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Category: Renewable Hydrogen

  • MIL-OSI Asia-Pac: Strengthening India-Belgium Partnership: Shri Piyush Goyal Meets Belgian Minister of Foreign Trade Mr. Theo Francken and Minister-President of Flanders Mr. Matthias Diependaele

    Source: Government of India

    Posted On: 04 MAY 2025 7:55PM by PIB Delhi

    Union Minister of Commerce and Industry, Shri Piyush Goyal, held a productive meeting in Brussels on 2nd May 2025 with Belgian Minister of Defence and Foreign Trade Mr. Theo Francken and Minister-President of the Flanders region Mr. Matthias Diependaele to strengthen the Indo-Belgian partnership across trade, technology, investment, and innovation. This engagement follows the March 2025 visit of HRH Princess Astrid of Belgium to India, where her meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi underscored the shared ambition to unlock new avenues for collaboration in trade, technology, defence, agriculture, life sciences, innovation, skilling and academic exchanges. The over 300-member Belgian Economic Mission, led by Princess Astrid, infused fresh momentum into this dynamic bilateral relationship. Both sides reaffirmed their commitment to building on this momentum to forge resilient, future-focused ties that enhance mutual growth and contribute to a more integrated global economic framework.

    The discussions highlighted growing economic synergies and focused on scaling bilateral trade, fostering industrial collaboration, and deepening investments in strategic sectors such as semiconductors, clean energy, defence production, and pharmaceuticals.The Flanders region, recognized as Belgium’s economic engine, was highlighted as a critical partner with its advanced manufacturing ecosystem, R&D infrastructure, and its strategic role as a European gateway. With India already the world’s fastest-growing major economy and widely expected to remain so over the next two decades ahead—driven by a young, aspirational population and a dynamic reform-oriented environment—the growth story presents an unprecedented opportunity for India and Belgium.

    The two sides reaffirmed their shared vision of mutual prosperity and resilient economic cooperation amidst evolving global challenges. Minister Goyal reflected on India’s transformative economic journey over the past decade, emphasizing reforms that have empowered citizens and entrepreneurs alike. “The last eleven years have not only been about economic upliftment, but about enabling aspirations,” he stated.

    The meeting also reviewed progress in EU–India Free Trade Agreement (FTA) negotiations, with both parties recognizing the need to address tariff and non-tariff barriers to enhance market access. Minister Goyal reiterated India’s position as a trusted and long-term economic partner for Europe’s growth, remarking, “India is not just a market of the future—it is a collaborator of trust.”

    Belgium remains one of India’s most significant economic partners in Europe. It is India’s 5th largest trading partner within the EU, with bilateral trade reaching USD 15.07 billion in 2023–24. Belgian FDI in India has totaled USD 3.94 billion from April 2000 to September 2024, including a remarkable 39% growth—USD 1.1 billion—in the past year alone. Bilateral cooperation spans a wide array of sectors including defence manufacturing, green hydrogen, nano-electronics, nuclear medicine, and pharmaceutical R&D, reflecting the expanding depth and strategic nature of the Indo-Belgian economic relationship. Both sides agreed to strengthen high-level engagements and facilitate regular visits by business delegations to accelerate trade and investment outcomes.

    ***

    Abhishek Dayal/Abhijith Narayana

    (Release ID: 2126845) Visitor Counter : 56

    MIL OSI Asia Pacific News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Governor Newsom announces new tax credits that will generate $2.1 billion investment in world’s 4th largest economy

    Source: US State of California 2

    May 2, 2025

    What you need to know: As part of the California Jobs First initiative, the state is awarding $30.5 million in tax credits to seven companies committed to creating new jobs and investing over $2.1 billion across key industries like clean energy, advanced manufacturing, logistics, and consumer goods.

    SACRAMENTO — Governor Gavin Newsom today announced the  Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development (GO-Biz) awarded $30.5 million in California Competes Tax Credit (CalCompetes) awards to seven companies, supporting the creation of new jobs and spurring more than $2.1 billion in new private investment across the state.

    “California is where innovation meets opportunity — and these investments prove it. From clean energy to advanced manufacturing, these companies are creating good-paying jobs and driving billions in private investment. We’re building a stronger, bottom-up economy that works for all Californians.”

    Governor Gavin Newsom

    The awardees represent a diverse range of sectors critical to California’s future:

    • Element Resources is investing $1.85 billion in a hydrogen fuel manufacturing facility in Lancaster.
    • Fuse Energy Technologies is bringing fusion energy R&D to San Leandro and the East Bay, with a $152 million in investment.
    • Legendary Foods will expand food manufacturing across Bell and Santa Monica, with over $70 million in investment.
    • Ariat International is expanding its San Leandro headquarters and design operations, investing $19 million.
    • Marine Terminals Corporation will invest $8 million to expand port operations in Port Hueneme, supporting logistics and supply chain infrastructure.
    • Cloacina will manufacture wastewater treatment equipment in Arroyo Grande, with a $3.9 million investment.
    • Rural Power Systems will scale water pump manufacturing in Davis, investing $9.15 million.

    “These awards reflect the incredible diversity and strength of California’s economy,” said Dee Dee Myers, Senior Advisor to Governor Newsom and Director of GO-Biz. “Whether it’s rural communities or urban innovation hubs, companies across the state are choosing to grow here because of our unmatched talent, infrastructure and vision for the future.”

    Since 2013, California Competes has awarded tax credits to more than 1,200 businesses, creating nearly 160,000 jobs, and resulting in more than $50 billion of private investment across the state.

    Over the past five years, CalCompetes has invested in companies such as Pacific Steel to construct the first steel mill in California in more than 50 years in Kern County; Relativity Space to expand their ability to manufacture 3D-printed rockets to carry satellites into space; AES to expand solar energy and battery storage operations across the state; and many more.

    See Full Award Details Here

    California Jobs First: A bold plan, realized locally

    In February, Governor Newsom released the California Jobs First Economic Blueprint – a new economic vision for California’s future. The Blueprint, which is being implemented by the nine state agencies on the California Jobs First Council, outlines key initiatives to support regional growth, invest in 21st century job training, create an attractive environment for job creators and strengthen California’s innovation economy – all to help increase access to good-paying jobs for Californians.

    California’s economic leadership

    With a nation-leading GDP and more Fortune 500 companies than any other state, California’s economy remains a global powerhouse driven by diversity, creativity and opportunity.

    • 4th Largest Economy in the World: California’s $4.1 trillion GDP recently surpassed Japan.
    • #1 in the Nation: Leads the U.S. in Fortune 500 companies, new business starts, venture capital access, manufacturing output, high-tech industries and agriculture.
    • Major Trade Powerhouse: Over $675 billion in two-way trade, making California the largest importer among U.S. states and a key driver of job creation.
    •  Manufacturing Hub: Home to 36,000+ manufacturing firms, employing over 1.1 million workers, with strengths in aerospace, electronics, and zero-emission vehicles.
    • AI & Innovation Leader: California hosts 32 of the world’s top 50 AI companies and produces 25% of global AI patents and conference papers.

    Recent news

    May 1, 2025

    News LOS ANGELES — California First Partner Jennifer Siebel Newsom today joined students, mental health professionals, and athletes at two schools in Pasadena and the Boys & Girls Clubs of the Peninsula’s East Palo Alto Clubhouse to celebrate Move Your Body, Calm…

    May 1, 2025

    News What you need to know: For the second year in a row, California’s Department of Finance released data showing the Golden State’s population grew. In 2024, the state added more than 100,000 residents. SACRAMENTO — Today, Governor Gavin Newsom announced that…

    May 1, 2025

    News What you need to know: House Republicans used an illegal tactic to attempt to overrule California’s clean cars and trucks program that has decreased smog and protected Californians’ health. SACRAMENTO — Governor Gavin Newsom issued the following statement today…

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Britain’s nuclear future? What small reactors, fusion and ‘Big Carl’ mean for net zero

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Tomas Martin, Associate Professor in Materials Physics, University of Bristol

    Former UK prime minister Tony Blair recently argued nuclear power is an “essential part of the answer” to net zero. Writing in the foreword of a report by his thinktank, the Tony Blair Institute, he claimed small modular nuclear reactors, nuclear fusion and other advanced technologies can help lower the emissions of the electricity sector.

    It’s worth looking at what these technologies involve, and how far off the UK is from integrating them into its electricity system. But we should first recognise great progress in the electricity sector in the past 15 years, and how dramatic reductions in the cost of wind and solar have led to huge increases in renewable capacity across the globe.

    The UK completely removed all coal-fired power in 2024, largely replaced by offshore wind and gas. However, relying on any one technology makes an electricity grid less resilient, and nuclear is zero-carbon and can help stabilise the grid when so much electricity comes from intermittent renewables.

    Historically, nuclear has contributed around 15% to 25% of the UK’s electricity supply, however most reactors have closed or are approaching the end of their life. The fleet of 26 Magnox reactors built in the 1960s finished operation by 2015 and are now being decommissioned.

    Over the past three years three other sites have also closed, with the remainder currently anticipated to run until 2028-2030. At this point, what was once 41 reactors will have shrunk to just Sizewell B, a power plant operational on the Suffolk coast since 1995.

    Replacing this drop in electricity production must be a big priority. The construction of two new reactors at Hinkley Point C in south-west England started in 2016 but won’t finish until at least 2029. Significant planning has taken place for an identical site at Sizewell C in Suffolk, and a final decision is expected shortly.

    The pressurised water reactor design at these two sites produces significantly more electricity than past UK designs, and these four reactors will together produce 6.4GW of electricity, replacing all 14 of the reactors that are retiring.

    Supporting the construction of new reactors at Hinkley Point and Sizewell is essential for maintaining the UK’s electricity supply, but basically returns the country to the status quo. Beyond, there are number of exciting new developments.

    SMRs

    Small modular reactors (SMRs) and advanced modular reactors (AMRs) have frustratingly similar names, but have become the main way to categorise the two options. The “small” in SMRs is because they produce between 30MW and 300MW of electricity, compared to 1,600MW for each reactor at Hinkley Point C.

    The “modular” is driven by a desire to produce multiple identical reactors at once in a factory, rather than constructing on site. This can dramatically reduce manufacturing and installation time, potentially making them much cheaper.

    A combination of new SMRs and one or two new Hinkley C-sized reactors would enable UK nuclear capacity to expand beyond the status quo in the 2030s, further reducing the carbon emissions of the electricity sector.

    The next generation

    Further into the future, exciting research is taking place on the next “generation IV” nuclear designs: advanced modular reactors (AMRs).

    Some AMRs can run at much higher temperatures, which could help decarbonise tricky industries like steelmaking or produce hydrogen for energy storage or low-carbon plane fuel. Some designs can even reuse nuclear waste, reducing how long it needs to be stored safely.

    Even further in the future, nuclear fusion – the same process that powers the sun – could offer clean electricity without producing long-lasting radioactive waste. The UK is supporting this by building a demonstration fusion plant called STEP which aims to start operating by 2040.

    One of the biggest criticisms of nuclear is the cost. Building a nuclear plant is a massive project that can take many years or even decades. Hinkley Point C, for example, has up to 10,000 workers and more than 100 cranes on site, including the world’s biggest crane “Big Carl”.

    Because plants take so long to build, the money is borrowed years before any electricity is generated, gathering significant interest in the meantime. These interest payments can ultimately make up as much as two-thirds of the total cost.

    A new funding model, similar to that used for big infrastructure projects like Crossrail, should lower costs.

    But once a nuclear plant is built and paid off, it’s one of the cheapest ways to generate electricity – especially as modern reactors can run for up to 80 years. That’s why government support to cover upfront construction costs can pay off in the long run.

    The previous UK government ambition was to build 24GW of new nuclear power by 2050 – about four times more than the country has today. However, the current government has not confirmed it will stick to this target.

    To get there, the UK would need to approve several new nuclear projects every few years starting in 2030, which will require major investment in skills, resources and collaborations.

    We urgently need to decarbonise our energy system, and future nuclear reactors can play an important role in that alongside renewables and other technologies.

    Tomas Martin receives funding from EDF and the Royal Academy of Engineering as part of the Royal Academy of Engineering Senior Research Fellowship scheme. His research work includes projects sponsored by EDF, UKAEA and UKNNL.

    – ref. Britain’s nuclear future? What small reactors, fusion and ‘Big Carl’ mean for net zero – https://theconversation.com/britains-nuclear-future-what-small-reactors-fusion-and-big-carl-mean-for-net-zero-255797

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Bid to lead hydrogen-powered future

    Source: Scotland – City of Aberdeen

    Aberdeen City Council is aiming to establish a “hydrogen valley” in the North East that integrates production, storage, and end-use applications. 

    The TH2ISTLE project could significantly contribute to the region’s decarbonisation goals, aligning with Scotland’s 2045 net-zero target. 

    Aberdeen is bidding for £7.7 million funding from the Clean Hydrogen Partnership under the Horizon Europe programme.  

    The city, long recognised as one of Europe’s energy capitals, has been at the forefront of hydrogen innovation for over a decade. 

    Cllr Christian Allard, Co-leader of Aberdeen City Council, said: “The TH2ISTLE project represents a bold step towards a sustainable future for North East.  

    “By harnessing the power of hydrogen, Aberdeen is set to lead the way in energy transition, driving economic growth, job creation, and environmental sustainability.  

    “With our rich energy heritage, skilled workforce, and strong partnerships, Aberdeen is the perfect location to spearhead this transformative initiative.”  

    Cllr Ian Yuill, Co-leader of Aberdeen City Council, said: “We have been at the forefront of hydrogen innovation for over a decade, and the TH2ISTLE project is a testament to our dedication to a greener future. 

    “The region’s extensive experience in energy production and its strategic location near significant renewable resources, such as offshore wind, further enhance its suitability for this initiative.” 

    By integrating five hydrogen production sites across the region, TH2ISTLE would ensure a steady supply of green hydrogen, reducing reliance on fossil fuels and enhancing energy security. 

    The project is expected to produce up to 627 tonnes of hydrogen per year by 2028, with the potential to scale up significantly. Total investment, including leveraged national and regional funding, could reach £62 million. 

    It could generate between 700 and 1,000 jobs during the initial deployment phase, with long-term projections of up to 13,000 jobs by 2030 through the development of new skills and training programmes – particularly targeting the region’s existing oil and gas workforce, which has a wealth of transferable skills.  

    The TH2ISTLE project brings together a diverse consortium of 30 partners.

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Dame Angela McLean’s speech at the Royal Institution

    Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments

    Speech

    Dame Angela McLean’s speech at the Royal Institution

    This is a draft text of the speech ‘Discourse: The future of engineering biology’ delivered by Government Chief Scientific Adviser Professor Dame Angela McLean at The Royal Institution on 25 April 2025.

    I want to start by asking you all to think about how you got here tonight.

    I don’t mean in some philosophical sense; that kind of question is better left to other speakers. I mean literally: how did you make your way, here, to the Royal Institution?

    If you’re anything like me, you relied on Google Maps to show you the way (although I may be obliged to say “Other providers are available”). Perhaps you also used your phone to pay for the bus or Tube.

    If you’re joining us online – hello to you all! – you’ll be watching on a phone, tablet or laptop. So, one way or another, most of us made it here thanks to 1 of these devices.

    Now I want you to think about the battery in your phone. Chances are it’s a lithium-ion battery. And if you came in an electric car or bus, you would also have depended on a lithium-ion battery.

    The advantage of lithium-ion batteries compared to traditional alkaline batteries – the kind you may still put in the back of your TV remote – is that they can provide more energy and are rechargeable. People old enough to have depended entirely on alkaline batteries for many more devices besides the TV remote will remember the frustration when they ran out of power – and trying to cobble together another set of batteries to get them working again. Our phones may go dead, but it’s simple and convenient to recharge them.

    But there is a downside, namely all the metals that go into making these modern batteries and electrical products, including lithium, cobalt and other rare earth elements.

    Getting hold of these metals is hard. Most are currently extracted and purified from compounds in rocks, a process which can be very energy-intensive as well as very polluting.

    Recycling and reusing these same metals is also hard.

    This is the periodic table of the elements created by Dmitri Mendeleev, first published in 1869 and subsequently presented right here at the Royal Institution some 20 years later.

    How many elements do you think are used in electronic products?

    Electronic products can contain up to 60 different elements – around 52 of them metals (those are the elements highlighted in blue on the slide) – and we currently rely on inefficient and environmentally damaging methods to isolate and recycle individual metals.

    Indeed, many electronic items cannot be recycled. They simply go to landfill. This is already a serious issue and it’s 1 that will only get worse as global demand for electronics increases.

    Well, what if I told you that researchers here in the UK have identified naturally occurring bacteria, which have the ability to extract and recycle metals from this sort of waste?

    Hats off to anyone in the audience familiar with the strain of bacteria called Shewanella oneidensis MR-1, which can remove manganese from lithium-ion batteries. Or the bacteria Desulfovibrio alaskensis, which is capable of precipitating cobalt out from a mixture of the different metals and chemicals in lithium-ion batteries.

    I’m only aware of these bacteria thanks to amazing research taking place in the UK, including by Louise Horsfall’s group at the University of Edinburgh. Louise’s team have been collaborating with researchers from across the country as part of the ReLib project, which stands for the reuse and recycling of lithium-ion batteries.

    Actually, 1 of the funders for this project is the Faraday Institution, the UK’s flagship battery research programme named for the great Michael Faraday whose desk is in front of me.

    On his desk I have a few items to use to help explain battery recycling.

    Louise’s team have primarily been focused on recycling metals from large lithium-ion batteries used in electric vehicles. However, they can be pretty large – too large for me to bring here tonight. Nevertheless, many of you will know what a lithium-ion battery looks like from your phone – and the science behind how we can recycle these batteries is no different.

    Once lithium-ion batteries reach the end of their life they can be disassembled and shredded using mechanical methods to produce this. In this case, the shredded material has come from part of the battery called the cathode, which contains lots of the metals we want to recycle.

    Once we’ve dissolved this shredded material using chemical or biological methods, we get this solution here… called metal leachate. This contains the useful metals we’re interested in and it’s at this point that we introduce the bacteria I mentioned earlier.

    The bacteria collect and excrete specific metals as tiny nanoparticles which we can recover to give us something like this… which is manganese that Louise’s team has produced in the way I’ve just described from this exact process! We can then use this manganese to build new batteries or other devices.

    You might be wondering what do we do with what’s left behind in the leachate solution. Well, after the bacteria have done their work we are left with this biobrine which is rich in lithium – and resembles what you might find in lithium deposits in South America. This too can be used to make new batteries.

    And I’m not just talking about using a few types of microorganism to improve the extraction and recycling of 1 or 2 metals. There appear to be lots of different microbes out there capable of extracting different metals. Indeed, it’s possible that the bacteria have evolved this capability in a way that detoxifies their own environment, collecting up and excreting harmful metals and so not being poisoned.

    So if we use combinations of these bacteria and we tweak the characteristics of these strains, we can increase the efficiency with which metals are purified and recycled from waste.

    That word tweaking is important and it doesn’t do justice to the science involved. What we’re really talking about is engineering existing microbes to extract and recycle metals.

    Extracting metals from the ground is a hugely expensive and damaging process. It looks rather like this:

    What you can see on the bottom part of this slide is an open cast manganese mine.

    And once we’re finished with products needing such metals, we throw them away. The top part of this slide shows a landfill site after a fire. There have been reports of lithium-ion batteries causing fires at landfill sites across the world.

    With engineering biology, we only need to remove metals from the ground once; thereafter they can become part of a genuine circular economy through continual re-use.

    We use physics, chemistry and engineering to get them out of the ground but then we can and should use biology and engineering to keep recycling them.

    And this is just 1 example of what is within our grasp thanks to the power and potential of the scientific field called engineering biology.

    I’m speaking about engineering biology this evening because I believe it could be the most significant branch of science for decades to come.

    I want to explain why I think that’s the case – and to share my excitement about this field for 2 main reasons.

    The first is that the science and engineering involved in this field is, frankly, beautiful.

    The second – and more important – reason is that both current and future applications will make a huge difference to the everyday lives of people in the UK and across the world.

    I’m here to try to convince you of both these things, but if I can convince you of only 1, I want it to be the latter.

    I’m really keen for people to recognise that the scientists and engineers in this field are working to  produce solutions that most, if not all, of us can agree are necessary… urgently necessary even.

    To kick off, I ought to say that – as Government Chief Scientific Adviser – my role is to advise the Prime Minister and the Government on all matters related to science, technology and engineering.

    The job – and the advice – is a mixture of proactive and reactive work. It covers everything from providing scientific and technical advice during a national emergency to explaining the risks and opportunities around emerging technologies like artificial intelligence and engineering biology.

    Now, in getting to grips with the promise of engineering biology, I did have a little bit of a head start.

    I am a mathematical biologist by background. My own research focused on using mathematical models to improve our understanding of the evolution and spread of infections like measles and HIV.

    I don’t, however, have any background in engineering, nor in biochemistry. So I have had to get up to speed over the past few years.

    At this point let me explain what engineering biology actually is.

    Engineering biology involves applying engineering to biological processes in order to bend biology to our will.

    In other words, it’s the practice of using ideas and tools taken from engineering to design and modify living organisms or biological systems.

    Using tools and ideas developed over recent decades, the goal is to develop new materials and energy sources; to improve animal, plant and human health; to address environmental issues in new and sustainable ways.

    What we’re talking about is the ability to harness and control biology predictably, repeatably and – I’ve said this already – usefully. Sometimes that will mean working with what’s already available in nature; at other times, it will involve genetic modification techniques.

    Let me unpack some of this a bit further.

    Firstly, on the engineering side. Here, I want to start with the design-build-test-learn cycle – DBTL for short.

    This approach has been central to product development in engineering disciplines for some time. It drives continuous refinement and innovation, making research and development faster and more efficient.

    In engineering biology, design-build-test-learn is brought to bear on biological processes – by which I mean the activities occurring within living organisms.

    Image of the design-build-test-learn cycle. Each element is located in a different quarter and all 4 quarters make up a circle.

    Essentially, I’m talking about designing something biological – like a version of a cell, or it could be a biological process (such as cell division) or a genetically-engineered system…

    Then building it, maybe in the lab…

    Then testing it to see how well it works…

    Before finally, and perhaps most importantly, learning from what did and didn’t work and then feeding the lessons into another round of design, making improvements again and again around this cycle, towards an end goal.

    This looks like being a more efficient way of recycling metals, to use the case study I gave at the start.

    And why is this approach necessary? Well, because living organisms are highly complex, with many different parts and networks of interactions between those parts.

    One could argue that physical or chemical systems are a bit more straightforward, more predictable, more easily quantifiable. We’ve been using this design-build-test-learn process to bend chemistry and physics to our will for more than a century – very successfully.

    The complex and often unpredictable nature of biological systems means we need to work through multiple permutations to get to a desired outcome – and that’s where the engineering in engineering biology comes in.

    If we can get this approach right – and I’m going to offer some further examples later showing where we already are – then we have the power to systematically develop biological systems to meet some of the biggest challenges we face.

    Let me be more definitive. If the nineteenth century was chemistry’s golden age, and the twentieth century was the same thing for physics, I believe the twenty-first century should be the golden age for biology.

    Why am I so optimistic?

    This century can belong to biology because of a series of extraordinary advances in scientific understanding.

    Where to begin? Of course, we have spent thousands of years modifying the living world.

    But I’m not going to go all the way back to the domestication of wild crops. I’m not even going back to Darwin and Mendel.

    Instead I’ll start with Watson, Crick and Wilkins – as well as the often overlooked Rosalind Franklin; 3 of the 4 received a Nobel Prize in 1962. By determining the structure of DNA, they discovered what we can call the language of biology.

    Understanding the structure of DNA opened the door to reading this complex language, then editing it, then actually writing it ourselves.

    Our ability to read DNA took a big step forward thanks to Walter Gilbert and Fred Sanger, who shared half of the 1980 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Gilbert and Sanger did lots of work to understand the building blocks of DNA – the nucleotide alphabet of biology, if you like.

    The next game-changer was in 1983 when an American biochemist, Kary Mullis, developed something called the Polymerase Chain Reaction. Better known as PCR, it is a laboratory technique that’s used to make copies of particular pieces of DNA. Think of it as a photocopier for DNA.

    The technique lets scientists easily – and cheaply – create many millions of copies of DNA segments from very small original amounts – and that makes reading the DNA in a sample possible even if it is only there in tiny amounts.

    You will all have become familiar with PCR during the Covid pandemic, when it was used to make many copies of the viral genetic material to allow reliable diagnosis of a Covid infection. That was the test where you did a swab, popped it in a test tube and then sent it away in the post. It was particularly important early on, before we had home testing kits.    

    The invention of PCR also earned a share of the 1993 Nobel Prize in Chemistry – that’s DNA Nobel number 3.

    Fast forward 10 years to 2003 and the completion of the Human Genome Project. Researchers across the world spent some 13 years cataloguing the precise sequence of all the DNA in the cells of a human being. It was a huge effort and that first whole genome sequence of a human cost an estimated £2.5 billion.

    Thankfully – but also remarkably – sequencing technology has come on leaps and bounds over the past 20 years. Now, it is possible to sequence the same amount of DNA analysed by the Human Genome Project in a single day – and for just a few hundred pounds! We’ve even developed pocket-sized machines which are capable of reading DNA in real-time.

    In fact, I have 1 here: a portable sequencing device made by Oxford Nanopore. You simply add your sample into the middle here – this contains the sensor that will help to read the DNA sequence of your sample. Then simply close the lid and press go. And the results are delivered straight to your laptop via a USB-C cable which plugs into the end here.

    This is useful for situations where we can’t send off a sample for analysis and wait days for the results – if, say, we’re urgently trying to identify the cause of an infection in some far-flung corner of the world.

    So… we’ve learned to amplify DNA using PCR and we’ve learned to read DNA – fast – using rapid sequencing technologies.

    We’ve also started learning – and do emphasise “started” – to accurately and precisely “edit” DNA.

    Previously, when we wanted to do this, the methods were somewhat cruder – such as gene guns, which were used to literally fire DNA into cells.

    We now have tools like CRISPR-Cas9 (another Nobel prize-winning technology developed by Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna), and we can now take a targeted portion of DNA and change it very accurately in specific places. Some people have compared CRISPR to using a pair of genetic scissors.

    Some of you might be wondering whether engineering biology is any different from another common term: synthetic biology. They are often applied interchangeably, although different countries interpret them in different ways.

    The way I see it, synthetic biology refers to tools like CRISPR, used to design and build new biological components. Engineering biology is taking these tools – with or without genetic modification – and using the DBTL cycle to apply these tools at scale to find solutions to problems in the world around us.

    There are still challenges with the accuracy of such tools, but the possibilities are vast.

    We know that certain diseases are caused by mutations in a single gene. Sickle cell disease, for example, is caused by mutations in the beta-globin gene, resulting in red blood cells which are misshapen. As a result, these red cells don’t flow around the body as well as they should. This can cause those affected – roughly 17,500 people in the UK – to suffer from anaemia as well as complications like terrible pain and organ damage.

    In the past, the only treatment was to rely on regular blood transfusions or a bone marrow transplant, neither of which comes without risks or complications. However, researchers have been using CRISPR to precisely edit the gene responsible for sickle cell with great success – so much so that, in January this year, the treatment was approved for use in the NHS as the world’s first gene-editing treatment for blood disorders.

    And this is just 1 of many gene-editing clinical trials going on right now, including treatments for liver disease, heart disease and some cancers.

    The possibilities are not confined to human diseases. We can use these genetic scissors to develop crops that are better at withstanding drought and more resistant to insects, so we don’t have to rely so much on pesticides.

    And it’s these tools that are being used to modify the bacteria designed for metal recycling that I spoke about at the start.

    Now, it would be remiss of me to talk about the tools of the future without mentioning AI and the transformative impacts it could have.

    A prime example is the challenge of understanding and predicting how proteins fold up intricately and precisely in all of our cells. Decoding this process is something scientists have been trying to achieve for decades.

    And in 2018, DeepMind came along with its AI model AlphaFold. AlphaFold has since been used to calculate the structure of hundreds of millions of proteins. And, yes, it earned the UK’s Demis Hassabis a share of last year’s Nobel prize in chemistry.

    Timeline starting with images of James Watson, Francis Crick, Maurice Wilkins and Rosalind Franklin above the year 1962. Images of Walter Gilbert and Frederick Sanger are next to the year 1980. Image of Kary Mullis is next to the year 1993. Images of Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna are below the year 2020 and an image of Demis Hassabis is below the year 2024.

    All that’s missing on my timeline now is the capacity to design a new protein from scratch de novo. That will bring us into the realm of being able to write the language of biology – designing and printing a sequence of synthetic DNA to produce a protein with the properties that we want, from scratch.

    I’ve just been talking about how technologies such as AI, and tools such as CRISPR, are helping to broaden the range of biological powers at our disposal and increase our ability to design and optimise biological systems.

    And all this comes with valid concerns about risks. An example which springs to my mind was when scientists in Australia created a version of a mouse virus back in 2001 that instead of causing the normal mild symptoms, killed all of the mice within nine days. They were conducting some innocent genetic engineering research to try and make a mouse contraceptive vaccine for pest control and inadvertently found a way of creating a much more deadly version of the mousepox virus. Unsurprisingly, this made quite a splash in the media – although I think it was good that such a story was not buried.

    The point I want to make is that we must develop the right practices and regulation so that we ensure that research is carried out safely and responsibly but we do not stifle innovation.

    We refer to this as “responsible innovation” and it is 1 of the pillars of our government vision for engineering biology. That has given rise to new guidance on which genetic sequences people should be allowed to order for their research – welcome progress.

    Having the UK take a lead in this kind of responsible innovation – where we are thinking carefully about the desired benefits of our research as well as about how to avoid negative impacts – lets us manage the risks and harness the wealth of opportunities that engineering biology can offer.

    There are also other challenges to overcome. What’s standing in the way of us exploiting engineering biology for good? I won’t dwell for long on this, because you’re here to hear about science, not policy – but it is important to talk about the barriers.

    We’ve already spoken about proper regulation for engineering biology. We also need to have proper ways of funding the basic research that drives this wonderful new technology and also the application of that research that lets us solve real-world problems. Then there’s also the task of making more people aware of the potential for progress here.

    But a key area for me – and also a common issue across all areas of science and technology – is making sure we have the right skills in our future workforce to perform the future jobs that come with new technologies.

    The skill set for engineering biology is particularly broad: the field is a combination many different skill-sets and mindsets. Mostly we train people either to become biologists or to become engineers, and for this technology we need people who can think with both those mindsets. So we need to think about a pipeline which starts in schools, with children getting the right grounding in key subjects – and children also hearing about the exciting careers they can pursue through developing and using the technologies I’ve talked about.

    I think it’s vital that we don’t think exclusively about technical skills: communication skills are extremely important too. It’s a wonderful thing to do pioneering, cutting-edge research but we also need to be able to explain what that’s about and why people should want it.

    So far, I’ve told you a bit about what engineering biology is and how we’ve got to this point, poised for biological century. I’ve also talked a bit about risks and challenges, but I think it’s now time to delve further into the applications that I think are so inspiring.

    Today, I launched a report called “Engineering Biology Aspirations”. It’s our attempt to share our excitement about the possibilities that this technology opens up – and we want to share it with everyone, my colleagues inside government and also much more widely.

    It contains case studies, written by UK-based experts, that illustrate some of the diverse problems we can address using engineering biology. Microbial metal extraction is 1 of them. I want to highlight some others during the rest of this talk – and to recognise some of the amazing research taking place in the UK.

    One of the reasons that I commissioned the report is that all too often, when someone mentions engineering biology or synthetic biology, the examples will involve vaccines or medicines.

    Of course those are fantastic, important applications: with the Covid pandemic such a fresh memory, we are all acutely aware of the life-saving importance of rapid and effective vaccine production. And I’m in awe of those researchers who can edit the gene that causes sickle cell disease.

    But I want to make sure that we also shine a light on the true breadth of opportunities that engineering biology presents, not only in health, but across agriculture, materials, chemicals, energy, defence.

    So, let’s shift gear and think about the fashion industry. Unlike metal recycling, it’s a sector familiar to all of us. We all buy and wear clothes, but we don’t often stop to think about where they’ve come from, how they’ve been made, and at what cost to the environment.

    Putting aside issues around workforce conditions and waste, the fashion industry is 1 of the world’s largest polluters, responsible for up to 8 per cent of carbon emissions globally…

    Not to mention the pollution generated in the form of clothing and textiles dumped in landfills, like this 1 in Bangladesh, never to biodegrade.

    At the same time, 1/5 of the pollution of clean water around the world is caused by dyeing and treating textiles.

    And there’s also growing awareness of the environmental damage caused by the microfibres shed by polyester clothing.

    So it’s no surprise that plenty of researchers and companies here in the UK and beyond are seeking inspiration from biological processes to make new materials that don’t rely on fossil fuels or on animal products such as leather.

    You may have been wondering why there are bottled drinks and a handbag beside each other on the Faraday desk. Well, they’re made of essentially the same material.

    The process of making both items starts with microbes that naturally produce a material called nanocellulose.

    In the case of Mogu Mogu – a coconut water drink you might find in your local supermarket – the nanocellulose is responsible for the lumps of jelly you can see in this bowl. 

    It is a polymer produced through fermentation – the same process used to make beer.

    Now, 1 company I visited last year is called Modern Synthesis, based in South London and founded by Jen Keane and Ben Reeve. They’re aiming to develop scalable solutions to meet the fashion industry’s need for high-performing, versatile materials that don’t pollute the planet.

    Modern Synthesis make nanocellulose fibres and then combine them with textiles such as cotton or linen to create new composites. These are then finished with natural coatings like waxes and oils to improve performance and to enhance look and feel, which are of course critical to customers. The result is this handbag!

    Image of black, biologically derived material

    And on the slide behind me, you can see in more detail the fibres that make up the handbag. These miniscule nanocellulose fibres are actually really, really strong – 8 times stronger than stainless steel relative to weight!

    Modern Synthesis is just 1 example of a pioneering UK company making waves in this area. Another example is Solena Materials who are using AI to help design completely new materials from scratch, including fibres that are effective at absorbing energy. This makes them relevant for the military and the police, who need blast-, ballistic- and stab-proof clothing. As the ex-Chief Scientific Adviser for the Ministry of Defence, it’s great to see engineering biology applications offering benefits for defence.

    Developing new materials like these can significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions compared to traditional material production. This includes minimising the environmental impacts of raising livestock for leather or the energy-intensive processes involved in creating synthetic textiles such as polyesters and nylons. Better still, these materials can be designed for biodegradability, getting away from the big problem of plastic pollution.

    Allow me to quote from our report for a second: “Imagine a world where every piece of your clothing has minimal cost to the environment, with zero waste going to landfills. Even if a piece of clothing is accidentally discarded into the environment, it safely biodegrades to leave no trace of its existence. This is the future of fashion, and engineering biology is helping to make it happen.”

    Let me move now to another pervasive problem: inefficiencies in food production. Most of you will be aware that fertilisers are used by farmers across the world to supply nitrogen to their crops. Without fertilisers, yields suffer.

    But there are 2 problems. First, the process for making nitrogen fertilisers is very energy-intensive. It’s responsible for between 1 and 2% of the entire world’s energy use – and generates matching CO2 emissions. Second, using fertilisers has considerable environmental impacts, releasing further greenhouse gas emissions and damaging waterways thanks to fertiliser runoff from fields.

    This slide shows excessive algae growth – a common impact of fertiliser runoff – in the River Wantsum in Kent.

    Currently, farmers across the world use more than 200 million tonnes of chemical fertilisers every year.

    Diagram showing molecules of nitrogen and hydrogen converted into molecules of ammonia, with a chemical equilibrium sign betweem ammonia and molecules of nitrogen that combine with molecules of hydrogen

    Now, this ability to produce nitrogen at scale – via the Haber-Bosch process – was without question the most important chemical breakthrough of the 20th century. The reaction that underpins this industrial process is shown behind me – converting nitrogen and hydrogen into ammonia, which is commonly used in fertilisers. It was discovered by Fritz Haber. Over half the global population depends for survival on foods fertilised using industrial production of nitrogen. But for the reasons I’ve outlined, we do need to do better.   

    So how can engineering biology help?

    What if we could engineer cereals crops to absorb their own nitrogen from the environment, without relying on fertilisers? We call that “fixing” nitrogen.

    There are actually examples of this happening in nature. There are bacteria in the soil called rhizobia which are particularly good at fixing nitrogen; in fact, they convert nitrogen gas from the atmosphere into ammonia – which is precisely the form of nitrogen that plants need. Legumes such as peas, clover and lupins attract these rhizobia bacteria to live in their roots – in small structures called nodules. In return for a steady supply of ammonia, the plant houses and feeds the bacteria, forming an ideal symbiotic relationship.

    Behind me is an illustration of a plant with root nodules… but in classic Blue Peter style, here are a couple I grew earlier!

    This clover plant from my lawn has nodules on its roots – but, because they are a bit tiny, I have also brought a photo of the same plant.

    For these sort of plants, we can already coat their seeds with rhizobia and achieve increases in yields. And we can even go a step further by adding the bacteria directly to fields in a process called soil inoculation.

    But the trouble with cereal crops like wheat, barley and maize is that they don’t have those root nodules and nor do they produce the special signalling chemicals that legumes use to attract bacteria.

    Image showing a clover plant with roots that have small circular nodules on them in the bottom left-hand corner and a sweet-corn plant with roots without nodules in the top right-hand corner

    Here is another plant that I’ve brought in from my garden. This 1 is sweet-corn, a variety of maize and a major cereal crop worldwide. You can see its roots here on the top part of the slide… no nodules! These kinds of crops do not set up this kind of symbiotic relationship with nitrogen-fixing bacteria.

    So what researchers, like Phil Poole at the University of Oxford, are doing is trying to engineer a new generation of fertiliser-free crops, drawing on plant genetics, biochemistry and soil ecology.

    One approach, given what I’ve just described, is to engineer cereals to form nodules on their roots that can host nitrogen-fixing bacteria.

    The UK is leading the way on this – Oxford and Cambridge universities have major programmes backed by investment from our research councils and from the Gates Foundation. In fact, the teams involved work together as part of a larger collaboration, and have recently made some significant advances, engineering barley to form nodule-like structures and engineering barley roots to release the chemical signal rhizopine that prompts rhizobia to start fixing nitrogen.

    The design-build-test-learn cycle I described earlier is a part of this research. All of the progress made so far has built on round after round of modifying, testing and redesigning organisms.

    There are still many hurdles to overcome, both from a technical perspective and societally; genetic modification of crops is a very sensitive issue. But the value of the prize here is large, and I think scientists should not be shy about describing it.

    Imagine a world where humanity’s main source of carbohydrates – cereal crops like wheat and barley – are able to generate their own nitrogen fertiliser.

    We could tackle global food shortages on a much more sustainable basis and at the same solve 1 of the most urgent climate challenges, consigning industrially-produced nitrogen to the past.

    Now, let’s just think about crops in a further context, because harvesting doesn’t have to be the end of their engineering biology journey!

    At the start of this talk, I name-dropped a couple of bacterial strains in relation to metal recycling. Well the biologist in me can’t help but tell you another 1 – this time being a type of bacteria called Halomonas.

    Researchers like Nigel Scrutton up at the University of Manchester, are engineering these bacteria to act as efficient factories for converting food waste into fuel via fermentation. When I say factories, I’m not talking about the massive industrial sites we would normally associate with fuel production.

    This photo is of Fawley oil refinery in Hampshire.

    Diagram showing drawings representing bacteria, food waste feedstock, a cylinder that produces fuel and container. The diagram shows that the result of feeding bacteria and food waste feedstock is fermentation that then produces fuel, which can be housed in a portable and scalable container

    By contrast, these fuel-producing bacteria can be housed in different-sized containers like the ones on this slide – some of them not too dissimilar to shipping containers.

    The beauty of this technology, therefore, is that it is inherently portable and scaleable to meet demand – with transformative implications for remote areas of the world where energy infrastructure can be scarce. And crucially, these are cleaner, fossil-free fuels that can be used to power homes, businesses, even aircraft.

    Let’s focus on that last application for a second. At the moment, the aviation industry relies almost completely on kerosene-based fuels, which account for a staggering 3% of global CO2 emissions.

    Burning fossil fuels is generally accepted as the main cause of global warming, so it is essential that we find ways to transition to sustainable sources of energy.

    Engineering biology solutions like Nigel’s can therefore play a significant role in creating a future without fossil fuels. One of the benefits of using bacteria to turn waste into useful fuels is that this can create another circular economy in which we no longer need to extract and burn more and more harmful fossil fuels; instead we recycle the carbon we already have.

    Personally, I think the environmental benefits are reason enough to get excited by this technology. But 1 of the great benefits of bacteria-fuel factories is how portable they are! In other words, they remove the need for large-scale bioreactor infrastructure.

    Imagine a world where clean fuels could be produced locally and on demand – including in all those remote and sparsely populated regions which currently struggle to access the fuels they require.

    Now, I argued just a moment ago that I want to convince people that engineering biology is about so much more than vaccines and medicines – and I hope that I’ve surprised at least some of you with the breadth of the examples I’ve described so far.

    But I do have 1 example from medicine that is just too fascinating to leave out, and that’s research into laboratory-grown blood.

    Why would we need such a product?

    Currently, the world relies almost entirely on human blood donations to treat disease and for emergency medicine. In many countries, including the UK, donation rates fluctuate, and shortages can happen. On top of that, donated blood has a limited shelf life. It is challenging to store and challenging to distribute. When you consider the fact that some countries don’t have the infrastructure to deliver blood products safely, or think about conflict or humanitarian emergencies, the problems associated with donated blood become even clearer.

    There are a few more issues too. It can be very difficult to source some rare blood types. And although blood services of course use screening to avoid known pathogens, there is always a risk of new ones arising, and being passed on to patients who receive blood transfusions.

    For all these reasons, finding new ways to produce blood would be another game changer, and, once more engineering biology can help us.

    Researchers, like Ash Toye at the University of Bristol, are exploring the possibility of banking unlimited supplies of red blood cells, either by transforming stem cells or genetically reprogramming donated precursor blood cells.

    What you can see on the screen is a beautiful illustration by artist Claudia Stocker, which provides a visualisation of CRISPR – the “genetic scissors” technology I mentioned earlier – being used here to edit the genetic material of the precursor cells that will go on to become red blood cells.

    The part of the image to focus on is the centre of the slide and specifically the spiral spools of DNA emanating from the big blue circle in the middle – the cell that will eventually give rise to the red blood cells around the outside of the slide. The little blue doughnuts represent the CRISPR technology in action, actively and precisely editing the DNA as we have instructed it to do.

    This editing can enable us to produce precursor cells that can grow and divide indefinitely in a controlled environment, giving us unlimited blood supplies.

    The Bristol team pioneering this research has been working closely with NHS Blood and Transplant and other partners in a ground-breaking clinical trial called RESTORE – RESTORE being the acronym for REcovery and survival of STem cell Originated REd cells.

    It’s the first time in the world that red blood cells grown in a laboratory have been given to another person as part of a trial into blood transfusion – you might have seen media coverage of this programme, which has attracted interest from all over the world. The trial should produce further results by the end of this year or early next.

    In the future, we could go a step further and use CRISPR to delete the genes responsible for blood groups, and – in doing so – create “universal” blood that would be invaluable in providing blood transfusions for individuals with rarer blood types.

    Image of a table containing the combinations of blood types of a donor and a recipient that match each other and ones that do not. The matches are highlighted in purple and the mismatches in red

    This slide is a brief reminder of the complexities around ensuring blood compatibility between donors and recipients. Only the combinations in purple are suitable.

    The prospects here are again tantalising. Imagine a world where no patient dies due to a lack of compatible blood following an accident or during surgery. Where safe blood is available on demand, can be stored for longer and is free of disease transmission risks.

    So there are all these amazing opportunities, which you can tell I love talking about!

    We’ve covered a fair bit of ground about engineering biology: not just historically but geographically, in universities and companies, and across a range of applications.

    I’m so proud that our country can lay claim to so much ingenuity. Microbial metal recycling from Edinburgh. Biosynthetic fuels from Manchester. Lab-grown blood from Bristol. Nitrogen-fixing cereals from Oxford.  And nanocellulose-based materials from right here in London.

    I want to end, though on a broader point concerning emerging technologies such as engineering biology and others besides.

    Earlier, you heard me talk about risks and challenges, including the need for responsible innovation.

    Another challenge – though – is about how we, as a society, talk about science and technology in general.

    Clearly, 1 of my aims this evening has been to raise awareness of engineering biology.

    But it strikes me that we’re living through a period where public engagement around science is getting harder.

    That’s not just because of the unprecedented volumes of misinformation circulating around us.

    We now live in a less paternalistic society – which is surely a good thing – it is no longer enough for scientists to tell people what’s good for them and expect them to toe the line. Instead, we know we need to have a proper, well-informed debate about these issues.

    Clearly, it would be possible for the promise of engineering biology to be compromised by public opposition. We need to listen to public concerns – really listen! – and understand that if we don’t respond to those concerns people will be perfectly within their rights to not support, or actively block, the engineering biology advances that we’re trying to create.

    There is a lot of work to do here. I don’t think we can ever be finished listening to the public.

    Essentially, the technologies we’re developing in engineering biology need to offer solutions to problems that people actually care about.

    Health, nutrition, climate, the environment, sustainability, global equity. I know that these are problems that billions of people care about.

    I hope I’ve persuaded you that when it comes to these problems, engineering biology can provide solutions.

    Image of the front cover of the ‘Engineering Biology Aspirations’ report on the left-hand side and a QR code to the webpage with the report on the right-hand side

    Thank you for listening – do read our report; here it is – and thank you to the Royal Institution for asking me to speak in this 200th anniversary year for discourses.

    Read the Engineering Biology Aspirations report.

    Updates to this page

    Published 2 May 2025

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI: Shell Plc 1st Quarter 2025 Unaudited Results

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

                                 
    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS    		        
                                             
     
    SUMMARY OF UNAUDITED RESULTS
    Quarters $ million    
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024 %¹   Reference      
    4,780    928    7,358    +415 Income/(loss) attributable to Shell plc shareholders        
    5,577    3,661    7,734    +52 Adjusted Earnings A      
    15,250    14,281    18,711    +7 Adjusted EBITDA A      
    9,281    13,162    13,330    -29 Cash flow from operating activities        
    (3,959)   (4,431)   (3,528)     Cash flow from investing activities        
    5,322    8,731    9,802      Free cash flow G      
    4,175    6,924    4,493      Cash capital expenditure C      
    8,575    9,401    8,997    -9 Operating expenses F      
    8,453    9,138    9,054    -7 Underlying operating expenses F      
    10.4% 11.3% 12.0%   ROACE D      
    76,511    77,078    79,931      Total debt E      
    41,521    38,809    40,513      Net debt E      
    18.7% 17.7% 17.7%   Gearing E      
    2,838    2,815    2,911    +1 Oil and gas production available for sale (thousand boe/d)        
    0.79    0.15    1.14 +427 Basic earnings per share ($)        
    0.92    0.60    1.20    +53 Adjusted Earnings per share ($) B      
    0.3580    0.3580    0.3440    — Dividend per share ($)        

    1.Q1 on Q4 change

    Quarter Analysis1

    Income attributable to Shell plc shareholders, compared with the fourth quarter 2024, reflected lower exploration well write-offs, lower operating expenses and higher Products margins.

    First quarter 2025 income attributable to Shell plc shareholders also included a charge of $0.5 billion related to the UK Energy Profits Levy and impairment charges. These items are included in identified items amounting to a net loss of $0.8 billion in the quarter. This compares with identified items in the fourth quarter 2024 which amounted to a net loss of $2.8 billion.

