The Energy Gang wraps up Climate Week in New York, after six days of debates, discussions, initiatives and pledges. Scheduled alongside the UN General Assembly, Climate Week brought together leaders from business, policy, finance, academia and activism to share ideas and push forward real solutions for climate change. 

Host Ed Crooks sits down with Helen Clarkson, CEO of the Climate Group which organizes Climate Week, to talk about the big stories that emerged from the week. Climate Week has evolved from a small business-focused event to a larger platform, engaging diverse sectors in climate action. This year it included about 900 separate events, attended by an estimated 100,000 people.

Helen explains the evolution of the event, and its shift of focus from the question of why companies should act on climate, to ideas for implementing solutions. Regulations that obstruct investment in low-carbon energy are emerging as one of the biggest challenges in the transition, and Helen and Ed discuss how to break down these barriers and facilitate the growth of renewables. Support from tech companies and other businesses for the development of clean energy was a key theme through the week. The launch of the 24/7 carbon-free coalition of energy buyers, backed by the Climate Group, was one of the big announcements of the week.

Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt, US Assistant Secretary of State for Energy Resources, also joins the show to discuss the Biden administration’s role in supporting Ukraine's energy security amid the ongoing conflict with Russia, and the importance of building a resilient energy infrastructure. He says one of the key issues at his meetings at Climate Week has been the importance of the supply chain for critical minerals, and the need to reduce dependence on China by creating new capabilities for mineral extraction and processing. Plus, Ed and Ambassador Pyatt debate the role of the U.S. in leading the energy transition globally. 

Find all our Climate Week reporting on The Energy Gang, wherever you get your podcasts.

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The transition to a low-carbon energy system will need a lot of people with bright ideas for how to do things differently. It is the greatest business challenge of our time, and also the greatest opportunity.

In this latest special edition of the Energy Gang for Climate Week NYC, Ed Crooks and Amy Myers-Jaffe host a live taping of the show in front of an audience of Amy’s students at NYU.

Joining them on the show are two founders of innovative cleantech companies. Marissa Beatty leads Turnover Labs, which is developing an advanced electrolysis process that can directly convert impure carbon dioxide wastes into valuable chemicals. Apoorv Sinha leads Carbon Upcycling Technologies, which uses industrial carbon dioxide emissions, combined with natural materials or industrial wastes, to create new materials with improved performance and lower emissions. 

Together they tell their stories of innovation and entrepreneurship, discussing the obstacles they faced, the support that helped them, and the strategies they used on their journeys from laboratory tests to commercial deployment. 

Also on the show is one of the biggest names in the world of cleantech venture capital investment: Dan Goldman, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Clean Energy Ventures, which invests in early-stage cleantech companies that are working to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. 

Along with Marissa and Apoorv, he talks about the role of venture capital funding in the transition, and how policy can support innovative new businesses. A consistent policy frameworks is vital to foster long-term growth in the clean energy sector, but is that at risk in the US?

The team offer words of wisdom for anyone thinking of trying to launch their own cleantech startup. If you want to help fix the climate problem while making money at the same time, what do you really need to know? Dan, Marissa, Apoorv and Amy have some answers.

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Author of ‘The Price Is Wrong’, Brett Christophers, joins the show to discuss the theories in his book.

On a recent episode of the show, host Ed Crooks was joined by Melissa Lott and Joseph Majkut to discuss two books that were generating a lot of interest in energy circles. One of those, The Price Is Wrong, argues that inadequate profitability is the key reason why the transition to low-carbon energy is not moving fast enough to address the threat of global warming.

There are plenty of interesting and provocative points raised in the book, so it made sense to hear them direct from the source. Ed and Melissa are joined by author and academic Brett Christophers to dissect the main points: the challenges and obstacles faced by renewable energy projects in terms of profitability and investment, and the true impact of these on progressing the energy transition.

Christophers says that low returns in renewables are a result of competition, volatility in wholesale power markets, and the design of energy markets – ‘returns are lower in renewables because there’s too much money chasing too few projects.’ Ed and Melissa weigh in with their thoughts on this. Plus, they discuss the importance of market design, the role of power purchase agreements, and the need for stability in renewable energy projects. There’s a definite need for more stability-providing sources to make renewable energy projects bankable on a larger scale. Are PPAs the answer?

Listen back to the review of The Price Is Wrong with Ed, Melissa and Joseph here: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/can-capitalism-save-the-planet/id663379413?i=1000658599656

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Some news for this podcast: Ed Crooks, VP of the Americas for Wood Mackenzie, will be taking over the show as our new host.

Co-hosts Katherine Hamilton and Stephen Lacey will be moving on. 

Wood Mackenzie will be producing the podcast from now on, bringing on a range of new voices to join the gang.

We discuss the transition in the first half of the episode. 

Later in the show, Katherine, Stephen and Ed explore the range of expectations for global climate talks in Glasgow. 

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The U.S. Department of Energy is crucial for funding, researching, and testing emerging energy tech.

Now, in the Biden era, the agency is orienting itself toward deployment. How difficult is that transition?

Our former co-host Jigar Shah joins Stephen, Katherine, and Ed to discuss his experience running the Energy Department’s loan programs office.

In March, Jigar left his position at Generate Capital (and this podcast) to head into government service and run the loan programs office. Jigar has $40 billion in authority to back a wide range of climate technologies -- and he’s been working on the first round of investments with those dollars.

In the second half of the show: a surprising twist in the global clean-energy transition. How much trouble will energy price inflation cause around the world?

