YOUR WEEKLY UPDATE ON CLIMATE TECHNOLOGY AND THE ENERGY TRANSITION
This fortnight leads with the waste no one wanted. Firefly Green Fuels is turning treated sewage into jet fuel, at a lifecycle carbon saving of 92 per cent. The wider theme is the distance between the laboratory and the market. Cambridge has built biocells that run on algae, and Chinese researchers have made a plastic that erases itself in six days. Britain, meanwhile, wasted a record volume of clean power last year, while AI data centres strain electricity supply worldwide. Policy is racing to close these gaps, from a new UK cleantech programme to European funding for wastewater metal recovery. Please share this newsletter and follow CSN on LinkedIn, BlueSky, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, and Threads.
SPOTLIGHT
Firefly Green Fuels is turning treated sewage, known as biosolids, into sustainable aviation fuel. The feedstock is effectively free, since water companies pay to dispose of it, and its usual route onto farmland is closing over forever chemicals and microplastics. Firefly's hydrothermal liquefaction process yields a biocrude that Cranfield University assessed at 92 per cent lower lifecycle carbon than fossil jet fuel. A 15-year offtake with Wizz Air, reported at close to a billion dollars, underpins a commercial plant at Harwich targeted for around 2029. Founder James Hygate argues biosolids alone could supply roughly a third of the UK's 2040 SAF mandate.
TECHNOLOGIES
A Cambridge biochemistry team and bio-designer Lucia Giron have built working biocells powered by algae. The devices generate a low, continuous current through photosynthesis, using cyanobacteria that stay unharmed as they work. One laboratory cell has produced electricity for six years and counting. The team, now developing the technology through a spin-out called e-Pho, argues it could displace the billions of small disposable batteries discarded each year. Commercial scale is still unproven, though the underlying science has run for years.
BUSINESS
The UK government has launched its Cleantech Innovation Challenges programme to move low-carbon technologies from lab to market. It offers no new research grants and targets the commercialisation gap instead. The first challenge covers carbon management, with long-duration storage, hydrogen and clean heat under review. Ministers cite analysis suggesting strong innovation could cut UK energy system costs by between £200 billion and £350 billion by 2050. Success will depend on whether its Challenge Coalitions can hold coordination together across shifting political and funding cycles.
SECTORS
Power has become the defining constraint of the AI economy. Facilities that once drew kilowatts per rack now demand megawatts, and some projects need gigawatt-scale supply. Grid interconnection delays of around five years, and up to twelve, are pushing developers towards on-site generation and private energy parks. Schneider Electric describes the shift as a grid-to-chip model that treats energy as one integrated system. The next generation of data centres will be built as energy systems first.
BUSINESS
Italian cleantech firm Circular Materials has raised €11.8 million to scale its wastewater metal recovery technology across Europe. Its Supercritical Water Precipitation process recovers more than 99 per cent of dissolved metals from difficult industrial streams. The funding will build a new hub in Ferrara, a template for further recovery sites. The company is positioning itself within Europe's push for domestic critical raw materials. Moving from validated concept to commercial deployment introduces new variables in feedstock, permitting and offtake.
TECHNOLOGIES
Researchers in China have created a plastic that fully degrades within six days, leaving no microplastic fragments. Built around the biodegradable polymer PCL, it carries dormant bacterial spores engineered to release plastic-eating enzymes on command. A two-stage enzymatic process breaks the material down to its basic chemical building blocks. The plastic keeps its strength during normal use and degrades only once deliberately activated. It is a proof of concept, and scaling it into real waste systems remains a separate challenge.
SECTORS
Britain wasted more than 10 terawatt-hours of wind and solar power in 2025, a record, as its grid strained under its own expansion. That waste is now driving investment in long-duration storage. Highview Power's £300 million Carrington project in Greater Manchester will store energy as liquid air, delivering 50 megawatts for six hours. A larger site at Hunterston is planned. Insurers, with little operating history to price, are being drawn into the projects early, making insurance as pivotal as the engineering.
📊 Renewables Set to Pass Coal – The IEA's mid-year update forecasts renewables will overtake coal as the world's largest source of electricity in 2026, a first. Source.
⚡ Grants Cut on Politics – US Energy Department lawyers admitted in court that clean energy grants were cancelled based solely on recipient states' political identity. Source.
🌏 China's Solar Pipeline Swells – Global Energy Monitor reports China now holds 664 gigawatts of prospective utility-scale solar, outpacing the rest of the world combined. Source.
⛽ Hydrogen Funding Down Under – Australia's HAMR Energy secured A$32m from ARENA to make green hydrogen and renewable fuels from forestry residues. Source.
Thanks for reading, and see you in a fortnight.