Proximocast: New Year Trends 2025

Every year, Proximo looks back at the highlights and trends of the last 12 months, and looks forward to what the next 12 months will bring. It asks a group of expert panellists to review the trends that Proximo’s editorial team has selected, as well as think up their own. Think of this as a companion to the project-related trends that Proximo released on 3 January.

The panellists are:

Ian Cogswell, a senior adviser at Portland Advisers, and a founder of CCC Training

Michael Whalen, managing director and energy and infrastructure finance adviser at Berkeley Research Group.

Jonathan Yellen, investment director at Climate Investment.

The trends, in order that panellists selected them, were:

1. The supply of both debt and equity for energy and infrastructure assets remains very strong. Ian

2. Sponsors are getting more vocal that reductions in debt pricing need to happen. Michael.

3. The demands of electrification are feeding through into strong mining finance activity. Jonathan

4. The battery manufacturing development and financing boom is over for now. Tom

5. Africa looks like it might take off. Ian*

6. AI and other applications are driving a surge in data centre financings that has yet to abate. Michael, though he thinks that a crunch is looming

7. Biden was not good for the US LNG market, but Trump is likely to be better. Jonathan

8. Offshore wind is positioned to head out of its recent doldrums. Tom

9. Biden was good for the US renewables market, but Trump is unlikely to make it much worse. Ian

10. A tougher economic and political environment might make newer technologies harder to finance. Michael*

11. We should witness a blossoming of equity growth capital. Jonathan*

12. Rest in peace Jimmy Carter, whose passage of PURPA allowed independent power to happen. Tom*

*Not on the list of trends supplied by Proximo.