Our daily walk around the world

🇮🇩 An Indonesian volcano erupted five times over a 24-hour period ending Wednesday. The eruptions from Mount Ruang forced the evacuation of 11,000+ people from surrounding areas, and caused the provincial airport to shut down. Local officials declared the highest volcanic alert, saying that part of the volcano could collapse into the sea and cause a tsunami – which occurred when Mount Ruang erupted in 1871.

💨 Global wind power installations reached a record high in 2023. A new report from the Global Wind Energy Council found new wind energy generation capacity increased by 50% in 2023 compared to the previous year, adding enough energy to power ~80 million homes. China led the way in wind energy generation, contributing to 65% of new installations, followed by the US, Brazil, and Germany.

🇳🇴 Norway’s sovereign wealth fund earned a record-high $109 billion last quarter. Since 1996, Norway has invested the proceeds of its state-run oil and gas companies into international markets, eventually growing their wealth fund to $1.6 trillion as of today (the largest in the world and enough to give $283,000 to every single Norwegian citizen). In an earnings report yesterday, Norwegian officials said last quarter’s gains were largely due to a continuing AI boom that propelled the stock values of Microsoft and Nvidia.