    Adjusted Earnings and Adjusted EBITDA2 were driven by the same factors as income attributable to Shell plc shareholders and adjusted for the above identified items.

    Cash flow from operating activities for the first quarter 2025 was $9.3 billion and primarily driven by Adjusted EBITDA, partly offset by tax payments of $2.9 billion and working capital outflows of $2.7 billion. The working capital outflows mainly reflected accounts receivable and payable movements.

    Cash flow from investing activities for the first quarter 2025 was an outflow of $4.0 billion, and included cash capital expenditure of $4.2 billion, and net other investing cash outflows of $0.9 billion which included the drawdowns on loan facilities provided at completion of the sale of The Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Limited (SPDC) in Nigeria, partly offset by divestment proceeds of $0.6 billion.

    Net debt and Gearing: At the end of the first quarter 2025, net debt was $41.5 billion, compared with $38.8 billion at the end of the fourth quarter 2024. This reflects free cash flow of $5.3 billion, which included working capital outflows of $2.7 billion, more than offset by share buybacks of $3.3 billion, cash dividends paid to Shell plc shareholders of $2.2 billion, lease additions of $1.3 billion including those related to the Pavilion Energy Pte. Ltd. acquisition and interest payments of $0.8 billion. Gearing was 18.7% at the end of the first quarter 2025, compared with 17.7% at the end of the fourth quarter 2024, mainly driven by higher net debt.

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

    Shareholder distributions

    Total shareholder distributions in the quarter amounted to $5.5 billion comprising repurchases of shares of $3.3 billion and cash dividends paid to Shell plc shareholders of $2.2 billion. Dividends declared to Shell plc shareholders for the first quarter 2025 amount to $0.3580 per share. Shell has now completed $3.5 billion of share buybacks announced in the fourth quarter 2024 results announcement. Today, Shell announces a share buyback programme of $3.5 billion which is expected to be completed by the second quarter 2025 results announcement.

    This Unaudited Condensed Interim Financial Report, together with supplementary financial and operational disclosure for this quarter, is available at www.shell.com/investors 3.

    1.All earnings amounts are shown post-tax, unless stated otherwise.

    2.Adjusted EBITDA is without interest, taxation, exploration well write-offs and depreciation, depletion and amortisation (DD&A) expenses.

    3.Not incorporated by reference.

    PORTFOLIO DEVELOPMENTS

    Integrated Gas

    In March 2025, we completed the previously announced acquisition of 100% of the shares in Pavilion Energy Pte. Ltd. (Pavilion Energy). Pavilion Energy, headquartered in Singapore, operates a global LNG trading business with contracted supply volume of approximately 6.5 million tonnes per annum (mtpa).

    Upstream

    In January 2025, we announced the start of production at the Shell-operated Whale floating production facility in the Gulf of America. The Whale development is owned by Shell (60%, operator) and Chevron U.S.A. Inc. (40%).

    In February 2025, we announced production restart at the Penguins field in the UK North Sea with a modern floating, production, storage and offloading (FPSO) facility (Shell 50%, operator; NEO Energy 50%). The previous export route for this field was via the Brent Charlie platform, which ceased production in 2021 and is being decommissioned.

    In February 2025, we signed an agreement to acquire a 15.96% working interest from ConocoPhillips Company in the Shell-operated Ursa platform in the Gulf of America. The transaction completed on May 1, 2025 which increases Shell’s working interest in the Ursa platform from 45.3884% to 61.3484%.

    In March 2025, we completed the sale of SPDC to Renaissance, as announced in January 2024.

    In March 2025, we announced the Final Investment Decision (FID) for Gato do Mato, a deep-water project in the pre-salt area of the Santos Basin, offshore Brazil. The Gato do Mato Consortium includes Shell (operator, 50%), Ecopetrol (30%), TotalEnergies (20%) and Pré-Sal Petróleo S.A. (PPSA) acting as the manager of the production sharing contract (PSC).

    Chemicals and Products

    In January 2025, CNOOC and Shell Petrochemicals Company Limited (CSPC), a 50:50 joint venture between Shell and CNOOC Petrochemicals Investment Ltd, took an FID to expand its petrochemical complex in Daya Bay, Huizhou, south China.

    In April 2025, we completed the previously announced sale of our Energy and Chemicals Park in Singapore to CAPGC Pte. Ltd. (CAPGC), a joint venture between Chandra Asri Capital Pte. Ltd. and Glencore Asian Holdings Pte. Ltd.

    In April 2025, we agreed to sell our 16.125% interest in Colonial Enterprises, Inc. (“Colonial”) to Colossus AcquireCo LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Brookfield Infrastructure Partners L.P. and its institutional partners (collectively, “Brookfield”), for $1.45 billion. The transaction is subject to regulatory approvals and is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2025.

    Renewables and Energy Solutions

    In January 2025, we completed the previously announced acquisition of a 100% equity stake in RISEC Holdings, LLC, which owns a 609-megawatt (MW) two-unit combined-cycle gas turbine power plant in Rhode Island, USA.

             Page 2

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

    PERFORMANCE BY SEGMENT

                                             
                       
    INTEGRATED GAS        
    Quarters $ million                
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024 %¹   Reference      
    2,789    1,744    2,761    +60 Income/(loss) for the period        
    306    (421)   (919)     Of which: Identified items A      
    2,483    2,165    3,680    +15 Adjusted Earnings A      
    4,735    4,568    6,136    +4 Adjusted EBITDA A      
    3,463    4,391    4,712    -21 Cash flow from operating activities A      
    1,116    1,337    1,041      Cash capital expenditure C      
    126    116    137    +9 Liquids production available for sale (thousand b/d)        
    4,644    4,574    4,954    +2 Natural gas production available for sale (million scf/d)        
    927    905    992    +2 Total production available for sale (thousand boe/d)        
    6.60    7.06    7.58    -6 LNG liquefaction volumes (million tonnes)        
    16.49    15.50    16.87    +6 LNG sales volumes (million tonnes)        

    1.Q1 on Q4 change

    Integrated Gas includes liquefied natural gas (LNG), conversion of natural gas into gas-to-liquids (GTL) fuels and other products. It includes natural gas and liquids exploration and extraction, and the operation of the upstream and midstream infrastructure necessary to deliver these to market. Integrated Gas also includes the marketing, trading and optimisation of LNG.

    Quarter Analysis1

    Income/(loss) for the period was driven by the same factors as Adjusted Earnings and includes identified items.

    Adjusted Earnings, compared with the fourth quarter 2024, reflected lower exploration well write-offs ($277 million), partly offset by lower LNG liquefaction volumes (decrease of $68 million). The net effect of contributions from trading and optimisation and realised prices was in line with the fourth quarter 2024 despite higher unfavourable (non-cash) impact of expiring hedging contracts.

    Identified items in the first quarter 2025 included favourable movements of $362 million due to the fair value accounting of commodity derivatives, that as part of Shell’s normal business are entered into as hedges for mitigation of economic exposures on future purchases, sales and inventory. These favourable movements compare with the fourth quarter 2024 which included impairment charges of $339 million and a loss of $96 million related to sale of assets, partly offset by favourable movements of $109 million due to the fair value accounting of commodity derivatives.

    Adjusted EBITDA2 was driven by the same factors as Adjusted Earnings.

    Cash flow from operating activities for the quarter was primarily driven by Adjusted EBITDA, and net cash inflows related to derivatives of $542 million, partly offset by tax payments of $773 million and working capital outflows of $687 million.

    Total oil and gas production, compared with the fourth quarter 2024, increased by 2% mainly due to lower planned maintenance in Pearl GTL (Qatar), partly offset by unplanned maintenance and weather constraints in Australia. LNG liquefaction volumes decreased by 6% mainly due to unplanned maintenance and weather constraints in Australia.

    1.All earnings amounts are shown post-tax, unless stated otherwise.

    2.Adjusted EBITDA is without interest, taxation, exploration well write-offs and DD&A expenses.

             Page 3

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

                                             
                       
    UPSTREAM          
    Quarters $ million                
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024 %¹   Reference      
    2,080    1,031    2,272    +102 Income/(loss) for the period        
    (257)   (651)   339      Of which: Identified items A      
    2,337    1,682    1,933    +39 Adjusted Earnings A      
    7,387    7,676    7,888    -4 Adjusted EBITDA A      
    3,945    4,509    5,727    -13 Cash flow from operating activities A      
    1,923    2,076    2,010      Cash capital expenditure C      
    1,335    1,332    1,331    — Liquids production available for sale (thousand b/d)        
    3,020    3,056    3,136    -1 Natural gas production available for sale (million scf/d)        
    1,855    1,859    1,872    — Total production available for sale (thousand boe/d)        

    1.Q1 on Q4 change

    The Upstream segment includes exploration and extraction of crude oil, natural gas and natural gas liquids. It also markets and transports oil and gas, and operates the infrastructure necessary to deliver them to the market.

    Quarter Analysis1

    Income/(loss) for the period was driven by the same factors as Adjusted Earnings and includes identified items.

    Adjusted Earnings, compared with the fourth quarter 2024, reflected lower exploration well write-offs ($346 million), lower depreciation, depletion and amortisation expenses (decrease of $330 million), lower operating expenses ($194 million) and comparative favourable tax movements ($179 million), partly offset by lower volumes (decrease of $359 million).

    Identified items in the first quarter 2025 included a charge of $509 million related to the UK Energy Profits Levy, partly offset by gains of $159 million from disposal of assets and gains of $95 million related to the impact of the strengthening Brazilian real on a deferred tax position. These charges and favourable movements compare with the fourth quarter 2024 which included a loss of $161 million related to the impact of the weakening Brazilian real on a deferred tax position, and impairment charges of $152 million.

    Adjusted EBITDA2 was driven by the same factors as Adjusted Earnings.

    Cash flow from operating activities for the first quarter 2025 was primarily driven by Adjusted EBITDA, partly offset by tax payments of $1,999 million and working capital outflows of $913 million.

    Total production, compared with the fourth quarter 2024, decreased mainly due to the SPDC divestment, largely offset by new oil production.

    1.All earnings amounts are shown post-tax, unless stated otherwise.

    2.Adjusted EBITDA is without interest, taxation, exploration well write-offs and DD&A expenses.

             Page 4

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

                                             
                       
    MARKETING        
    Quarters $ million                
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024 %¹   Reference      
    814    103    896    +688 Income/(loss) for the period        
    (49)   (736)   (7)     Of which: Identified items A      
    900    839    781    +7 Adjusted Earnings A      
    1,869    1,709    1,686    +9 Adjusted EBITDA A      
    1,907    1,363    1,319    +40 Cash flow from operating activities A      
    256    811    465      Cash capital expenditure C      
    2,674    2,795    2,763    -4 Marketing sales volumes (thousand b/d)        

    1.Q1 on Q4 change

    The Marketing segment comprises the Mobility, Lubricants, and Sectors and Decarbonisation businesses. The Mobility business operates Shell’s retail network including electric vehicle charging services and the Wholesale commercial fuels business which provides fuels for transport, industry and heating. The Lubricants business produces, markets and sells lubricants for road transport, and machinery used in manufacturing, mining, power generation, agriculture and construction. The Sectors and Decarbonisation business sells fuels, speciality products and services including low-carbon energy solutions to a broad range of commercial customers including the aviation, marine, and agricultural sectors.

    Quarter Analysis1

    Income/(loss) for the period was driven by the same factors as Adjusted Earnings and includes identified items.

    Adjusted Earnings, compared with the fourth quarter 2024, reflected lower operating expenses (decrease of $69 million), and higher Marketing margins (increase of $54 million) mainly due to higher Lubricants unit margins and seasonal impact of higher volumes partly offset by lower Mobility margins due to seasonal impact of lower volumes and lower Sectors and Decarbonisation margins. These net gains were partly offset by unfavourable tax movements ($109 million).

    Identified items in the first quarter 2025 included net losses of $61 million related to sale of assets. These losses compare with the fourth quarter 2024 which included impairment charges of $458 million, and net losses of $247 million related to sale of assets.

    Adjusted EBITDA2 was driven by the same factors as Adjusted Earnings.

    Cash flow from operating activities for the first quarter 2025 was primarily driven by Adjusted EBITDA, inflows relating to the timing impact of payments related to emission certificates and biofuel programmes of $540 million, and dividends (net of profits) from joint ventures and associates of $203 million. These inflows were partly offset by working capital outflows of $344 million and tax payments of $174 million.

    Marketing sales volumes (comprising hydrocarbon sales), compared with the fourth quarter 2024, decreased mainly due to seasonality.

    1.All earnings amounts are shown post-tax, unless stated otherwise.

    2.Adjusted EBITDA is without interest, taxation, exploration well write-offs and DD&A expenses.

             Page 5

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

                                             
                       
    CHEMICALS AND PRODUCTS        
    Quarters $ million                
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024 %¹   Reference      
    (77)   (276)   1,311    +72 Income/(loss) for the period        
    (581)   (99)   (458)     Of which: Identified items A      
    449    (229)   1,615    +296 Adjusted Earnings A      
    1,410    475    2,826    +197 Adjusted EBITDA A      
    130    2,032    (349)   -94 Cash flow from operating activities A      
    458    1,392    500      Cash capital expenditure C      
    1,362    1,215    1,430    +12 Refinery processing intake (thousand b/d)        
    2,813    2,926    2,883    -4 Chemicals sales volumes (thousand tonnes)        

    1.Q1 on Q4 change

    The Chemicals and Products segment includes chemicals manufacturing plants with their own marketing network, and refineries which turn crude oil and other feedstocks into a range of oil products which are moved and marketed around the world for domestic, industrial and transport use. The segment also includes the pipeline business, trading and optimisation of crude oil, oil products and petrochemicals, and Oil Sands activities (the extraction of bitumen from mined oil sands and its conversion into synthetic crude oil).

    Quarter Analysis1

    Income/(loss) for the period was driven by the same factors as Adjusted Earnings and includes identified items.

    Adjusted Earnings, compared with the fourth quarter 2024, reflected higher Products margins (increase of $546 million) mainly driven by higher margins from trading and optimisation and higher refining margins. Adjusted Earnings also reflected higher Chemicals margins (increase of $115 million). In addition, the first quarter 2025 reflected lower operating expenses (decrease of $134 million). These net gains were partly offset by comparative unfavourable tax movements ($96 million).

    In the first quarter 2025, Chemicals had negative Adjusted Earnings of $137 million and Products had positive Adjusted Earnings of $586 million.

    Identified items in the first quarter 2025 included impairment charges of $277 million, and unfavourable movements of $202 million due to the fair value accounting of commodity derivatives, that as part of Shell’s normal business are entered into as hedges for mitigation of economic exposures on future purchases, sales and inventory. These charges and unfavourable movements compare with the fourth quarter 2024 which included impairment charges of $224 million, partly offset by favourable deferred tax movements of $114 million..

    Adjusted EBITDA2 was driven by the same factors as Adjusted Earnings.

    Cash flow from operating activities for the first quarter 2025 was primarily driven by Adjusted EBITDA, and inflows relating to the timing impact of payments relating to emission certificates and biofuel programmes of $125 million. These inflows were partly offset by working capital outflows of $1,081 million, and net cash outflows relating to commodity derivatives of $508 million.

    Chemicals manufacturing plant utilisation was 81% compared with 75% in the fourth quarter 2024, mainly due to lower planned and unplanned maintenance.

    Refinery utilisation was 85% compared with 76% in the fourth quarter 2024, mainly due to lower planned maintenance.

    1.All earnings amounts are shown post-tax, unless stated otherwise.

    2.Adjusted EBITDA is without interest, taxation, exploration well write-offs and DD&A expenses.

             Page 6

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

                                             
                       
    RENEWABLES AND ENERGY SOLUTIONS        
    Quarters $ million                
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024 %¹   Reference      
    (247)   (1,226)   553    +80 Income/(loss) for the period        
    (205)   (914)   390      Of which: Identified items A      
    (42)   (311)   163    +87 Adjusted Earnings A      
    111    (123)   267    +190 Adjusted EBITDA A      
    367    850    2,466    -57 Cash flow from operating activities A      
    403    1,277    438      Cash capital expenditure C      
    76    76    77    +1 External power sales (terawatt hours)2        
    184    165    190    +12 Sales of pipeline gas to end-use customers (terawatt hours)3        

    1.Q1 on Q4 change

    2.Physical power sales to third parties; excluding financial trades and physical trade with brokers, investors, financial institutions, trading platforms, and wholesale traders.

    3.Physical natural gas sales to third parties; excluding financial trades and physical trade with brokers, investors, financial institutions, trading platforms, and wholesale traders. Excluding sales of natural gas by other segments and LNG sales.

    Renewables and Energy Solutions includes activities such as renewable power generation, the marketing and trading and optimisation of power and pipeline gas, as well as carbon credits, and digitally enabled customer solutions. It also includes the production and marketing of hydrogen, development of commercial carbon capture and storage hubs, investment in nature-based projects that avoid or reduce carbon emissions, and Shell Ventures, which invests in companies that work to accelerate the energy and mobility transformation.

    Quarter Analysis1

    Income/(loss) for the period was driven by the same factors as Adjusted Earnings and includes identified items.

    Adjusted Earnings, compared with the fourth quarter 2024, reflected higher margins (increase of $99 million) mainly due to higher trading and optimisation in the Americas as a result of higher seasonal demand and volatility, lower operating expenses (decrease of $90 million) and comparative favourable tax movements ($89 million). Most Renewables and Energy Solutions activities were loss-making in the first quarter 2025, which was partly offset by positive Adjusted Earnings from trading and optimisation.

    Identified items in the first quarter 2025 included a charge of $143 million related to the disposal of assets. These charges compare with the fourth quarter 2024 which included impairment charges of $996 million mainly relating to renewable generation assets in North America, partly offset by favourable movements of $50 million due to the fair value accounting of commodity derivatives, that as part of Shell’s normal business are entered into as hedges for mitigation of economic exposures on future purchases, sales and inventory.

    Adjusted EBITDA2 was driven by the same factors as Adjusted Earnings.

    Cash flow from operating activities for the first quarter 2025 was primarily driven by net cash inflows relating to working capital of $380 million and Adjusted EBITDA, partially offset by outflows related to derivatives of $169 million.

    1.All earnings amounts are shown post-tax, unless stated otherwise.

    2.Adjusted EBITDA is without interest, taxation, exploration well write-offs and DD&A expenses.

    Additional Growth Measures

                                             
    Quarters      
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024 %¹          
            Renewable power generation capacity (gigawatt):        
    3.5    3.4    3.2    +4 – In operation2        
    4.0    4.0    3.5    -1 – Under construction and/or committed for sale3        

    1.Q1 on Q4 change

    2.Shell’s equity share of renewable generation capacity post commercial operation date. It excludes Shell’s equity share of associates where information cannot be obtained.

    3.Shell’s equity share of renewable generation capacity under construction and/or committed for sale under long-term offtake agreements (PPA). It excludes Shell’s equity share of associates where information cannot be obtained.

             Page 7

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

                                     
                 
    CORPORATE      
    Quarters $ million          
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024   Reference    
    (483)   (335)   (354)   Income/(loss) for the period      
    (26)   45    14    Of which: Identified items A    
    (457)   (380)   (368)   Adjusted Earnings A    
    (261)   (24)   (92)   Adjusted EBITDA A    
    (531)   16    (545)   Cash flow from operating activities A    

    The Corporate segment covers the non-operating activities supporting Shell. It comprises Shell’s holdings and treasury organisation, headquarters and central functions, self-insurance activities and centrally managed longer-term innovation portfolio. All finance expense, income and related taxes are included in Corporate Adjusted Earnings rather than in the earnings of business segments.

    Quarter Analysis1

    Income/(loss) for the period was driven by the same factors as Adjusted Earnings and includes identified items.

    Adjusted Earnings, compared with the fourth quarter 2024, reflected unfavourable currency exchange rate effects, partly offset by lower operating expenses.

    Adjusted EBITDA2 was driven by the same factors as Adjusted Earnings.

    1.All earnings amounts are shown post-tax, unless stated otherwise.

    2.Adjusted EBITDA is without interest, taxation, exploration well write-offs and DD&A expenses.

             Page 8

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

    OUTLOOK FOR THE SECOND QUARTER 2025

    Full year 2024 cash capital expenditure was $21 billion. Our cash capital expenditure range for the full year 2025 is expected to be within $20 – $22 billion.

    Integrated Gas production is expected to be approximately 890 – 950 thousand boe/d. LNG liquefaction volumes are expected to be approximately 6.3 – 6.9 million tonnes. Second quarter 2025 outlook reflects scheduled maintenance across the portfolio.

    Upstream production is expected to be approximately 1,560 – 1,760 thousand boe/d. Production outlook reflects the SPDC divestment in March 2025 and the scheduled maintenance across the portfolio.

    Marketing sales volumes are expected to be approximately 2,600 – 3,100 thousand b/d.

    Refinery utilisation is expected to be approximately 87% – 95%. Chemicals manufacturing plant utilisation is expected to be approximately 74% – 82%. Second quarter 2025 utilisation outlook reflects the sale of the Energy and Chemicals Park in Singapore which was completed in April 2025.

    Corporate Adjusted Earnings1 were a net expense of $457 million for the first quarter 2025. Corporate Adjusted Earnings are expected to be a net expense of approximately $400 – $600 million in the second quarter 2025.

    1.For the definition of Adjusted Earnings and the most comparable GAAP measure see reference A.

    FORTHCOMING EVENTS

               
     
    Date Event
    May 20, 2025 Annual General Meeting
    July 31, 2025 Second quarter 2025 results and dividends
    October 30, 2025 Third quarter 2025 results and dividends

             Page 9

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

    UNAUDITED CONDENSED CONSOLIDATED INTERIM FINANCIAL STATEMENTS

                               
     
    CONSOLIDATED STATEMENT OF INCOME    
    Quarters $ million  
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
    69,234    66,281    72,478    Revenue1    
    615    (156)   1,318    Share of profit/(loss) of joint ventures and associates    
    302    683    907    Interest and other income/(expenses)2    
    70,152    66,807    74,703    Total revenue and other income/(expenses)    
    45,849    43,610    46,867    Purchases    
    5,549    5,839    5,810    Production and manufacturing expenses    
    2,840    3,231    2,975    Selling, distribution and administrative expenses    
    185    331    212    Research and development    
    210    861    750    Exploration    
    5,441    7,520    5,881    Depreciation, depletion and amortisation2    
    1,120    1,213    1,164    Interest expense    
    61,194    62,605    63,659    Total expenditure    
    8,959    4,205    11,044    Income/(loss) before taxation    
    4,083    3,164    3,604    Taxation charge/(credit)2    
    4,875    1,041    7,439    Income/(loss) for the period    
    95    113    82    Income/(loss) attributable to non-controlling interest    
    4,780    928    7,358    Income/(loss) attributable to Shell plc shareholders    
    0.79    0.15    1.14    Basic earnings per share ($)3    
    0.79    0.15    1.13    Diluted earnings per share ($)3    

    1.See Note 2 “Segment information”.

    2.See Note 7 “Other notes to the unaudited Condensed Consolidated Interim Financial Statements”.

    3.See Note 3 “Earnings per share”.

                               
                 
    CONSOLIDATED STATEMENT OF COMPREHENSIVE INCOME    
    Quarters $ million        
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
    4,875    1,041    7,439    Income/(loss) for the period    
          Other comprehensive income/(loss) net of tax:    
          Items that may be reclassified to income in later periods:    
    1,711    (4,899)   (1,995)   – Currency translation differences1    
    6    (11)   (6)   – Debt instruments remeasurements    
    (25)   224    53    – Cash flow hedging gains/(losses)    
    (42)   (50)   (14)   – Deferred cost of hedging    
    74    (91)   (12)   – Share of other comprehensive income/(loss) of joint ventures and associates    
    1,723    (4,827)   (1,974)   Total    
          Items that are not reclassified to income in later periods:    
    306    239    439    – Retirement benefits remeasurements    
    (16)   (50)   78    – Equity instruments remeasurements    
    (36)   46    10    – Share of other comprehensive income/(loss) of joint ventures and associates    
    254    235    528    Total    
    1,977    (4,592)   (1,445)   Other comprehensive income/(loss) for the period    
    6,852    (3,552)   5,994    Comprehensive income/(loss) for the period    
    105    50    56    Comprehensive income/(loss) attributable to non-controlling interest    
    6,748    (3,602)   5,937    Comprehensive income/(loss) attributable to Shell plc shareholders    

    1.See Note 7 “Other notes to the unaudited Condensed Consolidated Interim Financial Statements”.

             Page 10

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

                     
     
    CONDENSED CONSOLIDATED BALANCE SHEET
    $ million    
      March 31, 2025 December 31, 2024
    Assets    
    Non-current assets    
    Goodwill 16,072    16,032   
    Other intangible assets1 11,365    9,480   
    Property, plant and equipment 183,712    185,219   
    Joint ventures and associates 24,236    23,445   
    Investments in securities 2,284    2,255   
    Deferred tax 6,989    6,857   
    Retirement benefits 10,266    10,003   
    Trade and other receivables 7,269    6,018   
    Derivative financial instruments² 400    374   
      262,593    259,683   
    Current assets    
    Inventories 22,984    23,426   
    Trade and other receivables 48,247    45,860   
    Derivative financial instruments² 8,941    9,673   
    Cash and cash equivalents 35,601    39,110   
      115,773    118,069   
    Assets classified as held for sale1 10,881    9,857   
      126,654    127,926   
    Total assets 389,248    387,609   
    Liabilities    
    Non-current liabilities    
    Debt 65,120    65,448   
    Trade and other payables 5,487    3,290   
    Derivative financial instruments² 1,565    2,185   
    Deferred tax 13,257    13,505   
    Retirement benefits 6,756    6,752   
    Decommissioning and other provisions 20,313    21,227   
      112,498    112,407   
    Current liabilities    
    Debt 11,391    11,630   
    Trade and other payables 60,870    60,693   
    Derivative financial instruments² 6,371    7,391   
    Income taxes payable 4,343    4,648   
    Decommissioning and other provisions 5,104    4,469   
      88,079    88,831   
    Liabilities directly associated with assets classified as held for sale1 8,001    6,203   
      96,080    95,034   
    Total liabilities 208,578    207,441   
    Equity attributable to Shell plc shareholders 178,813    178,307   
    Non-controlling interest 1,856    1,861   
    Total equity 180,670    180,168   
    Total liabilities and equity 389,248    387,609   

    1.    See Note 7 “Other notes to the unaudited Condensed Consolidated Interim Financial Statements”.

    2.    See Note 6 “Derivative financial instruments and debt excluding lease liabilities”.

             Page 11

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

                                                         
     
    CONSOLIDATED STATEMENT OF CHANGES IN EQUITY
      Equity attributable to Shell plc shareholders      
    $ million Share capital1 Shares held in trust Other reserves² Retained earnings Total Non-controlling interest   Total equity
    At January 1, 2025 510    (803)   19,766    158,834    178,307    1,861      180,168   
    Comprehensive income/(loss) for the period —    —    1,967    4,780    6,748    105      6,852   
    Transfer from other comprehensive income —    —    11    (11)   —    —      —   
    Dividends³ —    —    —    (2,179)   (2,179)   (86)     (2,265)  
    Repurchases of shares4 (8)   —    8    (3,513)   (3,513)   —      (3,513)  
    Share-based compensation —    500    (663)   (405)   (567)   —      (567)  
    Other changes —    —    —    23    22    (24)     (2)  
    At March 31, 2025 502    (304)   21,090    157,527    178,813    1,856      180,670   
    At January 1, 2024 544    (997)   21,145    165,915    186,607    1,755      188,362   
    Comprehensive income/(loss) for the period —    —    (1,420)   7,358    5,937    56      5,994   
    Transfer from other comprehensive income —    —    138    (138)   —    —      —   
    Dividends3 —    —    —    (2,210)   (2,210)   (68)     (2,278)  
    Repurchases of shares4 (7)   —    7    (3,502)   (3,502)   —      (3,502)  
    Share-based compensation —    543    (426)   (392)   (275)   —      (275)  
    Other changes —    —    —    8    8    (4)     4   
    At March 31, 2024 537    (455)   19,445    167,038    186,565    1,739      188,304   

    1.    See Note 4 “Share capital”.

    2.    See Note 5 “Other reserves”.

    3.    The amount charged to retained earnings is based on prevailing exchange rates on payment date.

    4.     Includes shares committed to repurchase under an irrevocable contract and repurchases subject to settlement at the end of the quarter.

             Page 12

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

                                     
     
    CONSOLIDATED STATEMENT OF CASH FLOWS    
    Quarters $ million  
    Q1 2025   Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
    8,959      4,205    11,044    Income before taxation for the period    
            Adjustment for:    
    636      665    576    – Interest expense (net)    
    5,441      7,520    5,881    – Depreciation, depletion and amortisation1    
    28      649    554    – Exploration well write-offs    
    127      288    (10)   – Net (gains)/losses on sale and revaluation of non-current assets and businesses    
    (615)     156    (1,318)   – Share of (profit)/loss of joint ventures and associates    
    523      1,241    738    – Dividends received from joint ventures and associates    
    854      131    (608)   – (Increase)/decrease in inventories    
    (2,610)     751    (195)   – (Increase)/decrease in current receivables    
    (907)     1,524    (1,949)   – Increase/(decrease) in current payables    
    (244)     111    1,386    – Derivative financial instruments    
    (100)     (58)   (61)   – Retirement benefits    
    (480)     (256)   (600)   – Decommissioning and other provisions    
    570      (856)   509    – Other1    
    (2,900)     (2,910)   (2,616)   Tax paid    
    9,281      13,162    13,330    Cash flow from operating activities    
    (3,748)     (6,486)   (3,980)      Capital expenditure    
    (413)     (421)   (500)      Investments in joint ventures and associates    
    (15)     (17)   (13)      Investments in equity securities    
    (4,175)     (6,924)   (4,493)   Cash capital expenditure    
    559      493    323    Proceeds from sale of property, plant and equipment and businesses    
    33      305    133    Proceeds from joint ventures and associates from sale, capital reduction and repayment of long-term loans    
    5      6    569    Proceeds from sale of equity securities    
    508      581    577    Interest received    
    506      1,762    857    Other investing cash inflows    
    (1,394)     (655)   (1,494)   Other investing cash outflows1    
    (3,959)     (4,431)   (3,528)   Cash flow from investing activities    
    80      65    (107)   Net increase/(decrease) in debt with maturity period within three months    
            Other debt:    
    139      (13)   167    – New borrowings    
    (2,514)     (2,664)   (1,532)   – Repayments    
    (846)     (1,379)   (911)   Interest paid    
    326      (833)   (297)   Derivative financial instruments    
    (25)     (10)   (4)   Change in non-controlling interest    
            Cash dividends paid to:    
    (2,179)     (2,114)   (2,210)   – Shell plc shareholders    
    (86)     (53)   (68)   – Non-controlling interest    
    (3,311)     (3,579)   (2,824)   Repurchases of shares    
    (768)     (309)   (462)   Shares held in trust: net sales/(purchases) and dividends received    
    (9,183)     (10,889)   (8,248)   Cash flow from financing activities    
    353      (985)   (379)   Effects of exchange rate changes on cash and cash equivalents    
    (3,509)     (3,142)   1,175    Increase/(decrease) in cash and cash equivalents    
    39,110      42,252    38,774    Cash and cash equivalents at beginning of period    
    35,601      39,110    39,949    Cash and cash equivalents at end of period    

    1.See Note 7 “Other notes to the unaudited Condensed Consolidated Interim Financial Statements”.

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    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

    NOTES TO THE UNAUDITED CONDENSED CONSOLIDATED INTERIM FINANCIAL STATEMENTS

    1. Basis of preparation

    These unaudited Condensed Consolidated Interim Financial Statements of Shell plc (“the Company”) and its subsidiaries (collectively referred to as “Shell”) have been prepared in accordance with IAS 34 Interim Financial Reporting as issued by the International Accounting Standards Board (“IASB”) and adopted by the UK, and on the basis of the same accounting principles as those used in the Company’s Annual Report and Accounts (pages 240 to 312) for the year ended December 31, 2024, as filed with the Registrar of Companies for England and Wales and as filed with the Autoriteit Financiële Markten (the Netherlands) and Form 20-F (pages 223 to 296) for the year ended December 31, 2024, as filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, and should be read in conjunction with these filings.

    The financial information presented in the unaudited Condensed Consolidated Interim Financial Statements does not constitute statutory accounts within the meaning of section 434(3) of the Companies Act 2006 (“the Act”). Statutory accounts for the year ended December 31, 2024, were published in Shell’s Annual Report and Accounts, a copy of which was delivered to the Registrar of Companies for England and Wales. The auditor’s report on those accounts was unqualified, did not include a reference to any matters to which the auditor drew attention by way of emphasis without qualifying the report and did not contain a statement under sections 498(2) or 498(3) of the Act.

    Key accounting considerations, significant judgements and estimates

    Future commodity price assumptions and management’s view on the future development of refining and chemicals margins represent a significant estimate and were subject to change in 2024. These assumptions continue to apply for impairment testing purposes in the first quarter 2025. As per the normal process outlined in the 2024 Annual Report and Accounts and Form 20-F, these assumptions are subject to review later this year.

    The discount rates applied for impairment testing and the discount rate applied to provisions are reviewed on a regular basis. Both discount rates applied in the first quarter 2025 remain unchanged compared with 2024.

    2. Segment information

    With effect from January 1, 2025, segment earnings are presented on an Adjusted Earnings basis (Adjusted Earnings), which is the earnings measure used by the Chief Executive Officer, who serves as the Chief Operating Decision Maker, for the purposes of making decisions about allocating resources and assessing performance. This aligns with Shell’s focus on performance, discipline and simplification.

    The Adjusted Earnings measure is presented on a current cost of supplies (CCS) basis and aims to facilitate a comparative understanding of Shell’s financial performance from period to period by removing the effects of oil price changes on inventory carrying amounts and removing the effects of identified items. Identified items are in some cases driven by external factors and may, either individually or collectively, hinder the comparative understanding of Shell’s financial results from period to period.

    The segment earnings measure used until December 31, 2024 was CCS earnings. The difference between CCS earnings and Adjusted Earnings are the identified items. Comparative periods are presented below on an Adjusted Earnings basis.

             Page 14

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    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

                               
     
    REVENUE AND ADJUSTED EARNINGS BY SEGMENT    
    Quarters $ million  
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
          Third-party revenue    
    9,602    9,294    9,195    Integrated Gas    
    1,510    1,652    1,759    Upstream    
    27,083    27,524    30,041    Marketing    
    21,610    19,992    23,735    Chemicals and Products    
    9,417    7,808    7,737    Renewables and Energy Solutions    
    12    10    11    Corporate    
    69,234    66,281    72,478    Total third-party revenue1    
          Inter-segment revenue    
    2,675    2,024    2,404    Integrated Gas    
    9,854    9,931    10,287    Upstream    
    1,849    984    1,355    Marketing    
    8,255    8,656    10,312    Chemicals and Products    
    1,164    1,879    1,005    Renewables and Energy Solutions    
    —    —    —    Corporate    
          Adjusted Earnings    
    2,483    2,165    3,680    Integrated Gas    
    2,337    1,682    1,933    Upstream    
    900    839    781    Marketing    
    449    (229)   1,615    Chemicals and Products    
    (42)   (311)   163    Renewables and Energy Solutions    
    (457)   (380)   (368)   Corporate    
    5,670    3,766    7,804    Total Adjusted Earnings2    
    5,577    3,661    7,734    Adjusted Earnings attributable to Shell plc shareholders    
    94    106    70    Adjusted Earnings attributable to non-controlling interest    

    1.Includes revenue from sources other than from contracts with customers, which mainly comprises the impact of fair value accounting of commodity derivatives.

    2.See Reconciliation of income for the period to Adjusted Earnings below.

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    Cash capital expenditure is a measure used by the Chief Executive Officer for the purposes of making decisions about allocating resources and assessing performance.

                               
     
    CASH CAPITAL EXPENDITURE BY SEGMENT
    Quarters $ million  
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
          Capital expenditure    
    943    1,123    858    Integrated Gas    
    1,727    2,205    1,766    Upstream    
    252    798    427    Marketing    
    451    1,121    474    Chemicals and Products    
    358    1,214    421    Renewables and Energy Solutions    
    17    25    34    Corporate    
    3,748    6,486    3,980    Total capital expenditure    
          Add: Investments in joint ventures and associates    
    174    214    184    Integrated Gas    
    197    (117)   244    Upstream    
    4    13    38    Marketing    
    7    271    26    Chemicals and Products    
    30    36    8    Renewables and Energy Solutions    
    1    4    —    Corporate    
    413    421    500    Total investments in joint ventures and associates    
          Add: Investments in equity securities    
    —    —    —    Integrated Gas    
    —    (11)   —    Upstream    
    —    —    —    Marketing    
    —    —    —    Chemicals and Products    
    14    28    10    Renewables and Energy Solutions    
    —    —    3    Corporate    
    15    17    13    Total investments in equity securities    
          Cash capital expenditure    
    1,116    1,337    1,041    Integrated Gas    
    1,923    2,076    2,010    Upstream    
    256    811    465    Marketing    
    458    1,392    500    Chemicals and Products    
    403    1,277    438    Renewables and Energy Solutions    
    19    30    37    Corporate    
    4,175    6,924    4,493    Total Cash capital expenditure    

             Page 16

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

                               
                 
    RECONCILIATION OF INCOME FOR THE PERIOD TO ADJUSTED EARNINGS    
    Quarters $ million        
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
    4,780    928    7,358    Income/(loss) attributable to Shell plc shareholders    
    95    113    82    Income/(loss) attributable to non-controlling interest    
    4,875    1,041    7,439    Income/(loss) for the period    
    (15)   (75)   (360)   Add: Current cost of supplies adjustment before taxation    
    (2)   23    84    Add: Tax on current cost of supplies adjustment    
    (510) (3,008) (1,244) Less: Identified items adjustment before taxation    
    301 (230) (604) Add: Tax on identified items adjustment    
    5,670    3,766    7,804    Adjusted Earnings    
    5,577    3,661    7,734    Adjusted Earnings attributable to Shell plc shareholders    
    94    106    70    Adjusted Earnings attributable to non-controlling interest    

    Identified items

    The objective of identified items is to remove material impacts on net income/loss arising from transactions which are generally uncontrollable and unusual (infrequent or non-recurring) in nature or giving rise to a mismatch between accounting and economic results, or certain transactions that are generally excluded from underlying results in the industry.

    Identified items comprise: divestment gains and losses, impairments and impairment reversals, redundancy and restructuring, fair value accounting of commodity derivatives and certain gas contracts that gives rise to a mismatch between accounting and economic results, the impact of exchange rate movements and inflationary adjustments on certain deferred tax balances, and other items.

                                                   
     
    Q1 2025 $ million
      Total Integrated Gas Upstream Marketing Chemicals and Products Renewables and Energy Solutions Corporate
    Identified items included in Income/(loss) before taxation              
    Divestment gains/(losses) (106) (1) 154 (57) (15) (187) —
    Impairment reversals/(impairments) (341) — (21) 10 (293) (38) —
    Redundancy and restructuring (44) (1) (15) (9) (13) (9) 4
    Fair value accounting of commodity derivatives and certain gas contracts1 194 420 (1) 12 (258) 20 —
    Other2 (212) (70) 4 — (101) (46) —
    Total identified items included in Income/(loss) before taxation (510) 348 121 (44) (679) (260) 4
    Less: Total identified items included in Taxation charge/(credit) 301 43 378 4 (99) (54) 29
    Identified items included in Income/(loss) for the period              
    Divestment gains/(losses) (208) — 8 (61) (12) (143) —
    Impairment reversals/(impairments) (317) — (15) 6 (277) (31) —
    Redundancy and restructuring (24) (1) (5) (1) (12) (7) 2
    Fair value accounting of commodity derivatives and certain gas contracts1 187 362 — 7 (202) 20 —
    Impact of exchange rate movements and inflationary adjustments on tax balances3 108 4 132 — — — (28)
    Other2 (558) (59) (377) — (77) (45) —
    Impact on Adjusted Earnings (811) 306 (257) (49) (581) (205) (26)
    Impact on Adjusted Earnings attributable to non-controlling interest — — — — — — —
    Impact on Adjusted Earnings attributable to Shell plc shareholders (811) 306 (257) (49) (581) (205) (26)

    1.Fair value accounting of commodity derivatives and certain gas contracts: In the ordinary course of business, Shell enters into contracts to supply or purchase oil and gas products, as well as power and environmental products. Shell also enters into contracts for tolling, pipeline and storage capacity. Derivative contracts are entered into for mitigation of resulting economic exposures (generally price exposure) and these derivative contracts are carried at period-end

             Page 17

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

    market price (fair value), with movements in fair value recognised in income for the period. Supply and purchase contracts entered into for operational purposes, as well as contracts for tolling, pipeline and storage capacity, are, by contrast, recognised when the transaction occurs; furthermore, inventory is carried at historical cost or net realisable value, whichever is lower. As a consequence, accounting mismatches occur because: (a) the supply or purchase transaction is recognised in a different period; or (b) the inventory is measured on a different basis. In addition, certain contracts are, due to pricing or delivery conditions, deemed to contain embedded derivatives or written options and are also required to be carried at fair value even though they are entered into for operational purposes. The accounting impacts are reported as identified items.

    2.Other identified items represent other credits or charges that based on Shell management’s assessment hinder the comparative understanding of Shell’s financial results from period to period.

    3.Impact of exchange rate movements and inflationary adjustments on tax balances represents the impact on tax balances of exchange rate movements and inflationary adjustments arising on: (a) the conversion to dollars of the local currency tax base of non-monetary assets and liabilities, as well as recognised tax losses (this primarily impacts the Integrated Gas and Upstream segments); and (b) the conversion of dollar-denominated inter-segment loans to local currency, leading to taxable exchange rate gains or losses (this primarily impacts the Corporate segment).

                                                   
     
    Q4 2024 $ million
      Total Integrated Gas Upstream Marketing Chemicals and Products Renewables and Energy Solutions Corporate
    Identified items included in Income/(loss) before taxation              
    Divestment gains/(losses) (288) (99) (66) (216) 42 51 —
    Impairment reversals/(impairments) (2,554) (523) (183) (493) (288) (1,065) (1)
    Redundancy and restructuring (175) (27) (62) (70) (5) (11) (1)
    Fair value accounting of commodity derivatives and certain gas contracts1 209 136 (14) 58 (38) 67 —
    Other1 (200) — (165) (33) (2) — —
    Total identified items included in Income/(loss) before taxation (3,008) (514) (491) (753) (291) (958) (2)
    Less: Total identified items included in Taxation charge/(credit) (230) (92) 160 (17) (191) (43) (47)
    Identified items included in Income/(loss) for the period              
    Divestment gains/(losses) (321) (96) (51) (247) 33 40 —
    Impairment reversals/(impairments) (2,170) (339) (152) (458) (224) (996) (1)
    Redundancy and restructuring (115) (16) (34) (52) (3) (8) (1)
    Fair value accounting of commodity derivatives and certain gas contracts1 184 109 (4) 46 (17) 50 —
    Impact of exchange rate movements and inflationary adjustments on tax balances1 (210) (57) (199) — — — 46
    Other1 (147) (22) (212) (25) 113 — —
    Impact on Adjusted Earnings (2,778) (421) (651) (736) (99) (914) 45
    Impact on Adjusted Earnings attributable to non-controlling interest — — — — — — —
    Impact on Adjusted Earnings attributable to Shell plc shareholders (2,778) (421) (651) (736) (99) (914) 45

    1.For a detailed description, see the corresponding footnotes to the Q1 2025 identified items table above.

             Page 18

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

                                                   
     
    Q1 2024 $ million
      Total Integrated Gas Upstream Marketing Chemicals and Products Renewables and Energy Solutions Corporate
    Identified items included in Income/(loss) before taxation              
    Divestment gains/(losses) 10 (3) 27 (15) (9) 10 —
    Impairment reversals/(impairments) (227) (8) (96) (4) (178) 59 —
    Redundancy and restructuring (74) (1) (13) (20) (18) (15) (6)
    Fair value accounting of commodity derivatives and certain gas contracts1 (1,079) (1,068) (2) 6 (416) 400 —
    Other1 126 4 38 23 45 16 —
    Total identified items included in Income/(loss) before taxation (1,244) (1,075) (46) (11) (575) 469 (6)
    Less: Total identified items included in Taxation charge/(credit) (604) (157) (385) (4) (118) 80 (20)
    Identified items included in Income/(loss) for the period              
    Divestment gains/(losses) (4) (2) 10 (11) (7) 6 —
    Impairment reversals/(impairments) (186) (5) (102) (3) (152) 77 —
    Redundancy and restructuring (53) (1) (9) (15) (14) (11) (4)
    Fair value accounting of commodity derivatives and certain gas contracts1 (896) (887) — 5 (319) 306 —
    Impact of exchange rate movements and inflationary adjustments on tax balances1 403 (27) 412 — — — 18
    Other1 95 3 28 17 34 12 —
    Impact on Adjusted Earnings (641) (919) 339 (7) (458) 390 14
    Impact on Adjusted Earnings attributable to non-controlling interest — — — — — — —
    Impact on Adjusted Earnings attributable to Shell plc shareholders (641) (919) 339 (7) (458) 390 14

    1.For a detailed description, see the corresponding footnotes to the Q1 2025 identified items table above.

    The identified items categories above may include after-tax impacts of identified items of joint ventures and associates which are fully reported within “Share of profit/(loss) of joint ventures and associates” in the Consolidated Statement of Income, and fully reported as identified items included in Income/(loss) before taxation in the table above. Identified items related to subsidiaries are consolidated and reported across appropriate lines of the Consolidated Statement of Income.

    3. Earnings per share

                               
     
    EARNINGS PER SHARE
    Quarters    
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
    4,780    928    7,358    Income/(loss) attributable to Shell plc shareholders ($ million)    
               
          Weighted average number of shares used as the basis for determining:    
    6,033.5    6,148.4    6,440.1    Basic earnings per share (million)    
    6,087.8    6,213.9    6,504.3    Diluted earnings per share (million)    

             Page 19

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

    4. Share capital

                             
     
    ISSUED AND FULLY PAID ORDINARY SHARES OF €0.07 EACH
      Number of shares   Nominal value
    ($ million)
    At January 1, 2025 6,115,031,158      510     
    Repurchases of shares (98,948,766)     (8)    
    At March 31, 2025 6,016,082,392      502     
    At January 1, 2024 6,524,109,049      544     
    Repurchases of shares (88,893,999)     (7)    
    At March 31, 2024 6,435,215,050      537     

    At Shell plc’s Annual General Meeting on May 21, 2024, the Board was authorised to allot ordinary shares in Shell plc, and to grant rights to subscribe for, or to convert, any security into ordinary shares in Shell plc, up to an aggregate nominal amount of approximately €150 million (representing approximately 2,147 million ordinary shares of €0.07 each), and to list such shares or rights on any stock exchange. This authority expires at the earlier of the close of business on August 20, 2025, or the end of the Annual General Meeting to be held in 2025, unless previously renewed, revoked or varied by Shell plc in a general meeting.

