Category: 3. Business

An Coimiúsin Pleanála (ACP) has confirmed that plans have formally been withdrawn for a €1.4 billion wind farm comprising “30 Eiffel Tower sized turbines” off the coast of Co Clare and Co Galway.

Comedian Tommy Tiernan was one of 177 third parties to lodge submissions on the contentious plan to construct the 450MW wind farm with 30 turbines over 1,000ft high in the Atlantic ocean.

Fuinneamh Sceirde Teoranta (FST) was planning to construct its Sceirde Rocks wind farm on waters located 5km to 11.5m km off the west coast with Carna in Galway the nearest settlement.

The commission has informed Mr Tiernan and other third parties, along with local authorities, that FST has withdrawn its planning application.

With the abandonment of the project, FST has forfeited the €35.4 million performance security bond it lodged with the Department of Climate, Energy and the Environment connected to the proposal.

[ ‘Disgusting thing to do’: Tommy Tiernan objects to proposed Connemara offshore wind farmOpens in new window ]

This is in addition to the substantial costs it incurred in preparing the planning documentation, which was lodged with the marine section of the commission on January 17th last year.

In a letter to the commission, Sharn Ward, a director at FST, stated that representatives of FST and ACP met on December 4th “and FST noted its intention to withdraw the planning application”.

Ms Ward added: “With this letter, FST formally withdraws the planning application.”

Ms Ward said that “by way of background, FST notified the Dept of Climate, Energy and the Environment by letters dated April 25th and May 29th of the cessation of the Sceirde Rocks project”.

A spokesman at the Department of Climate, Energy and the Environment said on Friday that the project was owned by Corio Generation, who announced a planned corporate restructuring on April 8th 2025 that would see it focus on a smaller portfolio of projects worldwide.

He said the department had drawn down the performance security of €35.4 million.

He said: “Under the terms and conditions of ORESS 1 (the Offshore Renewable Electricity Support Scheme), abandonment of the project results in forfeiture of the performance security. Following abandonment of the Sceirde Rocks project, its performance security was forfeited. There is no provision in the terms and conditions for its return.”

In his objection to the Sceirde Rock proposal, Mr Tiernan wrote: “I’m objecting to the proposed offshore wind farm near Carna, Connemara, County Galway on the grounds of desecration of that area of natural beauty.”

The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) has approved the prospectus for the Offer for Sale and Initial Public Offering (IPO) of Signature Residency REIT, paving the way for the public offering of 8.25 million units, equivalent to 25 percent of the total units of the trust.

The approval continues the IPO momentum in the ongoing fiscal year 2025–26, with Signature Residency REIT set to become the fifth listing on the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) Main Board during the year and the second REIT to be listed so far.

Upon listing, the total number of REITs listed on the PSX will increase to five. SECP added that this offering signals renewed issuer confidence in capital market–based financing and underscores the expanding range of real estate–linked investment opportunities available to public investors through regulated market structures.

In a phase III trial (inMIND) reported in The Lancet, Sehn et al found that the addition of the CD19-targeted Fc-enhanced monoclonal antibody tafasitamab to lenalidomide plus rituximab improved progression-free survival in patients with relapsed or refractory follicular lymphoma.

Study Details

In the global double-blind trial, 548 patients from sites in North America, Europe, and the Asia-Pacific region were randomly assigned between April 2021 and August 2023 to receive up to twelve 28-day cycles of tafasitamab at 12 mg/kg on days 1, 8, 15, and 22 of cycles 1 to 3 and days 1 and 15 of cycles 4 to 12 (n = 273) or placebo (n = 275), with both groups receiving lenalidomide at 20 mg/day on days 1 to 21 of cycles 1 to 12 and rituximab at 375 mg/m² on days 1, 8, 15, and 22 of cycle 1 and day 1 of cycles 2 to 5. In total, 80% of patients were White. The primary endpoint was investigator-assessed progression-free survival in the intention-to-treat population.

Key Findings

Median follow-up was 14.3 months (95% confidence interval [CI] = 11.8–15.0 months) in the tafasitamab group and 14.1 months (95% CI = 11.5–15.0 months) in the control group. Median progression-free survival on investigator assessment was 22.4 months (95% CI = 19.2 months to not evaluable) in the tafasitamab group vs 13.9 months (95% CI = 11.5–16.4 months) in the control group (hazard ratio [HR] = 0.43, 95% CI = 0.32–0.58, P < .0001).

On independent review committee assessment, median progression-free survival was not reached (95% CI = 19.3 months to not evaluable) in the tafasitamab group vs 16.0 months (95% CI = 13.9–21.1 months) in the control group (HR = 0.41, 95% CI = 0.29–0.56, P < .0001).

