Reuters exclusively reports “the king of oil” bets on batteries for a green world

Reuters exclusively reported that Alex Beard, once one of the world’s most powerful oil traders and former Glencore executive, is now raising money to build a portfolio of strategic battery sites across the United Kingdom to support the renewable energy industry. In his first interview since leaving the commodities giant in 2019, billionaire Beard said his Adaptogen Capital investment fund planned to build storage with a capacity of at least 500 megawatts to power homes when grid supplies fall short. In his heyday at Glencore, Beard’s team was trading as much as 7% of the world’s oil. The fact he is turning to infrastructure to support renewables is another sign of the way the wind is blowing for the global energy industry.