    5. Other reserves

                                             
     
    OTHER RESERVES
    $ million Merger reserve Share premium reserve Capital redemption reserve Share plan reserve Accumulated other comprehensive income Total
    At January 1, 2025 37,298    154    270    1,417    (19,373)   19,766   
    Other comprehensive income/(loss) attributable to Shell plc shareholders —    —    —    —    1,967    1,967   
    Transfer from other comprehensive income —    —    —    —    11    11   
    Repurchases of shares —    —    8    —    —    8   
    Share-based compensation —    —    —    (663)   —    (663)  
    At March 31, 2025 37,298    154    279    754    (17,394)   21,090   
    At January 1, 2024 37,298    154    236    1,308    (17,851)   21,145   
    Other comprehensive income/(loss) attributable to Shell plc shareholders —    —    —    —    (1,420)   (1,420)  
    Transfer from other comprehensive income —    —    —    —    138    138   
    Repurchases of shares —    —    7    —    —    7   
    Share-based compensation —    —    —    (426)   —    (426)  
    At March 31, 2024 37,298    154    244    882    (19,132)   19,445   

    The merger reserve and share premium reserve were established as a consequence of Shell plc (formerly Royal Dutch Shell plc) becoming the single parent company of Royal Dutch Petroleum Company and The “Shell” Transport and Trading Company, p.l.c., now The Shell Transport and Trading Company Limited, in 2005. The merger reserve increased in 2016 following the issuance of shares for the acquisition of BG Group plc. The capital redemption reserve was established in connection with repurchases of shares of Shell plc. The share plan reserve is in respect of equity-settled share-based compensation plans.

    6. Derivative financial instruments and debt excluding lease liabilities

    As disclosed in the Consolidated Financial Statements for the year ended December 31, 2024, presented in the Annual Report and Accounts and Form 20-F for that year, Shell is exposed to the risks of changes in fair value of its financial assets and liabilities. The fair values of the financial assets and liabilities are defined as the price that would be received to sell an asset or paid to transfer a liability in an orderly transaction between market participants at the measurement date. Methods and assumptions used to estimate the fair values at March 31, 2025, are consistent with those used in the year ended December 31, 2024, though the carrying amounts of derivative financial instruments have changed since that date.

             Page 20

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    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

    The movement of the derivative financial instruments between December 31, 2024 and March 31, 2025 is a decrease of $732 million for the current assets and a decrease of $1,020 million for the current liabilities.

    The table below provides the comparison of the fair value with the carrying amount of debt excluding lease liabilities, disclosed in accordance with IFRS 7 Financial Instruments: Disclosures.

                     
     
    DEBT EXCLUDING LEASE LIABILITIES
    $ million March 31, 2025 December 31, 2024
    Carrying amount1 48,023    48,376   
    Fair value2 44,240    44,119   

    1.    Shell issued no debt under the US shelf or under the Euro medium-term note programmes during the first quarter 2025.

    2.     Mainly determined from the prices quoted for these securities.

    7. Other notes to the unaudited Condensed Consolidated Interim Financial Statements

    Consolidated Statement of Income

    Interest and other income

                               
     
    Quarters $ million  
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
    302    683    907    Interest and other income/(expenses)    
          Of which:    
    481    548    588    Interest income    
    1    25    23    Dividend income (from investments in equity securities)    
    (127)   (288)   10    Net gains/(losses) on sales and revaluation of non-current assets and businesses    
    (137)   267    66    Net foreign exchange gains/(losses) on financing activities    
    85    131    219    Other    

    Depreciation, depletion and amortisation

                               
     
    Quarters $ million  
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
    5,441    7,520    5,881    Depreciation, depletion and amortisation    
          Of which:    
    5,130 5,829 5,654 Depreciation    
    311 1,797 382 Impairments    
    (1) (106) (154) Impairment reversals    

    Impairments recognised in the first quarter 2025 of $311 million pre-tax ($287 million post-tax) principally relate to Chemicals and Products.

    Impairments recognised in the fourth quarter 2024 of $2,659 million pre-tax ($2,245 million post-tax), of which $1,797 million recognised in depreciation, depletion and amortisation and $863 million recognised in share of profit of joint ventures and associates, mainly relate to Renewables and Energy Solutions ($1,068 million pre-tax; $1,000 million post-tax), Integrated Gas ($532 million pre-tax; $345 million post-tax), Marketing ($495 million pre-tax; $459 million post-tax), Chemicals and Products ($315 million pre-tax; $247 million post-tax) and Upstream ($248 million pre-tax; $194 million post-tax).

    Impairments recognised in the first quarter 2024 of $382 million pre-tax ($332 million post-tax) include smaller

    impairments in various segments.

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    Taxation charge/credit

                               
     
    Quarters $ million  
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
    4,083    3,164    3,604    Taxation charge/(credit)    
          Of which:    
    4,024 3,125 3,525 Income tax excluding Pillar Two income tax    
    59 39 79 Income tax related to Pillar Two income tax    

    As required by IAS 12 Income Taxes, Shell has applied the exception to recognising and disclosing information about deferred tax assets and liabilities related to Pillar Two income taxes.

    Consolidated Statement of Comprehensive Income

    Currency translation differences

                               
     
    Quarters $ million  
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
    1,711    (4,899)   (1,995)   Currency translation differences    
          Of which:    
    1,618 (5,028) (1,983) Recognised in Other comprehensive income    
    92 129 (12) (Gain)/loss reclassified to profit or loss    

    Condensed Consolidated Balance Sheet

    Other intangible assets

                       
       
    $ million      
      March 31, 2025 December 31, 2024  
    Other intangible assets 11,365    9,480     
           

    The increase in other intangible assets as at March 31, 2025 compared with December 31, 2024 is mainly related to initial recognition at fair value of favourable LNG, gas offtake and sales contracts. These were recognised following completion of the acquisition of Pavilion Energy Pte. Ltd. during the first quarter 2025. The fair value of unfavourable LNG, gas offtake and sales contracts acquired was recognised under trade and other payables.

    Assets classified as held for sale

                       
       
    $ million      
      March 31, 2025 December 31, 2024  
    Assets classified as held for sale 10,881    9,857     
    Liabilities directly associated with assets classified as held for sale 8,001    6,203     

    Assets classified as held for sale and associated liabilities at March 31, 2025 principally relate to Shell’s UK offshore oil and gas assets in Upstream, mining interests in Canada and an energy and chemicals park in Singapore, both in Chemicals and Products. Upon completion of the sale, Shell’s UK offshore assets will be derecognised in exchange for a 50% interest in a newly formed joint venture.

    The major classes of assets and liabilities classified as held for sale at March 31, 2025, are Property, plant and equipment ($8,866 million; December 31, 2024: $8,283 million), Inventories ($1,003 million; December 31, 2024: $1,180 million), Decommissioning and other provisions ($3,228 million; December 31, 2024: $3,053 million), deferred tax liabilities ($2,823 million; December 31, 2024: $2,042 million), Trade and other payables ($1,000 million; December 31, 2024: $484 million) and Debt ($839 million; December 31, 2024: $624 million).

             Page 22

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

    Consolidated Statement of Cash Flows

    Cash flow from operating activities – Other

                               
     
    Quarters $ million  
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
    570    (856)   509    Other    

    ‘Cash flow from operating activities – Other’ for the first quarter 2025 includes $652 million of net inflows (fourth quarter 2024: $1,447 million net outflows; first quarter 2024: $188 million net inflows) due to the timing of payments relating to emission certificates and biofuel programmes in Europe and North America and $255 million in relation to reversal of currency exchange gains on Cash and cash equivalents (fourth quarter 2024: $672 million losses; first quarter 2024: $253 million losses).

    Cash flow from investing activities – Other investing cash outflows

                               
     
    Quarters $ million  
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
    (1,394)   (655)   (1,494)   Other investing cash outflows    

    ‘Cash flow from investing activities – Other investing cash outflows’ for the first quarter 2025 includes $818 million secured term loans provided to The Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Limited (SPDC) upon completion of the sale of SPDC. The first quarter 2024 includes $645 million of debt securities acquired in the Corporate segment.

    8. Reconciliation of Operating expenses and Total Debt

                               
     
    RECONCILIATION OF OPERATING EXPENSES    
    Quarters $ million  
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
    5,549    5,839    5,810    Production and manufacturing expenses    
    2,840    3,231    2,975    Selling, distribution and administrative expenses    
    185    331    212    Research and development    
    8,575    9,401    8,997    Operating expenses    
                               
                 
    RECONCILIATION OF TOTAL DEBT    
    March 31, 2025 December 31, 2024 March 31, 2024 $ million    
    11,391    11,630    11,046    Current debt    
    65,120    65,448    68,886    Non-current debt    
    76,511    77,078    79,931    Total debt    

             Page 23

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

    ALTERNATIVE PERFORMANCE (NON-GAAP) MEASURES

    A.Adjusted Earnings, Adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (“Adjusted EBITDA”) and Cash flow from operating activities

    The “Adjusted Earnings” measure aims to facilitate a comparative understanding of Shell’s financial performance from period to period by removing the effects of oil price changes on inventory carrying amounts and removing the effects of identified items. These items are in some cases driven by external factors and may, either individually or collectively, hinder the comparative understanding of Shell’s financial results from period to period. This measure excludes earnings attributable to non-controlling interest when presenting the total Shell Group result but includes these items when presenting individual segment Adjusted Earnings as set out in the table below.

    We define “Adjusted EBITDA” as “Income/(loss) for the period” adjusted for current cost of supplies; identified items; tax charge/(credit); depreciation, amortisation and depletion; exploration well write-offs and net interest expense. All items include the non-controlling interest component. Management uses this measure to evaluate Shell’s performance in the period and over time.

                                                   
     
    Q1 2025 $ million
      Total Integrated Gas Upstream Marketing Chemicals and Products Renewables and Energy Solutions Corporate
    Income/(loss) for the period 4,875 2,789 2,080 814 (77) (247) (483)
    Add: Current cost of supplies adjustment before taxation (15)     52 (67)    
    Add: Tax on current cost of supplies adjustment (2)     (14) 12    
    Less: Identified items (811) 306 (257) (49) (581) (205) (26)
    Less: Income/(loss) attributable to non-controlling interest 95            
    Less: Current cost of supplies adjustment attributable to non-controlling interest (1)            
    Add: Identified items attributable to non-controlling interest —            
    Adjusted Earnings 5,577            
    Add: Non-controlling interest 94            
    Adjusted Earnings plus non-controlling interest 5,670 2,483 2,337 900 449 (42) (457)
    Add: Taxation charge/(credit) excluding tax impact of identified items 3,784 803 2,619 391 99 63 (191)
    Add: Depreciation, depletion and amortisation excluding impairments 5,130 1,404 2,213 566 852 90 6
    Add: Exploration well write-offs 28 — 29        
    Add: Interest expense excluding identified items 1,119 51 200 12 14 2 841
    Less: Interest income 481 4 11 — 4 2 461
    Adjusted EBITDA 15,250 4,735 7,387 1,869 1,410 111 (261)
    Less: Current cost of supplies adjustment before taxation (15)     52 (67)    
    Joint ventures and associates (dividends received less profit) (178) (286) (159) 203 54 10 —
    Derivative financial instruments (38) 542 14 10 (508) (169) 73
    Taxation paid (2,900) (773) (1,999) (174) 63 52 (68)
    Other (206) (68) (386) 396 125 (17) (257)
    (Increase)/decrease in working capital (2,663) (687) (913) (344) (1,081) 380 (19)
    Cash flow from operating activities 9,281 3,463 3,945 1,907 130 367 (531)

             Page 24

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

                                                   
     
    Q4 2024 $ million
      Total Integrated Gas Upstream Marketing Chemicals and Products Renewables and Energy Solutions Corporate
    Income/(loss) for the period 1,041 1,744 1,031 103 (276) (1,226) (335)
    Add: Current cost of supplies adjustment before taxation (75)     (2) (73)    
    Add: Tax on current cost of supplies adjustment 23     2 21    
    Less: Identified items (2,778) (421) (651) (736) (99) (914) 45
    Less: Income/(loss) attributable to non-controlling interest 113            
    Less: Current cost of supplies adjustment attributable to non-controlling interest (7)            
    Add: Identified items attributable to non-controlling interest —            
    Adjusted Earnings 3,661            
    Add: Non-controlling interest 106            
    Adjusted Earnings plus non-controlling interest 3,766 2,165 1,682 839 (229) (311) (380)
    Add: Taxation charge/(credit) excluding tax impact of identified items 3,371 635 2,618 266 (198) 97 (46)
    Add: Depreciation, depletion and amortisation excluding impairments 5,829 1,440 2,803 587 896 96 8
    Add: Exploration well write-offs 649 277 372 — — — —
    Add: Interest expense excluding identified items 1,213 54 201 17 16 2 923
    Less: Interest income 548 3 — — 10 7 529
    Adjusted EBITDA 14,281 4,568 7,676 1,709 475 (123) (24)
    Less: Current cost of supplies adjustment before taxation (75)     (2) (73)    
    Joint ventures and associates (dividends received less profit) 451 110 (22) 172 139 51 —
    Derivative financial instruments 319 120 (28) (8) 230 533 (527)
    Taxation paid (2,910) (635) (2,019) (130) 36 (41) (120)
    Other (1,461) 114 (486) (1,227) (313) 77 375
    (Increase)/decrease in working capital 2,407 114 (611) 845 1,394 353 312
    Cash flow from operating activities 13,162 4,391 4,509 1,363 2,032 850 16
                                                   
     
    Q1 2024 $ million
      Total Integrated Gas Upstream Marketing Chemicals and Products Renewables and Energy Solutions Corporate
    Income/(loss) for the period 7,439 2,761 2,272 896 1,311 553 (354)
    Add: Current cost of supplies adjustment before taxation (360)     (153) (207)    
    Add: Tax on current cost of supplies adjustment 84     30 54    
    Less: Identified items (641) (919) 339 (7) (458) 390 14
    Less: Income/(loss) attributable to non-controlling interest 82            
    Less: Current cost of supplies adjustment attributable to non-controlling interest (12)            
    Add: Identified items attributable to non-controlling interest —            
    Adjusted Earnings 7,734            
    Add: Non-controlling interest 70            
    Adjusted Earnings plus non-controlling interest 7,804 3,680 1,933 781 1,615 163 (368)
    Add: Taxation charge/(credit) excluding tax impact of identified items 4,124 996 2,522 358 338 — (91)
    Add: Depreciation, depletion and amortisation excluding impairments 5,654 1,410 2,727 535 870 106 6
    Add: Exploration well write-offs 554 8 546 — — — —
    Add: Interest expense excluding identified items 1,163 42 169 12 17 1 922
    Less: Interest income 588 — 10 — 14 4 560
    Adjusted EBITDA 18,711 6,136 7,888 1,686 2,826 267 (92)
    Less: Current cost of supplies adjustment before taxation (360)     (153) (207)    
    Joint ventures and associates (dividends received less profit) (582) (197) (546) 93 56 13 —
    Derivative financial instruments 306 (1,080) (3) (39) (402) 1,978 (149)
    Taxation paid (2,616) (467) (1,802) (175) (19) (244) 91
    Other (97) 45 (231) 393 (378) (30) 104
    (Increase)/decrease in working capital (2,752) 275 421 (792) (2,639) 481 (499)
    Cash flow from operating activities 13,330 4,712 5,727 1,319 (349) 2,466 (545)

    Identified items

    The objective of identified items is to remove material impacts on net income/loss arising from transactions which are generally uncontrollable and unusual (infrequent or non-recurring) in nature or giving rise to a mismatch between accounting and economic results, or certain transactions that are generally excluded from underlying results in the industry.

             Page 25

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

    Identified items comprise: divestment gains and losses, impairments and impairment reversals, redundancy and restructuring, fair value accounting of commodity derivatives and certain gas contracts that gives rise to a mismatch between accounting and economic results, the impact of exchange rate movements and inflationary adjustments on certain deferred tax balances, and other items.

    See Note 2 “Segment information” for details.

    B.    Adjusted Earnings per share

    Adjusted Earnings per share is calculated as Adjusted Earnings (see Reference A), divided by the weighted average number of shares used as the basis for basic earnings per share (see Note 3).

    C.    Cash capital expenditure

    Cash capital expenditure represents cash spent on maintaining and developing assets as well as on investments in the period. Management regularly monitors this measure as a key lever to delivering sustainable cash flows. Cash capital expenditure is the sum of the following lines from the Consolidated Statement of Cash Flows: Capital expenditure, Investments in joint ventures and associates and Investments in equity securities.

    See Note 2 “Segment information” for the reconciliation of cash capital expenditure.

    D.    Capital employed and Return on average capital employed

    Return on average capital employed (“ROACE”) measures the efficiency of Shell’s utilisation of the capital that it employs.

    The measure refers to Capital employed which consists of total equity, current debt, and non-current debt reduced by cash and cash equivalents.

    In this calculation, the sum of Adjusted Earnings (see Reference A) plus non-controlling interest (NCI) excluding identified items for the current and previous three quarters, adjusted for after-tax interest expense and after-tax interest income, is expressed as a percentage of the average capital employed excluding cash and cash equivalents for the same period.

                           
     
    $ million Quarters
      Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024
    Current debt 11,046 9,931 9,044
    Non-current debt 68,886 71,610 76,098
    Total equity 188,304 188,362 195,530
    Less: Cash and cash equivalents (39,949) (38,774) (42,074)
    Capital employed – opening 228,286 231,128 238,598
    Current debt 11,391 11,630 11,046
    Non-current debt 65,120 65,448 68,886
    Total equity 180,670 180,168 188,304
    Less: Cash and cash equivalents (35,601) (39,110) (39,949)
    Capital employed – closing 221,580 218,134 228,286
    Capital employed – average 224,933 224,630 233,442

             Page 26

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

                           
     
    $ million Quarters
      Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024
    Adjusted Earnings – current and previous three quarters (Reference A) 21,558 23,716 26,338
    Add: Income/(loss) attributable to NCI – current and previous three quarters 441 427 295
    Add: Current cost of supplies adjustment attributable to NCI – current and previous three quarters 25 14 (24)
    Less: Identified items attributable to NCI (Reference A) – current and previous three quarters 18 18 (11)
    Adjusted Earnings plus NCI excluding identified items – current and previous three quarters 22,005 24,139 26,620
    Add: Interest expense after tax – current and previous three quarters 2,639 2,701 2,718
    Less: Interest income after tax on cash and cash equivalents – current and previous three quarters 1,329 1,389 1,368
    Adjusted Earnings plus NCI excluding identified items before interest expense and interest income – current and previous three quarters 23,315 25,452 27,971
    Capital employed – average 224,933 224,630 233,442
    ROACE on an Adjusted Earnings plus NCI basis 10.4% 11.3% 12.0%

    E.    Net debt and gearing

    Net debt is defined as the sum of current and non-current debt, less cash and cash equivalents, adjusted for the fair value of derivative financial instruments used to hedge foreign exchange and interest rate risk relating to debt, and associated collateral balances. Management considers this adjustment useful because it reduces the volatility of net debt caused by fluctuations in foreign exchange and interest rates, and eliminates the potential impact of related collateral payments or receipts. Debt-related derivative financial instruments are a subset of the derivative financial instrument assets and liabilities presented on the balance sheet. Collateral balances are reported under “Trade and other receivables” or “Trade and other payables” as appropriate.

    Gearing is a measure of Shell’s capital structure and is defined as net debt (total debt less cash and cash equivalents) as a percentage of total capital (net debt plus total equity).

                           
     
    $ million  
      March 31, 2025 December 31, 2024 March 31, 2024
    Current debt 11,391    11,630    11,046   
    Non-current debt 65,120    65,448    68,886   
    Total debt 76,511    77,078    79,931   
    Of which: Lease liabilities 28,488    28,702    26,885   
    Add: Debt-related derivative financial instruments: net liability/(asset) 1,905    2,469    1,888   
    Add: Collateral on debt-related derivatives: net liability/(asset) (1,295)   (1,628)   (1,357)  
    Less: Cash and cash equivalents (35,601)   (39,110)   (39,949)  
    Net debt 41,521    38,809    40,513   
    Total equity 180,670    180,168    188,304   
    Total capital 222,190    218,974    228,817   
    Gearing 18.7  % 17.7  % 17.7  %

    F.    Operating expenses and Underlying operating expenses

    Operating expenses

    Operating expenses is a measure of Shell’s cost management performance, comprising the following items from the Consolidated Statement of Income: production and manufacturing expenses; selling, distribution and administrative expenses; and research and development expenses.

             Page 27

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

                                                   
     
    Q1 2025 $ million
      Total Integrated Gas Upstream Marketing Chemicals and Products Renewables and Energy Solutions Corporate
    Production and manufacturing expenses 5,549 947 2,139 349 1,621 486 8
    Selling, distribution and administrative expenses 2,840 38 42 2,053 442 153 111
    Research and development 185 22 32 42 25 21 43
    Operating expenses 8,575 1,006 2,213 2,444 2,088 661 162
                                                   
     
    Q4 2024 $ million
      Total Integrated Gas Upstream Marketing Chemicals and Products Renewables and Energy Solutions Corporate
    Production and manufacturing expenses 5,839 982 2,470 270 1,632 480 5
    Selling, distribution and administrative expenses 3,231 39 96 2,258 471 241 126
    Research and development 331 40 69 73 46 37 66
    Operating expenses 9,401 1,061 2,635 2,602 2,149 757 196
                                                   
     
    Q1 2024 $ million
      Total Integrated Gas Upstream Marketing Chemicals and Products Renewables and Energy Solutions Corporate
    Production and manufacturing expenses 5,810 956 2,269 366 1,634 579 5
    Selling, distribution and administrative expenses 2,975 62 58 2,188 420 158 89
    Research and development 212 26 58 34 34 12 49
    Operating expenses 8,997 1,044 2,385 2,587 2,088 749 144

    Underlying operating expenses

    Underlying operating expenses is a measure aimed at facilitating a comparative understanding of performance from period to period by removing the effects of identified items, which, either individually or collectively, can cause volatility, in some cases driven by external factors.

                               
         
    Quarters $ million  
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
    8,575    9,401    8,997    Operating expenses    
    (44)   (174)   (73)   Redundancy and restructuring (charges)/reversal    
    (101)   (88)   —    (Provisions)/reversal    
    23    —    130    Other    
    (121)   (262)   57    Total identified items    
    8,453    9,138    9,054    Underlying operating expenses    

    G.    Free cash flow and Organic free cash flow

    Free cash flow is used to evaluate cash available for financing activities, including dividend payments and debt servicing, after investment in maintaining and growing the business. It is defined as the sum of “Cash flow from operating activities” and “Cash flow from investing activities”.

    Cash flows from acquisition and divestment activities are removed from Free cash flow to arrive at the Organic free cash flow, a measure used by management to evaluate the generation of free cash flow without these activities.

             Page 28

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

                               
     
    Quarters $ million  
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
    9,281    13,162    13,330    Cash flow from operating activities    
    (3,959)   (4,431)   (3,528)   Cash flow from investing activities    
    5,322    8,731    9,802    Free cash flow    
    597    805    1,025    Less: Divestment proceeds (Reference I)    
    45    1    —    Add: Tax paid on divestments (reported under “Other investing cash outflows”)    
    130    525    62    Add: Cash outflows related to inorganic capital expenditure1    
    4,899    8,453    8,839    Organic free cash flow2    

    1.Cash outflows related to inorganic capital expenditure includes portfolio actions which expand Shell’s activities through acquisitions and restructuring activities as reported in capital expenditure lines in the Consolidated Statement of Cash Flows.

    2.Free cash flow less divestment proceeds, adding back outflows related to inorganic expenditure.

    H.    Cash flow from operating activities excluding working capital movements

    Working capital movements are defined as the sum of the following items in the Consolidated Statement of Cash Flows: (i) (increase)/decrease in inventories, (ii) (increase)/decrease in current receivables, and (iii) increase/(decrease) in current payables.

    Cash flow from operating activities excluding working capital movements is a measure used by Shell to analyse its operating cash generation over time excluding the timing effects of changes in inventories and operating receivables and payables from period to period.

                               
     
    Quarters $ million  
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
    9,281    13,162    13,330    Cash flow from operating activities    
    854    131    (608)   (Increase)/decrease in inventories    
    (2,610)   751    (195)   (Increase)/decrease in current receivables    
    (907)   1,524    (1,949)   Increase/(decrease) in current payables    
    (2,663)   2,407    (2,752)   (Increase)/decrease in working capital    
    11,944    10,755    16,082    Cash flow from operating activities excluding working capital movements    

    I.    Divestment proceeds

    Divestment proceeds represent cash received from divestment activities in the period. Management regularly monitors this measure as a key lever to deliver free cash flow.

                               
     
    Quarters $ million  
    Q1 2025 Q4 2024 Q1 2024      
    559    493 323 Proceeds from sale of property, plant and equipment and businesses    
    33    305 133 Proceeds from joint ventures and associates from sale, capital reduction and repayment of long-term loans    
    5    6 569 Proceeds from sale of equity securities    
    597    805 1,025 Divestment proceeds    

             Page 29

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

    CAUTIONARY STATEMENT

    All amounts shown throughout this Unaudited Condensed Interim Financial Report are unaudited. All peak production figures in Portfolio Developments are quoted at 100% expected production. The numbers presented throughout this Unaudited Condensed Interim Financial Report may not sum precisely to the totals provided and percentages may not precisely reflect the absolute figures, due to rounding.

    The companies in which Shell plc directly and indirectly owns investments are separate legal entities. In this Unaudited Condensed Interim Financial Report, “Shell”, “Shell Group” and “Group” are sometimes used for convenience to reference Shell plc and its subsidiaries in general. Likewise, the words “we”, “us” and “our” are also used to refer to Shell plc and its subsidiaries in general or to those who work for them. These terms are also used where no useful purpose is served by identifying the particular entity or entities. ‘‘Subsidiaries’’, “Shell subsidiaries” and “Shell companies” as used in this Unaudited Condensed Interim Financial Report, refer to entities over which Shell plc either directly or indirectly has control. The terms “joint venture”, “joint operations”, “joint arrangements”, and “associates” may also be used to refer to a commercial arrangement in which Shell has a direct or indirect ownership interest with one or more parties. The term “Shell interest” is used for convenience to indicate the direct and/or indirect ownership interest held by Shell in an entity or unincorporated joint arrangement, after exclusion of all third-party interest.

    Forward-Looking statements

    This Unaudited Condensed Interim Financial Report contains forward-looking statements (within the meaning of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995) concerning the financial condition, results of operations and businesses of Shell. All statements other than statements of historical fact are, or may be deemed to be, forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are statements of future expectations that are based on management’s current expectations and assumptions and involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results, performance or events to differ materially from those expressed or implied in these statements. Forward-looking statements include, among other things, statements concerning the potential exposure of Shell to market risks and statements expressing management’s expectations, beliefs, estimates, forecasts, projections and assumptions. These forward-looking statements are identified by their use of terms and phrases such as “aim”; “ambition”; ‘‘anticipate’’; “aspire”, “aspiration”, ‘‘believe’’; “commit”; “commitment”; ‘‘could’’; “desire”; ‘‘estimate’’; ‘‘expect’’; ‘‘goals’’; ‘‘intend’’; ‘‘may’’; “milestones”; ‘‘objectives’’; ‘‘outlook’’; ‘‘plan’’; ‘‘probably’’; ‘‘project’’; ‘‘risks’’; “schedule”; ‘‘seek’’; ‘‘should’’; ‘‘target’’; “vision”; ‘‘will’’; “would” and similar terms and phrases. There are a number of factors that could affect the future operations of Shell and could cause those results to differ materially from those expressed in the forward-looking statements included in this Unaudited Condensed Interim Financial Report, including (without limitation): (a) price fluctuations in crude oil and natural gas; (b) changes in demand for Shell’s products; (c) currency fluctuations; (d) drilling and production results; (e) reserves estimates; (f) loss of market share and industry competition; (g) environmental and physical risks, including climate change; (h) risks associated with the identification of suitable potential acquisition properties and targets, and successful negotiation and completion of such transactions; (i) the risk of doing business in developing countries and countries subject to international sanctions; (j) legislative, judicial, fiscal and regulatory developments including tariffs and regulatory measures addressing climate change; (k) economic and financial market conditions in various countries and regions; (l) political risks, including the risks of expropriation and renegotiation of the terms of contracts with governmental entities, delays or advancements in the approval of projects and delays in the reimbursement for shared costs; (m) risks associated with the impact of pandemics, regional conflicts, such as the Russia-Ukraine war and the conflict in the Middle East, and a significant cyber security, data privacy or IT incident; (n) the pace of the energy transition; and (o) changes in trading conditions. No assurance is provided that future dividend payments will match or exceed previous dividend payments. All forward-looking statements contained in this Unaudited Condensed Interim Financial Report are expressly qualified in their entirety by the cautionary statements contained or referred to in this section. Readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Additional risk factors that may affect future results are contained in Shell plc’s Form 20-F for the year ended December 31, 2024 (available at www.shell.com/investors/news-and-filings/sec-filings.html and www.sec.gov). These risk factors also expressly qualify all forward-looking statements contained in this Unaudited Condensed Interim Financial Report and should be considered by the reader. Each forward-looking statement speaks only as of the date of this Unaudited Condensed Interim Financial Report, May 2, 2025. Neither Shell plc nor any of its subsidiaries undertake any obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statement as a result of new information, future events or other information. In light of these risks, results could differ materially from those stated, implied or inferred from the forward-looking statements contained in this Unaudited Condensed Interim Financial Report.

    Shell’s net carbon intensity

    Also, in this Unaudited Condensed Interim Financial Report we may refer to Shell’s “net carbon intensity” (NCI), which includes Shell’s carbon emissions from the production of our energy products, our suppliers’ carbon emissions in supplying energy for that production and our customers’ carbon emissions associated with their use of the energy products we sell. Shell’s NCI also includes the emissions associated with the production and use of energy products produced by others which Shell purchases for resale. Shell only controls its own emissions. The use of the terms Shell’s “net carbon intensity” or NCI is for convenience only and not intended to suggest these emissions are those of Shell plc or its subsidiaries.

    Shell’s net-zero emissions target

    Shell’s operating plan and outlook are forecasted for a three-year period and ten-year period, respectively, and are updated every year. They reflect the current economic environment and what we can reasonably expect to see over the next three and ten years. Accordingly, the outlook reflects our Scope 1, Scope 2 and NCI targets over the next ten years. However, Shell’s operating plan and outlook cannot reflect our 2050 net-zero emissions target, as this target is outside our planning period. Such future operating plans and outlooks could include changes to our portfolio, efficiency improvements and the use of carbon capture and storage and carbon credits. In the future, as society moves towards net-zero emissions, we expect Shell’s operating plans and outlooks to reflect this movement. However, if society is not net zero in 2050, as of today, there would be significant risk that Shell may not meet this target.

    Forward-Looking non-GAAP measures

    This Unaudited Condensed Interim Financial Report may contain certain forward-looking non-GAAP measures such as cash capital expenditure and Adjusted Earnings. We are unable to provide a reconciliation of these forward-looking non-GAAP measures to the most comparable GAAP financial measures because certain information needed to reconcile those non-GAAP measures to the most comparable GAAP financial measures is dependent on future events some of which are outside the control of Shell, such as oil and gas prices, interest rates and exchange rates. Moreover, estimating such GAAP measures with the required precision necessary to provide a meaningful reconciliation is extremely difficult and could not be accomplished without unreasonable effort. Non-GAAP measures in respect of future periods which cannot be reconciled to the most comparable GAAP financial measure are calculated in a manner which is consistent with the accounting policies applied in Shell plc’s consolidated financial statements.

    The contents of websites referred to in this Unaudited Condensed Interim Financial Report do not form part of this Unaudited Condensed Interim Financial Report.

    We may have used certain terms, such as resources, in this Unaudited Condensed Interim Financial Report that the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) strictly prohibits us from including in our filings with the SEC. Investors are urged to consider closely the disclosure in our Form 20-F, File No 1-32575, available on the SEC website www.sec.gov.

             Page 30

    SHELL PLC
    1st QUARTER 2025 UNAUDITED RESULTS

    This announcement contains inside information.

    May 2, 2025

         
    The information in this Unaudited Condensed Interim Financial Report reflects the unaudited consolidated financial position and results of Shell plc. Company No. 4366849, Registered Office: Shell Centre, London, SE1 7NA, England, UK.

    Contacts:

    – Sean Ashley, Company Secretary

    – Media: International +44 (0) 207 934 5550; U.S. and Canada: https://www.shell.us/about-us/news-and-insights/media/submit-an-inquiry.html

    LEI number of Shell plc: 21380068P1DRHMJ8KU70

    Classification: Inside Information

             Page 31

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI: Shell plc publishes first quarter 2025 press release

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    London, May 2, 2025

    “Shell delivered another solid set of results in the first quarter of 2025. We further strengthened our leading LNG business by completing the acquisition of Pavilion Energy, and high-graded our portfolio with the completion of the Nigeria onshore and the Singapore Energy and Chemicals Park divestments.

    Our strong performance and resilient balance sheet give us the confidence to commence another $3.5 billion of buybacks for the next three months, consistent with the strategic direction we set out at our Capital Markets Day in March.”

    Shell plc Chief Executive Officer, Wael Sawan


     

    SOLID RESULTS; RESILIENT BALANCE SHEET; CONSISTENT DISTRIBUTIONS

    • Q1 2025 Adjusted Earnings1 of $5.6 billion reflect strong performance across the business. CFFO excluding working capital was $11.9 billion for the quarter. Working capital outflow was $2.7 billion in Q1 2025.
    • Strengthened LNG trading and optimisation capabilities with the Pavilion Energy acquisition and high-graded the portfolio with the completion of the divestments of the Singapore Energy and Chemicals Park2, and SPDC3 in Nigeria.
    • Disciplined capital allocation, with 2025 cash capex outlook of $20 – 22 billion.
    • Commencing another $3.5 billion share buyback programme for the next 3 months, making this the 14th consecutive quarter of at least $3 billion in buybacks. Total shareholder distributions paid over the last 4 quarters were 45% of CFFO, consistent with the 40 – 50% of CFFO through the cycle distribution target announced at Capital Markets Day 2025.
    • Resilient balance sheet with gearing (including leases) of 19%.
    $ million1 Adj. Earnings Adj. EBITDA CFFO Cash capex
    Integrated Gas 2,483 4,735 3,463 1,116
    Upstream 2,337 7,387 3,945 1,923
    Marketing 900 1,869 1,907 256
    Chemicals & Products4 449 1,410 130 458
    Renewables & Energy Solutions (42) 111 367 403
    Corporate (457) (261) (531) 19
    Less: Non-controlling interest (NCI) 94      
    Shell Q1 2025 5,577 15,250 9,281 4,175
    Q4 2024 3,661 14,281 13,162 6,924

    1Income/(loss) attributable to shareholders for Q1 2025 is $4.8 billion. Reconciliation of non-GAAP measures can be found in the unaudited results, available at www.shell.com/investors.
    2 Completed on April 1, 2025.
    3The Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Limited.
    4Chemicals & Products Adjusted Earnings at a subsegment level are as follows: Chemicals $(0.1) billion and Products $0.6 billion.


     

    • CFFO excluding working capital is $11.9 billion in Q1 2025 and reflects tax payments of $2.9 billion. Working capital outflow is $2.7 billion, consistent with outflows as we have seen in the first quarters of recent years.
    • Net debt of $41.5 billion includes the lease additions related to the Pavilion Energy acquisition as well as a drawdown on the loan facilities provided at the completion of the sale of SPDC in Nigeria.
    $ billion1 Q1 2024 Q2 2024 Q3 2024 Q4 2024 Q1 2025
    Working capital (2.8) (0.3) 2.7 2.4 (2.7)
    Divestment proceeds 1.0 0.8 0.2 0.8 0.6
    Free cash flow 9.8 10.2 10.8 8.7 5.3
    Net debt 40.5 38.3 35.2 38.8 41.5

    1 Reconciliation of non-GAAP measures can be found in the unaudited results, available at www.shell.com/investors.


     

    Q1 2025 FINANCIAL PERFORMANCE DRIVERS

    INTEGRATED GAS

    Key data Q4 2024 Q1 2025 Q2 2025 outlook
    Realised liquids price ($/bbl) 63 64 —
    Realised gas price ($/thousand scf) 8.1 7.4 —
    Production (kboe/d) 905 927 890 – 950
    LNG liquefaction volumes (MT) 7.1 6.6 6.3 – 6.9
    LNG sales volumes (MT) 15.5 16.5 —
    • Adjusted Earnings were higher than in Q4 2024, reflecting lower exploration well write-offs. Trading and optimisation results were in line with Q4 2024, despite higher unfavourable (non-cash) impact from expiring hedging contracts.
    • Q2 2025 production and liquefaction outlook reflects higher scheduled maintenance across the portfolio.

    UPSTREAM

    Key data Q4 2024 Q1 2025 Q2 2025 outlook
    Realised liquids price ($/bbl) 71 71 —
    Realised gas price ($/thousand scf) 7.0 7.4 —
    Liquids production (kboe/d) 1,332 1,335 —
    Gas production (million scf/d) 3,056 3,020 —
    Total production (kboe/d) 1,859 1,855 1,560 – 1,760
    • Adjusted Earnings were higher than in Q4 2024, reflecting lower depreciation following year-end reserves updates and lower well write-offs, partially offset by lower sales volumes.
    • Q2 2025 production outlook reflects scheduled maintenance and the completed sale of SPDC in March 2025.

    MARKETING

    Key data Q4 2024 Q1 2025 Q2 2025 outlook
    Marketing sales volumes (kb/d) 2,795 2,674 2,600 – 3,100
    Mobility (kb/d) 2,041 1,964 —
    Lubricants (kb/d) 77 87 —
    Sectors & Decarbonisation (kb/d) 678 623 —
    • Adjusted Earnings were higher than in Q4 2024, supported by seasonally stronger margins in Lubricants.

    CHEMICALS & PRODUCTS

    Key data Q4 2024 Q1 2025 Q2 2025 outlook1
    Refinery processing intake (kb/d) 1,215 1,362 —
    Chemicals sales volumes (kT) 2,926 2,813 —
    Refinery utilisation (%) 76 85 87 – 95
    Chemicals manufacturing plant utilisation (%) 75 81 74 – 82
    Global indicative refining margin ($/bbl) 5.5 6.2 —
    Global indicative chemical margin ($/t) 138 126 —

    1Following the Singapore Energy and Chemicals Park divestment, IRM, ICM and associated sensitivities have been updated for Q2 2025; see the guidance tab of the Quarterly Databook, available at www.shell.com/investors.

    • Trading and optimisation results were significantly higher than in Q4 2024 and in line with contributions in Q2 and Q3 of 2024, while the Chemicals results continued to be impacted by a weak margin environment.
    • Q2 2025 outlook reflects the completed sale of the Energy and Chemicals Park in Singapore.

    RENEWABLES & ENERGY SOLUTIONS

    Key data Q4 2024 Q1 2025
    External power sales (TWh) 76 76
    Sales of pipeline gas to end-use customers (TWh) 165 184
    Renewables power generation capacity (GW)* 7.4 7.5
    • in operation (GW)
    		 3.4 3.5
    • under construction and/or committed for sale (GW)
    		 4.0 4.0

    *Excludes Shell’s equity share of associates where information cannot be obtained.

    • Adjusted Earnings were higher than in Q4 2024, with higher seasonal demand and volatility driving higher trading and optimisation, particularly in the Americas.

    Renewables and Energy Solutions includes activities such as renewable power generation, the marketing and trading and optimisation of power and pipeline gas, as well as carbon credits, and digitally enabled customer solutions. It also includes the production and marketing of hydrogen, development of commercial carbon capture and storage hubs, investment in nature-based projects that avoid or reduce carbon emissions, and Shell Ventures, which invests in companies that work to accelerate the energy and mobility transformation.

    CORPORATE

    Key data Q4 2024 Q1 2025 Q2 2025 outlook
    Adjusted Earnings ($ billion) (0.4) (0.5) (0.6) – (0.4)

    UPCOMING INVESTOR EVENTS

    May 20, 2025 Annual General Meeting
    July 31, 2025 Second quarter 2025 results and dividends
    October 30, 2025 Third quarter 2025 results and dividends


     

    USEFUL LINKS

    Results materials Q1 2025
    Quarterly Databook Q1 2025
    Webcast registration Q1 2025
    Dividend announcement Q1 2025
    Capital Markets Day 2025 materials


     

    ALTERNATIVE PERFORMANCE (NON-GAAP) MEASURES
    This announcement includes certain measures that are calculated and presented on the basis of methodologies other than in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) such as IFRS, including Adjusted Earnings, Adjusted EBITDA, CFFO excluding working capital movements, free cash flow, Divestment proceeds and Net debt. This information, along with comparable GAAP measures, is useful to investors because it provides a basis for measuring Shell plc’s operating performance and ability to retire debt and invest in new business opportunities. Shell plc’s management uses these financial measures, along with the most directly comparable GAAP financial measures, in evaluating the business performance.

    This announcement may contain certain forward-looking non-GAAP measures such as Adjusted Earnings and divestments. We are unable to provide a reconciliation of these forward-looking non-GAAP measures to the most comparable GAAP financial measures because certain information needed to reconcile the non-GAAP measures to the most comparable GAAP financial measures is dependent on future events some of which are outside the control of the company, such as oil and gas prices, interest rates and exchange rates. Moreover, estimating such GAAP measures with the required precision necessary to provide a meaningful reconciliation is extremely difficult and could not be accomplished without unreasonable effort. Non-GAAP measures in respect of future periods which cannot be reconciled to the most comparable GAAP financial measure are estimated in a manner which is consistent with the accounting policies applied in Shell plc’s consolidated financial statements.

    CAUTIONARY STATEMENT
    The companies in which Shell plc directly and indirectly owns investments are separate legal entities. In this announcement, “Shell”, “Shell Group” and “Group” are sometimes used for convenience to reference Shell plc and its subsidiaries in general. Likewise, the words “we”, “us” and “our” are also used to refer to Shell plc and its subsidiaries in general or to those who work for them. These terms are also used where no useful purpose is served by identifying the particular entity or entities. “Subsidiaries”, “Shell subsidiaries” and “Shell companies” as used in this announcement refer to entities over which Shell plc either directly or indirectly has control. The terms “joint venture”, “joint operations”, “joint arrangements”, and “associates” may also be used to refer to a commercial arrangement in which Shell has a direct or indirect ownership interest with one or more parties. The term “Shell interest” is used for convenience to indicate the direct and/or indirect ownership interest held by Shell in an entity or unincorporated joint arrangement, after exclusion of all third-party interest.

    This announcement contains forward-looking statements (within the meaning of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995) concerning the financial condition, results of operations and businesses of Shell. All statements other than statements of historical fact are, or may be deemed to be, forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are statements of future expectations that are based on management’s current expectations and assumptions and involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results, performance or events to differ materially from those expressed or implied in these statements. Forward-looking statements include, among other things, statements concerning the potential exposure of Shell to market risks and statements expressing management’s expectations, beliefs, estimates, forecasts, projections and assumptions. These forward-looking statements are identified by their use of terms and phrases such as “aim”; “ambition”; “anticipate”; “aspire”; “aspiration”; ‘‘believe’’; “commit”; “commitment”; ‘‘could’’; “desire”; ‘‘estimate’’; ‘‘expect’’; ‘‘goals’’; ‘‘intend’’; ‘‘may’’; “milestones”; ‘‘objectives’’; ‘‘outlook’’; ‘‘plan’’; ‘‘probably’’; ‘‘project’’; ‘‘risks’’; “schedule”; ‘‘seek’’; ‘‘should’’; ‘‘target’’; “vision”; ‘‘will’’; “would” and similar terms and phrases. There are a number of factors that could affect the future operations of Shell and could cause those results to differ materially from those expressed in the forward-looking statements included in this announcement, including (without limitation): (a) price fluctuations in crude oil and natural gas; (b) changes in demand for Shell’s products; (c) currency fluctuations; (d) drilling and production results; (e) reserves estimates; (f) loss of market share and industry competition; (g) environmental and physical risks, including climate change; (h) risks associated with the identification of suitable potential acquisition properties and targets, and successful negotiation and completion of such transactions; (i) the risk of doing business in developing countries and countries subject to international sanctions; (j) legislative, judicial, fiscal and regulatory developments including tariffs and regulatory measures addressing climate change; (k) economic and financial market conditions in various countries and regions; (l) political risks, including the risks of expropriation and renegotiation of the terms of contracts with governmental entities, delays or advancements in the approval of projects and delays in the reimbursement for shared costs; (m) risks associated with the impact of pandemics, regional conflicts, such as the Russia-Ukraine war and the conflict in the Middle East, and a significant cyber security, data privacy or IT incident; (n) the pace of the energy transition; and (o) changes in trading conditions. No assurance is provided that future dividend payments will match or exceed previous dividend payments. All forward-looking statements contained in this announcement are expressly qualified in their entirety by the cautionary statements contained or referred to in this section. Readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Additional risk factors that may affect future results are contained in Shell plc’s Form 20-F for the year ended December 31, 2024 (available at www.shell.com/investors/news-and-filings/sec-filings.html and www.sec.gov). These risk factors also expressly qualify all forward-looking statements contained in this announcement and should be considered by the reader. Each forward-looking statement speaks only as of the date of this announcement, May 2, 2025. Neither Shell plc nor any of its subsidiaries undertake any obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statement as a result of new information, future events or other information. In light of these risks, results could differ materially from those stated, implied or inferred from the forward-looking statements contained in this announcement.
    All amounts shown throughout this announcement are unaudited. The numbers presented throughout this announcement may not sum precisely to the totals provided and percentages may not precisely reflect the absolute figures, due to rounding.
    Shell’s Net Carbon Intensity
    Also, in this  announcement, we may refer to Shell’s “net carbon intensity” (NCI), which includes Shell’s carbon emissions from the production of our energy products, our suppliers’ carbon emissions in supplying energy for that production and our customers’ carbon emissions associated with their use of the energy products we sell. Shell’s NCI also includes the emissions associated with the production and use of energy products produced by others which Shell purchases for resale. Shell only controls its own emissions. The use of the terms Shell’s “net carbon intensity” or NCI is for convenience only and not intended to suggest these emissions are those of Shell plc or its subsidiaries.

    Shell’s Net-Zero Emissions Target
    Shell’s operating plan and outlook are forecasted for a three-year period and ten-year period, respectively, and are updated every year. They reflect the current economic environment and what we can reasonably expect to see over the next three and ten years. Accordingly, the outlook reflects our Scope 1, Scope 2 and NCI targets over the next ten years. However, Shell’s operating plan and outlook cannot reflect our 2050 net-zero emissions target, as this target is outside our planning period. Such future operating plans and outlooks could include changes to our portfolio, efficiency improvements and the use of carbon capture and storage and carbon credits. In the future, as society moves towards net-zero emissions, we expect Shell’s operating plans and outlooks to reflect this movement. However, if society is not net zero in 2050, as of today, there would be significant risk that Shell may not meet this target.

    The content of websites referred to in this announcement does not form part of this announcement.

    We may have used certain terms, such as resources, in this announcement that the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) strictly prohibits us from including in our filings with the SEC. Investors are urged to consider closely the disclosure in our Form 20-F, File No 1-32575, available on the SEC website www.sec.gov.

    The financial information presented in this announcement does not constitute statutory accounts within the meaning of section 434(3) of the Companies Act 2006 (“the Act”). Statutory accounts for the year ended December 31, 2024 were published in Shell’s Annual Report and Accounts, a copy of which was delivered to the Registrar of Companies for England and Wales. The auditor’s report on those accounts was unqualified, did not include a reference to any matters to which the auditor drew attention by way of emphasis without qualifying the report and did not contain a statement under sections 498(2) or 498(3) of the Act.

    The information in this announcement does not constitute the unaudited condensed consolidated financial statements which are contained in Shell’s first quarter 2025 unaudited results available on www.shell.com/investors.