Death occurred in 15 patients in the tafasitamab group and 23 patients in the control group. Full analysis of overall survival is planned at 5 years of follow-up.

Grade 3 to 4 adverse events occurred in 71% of the tafasitamab group vs 69% of the control group. The most common were neutropenia (40%), pneumonia (8%), COVID-19 (6%), and thrombocytopenia (6%) in the tafasitamab group, and neutropenia (38%), thrombocytopenia (7%), anemia (6%), and pneumonia (5%) in the control group. Serious adverse events occurred in 36% vs 32% of patients, most commonly pneumonia in both groups (8% vs 5%). Adverse events led to the discontinuation of treatment in 11% vs 7% of patients.

The investigators concluded: “The addition of tafasitamab to lenalidomide and rituximab resulted in a statistically significant and clinically meaningful improvement in progression-free survival, with an acceptable safety profile in patients with relapsed or refractory follicular lymphoma. This combination represents a potential new standard-of-care treatment.”

Laurie H. Sehn, MD, of BC Cancer Centre for Lymphoid Cancer and The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada, is the corresponding author for The Lancet article.

Disclosure: The study was funded by Incyte. For full disclosures of the study authors, visit thelancet.com.

Wheatland Electric Cooperative has won a national award for educating its communities about electric vehicles and installing public chargers to help close a 100-mile gap between stations in southwest and central Kansas. 

The 21,000-member, Scott City-based co-op beat out three large investor-owned utilities in Michigan, New York and New Jersey in the final round to win top honors in the utilities category of the 2025 Drive Electric Awards. The awards are given by Plug In America, a national, nonprofit organization that advocates for affordable, accessible EVs and charging stations. 

“Though small, Wheatland Electric Cooperative leads with innovation—bridging the gap in rural America and proving no community is too small, too rural, or too remote to be part of the clean transportation future,” the group said in announcing the award. 

Since 2021, WEC has installed three ChargePoint® Level 2 public charging stations—with two charging ports each—across an area where no chargers existed within a 100-mile radius. As of October, the stations have supported more than 1,500 charging sessions by nearly 670 different drivers. The co-op created them at its own expense.  

“We’re in a part of the country that’s often overlooked, simply because we’re so rural,” said Shajia Donecker, the co-op’s multimedia specialist. “We are always striving to put our region on the EV maps, and I think Plug In America recognized that.” 

 The co-op also invites community members to test drive EVs at special events, which included a “Dine and Drive” lunch in 2024 in Great Bend that attracted 150 people for a free lunch and a chance to get behind the wheel of three different types of EVs.  

The co-op brought its own two electric vehicles—a Hyundai Kona and a Ford F-150 Lightning—and an employe shared his Tesla Model Y. The co-op’s member services team won NRECA’s 2025 Service Excellence Gold Award for creating the “best external event.” 

This year, the co-op held “EVs & Espressos” events at or near several local coffee shops, providing free coffee to help entice people to explore EVs as part of National Drive Electric Month.  

“Our whole goal is to make EVs more approachable,” said Alli Conine, WEC’s director of member services and corporate communications. “When we give people those hands-on experiences, their perspectives change. We want them to have fun while learning more about EVs.” 

EVs are still relatively scarce in the area and no local car dealers display them, making the co-op events the only chance many residents have to test drive an EV, Donecker said. 

“We try to meet people where they are,” she said. “You get all kinds of reactions. Some people will say, ‘no, absolutely not, I don’t want anything to do with an EV.’ But you also get, ‘wow, I had no idea how much power an EV has.” About 99% of the time, the reaction is good after they get a chance to drive.” 

WEC’s grassroots efforts have focused on EV “accessibility, reliability, and cost savings to resonate locally,” Plug In America said. 

“Beyond consumers, Wheatland has provided training and education to first responders, chambers of commerce, and civic leaders. The co-op is also electrifying its fleet, mentoring cooperatives in Kansas and Oklahoma, and providing a replicable playbook for other rural coops across the U.S.” 

Erin Kelly is a staff writer for NRECA.

Researchers have proposed a new mechanism of acute kidney injury to account for patients with renal cell carcinoma (RCC) who have an inferior vena cava (IVC) tumor thrombus, according to findings presented at the 26th Annual Meeting of the Society of Urologic Oncology (SUO).¹ By analyzing perioperative renal function in these patients, the researchers identified a distinct, reversible pattern of kidney injury linked to venous congestion—suggesting that timely thrombectomy may be critical to preserve renal function.

