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Industry Data

  • Commodity prices: metals, materials and chemicals?

    Commodity prices: metals, materials and chemicals?

    Annual commodity prices are tabulated in this database for 70 materials commodities; covering steel prices, other metal prices, chemicals prices, polymer prices, all with data going back to 2012. 2022 was a record year for commodities. The average material commodity traded 25% above its 10-year average and 60% of all material commodities made ten-year highs.

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  • Wind turbine capacity factors: by country, by facility?

    Wind turbine capacity factors: by country, by facility?

    Wind turbine capacity factors average 26% globally. But they vary from c20% in non-windy countries to 45% in the windiest countries. And they also vary within countries, with a normal distribution and a standard deviation of 7-12%. This data-file maps capacity factors of wind power generation.

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  • European coal generation by facility and coal plant closures?

    European coal generation by facility and coal plant closures?

    Europe generated 350TWH of electricity from coal in 2023, having halved over the prior decade, and potentially declining to zero around 2040. We have recently been wondering whether this phase-back of coal is compatible with geopolitical priorities or the need to keep pace with the rise of AI. Hence this data-file tracks European coal generation…

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  • Labor costs of coal production: labor productivity and salaries?

    Labor costs of coal production: labor productivity and salaries?

    This data-file estimates the labor costs of coal production, as a function of labor productivities and salaries, by region and over time. As a global average, across the 3M global coal mine employees captured in the data-file, labor productivity runs at 2,500 tons of coal per employee per year, average salary is $14k pp pa,…

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  • Capital goods market sizes: by category, by country?

    Capital goods market sizes: by category, by country?

    This data-file tabulates globally traded capital goods market sizes, based on the values of products exported from different countries-regions. Specifically, commodity Code 84 represents machinery and mechanical appliances, worth $2.5trn pa in 2023. About half of that represents classic capital goods categories, as decomposed in the chart above. Our top five conclusions follow below.

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  • Early-stage companies: growth versus projections?

    Early-stage companies: growth versus projections?

    Early-stage companies’ growth versus projections is assessed in this data-file, tabulating the performance of 20 new energies SPACs from 2020-21. The average of these companies was projecting that its revenues would explode to $1.3bn by 2024, but in reality, revenue only trebled to $110M. On average, 2024 EBITDA also missed aspirations from 2020-21 by $350M.…

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  • Global trade: imports and exports, by product, by region?

    Global trade: imports and exports, by product, by region?

    Global trade is set to hit a new peak of $33trn in 2024 (30% of global GDP), of which 70-80% is for goods and 20-30% is for services. This data-file disaggregates global trade by product by region, across c20 categories of energy, materials and capital goods, which we follow in our research, and which are…

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  • Water intensity of power generation?

    Water intensity of power generation?

    The water intensity of US power generation averages 21 liters per kWh (5,600 gallons per MWH), but 95% of this total comes from evaporation at hydro reservoirs. Excluding hydro power, good estimates are that nuclear power uses 2.1 liters/kWh of water, coal power uses 2 liters/kWh and CCGTs use 1.2 liters/kWh, or less in some…

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  • Residential energy prices: reasons for optimism?

    Residential energy prices: reasons for optimism?

    Residential energy prices tend to run 4x higher than underlying wholesale energy prices. This is a very wide margin, as by contrast, typical commoditized products in supermarkets are usually only marked up by about 2x, compared to their wholesale prices. Today’s data-file compares retail prices vs wholesale prices across a dozen different categories. A remarkable…

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  • Overview of lasers: by type, market size and efficiency?

    Overview of lasers: by type, market size and efficiency?

    The global laser market is worth $20bn pa, of which half comprises diode lasers mainly used for fiber-optic communications and around 30% is fiber lasers mainly used for cutting, welding and heat-treating materials. These two laser types dominate because of their high, 30-80% efficiencies. This data-file is a brief overview of lasers.

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