    CONTACTS

    • Media: International +44 207 934 5550; U.S. and Canada: Contact form

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Weber Washington Times Op-Ed: The world runs on Southeast Texas energy

    Source: United States House of Representatives – Congressman Randy Weber (14th District of Texas)

    Washington, D.C. – In a new op-ed in the Washington Times, U.S. Rep. Randy Weber (TX-14), the Chairman of the Energy Subcommittee on the Science, Space, and Technology Committee and Vice-Chair of the Energy Subcommittee on the Energy and Commerce Committee, details the urgent need to restore American energy leadership by investing in the Gulf Coast — particularly Southeast Texas.

    Below, please find an excerpt from the op-ed.

    The world runs on Southeast Texas energy

    Washington Times

    By: Representative Randy Weber

    April 28, 2025

    “When America needs energy, it turns to Texas and more specifically, to Southeast Texas. We don’t just refine oil or export gas. We fuel economies, empower allies, and protect national security. In short: we are the energy capital of the world…

    “Our energy sector supports millions of well-paying jobs across America and tens of thousands of those are in Southeast Texas. These are jobs that don’t require four-year degrees, but do demand skill, grit, and the kind of work ethic that built this county. Welders, pipefitters, engineers, rig hands, terminal operators, truck drivers, safety techs this is the American workforce at its best…

    “We have four years to do a lot of important work that has been neglected for years. If we want to continue our energy dominance, we must double down on Southeast Texas…

    “That means investing in critical infrastructure pipelines, ports, and power grids to move our products faster and safer. It means cutting the red tape that delays permits and discourages innovation. It means unleashing the full potential of LNG, hydrogen, and carbon capture, and empowering the hardworking men and women who keep our energy economy running.”

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: What’s Up: May 2025 Skywatching Tips from NASA

    Source: NASA

    [embedded content]

    The first week of May brings the annual Eta Aquarid meteors, peaking on the 6th. And sometime in the next few months, astronomers predict a “new star” or nova explosion will become visible to the unaided eye. 

    All Month – Planet Visibility: 

    Venus: Appears very bright and low in the east in the hour before sunrise all month. 

    Mars: Easy to find in the west in the first few hours of the night, all month long. Sets around midnight to 1 a.m. local time. 

    Jupiter: Shines brightly in the west following sunset all month. Early in the month it sets about two hours after the Sun, but by late May it’s setting only an hour after sunset. 

    Saturn: Begins the month next to Venus, low in the eastern sky before sunrise. Quickly separates from Saturn and rises higher in the sky each day before dawn. 

    Daily Highlights
    May 6 – Eta Aquarid Meteors – The peak of this annual shower is early on the morning of May 6th. The two or three nights before that are also decent opportunities to spy a few shooting stars. On the peak night this year, the Moon sets by around 3 a.m., leaving dark skies until dawn, for ideal viewing conditions. Seeing 10-20 meteors per hour is common for the Northern Hemisphere, while south of the equator, observers tend to see substantially more. 
    May 3 – Mars & Moon: The first quarter Moon appears right next to the Red Planet on the 3rd. Find them in the west during the first half of the night that evening. 
    All month – Venus & Saturn: Low in the eastern sky each morning you’ll find bright Venus paired with much fainter Saturn. They start the month close together, but Saturn pulls away and rises higher over the course of the month. 
    All month – Mars & Jupiter: The planets to look for on May evenings are Mars and Jupiter. They’re visible for a couple of hours after sunset in the western sky. 
    All month – Corona Borealis: Practice finding this constellation in the eastern part of the sky during the first half of the night, so you have a point of comparison when the T CrB nova appears there, likely in the next few months. 

    What’s Up for May? Four bright planets, morning and night, a chance of meteor showers, and waiting for a nova. 
    May Planet Viewing 
    For planet watching this month, you’ll find Mars and Jupiter in the west following sunset. Mars sticks around for several hours after it gets dark out, but Jupiter is setting by 9:30 or 10 p.m., and getting lower in the sky each day. The first quarter Moon appears right next to the Red Planet on the 3rd. Find them in the west during the first half of the night that evening. 

    In the morning sky, Venus and Saturn are the planets to look for in May. They begin the month appearing close together on the sky, and progressively pull farther apart as the month goes on. For several days in late May, early risers will enjoy a gathering of the Moon with Saturn and Venus in the eastern sky before dawn. Watch as the Moon passes the two planets while becoming an increasingly slimmer crescent. You’ll find the Moon hanging between Venus and Saturn on the 23rd.   
    Eta Aquarid Meteor Shower 
    Early May brings the annual Eta Aquarid meteor shower. These are meteors that originate from Comet Halley. Earth passes through the comet’s dust stream each May, and again in October. Eta Aquarids are fast moving, and a lot of them produce persistent dust trains that linger for seconds after the meteor’s initial streak.  
    This is one of the best annual showers in the Southern Hemisphere, but tends to be more subdued North of the Equator, where we typically see 10-20 meteors per hour. On the peak night this year, the Moon sets by around 3 a.m., leaving dark skies until dawn, for ideal viewing conditions. While the peak is early on the morning of May 6th, the two or three nights before that are also decent opportunities to spy a few shooting stars. 
    Waiting for a Nova 

    Astronomers have been waiting expectantly for light from a distant explosion to reach us here on Earth. An event called a nova is anticipated to occur sometime in the coming months. Some 3,000 light years away is a binary star system called T Coronae Borealis, or “T CrB.” It consists of a red giant star with a smaller white dwarf star orbiting closely around it. Now the giant’s outer atmosphere is all puffed up, and the dwarf star is close enough that its gravity continually captures some of the giant’s hydrogen. About every 80 years, the white dwarf has accumulated so much of the other star’s hydrogen, that it ignites a thermonuclear explosion. And that’s the nova. 
    T Coronae Borealis is located in the constellation Corona Borealis, or the “Northern Crown,” and it’s normally far too faint to see with the unaided eye. But it’s predicted the nova will be as bright as the constellation’s brightest star, which is about as bright as the North Star, Polaris. You’ll find Corona Borealis right in between the two bright stars Arcturus and Vega, and you can use the Big Dipper’s handle to point you to the right part of the sky. Try having a look for it on clear, dark nights before the nova, so you’ll have a comparison when a new star suddenly becomes visible there. 

    Now, you may have heard about this months ago, as astronomers started keeping watch for the nova midway through 2024, but it hasn’t happened yet. Predicting exactly when novas or any sort of stellar outburst will happen is tricky, but excitement began growing when astronomers observed the star to dim suddenly, much as it did right before its previous nova in 1946. When the nova finally does occur, it won’t stay bright for long, likely flaring in peak brightness for only a few days. And since it’s not predicted again for another 80 years, you might just want to join the watch for this super rare, naked eye stellar explosion in the sky! 
    Here are the phases of the Moon for May. 

    You can stay up to date on all of NASA’s missions exploring the solar system and beyond at NASA Science.
    I’m Preston Dyches from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and that’s What’s Up for this month. 

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Is the UK’s energy storage growing fast enough?

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Victor Becerra, Professor of Power Systems Engineering, University of Portsmouth

    Sommart Sombutwanitkul/Shutterstock

    Britain’s booming green energy generation has a costly side-effect: the national electricity system operator has had to compensate wind turbine operators that could have produced more clean electricity than the grid could take.

    The cost of paying windfarms to temporarily switch off rose significantly in early 2025, surpassing £250 million in the first two months of the year. This figure not only includes these “constraint payments” to windfarm operators, but also payments to gas power plants to switch on and meet demand in the south of England that could theoretically be met by wind energy.

    Wind power is often generated in remote areas like the Scottish Highlands, where there is low electricity demand. To transmit this power over long distances to areas of higher demand (mostly in the south of England) requires power lines, but these have transmission limits and there are not enough of them.

    Britain will only make effective use of its energy potential if grid-scale energy storage keeps pace with the expansion of new windfarms and other forms of intermittent renewable energy, such as solar.

    Large-scale battery systems, pumped hydro and other storage methods could capture the excess energy injected by windfarms on windy days and release it when needed. But are these energy storage options arriving quickly enough?

    Why is storage so important?

    Most British consumers will not see a significant change in how they use electricity with the introduction of planned storage installations, other than fewer blips in power quality, such as flickering or dimming lights.

    You might spot these new energy storage facilities in rows of what look like shipping containers but are actually batteries. And the national grid (which serves England, Wales and Scotland – Northern Ireland has a separate electricity network) will be more capable of responding quickly to even minor variations in electricity supply and demand, meaning fewer headlines about curtailed windfarms.

    A lithium-ion grid battery site.
    106882997/Shutterstock

    The UK government is aiming to build up to 27 gigawatts of battery storage by 2030 (in 2023, battery capacity was estimated to be around 5 gigawatts). There are applications totalling 59 gigawatts of battery storage in the connections queue for 2030.

    Some of these are speculative – introduced to secure connection slots and permissions, with the intention of selling the rights on. These connections will not necessarily be built, yet contribute to long delays in approvals.

    As a result, the energy regulator Ofgem has been working with network operators to reform the connections queue. This includes new rules and more coordination between grid operators and project developers, as well as incentives (such as lower connection charges) to encourage battery developers to ensure their output can be adjusted to accommodate network constraints when necessary.

    Having substantial grid-scale energy storage could help stabilise electricity prices, which might give households lower and less volatile bills. It would also reduce the need to fire up gas generators during supply lulls, lowering the influence of expensive imported gas on electricity prices.

    Options and opportunities

    Storing excess renewable energy involves a range of technologies. Short-duration storage options such as batteries can supply energy ranging from seconds to a few hours. Long-duration storage, such as pumped hydro, can supply energy for several hours, days or more.

    Pumped hydro is the oldest long-duration storage technology. It involves storing vast amounts of energy by pumping water to a higher reservoir when electricity is plentiful, and releasing it to a lower reservoir through a turbine when needed. Dinorwig in north Wales and Cruachan in western Scotland are capable of storing 9 and 7 gigawatt-hours of energy, respectively.

    Major expansions are planned, such as the new pumped hydro storage scheme Coire Glas in Scotland. Expected to be completed around 2030-31, it is designed to store 30 gigawatt-hours, adding vast reserves of energy to the grid.

    Britain’s largest grid-scale battery installation, the Minety battery storage project completed in 2022 in Wiltshire, southern England, is capable of absorbing or delivering 150 megawatts – roughly equivalent to the power demand of 450,000 UK households.

    While Britain is making progress with its storage infrastructure, other countries are scaling up rapidly. China has built huge pumped hydro stations and the US is deploying very large grid-scale batteries. Germany, meanwhile, is testing hydrogen storage to absorb the power from its onshore windfarms.

    New forms of storage

    There is a drive by energy companies to develop new forms of long-duration storage. Along with hydrogen, liquid‑air storage is capable of inter-seasonal storage. This would allow solar energy collected during the summer to be available for release during the duller autumn and winter months.

    A solar farm in west Sussex, southern England.
    PBabic/Shutterstock

    In liquid-air plants, excess electricity is used to cool air to a liquid which can then be stored in insulated tanks. When electricity is required, the liquid air is heated and turned back into a gas, which moves a turbine and generates electricity. A 50-megawatt liquid-air plant planned near Manchester is expected to start commercial operation in 2026.

    In hydrogen energy storage plants, surplus electricity powers an electrolyser that splits water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen. The hydrogen is stored and, when electricity is needed, fed into a fuel cell or turbine to generate the electricity. An example is the proposed Aldbrough facility in east Yorkshire, which is expected to be in operation by 2030 and will have a storage capacity of 320 gigawatt-hours. This facility will use three repurposed salt caverns originally developed to store natural gas.

    Energy storage technology has become a serious business opportunity, with companies investing billions of pounds into building new facilities. The variety of projects in the pipeline suggests the UK will be better able to avoid curtailing wind energy in the future, even accounting for growth in wind power capacity. Paying windfarm operators to switch off may soon be a thing of the past.

    Don’t have time to read about climate change as much as you’d like?

    Get a weekly roundup in your inbox instead. Every Wednesday, The Conversation’s environment editor writes Imagine, a short email that goes a little deeper into just one climate issue. Join the 45,000+ readers who’ve subscribed so far.

    Victor Becerra does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Is the UK’s energy storage growing fast enough? – https://theconversation.com/is-the-uks-energy-storage-growing-fast-enough-251867

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: £3.4 million for Scotland’s hydrogen future

    Source: Scottish Government

    Projects across the country to receive a share of funding.

    Eleven projects designed to accelerate Scotland’s hydrogen economy are set to benefit from a share of £3.4 million funding.

    The Scottish Government funding will help develop green hydrogen production, improve the hydrogen supply chain, and enhance hydrogen transport and storage infrastructure.

    Opening a parliamentary debate on Scotland’s hydrogen future, Acting Net Zero Cabinet Secretary Gillian Martin said:

    “Hydrogen stands as a critical pillar of Scotland’s route to net zero by 2045, but also, alongside the development of our offshore wind capacity, as one of Scotland’s greatest industrial opportunities since the discovery of oil and gas in the North Sea.

    “A just transition remains at the heart of our approach, and we are determined that no community, particularly those which have powered our economy for generations, will be left behind as we move away from burning fossil fuels towards a low carbon energy system.

    “We are working to build a hydrogen economy in which the benefits of our energy transition are shared, and which harnesses the full potential of our skilled people, our worldclass industries, and our natural resources.”

    In September 2024 the Scottish Government invited projects to apply for a match-funding grant award of up to 50%, to the maximum value of £2 million.

    Shortlisting saw 18 projects invited to submit a full application to delivery partner Scottish Enterprise, with funding ultimately provided to 11 successful projects.

    Background

    Hydrogen action plan – gov.scot

    Lead Organisation

    Project Title

    Council Area

    Grant Award

    European Marine Energy Centre

    Sustainable Fuels Orkney

    Orkney Islands

    £375,000

    Green Cat Hydrogen Ltd.

    Creca Hydrogen Facility

    Dumfries and Galloway

    £490,088

    Green Cat Hydrogen Ltd.

    Strathallan Hydrogen

    Perth and Kinross

    £320,549

    Green Cat Hydrogen Ltd.

    Binn Ecopark Hydrogen

    Perth and Kinross

    £258,478

    Protium Green Solutions

    Protium Lanark – Hydrogen Island

    South Lanarkshire

    £450,619

    SSE Hydrogen Developments

    Peterhead 1&2 Hydrogen

    Aberdeenshire

    £162,600

    Statkraft Hydrogen UK Holding Ltd

    Shetland Hydrogen Project 2 Pre-FEED

    Shetland Islands

    £270,500

    Storegga Hydrogen (Cromarty)

    Cromarty Hydrogen Phase 2 Longman

    Highland

    £238,400

    Storegga Hydrogen (Cromarty)

    Cromarty Hydrogen Phase 2 Muir of Ord

    Highland

    £290,155

    Glacier Energy

    Feasibility and Industrial Research

    Aberdeen City

    £382,000

    Hydrasun

    Standardised Tube Trailer Industrial Hydrogen Offtaker Panels

    Multiple: Aberdeen City; Glasgow City; Highland

    £147,122

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Using fire to produce nanoparticles could revolutionize various industries

    Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Keroles Riad, Postdoctoral fellow, Energy and Particle Technology Laboratory, Carleton University

    Fire is how most widely used nanoparticles — and by extension nanotechnologies — are made. (Shutterstock)

    Fire is arguably humanity’s earliest discovery. It was pivotal in advancing society — underpinning many of humanity’s most transformative inventions, from cooking and forging weapons to generating energy and enabling car combustion engines.

    Today, fire continues to be the gateway to some of the most cutting-edge nanotechnologies currently being developed for use in cancer treatments and as breath sensors for early detection of diabetes and other metabolic diseases.

    Nanotechnologies can be found in almost every aspect of our daily lives. For instance, I have previously written about the nanotechnology used in the mRNA vaccines that helped us through the pandemic, and have facilitated conversations discussing how nanotechnology affects our wine, gut and climate.

    For example, gas sensors incorporating nanoparticles made via fire can be used to verify that there’s no methanol in alcoholic beverages. Methanol is a highly poisonous alcohol contaminant, and has caused numerous poisonings worldwide.

    Fire is how most widely used nanoparticles — and by extension, nanotechnologies — are made. For example, a third of a car tire’s weight is comprised of carbon black nanoparticles, which are made using fire. These nanoparticles help to reinforce the tire. The white paint we use on our walls and the coatings on some pills contain fire-made titania nanoparticles. Similarly, fumed silica — which is used in the optical fibres needed for internet and communication systems — are also forged in fire.

    How nanotechnology is made

    So how do nanoparticles, which are 80 to 100 thousand times smaller than the thickness of a human hair, form inside a fire?

    I specialize in making nanoparticles in fire — specifically using a technology called flame spray pyrolysis.

    In my research, I burn flammable chemicals that contain the target metal elements to form my nanoparticles. Everything gets oxidized during combustion: carbon becomes CO2, hydrogen becomes water vapor and metal elements become metal oxides.

    During the milliseconds that these metal oxide particulates spend inside the fire, they collide and grow into nano- or micro-particles. I collect these particles on a filter on top of the fire. Important properties such as the size and crystal structure of the nanoparticles that are produced depend on how much time these particles spend inside the fire.

    The more time the particles have to collide inside the forging fire, the larger they grow. We can also make complicated particles consisting of multiple elements by burning a mixture of different chemicals. This process is both versatile and scalable — allowing millions of tonnes of nanoparticles to be produced each year.

    Carbon black is a nanoparticle that is produced through flame spray pyrolysis.
    (Shutterstock)

    Overcoming limitations

    Being able to mass-produce nanoparticles has been one of the biggest challenges of producing nanotechnologies on a larger scale. This is because most of the nanoparticles used in nanotechnologies can only be made via “wet chemistry,” or by using liquids.

    It can take hours of working with liquid in beakers, mixing them, heating them, then separating and centrifuging them just to obtain tiny amounts of material. These processes are often too expensive and too dangerous to scale enough for viable commercialisation.

    For instance, quantum dots (nanoparticles made from semiconducting materials which have both optical and electrical properties) — the discovery of which was celebrated by the Chemistry Noble Prize in 2023. These have the potential to revolutionize many technologies — including solar cells, carbon capture and contrast agents used in medical imaging.

    However, quantum dots are hardly ever used in those technologies on a large scale because the prohibitive cost of making them via wet chemistry can be as high as US$45,000 per gram.

    But unlike wet chemistry, fire is simple, cheap, scaleable and surprisingly safe. So when processes that allow for the production of high value nanoparticles, such as quantum dots, with fire are developed, costs drastically drop and they become immediately scaleable and of potential interest to industry.

    Fire can also produce harmful particles and by-products.

    For instance, if you place a napkin in front of the exhaust of your car, black stuff will accumulate on it. This black residue is soot particles produced by the fire burning inside the engine. Similarly, smoking cigarettes causes soot to form and accumulate in a smoker’s lung, often causing cancer.

    Soot is also, by some estimations, the third highest contributor to global warming after carbon dioxide and methane. However, those assessments may actually be underestimating the true contribution of soot to greenhouse gas effects.

    Flame spray pyrolysis technology has also been used to simulate combustion conditions to not only study the impact of generated soot more accurately, but also test process changes that could virtually eliminate soot emissions. For example, one study used flame spray pyrolysis to show that injecting air downstream of jet fuel combustion can reduce soot emission by more than 90 per cent. Flame spray pyrolysis could continue to be a useful tool in researching the impacts of pollution.

    The future of nanoparticles

    But not all nanoparticles can be produced by fire. As such, research exploring new recipes and processes to make high-value nanoparticles that are not yet possible to make in fire could have a large impact.

    For example, a major focus of my current work is to explore the possibility of using fire to make graphene. Graphene is the strongest material known at the nanoscale. My previous work shows that by using ultraviolet light, graphene can be transformed into strong macroscopic structures — possibly allowing it to be used in 3D printing.

    Graphene is the strongest material known at nanoscale.
    (Shutterstock)

    Further, there’s massive untapped potential in nanomedicine to integrate the nanoparticles that are already possible to make in fire. Only about 30 types of nanoparticles are approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration — such as those used in COVID-19 vaccines, as well as iron-based nanoparticles used for treating anemia and kidney disease.

    All those approved nanomedicines are given via injections. This leaves plenty of room to explore the benefits of inorganic nanoparticles in medicine — especially orally administrated therapeutics.

    Keroles Riad is the founder and CEO of O Nanotech Solutions, a startup that produces flame-made quantum dots. He also receives funding from NSERC as a Canada Banting Postdoctoral Fellow. He also receives funding from MITACS as a part of their Accelerate Entrepreneur Program. He holds both scholarships at Carleton University. He is also the CEO of enuf, a Bcorp-certified social enterprise focused on sustainable waste management.

    – ref. Using fire to produce nanoparticles could revolutionize various industries – https://theconversation.com/using-fire-to-produce-nanoparticles-could-revolutionize-various-industries-234058

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Where Does Gold Come From? NASA Data Has Clues

    Source: NASA

    Since the big bang, the early universe had hydrogen, helium, and a scant amount of lithium. Later, some heavier elements, including iron, were forged in stars. But one of the biggest mysteries in astrophysics is: How did the first elements heavier than iron, such as gold, get created and distributed throughout the universe?
    “It’s a pretty fundamental question in terms of the origin of complex matter in the universe,” said Anirudh Patel, a doctoral student at Columbia University in New York. “It’s a fun puzzle that hasn’t actually been solved.”
    Patel led a study using 20-year-old archival data from NASA and ESA telescopes that finds evidence for a surprising source of a large amount of these heavy elements: flares from highly magnetized neutron stars, called magnetars. The study is published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.
    Study authors estimate that magnetar giant flares could contribute up to 10% of the total abundance of elements heavier than iron in the galaxy. Since magnetars existed relatively early in the history of the universe, the first gold could have been made this way.
    “It’s answering one of the questions of the century and solving a mystery using archival data that had been nearly forgotten,” said Eric Burns, study co-author and astrophysicist at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge.
    How could gold be made at a magnetar?
    Neutron stars are the collapsed cores of stars that have exploded. They are so dense that one teaspoon of neutron star material, on Earth, would weigh as much as a billion tons. A magnetar is a neutron star with an extremely powerful magnetic field.
    On rare occasions, magnetars release an enormous amount of high-energy radiation when they undergo “starquakes,” which, like earthquakes, fracture the neutron star’s crust. Starquakes may also be associated with powerful bursts of radiation called magnetar giant flares, which can even affect Earth’s atmosphere. Only three magnetar giant flares have been observed in the Milky Way and the nearby Large Magellanic Cloud, and seven outside.
    Patel and colleagues, including his advisor Brian Metzger, professor at Columbia University and senior research scientist at the Flatiron Institute in New York, have been thinking about how radiation from giant flares could correspond to heavy elements forming there. This would happen through a “rapid process” of neutrons forging lighter atomic nuclei into heavier ones.   
    Protons define the element’s identity on the periodic table: hydrogen has one proton, helium has two, lithium has three, and so on. Atoms also have neutrons which do not affect identity, but do add mass. Sometimes when an atom captures an extra neutron the atom becomes unstable and a nuclear decay process happens that converts a neutron into a proton, moving the atom forward on the periodic table. This is how, for example, a gold atom could take on an extra neutron and then transform into mercury. 
    In the unique environment of a disrupted neutron star, in which the density of neutrons is extremely high, something even stranger happens: single atoms can rapidly capture so many neutrons that they undergo multiple decays, leading to the creation of a much heavier element like uranium.
    When astronomers observed the collision of two neutron stars in 2017 using NASA telescopes and the Laser Interferomete Gravitational wave Observatory (LIGO), and numerous telescopes on the ground and in space that followed up the initial discovery, they confirmed that this event could have created gold, platinum, and other heavy elements. But neutron star mergers happen too late in the universe’s history to explain the earliest gold and other heavy elements. Recent research by co-authors of the new study — Jakub Cehula of Charles University in Prague, Todd Thompson of The Ohio State University, and Metzger — has found that magnetar flares can heat and eject neutron star crustal material at high speeds, making them a potential source.

    New clues in old data
    At first, Metzger and colleagues thought that the signature from the creation and distribution of heavy elements at a magnetar would appear in the visible and ultraviolet light, and published their predictions. But Burns in Louisiana wondered if there could be a gamma-ray signal bright enough to be detected, too. He asked Metzger and Patel to check, and they found that there could be such a signature.
    “At some point, we said, ‘OK, we should ask the observers if they had seen any,’” Metzger said.
    Burns looked up the gamma ray data from the last giant flare that has been observed, which was in December 2004. He realized that while scientists had explained the beginning of the outburst, they had also identified a smaller signal from the magnetar, in data from ESA (European Space Agency)’s INTErnational Gamma-Ray Astrophysics Laboratory (INTEGRAL), a recently retired mission with NASA contributions. “It was noted at the time, but nobody had any conception of what it could be,” Burns said.
    Metzger remembers that Burns thought he and Patel were “pulling his leg” because the prediction from their team’s model so closely matched the mystery signal in the 2004 data. In other words, the gamma ray signal detected over 20 years ago corresponded to what it should look like when heavy elements are created and then distributed in a magnetar giant flare.
    Patel was so excited, “I wasn’t thinking about anything else for the next week or two. It was the only thing on my mind,” he said.
    Researchers supported their conclusion using data from two NASA heliophysics missions: the retired RHESSI (Reuven Ramaty High Energy Solar Spectroscopic Imager) and the ongoing NASA’s Wind satellite, which had also observed the magnetar giant flare. Other collaborators on the new study included Jared Goldberg at the Flatiron Institute.
    Next steps in the magnetar gold rush
    NASA’s forthcoming COSI (Compton Spectrometer and Imager) mission can follow up on these results. A wide-field gamma ray telescope, COSI is expected to launch in 2027 and will study energetic phenomena in the cosmos, such as magnetar giant flares. COSI will be able to identify individual elements created in these events, providing a new advancement in understanding the origin of the elements. It is one of many telescopes that can work together to look for “transient” changes across the universe.
    Researchers will also follow up on other archival data to see if other secrets are hiding in observations of other magnetar giant flares.
    “It very cool to think about how some of the stuff in my phone or my laptop was forged in this extreme explosion of the course of our galaxy’s history,” Patel said.
    Media Contact
    Elizabeth LandauHeadquarters, Washington202-358-0845elandau@nasa.gov

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-Evening Report: The Coalition’s costings show some savings, but a larger deficit than Labor in the first two years

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stephen Bartos, Professor of Economics, University of Canberra

    The Coalition’s policy costings have been released, just two days ahead of the federal election.

    The costings show the Coalition would run up a larger budget deficit than Labor in the first two years of government, but make a greater contribution to budget repair in years three and four.

    This arises because two big-spending Coalition policies – the fuel excise reduction and cost of living tax offset – are short term. Their impact on the deficit disappears after year two.

    Shadow Treasurer Angus Taylor said the deficit would narrow by A$14 billion by the end of the fourth year.

    There are other spending initiatives – notably a significant increase in defence rising to $5.7 billion by the last year of the estimates, 2028-29. This will bring defence spending to 2.5% of gross domestic product (GDP).

    The vexed question of nuclear costings

    On the vexed question of nuclear power, the statement promises to fund the program primarily through equity investments in exchange for an ownership stake.

    These do not appear in the budget, on the premise that they fund commercial activities. This funding is estimated to total $118.2 billion by 2050 – well short of the $600 billion Labor has estimated the proposal will cost. There is no independent Parliamentary Budget Office costing of the number – it is based on Coalition modelling.

    Smaller sums are proposed for “community engagement” on nuclear technology ($87 million over four years) and a nuclear coordinating authority and training facility ($65 million). Both look to be in the right ballpark; they are however tiny compared with the costs of building nuclear reactors.

    Items to reduce the budget deficit include income tax increases by abolishing Labor’s top-up tax cut and public service reductions. In 2028-29 the tax increase raises $7.4 billion and public service cuts save $6.7 billion.

    A range of savings measures

    There are numerous other savings, including:

    • taxation of vaping products
    • reduction in a variety of environmental programs
    • reversing tax incentives for electric vehicles
    • cuts to the Housing Australia Future Fund
    • reduced spending on overseas aid
    • restoring the activity test for childcare
    • changing eligibility for several government welfare payment programs.

    It is a long and detailed list.

    Most of the savings appear achievable, with the notable exception of cuts to the public service. It will be close to impossible to achieve a saving of 41,000 public servants in Canberra alone without forced redundancies.

    The total Canberra public service workforce according to the Australian Public Service Commission is only around 68,000.

    Under the Coalition’s plan, some 41,000 public servant jobs in Canberra will be axed.
    Phillip Kraskoff/Shutterstock

    At the press conference announcing the costings, Opposition spokesperson Jane Hume said however the figure was 110,000.

    It is not clear where that number comes from. If the Coalition is using a different set of public service numbers to those published by the Australian Public Service Commission, it should identify where the extra come from. Off a larger base the savings would be difficult, but not completely infeasible.

    As with the Labor proposal to cut consultants, it still leaves the question of what will happen to the work those public servants were doing. Without changes to programs or activities, the Coalition will need to spend budget funds to get the work done.

    Too late for the early voters

    The costing release comes after more than 4.8 million Australians have already cast their vote. This is less than ideal for helping inform voters’ choices.

    There is precedent for releasing costings late. The Albanese opposition similarly released costings on the Thursday before polling day in 2022.

    This week, the Labor government released its costings on Monday.

    It is not clear what drives the practice of late release. One possibility is small target strategy: the less detail there is to criticise the more comfortable an opposition feels.

    There is so much detail in this Coalition announcement, and so many interest groups potentially offended, that the caution about its release may be justified.

    Savings previously announced by the Coalition include scrapping production tax credits for critical minerals and hydrogen and removing fringe benefit tax breaks for electric vehicles.

    The Coalition also plans to scrap some of the government’s off-budget funds and measures, including the Rewiring the Nation fund for electricity transmission and the Housing Australia Future Fund.

    Stephen Bartos was Parliamentary Budget Officer for the past three New South Wales state elections.

    – ref. The Coalition’s costings show some savings, but a larger deficit than Labor in the first two years – https://theconversation.com/the-coalitions-costings-show-some-savings-but-a-larger-deficit-than-labor-in-the-first-two-years-255592

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-OSI: Westport Announces Lock-Up Agreements in Support of the Light-Duty Divestment Transaction

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    VANCOUVER, British Columbia, April 30, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Westport Fuel Systems Inc. (“Westport” or the “Company”) (TSX:WPRT / Nasdaq:WPRT), has entered into lock-up agreements with certain of its shareholders, executives and board members representing an aggregate of approximately 2.0 million shares, or 11.4% of the currently issued and outstanding shares, to vote in favour of the special resolution approving the sale of Westport Fuel Systems Italia S.r.l. (the “Lock-Up Agreements”).

    “These Lock-Up Agreements are a significant vote of confidence in Westport’s strategic direction and growth potential.  I am thankful to our key shareholders and our Board, for their continued support as we execute our plans to reduce the complexity of Westport’s business and move forward focusing on providing affordable solutions for hard to decarbonize segments of the heavy-duty truck and industrial application, supported by a strengthened balance sheet,” said Dan Sceli, Chief Executive Officer, Westport Fuel Systems.”

    Recap of the Transaction

    On March 31, 2025 Westport announced it had entered into a binding agreement (the “Agreement”) to sell its interest in Westport Fuel Systems Italia S.r.l., which includes the Light-Duty segment, including the light-duty OEM, delayed OEM, and independent aftermarket businesses, to a wholly-owned investment vehicle of Heliaca Investments Coöperatief U.A. (“Heliaca Investments”), a Netherlands based investment firm supported by Ramphastos Investments Management B.V. a prominent Dutch venture capital and private equity firm (the “Transaction”).

    The Transaction provides for a base purchase price of $73.1 million (€67.7 million), subject to certain adjustments, and potential earnouts of up to an estimated $6.5 million (€6.0 million) if certain conditions are achieved, in accordance with the terms of the Agreement.

    Under the terms of the Agreement, Heliaca Investments through its subsidiary will acquire Westport’s Light-Duty segment, including its related assets and customer contracts. The Transaction is subject to shareholder approval and other customary closing conditions and is expected to close in late Q2 of 2025.

    The proceeds from the proposed Transaction are expected to enable Westport to significantly improve its financial stability, while also supporting key growth initiatives focused on providing solutions for hard-to-decarbonize mobility and industrial applications. Following closing, Westport intends to align its cost structure to be more reflective of a smaller, more efficient organization, while also seeking further opportunities for efficiency gains.

    About Westport Fuel Systems

    At Westport Fuel Systems, we are driving innovation to power a cleaner tomorrow. We are a leading supplier of advanced fuel delivery components and systems for clean, low-carbon fuels such as natural gas, renewable natural gas, propane, and hydrogen to the global transportation industry. Our technology delivers the performance and fuel efficiency required by transportation applications and the environmental benefits that address climate change and urban air quality challenges. Headquartered in Vancouver, Canada, with operations in Europe, Asia, North America, and South America, we serve our customers in approximately 70 countries with leading global transportation brands. At Westport Fuel Systems, we think ahead. For more information, visit www.wfsinc.com.

    Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements

    This press release contains forward-looking statements, including statements regarding the closing of, and timing for closing of, the Transaction, shareholder approval of the Transaction, the anticipated benefits of the Transaction, including potential earn-out payments, the ability to strengthen our balance sheet and align our cost structure, the ability to capitalize on growth initiatives, the ability to transition to a smaller, more efficient organization and our expectations regarding the future success of our business. Other forward-looking statements included in the release include those relating to Westport’s future strategic plans, business opportunities and use of the Transaction proceeds. These statements are neither promises nor guarantees but involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties and are based on both the views of management and assumptions that may cause our actual results, levels of activity, performance, or achievements to be materially different from any future results, levels of activities, performance, or achievements expressed in or implied by these forward-looking statements. These risks, uncertainties, and assumptions include those related to completion and satisfaction of all conditions to closing of the Transaction set out in the Agreement, governmental policies, regulation and approval, the achievement of the performance criteria required for the earn out described above, purchase price adjustments contained in the Agreement, the demand our products, as well as other risk factors and assumptions that may affect our actual results, performance, or achievements, as discussed in our most recent Annual Information Form and other filings with securities regulators. Readers should not place undue reliance on any such forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date they were made. We disclaim any obligation to publicly update or revise such statements to reflect any change in our expectations or in events, conditions, or circumstances on which any such statements may be based, or that may affect the likelihood that actual results will differ from those set forth in these forward-looking statements except as required by National Instrument 51-102. The contents of any website referenced in this press release are not incorporated by reference herein.

    Investor Inquiries:
    Investor Relations
    T: +1 604-718-2046
    E: invest@wfsinc.com

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI Canada: B.C. streamlines permitting for renewable-energy projects

    Source: Government of Canada regional news

    The Province is taking action to speed up permitting for renewable-energy projects to meet growing demand for clean power, address climate change and secure energy independence for British Columbians in the face of unprecedented trade threats.

    Government introduced the renewable energy projects (streamlined permitting) act to the legislative assembly on Wednesday, April 30, 2025. If passed, the act will expand the authority of the BC Energy Regulator (BCER) to oversee renewable-energy projects, building on the Province’s investments to generate the clean power needed to create a healthier environment and sustainable future for British Columbians.

    “B.C. has a once-in-a-generation opportunity to become a world leader in clean-energy production and we will take every action possible to see that all British Columbians benefit from this opportunity,” said Adrian Dix, Minister of Energy and Climate Solutions. “Renewable energy projects like wind and solar are urgently needed to provide affordable clean power, create jobs, and strengthen and diversify our economy, especially during this period of global market uncertainty.”

    If approved, these changes will establish the BCER as the primary permitting agency for renewable-energy projects and transmission lines. The legislation will help simplify the approvals process for these projects, eliminating the need for cross-ministry and agency permitting, by establishing the BCER as the single window for permitting in accordance with strict environmental standards. This will be completed in a staged approach through regulation.

    The BCER’s initial focus will be on the North Coast Transmission Line (NCTL) project and the wind- and solar-power projects in BC Hydro’s 2024 call for power. This will help accelerate the expansion of British Columbia’s electricity grid and meet the demand in growth arising from critical-mineral and metal mining, port electrification, hydrogen and fuel processing, and shipping projects under consideration.

    The proposed legislation would also:

    • exempt the NCTL project and the nine wind projects selected in the 2024 call for power from the environmental assessment processes and allow government to do the same for other wind-power projects in the future; and
    • enable the BCER to establish a new rigorous regulatory framework for renewable-energy projects through consultation with First Nations, ensuring that environmental standards are upheld.

    “The BC Energy Regulator is pleased to see the introduction of this legislation and has been engaging with ministries and others to prepare for this expanded mandate that will include permitting processes and engagement functions,” said Michelle Carr, CEO and commissioner, BC Energy Regulator. “Our staff are working across seven regional offices to ensure energy activities are carried out safely, responsibly and in alignment with provincial goals and BCER’s vision for a resilient energy future.”

    The Province is committed to accelerating decisions on renewable-energy projects responsibly.

    The BCER has demonstrated expertise at getting projects moving quickly, while providing robust regulatory oversight through the lifecycle of projects. This is a natural evolution of the BCER’s role, which initially focused on oil, gas and geothermal development, then expanded to include hydrogen and now, renewable energy.

    Quotes:

    Doug Slater, vice-president, Indigenous relations and regulatory affairs, FortisBC —

    “Our focus is on delivering safe, reliable and affordable energy to the families and businesses we serve. Collaborating with local power providers and Indigenous organizations helps us meet the energy demands of homes and businesses in the southern Interior while supporting regional development. Our hope is that these legislative and regulatory changes will help streamline processes and accelerate projects to efficiently deliver power to our customers, including our plans to add up to 1,100 GWh of energy supply as soon as 2030.”

    Kwatuuma Cole Sayers, executive director, Clean Energy Association of British Columbia —

    “This legislation is an important step toward a balanced regulatory framework that encourages responsible clean-energy development at a critical time for our communities, our economy and our climate. The Clean Energy Association of British Columbia is proud to work with the Province and the BC Energy Regulator to help build a framework that is efficient, transparent and aligned with the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act. Together, we can build a cleaner, stronger and more resilient future.”

    Quick Facts:

    • Under the renewable energy projects (streamlined permitting) act, a renewable or clean resource means biomass, biogas, geothermal heat, hydro, solar, ocean, wind or any other clean-energy resource.
    • The BCER has a team of more than 300 employees in seven offices throughout B.C.
    • The BCER’s staff includes biologists, engineers, hydrologists, agrologists, compliance and enforcement officers, First Nations liaison officers, heritage conservation officers and archeologists.
    • The BCER will hire additional staff and subject-matter experts to support the additional responsibilities.
    • In 2024, FortisBC issued a request for expression of interest for new power to identify projects from lower-carbon and renewable sources in British Columbia that could add up to 1,100 gigawatt hours (GWh) of energy supply for its approximately 190,000 electricity customers in the south Okanagan by 2030.

    Learn More:

    To learn more about the BC Energy Regulator, visit: https://www.bc-er.ca/

    For more information about B.C. legislation, visit: https://strongerbc.gov.bc.ca/Legislation

    A backgrounder follows.

    MIL OSI Canada News –

  • MIL-OSI Global: China is reshaping central Asia’s energy sector as Russian influence fades

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Lorena Lombardozzi, Senior Lecturer in Political Economy of Global Development, SOAS, University of London

    China has been developing closer ties with countries in central Asia over recent years. Trade between China and the central Asia region grew to US$89 billion (£69 billion) in 2023, an increase of 27% on the previous year. Chinese trade rose with every country there except Turkmenistan.

    In my paper from June 2024, which is part of a collection of studies looking at the impact of China’s sprawling belt and road initiative in low- and middle-income countries, I explored how Chinese investment is affecting Uzbekistan’s energy sector.

    Chinese investment in Uzbekistan has grown significantly since 2020. By the end of 2022, it had reached US$4.5 billion, up from US$2.8 billion one year before. There are now over 3,450 Chinese companies in Uzbekistan, accounting for roughly 20% of all foreign companies in the country.

    One of the main reasons for China’s expanding footprint in central Asia is to intensify energy cooperation. By becoming a major buyer, lender and investor in the region’s energy sector, China is hoping to reduce its dependence on countries such as Russia.

    Central Asia is a region of Asia consisting of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.
    Peter Hermes Furian / Shutterstock

    Central Asia has been politically and economically dependent on Russia since the Soviet Union invaded the region in the 19th century. Much of its infrastructure was built to provide commodities like cotton and energy to Russia, with the latter selling it at high prices to Europe. This infrastructure has, until relatively recently, remained largely unchanged.

    However, some central Asian countries have been able to reduce their dependence on Russia over the past decade or so. China has become the main importer of Uzbek gas, with a peak share of more than 80%. And Uzbekistan exported almost US$2 billion worth of goods to China in 2022, matching its volume of trade with Russia.

    Investment in energy infrastructure is taking place in a reflection of these trade patterns. Central Asia boasts significant reserves of oil and gas. But most of the region’s pipelines were traditionally directed towards Russia and, to a lesser extent, south-west to Turkey.

    Pipelines have been built and maintained with China’s support that are directed towards the east. These pipelines have facilitated trade with China and have helped reduce operational waste in the energy sectors of Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.

    In 2025, China plans to resume the construction of a pipeline stretching from Turkmenistan through Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, pending the finalisation of a gas supply contract with Turkmenistan. This will further strengthen China’s energy ties with the region.

    A few years ago, while I was carrying out fieldwork in Uzbekistan, I interviewed policy experts and those involved in the Uzbek energy industry. My interviewees saw deals with China as more reliable than Russia, which has in the past renegotiated the terms of long-term energy contracts with central Asian countries or has added unfair clauses in its favour.

    In 2018, for example, the Uzbek government needed additional gas to meet domestic demand. Russia’s Lukoil energy company agreed to sell the gas from a joint Lukoil-Uzbek production facility to Uzbekistan, but at a hefty price. The Uzbek government incurred debt to Lukoil worth US$600 million.

    A train transporting gas parked in Samarkand train station, Uzbekistan.
    Lewis Tse / Shutterstock

    Chinese involvement in the Uzbek energy sector is also having an indirect effect on Uzbekistan’s green economy. During the pandemic, Uzbekistan’s gas exports to China dropped significantly, exposing operators to the vulnerability of relying on a single energy source.

    Gas exports to China have recovered since 2021. But this shock prompted policymakers to explore ways of diversifying Uzbekistan’s energy production away from fossil fuels. Over the past few years, Uzbekistan has invested over US$4 billion in renewable energy production, with the technology and expertise often coming from China.

    With the support of Chinese companies, vast solar power plants have been planned and developed near the Uzbek capital, Tashkent, as well as other cities like Navoi. Wind turbines have been supplied by Chinese firms for projects in Ferghana, near the border with Kyrgyzstan.

    Chinese-led investment in the renewable energy sector has created further demand for skilled and semi-skilled labour, such as translators, logistics operators and engineers. My interviewees noted positive – albeit limited – effects on employment and wages in the sector.

    New challenges ahead

    There are, however, also drawbacks to Chinese involvement in central Asia’s energy sector. Uzbekistan’s gas trade with China is a possible source of political and economic vulnerability.

    The export price of Uzbek gas is more profitable for energy companies than the local subsidised price, so exports have taken priority over the domestic market. Uzbek consumers often have to contend with rationed gas supplies or no access to gas at all, especially during the winter when demand is at its highest.

    This has led to dissatisfaction among the Uzbek population, especially in rural areas where people have had to resort to burning alternative sources of fuel like coal, firewood and animal dung. These energy sources are harmful to health and the environment.

    Western sanctions on Russian oil and gas since 2022, when Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine, have also created further competition for Uzbek gas. Russian gas suppliers have sought alternative markets in Asia to circumvent the sanctions. Trade flow data shows that India, Turkey and even China have increased the amount of Russian fossil fuels they buy.

    But, by and large, the state of play in the global energy market seems to be changing. Central Asia is in a strong position to benefit.

    Lorena Lombardozzi does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. China is reshaping central Asia’s energy sector as Russian influence fades – https://theconversation.com/china-is-reshaping-central-asias-energy-sector-as-russian-influence-fades-245232

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-Evening Report: State of the states: the campaign is almost over, so how has it played out across Australia?

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Clune, Honorary Associate, Government and International Relations, University of Sydney

    While many Australians have already voted at pre-poll stations and by post, the politicking continues right up until May 3.

    So what’s happened across the country over the past five weeks?

    Here, six experts analyse how the campaign has looked in New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria and Western Australia.

    New South Wales

    David Clune, honorary associate, government and international relations, University of Sydney

    The campaign in NSW is concluding much as it began, largely mirroring the Australia-wide trend with little evidence of localism.

    The main themes of both sides remain similar: cost-of-living alleviation, improved health care and housing affordability. Both leaders quickly matched each other’s promises: it could be described as the “Albanutton” campaign.

    Opposition Leader Peter Dutton’s campaign continued to be hampered by slip-ups and a lack of focus, detail and discipline. Although the government’s record had given him plenty of scope, Dutton struggled to land a blow.

    Prime Minister Anthony Albanese had his share of gaffes, but appeared more coherent and convincing. Labor’s negative campaign to portray Dutton as a local Trump clone seems to have been effective.

    Some in the Liberal Party argue there’s pent-up resentment against the government in Western Sydney that hasn’t been picked up by opinion polls. Whether this hypothetical backlash turns into seats on polling day remains to be seen.

    Bennelong (notionally Liberal after the redistribution) and Gilmore, seem the most likely Liberal gains. Parramatta, Reid, Paterson, Robertson and Werriwa are also in play. There is speculation about an independent threat in the safe Labor seat of McMahon.

    The Coalition has a fight on its hands to retain Cowper and Bradfield, with strong independent challenges in both seats. There is a tight three-way contest in Calare between former National turned independent, Andrew Gee, a National and a Teal.

    As there is little real policy differentiation between the major parties; it seems to come down to which side the voters find more credible and trustworthy in uncertain times.

    According to a Newspoll published on April 27, Albanese led Dutton as preferred prime minister by 51% to 35%. Only 39% of those surveyed believed the government deserved to be re-elected. However, 62% believed the Coalition was not ready to govern.

    An aggregate of polling data showed in NSW, as at April 28, Labor’s two-party preferred vote was 53.0%, an increase since the March Budget of 2.8% and of 1.6% since the 2022 election.

    Queensland

    Paul Williams, associate professor of politics and journalism, Griffith University

    In the campaign’s closing week, Queensland remains largely inconsequential as to whether Albanese or Dutton will call The Lodge home.

    But that doesn’t mean the Liberal National Party (LNP) isn’t concerned about its prospects north of the Tweed.

    While the LNP still leads Labor in the two party-preferred vote, 54 to 46, across Queensland – roughly the 2022 result – last week’s YouGov poll found that result to be a three-point fall for the LNP from the previous week.

    While Labor is hardly going to blitz Queensland, some LNP seats are nonetheless more vulnerable than at any time over the past decade. These include the regional seats of Leichhardt (3.4 %) and Flynn (3.8%), the outer suburban seats of Dickson (held by Dutton by just 1.7%), Longman (3.1%), Forde (4.2%) and Petrie (4.4%), and the middle-suburb mortgage-belt seat of Bonner (3.4%).

    Independent Suzie Holt might also worry the LNP in the usually safe seat of Groom, around Toowoomba.
    But the last-minute “rescue” of the LNP by Pauline Hanson’s One Nation (PHON) – Hanson (reciprocating the LNP’s preferencing of PHON) pulped existing how to vote cards and printed new ones placing the LNP second in most seats – might just save the opposition.

    However, the campaign has offered little clarity on the prospects in other key Queensland contests: the battles for three Greens-held inner-urban seats of Brisbane, Ryan and Griffith.