“The mechanism reframes how we think about renal failure in IVC thrombus. The injury is hemodynamic, not structural. Congestive nephropathy offers a unifying explanation, and it supports timely thrombectomy to relieve venous pressure,” said presenting author Lorraine Scanlon, MD, of London Health Sciences Centre Research Institute in Canada. “Ultimately, it introduces a fourth mechanism of renal dysfunction, and it may change how we counsel patients and design perioperative studies.”

The Clinical Issue

Patients with RCC and IVC thrombus often present with a poor baseline renal function in terms of estimated glomerular filtration rate. This has traditionally been attributed to tumor burden, chronic kidney disease, or comorbidities. But many patients recover their renal function after thrombectomy, which does not fit with structural or irreversible chronic kidney disease.

“This suggests a gap in how we conceptualize renal dysfunction in these patients,” Dr. Scanlon explained.

Acute kidney injury is classified as prerenal with lower perfusion rates, intrinsic with nephron injury, or as postrenal with obstruction leading to hydronephrosis. “This framework is incredibly useful, but none of these mechanisms explain what we see in IVC tumor thrombus,” she commented.

Instead, patients with IVC tumor thrombus have normal arterial inflow, no parenchymal injury, and no ureteric obstruction, so they cannot fall into any one of the three existing acute kidney injury classifications.

Hypothesis and Study Design

Dr. Scanlon suggested that there was a fourth possible mechanism of renal dysfunction: renal venous outflow obstruction, whereby IVC thrombus elevates the venous pressure, increases the interstitial pressure, and lowers the filtration gradient. This leads to a reversible injury that she called a congestive nephropathy.

“It reframes renal dysfunction as venous, not as arterial or as intrinsic,” she commented. “Our hypothesis was simple: if venous congestion is the driver, then relieving it via thrombectomy should preserve renal function, even in patients with worse baseline function.”

Researchers conducted a retrospective cohort study using data collected from 2002 to 2023 with three groups of patients: patients who underwent radical nephrectomy and IVC thrombectomy (n = 23), open radical nephrectomy alone (n = 35), and those who had a laparoscopic radical nephrectomy (n = 23). The primary outcome measurement was the change in the estimated glomerular filtration rate after more than 90 days.

Findings and Clinical Conclusion

The patients with IVC tumor thrombus had larger tumors, higher American Society of Anesthesiologists grades, and worse baseline estimated glomerular filtration rates. However, these patients also showed the best renal preservation.

Across all three groups, all patients experienced a decrease in their estimated glomerular filtration rate for the first day or two after surgery, but the rates recovered and converged at more than 90 days only for the patients with IVC tumor thrombus. “This cannot be explained by nephron loss. It’s most consistent with the reversible and venous congestion,” Dr. Scanlon stated.

At 90 days, the absolute change in estimated glomerular filtration rates were –10 for the patients with IVC tumor thrombus who underwent radical nephrectomy and IVC thrombectomy, –25 for patients who underwent radical nephrectomy alone, and –25 for those who underwent laparoscopic radical nephrectomy. The percentage decline in estimated glomerular filtration rate in the IVC tumor thrombus group was –21%, compared with –38% in the other two groups, even though these patients had worse function at baseline.

Additionally, the researchers found that prior to surgery, venous obstruction led to increasing pressure in the patients with tumor thrombus, which caused filtration rates to fall. But after thrombectomy, the outflow rate was restored and the filtration gradient normalized, leading to a recovery in the patients’ renal function, confirming the expected signature of reversibility.

Disclosure: Dr. Scanlon reported no conflicts of interest.

REFERENCE

1. Scanlon L, Cendejas J, Kailavasan M, et al. Relief of venous congestion as a modifiable cause of renal dysfunction in RCC with IVC tumor thrombus. 2025 SUO Annual Meeting. Presented December 4, 2025.

China’s BYD overtook Tesla as the world’s largest electric carmaker in 2025, after the US company run by Elon Musk reported a slump in deliveries at the end of the year.

BYD sold 2.26m battery electric cars during the year, easily outstripping the 1.63m deliveries reported on Friday by Tesla for the same period.

The switch is a symbolic moment in the rise of China’s car companies, which have used the transition to electric cars to try to dominate the global automotive industry. Chinese car exports have risen in recent years, led by BYD and rivals such as the state-owned SAIC and Chery, which runs the Omoda and Jaecoo brands.

Electric car sales have continued to grow in the past two years, but the rate of growth has been slower than expected. Electric carmakers have been forced to cut prices aggressively, and governments around the world have rolled back targets on the shift away from petrol.

