Ernst &Young Global Power & Utilities Center - Ernst & Young - Global

How do you manage through the recession and position your company for growth? Our power and utilities professionals and other sector leaders conducted over 1500 client meetings and identified some overarching themes. Proactive capital allocation, steps to accelerate decision-making and an increased focus on risk management could mean the difference between surviving and thriving.

The nuclear power industry is experiencing its biggest surge of interest and activity for 25 years. The report provides an overview of investment opportunities for utilities and the associated supply chain (pdf, 677.1kb) . We assess the attractiveness of 21 countries that are either pursuing new nuclear development or need to replace their nuclear stations. We explore the implications for the industry, and see how the upswing of interest is affecting organizations.

Our country attractiveness indices provide scores for national renewable energy markets (pdf, 654.6kb), renewable energy infrastructures and their suitability for individual technologies. In this issue China climbed three points, tying with Germany in the All renewables index, following announcements of increased support for solar PV. Also the UK government published five key documents that will shape its renewable energy industry. Find out what else is on the horizon. 

In the June 2009 edition of our magazine, world leading companies like EDF, E.ON, Gazprom, Southern Company and Vattenfall talk about their ambitious new projects, their vision for the future and the challenge of refocusing business plans in a tighter economy. We also explore the business impact of new carbon restrictions and ask: how should we spend our money to battle climate change?  Access the new issue here (pdf, 2mb).

Ernst & Young has analyzed the effectiveness of receivables management of the leading European electric and gas utilities. We have published our analysis in our new report Cash on the meter – Electricity and gas utility receivables: performance and leading practice. The report reveals that the European power and utility industry has achieved improvements (pdf, 2mb) in the past. However, the deteriorating economic conditions across Europe appear to have had a marked adverse effect on utilities’ receivables performance. The results suggest plentiful opportunities for releasing cash from receivables.

The credit crisis is an unavoidable and underlying theme of Issue 6. The entire biofuels value chain has been hit globally with an alarmingly high number of biofuel producers halting production or, worse still, filing for protection from creditors. Brazil has maintained its position at the top of the index, with the US hanging on to its second place, despite a significant drop in its score. In Europe concerns over the sustainability of biofuels have resulted in some countries reducing mandates and tax incentives.

As part of its plan to produce 20% of overall energy consumption from renewable sources by 2020, the EU Renewables Directive has proposed national renewables targets for each of its Member States. Read in this paper about the renewables targets and the challenges (pdf, 599kb) they present, the impact on utilities’ strategy as well as Ernst & Young’s recommendations for the industry and policy-makers.

With the financial crisis having a worldwide impact, we are now facing a possible scenario of "stagflation" – high commodity costs and inflation, coupled with economic stagnation. Read in this paper (pdf, 285kb) how this will affect utilities, historically considered to be safe havens in times of trouble.