    But a mid-April DemosAU poll found the Greens’ primary vote falling by 1.7 points to 29%, a figure exactly tied with Labor’s, which has risen 2.7% since 2022.

    Problematically for Dutton, the LNP, whose primary vote remains locked at 36%, appears not to have capitalised on cost-of-living angst in inner Brisbane.

    Despite 58% of inner Brisbane leaning centre-left, these figures suggest the LNP may fail to win any Greens seats, with the contest a close one between the Greens and Labor only. The result rests on who runs third: Labor or the Greens. There could be a mere 100 votes in these must-watch seats.

    In the Northern Territory, the seat of Lingiari, which takes in Alice Springs and Katherine, is held by Labor’s Marion Scrymgour by 1.7%. In 2022, just one in three enrolled voters cast a ballot in the electorate, prompting the Australian Electoral Commission to try to increase voter turnout. In the wash-up, it will be interesting to see if this improves.

    South Australia

    Rob Manwaring, associate professor of politics and public policy, Flinders University

    Given SA is home to only a handful of marginal seats, it’s not a well-trodden part of the campaign trail. That’s typical of most federal elections.

    What’s not so typical is the overall feel of the campaign. The rhythms of Australian elections are changing. On one level, there are the familiar tropes and activities; TV debates, campaign launches and letter box blitzes in key marginal seats.

    Yet, on the other hand, voters behave differently than they used to. Data from the Australian Election Study(AES) tells us far fewer voters have made their decision “a long time ago” (55% in 2007, down to 36% in 2022).

    This means the number of “soft” voters is probably much higher as major parties have fewer “lifetime voters”. Voters are much more transactional.

    Voters are more distanced from parties, too. The study shows fewer voters use how to vote cards (51% used them in 2007, 31% in 2022). We can’t rely on traditional metrics in the same way, such as the national two-party preferred vote given the number of “non-traditional seats”.

    In short, it’s now harder to more know how the campaigns are tracking. So while the Coalition campaign has been beset by a number of mis-steps, how this is playing out is far less clear.

    Further, a strange paradox of the emergence of the Teals and other independents is there is a stronger local focus on representation, rather than broader policy debates. Again, AES data suggests most voters tend to vote for policy reasons (like the economy or health) but the current media focus on the major parties, especially through the TV debates, actually seems to narrow the broader policy discussions.

    So while the proof will be in the pudding when the votes are counted, it may be high time to reflect on what campaign strategies work best for politics in 2025.

    Tasmania

    Robert Hortle, deputy director of the Tasmanian Policy Exchange, University of Tasmania

    On Australia’s South Island, most of the campaign focus has been on Lyons, Franklin and Braddon.

    In Lyons, Tassie’s most marginal electorate (ALP by 0.9%), the latest polls have swung behind the ALP’s Rebecca White. Her popularity as a state MP for the electorate has been bolstered by some crucial slip ups from Liberal candidate Susie Bower.

    One potentially vote-winning policy announcement that has gone under the radar nationally is Labor’s commitment of $24 million to guarantee the continued operation of the Boyer Paper Mill in Lyons, an important employer and regional symbol of economic activity.

    Franklin has been full of drama. 19-year-old Greens candidate Owen Fitzgerald had to withdraw his candidacy after it emerged that he is likely to still be a New Zealand citizen. It seemed like the Greens would encourage their voters to preference independent anti-salmon candidate Peter George.

    However, when the party’s how to vote cards were published, they said “Vote 1 – Owen Fitzgerald”.

    According to the Greens, this was to make sure that voters completed their ballot correctly. The Liberal Party argued the Greens were just trying to secure public funding.

    There have also been billboard shenanigans and various other dirty (or should that be clean?) tricks.

    The result is likely to rest on how Liberal voters feel about salmon farming and how this influences their preferences. Are they so anti-Labor that they will preference Peter George ahead of Julie Collins despite his anti-salmon stance? Or will they put Collins ahead of George based on Labor’s support for the industry?

    In Braddon, where salmon farming is again a key issue, Labor’s Anne Urquhart has been more visible on the campaign trail than Liberal Mal Hingston. Although the margin at the last election was 8% in favour of the Liberals, last-minute polling (albeit with a small sample size) has offered Labor hope of winning the crucial seat.

    Bridget Archer, Liberal MP for Bass, has had a solid if unspectacular campaign. She was helped by Labor selecting a low-profile first-time candidate, Jess Teesdale, who the party sees as “one for the future”. Teesdale revealed her “greenness” – in both senses of the word – by accidentally contradicting the ALP’s position on native forest logging, which is always a flashpoint in Tassie.

    Victoria

    Zareh Ghazarian, senior lecturer in politics, school of social sciences, Monash University

    With just days to go in this campaign, Victoria still looks like a key state that will determine who governs for the next three years. Many seats across the state have new boundaries following the AEC redistribution.

    Victoria is also home to the most marginal seat in the country. Deakin, which covers the eastern suburbs of Melbourne, is held by Liberal Michael Sukkar with a margin of just 0.02%, according to ABC Election Analyst Antony Green.

    Deakin will be the seat to watch on election night. If the Liberal Party can’t hold on to Deakin, it would be unlikely to be able to win government.

    There are also other seats that will provide a fascinating contest on Saturday night. Labor will face its own test in trying to retain Chisholm and Aston, both in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne.

    Chisholm is a swinging seat. It has been won by both Labor and Liberal parties over the past 40 years and is currently held by Labor with a margin of 3.3%. It has had a significant redistribution, losing strong Labor booths in the north and south parts of the electorate.

    Aston is also on a similarly slim margin of 3.6% and was famously won by Labor at the by-election in 2023. Holding onto Aston will be a crucial test for Labor. Losing this seat may threaten Labor’s chances of forming a majority government after the election.

    There are also the two seats held by the independents which promise to be tight contests. The previously safe Liberal seats of Kooyong and Goldstein, which were won by Monique Ryan and Zoe Daniel respectively, have been targeted by the Liberal Party. The independents will face a significant battle and, if successful, will demonstrate a significant shift in voting behaviour has occurred in these electorates.

    Western Australia

    Narelle Miragliotta, associate professor in politics, Murdoch University

    The idea that WA would determine the outcome of government has been a persistent theme throughout the campaign, reinforced by four visits from Albanese and three from Dutton. The amount of attention WA has received from the major party leaders was more than any state or territory other than the three big population states: NSW, Victoria and Queensland. Even then, Albanese made one more visit to WA than he did Queensland at the time of writing.

    Both major parties brought their big guns on the campaign trail. Former Liberal PM John Howard visited Curtin, Tangney and Bullwinkel. The newly re-elected WA Labor Premier Roger Cook campaigned heavily with Albanese during his visits. And in the final days of the campaign, Mark McGowan, the popular former premier, was seen on the hustings with Labor candidates in four marginal seats.

    Neither major party leader ventured to places where they might receive an unwelcome reception. Dutton’s intention to steer clear of the Shire of Collie, particularly the town of Muja, the proposed site of the one of the seven nuclear power plants, was signalled early in the campaign. Albanese avoided electorates in the state’s southwest opposed to coastal wind farms.

    There were no significant candidate blunders. However, questions were raised about the whereabouts of Andrew Hastie, shadow defence minister and (putative) future Liberal leader. Hastie was also questioned about the missing party logo (as against party authorisations) on his campaign materials.

    The competition between the Nationals and Liberals in the seat of Bullwinkel was without major media incident. This includes when the Nationals’ candidate, Mia Davies, broke with the federal coalition over support for Labor’s production tax credits plan.

    The contest for Curtin attracted outsized local media attention. In the final days of the campaign, there were renewed efforts to link the independent incumbent, Kate Chaney, to the Greens. All the proof the West Australian newspaper required was Chaney’s connection to a senior Greens party official, evidenced by a 2024 donation totalling $104, a photo and an author’s credit.

    To what extent has the leader visits and the campaign moved the needle? A recent study found party leader visits make only a modest impact on the vote. Polling for Labor and the Liberals in WA has remained very steady. This doesn’t mean some seats won’t change, but to which party or candidate remains unclear.

    Paul Williams is a research associate with the T.J. Ryan Foundation.

    David Clune, Narelle Miragliotta, Rob Manwaring, Robert Hortle, and Zareh Ghazarian do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. State of the states: the campaign is almost over, so how has it played out across Australia? – https://theconversation.com/state-of-the-states-the-campaign-is-almost-over-so-how-has-it-played-out-across-australia-253125

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-OSI Asia-Pac: MNRE Minister Pralhad Joshi launches Green Hydrogen Certification scheme

    Source: Government of India

    MNRE Minister Pralhad Joshi launches Green Hydrogen Certification scheme

    MNRE organizes Workshop on opportunities for MSMEs in Green Hydrogen Supply Chain

    Posted On: 29 APR 2025 6:17PM by PIB Delhi

    The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) organized on 29th April 2025 one-day National Workshop on opportunities for “Micro, Small & Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) in the Green Hydrogen Supply Chain”, at  New Delhi. The workshop was  aimed to explore opportunities and discuss key role of MSMEs in development of green hydrogen ecosystem in India. Over 300 delegates drew participation from different stakeholder groups, including MSMEs, policymakers, technology providers, industry associations, and international partners.

    Delivering the inaugural address, Shri Pralhad Venkatesh Joshi, Hon’ble Union Minister of New and Renewable Energy, highlighted the government’s commitment to fostering innovation-led growth and emphasized that MSMEs will serve as the backbone of India’s energy transition through their innovative capabilities and localized solutions. He highlighted the critical role MSMEs will play in realizing the Mission’s objectives of building a self-reliant green hydrogen ecosystem by 2030.

    Hon’ble Union Minister also launched the Green Hydrogen Certification Scheme of India (GHCI). He mentioned that the scheme is a foundational step towards creating a robust framework for certifying green hydrogen production and ensuring transparency, traceability, and market credibility.

    Shri Santosh Kumar Sarangi, Secretary, MNRE highlighted some key achievements in the implementation of National Green Hydrogen Mission. He stressed upon the importance of building capacities, facilitating finance, and strengthening technology linkages to empower MSMEs to meaningfully participate in this new industrial landscape. He reiterated the Ministry’s commitment to building institutional and infrastructural support for green hydrogen, with MSMEs playing a critical role.

    The workshop included four focused technical sessions as follows:

    1. Technology Collaboration for MSMEs

    Panelists deliberated on R&D collaboration models, indigenization of components such as bipolar plates and electrolysers, and the role of knowledge institutions.

    1. Business Opportunities in the Green Hydrogen Supply Chain

    Discussions centered on the integration of MSMEs into large-scale projects. Experts from international agencies and corporate leaders outlined business models and market opportunities, advocating for systematic MSME engagement strategies.

    1. Decentralized Hydrogen Production through Biomass

    Expert speakers presented use cases on thermochemical and biochemical conversion of biomass to hydrogen, exploring their application in rural industries. The session highlighted the potential of decentralized models to meet local demand while promoting circular economy principles.

    1. Catalyzing Investments in the Green Hydrogen Ecosystem

    Financial institutions, including the World Bank, IREDA, KfW, and IIFCL, discussed de-risking strategies, blended finance mechanisms, and the need to design green credit lines accessible to MSMEs.

    The workshop marked an important step towards mainstreaming MSMEs in India’s clean energy transition and showed MNRE’s commitment towards building an inclusive, technology-driven, and decentralized green hydrogen economy. The workshop saw active participation from MSMEs, who showed strong interest in entering the green hydrogen sector, particularly in areas such as component manufacturing, operations and maintenance services, and rural hydrogen generation. Participants emphasized the need for standardized protocols, shared platforms for joint innovation, and the formation of Green Hydrogen Clusters to help MSMEs combine capacities and benefit from economies of scale. The discussions also highlighted the importance of clear demand signals and long-term policy stability to encourage private investment. Experts noted India’s strong potential to emerge as a manufacturing hub for green hydrogen technologies, especially electrolysers and fuel cells.

    The Government of India is implementing the National Green Hydrogen Mission, with an objective to make India a global hub of production, usage and export of Green Hydrogen and its derivatives.

    The Mission will result in the following likely outcomes by 2030:

    1. Development of Green Hydrogen production capacity of at least 5 MMT (Million Metric Tonne) per annum with an associated renewable energy capacity addition of about 125 GW in the country
    2. Over Rs. Eight lakh crore in total investments
    3. Creation of over Six lakh jobs
    4. Cumulative reduction in fossil fuel imports over Rs. One lakh crore
    5. Abatement of nearly 50 MMT of annual greenhouse gas emissions

    ******

    TPJ/NJ

    (Release ID: 2125231) Visitor Counter : 29

    MIL OSI Asia Pacific News –

  • MIL-OSI Asia-Pac: Commerce Secretary Shri Sunil Barthwal Visits Netherlands to Strengthen Bilateral Trade and Economic Partnership

    Source: Government of India

    Commerce Secretary Shri Sunil Barthwal Visits Netherlands to Strengthen Bilateral Trade and Economic Partnership

    Commerce Secretary Engages with Port of Rotterdam Authority, Explores Green and Digital Corridor Cooperation to Boost Maritime and Trade Ties

    Posted On: 29 APR 2025 11:17AM by PIB Delhi

    Commerce Secretary, Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Government of India,Shri Sunil Barthwal, visited the Netherlands from 24–26 April 2025 to advance bilateral trade and economic cooperation between India and the Netherlands. The visit underlined India’s commitment to strengthening its economic engagement with the Netherlands, a key European partner. During his visit, Mr. Barthwal engaged in high-level discussions, industry interactions and toured places of economic importance.

    The visit of the Commerce Secretary yielded several tangible outcomes. It reinforced the strategic importance of the India-Netherlands partnership in addressing global economic challenges and fostering innovation-driven growth. The discussions at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Economic Affairs laid the groundwork for enhanced collaboration through institutional mechanisms like the JTIC. The CEOs Roundtable fostered new business connections, with Dutch companies expressing keen interest in India’s growing market and investment opportunities. The engagements at the Port of Rotterdam and ASML opened new avenues for cooperation in maritime infrastructure and semiconductors, aligning with India’s economic priorities. Commerce Secretary Barthwal’s visit has injected fresh momentum into India Netherlands partnership, setting the stage for deeper economic collaboration.

    Mr. Barthwal commenced his visit with a productive discussion with Mr. Michiel Sweers, Director General for Foreign Economic Relations, Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in The Hague. The discussions focused on strengthening bilateral trade and economic ties, inter alia, through setting up of the Joint Trade and Investment Committee (JTIC) mechanism.  Further, the meeting covered diverse issues of bilateral trade and economic relationship, advancing strategic economic cooperation, fostering policy alignment, and addressing trade barriers to facilitate smoother market access for Indian and Dutch businesses. The dialogue reaffirmed the shared commitment to creating a conducive environment for trade and investment, leveraging the complementary strengths of both economies.

    A highlight of the visit was the CEOs Round-table Conference organized by the Embassy of India. Attended by approximately 40 representatives from leading Dutch and Indian companies, as well as business chambers and trade organizations, the round-table facilitated discussions on trade opportunities, challenges and actionable solutions. Participants offered valuable suggestions, with the Government of India and the Embassy pledging to address concerns. The Conference provided a platform for industry leaders to share insights, explore synergies, and identify opportunities for collaboration in sectors such as renewable energy, agriculture, healthcare, logistics, waste management and urban development. Mr. Barthwal emphasized India’s ambitious economic reforms, including initiatives to boost manufacturing, exports and ease of doing business, which resonated strongly with Dutch stakeholders. The Roundtable also featured the showcasing of One District One Product (ODOP) handicrafts by the Embassy, celebrating India’s rich artisanal heritage. The subsequent networking session acted as a platform for corporate leaders and trade bodies to forge meaningful connections, with Commerce Secretary Barthwal and Ambassador Tuhin actively engaging the participants.

    Mr. Barthwal visited the Port of Rotterdam, Europe’s largest and one of the world’s most advanced ports. Received by Mr. Boudewijn Siemons, CEO of the Port of Rotterdam Authority, at the World Port Center, Mr. Barthwal held in-depth discussions on enhancing cooperation between the Indian ports and Rotterdam. The talks explored opportunities for knowledge sharing, technology transfer, and sustainable port management practices. A tour of the port facilities, including the fully automated APM Terminals at Maasvlakte II, provided insights into Rotterdam’s state-of-the-art infrastructure and operational efficiencies. Mr. Barthwal highlighted the potential for collaboration in modernizing Indian ports, aligning with India’s Maritime Vision 2030, which aims to enhance port capacity and logistics efficiency. Both sides expressed interest in deepening ties through joint initiatives in port digitalization, green shipping, and logistics optimization, which are critical to boosting bilateral trade flows. The visit laid the groundwork for setting up of a Green and Digital Corridor between the Port of Rotterdam and Indian ports like the Deendayal Port Authority Kandla, and export of Green Hydrogen and carriers like Ammonia and Methanol from India to Europe, with the Port of Rotterdam acting as a gateway to Europe.

    Later, Mr. Barthwal traveled to Veldhoven to visit the headquarters of ASML, a global leader in photolithography systems for the semiconductor industry. In a productive meeting with ASML’s CEO, Mr. Christophe Fouquet, Mr. Barthwal discussed deepening India-Netherlands cooperation in the semiconductor sector. The discussions focused on leveraging ASML’s expertise to support India’s ambitions to become a global semiconductor manufacturing hub, as outlined in the India Semiconductor Mission.  Mr. Barthwal emphasized India’s robust policy framework to attract investments in semiconductors, including production-linked incentives and infrastructure development. The engagement with ASML highlighted India’s interest in fostering innovation and building a resilient semiconductor ecosystem, with the Netherlands as a key partner.

         

    Joint Secretary, Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Government of India, Shri Saket Kumar, who accompanied Commerce Secretary, met Mr. Tjerk Opmeer, Deputy Director General for Enterprise and Innovation, at the Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs in The Hague. The discussions centered on fostering innovation-driven partnerships, particularly in technology and startup ecosystems. Both sides committed to deepening collaboration in the startups and innovation ecosystem through mutual efforts under the Indo-Dutch Startup Link. The meeting also explored collaboration in entrepreneurship, tech exchange and space cooperation. These engagements highlighted India’s growing role as a hub for innovation and the Netherlands’ expertise in cutting-edge technologies, paving the way for enhanced bilateral cooperation.

                  

     ***

    Abhishek Dayal/Abhijith Narayanan

    (Release ID: 2125060) Visitor Counter : 35

    MIL OSI Asia Pacific News –

  • MIL-OSI: Annual report and financial statements for the period ended 31 December 2024

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    OCTOPUS FUTURE GENERATIONS VCT PLC

    Annual report and financial statements for the period ended 31 December 2024

    Octopus Future Generations VCT plc (‘Future Generations VCT’ or the ‘Company’) is backing businesses that aim to address some of society’s biggest challenges, providing an opportunity for investors to share in the growth of ambitious, purpose‑driven companies.

    The Company is managed by Octopus AIF Management Limited (the ‘Manager’), which has delegated investment management to Octopus Investments Limited (‘Octopus’ or ‘Portfolio Manager’) via its investment team Octopus Ventures.

    Chair’s statement

    I am pleased to present the financial report and audited accounts for the Company for the 18 months to 31 December 2024.

    I would like to welcome all of our new shareholders to the Company. Future Generations VCT invests in exciting early-stage companies which aspire to address current environmental and societal issues. In 2023, the Board reviewed and approved a proposal to move the Company’s year end from 30 June to 31 December. As a result, shareholders are receiving this annual report covering an extended 18-month period and will thereafter receive a half-year report as at June, and annual report and audited financial statements for the years ending December thereafter.

    The NAV per share at 31 December 2024 was 88.8p, which represents a net decrease of 5.5p per share from 30 June 2023. In the 18 months to 31 December 2024, we utilised £10.1 million of our cash resources, including £8.2 million which was invested into 16 new and follow‑on opportunities. The cash balance of £20.1 million (excluding cash awaiting allotment) as at 31 December 2024 represents 42% of net assets at that date. The loss made in the period to 31 December 2024 was £2.9 million. This decline is reflective of some company specific performance challenges and the difficult funding conditions in the early-stage space which have led to downward movements in some valuations. Given the Company is still a relatively young VCT, many of its portfolio companies are at the beginning of their journey and will likely require further funding to succeed, so it is to be expected to see under performance or even failures before any growth in value of companies which are ultimately successful. The decline is also accentuated by the running costs of the Company exceeding returns from investments, which is to be anticipated at this stage.

    We look forward to deploying further capital into attractive new investment opportunities, and we ultimately intend the profile of the Company to comprise 80% to 90% in VCT qualifying investments and 10% to 20% in permitted non-VCT qualifying investments or cash.

    Fundraise
    We raised £3.6 million in the fundraise which closed on 31 October 2024. The 2023/2024 VCT fundraise market was highly competitive, ranking as the third highest on record with £882 million raised. In this environment, newer VCTs such as ours faced challenges in raising funds, as we compete with more established funds.

    On 3 February 2025, to further support the Company’s growth, the Board launched an initial offer to raise up to £5 million. The offer closed for new applications on 1 April 2025 for the 2024/2025 tax year having successfully raised £5.0 million.

    As investors will be aware, the intention is to invest in businesses which meet one of three key themes, which we hope will demonstrate excellent investment prospects as well as having the potential to transform the world we live in for the better.

    VCT status
    In November 2023, a ten-year extension was announced to the ‘sunset clause’ (a retirement date for the VCT scheme), meaning that VCT tax reliefs will be available until 5 April 2035. This extension passed through Parliament in February 2024 and on 3 September 2024 His Majesty’s Treasury brought the extension into effect through The Finance Act 2024.

    Board of Directors
    As announced in the half-yearly report to 31 December 2023, Emma Davies announced her retirement from the Board of Directors with effect from 31 March 2024 and Ajay Chowdhury was appointed with effect from 1 March 2024 and was elected by shareholders at the Annual General Meeting (AGM) held in December. We are already benefiting from his extensive experience in the early-stage venture ecosystem.

    All the other Directors have indicated their willingness to remain on the Board and will be seeking re-election at the AGM.

    Portfolio Manager
    In September 2024, Octopus Titan VCT PLC, a fund which the Company has co-invested alongside to date, announced a review of strategy, due to the ongoing performance issues it has faced. This review (which benefits from independent external advice) is ongoing, and when concluded, the results will be shared with the Board of the Company and via any public announcements that the Board of Octopus Titan VCT PLC may make.

    During this period, the investment team has prioritised much of its resource towards those portfolio companies which they believe have the potential to drive the greatest returns. This has affected your Company’s investment rate into new opportunities.

    In the meantime, there have been a significant number of leavers from the broader Octopus Ventures team which invests capital from both the Company and other funds under management. Simon King, Octopus’ Lead Fund Manager for Future Generations, has unfortunately resigned to pursue a new opportunity after 13 years with Octopus. He will continue to take an active role as Lead Fund Manager of the Company until late summer. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Simon for his contribution and to wish him well for the future. We will provide you with updates in due course regarding his potential successor.

    Erin Platts was appointed as new Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Octopus Ventures in January 2025. Previously, she was CEO of HSBC Innovation Banking UK, formerly Silicon Valley Bank UK and worked at the heart of the UK and European tech ecosystem. Erin will be looking to scale the Octopus Ventures business, including ensuring there is appropriate investment and portfolio management resource to support the ongoing success of the Company.

    AGM
    The AGM will take place on 4 June 2025 from 10am and will be held at 33 Holborn, London EC1N 2HT. Full details of the business to be conducted at the AGM are given in the Notice of the AGM. We will have a Portfolio Manager’s update at the AGM, supported by a filmed update from the Portfolio Manager which will be available on the website at www.octopusinvestments.com/futuregenvct/.

    Shareholders’ views are important, and the Board encourages shareholders to vote on the resolutions within the Notice of the AGM using the proxy form, or electronically at www.investorcentre.co.uk/eproxy. The Board has carefully considered the business to be approved at the AGM and recommends shareholders to vote in favour of all the resolutions being proposed, as the Board will be doing.

    Outlook
    In the 18-month reporting period, the sharpest decline in NAV was seen in the first half of 2024 with a 7.1% drop. This was reflective of some of the portfolio companies struggling to scale, secure customer wins and successfully fundraise, meaning they were not achieving the milestones set at the time the Company invested. With companies not able to prove their business models, we will unfortunately see some fail. The Board is mindful that such performance is not an unusual outcome for a VCT at this stage of its investment life cycle, with any failures likely preceding valuation growth which is usually expected once the portfolio matures. The portfolio has been operating in a volatile macro environment since the Company launched and global geo-political and economic pressures continue to hamper some of their growth plans. However, we are satisfied to see a stabilisation in the NAV, with the portfolio showing a positive return in the six months from June to December 2024.

    The Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A) environment has started to thaw with startups experiencing the highest annual M&A transaction levels since 2019¹. We are delighted to have been able to realise the Company’s first full and partial exits in the reporting period. These exits within just three years of launch we hope provide validation of Future Generations VCT’s investment strategy, demonstrating the ability of Octopus to identify and back high-potential companies while delivering early returns to the VCT and brings confidence that it is well positioned to generate long-term, sustainable value for shareholders.

    The long-term target is to pay an annual dividend of 5% of the NAV. However, given the expected holding period of target portfolio companies and restrictions imposed on VCTs, it is very unlikely that the Company will be able to pay dividends before 2026. During this time, any growth in value will increase the net asset value of the Company. Dividends are likely to be generated from successful exits, so the Company is unlikely to pay significant dividends until more portfolio companies have time to mature and realisations are secured.

    I would like to conclude by thanking both my Board colleagues and the Octopus team on behalf of all shareholders for their hard work. The Board’s long-term view of early-stage venture capital remains positive, and I am looking forward to seeing what 2025 brings for your Company.

    Helen Sinclair
    Chair

    1 https://carta.com/uk/en/data/state-of-private-markets-q4-2024/#key-trends

    Portfolio Manager’s review

    At Octopus, our focus is on managing your investments and providing investors with clear and transparent communication. Our annual and half-yearly updates are designed to keep you informed about the progress of your investment.

    Focus on Future Generations VCT’s performance
    The NAV per share at 31 December 2024 was 88.8p, which represents a decrease in NAV of 5.5p per share versus a NAV of 94.3p per share as at 30 June 2023. The Company invests in three key areas that we believe demonstrate excellent investment prospects and have potential to transform our world for the better.

    Below is a breakdown of the 36 investments held as at 31 December 2024, showing the proportion and value of the portfolio in each investment theme:

    Proportion by number of portfolio companies in each theme
    Revitalising healthcare: 53%
    Empowering people: 28%
    Building a sustainable planet: 19%

    Value of the portfolio in each theme
    Revitalising healthcare: £13.3m
    Empowering people: £8.0m
    Building a sustainable planet: £5.5m

    The decline in valuation over the 18-month period has been in large part driven by the downward valuation movements across 11 companies which saw a collective decrease in valuation of £7.9 million. The businesses which contributed most significantly to this were Tympa Health, Pear Bio and Elo Health. Tympa Health over‑invested in growth and had to make significant cost cuts and changes to senior management whilst running a fundraise process. It has successfully concluded a further investment round, but at a reduced valuation and the Company’s shareholding now sits behind a large preference stack, meaning that other investors get paid back first before the Company would see any returns. Pear Bio also had to significantly reduce its cash burn but has limited runway and needs to further fundraise, so the valuation has been reduced to reflect the risk to its future. Elo Health struggled to find a market fit and execute on the investment thesis, so to extend its cash runway it had to raise an investment round at a reduced valuation. These three valuation movements account for 86% of the total decline in the reporting period. The total investment cost of these three companies was £7 million.

    Octopus Ventures believes that some of the companies which have seen decreased valuations in the 18 months have the potential to overcome the issues they face and get their growth plans back on track. We will continue to work with them to help them realise their ambitions. In some cases, if a company is achieving its performance milestones, the support offered could include further funding, to ensure a business has the capital it needs to execute on its strategy. At this early stage of the Company’s life cycle, it is to be anticipated that failures will likely precede valuation growth, which takes longer as the portfolio companies must achieve their agreed milestones and mature.

    Conversely, 12 companies saw an increase in unrealised valuation in the period, delivering a collective increase in valuation of £4.4 million. These valuation increases reflect businesses which have successfully concluded further funding rounds, grown revenues or met certain important milestones. Notable strong performers in the portfolio include Apheris and Manual, both of which have shown impressive capital efficient growth. These strong performers demonstrate that there are opportunities available for companies to scale.

    The interest on Future Generation’s uninvested cash reserves was £1.4 million in the 18 months to 31 December 2024 (30 June 2023: gain of £0.4 million), driven by returns on money market funds. The Board’s objective for these investments is to generate sufficient returns through the cycle to cover costs, at limited risk to capital.

    Disposals
    In September 2024, as part of a Series A funding round, Octopus sold a portion of the Company’s shares in Neat. Then in November, Pluxee (a global leader in employee benefits) acquired Cobee. The two exits combined offer the Company a return of 1.5x, including contingent deferred proceeds.

    Overview of investments
    The Company completed 16 investments in the 18 months to 31 December 2024 (comprising a total of £8.2 million) and 4 further investments after the reporting date totalling £2.4 million. More information on some of these businesses can be found below:

    A selection of our completed investments

    Revitalising Healthcare

    Pencil Biosciences is a gene editing technology platform.

    Awell Health automates routine clinical tasks, synchronising data between systems and driving seamless coordination between care teams and patients.

    Cellvoyant is an artificial intelligence (AI) first biotechnology company creating novel stem cell-based therapies for chronic diseases.

    Manual provides easy access to advice and medical support for diagnosis, custom treatment plans and holistic care to induce long-term behaviour change.

    Nanosyrinx has developed a targeted biologic therapeutic delivery platform (a nano-syringe).

    Empowering people

    Correcto is an AI writing and grammar tool for the Spanish language.

    Remofirst is an Employer of Record (EOR) and compliance platform that allows companies to hire and pay employees globally.

    Swiipr has developed a digital payments platform specifically for the airline industry.

    Building a sustainable planet

    Metris Energy has created a platform that allows landlords of multi-unit buildings to monetise modular renewable energy projects through a single billing platform to charge tenants.

    Drift is designing sailing vessels and routing algorithms required to capture deep water wind energy and convert it into onboard hydrogen gas for transportation back to shore using a fully integrated desalination, electrolysis and storage system.

    Q&A

    Q. How do you value a portfolio company?
    A. Future Generations VCT’s unquoted portfolio companies are valued in accordance with UK Generally Accepted Accounting Practice (UK GAAP) accounting standards and the International Private Equity and Venture Capital (IPEV) valuation guidelines.

    This means we value the portfolio at fair value, with all companies being valued at least twice yearly, for our half-year (June) and annual accounts (December).

    Q. What do you mean by ‘fair value’?
    A. When we say fair value, we mean the price we expect people would be willing to buy or sell an asset for, assuming they understand the asset and market conditions, are knowledgeable parties, act independently, and that the transaction is carried out under the normal course of business (i.e. is not rushed and proper marketing has taken place).

    Q. Who values the portfolio, what is the process and what oversight is there to make sure this is right?
    A. The Octopus Investment Managers involved with the portfolio companies, either in the capacity of a Director or observer on the board, or the primary contact, will provide commentary including, but not limited to, recent developments with the portfolio and the wider market in which they operate, progress towards milestones, management team changes, board dynamics and technical progress. This is combined with the latest available financial accounts and budget provided by the portfolio company which will be summarised into Key Performance Indicators (KPIs).

    From this information, a member of the separate Valuations team drafts the initial proposal. This will highlight any material changes, key asset level assumptions used and KPIs, and discuss portfolio company performance as well as the rationale underpinning the selected valuation methodology. A peer review exercise then takes place, where the proposals are challenged and reviewed. The peer reviewer is an investment professional from the Fund Manager (typically the Lead Fund Manager) who has not been involved in preparing the valuations.

    This will then be reviewed and approved by the Octopus Valuations Committee which comprises individuals with appropriate expertise and experience in valuations. Those individuals are not involved in the investment decisions and as such can independently review and challenge. The Future Generations VCT Board will then meet to discuss them in detail, revise as necessary and ultimately approve them.

    There are also more valuation checkpoints throughout the year in advance of allotments and other share-related transactions, which means that the portfolio’s valuation is reviewed to ensure NAV is fairly represented prior to these corporate actions.

    As part of our continuous improvement processes, we periodically review the actual realised value of our investments compared to their last holding value and refine our valuation methodologies accordingly. This, combined with the high proportion of valuations that are based on the terms of further funding rounds led by new external investors, firmly underpins the robustness of the valuation process.

    Valuations
    The table illustrates the split of valuation methodology (shown as a percentage of portfolio value and number of companies). ‘External price’ includes valuations based on funding rounds that typically completed in the last 18 months to the period end or shortly after the period end, and exits of companies where terms have been agreed with an acquirer. ‘Multiples’ is predominantly used for valuations that are based on a multiple of revenues for portfolio companies. Where there is uncertainty around the potential outcomes available to a company, a probability weighted ‘scenario analysis’ is considered.

    Valuation methodology By value By number of companies
    Multiples 18% 3
    External price 44% 12
    Scenario analysis 14% 7
    Milestone analysis 24% 10
    Write-off — 4

    Portfolio case studies

    CoMind
    CoMind is building revolutionary brain sensing technologies.

    Their mission is to redefine the way the brain is measured and treated at every stage of care. One of the first applications of CoMind’s core technology is in measuring intracranial brain pressure using an adhesive sensor and advanced signal processing. This will be a step change from the current standard of having to drill through the skull to measure intracranial pressure in patients impacted by traumatic brain injury, stroke, and/or other neurocritical conditions.

    While other companies are trying to create noninvasive technology in this sector, we believe CoMind has a distinct competitive advantage. CoMind has developed an advanced optical sensing technique that has opened up new possibilities in monitoring brain health. Unlike existing methods, CoMind’s technology is more similar to the “LiDAR” (Light Detection and Ranging) systems used in self-driving cars. This allows CoMind’s devices to give a unique, detailed view of brain health, helping doctors deliver more personalised and targeted treatments to patients at every stage of care.

    >250 subjects were measured in 2024.
    Several devices are currently being used in hospitals for clinical trials.

    Swiipr
    Passengers get quick, easy-to-use compensation, airlines save on processing costs while improving service.

    When flights are disrupted, compensating passengers is a hassle for both airlines and travellers. Swiipr’s platform simplifies this by automating payment verification and processing through a system designed specifically for airlines. The company provides passengers with virtual and physical prepaid cards, offering instant, flexible spending compared to outdated paper vouchers or slow payments. Swiipr also supports airlines with solutions for crew, operational, and crisis payments, enabling fast, direct payouts to staff. Passengers get quick, easy-to-use compensation, airlines save on processing costs while improving service, and retailers benefit from instant payment settlement. Swiipr also integrates with airline Customer Relationship Management systems, making it an essential partner for the industry.

    Octopus Ventures is excited about Swiipr’s travel-focused digital payments solution and its potential to revolutionise how airlines handle pay-outs. Swiipr’s innovative product aims to transform compensation payments and speed up management processes for airlines and beyond. By enabling digital payments, Swiipr seeks to boost efficiency, enhance customer experiences, and provide automated processes that are transparent and compliant with regulations.

    With over 500 million passengers affected by travel disruptions each year, simplifying the path to compensation has the potential to significantly improve customer satisfaction, build trust, and foster loyalty in the industry.

    Only 1–2% of disrupted passengers currently receive compensation.
    Billions of dollars lost by passengers in outdated, inefficient pay-out processes every year.
    Pay360 Payment Award winner: Best B2B Programme and Best Customer Facing Experience at the 2024 awards.

    DRIFT
    DRIFT aims to drive the clean energy transition worldwide with high-performance sailing vessels that harness deep ocean wind to produce green hydrogen at sea and deliver it globally.

    It does this using a unique, AI-enabled vessel routing system that enables the vessels to find and stay in optimum weather conditions. The growing demand for clean hydrogen to accelerate the decarbonisation of sectors such as heavy industry, transportation and manufacturing is sparking innovation in the sector. DRIFT’s solution is mobile, resilient and works outside of existing infrastructure. The company is developing renewable energy partnerships that will benefit coastal and island communities around the world.

    DRIFT is leading the way in developing a truly innovative new class of mobile renewable energy, building the world’s first net-positive ships and unlocking a new era of clean fuel generation capable of covering 70% of the globe. The company’s technology uniquely unlocks the planet’s greatest resource, overcoming supply challenges and enabling a fair and equitable clean energy transition.

    €10 trillion: Goldman Sachs estimates that the green hydrogen market could reach €10 trillion by 2050.

    24%: Bank of America predicts that clean hydrogen could provide 24% of global energy needs by 2050.

    COP 28 winner: DRIFT is a COP 28 award-winning DeepTech company and winner of the Monaco Prize for Innovation in Renewable Hydrogen and Transportation 2024.

    Top 10 investments
    Here, we set out the cost and valuation of the top 10 holdings, which account for over 58% of the value of the portfolio.

    Portfolio company Investment cost Valuation at
    31 December 2024    		 Investment Theme
    1. HelloSelf Limited £2.6m £2.6m Revitalising healthcare
    2. Remofirst, Inc £1.2m £1.7m Empowering people
    3. Infinitopes Ltd £1.6m £1.6m Revitalising healthcare
    4. Neat SAS £0.6m £1.5m Building a sustainable planet
    5. TYTN Ltd (t/a TitanML) £0.5m £1.5m Building a sustainable planet
    6. Apheris AI GmbH £1.5m £1.5m Empowering people
    7. Menwell Limited (t/a Manual) £0.9m £1.5m Revitalising healthcare
    8. Mr & Mrs Oliver Ltd (t/a Skin + Me) £1.0m £1.4m Revitalising healthcare
    9. Intrinsic Semiconductor Technologies Ltd £0.9m £1.2m Empowering people
    10. CoMind Technologies Ltd £0.8m £1.0m Revitalising healthcare

    Top 10 investments in detail1

    1

    HelloSelf Limited
    A digital, personalised psychological therapy and coaching platform.
    www.helloself.com

    Initial investment date: January 2023
    Investment cost: £2.6m
      (2023: £2.6m)
    Valuation: £2.6m
      (2023: £2.6m)
    Last submitted accounts: 31 March 2024
    Turnover: Not available2
    (2023: Not available2)
    Profit/(loss) before tax: Not available2
      (2023: Not available2)
    Net assets: £(15.5)m
      (2023: £(9.8)m)
    Valuation methodology: Calibration

    2
    Remofirst, Inc.
    Global payroll and compliance system for remote teams.
    www.remofirst.com

    Initial investment date: February 2024
    Investment cost: £1.2m
      (2023: n/a)
    Valuation: £1.7m
      (2023: n/a)
    Last submitted accounts: Not available2
    Turnover: Not available2
      (2023: Not available2)
    Profit/(loss) before tax Not available2
      (2023: Not available2)
    Net assets: Not available2
      (2023: Not available2)
    Valuation methodology: Last Round

    3
    Infinitopes Ltd
    Has built an antigen discovery platform to develop cancer vaccines that provide better treatment outcomes.
    www.infinitopes.com

    Initial investment date: December 2022
    Investment cost: £1.6m
      (2023: £1.6m)
    Valuation: £1.6m
      (2023: £1.6m)
    Last submitted accounts: 31 December 2023
    Turnover: Not available2
      (2023: Not available2)
    Profit/(loss) before tax Not available2
      (2023: Not available2)
    Net assets: £9.3m
      (2023: £8.1m)
    Valuation methodology: Last Round

    4
    Neat SAS
    An embedded insurance platform that gives merchants the ability to provide insurance bundles to their customers at a competitive rate.
    mobility.neat.eu

    Initial investment date: November 2022
    Investment cost: £0.6m
      (2023: £0.8m)
    Valuation: £1.5m
      (2023: £0.8m)
    Last submitted accounts: Not available2
    Turnover: Not available2
      (2023: Not available2)
    Profit/(loss) before tax: Not available2
      (2023: Not available2)
    Net assets: Not available2
      (2023: Not available2)
    Valuation methodology: Last round

    5

    TYTN Ltd (t/a TitanML)
    An artificial intelligence company which is developing a one-stop-shop for Natural Language Processing AI Optimisation, allowing enterprises to generate value from their data.
    www.titanml.co

    Initial investment date: February 2023
    Investment cost: £0.5m
      (2023: £0.5m)
    Valuation: £1.5m
      (2023: £0.5m)
    Last submitted accounts: 30 April 2024
    Turnover: Not available2
      (2023: Not available2)
    Profit/(loss) before tax: Not available2
      (2023: Not available2)
    Net assets: £1.5m
      (2023: £2.0m)
    Valuation methodology: Last Round

    6

    Apheris AI GmbH
    An end-to-end federated learning platform enabling data scientists to conduct analysis over sensitive data without compromising the privacy or security of the data subjects.
    www.apheris.com

    Initial investment date: November 2022
    Investment cost: £1.5m
      (2023: £1.2m)
    Valuation: £1.5m
      (2023: £1.2m)
    Last submitted accounts: Not available2
    Turnover: Not available2
      (2023: Not available2)
    Profit/(loss) before tax: Not available2
      (2023: Not available2)
    Net assets: Not available2
      (2023: Not available2)
    Valuation methodology: Last round

    7

    Menwell Limited (t/a Manual)
    Making high-quality healthcare more accessible and stigma-free
    www.manual.co

    Initial investment date: May 2024
    Investment cost: £0.9m
    (2023: n/a)
    Valuation: £1.5m
      (2023: n/a)
    Last submitted accounts: 31 December 2023
    Turnover: £54.7m
    (2023: £22.4m)
    Profit/(loss) before tax: £(7.9)m
    (2023: £(10.6)m)
    Net assets: £11.8m
    (2023: £8.0m)
    Valuation methodology: Last round

    8
    Mr & Mrs Oliver Ltd (t/a Skin + Me)
    A direct to consumer, personalised skin care company.
    www.skinandme.com

    Initial investment date: December 2022
    Investment cost: £1.0m
      (2023: £1.0m)
    Valuation: £1.4m
      (2023: £1.3m)
    Last submitted accounts: 31 August 2023
    Turnover: £28.7m
      (2023: £14.3m)
    Profit/(loss) before tax: £1.8m
      (2023: £(3.3)m)
    Net assets: £12.8m
      (2023: £(0.7)m)
    Valuation methodology: Revenue Multiple

    9
    Intrinsic Semiconductor Technologies Ltd
    Solid state memory technology that is simple to integrate and faster than current alternatives like Flash.
    www.intrinsicsemi.com

    Initial investment date: December 2023
    Investment cost: £0.9m
      (2023: n/a)
    Valuation: £1.2m
      (2023: n/a)
    Last submitted group accounts: 31 December 2023
    Turnover: Not available2
    (2023: Not available2)
    Profit/(loss) before tax: Not available2
    (2023: Not available2)
    Consolidated net assets: £4.0m
      (2023: £5.5m)
    Valuation methodology: Scenario Analysis

    10

    CoMind Technologies Ltd
    Development of non-invasive brain sensing technology for monitoring of medical conditions.
    comind.io

    Initial investment date: November 2023
    Investment cost: £0.8m
      (2023: n/a)
    Valuation: £1.0m
      (2023: n/a)
    Last submitted group accounts: 31 December 2023
    Turnover: Not available2
    (2023: Not available2)
    Profit/(loss) before tax: Not available2
    (2023: Not available2)
    Net assets: £17.1m
      (2023: £4.1m)
    Valuation methodology: Milestone Analysis

    1. These are numbers per latest public filings. More recent figures have not yet been disclosed.
    2. Information not publicly available.

    Portfolio engagement
    As part of our strategy, we require portfolio companies to put in place a Diversity and Inclusion policy (D&I) and an Anti-Harassment policy. We also engage with each company to help them understand their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and support them to take action to minimise them. You can see how we are progressing with these goals below, as at the date of this report:

    D&I policy status
    Policy in place: 100%

    Engaged in monitoring 2023 greenhouse gas emissions1
    Signed up: 16
    Introduced: 19
    In progress: 1

    1 As of 31 December 2024, only 2023 carbon emissions data was available.

    Outlook
    Despite the declining NAV in the reporting period, we are reassured to see an increase in the NAV per share of the fund in the last six months. This, combined with the two profitable realisations in the period, is offering us early proof points of the Company’s investment strategy to deliver sustainable growth as it moves into its third year of deployment. With a more diversified portfolio, in terms of both stage and sector, this also offers a clearer path for the Company to enter a growth phase.

    As is to be expected at this stage in the Company’s lifecycle, it has started to make its first follow-on investments into portfolio companies which are achieving their agreed milestones and successfully gaining new external lead funders. The Company made two follow-on investments in the reporting period and three after.

    This strategy of reinvesting into existing portfolio companies aims to increase the Company’s stake in portfolio companies that have achieved market fit and are scaling successfully, supporting its overall growth plan. Along with further financial support, Octopus’ resources are directed in the most impactful way, both through Octopus-appointed non-executive Directors or monitors on the boards and our in-house People and Talent team. This team works directly with the portfolio company management teams, offering training and recruitment support to ensure the best talent pool is being explored to help drive success.

    We are excited to have the opportunity to continue to scale the Company, support its ambition to make the world a better place for future generations, and hope to deliver attractive returns to shareholders.

    Simon King
    Partner and Lead Fund Manager for Future Generations VCT

    Risks and risk management

    The Board assesses the risks faced by Future Generations VCT, reviews the mitigating controls and monitors the effectiveness of these controls.

    Emerging and principal risks, and risk management
    The Board is mindful of the ongoing risks and will continue to make sure that appropriate safeguards are in place. The Board carries out a regular review of the risk environment in which the Company operates.

    Emerging risks

    The Board has considered emerging risks. The Board seeks to mitigate risks by setting policy, regularly reviewing performance and monitoring progress and compliance. In the mitigation and management of these risks, the Board applies the principles detailed in the Financial Reporting Council’s Guidance on Risk Management, Internal Control and Related Financial and Business Reporting.

    The following are some of the potential emerging risks management and the Board are currently monitoring:

    • adverse changes in global macroeconomic environment;
    • challenging market conditions for private company fundraising and exits;
    • geo‑political instability; and
    • climate change.

    Detailed below are the principal risks of Future Generations VCT, and the mitigating actions in relation to those risks.