Tesla’s sales appear to have suffered in large part because of the withdrawal of electric vehicle (EV) subsidies by Donald Trump. The US president has also removed emissions regulations that incentivised electric car production. And Tesla also faced a backlash from some consumers after Musk’s embrace of far-right politics at the end of 2024.

Tesla’s deliveries slumped to 418,200 in the final quarter of the year, below the average forecasts of analysts. Sales for 2025 were down by 9% compared with 2024.

An average compiled by Bloomberg had suggested that Tesla would deliver 441,000 vehicles during the quarter, but Tesla took the unusual step before the new year of publishing its own consensus estimate for the first time, apparently in an effort to guide investors that sales were expected to be lower.

Tesla’s share price was down 1% on Friday, although they were down by 8% since Christmas Eve.

Trump’s anti-EV policies came despite Musk donating more money than anyone else to the victorious 2024 presidential election campaign and briefly running an effort to cut government costs. Musk at first seemed to win support for EVs from Trump – and even an awkward photoshoot in a Tesla in front of the White House – but they fell out dramatically in the summer.

It was the second consecutive decline in annual sales for Tesla. Yet even as sales have fallen it remains by far the world’s most valuable carmaker, with shares valued at $1.4tn – more than the next 30 carmakers combined. Investors appear to be betting that Musk will lead Tesla to be a leading force in robotics and artificial intelligence.

Musk has consistently claimed that autonomous capabilities will set Tesla apart from rivals, and it has started operating a limited robotaxi service in Austin, Texas. However, it will still face competition on that front. Several Chinese carmakers and tech companies already have comparable technology, including an offering from BYD called “God’s Eye” that is now included even on its cheapest cars.

BYD’s electric car sales rose by 28% during the year despite a weaker performance in December.

BYD was founded in 1995 as a battery company by Wang Chuanfu, who is often described as China’s equivalent to Musk. Its business already produced more cars overall than Tesla when counting hybrids.

The Shenzhen-headquartered manufacturer has overtaken Tesla during single quarters before. However, its battery electric production pulled away from its US rival in 2025, even as it faced intense competition from Chinese rivals.

BYD recorded 4.55m car sales overall during 2025, although its sales of plug-in hybrids fell by 8% year on year to 2.29m. That came despite an uptick in sales of plug-in hybrids, combining a smaller battery with a petrol or diesel engine, in some markets from consumers worried about their ability to charge. BYD also more than doubled its sales of commercial vehicles, including electric buses and lorries, to 57,000.

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Hedge fund giants Millennium and Citadel delivered a double-digit return to investors in 2025, recovering after a lacklustre first half but lagging behind many smaller firms in the “multi-manager” sector.

Izzy Englander’s Millennium and Ken Griffin’s Citadel were both briefly in the red in the first few months of last year, as markets were rocked by US President Donald Trump’s trade war.

But the firms recovered to gain 10.5 per cent and 10.2 per cent, respectively, by the end of 2025, following months of steady returns in the second half of the year, said people who had seen the numbers.

The recoveries partly reflect a return to more normal market conditions after Trump backed away from many of his most aggressive tariffs, allowing equity indices to chalk up strong gains by the end of the year. The S&P 500 finished 16.5 per cent higher while the UK’s FTSE 100 gained 21.5 per cent.

Millennium and Citadel were outshone by many of their smaller rivals in the multi-manager sector, including ExodusPoint, which gained 18 per cent, and Schonfeld’s flagship fund, which gained 12.5, said people who had seen the numbers.

Multi-manager firms have risen to the top of the hedge fund industry over the past several years by operating hundreds of trading teams known as “pods” across multiple asset classes such as equities, bonds and commodities. These hedge funds are known for heavy use of borrowing to juice their returns but also strict central risk management that often forces traders to quickly exit losing positions.

In addition, they charge investors higher fees than traditional hedge funds by passing through a host of costs, such as bonuses and client entertainment, directly to investors.

Their model has generally delivered consistent returns over the past decade, satisfying a desire from large investors such as pensions for steady profits.

These firms do not benchmark themselves against equity indices such as the S&P 500, instead trying to make their investors money whether stocks rise or fall. For instance, many multi-manager firms were up in 2022 when equity markets sustained big losses.

Elsewhere, macro hedge funds had their best year since 2008, with Bridgewater’s Pure Alpha hedge fund up 33 per cent to December 29, the most profitable year for the firm since it was founded 50 years ago.

Millennium, ExodusPoint, Schonfeld, Bridgewater and Citadel declined to comment.