Additive manufacturing: technology leaders?

This data-file tabulates 5,500 patents into additive manufacturing (AM, a.k.a., 3D printing), in order to identify technology leaders.  Patent filings over time show a sharp acceleration, making AM one of the fastest growth areas for the energy transition.

14 companies with concentrated exposure to the theme are profiled, including their size, revenues, share of revenues from AM and 3-6 lines of notes on each company.

The full screen also shows growing AM activity from Cap Goods, aerospace, automotive and oil services companies.

Use of thermoplastic materials is also seen by narrowing in upon 130 patents from leading chemicals companies (e.g., Covestro, Solvay, SABIC, Arkema).

Examples from the patents show how AM can reduce costs by 25-90% and lead times by 10-90%.

 

Leading Companies in Pipeline Gas Distribution?

This data-file tracks over 800 ex-China patents for the pipeline transportation of natural gas, filed from 2010 to 2019. The aim is to screen for exciting technologies and companies, as natural gas demand is set to treble in the most economic route to an energy transition.

Innovative growth companies with a focus on pipeline gas transport include 3 publicly listed firms and 6 venture-stage start-ups. They are commercialising next-generation materials, leak monitoring and remote metering solutions.

Larger and listed companies with recent innovations in gas distribution include Air Products, Kogas, Tokyo Gas, Shawcor and Ecolab.

Leading Companies in Battery Recycling?

This data-file tracks over 6,000 patents filed into battery recycling technology, focusing in on 1,800+ post-2010, Western-filed patents. This matters as annual battery disposal requirements will ramp up to over 250kTpa over the next decade.  Hence the pace of patent developement has been escalating at a 15% CAGR.

18 technology leaders are profiled ex-China, based on their patent filings and public disclosures. We tabulate the size, likely battery recycling revenues and recent commercial progress.

The leaders include 6 larger-cap listed companies (two in Japan, two in the US, one in Korea, one in Europe) and 10 private companies, including some exciting, early-stage concepts to improve material recovery and costs.

The final tabs of the file include all of the patents, with summaries, and our notes from recent technical papers.

Nature-based CO2 offsets: measuring forest and soil carbon?

This data-file screens twenty companies involved in measuring and verifying nature-based carbon offsets, in forests and soils. It includes 6 leading companies at the cutting edge (5 private, and 1 subsidiary of a large, listed US corporation).

Traditional methodologies have evolved rapidly, from time-intensive and cumbersome manual methods, into a fully-fledged, technology-driven, real-time remote sensing industry. This is a pre-requisite for the scale-up of nature-based CO2 offsets.

The data-file contains an overview of each of the 20 companies, its size, recent progress and a subjective score of its edge and interest.  The file also contains our notes on measuring soil and forest CO2, plus c400 patents that informed the screen.

Leading Companies Commercialising Heat Pumps?

Heat pumps can halve the CO2 intensity of residential heating while also lowering costs by c10-35% in some cases (model here).

Hence this data-file aims to quantify the leading companies commercialising heat pumps, tracking 70,000 patents since 2000, focusing in upon 4,000 Western-centric patents from 2017-19. The space is competitive, with 20 leaders vying for market share.

Our screen focuses in upon the technology leaders with the most concentrated exposure to the theme. We have profiled 7 leading public companies and 4 private companies, including two venture stage firms developing particularly exciting concepts.

Screen of Large Public Fertilizer Companies

This data-file screens the large, listed fertilizer companies, comparing their CO2 intensity, ROACE, cash flow and recent patent filings.

The industry could be disrupted by the rise of conservation agriculture, eroding thee 186MTpa global fertilizer market, which also comprises c1% of global emissions.

Covered companies include BASF, CF Industries, Israel Chemicals, K+S, Mosaic, Nutrien, Uralkali and Yara.

Leading Companies in Redox Flow Batteries

We have compiled a database of 25 leading companies in Redox Flow Batteries, starting by looking across 1,237 patents filed about the technology since 2017 (all patents are summarized in the second tab of the data-file).

For each company, we summarize its technology, its recent projects news, its size, its location and whether it is public/private. Covered companies range from public Asian conglomerates to public/private redox flow pure-plays.

Exciting progress is visible from Redox Flow batteries, rapidly progressing toward technical maturity, constructing demonstration facilities and offering ultra long-life battery storage, which could greatly surpass lithium ion economics in grid applications.

Aerial Vehicles: Which Ones Fly?

We have compiled a database of over 100 companies, which have already flown c40 aerial vehicles (aka “flying cars”) and the number should rise to c60 by 2021.

The data substantiates our conclusion that aerial vehicles will gain credibility in the 2020s, the way electric vehicles did in the 2010s. Our latest updated in early-2020 shows strong progress was made in 2019 (chart below).

The database categorizes the top vehicle concepts by type, company, year-founded, company-size, company-geography, backers, fuel-type, speed, range, take-off weight, payload, year of first prototype, target commercial delivery date, fuel economy and required battery weights.

Some vehicle concepts are extremely impressive and credible; but a few may find it more challenging to meet the ranges they have promised at current battery densities…

The Top 25 Companies in Plastics Pyrolysis?

This data-file assesses the outlook for 25 plastic pyrolysis companies, operating  (or constructing) 100 plants around the world, which use chemical processes to turn waste plastics back into oil.

Our data-file includes the number of plants, locations, start-up years, input-types and capacities for each plant. We also include our own notes, our assessment’s of each company’s technology.

The data-file has been updated in 1Q20, revising our rankings, and adsding an assessment of 2019’s pace of newsflow. It is extremely encouraging to see Super-Majors entering the fray (Shell, TOTAL, BP), as well as strong progress from the leading companies.

Blockchain in the Oil & Gas Supply Chain

This datafile tabulates ten examples of deploying Blockchain in the oil and gas industry from 2017 onwards; including the companies involved, the use cases, and our estimates of the cost savings.

Most prior examples have been in oil and gas trading, where cost savings tend to run at c35%. More niche applications are gaining traction in downstream, B2B applications.

For 2020, we are particularly excited by the broadening of Blockchain technologies into the procurement industry by a particular company, Data Gumbo.

c10% cost savings may be achieved for fragmented supply chains, such as US shale, by analogy to other digital procurement platforms we have evaluated in the past.