    Principal risks

    Risk Mitigation Change
    Investment performance:    
    The focus of Future Generations VCT investments is into early-stage, unquoted, small and medium‑sized VCT qualifying companies which, by their nature, entail a higher level of risk and shorter cash runway than investments in larger quoted companies. Octopus has significant experience of investing in early-stage unquoted companies, and appropriate due diligence is undertaken on every new investment. A member of the Octopus Ventures team is appointed to the board of a portfolio company using a risk-based approach, considering the size of the company within the Future Generations VCT portfolio and the engagement levels of other investors. This arrangement, in conjunction with its Portfolio Talent team’s active involvement, allows Future Generations VCT to play a prominent role in a portfolio company’s ongoing development and strategy. Increased exposures reflected in the previous period remain unchanged due to the difficult macro environment and challenging trading conditions for some portfolio companies continuing.
    Risk Mitigation Change
    VCT qualifying status:    
    Future Generations VCT is required at all times to observe the conditions for the maintenance of approved VCT status. The loss of such approval could lead to Future Generations VCT and its investors losing access to the various tax benefits associated with VCT status and investment. Octopus tracks Future Generations VCT’s qualifying status throughout the period, and reviews this at key points, including at the point of investment and realisation. This status is reported to the Board at each Board meeting. The Future Generations VCT Board has also engaged external independent advisers to undertake an independent VCT status monitoring role. VCT status monitoring by independent advisers continues to reduce the risk of an issue causing a loss of VCT status.
    Risk Mitigation Change
    Loss of key people:    
    The loss of key investment staff by the Portfolio Manager could lead to poor fund management and/or performance due to lack of continuity or understanding of Future Generations VCT. The Portfolio Manager has a broad team experienced in and focused on early-stage investing. This mitigates the risk of any one individual with the required skill set and knowledge of venture capital investing, and the portfolio specifically, leaving. Key investment staff are also incentivised via the performance incentive fee. The increase is attributed to the departure of key personnel from the Octopus Ventures team and risk exposure reflects a reduction in performance fees potentially increasing attrition.
    Risk Mitigation Change
    Operational:    
    The Future Generations VCT Board is reliant on the Portfolio Manager to manage investments effectively, and manage the services of a number of third parties, in particular the registrar, depositary and tax advisers. A failure of the systems or controls at Octopus or third‑party providers could lead to an inability to provide accurate reporting and accounting and to ensure adherence to VCT rules. The Future Generations VCT Board reviews the system of internal controls, both financial and non-financial, operated by Octopus (to the extent the latter are relevant to Future Generations VCT’s internal controls). These include controls designed to make sure that Future Generations VCT assets are safeguarded and that proper accounting records are maintained. No overall change in risk exposure on balance.
    Risk Mitigation Change
    Information security:    
    A loss of key data could result in a data breach and fines. The Future Generations VCT Board is reliant on Octopus and third parties to take appropriate measures to prevent a loss of confidential customer information. Annual due diligence is conducted on third parties which includes a review of their controls for information security. Octopus has a dedicated Information Security team and a third party is engaged to provide continual protection in this area. A security framework is in place to help prevent malicious events. The appropriateness of mitigants in place are continuously reassessed to adapt to new risk exposures, such as those posed by artificial intelligence. No overall change on balance, although cyber threat remains a significant risk area faced by all providers.
    Risk Mitigation Change
    Economic:    
    Events such as an economic recession, movement in interest rates, inflation and rising living costs could adversely affect some smaller companies’ valuations, as they may be more vulnerable to changes in trading conditions of the sectors in which they operate. This could result in a reduction in the value of Future Generations VCT assets. Future Generations VCT aims to invest in a diverse portfolio of companies, across a range of sectors, which helps to mitigate against the impact on any one sector. Future Generations VCT also maintains adequate liquidity to make sure that it can continue to provide follow‑on investment to those portfolio companies which require it and which are supported by the individual investment case. Increased exposures reflected in the previous periods remain as economic uncertainty persists through high inflation, high interest rates and other economic factors.
    Risk Mitigation Change
    Legislative:    
    A change to the VCT regulations could adversely impact Future Generations VCT by restricting the companies Future Generations VCT can invest in under its current strategy. Similarly, changes to VCT tax reliefs for investors could make VCTs less attractive and impact Future Generations VCT’s ability to raise further funds. The Portfolio Manager engages with HM Treasury and industry bodies to demonstrate the positive benefits of VCTs in terms of growing early-stage companies, creating jobs and increasing tax revenue, and to help shape any change to VCT legislation. Risk exposure has reduced following the extension of the sunset clause to 2035 being agreed.
    Risk Mitigation Change
    Liquidity:    
    The risk that Future Generations VCT’s available cash will not be sufficient to meet its financial obligations. Future Generations VCT invests into smaller unquoted companies, which are inherently illiquid as there is no readily available market for these shares. Therefore, these may be difficult to realise for their fair market value at short notice. Future Generations VCT’s liquidity risk is managed on a continuing basis by Octopus in accordance with policies and procedures agreed by the Board. Future Generations VCT’s overall liquidity risks are monitored on a quarterly basis by the Board, with frequent budgeting and close monitoring of available cash resources. Future Generations VCT maintains sufficient investments in cash and readily realisable securities to meet its financial obligations. At 31 December 2024, these resources were valued at £20,084,000. Risk exposures continue to increase, reflecting the potential knock-on effects of economic uncertainty, impacting fundraising and increasing the risk of disposal failure.

    Viability statement

    In accordance with the FRC UK Corporate Governance Code published in 2018 and provision 36 of the AIC Code of Corporate Governance, the Directors have assessed the prospects of Future Generations VCT over a period of five years, consistent with the expected investment holding period of an investor. A fundraise with an initial offer to raise up to £5 million was launched on 3 February 2025. The offer closed for new applications on 1 April 2025 for the 2024/2025 tax year having successfully raised £5 million. Under VCT rules, subscribing investors are required to hold their investment for a five‑year period in order to benefit from the associated tax reliefs. The Board regularly considers strategy, including investor demand for Future Generations VCT’s shares, and a five-year period is considered to be a reasonable time horizon for this.

    The Board carried out a robust assessment of the emerging and principal risks facing Future Generations VCT and its current position. This includes risks which may adversely impact its business model, future performance, solvency or liquidity, and focused on the major factors which affect the economic, regulatory and political environment. Particular consideration was given to the Company’s reliance on, and close working relationship with, the Investment Manager. The principal risks faced by the Company and the procedures in place to monitor and mitigate them are set out above.

    The Board has carried out robust stress testing of cash flows, which included assessing the resilience of portfolio companies, including the requirement for any future financial support.

    The Board has additionally considered the ability of Future Generations VCT to comply with the ongoing conditions to make sure it maintains its VCT qualifying status under its current Investment policy.

    Based on this assessment, the Board confirms that it has a reasonable expectation that Future Generations VCT will be able to continue in operation and meet its liabilities as they fall due over the five-year period to 31 December 2029. The Board is mindful of the ongoing risks and will continue to make sure that appropriate safeguards are in place, in addition to monitoring the cash flow forecasts to make sure Future Generations VCT has sufficient liquidity.

    Directors’ responsibilities statement

    The Directors are responsible for preparing the Strategic Report, the Directors’ Report, the Directors’ Remuneration Report and the Financial Statements in accordance with applicable law and regulations. They are also responsible for ensuring that the annual report and financial statements include information required by the UK Listing Rules of the Financial Conduct Authority.

    Company law requires the Directors to prepare financial statements for each financial year. Under that law the Directors have elected to prepare the financial statements in accordance with United Kingdom Generally Accepted Accounting Practice (GAAP), including Financial Reporting Standard 102 – The Financial Reporting Standard Applicable in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland (FRS 102), United Kingdom accounting standards and applicable law. Under company law the Directors must not approve the financial statements unless they are satisfied that they give a true and fair view of the state of affairs and profit or loss of the Company for that period. In preparing these financial statements, the Directors are required to:

    • select suitable accounting policies and then apply them consistently;
    • make judgements and accounting estimates that are reasonable and prudent;
    • state whether applicable UK accounting standards have been followed, subject to any material departures disclosed and explained in the financial statements;
    • prepare the financial statements on the going concern basis unless it is inappropriate to presume that the Company will continue in business; and
    • prepare a Strategic Report, Directors’ Report and Directors’ Remuneration Report which comply with the requirements of the Companies Act 2006.

    The Directors are responsible for keeping adequate accounting records that are sufficient to show and explain the Company’s transactions and disclose with reasonable accuracy at any time the financial position of the Company and enable them to ensure that the financial statements comply with the Companies Act 2006. They are also responsible for safeguarding the assets of the Company and hence for taking reasonable steps for the prevention and detection of fraud and other irregularities.

    In so far as each of the Directors is aware:

    • there is no relevant audit information of which the Company’s auditor is unaware; and
    • the Directors have taken all steps that they ought to have taken to make themselves aware of any relevant audit information and to establish that the auditor is aware of that information.

    The Directors are responsible for preparing the annual report and financial statements in accordance with applicable law and regulations. Having taken advice from the Audit Committee, the Directors are of the opinion that this report as a whole provides the necessary information to assess the Company’s performance, business model and strategy and is fair, balanced and understandable.

    The Directors are responsible for the maintenance and integrity of the corporate and financial information included on the Company’s website. Legislation in the United Kingdom governing the preparation and dissemination of financial statements may differ from legislation in other jurisdictions.

    The Directors confirm that, to the best of their knowledge:

    • the financial statements, prepared in accordance with United Kingdom Generally Accepted Accounting Practice, including FRS 102, give a true and fair view of the assets, liabilities, financial position and profit or loss of the Company; and
    • the annual report and financial statements (including the Strategic Report), give a fair review of the development and performance of the business and the position of the Company, together with a description of the principal risks and uncertainties that it faces.

    On behalf of the Board

    Helen Sinclair
    Chair

    Income statement

        18 months to 31 December 2024 Year to 30 June 2023
        Revenue Capital Total Revenue Capital Total
        £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000
    Gain on disposal of fixed asset investments   — 1,382 1,382 — — —
    Net loss on valuation of fixed asset investments   — (3,564) (3,564) — (6) (6)
    Investment management fee   (345) (1,035) (1,380) (174) (522) (696)
    Investment income   1,427 — 1,427 424 — 424
    Other expenses   (759) — (759) (500) — (500)
    Earnings/(loss) before tax   323 (3,217) (2,894) (250) (528) (778)
    Tax   — — — — — —
    Earnings/(loss) after tax   323 (3,217) (2,894) (250) (528) (778)
    Earnings/(loss) per share – basic and diluted   0.6p (6.3)p (5.7)p (0.6)p (1.3)p (1.9)p
    • The ‘Total’ column of this statement is the profit and loss account of Future Generations VCT; the supplementary revenue return and capital return columns have been prepared under guidance published by the Association of Investment Companies.
    • All revenue and capital items in the above statement derive from continuing operations.
    • Future Generations VCT has only one class of business and derives its income from investments made in shares and securities and from bank and money market funds.

    Future Generations VCT has no other comprehensive income for the period.

    The accompanying notes form an integral part of the financial statements.

    Balance sheet

        As at 31 December 2024 As at 30 June 2023  
        £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000  
    Fixed asset investments     26,769   24,895  
    Current assets:            
    Debtors   1,166   379    
    Applications cash1   100   370    
    Cash at bank   112   152    
    Money market funds   19,972   20,140    
          21,350   21,041  
    Creditors: amounts falling due within one year   (196)   (518)    
    Net current assets     21,154   20,523  
    Net assets     47,923   45,418  
    Share capital     54   48  
    Share premium     51,854   46,461  
    Capital reserve realised     (328)   (640)  
    Capital reserve unrealised     (3,526)   3  
    Revenue reserve     (131)   (454)  
    Total equity shareholders’ funds     47,923   45,418  
    NAV per share     88.8p   94.3p  
    1. Cash received from investors but not yet allotted.

    The accompanying notes form an integral part of the financial statements.

    The statements were approved by the Directors and authorised for issue on 28 April 2025 and are signed on their behalf by:

    Helen Sinclair
    Chair
    Company No: 13750143

    Statement of changes in equity

      Share capital
    £’000    		 Share premium
    £’000    		 Capital reserve realised1
    £’000    		 Capital reserve unrealised
    £’000    		 Revenue reserve1
    £’000    		 Total
    £’000
    As at 1 July 2023 48 46,461 (640) 3 (454) 45,418
    Comprehensive income for the period:            
    Management fees allocated as capital expenditure — — (1,035) — — (1,035)
    Current year gain on disposal of fixed asset investments — — 1,382 — — 1,382
    Net loss on fair value of fixed asset investments — — — (3,564) — (3,564)
    Gain after tax — — — — 323 323
    Total comprehensive loss for the period — — 347 (3,564) 323 (2,894)
    Contributions by and distributions to owners:            
    Share issue 6 5,506 — — — 5,512
    Share issue costs — (113) — — — (113)
    Total contributions by and distributions to owners 6 5,393 — — — 5,399
    Other movements:            
    Prior year fixed asset loss unrealised — — (35) 35 — —
    Total other movements — — (35) 35 — —
    Balance as at 31 December 2024 54 51,854 (328) (3,526) (131) 47,923
      Share capital
    £’000    		 Share premium
    £’000    		 Capital reserve realised1
    £’000    		 Capital reserve unrealised
    £’000    		 Revenue reserve1
    £’000    		 Total
    £’000
    As at 1 July 2022 33 31,572 (118) 9 (204) 31,292
    Comprehensive income for the period:            
    Management fees allocated as capital expenditure — — (522) — — (522)
    Net loss on fair value of fixed asset investments — — — (6) — (6)
    Loss after tax — — — — (250) (250)
    Total comprehensive loss for the period — — (522) (6) (250) (778)
    Contributions by and distributions to owners:            
    Shares issued 15 15,164 — — — 15,179
    Share issue costs — (275) — — — (275)
    Total contributions by and distributions to owners 15 14,889 — — — 14,904
    Balance as at 30 June 2023 48 46,461 (640) 3 (454) 45,418
    1. Reserves are available for distribution, subject to the restrictions.

    The accompanying notes form an integral part of the financial statements.

    Cash flow statement

        18 months to
    31 December     		 Year to
    30 June
        2024 2023
        £’000 £’000
    Cash flows from operating activities      
    Loss before tax1   (2,894) (778)
    Decrease/(increase) in debtors   173 (325)
    Decrease in creditors   (52) (103)
    Gain on disposal of fixed assets   (1,382) —
    Loss on valuation of fixed asset investments   3,564 6
    Outflow from operating activities   (591) (1,200)
    Cash flows from investing activities      
    Purchase of fixed asset investments   (8,162) (23,238)
    Sale of fixed asset investments   3,146 —
    Outflow from investing activities   (5,016) (23,238)
    Cash flows from financing activities      
    Movement in applications account   (270) (1,544)
    Proceeds from share issues   5,512 15,179
    Share issue costs   (113) (275)
    Inflow from financing activities   5,129 13,360
    Decrease in cash and cash equivalents   (478) (11,079)
    Opening cash and cash equivalents   20,662 31,741
    Closing cash and cash equivalents   20,184 20,662
    Cash and cash equivalents comprise      
    Cash at bank   112 152
    Money market funds   19,972 20,140
    Applications cash   100 370
    Closing cash and cash equivalents   20,184 20,662
    1. Loss before tax includes cashflows from dividends of £1.4 million (2023: £0.4 million).

    The accompanying notes form an integral part of the financial statements.

    Notes to the financial statements

    1. Principal accounting policies

    Octopus Future Generations VCT plc (‘Future Generations VCT’) is a Public Limited Company (plc) incorporated in England and Wales and its registered office is at 6th Floor, 33 Holborn, London EC1N 2HT.

    Future Generations VCT has been approved as a Venture Capital Trust by HMRC under Section 259 of the Income Taxes Act 2007. The shares of Future Generations VCT were first admitted to the Official List of the UK Listing Authority and trading on the London Stock Exchange on 5 April 2022 and can be found under the TIDM code OFG. Future Generations VCT is premium listed.

    The principal activity of Future Generations VCT is to invest in a diversified portfolio of UK smaller companies in order to generate capital growth over the long term as well as an attractive tax-free dividend stream.

    The financial statements are presented in GBP (£) to the nearest £’000. The functional currency is also GBP (£). Some accounting policies have been disclosed in the respective notes to the financial statements.

    Basis of preparation
    The financial statements have been prepared on a going concern basis under the historical cost convention, except for the measurement at fair value of certain financial instruments, and in accordance with UK Generally Accepted Accounting Practice (GAAP), including Financial Reporting Standard 102 – ‘The Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland’ (FRS 102), the Companies Act 2006 and the Statement of Recommended Practice (SORP) ‘Financial Statements of Investment Trust Companies and Venture Capital Trusts (July 2022)’.

    2. Investment income
    Accounting policy

    Investment income comprises interest earned on money market funds. Dividend income is shown net of any related tax credit. Dividends receivable are brought into account when Future Generation’s right to receive payment is established and there is no reasonable doubt that payment will be received. Fixed returns on debt and money market funds are recognised so as to reflect the effective interest rate, provided there is no reasonable doubt that payment will be received in due course.

    Disclosure

      18 months to  
      31 December 2024

        30 June 2023
      £’000 £’000
    Money market funds 1,427 424
    Total investment income 1,427 424

    3. Investment management fees
    Accounting policy

    For the purposes of the revenue and capital columns in the Income Statement, the management fee has been allocated 25% to revenue and 75% to capital, in line with the Board’s expected long-term return in the form of income and capital gains respectively from Future Generations VCT’s investment portfolio.

    Disclosure

      18 months to 31 December 2024 Year to 30 June 2023
      Revenue Capital Total Revenue Capital Total
      £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000
    Investment            
    management fee 345 1,035 1,380 174 522 696
    Total 345 1,035 1,380 174 522 696

    The Portfolio Manager provides investment management services through agreements with Octopus AIF Management Limited and Future Generations VCT. It also provides accounting and administration services to Future Generations VCT under a Non-Investment Services Agreement (NISA). No compensation is payable if the agreement is terminated by either party, if the required notice period is given. The fee payable, should insufficient notice be given, will be equal to the fee that would have been paid should continuous service be provided, or the required notice period was given.

    4. Other expenses
    Accounting policy

    Other expenses are accounted for on an accruals basis and are charged wholly to revenue.

    The transaction costs incurred when purchasing or selling assets are written off to the Income Statement in the period that they occur.

      18 months to Year to
      31 December 30 June
      2024 2023
      £’000 £’000
    NISA fees 213 122
    Directors’ remuneration1 157 77
    Audit fees2 78 63
    Directors and Officers (D&O) insurance 74 15
    Depositary fees 62 57
    Listing fees 46 58
    Registrars fees 28 21
    Director recruitment & expenses 27 —
    Report and account fees 26 38
    Other fees 48 49
    Total 759 500

    1. Includes employers’ NI.
    2. Includes VAT.

    Total ongoing charges are capped at 3.0% of net assets. For the period to 31 December 2024, the ongoing charges exceeded this cap and a rebate was paid from the Portfolio Manager for the amount of £39,000. For the 18 months to 31 December 2024 the ongoing charges were 3.0% (2023: 3.0%) of net assets. This is calculated by summing the annualised expenses incurred in the period (excluding non-recurring expenses) divided by the average NAV throughout the period.

    5. Tax on ordinary activities
    Accounting policy

    Corporation tax payable is applied to profits chargeable to corporation tax, if any, at the current rate. The tax effect of different items of income/gain and expenditure/loss is allocated between capital and revenue return on the ‘marginal’ basis as recommended in the SORP.

    Deferred tax is recognised in respect of all timing differences at the reporting date. Timing differences are differences between taxable profits and total income as stated in the financial statements that arise from the inclusion of income and expenses in tax assessments in periods different from those in which they are recognised in financial statements.

    Disclosure
    The corporation tax charge for the period was £nil.

      18 months to Year to
      31 December 30 June
      2024 2023
      £’000 £’000
    Loss on ordinary activities before tax (2,894) (778)
    Current tax at 25% (2023: 20.5%) (724) (159)
    Effects of:    
    Non-taxable income (357) —
    Non-taxable capital gains 546 1
    Non-deductible expenses 1 —
    Excess management expenses on which deferred tax not recognised 534 193
    Tax rate differences1 — (35)
    Total current tax charge — —

    1. Tax rate difference due to tax charge for the period being calculated at 20.5% and excess management expenses on which deferred tax is not recognised being calculated at 25%.

    Unrelieved tax losses of £3,231,000 (2023: £1,094,000) are estimated to be carried forward at 31 December 2024 (subject to completion of Future Generations VCT’s tax return) and are available for offset against future taxable income, subject to agreement with HMRC. Future Generations VCT has not recognised the deferred tax asset of £808,000 (2023: £273,000) in respect of these tax losses because there is insufficient forecast taxable income in excess of deductible expenses to utilise these losses carried forward.

    Approved VCTs are exempt from tax on capital gains. As the Directors intend for Future Generations VCT to continue to maintain its approval as a VCT through its affairs, no current deferred tax has been recognised in respect of any capital gains or losses arising on the revaluation or disposal of investment.

    6. (Loss)/earnings per share

      18 months to 31 December 2024 Year to 30 June 2023
      Revenue Capital Total Revenue Capital Total
      £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000
    Earnings/(loss) attributable to Ordinary shareholders (£’000)

    323

    (3,217)

    (2,894)

    (250)

    (528)

    (778)
    Earnings/(loss) per Ordinary share (p) 0.6 (6.3) (5.7) (0.6) (1.3) (1.9)

    The Earnings/(loss) per share is based on 51,727,417 (2023: 40,987,788) Ordinary shares, being the weighted average number of Ordinary shares in issue during the period.

    There are no potentially dilutive capital instruments in issue and so no diluted return per share figures are relevant. The basic and diluted earnings per share are therefore identical.

    7. Net asset value per share

      31 December 30 June
      2024 2023
    Net assets (£’000) 47,923 45,418
    Shares in issue 53,941,104 48,138,337
    NAV per share (p) 88.8 94.3

    8. Transactions with the Manager and Portfolio Manager

    Future Generations VCT is classified as a full-scope Alternative Investment Fund under the Alternative Investment Fund Management Directive (the ‘AIFM Directive’). Future Generations VCT has appointed Octopus AIF Management Limited to provide the services of an AIFM of a full-scope AIF. In accordance with its power to do so under AIFMD, Octopus AIF Management Limited has delegated investment management to Octopus Investments Limited, whilst retaining the obligations of a risk manager.

    Future Generations VCT paid Octopus AIF Management Limited £1,380,000 (2023: £696,000) in the period as a management fee, after applying a rebate to maintain the total ongoing charges below the 3% cap. The annual management charge (AMC) is based on 2% of Future Generations VCT’s NAV. The AMC is payable quarterly in advance and calculated using the latest published NAV of Future Generations VCT and the number of shares in issue at each quarter end. Once the quarter has ended, an adjustment will be made if the NAV at the end of the current quarter is calculated and which differs from the NAV as at the end of the previous quarter. The Manager will donate 10% of the management fee to the Octopus Giving Charitable Foundation, which was set up in 2014 to help charities make the world a better place and which, since inception, has donated more than £1 million to such worthy causes.

    Octopus also provides Non-Investment Services to Future Generations VCT, payable quarterly in advance. The fee is 0.3% of Future Generations VCT’s NAV, calculated at quarterly intervals. The NISA fee is calculated using the latest published NAV of Future Generations VCT and the number of shares in issue at each quarter end. As with the AMC, an adjustment will be made once the quarter has ended if the NAV at the end of the current quarter is calculated and which differs from the NAV as at the end of the previous quarter. During the period £213,000 (2023: £122,000) was paid to Octopus for Non‑Investment Services. In addition, Octopus is entitled to performance-related incentive fees, subject to Future Generations VCT’s total return at year end exceeding the total return at the previous year end when an incentive fee was paid, or 97p if the first incentive fee has not yet been paid (the ‘Excess’), equal to 20% of the Excess. No performance fee will be paid prior to the financial year ending on 31 December 2025, dividends (paid or declared) being equal to or greater than 10p per Ordinary share and the total return exceeding 120p.

    The cap relating to Future Generations VCT’s total expense ratio, that is the regular, recurring costs of Future Generations VCT expressed as a percentage of its NAV, above which Octopus has agreed to pay, is 3.0%, and is calculated in accordance with the AIC Guidelines.

    Octopus AIF Management Limited remuneration disclosures (unaudited)
    Quantitative remuneration disclosures required to be made in this annual report in accordance with the FCA Handbook FUND 3.3.5 are available on the website: https://www.octopusinvestments.com/remuneration-disclosures/.

    9. Related party transactions

    Several members of the Octopus investment team hold non-executive directorships as part of their monitoring roles in Future Generations VCT’s portfolio companies, but they have no controlling interests in those companies.

    Emma Davies, a Non-Executive Director of Future Generations VCT, previously held the role of co-CEO of Octopus Ventures and she also holds shares in Octopus Capital Ltd. On 24 March 2023, Emma Davies ceased to be employed by Octopus Capital Limited and therefore she is no longer considered a related party. Emma retired as a Non-Executive Director of Future Generations VCT on 31 March 2024. No dividends have been paid to the Directors of Future Generations VCT in the period (2023: £nil).

    10. 2024 financial information

    The figures and financial information for the period ended 31 December 2024 are extracted from the Company’s annual financial statements for the period and do not constitute statutory accounts. The Company’s annual financial statements for the period to 31 December 2024 have been audited but have not yet been delivered to the Registrar of Companies. The Auditors’ report on the 2024 annual financial statements was unqualified, did not include a reference to any matter to which the auditors drew attention without qualifying the report, and did not contain any statements under Sections 498(2) or 498(3) of the Companies Act 2006.

    11. 2023 financial information

    The figures and financial information for the year ended 30 June 2023 are compiled from an extract of the published financial statements for the period and do not constitute statutory accounts. Those financial statements have been delivered to the Registrar of Companies and included the Auditors’ report which was unqualified, did not include a reference to any matter to which the auditors drew attention without qualifying the report, and did not contain any statements under Sections 498(2) or 498(3) of the Companies Act 2006.

    12. Annual Report and financial statements
    The Annual Report and financial statements will be posted to shareholders in early May and will be available on the Company’s website, https://octopusinvestments.com/our-products/venture-capital-trusts/octopus-future-generations-vct/.
    The Notice of Annual General Meeting is contained within the Annual Report.

    13. General information

    Registered in England & Wales. Company No. 13750143
    LEI: 213800AL71Z7N2O58N66

    14. Directors

    Helen Sinclair (Chair), Joanna Santinon and Ajay Chowdhury

    15. Secretary and registered office   

    Octopus Company Secretarial Services Limited
    6th Floor, 33 Holborn, London EC1N 2HT

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI: Annual report and financial statements for the year ended 31 December 2024

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    OCTOPUS TITAN VCT PLC

    Annual report and financial statements for the year ended 31 December 2024

    Octopus Titan VCT plc announces the final results for the year to 31 December 2024 as below.

    Octopus Titan VCT plc (‘Titan’ or the ‘Company’) is managed by Octopus AIF Management Limited (the ‘Manager’), which has delegated investment management to Octopus Investments Limited (‘Octopus’ or ‘Portfolio Manager’) via its investment team Octopus Ventures.

    Key financials

      2024 2023
    Net assets (£’000) £831,358 £993,744
    Loss after tax (£’000) £(147,649) £(149,499)
    NAV per share 50.5p 62.4p
    Total value per share1 155.6p 164.4p
    Total return per share2 (8.8)p (9.5)p
    Total return per share %3 (14.1)% (12.4)%
    Dividends paid in the year 3.1p 5.0p
    Dividend yield %4 5.0% 6.5%
    Dividend declared 0.5p 1.9p
    1. Total value per share is an alternative performance measure, calculated as NAV plus cumulative dividends paid since launch, as described in the glossary of terms.
    2. Total return per share is an alternative performance measure, calculated as movement in NAV per share in the period plus dividends paid in the period, as described in the glossary of terms.
    3. Total return % is an alternative performance measure, calculated as total return/opening NAV, as described in the glossary of terms.
    4. Dividend yield is an alternative performance measure, calculated as dividends paid/opening NAV, as described in the glossary of terms.

    Chair’s statement
    Titan’s total return for the year to 31 December 2024 was -14.1% with net assets at the end of the period totalling £831 million.

    The Net Asset Value (NAV) per share at 31 December 2024 was 50.5p which, adjusting for dividends paid in the year, represents a net decrease of 8.8p per share from 31 December 2023 or a total return of –14.1%.

    This further decline in value has been driven by several factors, including company-specific performance issues and tougher trading conditions, which have reduced revenue growth across a range of sectors. As a result, many companies in the portfolio have not met performance expectations, leading to lower valuation multiples being applied compared to those at recent points of investment. This situation has been exacerbated by a continued slow private market fundraising environment, leading to more limited capital availability. Consequently, companies have prioritised extending their cash runway, aiming to achieve profitability or delay fundraising until market conditions improve. In the short term, this has led to reduced valuations due to slower growth, but in the long run, the disciplined focus on sustainable growth should be beneficial.

    With this further decline in NAV, the 5-year tax-free annual compound return for shareholders is now -3.5%. Since the high watermark as at 31 December 2021, Titan’s total return per share has been –39.8% with which the Board and Manager are, and shareholders will be, deeply disappointed. The scale of shareholder dissatisfaction has been made abundantly clear following the recently conducted survey.

    In the 12 months to 31 December 2024, the Company utilised £137 million of its cash resources, comprising £30 million in new and follow-on investments, £44 million in dividends (net of the Dividend Reinvestment Scheme (DRIS)), £38 million in share buybacks and £25 million in annual investment management fees and other running costs. The cash and corporate bond balance of £184 million at 31 December 2024 represented 22% of net assets at that date, compared to 20% at 31 December 2023.

    The total value (NAV plus cumulative dividends paid per share since launch) at the end of the period was 155.6p (31 December 2023: 164.4p). Titan’s one-year total return of -8.8p (-14.1%) five-year total return of -15.6p (-16.4%) and ten-year total return of 6.7p (6.6%) evidences the disappointing decline in performance in recent years.

    Strategic Review

    As shareholders will be aware, in the half-yearly report issued at the end of September 2024, we announced a review of strategy to ensure a thorough retrospective analysis took place and a plan be drawn up for how the Company can be best structured for sustainability and improved performance in the future. A significant amount of work has been undertaken by Octopus and our appointed external advisers, Smith Square Partners LLP, across a number of different workstreams. This includes a detailed analysis of historical investment performance, ongoing sustainability, the forward-looking pipeline for realisations, future investment strategy, investment team resources and, finally, investment manager’s culture and governance. The significant performance challenges and the early-stage nature of much of the portfolio mean that it will take some time for changes to have an impact on performance and a longer-term approach to shaping the future of the Company is needed. We are making reasonably good progress, and more can be read about the steps which have been taken in the Spotlight section. The response to our shareholder survey is included below. From this it is clear that there is widespread and deep dissatisfaction with the past performance of Titan, both in absolute and relative terms and an understandable frustration with the lack of capital growth in recent years. The Board also acknowledges the recent press coverage, particularly in respect of shareholders’ views on the fees that Titan pays. We would like to thank those that participated in the survey, as well as those that have provided their feedback to both the Board and Octopus. The Board wishes to assure shareholders that it is considering the results and feedback alongside the review.

    We expect to provide a further update on the review at, or prior to, our Annual General Meeting (AGM) on 19 June 2025. However, we do not anticipate the process to be completed by this point, so any proposals for the future of the Company will likely be put to shareholders at a later date.

    Performance incentive fees
    As the 2024 total return has been negative, and total value per share has declined since 31 December 2021, no performance fee is payable. To remind you, the performance fee is calculated as 20% on net gains above the high-water mark (the highest total value per share as at previous year ends), which is currently set as 197.7p as at 31 December 2021.

    Dividends
    Following careful consideration and recognising the value that shareholders’ place on receiving tax-free dividends, I am pleased to confirm that the Board has decided to declare a second interim dividend of 0.5p per share (2023: 1.9p per share). This will be paid on 29 May 2025 to shareholders on the register as at 25 April 2025. This second interim dividend, in addition to the 1.2p per share interim dividend paid in December 2024 brings the total dividends declared to 1.7p per share in respect of 2024. However, this 0.5p per share dividend is lower than that paid in previous years because of the ongoing performance challenges and dividends are typically a distribution of achieved performance. Considering dividends paid during 2024 (totalling 3.1p), the total dividend yield for the year is 5%, therefore meeting the Company’s target.

    Dividends, whether paid in cash or reinvested under the DRIS, are always at the discretion of the Board, are never guaranteed, and are subject to regular review reflecting the returns generated by the Company, the timing of investment realisations, cash and distributable reserves and continuing compliance with VCT rules.

    The Board will consider any further dividends to be paid in 2025 in the second half of the year at, or around, the release of the interim accounts for the six months ending 30 June 2025, subject to Titan’s performance, both realised and unrealised, improving and, as ever, Titan holding sufficient cash reserves.

    As with the dividend paid to shareholders on 19 December 2024, and in light of the ongoing review of Titan’s strategy, the Board continues to suspend the Company’s dividend reinvestment scheme for the dividend to be paid on 29 May 2025, with the dividend being paid to shareholders in cash.

    Fundraise and buybacks
    We were pleased to raise over £107 million in the fundraise which closed on 5 April 2024. As stated in the half-yearly review, the Board will decide on the approach to future fundraising at the conclusion of the review of strategy.

    During the year, Titan repurchased 67 million shares for £38 million (representing 4.2% of the net asset value as at 31 December 2023). Further details can be found in Note 14 of the financial statements. Details of the share buybacks undertaken during the year can be found in the Directors’ Report.

    VCT status
    In November 2023, a ten-year extension was announced to the ‘sunset clause’ (a retirement date for the VCT scheme), meaning VCT tax reliefs will be available until 5 April 2035. This extension passed through Parliament in February 2024 and on 3 September 2024, His Majesty’s Treasury brought the extension into effect through The Finance Act 2024. The Board is delighted that this has brought clarity to the status of VCTs.

    Board of Directors
    Rupert Dickinson was appointed to the Board with effect from 1 May 2024 and was elected by shareholders at the AGM held in June 2024. Rupert has over 20 years’ experience in the wealth and investment management industries. We are already benefitting from his extensive experience.

    All the other Directors have indicated their willingness to remain on the Board, and Jane O’Riordan and Lord Rockley will be seeking re-election at the AGM.

    Portfolio Manager and team
    In March 2024, Malcolm Ferguson, Octopus’ lead Fund Manager for Titan, resigned and Jo Oliver was appointed as lead Fund Manager and Adviser to the Board on fund and strategy on an interim basis. In August 2024, Jo stepped down from this interim role. We wish to take this opportunity to thank both Jo and Malcolm for their contributions to the Company and wish them well for the future. We are pleased that, despite Malcolm’s resignation, he continues to support with portfolio management on a contractual basis. The process to appoint a replacement lead Fund Manager will commence once the review of strategy is completed.

    Shareholders may be aware that there has been considerable turnover over the past twelve months in the Octopus Ventures team, which is responsible for managing Titan. As part of the on-going strategic review, Octopus is assessing the team structure, size, culture and experience to ensure it is aligned with its future investment strategy proposals. In the interim, the Octopus Ventures team is receiving additional senior support from across the business to ensure adequate resources are available.

    AGM and shareholder event
    The AGM will take place on 19 June 2025 from 12.00 noon and will be held at the offices of Octopus Investments Limited, 33 Holborn, London, EC1N 2HT. Full details of the business to be conducted at the AGM are given in the Notice of AGM.

    Shareholders’ views are important, and the Board encourages shareholders to vote on the resolutions within the Notice of AGM using the proxy form, or electronically at www.investorcentre.co.uk/eproxy. Shareholders are invited to send any questions they may have via email to TitanAGM@octopusinvestments.com. The Board has carefully considered the business to be approved at the AGM and recommends shareholders to vote in favour of all the resolutions being proposed, as the Board will be doing.

    Currently, we do not anticipate the strategic review process will have been fully completed by the date of the AGM. As a result, we will issue a further communication to shareholders in due course setting a date for a shareholder event and, if applicable, a General Meeting at which shareholders will be able to vote on any proposals for the future direction of the Company.

    Outlook
    The further decline in NAV to 31 December 2024 is extremely disappointing, especially when set against the backdrop of the recent recovery of some of the comparable markets and other VCTs. This decline has been primarily driven by specific portfolio performance issues and sectoral downturns, leading to cash constraints exacerbated by a challenging fundraising environment. Some portfolio companies attempted to raise funds but were unsuccessful, resulting in several being placed into administration or accepting acquisition offers on unfavourable terms. More details on these disposals can be found in the Portfolio Manager’s review. Others had to complete funding rounds at lower valuations or in ways that negatively impacted the value of the Company’s shareholding.

    The Company returned £29 million in cash proceeds from exits in 2024, in addition to £12.4 million distributed from Zenith Holding Company to Titan. This is a disappointing outcome as it is below the level achieved in 2023, and does not accomplish the Company’s long-term sustainability target. Despite the Manager’s initiatives to increase the number of realisations of portfolio companies and return cash proceeds to Titan, we have not yet seen any profitable realisations in 2025. This sustained focus on achieving regular liquidity is an important step towards ensuring the ongoing sustainability of the Company.

    Despite this, the Board retains a degree of optimism about the potential of some of the companies within what is undoubtedly a diversified portfolio, with over 135 companies spanning a wide range of sectors, business models and investment stages. Furthermore, Titan’s portfolio remains well funded with circa 42% of the portfolio NAV being comprised of companies not expecting to need further funding. This figure rises to 67% when including those companies with more than 12 months’ cash runway.

    I would like to conclude by thanking both the Board and the Octopus team on behalf of all shareholders for their hard work during this very challenging period.

    Tom Leader
    Chair

    Spotlight on the review of strategy

    On 30 September 2024, the Board, in conjunction with the Manager, announced a strategic review. This was catalysed by the ongoing challenges in the early-stage venture market to which the Company is exposed and the resultant performance issues faced. Since this date, the Board and Manager have undertaken numerous actions to identify the areas of focus and potential changes which could be made to drive the best performance for the Company and outcome for shareholders. Below is a summary of the steps taken to date by both the Board and Manager.

    Date Investment Manager’s actions Titan VCT Board’s actions Board meetings held
    Sep 2024   Announcement of review of strategy. Four Board meetings
    Oct 2024 Establish internal review committee comprised of different areas of the business.

    Co-ordinating information packs for the external advisers.

    		 External adviser selection process concluded and terms agreed.  
    Nov 2024 Recruitment process for senior Portfolio Management roles commences.

    Internal review committee submits scope of work to the Board.

    		 External advisers, Smith Square Partners, appointed.

    Board reviews Octopus’ scope of work.

    		 Two Board meetings
    Dec 2024 Internal review committee submits information pack on sustainability and fund performance workstreams to the Board. Shareholder and adviser survey launched.

    Board reviews information pack on sustainability and fund performance.

    Board reviews external advisers’ analysis of performance and benchmarking.

    		 One Board meeting
    Jan 2025 Survey results analysed.

    External specialists commence review of Consumer Duty.

    Internal review committee submits information pack on team and culture and risk and governance work streams to the Board.

    		 Board reviews external advisers’ progress report including analysis of the realisations pipeline.

    Board reviews information pack on team and culture and risk and governance work streams.

    Survey results analysed.

    		 Two Board meetings
    Feb 2025 Internal review committee presents first part of the go-forward investment strategy and further sustainability analysis and metrics. Board reviews go‑forward strategy and sustainability analysis and metrics. One Board meeting
    Mar 2025 Results of Consumer Duty Review analysed. Board reviews external advisers’ progress report.

    Results of Consumer Duty Review analysed.

    Unaudited NAV released with update on progress of review.

    		 Two Board meetings
    Apr 2025 Internal review committee presents follow up detail on the go-forward investment strategy, as well as proposals for future team and resourcing plan.

    Proposal submitted to Board regarding ongoing fees.

    		 External advisers’ interim report shared with the Board.

    Annual report published.

    Board considers proposal on future team and resourcing strategy and fees.

    Board commences fee negotiations with Octopus.

    		 Two Board meetings

    Summary of the Manager’s internal review workstreams:

    1. Fund performance
    Working to understand the most appropriate investment and divestment strategy looking at past performance metrics, benchmarks and future objectives.

    2. Fund strategy
    Investigating potential future options for Titan’s strategy which could drive improved performance. Some potential options were included in the shareholder survey to canvas views.

    3. Sustainability
    Working on past performance and future forecasting to ensure Titan operates sustainably, returning funds through realisations.

    4. Team & culture
    Reviewing the team structure, size, culture and experience (past and present) and how it maps to the successful management of the Company. Full Octopus Ventures strategy refresh in line with new Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Erin Platts joining.

    5. Consumer Duty
    External consultants appointed to carry out a review of Consumer Duty. This is to understand shareholders’ expected outcomes and assessing how the Company has delivered against them.

    6. Risk & governance
    Work led by the compliance team updating Titan’s risk register. Review and enhancement of governance processes and procedures, where relevant.

    What’s next
    1. Final Smith Square Partners report presented to the Board.
    2. Finalise fee proposal, as well as review of the Investment Management Agreement and Non-Investment Services Agreement.

    Octopus Ventures’ new CEO

    Erin Platts joined Octopus Ventures as CEO in January 2025.

    Previously, she held the role of CEO at HSBC Innovation Banking UK, formerly Silicon Valley Bank UK & EMEA. Over two decades in leadership roles with the institution, she established Silicon Valley Bank UK as a standalone, regulated subsidiary before leading the organisation through the transition period following its sale to HSBC in 2023, scaling operations to over 800 people, across six countries and into the market leading position across the sector.

    With a career spent in the US, UK and European tech ecosystems, Erin is an active and vocal spokesperson, championing Diversity, Equity and Inclusion through partnerships with organisations including Tech Nation, Founders Forum and the Newton Venture Program.

    Portfolio Manager’s review

    At Octopus, our focus is on managing your investments and providing open communication. Our annual and half-year updates are designed to keep you informed about the progress of your investment.

    Focus on performance
    The NAV of 50.5p per share at 31 December 2024 represents a decrease in NAV of 8.8p per share versus a NAV of 62.4p per share as at 31 December 2023, after adding back dividends paid during the year of 3.1p (2023: 5p) per share, a negative total return per share of 14.1% in the year.

    The performance over the five years to 31 December 2024 is shown below:

      Year ended Year ended Year ended Year ended Year ended
      31 December 31 December 31 December 31 December 31 December
      2020 2021 2022 2023 2024
    NAV, p 97.0 105.7 76.9 62.4 50.5
    Cumulative dividends paid, p 81.0 92.0 97.0 102.0 105.1
    Total value, p 178.0 197.7 173.9 164.4 155.6
    Total return1 7.1% 20.3% (22.5)% (12.4)% (14.1)%
    Dividend yield2 5.3% 11.3% 4.7% 6.5% 5.0%

    1. Total return % is an alternative performance measure, calculated as total return/opening NAV.
    2. Dividend yield is an alternative performance measure, calculated as dividends paid/opening NAV.

    We are deeply disappointed by the negative total return of 14.1% in 2024 which has been driven by a decline of £193 million across 72 companies. The businesses that contributed most significantly to this decline were Pelago, Many Pets and Big Health. Whilst these companies continue to look to scale, they have underperformed the high expectations set at their last funding round, and so have seen their valuations decline.

    These three valuation movements account for around a third of the total decline in NAV over the twelve-month reporting period.

    Octopus Ventures believes that many of the companies which have seen decreased valuations in the period have the potential to overcome the issues they face and get their growth plans back on track. Octopus Ventures continues to work with them to help them realise their potential. In some cases, the support offered could include further funding to ensure a business has the capital it needs to execute on its strategy. Our in-house Talent team is being utilised to build high-performing teams and support on key recruitment initiatives. This team, as well as our expert network of consultants, support companies on project work and can also work part-time with the businesses.

    More positively, 39 companies saw an increase in valuation in the period, delivering a collective increase in valuation of £56 million. These valuation increases reflect businesses which have successfully concluded further funding rounds at increased valuations, grown revenues or met certain important milestones. Notable strong performers in the portfolio include Legl, Taster and Katkin – all of which have increased their market reach through new product launches. These strong performers demonstrate that there are opportunities available for companies to thrive, and Titan’s diverse portfolio allows different routes for each company to succeed in their market.

    The gain on Titan’s uninvested cash reserves was £9.2 million in the year to 31 December 2024, primarily driven by a fair value movement of £4.4 million in the corporate bond portfolio and a return of £4.2 million on the money market funds. The objective for the money market funds is to earn appropriate market rates on highly liquid treasury holdings, with limited risk to capital.

    Titan total value growth from inception
    The table below highlights the compound annual growth rate across different holding periods.

    Despite the reduction in NAV in the year, the total value has seen an increase since the end of Titan’s first year, from 89.9p to 155.6p at 31 December 2024. Since Titan launched, a total of over £557 million has been distributed back to shareholders in the form of tax-free dividends. This includes dividends reinvested as part of the DRIS.

    Holding period Total return Tax-free compound
    annual growth rate
    Since October 2008 73.1% 3.4%
    10 years 6.6% 0.6%
    5 years (16.4)% (3.5)%
    1 year (14.1)% (14.1)%

    Disposals
    Disposals and deferred proceeds have returned £29 million in cash during the period. In addition, £12.4 million was distributed from Zenith Holding Company to the Company.

    Exits
    In June, Taxfix (a European focused tax return technology platform) acquired TaxScouts, for a combination of cash and equity, which has allowed it to enter the UK market. As a result, Titan now holds shares in Taxfix.

    In July, Foodsteps was acquired by Registrar Corp (a provider of regulatory and compliance software for the food, cosmetic and life sciences industry). This transaction was also for a combination of cash and equity and has offered Registrar Corp access to Foodsteps’ global market platform of over 32,000 companies in 190 countries.

    In November, Cobee was acquired by Pluxee Group (an employee benefits and engagement platform) as part of its strategic growth plan. Pluxee is a global leader in employee benefits and engagement, operating in 31 countries with over 5,000 employees. Pluxee is uniquely positioned to support Cobee’s continued growth.

    In November, nCino (a cloud-based software company that provides a platform for financial institutions to manage their business lines) acquired FullCircl. This will enhance nCino’s data and automation capabilities and allow it to expand its reach across the UK and Europe.

    In December, Behavox (a leading provider of AI powered archiving, compliance and security solutions) acquired Mosaic Smart Data.

    Partial exits
    Two partial exits completed in October with Neat (an embedded insurance platform that enables merchants to offer tailored insurance bundles to their customers at competitive rates) completing a €50 million Series A funding round, and Vitesse (a global domestic settlement and liquidity management system to hold funds and execute cross-border payments) completing a $93 million Series C investment round. As part of both of these rounds, Titan sold a portion of its shares. We are pleased to have realised some value for shareholders in these transactions, but also excited to maintain a holding in the companies and to be able to continue to support their growth journeys.

    Deferred proceeds
    In the year, Titan also received deferred proceeds from the sale of Calastone (to The Carlyle Group in 2020) which was held via Octopus Zenith Holding Company, iSize (to Sony Interactive Entertainment in 2023), Conversocial (to Verint), Glofox (to ABC Fitness), Comma (to Weavr) and Foodsteps (to Registrar).

    Exits at a loss
    There have been four disposals made at a loss: Titan sold its remaining shares in Cazoo, which was listed on the New York Stock Exchange, Unmade was acquired by High-Tech Apparel, and Titan’s shares in Appear Here were converted to deferred shares and divested, as there was not seen to be a chance of recovery of any funds. Vinter was acquired by Kaiko (a leading provider of cryptocurrency market data, analytics and indices) for equity. As a result, Titan now holds shares in Kaiko, which are currently valued below Titan’s initial cost of investment, but these will be subject to re-valuation at least twice annually as per our normal process. In aggregate, these losses generated negligible proceeds compared to an investment cost of £19 million.

    Companies placed into administration
    Unfortunately, Audiotelligence, Stackin (now fully dissolved), Contingent, Phoelex, Excession, Dead Happy, Pulse Platform and Allplants were placed into administration having all been unsuccessful in securing further funding and having explored and exhausted all available options. In aggregate, the investment cost of the companies placed into administration totalled £26 million.

    In the year to 31 December 2024, Third Eye and LifeBook were fully dissolved having been placed into administration in previous reporting periods.

    The underperformance of a portfolio company is always disappointing for Octopus and shareholders alike, but it is an inherent characteristic of a venture capital portfolio, and we believe the successful disposals will continue to outweigh the losses over the medium to long-term.

      Year ended 31 December 2020 Year ended 31 December 2021 Year ended 31 December 2022 Year ended 31 December 2023 Year ended 31 December 2024 Total
    Disposal proceeds1 (£’000) 23,915 221,504 62,213 45,637 41,432 394,701

    1.This table includes cash and retention proceeds received in the period.

    New and follow-on investments
    Titan completed 8 new investments and made 14 follow-on investments in the reporting period. Together, these totalled £30 million (made up of £19 million into new companies and £11 million invested into the existing portfolio).

