All articles by Thom Atkinson

WCN's editor-in-chief

The execution economy of battery storage

The first phase of the battery storage industry was defined by expansion. The next phase may be defined by execution.…
The energy transition’s cyber paradox

The energy transition has always been presented as an engineering challenge financed at unprecedented scale. Build more renewable generation, reinforce…
What do dark factories mean for the energy transition?

The case for dark factories is often framed around automation. But does that miss the bigger commercial question? For those…
Latin America’s clean power success creates a harder problem

Latin America and the Caribbean has largely solved the problem many power markets are still struggling with: generating low-carbon electricity…
Renewable investment enters a new phase as grids become the limiting factor

According to Energy Monitor's parent company GlobalData, global renewable energy investment reached about $683bn in 2025 and is projected to…

Why freight decarbonisation is becoming an infrastructure race

Freight operators face a familiar problem with decarbonisation. Regulatory deadlines are becoming clearer just as the infrastructure needed to meet…
Data centres are becoming a defining force in power markets – can renewables keep up?

The energy transition has spent years focused on supply. The next challenge may be demand. According to GlobalData, global data…
Critical minerals are becoming the energy transition’s delivery constraint

For most of the past decade, the economics of the energy transition improved faster than many perhaps expected. Solar and…
Hydrogen’s next phase will favour execution over scale

Hydrogen did not contract sharply in the first quarter of 2026 (Q1 2026). Instead, the market became more selective. GlobalData…
Africa’s clean energy story is being rewritten by grids, not gigawatts

Africa’s energy transition is unfolding against a far less stable global backdrop than many expected even a year ago. The…