quiet corner of Utah's Black Rock Desert.
Millard County, which can be found on the westernmost edge of the Beehive State, is a flat, remote and sparsely populated area.
These attributes do not lend themselves well to most industries, but they are conducive to the construction of data centres.
Right now, a company called Creekstone Energy is building what it calls a "gigasite" in Millard Country – a next-generation power and data infrastructure campus designed to feed the burgeoning electricity appetite of AI.
The site first broke ground in December 2025 and, by the first half of 2027, Creekstone plans to have more than 300MW of gas-powered capacity online. That, however, is only the beginning.
By the time it is entirely finished, it is expected to be the world's largest AI-optimised data centre campus, boasting an eye-watering power capacity of 10GW.
This would be enough electricity to power 15 million homes in Great Britain, according to the Low Carbon Contracts Company.