    Please see a summary of some of the new investments we made in the year.

    • DRIFT Energy: Designing sailing vessels and routing algorithms required to capture deep water wind energy and convert it into onboard hydrogen gas for transportation back to shore.
    • ExpressionEdits: Using a proprietary AI algorithm to design DNA sequences and intronization technology to enhance the expression of proteins in mammalian cells.
    • Forefront: Developing a tuneable Radio Frequency Front-End (RFFE) module for mobile devices which is smaller, cheaper, and more flexible than currently available products sold.
    • LabGenius: A next-generation platform leveraging machine learning to develop novel therapeutic antibodies.
    • Manual: Provides innovative treatments for a range of health conditions.
    • Remofirst is an Employer of Record (EOR) and compliance platform that allows companies to hire and pay employees globally.
    • SWiiPR: Developed a digital payments platform specifically for the airline industry.

    As explained in the half-yearly report, the Octopus Ventures team is focused on improving performance from the existing portfolio and driving improved returns to shareholders. Given Titan’s scale, the greatest returns are expected to be driven by its existing, largest holdings. Over the last nine months, Titan has focused on building value in its existing portfolio, allowing capital and time to be prioritised on existing companies. No term sheets for new investments have been signed since the summer of 2024. The five follow-on investments which completed in the second half of 2024 have all increased in value in the December valuation round, on average seeing an increase of 10%. We believe that this focus will drive positive future NAV performance as these portfolio companies are more established, so have a greater potential to secure further investment, or are closer to an exit.

    Shareholder survey results
    Octopus regularly seeks feedback from Titan’s investor and adviser base either through local Business Development Managers or after webinars with the Investment Managers. Considering the ongoing review of Titan’s strategy, which is looking at a wide range of areas such as investment strategy, fundraising and dividend policies, Octopus and the Board wanted to give investors and advisers an extra opportunity to share feedback and help shape the future strategic direction of Titan. In conjunction with an external research firm, between December 2024 and January 2025, Octopus surveyed Titan’s investor and adviser base to try to better understand investors’ priorities, areas of concern and opportunities which may be of interest.

    We were pleased to see significant engagement, having received over 3,000 responses from investors and advisers. As stated in the Chair’s statement, the results emphasise that the greatest areas of dissatisfaction are around past performance and the capital growth opportunity, as highlighted below. Octopus and the Board share investors’ frustration with the recent poor performance, and have been reviewing Titan’s investment strategy with the aim to improve shareholder returns. The Board intends to communicate to investors any strategic changes once they are agreed in due course.

    To understand investors’ priorities when making their investment decision we asked the following:

    When you first chose to invest in Titan VCT, how important were the following factors?
    The results were as follows in order of importance:

    1. Tax reliefs available on your investment (income tax relief, tax free dividends and tax free capital gains)
    2. 5% annual target dividend
    3. Capital growth opportunity
    4. Past performance of fund
    5. Access to early-stage, unlisted tech enabled companies with high growth potential
    6. Ability to sell your shares back to the VCT via the share buyback facility
    7. Size of fund
    8. Fees and charges

    Octopus asked investors to rank their level of satisfaction against each of the top eight factors and the results were as follows:

      Satisfied Dissatisfied Neutral or not sure
    Tax reliefs available on your investment 88% 2% 10%
    5% annual target dividend 50% 22% 28%
    Capital growth opportunity 18% 60% 22%
    Past performance of fund 21% 52% 27%
    Access to early-stage, unlisted tech enabled companies with high growth potential 39% 10% 51%
    Ability to sell your shares back to the VCT via the share buyback facility 29% 8% 63%
    Size of fund 34% 6% 60%
    Fees and charges 22% 18% 60%

    Survey results based on responses from 1,093 direct investors and 2,195 advised investors, does not include responses from advisers.

    Valuations
    Titan’s unquoted portfolio companies are valued in accordance with UK GAAP accounting standards and the International Private Equity and Venture Capital (IPEV) valuation guidelines. This means we value the portfolio at Fair Value, which is the price we expect people would be willing to buy or sell an asset for, assuming they had all the information available that we do, are knowledgeable parties with no pre-existing relationship, and that the transaction is carried out under the normal course of business.

    The table below illustrates the split of valuation methodology (shown as a percentage of portfolio value and number of companies). ‘External price’ includes valuations based on funding rounds that typically completed by the year end or shortly after the year end, and exits of companies where terms have been issued with an acquirer. ‘External price’ also includes quoted holdings, which are held at their quoted price as at the valuation date. As at 31 December 2024, Titan only held one quoted holding. ‘Multiples’ is predominantly used for valuations that are based on a multiple of revenues for portfolio companies. Where there is uncertainty around the potential outcomes available to a company, a probability-weighted ‘scenario analysis’ is considered.

    Valuation methodology By value By number of companies
    External price 17% 25
    Multiples 53% 30
    Scenario analysis 16% 33
    Milestone analysis 14% 25
    Write-off – 25

    Case studies

    MANUAL
    https://www.manual.co/
    Making high-quality care more accessible and stigma-free

    MANUAL provides innovative treatments for a range of conditions, from hair loss and low testosterone to weight management and diagnostics.

    With over 800,000 patients served across the UK and Brazil, MANUAL continues to expand its impact. The company’s weight loss brand, Voy, has helped over 70,000 people lose weight. In 2024, MANUAL acquired Menopause Care – the UK’s second largest menopause clinic – furthering its mission to support underserved areas of health.

    Following the company’s £29 million Series B raise in 2024, the company is accelerating its growth, with a 140% revenue Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) since 2019. With this investment, MANUAL is scaling its reach and pioneering new healthcare solutions, ensuring more people get the treatments they need to improve their quality of life.

    • Nearly 90% of men do not seek help unless they have a serious problem
    • Served more than 800,000 patients to date

    Legl
    https://legl.com/
    Revolutionising Legal Services with AI and Data-Driven Insights

    Legl delivers a world-class client experience for UK law firms by reducing risk, improving cash flow, and enabling them to bill and collect payments faster. With actionable client intelligence, their customers are empowered to make smarter decisions and drive business growth.

    By leveraging cutting-edge technology and data insights, Legl creates seamless onboarding experiences and superior payment processing capabilities. Beyond onboarding, they provide intelligence and audit functionality to help firms manage risk intelligently in a complex and ever-changing environment. Its embedded finance stack, which has been built specifically for law firms, makes collecting payments, reducing debt, and fostering exceptional client relationships effortless. In turn, providing a step-change for internal cash flow and treasury management.

    • Helped firms manage risk for over one million clients
    • Processed over $500 million in payments

    BondAval
    https://www.bondaval.com/
    Transforming non-payment risk protection

    Founded in 2020, B2B insurtech Bondaval protects companies when their customers buy now, but don’t pay later, and is already serving some of the largest companies in the world. While existing options are opaque, inflexible or limited, Bondaval’s range of insurance products are made more powerful via their proprietary technology platform, which translates policy obligations into clear tasks, helps aggregate and monitor risk signals, and makes limit management effortless for credit managers. With their receivables secured, businesses can grow faster with more peace of mind, achieve more predictable financial performance, and even access new lines of financing.

    • Offices in London, New York and Dallas
    • Licensed in 30+ countries

    Taster
    https://taster.com/
    Food innovators redefining quick-service dining

    Taster was founded with the goal of revolutionising the quick-service food experience globally. In 2017, the company raised €8 million, and by 2021, they secured an additional €30 million. By the end of 2023, Taster had grown to 400 online restaurants, with its franchise network expanding across France, the UK, Spain, the Netherlands, and Belgium. Taster collaborates closely with co-creators and kitchen partners, from launching new brands to creating special edition menu items. Their strategy focuses on building social media-first brands that engage audiences and cultivate communities around their digital restaurants.

    • Operating in over 90 cities across Europe

    We are disappointed to report a net decrease in the value of the portfolio of £137 million since 31 December 2023, excluding additions and disposals. This represents a decline of 17% on the value of the portfolio at the start of the year. Here, we set out the cost and valuation of the top 20 holdings, which account for 61% of the value of the portfolio and 47% of the total NAV.

      Portfolio: Investment focus: Investment cost: Total valuation including cost:
    1 Skin+Me Health £11.5m £44.9m
    2 Amplience B2B Software £13.6m £35.0m
    3 Permutive B2B Software £19.0m £31.0m
    4 Elliptic Fintech £9.9m £26.2m
    5 Vitesse Fintech £8.8m £25.8m
    6 ManyPets Fintech £10.0m £24.6m
    7 Pelago1 Health £17.9m £23.2m
    8 Legl B2B Software £7.3m £18.6m
    9 Orbex Deep tech £12.0m £17.8m
    10 Token Fintech £12.6m £16.5m
    11 Taster Consumer £8.1m £15.4m
    12 vHive Deep tech £8.0m £14.9m
    13 Ometria B2B Software £11.5m £14.0m
    14 SeatFrog Consumer £9.6m £13.5m
    15 KatKin Consumer £8.2m £13.2m
    16 Automata Health £12.3m £12.4m
    17 XYZ Consumer £15.3m £10.7m
    18 BondAval Fintech £7.1m £10.6m
    19 Iovox B2B Software £7.2m £10.4m
    20 Ibex Health £11.8m £9.5m
    1. Digital Therapeutics, Inc., formerly Quit Genius, has rebranded as Pelago.

    Top 10 investments in detail1
    1
    Skin+Me

    Skin+Me offers direct-to-consumer, personalised skincare.
    www.skinandme.com

    Initial investment date: September 2019
    Investment cost: £11.5m
      (2023: £11.5m)
    Valuation: £44.9m
      (2023: £48.5m)
    Last submitted accounts: 31 August 2023
    Turnover: £28.7m
    (2023: £14.3m)
    Profit/(loss) before tax: £1.8m
      (2023: £(3.3)m)
    Net assets: £12.8m
      (2023: £(0.7m)
    Valuation methodology: Multiple
    2023: Multiple

    2
    Amplience
    Amplience is a leading headless content management system, which powers retailers’ digital channels.
    www.amplience.com

    Initial investment date: December 2010
    Investment cost: £13.6m
      (2023: £13.6m)
    Valuation: £35.0m
      (2023: £41.8m)
    Last submitted accounts: 30 June 2024
    Turnover: £16.0m
      (2023: £14.9m)
    Loss before tax: £(5.5)m
      (2023: £(8.1)m)
    Net assets: £(22.8)m
      (2023: (£17.4m)
    Valuation methodology: Multiple
    2023: Multiple

    3
    Permutive
    Permutive’s publisher data platform gives its customers an in-the-moment view of everyone on their site.
    www.permutive.com

    Initial investment date: May 2015
    Investment cost: £19.0m
      (2023: £19.0m)
    Valuation: £31.0m
      (2023: £41.2m)
    Last submitted accounts: 31 January 2023
    Turnover: Not available2
      (2023: £9.8m)
    Loss before tax: Not available2
      (2023: £(19.3)m)
    Net assets: Not available2
      (2023: £(40.2)m)
    Valuation methodology: Multiple
      2023: Multiple

    4
    Elliptic
    Crypto compliance and forensic investigation solutions used by financial institutions, crypto businesses, law enforcement, and regulators to detect and prevent financial crime.
    www.elliptic.co

    Initial investment date: July 2014
    Investment cost: £9.9m
      (2023: £9.9m)
    Valuation: £26.2m
      (2023: £19.0m)
    Last submitted accounts: 31 March 2024
    Turnover: £13.7m
      (2023: £9.6m)
    Loss before tax: £(16.4)m
      (2023: £(27.1)m)
    Net assets: £(3.8)m
      (2023: £10.6m)
    Valuation methodology: Multiple
    2023: Multiple

    5
    Vitesse

    A settlement and liquidity management platform to hold funds and deliver international payments globally, using domestic, in-country processing.
    www.vitesse.io/

    Initial investment date: June 2020
    Investment cost: £8.8m
      (2023: £10.1m)
    Valuation: £25.8m
      (2023: £26.6m)
    Last submitted accounts: 31 March 2024
    Consolidated turnover: £24.8m
      (2023: £11.2m)
    Consolidated profit/(loss) before tax: £0.6m
      (2023: £(5.7)m)
    Net assets: £17.3m
      (2023: £16.2m)
    Valuation methodology: Multiple
    2023: Last Round

    6
    ManyPets

    An award-winning insurtech company with a specific focus on providing better pet insurance for everyone.
    www.manypets.com

    Initial investment date: October 2016
    Investment cost: £10.0m
      (2023: £10.0m)
    Valuation: £24.6m
      (2023: £47.1m)
    Last submitted accounts: 31 March 2024
    Turnover: £29.6m
      (2023: £35.9m)
    Loss before tax: £(34.1)m
      (2023: £(67.5)m)
    Net assets: £79.9m
      (2023: £110.6m)
    Valuation methodology: Multiple
    2023: Multiple

    7
    Pelago

    A digital health solution for managing substance use disorders.
    www.pelagohealth.com

    Initial investment date: January 2020
    Investment cost: £17.9m
    (2023: £17.9m)
    Valuation: £23.2m
      (2023: £38.6m)
    Last submitted accounts: Not available2
    Turnover: Not available2
    2023: Not available2:
    Loss before tax: Not available2
    2023: Not available2
    Net assets: Not available2
    2023: Not available2
    Valuation methodology: Multiple
    2023: Last round

    8
    Legl
    Cloud based legal workflow automation platform.
    www.legl.com

    Initial investment date: January 2021
    Investment cost: £7.3m
      (2023: £7.3m)
    Valuation: £18.6m
      (2023: £13.8m)
    Last submitted accounts: 31 December 2023
    Turnover: Not available2
      2023: Not available2
    Profit/(loss) before tax: $1.5m
      (2023: $(0.1)m)
    Net assets: $30.4m
      (2023: $28.8m)
    Valuation methodology: Multiple
    2023: Multiple

    9
    Orbex

    Focused on providing low-cost orbital launch services for small satellites.
    www.orbex.space

    Initial investment date: December 2020
    Investment cost: £12.0m
      (2023: £10.3m)
    Valuation: £17.8m
      (2023: £15.3m)
    Last submitted group accounts: 31 December 2023
    Turnover: Not available2
    2023: Not available2
    Consolidated loss before tax: £(17.2)m
    (2023:(8.8)m)
    Consolidated net assets: £16.3m
      (2023: £31.8m)
    Valuation methodology: Scenario Analysis
    2023: Scenario Analysis

    10
    Token

    A leading open banking solution, focused on payments.
    www.token.io

    Initial investment date: March 2017
    Investment cost: £12.6m
      (2023: £12.6m)
    Valuation: £16.5m
      (2023: £17.1m)
    Last submitted group accounts: 31 December 2023
    Turnover: Not available2
    2023: Not available2
    Loss before tax: Not available2
    2023: Not available2
    Net assets: £0.9m
      (2023: £0.7m)
    Valuation methodology: Multiple
    2023: Multiple

    1. These are numbers per latest public filings. More recent figures have not yet been disclosed.
    2. Information not publicly available.

    Outlook
    Our portfolio companies have been navigating a turbulent few years and global geo‑political and economic conditions remain uncertain. Due to the early‑stage nature of the portfolio companies, any improvement in conditions will not be felt immediately.

    The fundraising environment remains challenging for portfolio companies, with 2024 seeing both a decline in the number of investments completed at the seed and Series A stages and many rounds completing at decreased valuations. This is largely a function of a reset in venture-backed valuations which began in 2022, with many companies having no option but to accept a reduced valuation to bring in new capital to survive or scale. We have also seen in the year that the venture landscape has been reshaped by AI, which captured a 37% share in all funding in 2024 and 17% of all deals.1 However, when AI investments are excluded, global deal activity dropped to its lowest levels since 2016.

    With some of our portfolio companies struggling to secure new investors and requiring significant investment to develop, many have had to focus on cash preservation and limit their growth. As such, the valuation multiples being applied have declined in line with this. We have also seen some companies being unable to achieve the milestones Octopus set out when the initial investment was completed and so we have seen more declines in value.

    Looking to the future, the Octopus Ventures team has been focusing on driving both improved performance and distributions to Titan. In the year, we have been able to realise £29 million in cash proceeds to the Company from exits. This includes deferred amounts received in cash relating to disposals from previous periods. In addition, £12.4 million was distributed from Zenith Holding Company to the Company. The team is actively involved in its portfolio companies and during the year developed specific workstreams to support the portfolio with value-adding activities, as summarised below:

    • Capital allocation: aims to optimise financial planning by fostering stronger alignment between each company’s strategic objectives and their financial plans, reducing the risk of unexpected cash issues and value-eroding insolvencies or emergency down-rounds. Improving financial planning will ensure efficient resource allocation, minimise risks and enhance profitability, ultimately leading to sustainable growth and long-term success.
    • Return: looking to drive exits or other liquidity events as part of a clear aim of regularly recycling capital back into the Company.
    • Raise: to improve fundraising outcomes for portfolio companies, through initiatives such as supporting the creation of fundraising material, network introductions for potential investors or timeframe planning. Raising additional funding is crucial to provide the necessary capital to expand operations, invest in new technologies and seize available growth opportunities, ensuring a company’s long-term viability and competitive edge.
    • Talent and board: to drive performance in companies by supporting and influencing the build of high performing leadership teams and effective boards. This workstream is driven by Octopus Ventures in-house People and Talent team. Building talented teams drives innovation, enhances productivity and contributes to a positive work culture, all of which lead to a company’s overall success.

    Titan’s capital and resources have been prioritised on those portfolio companies which have the potential to drive the greatest returns. This portfolio focus has been leveraging the advantages Titan has of being a very large and mature VCT holding a highly diversified portfolio. Having made over 80 investments in the preceding few years, there remains the opportunity for long-term returns to the Company. The ongoing focus for the team will be optimising growth plans for the portfolio and taking advantage of exit opportunities.

    1. https://www.cbinsights.com/research/report/venture-trends-2024/

    Risks and risk management

    The Board assesses the risks faced by Titan and, as a board, reviews the mitigating controls and actions, and monitors the effectiveness of these controls and actions.

    Emerging and principal risks, and risk management

    Emerging risks

    The Board has considered emerging risks. The Board seeks to mitigate emerging risks and those noted below by setting policy, regular review of performance and monitoring progress and compliance. In the mitigation and management of these risks, the Board applies the principles detailed in the Financial Reporting Council’s Guidance on Risk Management, Internal Control and Related Financial and Business Reporting.

    The following are some of the potential emerging risks that management and the Board are currently monitoring:

    • adverse changes in global macroeconomic environment;
    • challenging market conditions for private company fundraising and exits;
    • geo-political instability; and
    • climate change.

    Principal risks

    Risk Mitigation Change
    Investment performance:    
    The focus of Titan’s investments is into unquoted, small and medium‑sized VCT qualifying companies which, by their nature, entail a higher level of risk and shorter cash runway than investments in larger quoted companies. Octopus has significant experience of investing in early-stage unquoted companies, and appropriate due diligence is undertaken on every new investment. A member of the Octopus Ventures team is appointed to the board of a portfolio company using a risk-based approach, considering the size of the company within the Titan portfolio and the engagement levels of other investors. Regular board reports are prepared by the portfolio company’s management and examined by the Manager. This arrangement, in conjunction with its Portfolio Talent team’s active involvement, allows Titan to play a prominent role when necessary in a portfolio company’s ongoing development and strategy. The overall risk in the portfolio is mitigated by maintaining a wide spread of holdings in terms of financing stage, age, industry sector and business model. The Board reviews the investment portfolio with the Portfolio Manager on a regular basis. The Portfolio Manager is incentivised via a performance incentive fee for exceeding certain performance hurdles. The Board and Octopus are reviewing the fee structure. Risk exposures continue to increase due to the difficult macro environment and challenging trading conditions for some portfolio companies continuing.
    Risk Mitigation Change
    VCT qualifying status:    
    Titan is required at all times to observe the conditions for the maintenance of approved VCT status. The loss of such approval could lead to Titan and its investors losing access to the various tax benefits associated with VCT status and investment. Octopus tracks Titan’s qualifying status regularly throughout the year, and reviews this at key points including investment realisation. This status is reported to the Board at each Board meeting. The Board has also engaged external independent advisers to undertake an independent VCT status monitoring role. Decreased exposures reflected in the previous period remain. VCT status monitoring by independent advisers continues to reduce the risk of an issue causing a loss of VCT status.
    Risk Mitigation Change
    Loss of key people:    
    The loss of key investment staff by the Portfolio Manager could lead to poor fund management and/or performance due to lack of continuity or understanding of Titan. The Portfolio Manager has a broad team, experienced in and focused on early-stage
    investing and portfolio company management. Various mitigants exist to assist in managing key person risk. These include frameworks that review succession, remuneration and career progression. Workforce planning is continuous and reviews skillsets and team structures. To reduce the exposure further, the core team is also supplemented by part-time venture partners with sector or functional specialism.    		 The increased exposures reflected in the previous period remain due to the loss of the lead fund manager and other leadership positions at the Portfolio Manager. The absence of a performance fee and lack of new investments or deal-making opportunities compared to previous periods are also factors.
    Risk Mitigation Change
    Operational:    
    The Board is reliant on the Portfolio Manager to manage investments effectively, and manage the services of a number of third parties, in particular the registrar, depositary and tax advisers. A failure of the systems or controls at Octopus or third-party providers could lead to an inability to provide accurate reporting and accounting and to ensure adherence to VCT rules. The Board reviews the system of internal controls, both financial and non-financial, operated by Octopus (to the extent the latter are relevant to Titan’s internal controls). These include controls designed to make sure that Titan’s assets are safeguarded and that proper accounting records are maintained. No overall change in risk exposure on balance.
    Risk Mitigation Change
    Information security:    
    A loss of key data could result in a data breach and fines. The Board is reliant on Octopus and third parties to take appropriate measures to prevent a loss of confidential customer information. Annual due diligence is conducted on third parties which includes a review of their controls for information security. Octopus has a dedicated information security team and a third party is engaged to provide continual protection in this area. A security framework is in place to help prevent malicious events. No overall change on balance, although cyber threat remains a significant risk area faced by all service providers. The appropriateness of mitigants in place are continuously reassessed to adapt to new risk exposures, such as those posed by artificial intelligence.
    Risk Mitigation Change
    Economic:    
    Events such as an economic recession and movement in interest rates could adversely affect some smaller companies’ valuations, as they may be more vulnerable to changes in trading conditions or the sectors in which they operate. This could result in a reduction in the value of Titan’s assets. Titan invests in a diverse portfolio of companies, across a range of sectors, which helps to mitigate against the impact on any one sector. Titan also maintains adequate liquidity to make sure it can continue to provide follow‑on investment to those portfolio companies which require it and which is supported by the individual investment case. Increased exposures reflected in the previous periods remain and have heightened further as economic uncertainty persists through high inflation, high interest rates and other economic factors.
    Risk Mitigation Change
    Legislative:    
    A change to the VCT regulations could adversely impact Titan by restricting the companies Titan can invest in under its current strategy. Similarly, changes to VCT tax reliefs for investors could make VCTs less attractive and impact Titan’s ability to raise further funds. The Portfolio Manager engages with HM Treasury and industry bodies to demonstrate the positive benefits of VCTs in terms of growing early-stage companies, creating jobs and increasing tax revenue, and to help shape any change to VCT legislation. Risk exposure has continued to reduce since the previous period following the extension of the sunset clause to 2035 being agreed.
    Risk Mitigation Change
    Liquidity:    
    The risk that Titan’s available cash will not be sufficient to meet its financial obligations. Titan invests in smaller unquoted companies, which are inherently illiquid as there is no readily available market for these shares. Therefore, these may be difficult to realise for their fair market value at short notice. Titan’s liquidity risk is managed on a continuing basis by Octopus in accordance with policies and procedures agreed by the Board. Titan’s overall liquidity risks are monitored on a quarterly basis by the Board, with frequent budgeting and close monitoring of available cash resources. Titan maintains sufficient investments in cash and readily realisable securities to meet its financial obligations. At 31 December 2024, these investments were valued at £183,770,000 (2023: £199,841,000), which represents 22% (2023: 20%) of the net assets of Titan. The Board also reviews the cash runway in the portfolio. Risk exposure has continued to increase, reflecting economic uncertainty, the impact on fundraising and the risk of failing to exit portfolio companies.
    Risk Mitigation Change
    Valuation:    
    The portfolio investments are valued in accordance with International Private Equity and Venture Capital (IPEV) valuation guidelines. This means companies are valued at fair value. As the portfolio comprises smaller unquoted companies, establishing fair value can be difficult due to the lack of a readily available market for the shares of such companies and the potentially limited number of external reference points. Valuations of portfolio companies are performed by appropriately experienced staff, with detailed knowledge of both the portfolio company and the market it operates in. These valuations are then subject to review and approval by Octopus’ Valuation Committee, comprised of staff who are independent of Octopus Ventures with relevant knowledge of unquoted company valuations, as well as Titan’s Board of Directors. Risk exposure remains unchanged from the previous period due to economic uncertainty within valuation modelling.
    Risk Mitigation Change
    Foreign currency exposure:    
    Investments held and revenues generated in other currencies may not generate the expected level of returns due to changes in foreign exchange rates. Octopus and the Board regularly review the exposure to foreign currency movement to make sure the level of risk is appropriately managed. Investments are primarily made in GBP, EUR and USD so exposure is limited to a small number of currencies. On realisation of investments held in foreign currencies, cash is converted to GBP shortly after receiving the proceeds to limit the amount of time exposed to foreign currency fluctuations. Risk exposure has not changed since the previous period.

    Viability statement

    In accordance with the FRC UK Corporate Governance Code published in 2018 and provision 36 of the AIC Code of Corporate Governance, the Directors have assessed the prospects of Titan over a period of five years, consistent with the expected investment hold period of a VCT investor. Under VCT rules, subscribing investors are required to hold their investment for a five-year period in order to benefit from the associated tax reliefs. The Board regularly considers strategy, including investor demand for Titan’s shares, and a five-year period is considered to be a reasonable time horizon for this.

    The Board carried out a robust assessment of the emerging and principal risks facing Titan and its current position, including risks which may adversely impact its business model, future performance, solvency or liquidity, and focused on the major factors which affect the economic, regulatory and political environment. Particular consideration was given to Titan’s reliance on, and close working relationship with, the Portfolio Manager.

    The Board has carried out robust stress testing of cash flows which included assessing the resilience of portfolio companies, including the requirement for any future financial support and the ability to pay dividends, and buybacks.

    The Board has additionally considered the ability of Titan to comply with the ongoing conditions to make sure it maintains its VCT qualifying status under its current Investment policy.

    Based on this assessment the Board confirms that it has a reasonable expectation that Titan will be able to continue in operation and meet its liabilities as they fall due over the five-year period to 31 December 2029. The Board is mindful of the ongoing risks and will continue to make sure that appropriate safeguards are in place, in addition to monitoring the cash flow forecasts to ensure Titan has sufficient liquidity.

    Directors’ responsibilities statement

    The Directors are responsible for preparing the Strategic Report, the Directors’ Report, the Directors’ Remuneration Report and the financial statements in accordance with applicable law and regulations. They are also responsible for ensuring that the annual report and financial statements include information required by the Listing Rules of the Financial Conduct Authority.

    Company law requires the Directors to prepare financial statements for each financial year. Under that law the Directors have elected to prepare the financial statements in accordance with United Kingdom Generally Accepted Accounting Practice (GAAP), including Financial Reporting Standard 102 – ‘The Financial Reporting Standard Applicable in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland’ (FRS 102), (United Kingdom accounting standards and applicable law). Under company law the Directors must not approve the financial statements unless they are satisfied that they give a true and fair view of the state of affairs and profit or loss of the Company for that period. In preparing these financial statements, the Directors are required to:

    • select suitable accounting policies and then apply them consistently;
    • make judgements and accounting estimates that are reasonable and prudent;
    • state whether applicable UK Accounting Standards have been followed, subject to any material departures disclosed and explained in the financial statements;
    • prepare the financial statements on the going concern basis unless it is inappropriate to presume that the Company will continue in business; and
    • prepare a Strategic Report, Directors’ Report and Directors’ Remuneration Report which comply with the requirements of the Companies Act 2006.

    The Directors are responsible for keeping adequate accounting records that are sufficient to show and explain the Company’s transactions and disclose with reasonable accuracy at any time the financial position of the Company and enable them to ensure that the financial statements comply with the Companies Act 2006. They are also responsible for safeguarding the assets of the Company and hence for taking reasonable steps for the prevention and detection of fraud and other irregularities.

    Insofar as each of the Directors is aware:

    • there is no relevant audit information of which the Company’s auditor is unaware; and
    • the Directors have taken all steps that they ought to have taken to make themselves aware of any relevant audit information and to establish that the auditor is aware of that information.

    The Directors are responsible for preparing the annual report and financial statements in accordance with applicable law and regulations. Having taken advice from the Audit Committee, the Directors are of the opinion that this report as a whole provides the necessary information to assess the Company’s performance, business model and strategy and is fair, balanced and understandable.

    The Directors are responsible for the maintenance and integrity of the corporate and financial information included on the Company’s website. Legislation in the United Kingdom governing the preparation and dissemination of financial statements may differ from legislation in other jurisdictions.

    The Directors confirm that, to the best of their knowledge:

    • the financial statements, prepared in accordance with United Kingdom Generally Accepted Accounting Practice, including FRS 102, give a true and fair view of the assets, liabilities, financial position and profit or loss of the Company; and
    • the annual report and financial statements (including the Strategic Report), give a fair review of the development and performance of the business and the position of the Company, together with a description of the principal risks and uncertainties that it faces.

    On behalf of the Board

    Tom Leader
    Chair

    Income statement

        Year to 31 December 2024 Year to 31 December 2023
        Revenue Capital Total Revenue Capital Total
        £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000
    Gain/(loss)/gain on disposal of fixed asset investments   — 5,184 5,184 — (1,870) (1,870)
    Gain on disposal of current asset investments   — 563 563 — 355 355
    Loss on valuation of fixed asset investments   — (136,894) (136,894) — (131,655) (131,655)
    Gain on valuation of current asset investments   — 4,439 4,439 — 8,098 8,098
    Investment income   4,215 — 4,215 4,467 — 4,467
    Investment management fee   (954) (18,125) (19,079) (1,054) (20,028) (21,082)
    Other expenses   (6,072) — (6,072) (6,264) — (6,264)
    Foreign exchange translation   — (5) (5) — (1,548) (1,548)
    Loss before tax   (2,811) (144,838) (147,649) (2,851) (146,648) (149,499)
    Tax   — — — — — —
    Loss after tax   (2,811) (144,838) (147,649) (2,851) (146,648) (149,499)
    Loss per share – basic and diluted   (0.2)p (8.8)p (9.0)p (0.2)p (9.7)p (9.9)p
    • The ‘Total’ column of this statement is the profit and loss account of Titan. The supplementary revenue return and capital return columns have been prepared under guidance published by the Association of Investment Companies.
    • All revenue and capital items in the above statement derive from continuing operations.
    • Titan has only one class of business and derives its income from investments made in shares and securities, and from bank and money market funds.

    Titan has no other comprehensive income for the period.

    The accompanying notes form an integral part of the financial statements.

    Balance sheet

        As at 31 December 2024 As at 31 December 2023  
        £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000  
    Fixed asset investments     640,797   791,403  
    Current assets:            
    Money market funds   93,523   91,172    
    Corporate bonds   90,247   108,669    
    Applications cash1   22   17,842    
    Cash at bank   213   2,970    
    Debtors   8,412   1,218    
          192,417   221,871  
    Creditors: amounts falling due within one year   (1,856)   (19,530)    
    Net current assets     190,561   202,341  
                 
    Net assets     831,358   993,744  
                 
    Share capital     1,647   1,594  
    Share premium     —   45,780  
    Capital redemption reserve     141   74  
    Special distributable reserve     1,056,537   1,025,614  
    Capital reserve realised     (125,444)   (89,570)  
    Capital reserve unrealised     (57,285)   51,674  
    Revenue reserve     (44,238)   (41,422)  
                 
    Total equity shareholders’ funds     831,358   993,744  
                 
    NAV per share     50.5p   62.4p  
    1. Funds raised from investors since Titan opened for new investment which have not been allotted as at year end.

    The accompanying notes form an integral part of the financial statements.

    The statements were approved by the Directors and authorised for issue on 28 April 2025 and are signed on their behalf by:

    Tom Leader, Chair
    Company Number 06397765

    Statement of changes in equity

          Capital Special Capital Capital    
      Share Share redemption distributable reserve reserve Revenue  
      capital premium reserve reserve1 realised1 unrealised reserve1 Total
      £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000
    As at 1 January 2024 1,594 45,780 74 1,025,614 (89,570) 51,674 (41,422) 993,744
    Comprehensive income for the year:                
    Management fees allocated as capital expenditure — — — — (18,125) — — (18,125)
    Current year gain on disposal of fixed asset investments — — — — 5,184 — — 5,184
    Current year gain on disposal of current asset investments — — — — 563 — — 563
    Loss on fair value of fixed asset investments — — — — — (136,894) — (136,894)
    Gain on fair value of current asset investments — — — — — 4,439 — 4,439
    Loss after tax — — — — — — (2,811) (2,811)
    Foreign exchange translation — — — — — — (5) (5)
    Total comprehensive income for the year — — — — (12,378) (132,455) (2,816) (147,649)
    Contributions by and distributions to owners:                
    Share issue (includes DRIS) 120 76,664 — — — — — 76,784
    Share issue costs — (1,893) — — — — — (1,893)
    Repurchase of own shares (67) — 67 (37,986) — — — (37,986)
    Dividends paid (includes DRIS) — — — (51,642) — — — (51,642)
    Total contributions by and distributions to owners 53 74,771 67 (89,628) — — — (14,737)
    Other movements:                
    Share premium cancellation — (120,551) — 120,551 — — — —
    Prior year fixed asset gains now realised — — — — 7,473 (7,473) — —
    Prior year current asset losses now realised — — — — (74) 74 — —
    Transfer between reserves — — — — (30,895) 30,895 — —
    Total other movements — (120,551) — 120,551 (23,496) 23,496 — —
    Balance as at 31 December 2024 1,647 — 141 1,056,537 (125,444) (57,285) (44,238) 831,358
    1. Reserves are available for distribution, subject to the restrictions.

    The accompanying notes form an integral part of the financial statements.

          Capital Special Capital Capital    
      Share Share redemption distributable reserve reserve Revenue  
      capital premium reserve reserve1 realised1 unrealised reserve1 Total
      £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000
    As at 1 January 2023 1,368 92,896 27 887,288 (53,430) 160,634 (37,023) 1,051,760
    Comprehensive income for the year:                
    Management fees allocated as capital expenditure — — — — (20,028) — — (20,028)
    Current year loss on disposal of fixed asset investments — — — — (1,870) — — (1,870)
    Current year gain on disposal of current asset investments — — — — 355 — — 355
    Loss on fair value of fixed asset investments — — — — — (131,655) — (131,655)
    Gain on fair value of current asset investments — — — — — 8,098 — 8,098
    Loss after tax — — — — — — (2,851) (2,851)
    Foreign exchange translation — — — — — — (1,548) (1,548)
    Total comprehensive income for the year — — — — (21,543) (123,557) (4,399) (149,499)
    Contributions by and distributions to owners:                
    Share issue (includes DRIS) 273 207,132 — — — — — 207,405
    Share issue costs — (5,737) — — — — — (5,737)
    Repurchase of own shares (47) — 47 (32,422) — — — (32,422)
    Dividends paid (includes DRIS) — — — (77,763) — — — (77,763)
    Total contributions by and distributions to owners 226 201,395 47 (110,185) — — — 91,483
    Other movements:                
    Share premium cancellation — (248,511) — 248,511 — — — —
    Prior year current asset losses now realised — — — — (355) 355 — —
    Transfer between reserves — — — — (14,242) 14,242 — —
    Total other movements — (248,511) — 248,511 (14,597) 14,597 — —
    Balance as at 31 December 2023 1,594 45,780 74 1,025,614 (89,570) 51,674 (41,422) 993,744
    1. Reserves are available for distribution, subject to the restrictions.

    The accompanying notes form an integral part of the financial statements.

    Cash flow statement

        Year to 31 December Year to 31 December
        2024 2023
        £’000 £’000
    Reconciliation of profit to cash flows from operating activities      
    Loss before tax1   (147,649) (149,499)
    Decrease in debtors2   279 3,671
    Decrease/(increase) in creditors   146 (440)
    Gain on disposal of current asset investments   (563) (355)
    Gain on valuation of current asset investments   (4,439) (8,098)
    Gain on disposal of fixed asset investments   (5,184) (1,111)
    Loss on valuation of fixed asset investments   136,894 131,655
    Outflow from operating activities   (20,516) (24,177)
    Cash flows from investing activities      
    Sale of current asset investments   23,424 4,028
    Purchase of fixed asset investments   (30,011) (97,650)
    Proceeds from sale of fixed asset investments3   41,432 45,637
    Inflow/(outflow) from investing activities   34,845 (47,985)
    Cash flows from financing activities      
    Movement in applications account   (17,820) (5,457)
    Dividends paid (net of DRIS)   (43,881) (58,210)
    Purchase of own shares   (37,986) (32,422)
    Share issues (net of DRIS)   69,025 187,852
    Share issue costs   (1,893) (5,737)
    (Outflow)/inflow from financing activities   (32,555) 86,026
    Increase/(decrease) in cash and cash equivalents   (18,226) 13,864
    Opening cash and cash equivalents   111,984 98,120
    Closing cash and cash equivalents   93,758 111,984
    Cash and cash equivalents comprise      
    Cash at bank   213 2,970
    Applications cash   22 17,842
    Money market funds   93,523 91,172
    Closing cash and cash equivalents   93,758 111,984
    1. Loss before tax includes cashflows from dividends of £4.2 million (2023: £4.2 million).
    2. Movement in debtors, net of disposal proceeds received in the year £41.4 million, with £40.9 million relating to current year disposals and £0.5 million relating to prior year disposals.
    3. Of these proceeds, £12.4 million was distributed from Zenith Holding Company, a wholly owned subsidiary of Titan, to Titan during the year.

    The accompanying notes form an integral part of the financial statements.

    Notes to the financial statements

    1. Principal accounting policies

    Titan is a Public Limited Company (plc) incorporated in England and Wales and its registered office is at 6th Floor, 33 Holborn, London EC1N 2HT.

    Titan has been approved as a Venture Capital Trust by HMRC under Section 259 of the Income Taxes Act 2007. The shares of Titan were first admitted to the Official List of the UK Listing Authority and trading on the London Stock Exchange on 28 December 2007 and can be found under the TIDM code OTV2. Titan is premium listed.

    The principal activity of Titan is to invest in a diversified portfolio of UK smaller companies in order to generate capital growth over the long term as well as an attractive tax-free dividend stream.

    The financial statements are presented in GBP (£) to the nearest £’000. The functional currency is also GBP (£). Some accounting policies have been disclosed in the respective notes to the financial statements.

    Basis of preparation

    The financial statements have been prepared on a going concern basis under the historical cost convention, except for the measurement at fair value of certain financial instruments, and in accordance with UK Generally Accepted Accounting Practice (GAAP), including Financial Reporting Standard 102 – ‘The Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland’ (FRS 102), and with the Companies Act 2006 and the Statement of Recommended Practice (SORP) ‘Financial Statements of Investment Trust Companies and Venture Capital Trusts (July 2022)’.

    2. Investment income
    Accounting policy
    Investment income includes interest earned on money market funds. Dividend income is shown net of any related tax credit.

    Dividends receivable are brought into account when Titan’s right to receive payment is established and there is no reasonable doubt that payment will be received. Fixed returns on debt and money market funds are recognised so as to reflect the effective interest rate, provided there is no reasonable doubt that payment will be received in due course.

    Disclosure

      Year to Year to
      31 December 31 December
      2024 2023
      £’000 £’000
    Money market funds 4,215 4,154
    Loan note interest receivable — 313
    Total investment income 4,215 4,467

    In the current year, accrued loan note interest income is treated to be included in the fair value of investments. The opening balance of accrued loan interest has been reclassified to be included in the fair value of investments. This reclassification amends the balance previously reported as of 31 December 2023.

    3. Investment management fees
    Accounting policy

    For the purposes of the revenue and capital columns in the Income Statement, the management fee has been allocated 5% to revenue and 95% to capital, in line with the Board’s expected long-term return in the form of income and capital gains respectively from Titan’s investment portfolio.

    Disclosure

      Year to 31 December 2024 Year to 31 December 2023
      Revenue Capital Total Revenue Capital Total
      £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000 £’000
    Investment            
    management fee 954 18,125 19,079 1,054 20,028 21,082

    The Portfolio Manager provides investment management services through agreements with Octopus AIF Management Limited and Titan. It also provides non-investment services to Titan under a non-investment services agreement. No compensation is payable if the agreement is terminated by either party, if the required notice period is given. The fee payable, should insufficient notice be given, will be equal to the fee that would have been paid should continuous service be provided, or the required notice period was given. The basis upon which the management fee is calculated is disclosed within the Annual Report and financial statements.

    4. Other expenses
    Accounting policy

    Other expenses are accounted for on an accruals basis and are charged wholly to revenue.

    The transaction costs incurred when purchasing or selling assets are written off to the Income Statement in the period that they occur.

      Year to Year to
      31 December 31 December
      2024 2023
      £’000 £’000
    Ongoing adviser and non-advised charges 2,111 2,370
    Non-investment services fee1 2,078 2,020
    Other fees 780 480
    Directors’ remuneration2 263 192
    Audit fees 204 191
    Registrar’s fees 196 200
    Depositary fees 187 270
    Listing fees 136 401
    Directors and Officers (D&O) insurance 117 123
    Impairment of accrued loan note interest receivable — 17
    Total 6,072 6,264
    1. For further information please see note 9.
    2. Includes employers’ NI.

    Total ongoing charges are capped at 2.5% of net assets. For the year to 31 December 2024, the ongoing charges were 2.5% of net assets (2023: 2.4%). This is calculated by summing the expenses incurred in the period (excluding ongoing IFA charges and non‑recurring expenses) divided by the average NAV throughout the period.

    5. Tax on ordinary activities
    Accounting policy

    Corporation tax payable is applied to profits chargeable to corporation tax, if any, at the current rate. The tax effect of different items of income/gain and expenditure/loss is allocated between capital and revenue return on the ‘marginal’ basis as recommended in the SORP.

    Deferred tax is recognised in respect of all timing differences at the reporting date. Timing differences are differences between taxable profits and total income as stated in the financial statements that arise from the inclusion of income and expenses in tax assessments in periods different from those in which they are recognised in financial statements.

    Disclosure
    The corporation tax charge for the period was £nil (2023: £nil).

      Year to Year to
      31 December 31 December
      2024 2023
      £’000 £’000
    Loss on ordinary activities before tax (147,649) (149,499)
    Current tax at 25% (2023: 23.5%) (36,912) (35,163)
    Effects of:    
    Non‑taxable income (1,054) (977)
    Non‑taxable capital loss 31,677 29,418
    Non‑deductible expenses 55 71
    Zenith distribution1 3,100 —
    Excess management expenses on which deferred tax not recognised 3,134 7,070
    Tax rate differences2 — (419)
    Total current tax charge — —

    1. £12.4 million was distributed from Zenith Holding Company to Titan in the year which is taxable income for Titan.
    2. Tax rate difference in the year to 31 December 2023 due to tax charge for the year being calculated at 19% and excess management expenses on which deferred tax is not recognised being calculated at 25%.

    Unrelieved tax losses of £227,486,000 (2023: £214,949,000) are estimated to be carried forward at 31 December 2024 (subject to completion of Titan’s tax return) and are available for offset against future taxable income, subject to agreement with HMRC. Titan has not recognised the deferred tax asset of £56,871,000 (2023: £53,737,000) in respect of these tax losses because there is insufficient forecast taxable income in excess of deductible expenses to utilise these losses carried forward. There is no expiry period on these deductible expenses under the UK HMRC legislation.

    Approved VCTs are exempt from tax on capital gains. As the Directors intend for Titan to continue to maintain its approval as a VCT through its affairs, no current deferred tax has been recognised in respect of any capital gains or losses arising on the revaluation or disposal of investment.

    6. Dividends
    Accounting policy

    Dividends payable are recognised as distributions in the financial statements when Titan’s liability to make the payment has been established. This liability is established on the record date, the date on which those shareholders on the share register are entitled to the dividend.

    Disclosure

      Year to Year to
      31 December 31 December
      2024 2023
      £’000 £’000
    Dividends paid in the year    
    Previous year’s second interim dividend – 1.9p (2023: 3.0p) 31,876 46,127
    Current year’s interim dividend – 1.2p (2023: 2.0p) 19,767 31,636
    Total 51,643 77,763
         
    Dividends in respect of the year    
    Interim dividend – 1.2p (2023: 2.0p) 19,767 31,636
    Second interim dividend – 0.5p (2023: 1.9p) 8,236 31,876
    Total 28,003 63,512

    The figures above include dividends elected to be reinvested through the DRIS.

    The second interim dividend of 0.5p for the period ending 31 December 2024 will be paid on 29 May 2025 to shareholders on the register on 25 April 2025, this equates to 1% of the Company’s opening NAV per share.

    7. Earnings per share

      Year to 31 December 2024 Year to 31 December 2023
      Revenue Capital Total Revenue Capital Total
    Loss attributable to Ordinary shareholders (£’000) (2,811) (144,838) (147,649) (2,851) (146,648) (149,499)
    Loss per Ordinary share (p) (0.2)p (8.8)p (9.0)p (0.2)p (9.7)p (9.9)p

    The total loss per share is based on 1,644,900,726 (2023: 1,506,111,802) Ordinary shares, being the weighted average number of Ordinary shares in issue during the year.

    There are no potentially dilutive capital instruments in issue and so no diluted return per share figures are relevant. The basic and diluted earnings per share are therefore identical.

    8. Net asset value per share

      31 December 31 December
      2024 2023
    Net assets (£) 831,358,000 993,744,000
    Ordinary shares in issue 1,647,212,355 1,593,601,092
    NAV per share (p) 50.5 62.4

    9. Transactions with the Manager and Portfolio Manager

    Since 1 September 2017, Titan has been classified as a full-scope Alternative Investment Fund under the Alternative Investment Fund Management Directive (the ‘AIFM Directive’). As a result, since 1 September 2017, Titan’s investment management agreement was assigned by way of the deed of novation from Octopus Investments Limited to Octopus AIF Management Limited to act as Manager (an authorised alternative investment fund manager responsible for ensuring compliance with the AIFM Directive). Octopus AIF Management Limited has in turn appointed Octopus Investments Limited to act as Portfolio Manager to Titan (responsible for portfolio management and the day-to-day running of Titan).

    Titan paid Octopus AIF Management Limited £19,079,000 (2023: £21,082,000) in the period as a management fee. The annual management charge (AMC) is based on 2% of Titan’s NAV in respect of existing funds but in respect of funds raised by Titan under the 2018 Offer and thereafter (and subject to Titan having a cash reserve of 10% of its NAV), the AMC on uninvested cash is the lower of either (i) the actual return that Titan receives on its cash and funds that are the equivalent of cash (which currently consist of corporate bonds and money market funds) subject to a 0% floor and (ii) 2% of Titan’s NAV. The AMC is payable quarterly in advance and calculated using the latest published NAV of Titan and the number of shares in issue at each quarter end.

    Octopus provides non-investment services to the Company and receives a fee for these services which is capped at the lower of (i) 0.3% per annum of the Company’s NAV or (ii) the administration and accounting costs of the Company for the year ended 31 December 2020 with inflation increases in line with the Consumer Price Index. During the period, the Company paid £2,078,000 (2023: £2,020,000) to Octopus for the non‑investment services.

    In addition, Octopus is entitled to performance-related incentive fees. The incentive fees were designed to ensure that there were significant tax-free dividend payments made to shareholders as well as strong performance in terms of capital and income growth, before any performance-related fee payment was made.

    Due to performance in the year, the total value has decreased to 155.6p, representing a total loss of 8.8p. Therefore, the high water mark for the 2025 financial year remains at 197.7p.

    If, on a subsequent financial year end, the performance value of Titan falls short of the high water mark on the previous financial year end, no performance fee will arise. If, on a subsequent financial year end, the performance exceeds the previous best high water mark of Titan, the Manager will be entitled to 20% of such excess in aggregate.

    Octopus received £39,000 in the period to 31 December 2024 (2023: £36,000) in regard to arrangement and monitoring fees in relation to investments made on behalf of Titan. Since 31 October 2018, Octopus no longer receives such fees in respect of new investments or any such new fees in respect of further investments into portfolio companies in which Titan invested on or before 31 October 2018, with any such fees received after that time being passed to Titan.

    The cap relating to Titan’s total ongoing charges ratio, that is the regular, recurring costs of Titan expressed as a percentage of its NAV, above which Octopus has agreed to pay, is 2.5%, and is calculated in accordance with the AIC Guidelines.

    Octopus AIF Management Limited remuneration disclosures (unaudited)
    Quantitative remuneration disclosures required to be made in this annual report in accordance with the FCA Handbook FUND 3.3.5 are available on the website: https://www.octopusinvestments.com/remuneration-disclosures/.

    10. Related party transactions

    Titan owns Zenith Holding Company Limited, which owns a share in Zenith LP, a fund managed by Octopus.

    In the year, Octopus Investments Nominees Limited (OINL) has purchased Titan shares from shareholders to correct administrative issues, on the understanding that shares will be sold back to Titan in subsequent share buybacks. As at 31 December 2024, no Titan shares were held by OINL (2023: no shares) as beneficial owner. Throughout the period to 31 December 2024, OINL purchased 65,000 shares (2023: 1,883,000 shares) at a cost of £36,000 (2023: £1,563,000) and sold 65,000 shares (2023: 1,883,000 shares) for proceeds of £34,000 (2023: £1,353,000). This is classed as a related party transaction as Octopus, the Portfolio Manager, and OINL are part of the same group of companies. Any such future transactions, where OINL takes over the legal and beneficial ownership of Company shares, will be announced to the market and disclosed in annual and half‑yearly reports.

    Several members of the Octopus investment team hold non-executive directorships as part of their monitoring roles in Titan’s portfolio companies, but they have no controlling interests in those companies.

    Details of the Directors and their remuneration can be found in the Directors’ Remuneration Report.

    The Directors received the following dividends from Titan:

      Year to Year to
      31 December 31 December
      2024 2023
      £ £
    Jane O’Riordan 4,766 6,901
    Tom Leader 1,464 1,889
    Lord Rockley 2,406 2,776
    Julie Nahid Rahman 138 89
    Gaenor Bagley
    Rupert Dickinson    		 738
    —    		 901
    —

    11. 2024 financial information

    The figures and financial information for the year ended 31 December 2024 are extracted from the Company’s annual financial statements for the period and do not constitute statutory accounts. The Company’s annual financial statements for the year to 31 December 2024 have been audited but have not yet been delivered to the Registrar of Companies. The Auditors’ report on the 2024 annual financial statements was unqualified, did not include a reference to any matter to which the auditors drew attention without qualifying the report, and did not contain any statements under Sections 498(2) or 498(3) of the Companies Act 2006.

    12. 2023 financial information

    The figures and financial information for the period ended 31 December 2023 are compiled from an extract of the published financial statements for the period and do not constitute statutory accounts. Those financial statements have been delivered to the Registrar of Companies and included the Auditors’ report which was unqualified, did not include a reference to any matter to which the auditors drew attention without qualifying the report, and did not contain any statements under Sections 498(2) or 498(3) of the Companies Act 2006.

    13. Annual Report and financial statements

    The Annual Report and financial statements will be posted to shareholders in early May and will be available on the Company’s website, octopustitanvct.com. The Notice of Annual General Meeting is contained within the Annual Report.

    14. General information

    Registered in England & Wales. Company No. 06397765
    LEI: 213800A67IKGG6PVYW75

    15. Directors

    Tom Leader (Chair), Jane O’Riordan, Lord Rockley, Gaenor Bagley, Julie Nahid Rahman and Rupert Dickinson.

    16. Secretary and registered office   

    Octopus Company Secretarial Services Limited
    6th Floor, 33 Holborn, London EC1N 2HT

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI Asia-Pac: Towards a new approach for green hydrogen production

    Source: Government of India

    Posted On: 28 APR 2025 5:09PM by PIB Delhi

    Researcher have developed fresh insights into proton adsorption behaviour at the surface of catalysts, which can help construct electrocatalysts useful for producing green hydrogen.

    Plethora of heterostructures have been studied for green hydrogen generation with the effect of built-in electric field (BIEF). However, the metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) based p-n heterojunction can be considered as a promising material to have robust BIEF due to asymmetric electronic environment.

    Recent research is focused on leveraging BIEFs at the interface of different electronic environments to improve hydrogen production. Therefore, analysing and correlating parameters such as the work function, BIEF, and Gibbs free energy (a thermodynamic potential that can be used to calculate the maximum amount of work) is crucial for understanding the reaction mechanism. The difference in work functions between two materials is what drives the initial charge redistribution, which in turn sets up the built-in potential across the junction. BIEF directly affects the dynamics of proton adsorption/desorption, which was evaluated by Gibbs free energy of adsorption.

    Scientists of Institute of Nano Science and Technology (INST), Mohali, grew CuWO4 (Copper tungsten oxide) nano-particles precursor over Cu (OH)2 (Copper hydroxide) and fabricated CuWO4-CuO hetero-structure and studied its physical and electrochemical properties. They examined the Gibbs free energy profile for proton adsorption of different regiones and found that near the depletion region and along the interface, the proton adsorption energy shows contrasting behaviour as compared with bulk area. This induces a gradient in Gibbs free energy across and near the depletion region, thereby promoting an improved hydrogen adsorption and desorption.

    Fig:  Mechanism revealing an interplay of BIEF and Gibbs Free Energy in CuO-CuWO4 p-n heterojunction for proton adsorption/desorption in HER.

    Interestingly, Scientists from INST, an autonomous institute of the Department of Science and Technology (DST), demonstrated that the interplay between the built-in electric field (BIEF) and Gibbs free energy in the proposed catalyst gives rise to a favourable regime, where hydrogen bonding to the catalyst is optimized, facilitating efficient hydrogen evolution. They also found that along the heterojunction interface, the ∆G indicates high adsorption affinity of protons toward the CuO phase and significant desorption at the CuWO4 phase. The CuO-CuWO₄ catalyst unveils an excellent example of ‘negative cooperativity,’ in which the binding of one molecule decreases the affinity of other binding sites for additional molecules. With more and more proton coverage, the affinity of the catalyst’s surface towards the proton adsorption decreases, and promotes alkaline Hydrogen Evolution Reaction by enhancing desorption.

    This research published in Adv. Energy Mater. 2025 helped understand the typical proton adsorption behaviour at the surface of the catalyst, which can help others to design and construct similar electrocatalyst which can give robust activity to produce green hydrogen. Improving in electrocatalytic hydrogen production can lead to sustainable environment with advance green technologies.

    ***

    NKR/PSM

    (Release ID: 2124882) Visitor Counter : 63

    MIL OSI Asia Pacific News –

  • MIL-OSI Asia-Pac: Consultative Committee of the Members of Parliament for the Ministry of Power held on the subject- “Roadmap for Development of Nuclear Power Generation”

    Source: Government of India

    Consultative Committee of the Members of Parliament for the Ministry of Power held on the subject- “Roadmap for Development of Nuclear Power Generation”

    Government targets 100 GW of nuclear power capacity by 2047 to strengthen India’s long-term energy security

    Strategic measures underway to accelerate nuclear power deployment and promote clean energy transition

    Posted On: 28 APR 2025 7:22PM by PIB Delhi

    A meeting of the Consultative Committee of the Ministry of Power was held today under the Chairmanship of Shri Manohar Lal, Hon’ble Union Minister for Power and Housing & Urban Affairs. The agenda for discussion was “Roadmap for Development of Nuclear Power Generation.”

    Nuclear Power: A Key Pillar for Achieving Net Zero Goals

    During the meeting, Hon’ble Minister highlighted India’s commitment to achieving net zero carbon emissions by 2070 and emphasized that increasing the share of non-fossil fuel-based power generation is central to this vision. As the power sector contributes over 40% of global energy-related emissions, nuclear energy, being a non-fossil and stable power source, will play an increasingly important role in India’s sustainable development journey.

    The Hon’ble Minister elaborated that, apart from electricity generation, nuclear energy can also serve non-electric applications such as hydrogen production, desalination, process steam, and space heating, thus supporting India’s broader energy transition goals.

    Current Status and Future Plans

    Members were informed that India currently operates 25 nuclear reactors across seven locations, with a total installed capacity of 8,880 MW, contributing about 3% of the country’s electricity generation. Eight reactors with 6,600 MW capacity are under construction, and another ten reactors with 7,000 MW capacity are in pre-project stages.

    In line with India’s vision of ‘Viksit Bharat @2047’, the Government has set a target of achieving 100 GW of nuclear power capacity by 2047. This will significantly strengthen India’s long-term energy security and contribute towards achieving clean energy goals.

    Strategic Initiatives for Accelerated Deployment

    The Hon’ble Minister outlined the key challenges and strategic steps required for scaling up nuclear energy, including:

    • Amending the Atomic Energy Act, 1962 and Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Act, 2010 to enable broader participation by private and state sectors.
    • Strengthening public perception and enhancing awareness about nuclear energy’s safety and benefits.
    • Facilitating faster land acquisition through brownfield expansions and repurposing retired thermal sites.
    • Streamlining regulatory approval processes to reduce project timelines.
    • Introducing tax concessions, green power classification, and long-term financing to ensure competitive nuclear tariffs.
    • Diversifying technology choices through competitive bidding and promoting indigenous manufacturing under Make in India.
    • Securing diversified uranium fuel sources and expanding the vendor base for specialized nuclear equipment.
    • Building skilled manpower capacity by strengthening nuclear education and training infrastructure.

    Members’ Participation and Way Forward

    Members of Parliament actively participated in the discussions and provided valuable suggestions for expediting nuclear power deployment. They stressed the need for faster project execution, creating a favorable public narrative, ensuring technology diversification, and building robust vendor and manpower ecosystems.

    In his concluding remarks, the Hon’ble Minister assured the Members that the Ministry of Power would work closely with the Department of Atomic Energy, State Governments, industries, and other stakeholders to accelerate the deployment of nuclear power projects and ensure a clean, secure, and sustainable energy future for India.

    ***

    SK

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    MIL OSI Asia Pacific News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: New Atomic Fountain Clock Joins Elite Group That Keeps the World on Time

    Source: US Government research organizations

    NIST scientists Greg Hoth (left) and Vladislav Gerginov work on NIST-F4, NIST’s new cesium fountain clock.

    Credit: R. Eskalis/NIST

    Clocks on Earth are ticking a bit more regularly thanks to NIST-F4, a new atomic clock at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) campus in Boulder, Colorado.

    This month, NIST researchers published a journal article establishing NIST-F4 as one of the world’s most accurate timekeepers. NIST has also submitted the clock for acceptance as a primary frequency standard by the International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM), the body that oversees the world’s time.

    NIST-F4 measures an unchanging frequency in the heart of cesium atoms, the internationally agreed-upon basis for defining the second since 1967. The clock is based on a “fountain” design that represents the gold standard of accuracy in timekeeping. NIST-F4 ticks at such a steady rate that if it had started running 100 million years ago, when dinosaurs roamed, it would be off by less than a second today.

    By joining a small group of similarly elite time pieces run by just 10 countries around the world, NIST-F4 makes the foundation of global time more stable and secure. At the same time, it is helping to steer the clocks NIST uses to keep official U.S. time. Distributed via radio and the internet, official U.S. time is critical for telecommunications and transportation systems, financial trading platforms, data center operations and more.

    NIST-F4 has improved time signals that are “used literally billions of times each day for everything from setting clocks and watches to ensuring the accurate time stamping of hundreds of billions of dollars of electronic financial transactions,” said Liz Donley, chief of the Time and Frequency Division at NIST.

    Introducing NIST-F4: The Nation’s New Primary Frequency Standard

    NIST-F4 isn’t just a clock — it’s the culmination of decades of scientific ingenuity, engineering breakthroughs, and an unwavering pursuit of precision. In this video, we explore the creation of NIST-F4, the United States’ latest primary frequency standard, and how it redefines what it means to measure time with atomic accuracy. From unexpected flaws to groundbreaking redesigns, this is the story of how one of the most precise timekeeping instruments ever built came to be — and why it’s crucial for everything from global synchronization to tomorrow’s technologies. Because when it comes to time, every billionth of a second counts. Find out more: https://www.nist.gov/atomic-clocks

    A Special Kind of Clock

    Cesium fountain clocks such as NIST-F4 are a type of atomic clock — a complex, high-precision device that extracts timing pulses from atoms. These clocks play a critical role in our globally connected society: They serve as “primary frequency standards” that work together to calibrate Coordinated Universal Time, or UTC (an agreed-upon system for keeping time using data from atomic clocks around the world, known as a time scale).

    National measurement labs such as NIST produce and distribute versions of UTC using their own time scales; NIST’s version, for example, is known as UTC(NIST). Those national time scales are then used to synchronize the clocks and networks we rely on in our daily lives. 

    In fountain clocks, a cloud of thousands of cesium atoms is first cooled to near absolute zero using lasers. Then, a pair of laser beams toss the atoms gently upward, after which they fall under their own weight.

    During their journey, the atoms pass twice through a small chamber full of microwave radiation. The first time, as the atoms are on their way up, the microwaves put the atoms into a quantum state that cycles in time at a special frequency known as the cesium resonant frequency — an unchanging constant set by the laws of nature.

    About one second later, as the atoms fall back down, a second interaction between the microwaves and the atoms reveals how close the clock’s microwave frequency is to the atoms’ natural resonant frequency. This measurement is used to tune the microwave frequency toward the atomic resonance frequency.

    A detector then counts 9,192,631,770 wave cycles of the fine-tuned microwaves. The time it takes to count those cycles defines the official international second.

    (That may change as early as 2030, when nations plan to consider redefining the second in terms of one or more different atomic elements used in so-called optical clocks that can measure time even more precisely than fountain clocks can. Even after that, cesium fountain clocks will still play an important, though diminished, role in timekeeping.)

    How does NIST-F4, NIST’s newest fountain clock, work?

    Meet NIST-F4, NIST’s newest fountain clock and our nation’s primary standard for the measurement of a second. It’s used to calibrate the hydrogen maser clocks that determine U.S. standard time. In this animation we explain the intricacies of how it works.

    A Journey Years in the Making

    Fewer than 20 cesium fountains are operating anywhere in the world. Unlike commercially available atomic clocks that tick off seconds for internet data centers, stock markets and other private enterprises, nearly every fountain clock is built and operated by scientists in a national measurement lab such as NIST.
    “It’s a beautiful technology that has real performance advantages, but it’s very delicate,” said Greg Hoth, a NIST physicist on the fountain clock team.

    Getting NIST-F4 admitted into this rarefied club was a journey years in the making. NIST scientists built the agency’s first fountain clock, NIST-F1, in the late 1990s. NIST-F1 ran for more than a decade and a half and was used to perform regular frequency calibrations. But fountain clocks can be as fragile as they are precise, and after a move to a new building in 2016, the clock had to be restored and carefully tested to operate as a primary frequency standard again — a process that took longer than expected.

    In 2020, physicist Vladislav Gerginov began investigating NIST-F1’s frequency measurements. Eventually, he, Hoth and colleagues decided to rebuild the core of the clock — the microwave cavity, where the cesium atoms are measured — from scratch. To achieve the necessary precision, they needed to achieve tolerances of 5 to 10 microns — roughly one-fifth the width of a human hair.

    The scientists added and fine-tuned new electric heating coils, magnetic coils, optics and microwave components. The NIST team decided to name the new fountain NIST-F4. (NIST has built two other fountain clocks, NIST-F2 and NIST-F3, making NIST-F4 the fourth in the series.)

    The research team took months’ worth of measurements to make sure NIST-F4 was not thrown off by factors such as pressure and temperature fluctuations or stray electric and magnetic fields. They compared the fountain’s ticks to those of hydrogen masers — the workhorse atomic clocks that tick off the seconds for official U.S. time — to make sure they were keeping a steady, unchanging beat.

    “Fountain clocks are supposed to be very boring,” said Hoth.

    Evaluating a fountain clock such as NIST-F4 “is a slow process because we have to be very conservative,” said Gerginov. “We should know everything about it” before putting it into service, he said, because any error in the timing signals could corrupt not only U.S. time but also the global timekeeping infrastructure.

    This month, the NIST team reported in the journal Metrologia that NIST-F4’s frequency measurements were accurate to within 2.2 parts in 10 to the 16th (10 million billion) — comparable to the world’s best fountain clocks. The NIST team also sent the clock data to the BIPM, where a team of experts is checking it over before BIPM officially certifies the clock as a primary frequency standard.

    “The success of NIST-F4 has renewed NIST’s global leadership in primary frequency standards,” said Donley. “Vladi and Greg used ingenuity and skill to restore the reliable, world-class operation of NIST’s atomic fountains.” 

    NIST-F4 and a second fountain clock, NIST-F3, operate roughly 90% of the time, with at least one of the clocks running at any given time. Data from NIST-F4 will be sent periodically to BIPM to calibrate UTC, and both clocks are already helping to steer the NIST time scale UTC(NIST).

    The NIST time scale “has already benefited significantly from the fountain’s high uptime and the reliability of its performance,” Donley said.

    Paper:  Vladislav Gerginov, Gregory W. Hoth, Thomas P. Heavner, Thomas E. Parker, Kurt Gibble and Jeff A. Sherman. Accuracy evaluation of primary frequency standard NIST-F4. Metrologia. Published online April 15, 2025. DOI: 10.1088/1681-7575/adc7bd

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI Global: How does soap keep you clean? A chemist explains the science of soap

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Paul E. Richardson, Professor of Biochemistry, Coastal Carolina University

    Be sure to wash your hands for at least 20 seconds. Mladen Zivkovic/iStock via Getty Images Plus

    Curious Kids is a series for children of all ages. If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, send it to CuriousKidsUS@theconversation.com.

    How does soap clean our bodies? – Charlie H., age 8, Stamford, Connecticut

    Thousands of years ago, our ancestors discovered something that would clean their bodies and clothes. As the story goes, fat from someone’s meal fell into the leftover ashes of a fire. They were astonished to discover that the blending of fat and ashes formed a material that cleaned things. At the time, it must have seemed like magic.

    That’s the legend, anyway. However it happened, the discovery of soap dates back approximately 5,000 years, to the ancient city of Babylon in what was southern Mesopotamia – today, the country of Iraq.

    As the centuries passed, people around the world began to use soap to clean the things that got dirty. During the 1600s, soap was a common item in the American colonies, often made at home. In 1791, Nicholas Leblanc, a French chemist, patented the first soapmaking process. Today, the world spends about US$50 billion every year on bath, kitchen and laundry soap.

    But although billions of people use soap every day, most of us don’t know how it works. As a professor of chemistry, I can explain the science of soap – and why you should listen to your mom when she tells you to wash up.

    You’ll be amazed at how much work it takes to make a bar of soap.

    The chemistry of clean

    Water – scientific name: dihydrogen monoxide – is composed of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom. That molecule is required for all life on our planet.

    Chemists categorize other molecules that are attracted to water as hydrophilic, which means water-loving. Hydrophilic molecules can dissolve in water.

    So if you were to wash your hands under a running faucet without using soap, you’d probably get rid of lots of whatever hydrophilic bits are stuck to your skin.

    But there is another category of molecules that chemists call hydrophobic, which means water-fearing. Hydrophobic molecules do not dissolve in water.

    Oil is an example of something that’s hydrophobic. You probably know from experience that oil and water just don’t mix. Picture shaking up a jar of vinaigrette salad dressing – the oil and the other watery ingredients never stay mixed.

    So just swishing your hands through water isn’t going to get rid of water-fearing molecules such as oil or grease.

    Here’s where soap comes in to save the day.

    Soap, a complex molecule, is both water-loving and water-fearing. Shaped like a tadpole, the soap molecule has a round head and long tail; the head is hydrophilic, and the tail is hydrophobic. This quality is one of the reasons soap is slippery.

    It’s also what gives soap its cleaning superpower.

    The round head and long wiggly tail of the soap molecules work together to eradicate dirt, grease and grime.
    Tumeggy/Science Photo Library via Getty Images

    A microscopic view

    To see what happens when you wash your hands with soap and water, let’s zoom in.

    Picture all the gunk that you touch during the day and that builds up on your skin to make your hands dirty. Maybe there are smears of food, mud from outside, or even sweat and oils from your own skin.

    All of that material is either water-loving or water-fearing on the molecular level. Dirt is a jumbled mess of both. Dust and dead skin cells are hydrophilic; naturally occurring oils are hydrophobic; and environmental debris can be either.

    If you use only water to clean your hands, plenty will be left behind because you’d only remove the water-loving bits that dissolve in water.

    But when you add a bit of soap, it’s a different story, thanks to its simultaneously water-loving and water-fearing properties.

    Soap molecules work together to encapsulate grime within a bubblelike micelle structure.
    TUMEGGY/Science Photo Library via Getty Images

    Soap molecules come together and surround the grime on your hands, forming what’s known as a micelle structure. On a molecular level, it looks almost like a bubble encasing the hydrophobic bit of debris. The water-loving heads of the soap molecules are on the surface, with the water-fearing tails inside the micelle. This structure traps the dirt, and running water washes it all away.

    To get the full effect, wash your hands at the sink for at least 20 seconds. Rubbing your hands together helps force the soap molecules into whatever dirt is there to break it up and envelope it.

    It’s not just dirt

    Along with dirt, your body is covered by microorganisms – bacteria, viruses and fungi. Most are harmless and some even protect you from getting sick. But some microorganisms, known as pathogens, can cause illness and disease.

    Whether liquid or bar, soap gets the job done.
    velvelvel/iStock via Getty Images Plus

    They can also cause you to smell if you haven’t taken a bath in a while. These bacteria break down organic molecules and release stinky fumes.

    Although microorganisms are protected by a barrier – it’s called a membrane – soap and water can disrupt the membrane, causing the microorganism to burst open. The water then washes the remains of the microorganism away, along with the stink.

    To say that soap changed the course of civilization is an understatement. For thousands of years, it’s helped keep billions of people healthy. Think of that the next time Mom or Dad asks you to wash up – which will likely be sometime soon.

    Hello, curious kids! Do you have a question you’d like an expert to answer? Ask an adult to send your question to CuriousKidsUS@theconversation.com. Please tell us your name, age and the city where you live.

    And since curiosity has no age limit – adults, let us know what you’re wondering, too. We won’t be able to answer every question, but we will do our best.

    Paul E. Richardson receives funding from the NIH and NSF.

    – ref. How does soap keep you clean? A chemist explains the science of soap – https://theconversation.com/how-does-soap-keep-you-clean-a-chemist-explains-the-science-of-soap-247559

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Europe: REPORT on the proposal for a regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council amending Regulation (EU) 2017/1938 as regards the role of gas storage for securing gas supplies ahead of the winter season – A10-0079/2025

    Source: European Parliament

    DRAFT EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT LEGISLATIVE RESOLUTION

    on the proposal for a regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council amending Regulation (EU) 2017/1938 as regards the role of gas storage for securing gas supplies ahead of the winter season

    (COM(2025)0099 – C10‑0041/2025 – 2025/0051(COD))

    (Ordinary legislative procedure: first reading)

    The European Parliament,

    – having regard to the Commission proposal to Parliament and the Council (COM(2025)0099),

    – having regard to Article 294(2) and Article 194(2) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, pursuant to which the Commission submitted the proposal to Parliament (C10‑0041/2025),

    – having regard to Article 294(3) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union,

    – having regard to the opinion of the European Economic and Social Committee of 26 March 2025[1],

    – having regard to the opinion of the Committee of the Regions of …[2],

    – having regard to Rule 60 of its Rules of Procedure,

    – having regard to the report of the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy (A10-0079/2025),

    1. Adopts its position at first reading hereinafter set out;

    2. Calls on the Commission to refer the matter to Parliament again if it replaces, substantially amends or intends to substantially amend its proposal;

    3. Instructs its President to forward its position to the Council, the Commission and the national parliaments.

     

    Amendment  1

    AMENDMENTS BY THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT[*]

    to the Commission proposal

    ———————————————————

     

    REGULATION OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL

    Amending Regulation (EU) 2017/1938 as regards the role of gas storage for securing gas supplies ahead of the winter season

    THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN UNION,

    Having regard to the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, and in particular Article 194(2) thereof,

    Having regard to the proposal from the European Commission,

    After transmission of the draft legislative act to the national parliaments,

    Acting in accordance with the ordinary legislative procedure,

    Whereas:

    (1) Regulation (EU) 2022/1032 of the Parliament and of the Council[3] was adopted in reaction to the gas-supply crisis and unprecedented price increases caused by the escalation of the Russia’s ongoing unjustified and unprovoked war of aggression against Ukraine since February 2022, impelling the Union to act in a coordinated and comprehensive manner to avoid potential risks resulting from further gas-supply disruptions.

    (2) Regulation (EU) 2022/1032 amended Regulation (EU) 2017/1938 by introducing a temporary legal framework for measures regarding the filling level of underground storage facilities to strengthen the security of gas supply in the Union, in particular gas supplies to protected customers.

    (3) Gas-storage facilities provide for 30% of the Union’s gas consumption during the winter months, and well-filled underground gas-storage facilities as well as gas demand reduction contribute substantially to the security of gas supply by providing additional gas in the event of high demand or supply disruptions.

    (4) The laying down of a mandatory target to ensure that gas-storage facilities are 90% full by 1 November (filling target), with a series of intermediate targets for each Member State in February, May, July and September of the following year ▌(filling trajectory), proved to be fundamental during the energy crisis sparked by Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine and Russia’s weaponisation of its gas supplies in both: (i) weathering the gas-supply shortages; and (ii) reducing market uncertainties and price volatility.

    (5) Despite the substantial improvement of the gas market situation compared to the period 2022-2023 ▌, the European gas market remains tight and the geopolitical situation remains unclear. More intense competition for global LNG supplies can increase Member States exposure to price volatility. ▌In such situation, the role of gas storages remains paramount. ▌

    (6) Pursuant to Regulation (EU) 2017/1938 the obligation of the Member States to follow an annual filling trajectory and to ensure that the filling target is achieved by 1 November of each year expires on 31 December 2025.

    (6a) Since 2022, the Union has substantially succeeded in making gas supplies more secure by increasing LNG imports from trustworthy global partners and is aiming to fully eliminate the Union’s reliance on Russian fossil fuels, building on the progress of REPowerEU. The Union has developed new regasification facilities and port terminals, while also establishing a liquid gas market that ensures strong resilience against potential disruptions in the remaining Russian pipeline supplies.

    (6b) The changed global political environment has to be taken into account with regard to the reliability of the gas suppliers and gas supplying countries.

    (7) In the light of the European success to derisk its gas import structure, the overall framework to meet the Union’s need for natural gas must strike a balance between energy security and the return to market-based principles. It must thus be flexible enough during the filling season to allow a swift reaction to constantly changing market conditions and in particular to take advantage of the best purchasing conditions in order to bring down gas prices in Europe. The filling target should therefore be lowered to 83 %

    (8) To enhance market stability and mitigate the risk of undue price volatility potentially triggered by intermediary filling targets, it is appropriate to provide increased flexibility for storage filling. Member States should therefore provide indicative filling plans on a yearly basis that could include where appropriate an indicative filling trajectory and should allow for storage filling in such a way that there is sufficient flexibility available for market participants throughout the year, taking into account Recommendation (2025)1481.

    (8a) Member States should have the possibility to deviate by up to four percentage points from the filling target in the case of unfavourable market conditions, relating, inter alia, to factors such as supply and demand and competition, or of trading activities hindering cost-effective storage filling, that significantly limit the ability to ensure that the gas storages are filled in accordance with this Regulation.

    (8b) Moreover, the Commission should be empowered to adopt delegated acts to amend for one filling season the level of the allowed deviation of four percentage points by increasing it by up to an additional four percentage points, in the case of persistent unfavourable market conditions.

    (8c) The cumulative effects of the flexibilities and derogations in this Regulation should not bring down the overall storage filling obligations under 75 %.

    (9) The Commission’s assessment of the current energy-security framework has confirmed the positive impact of the storage-filling requirements on the security of gas supply and those positive effects should be preserved beyond 2025. Extending these measures would not only contribute to the continued safeguarding of supply security, but would also constitute a key instrument in the Union’s efforts to eliminate its dependence on imports of gas originating in the Russian Federation.

    (9a) At the same time this Regulation should respond to current and future changes in the natural gas markets and contribute to the strategic objective of bringing down energy prices and facilitate the gradual return towards market-based mechanisms for storage refilling.

    (9b) In order to maintain the security of supply and the appropriate level of filling, the Commission should continuously monitor the market and explore ways that could help meet the filling target, for example using demand aggregation and joint purchasing mechanisms.

    (10) It is therefore necessary to extend by two years the relevant gas storage filling provisions that provide predictability and transparency as to the utilisation of gas-storage facilities across the Union while at the same time introducing some flexibility into this Regulation.

    (10a) In line with the Commission’s commitment to better regulation and simplification, and reflecting the overall improvement in the Union’s energy security framework, the monitoring of compliance with this Regulation should place greater trust in the Member States’ administrative capacities. The supervisory burden on the Commission should be reduced accordingly, with a shift towards lighter-touch reporting obligations and streamlined procedures. This approach reinforces the principle of subsidiarity, avoids unnecessary administrative complexity, and is consistent with the Commission’s simplification efforts as outlined in its Work Programme 2025.

    (10b) Regulation (EU) 2017/1938 should be revised by the Commission in due time and before 2027 to be adapted to the evolving energy landscape and to reflect the future needs for gas storage. Among other issues, any amendments should address the limitations of the current definition of “protected customers”, the prevention of speculation on the gas markets and speculative activities that artificially inflate prices, the role of energy efficiency measures leading to verifiable gas demand reduction and how this could be used for further flexibilities by Member States and consider the framework under an evolving energy mix that will have an increased role of alternative sources to gas such as renewable energy sources, hydrogen together with the role of energy efficiency.

    (11) Regulation (EU) 2017/1938 should therefore be amended accordingly,

    HAVE ADOPTED THIS REGULATION:

    Article 1

    Amendment to Regulation (EU) 2017/1938

     

    ▌Regulation (EU) 2017/1938 is amended as follows:

    (1) in Article 2, point 27 is deleted;

    (2) Article 6a is amended as follows:

    (a) the title is replaced by the following: ‘Filling target’;

    (b) in paragraph 1, the first subparagraph is replaced by the following:

    ‘1. Subject to paragraphs 2 to 5, Member States shall meet the filling target of 83 % for the aggregated capacity of all underground gas storage facilities that are located on their territory and directly interconnected to a market area in their territory and for storage facilities listed in Annex Ib at any point in time between 1 October and 1 December each year.’;

    (c) the following paragraphs are inserted:

    ‘5a.  Notwithstanding paragraph 1 and without prejudice to the obligation of other Member States to fill the underground gas storage facilities concerned, Member States may decide to deviate by up to four percentage points, from the filling target set out in paragraph 1 for each Member State if market conditions are unfavourable for filling underground gas storage facilities.

    5b. In duly justified cases of persistent unfavourable market conditions, and provided that the security of supply of the Union and the Member States is not undermined, the Commission is empowered to adopt delegated acts in accordance with Article 19 to amend this Regulation by increasing the allowed deviation for Member States, as laid down in paragraph 5a by up to 4 percentage points.

    In its assessment, the Commission shall in particular take into account the level of storage filling in the Member States, global gas supply, ENTSOG’s seasonal supply outlook, and indications of market manipulation. It may also take into consideration Member State measures, such as the deployment of gas demand-reduction measures for gas that achieve equivalent gas reductions during the following withdrawal season.

    5c. Member States referred to in paragraph 2 may under the same conditions as those provided for in paragraph 5a decide to deviate by up to 1,55 % below the volume set out in paragraph 2.

    5d. Before using any of the deviations provided for in paragraphs 5a and 5c, each Member State shall consult the Commission and provide without undue delay a justification for its decision. The Commission shall promptly inform the GCG about the cumulative effects of all deviations pursuant to paragraphs 5a and 5c and any directly affected Member States.’;

    (d) paragraph 6 and 7 are replaced by the following:

    ‘6. In order to meet the filling target, Member States shall take all necessary measures and strive to follow the filling plan defined in accordance to paragraph 7.

    7. Member States with underground gas storage facilities shall submit to the Commission in due time an indicative filling plan for the whole calendar year to reach the yearly gas storage filling target set in paragraph 1. The plan shall include technical information for the underground gas storage facilities on its territory and shall be directly interconnected to its market area in an aggregated form.’;

    (e) paragraph 8 is deleted;

    (f) paragraphs 10 and 11 are replaced by the following:

    ‘10. The competent authority of each Member State shall continuously monitor compliance with the filling target as set in the filling plan and shall report regularly and at least once per month to the Commission and the GCG. If it is foreseen that the target cannot be met, the competent authority shall, without delay, take effective measures to meet the target. Member States shall inform the Commission and the GCG of the measures taken.

    11. In the event of a substantial and sustained deviation by a Member State from the filling plan, which compromises the meeting of the filling target or in the event of a deviation from the filling target, the Commission shall, where appropriate, after consulting the GCG and the Member States concerned, issue a recommendation to that Member State or to the other Member States concerned regarding measures to be taken immediately to remedy the deviation or to minimize the impact on the security of supply, considering inter alia possible unfavourable market conditions. and specificities of Member States, such as the technical characteristics and size of the underground gas storage facilities in relation to the domestic gas consumption, the declining importance of the underground low calorific gas storage facilities for the security of gas supply, and existing LNG storage capacity.

    11a. When a Member State does not meet the filling target set in paragraph 1 thus endangering the security of supply of the Union, the Commission shall adopt an implementing act setting a filling plan for that Member State for the year after, based on the technical information provided by each Member State and taking into account the assessment of the GCG. That implementing act shall be adopted in accordance with the examination procedure referred to in Article 18a(2). It shall be based on an assessment of the general security of gas supply situation and the development of gas demand and supply in the Union and individual Member States with the aim of safeguarding the security of gas supply.’;

    (3) Article 6b is amended as follows:

    (a) the title is replaced by the following: ‘Implementation of the filling target’;

    (b) in paragraph 1, the first subparagraph is replaced by the following:

    ‘1. Member States shall take all necessary measures to meet the filling target set pursuant to Article 6a. When ensuring that the filling target is met, Member States shall prioritise, where possible, market-based measures.’;

    (c) paragraph 2 is replaced by the following:

    ‘2. The measures taken by the Member States pursuant to paragraph 1 shall be limited to what is necessary to meet the filling target. They shall be clearly defined, transparent, proportionate, non-discriminatory and verifiable. They shall not unduly distort competition or the proper functioning of the internal market in gas, unduly increase energy costs or endanger the security of gas supply of other Member States or of the Union. Member States shall inform the Commission and the GCG of any such measures.’;

    (4) Article 6c is amended as follows:

    (a) in paragraph 1, first subparagraph is replaced by the following:

    ‘1. A Member State without underground gas storage facilities shall ensure that market participants within that Member State have in place arrangements with underground storage system operators or other market participants in Member States with underground gas storage facilities. Those arrangements shall provide for the use, by 1 December, of storage volumes corresponding to at least 15 % of the average annual gas consumption over the preceding five years of the Member State without underground gas storage facilities. However, where cross-border transmission capacity or other technical limitations prevent a Member State without underground gas storage facilities from fully using 15 % of those storage volumes, that Member State shall store only those volumes that are technically possible.’;

    (b) in paragraph 2, second subparagraph is replaced by the following:

    ‘Member States without underground gas storage facilities shall demonstrate that they comply with paragraph 1 and shall notify the Commission accordingly.’;

    (c) in paragraph 5, first subparagraph, point (a) is replaced by the following:

    ‘(a) ensure that by 1 December storage volumes correspond at least to the average usage of the storage capacity over the preceding five years, determined, inter alia, by taking into account the flows during withdrawal season over the preceding five years from the Member States where the storage facilities are located; or’;

    (d) paragraph 6 is replaced by the following:

    ‘6. Unless otherwise specified in Annex Ib, in the case of underground gas storage facilities located in one Member State that are not covered by paragraph 5 but that are directly connected to the market area of another Member State, that other Member State shall ensure that between 1 October and 1 December storage volumes correspond to at least the average of the storage capacity booked at the relevant cross-border point over the preceding five years.’;

    (5) Article 6d is amended as follows:

    (a) paragraphs 1 and 2 are replaced by the following:

    ‘1. Storage system operators shall report the filling level to the competent authority in each Member State where the underground gas storage facilities concerned are located and, if applicable, to an entity designated by that Member State (the ‘designated entity’) as set pursuant to Article 6a.

    2. The competent authority and, if applicable, the designated entity of each Member State shall monitor the filling levels of the underground gas storage facilities on their territory at the end of each month and report monthly the results to the Commission without any delay. The competent authority shall also include information on the share of gas originating in the Russian federation being stored in that Member State, where such information is available.

    The Commission may, where appropriate, invite the European Union Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators (ACER) to assist with such monitoring.’;

    (b) paragraphs 4 and 5 are replaced by the following:

    ‘4. The GCG shall assist the Commission in the monitoring of the filling ▌target, and shall develop guidance for the Commission on adequate measures to ensure better alignment in the event that Member States filling rates compromise the achievement of the filling target, or to ensure compliance with the filling target.

    4a. Where appropriate, the Commission shall implement measures helping Member States to meet the filling target, including measures to encourage participation in the demand aggregation and joint purchasing mechanism set up under Regulation (EU) 2022/2576 (‘AggregateEU’)* .

    5. Member States and, where appropriate, the Commission shall take the necessary measures to meet the filling target and to enforce upon market participants the storage obligations. These measures may include sufficiently deterrent sanctions and fines, such as adequate financial penalties.

    ___________________

    * Council Regulation (EU) 2022/2576 of 19 December 2022 enhancing solidarity through better coordination of gas purchases, reliable price benchmarks and exchanges of gas across borders (OJ L 335, 29.12.2022, p. 1, ELI: http://data.europa.eu/eli/reg/2022/2576/oj).’;

    (6) in Article 17a, paragraph 1, the following point is added:

    ‘(da) the information about the share of gas originating in the Russian federation stored in the EU storages, provided by Member States in accordance with Article 6d(2).’;

    (7) in Article 22, the fourth paragraph is replaced by the following:

    ‘Article 2, points (27) to (31), Articles 6a to 6d, Article 16(3), Article 17a, Article 18a, Article 20(4) and Annex Ib shall apply until 31 December 2027.’;

    (8) Annex Ia is deleted.

     

    Article 2

    Entry into force

    This Regulation shall enter into force and shall apply on the day following that of its publication in the Official Journal of the European Union.

    This Regulation shall be binding in its entirety and directly applicable in all Member States.

    Done at Brussels,

    For the European Parliament

    The President

    For the Council

    The President

     

    MIL OSI Europe News –

  • MIL-OSI Russia: HSE scientists learn to convert CO₂ into fuel without expensive reagents

    Translation. Region: Russian Federal

    Source: State University Higher School of Economics – State University Higher School of Economics –

    Researchers MIEM HSE Together with Chinese scientists, they created a catalyst that helps convert carbon dioxide into formic acid more efficiently. Thanks to the carbon coating, it works stably in an acidic environment and with a minimum amount of potassium, although it was previously believed that the element was necessary in high concentrations. This will reduce the cost of gas processing, and also simplify its industrial use – for example, in the production of fuel for environmentally friendly types of transport. Study published in the journal Nature Communications.

    Electrochemical reduction of carbon dioxide is a process in which gas is converted into other chemical compounds under the influence of electric current. It has long been considered not only as a way to utilize CO₂, but also as a source of valuable raw materials. For example, formic acid, which can be used as a liquid fuel, solvent or component for the chemical industry.

    However, the electrochemical reduction of CO₂ has a problem: a side reaction releases hydrogen, which reduces the efficiency of the process. In alkaline solutions, this problem is solved by adding more potassium ions (K⁺), but this not only makes the process more expensive, but also leads to the formation of sediments that clog the installation and impair its operation. And if, on the contrary, an acidic environment is used, the catalysts quickly deteriorate and lose their efficiency.

    A group of researchers, including specialists from MIEM HSE, proposed an alternative approach. They developed a catalyst that works stably in an acidic environment with a minimum amount of potassium. Its base is indium oxide (In₂O₃), covered with a thin layer of carbon.

    First, using computer modeling, MIEM employees found out how to control the distribution of ions on the catalyst surface. The model showed that the carbon coating not only protects the catalyst from destruction, but also forms an electric field that holds potassium ions near its surface. Thanks to this, potassium does not precipitate, and unwanted side reactions are suppressed.

    To test the model’s predictions, Chinese scientists synthesized indium oxide nanoparticles and coated them with a thin layer of carbon. They then conducted a series of experiments in an electrolyte reactor. They used a highly acidic environment and several times less potassium than in traditional systems. Tests showed that even under such conditions, the catalyst remained stable: it remained active for more than 100 hours, while the efficiency of converting CO₂ into formic acid was 98.9%.

    “We have managed to show that it is possible to abandon the excess potassium, which complicates the operation of the system. This approach made the process cheaper, and the catalyst itself more stable,” comments MIEM HSE Associate Professor Liu Dongyu.

    To make sure that the carbon coating was indeed the culprit, the researchers conducted additional tests. They found that without the coating, indium oxide quickly reduced to metallic indium, which was much less effective at electrochemically reducing CO₂. This confirmed that it was the carbon layer that protected the catalyst, preventing it from deteriorating.

    The method not only simplifies the technology of carbon dioxide processing, but also makes it more accessible for industrial use. Unlike traditional alkaline systems, it does not require a high concentration of potassium and eliminates the formation of sediments. The introduction of the technology into real installations can make carbon dioxide processing more environmentally friendly.

    “We have made the process more stable and convenient for scaling, which means we have brought the electrochemical reduction of carbon dioxide closer to application in real production,” comments Andrey Vasenko, professor at MIEM HSE. “The technology can be useful not only for the synthesis of formic acid, but also for other processes related to the processing of CO₂.”

    Please note: This information is raw content directly from the source of the information. It is exactly what the source states and does not reflect the position of MIL-OSI or its clients.

    MIL OSI Russia News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Hubble Visits Glittering Cluster, Capturing Its Ultraviolet Light

    Source: NASA

    As part of ESA/Hubble’s 35th anniversary celebrations, the European Space Agency (ESA) shared new images that revisited stunning, previously released Hubble targets with the addition of the latest Hubble data and new processing techniques.
    ESA/Hubble released new images of NGC 346, the Sombrero Galaxy, and the Eagle Nebula earlier in the month. Now they are revisiting the star cluster Messier 72 (M72).
    M72 is a collection of stars, formally known as a globular cluster, located in the constellation Aquarius roughly 50,000 light-years from Earth. The intense gravitational attraction between the closely packed stars gives globular clusters their regular, spherical shape. There are roughly 150 known globular clusters associated with the Milky Way galaxy.
    The striking variety in the color of the stars in this image of M72, particularly compared to the original image, results from the addition of ultraviolet observations to the previous visible-light data. The colors indicate groups of different types of stars. Here, blue stars are those that were originally more massive and have reached hotter temperatures after burning through much of their hydrogen fuel; the bright red objects are lower-mass stars that have become red giants. Studying these different groups help astronomers understand how globular clusters, and the galaxies they were born in, initially formed.
    Pierre Méchain, a French astronomer and colleague of Charles Messier, discovered M72 in 1780. It was the first of five star clusters that Méchain would discover while assisting Messier. They recorded the cluster as the 72nd entry in Messier’s famous collection of astronomical objects. It is also one of the most remote clusters in the catalog.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI Economics: Europe’s hydrogen initiatives and renewable energy auctions to accelerate region’s energy transition, says GlobalData

    Source: GlobalData

    Europe’s hydrogen initiatives and renewable energy auctions to accelerate region’s energy transition, says GlobalData

    Posted in Power

    Three years into the Russia-Ukraine conflict, Europe has significantly diminished its reliance on Russia. Even though the EU has been importing liquified natural gas (LNG) primarily from the US, Norway, and Qatar since the onset of hostilities, the continent has decreased its overall consumption of fossil fuels, particularly the power sector has progressively become cleaner. The structural modifications to the permitting process for renewable energy projects and hydrogen initiatives are expected to further accelerate the region’s energy transition, says GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.

    GlobalData’s latest report, “Europe Renewable Energy Policy Handbook 2025,” reveals that in response to structural changes in permitting, EU countries acted in a united and prompt manner. Merely weeks following Russia’s incursion into Ukraine, the leaders of the 27 EU member states resolved to expedite the EU’s transition away from reliance on Russian fossil fuels by diversifying energy supplies and sources, curtailing the use of fossil fuels, and accelerating the transition to cleaner energy sources. Subsequently, the European Commission introduced the REPowerEU plan—a strategic framework aimed at enhancing the EU’s energy independence and promoting the adoption of clean energy.

    The EU, with its “Fit for 55” package, is committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions by at least 55% by 2030, thereby aligning its energy targets with an emphasis on renewable energy. In 2023, the EU, under the revised REPowerEU plan, set a goal for a 42.5% renewable energy share by 2030. Member states are encouraged to contribute through their respective National Energy and Climate Plans (NECPs). The EU is promoting clean energy through auctions and hydrogen energy.

    Sudeshna Sarmah, Power Analyst at GlobalData, comments: “The EU is actively pursuing a variety of strategies to broaden the adoption of renewable technologies. The implementation of the Innovation Fund auction and the Renewable Energy Sources Auction platform is anticipated to garner support for renewable hydrogen projects and serve as a catalyst for renewable power auctions, respectively. These initiatives are expected to foster a favorable environment for investment opportunities within the EU.”

    In the Innovation Fund’s 24th auction, which concluded in February 2025, member countries of the European Economic Area (EEA) were given the opportunity to enhance projects with additional national funding through the Auctions as a Service (AaaS) mechanism. Spain, Lithuania, and Austria chose to participate in the IF24 AaaS, collectively committing over EUR 700 million (approximately $740.3 million) in national funds to support renewable hydrogen production projects within their territories.

    Launched in May 2024, the Renewable Energy Sources (RES) Auctions Platform represents a critical component of the European Commission’s Wind Power Action Plan. This platform consolidates vital information from Member States concerning upcoming renewable energy auctions within the European Union. Its purpose is to provide companies with improved visibility of expected deployment volumes, thus aiding the industry in planning their investments more efficiently.

    Sarmah concludes: “The European Hydrogen Strategy sets an ambitious annual consumption target of 20 million tons of hydrogen by the year 2030. Of this total, approximately 10 million tons are expected to be produced within the European Union. To facilitate the domestic manufacture of such significant volumes of green hydrogen, the development of an infrastructure capable of supporting 40 GW of electrolysis capacity will be essential by the decade’s end, indicating a promising trajectory for the growth of green hydrogen in the region.”

    MIL OSI Economics –