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Bloom Energy. Bloom’s onsite energy platform provides unparalleled control for those looking to secure clean, reliable 24/7 power that scales to meet critical business needs. It eliminates outage and price risk while accelerating us towards a zero carbon future. Visit Bloom Energy to learn how to take charge today.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Hitachi Energy. What does your energy future look like? Look to Hitachi Energy for the advanced energy technologies needed to deliver real outcomes — unlocking new revenue streams, maximizing renewable integration, and lowering carbon emissions. Learn more.

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EIA and IEA are out with projections for emissions and fossil fuel consumption. And they don’t look good. 

On our current policy trajectory, there is no peak in sight, according to EIA By 2050, we will likely see a 50% increase in energy consumption. And even though renewables will be the fastest-growing new source of energy, hydrocarbon liquid fuels will meet the majority of demand.

That means emissions could rise through 2050, absent massive changes to policy.

In July, the International Energy Agency issued a similar analysis showing that carbon emissions will hit record levels in the coming years. And that spending packages around the world — even at historic levels — are still not enough. 

How do we make sense of this sobering analysis?

Plus, Wood Mackenzie is out with a new analysis of global energy storage trends, showing that storage deployments are set to triple this year. Most of that growth is coming from America and China, which account for 70% of installations. What are the applications, technologies and markets that will dominate this growth?

Finally, Europe is in a crisis headed into winter. Natural gas is the second-most confused fuel in Europe — and prices are 6 times higher than they were in the spring.

A confluence of factors — rapidly rising demand all at once, lower production than expected from Russia, low storage in Europe, lower-than-expected hydro and wind production — are contributing to the problem. 

What could alleviate the crisis? And does this put strain on Europe’s climate ambitions headed into COP26?

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Bloom Energy. Bloom’s onsite energy platform provides unparalleled control for those looking to secure clean, reliable 24/7 power that scales to meet critical business needs. It eliminates outage and price risk while accelerating us towards a zero carbon future. Visit Bloom Energy to learn how to take charge today.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Hitachi Energy. What does your energy future look like? Look to Hitachi Energy for the advanced energy technologies needed to deliver real outcomes — unlocking new revenue streams, maximizing renewable integration, and lowering carbon emissions. Learn more.

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Suddenly everyone is talking about green hydrogen. 

From South Africa to the United Arab Emirates. From China to Utah. Governments and developers are eyeing hydrogen as a decarbonization tool. 

But the rush is also raising lots of questions: Where will hydrogen be most useful? How do you create a supply chain to support it? And how can we ensure it has climate integrity?

For answers, we turned to two experts who are obsessing over the future of hydrogen: Janice Lin and Stephen Lamm.

Janice Lin is the founder and CEO of Strategen. And she’s president of the green hydrogen coalition. 

Stephen Lamm is the director of sustainability at Bloom Energy, a company deploying zero-carbon solutions like green hydrogen.

With so much renewed attention on the resource, we brought Janice and Stephen together for a discussion about where green hydrogen tech, markets, and applications are headed.

This episode was produced in collaboration with Bloom Energy. Bloom’s onsite energy platform provides unparalleled control for those looking to secure clean, reliable 24/7 power that scales to meet critical business needs. It eliminates outage and price risk while accelerating us towards a zero carbon future. Visit Bloom Energy to learn how to take charge today.

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Ride sharing has swept transportation systems over the last decade -- bringing convenience, but also congestion, inequities, and political fights.

Now a new category of transportation networking is emerging: TransitTech.

It makes up a class of companies that are using tech to help maximize public transit systems. So what does TransitTech look like post-pandemic?

Tiffany Chu joins Katherine and Stephen this week to discuss the path forward for transit. Tiffany is the co-founder and CEO of Remix, which was recently acquired by Via for $100 million.

We’ll also dig into a new study from Carnegie Mellon University that shows Uber and Lyft are increasing external societal and environmental costs by up to 35% compared to personal car driving. 

We’ll wrap up with a discussion about how transportation will play into upcoming legislation on climate and infrastructure. 

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Bloom Energy. Bloom’s onsite energy platform provides unparalleled control for those looking to secure clean, reliable 24/7 power that scales to meet critical business needs. It eliminates outage and price risk while accelerating us towards a zero carbon future. Visit Bloom Energy to learn how to take charge today.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Hitachi ABB Power Grids. What does your energy future look like? Look to Hitachi ABB Power Grids for the advanced energy technologies needed to deliver real outcomes — unlocking new revenue streams, maximizing renewable integration, and lowering carbon emissions. Learn more.

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All around us, hidden inside our buildings, are a series of choices and tradeoffs -- choices with direct impacts on our health, our money, and our energy use. 

Our buildings are wasteful and are filled with a lot of  “embodied” carbon. As a result, buildings directly and indirectly account for 40 percent of global emissions. 

How do we make those choices with better building science?

And how do we use that science to design carbon out of our buildings?

This week, Katherine and Stephen are joined by Christine Williamson, the creator of Building Science Fight Club. She is a building scientist who teaches architects how to think more intelligently about designing residential and commercial buildings to improve comfort and energy performance, while minimizing system failures.

She also has an unconventional take on the green building space — arguing that many of the “feel good” approaches are not necessarily the most functional. 

Christy has spent her career inside homes and commercial buildings using “building forensics” to identify problems with design and operation. So what does an on-the-ground practitioner think about what’s most effective for improving the performance of buildings, and what’s not?

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Sungrow. As a leading provider of PV inverter solutions across the world, Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone and 154 gigawatts in total across the globe. Email them to learn more.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by S&C Electric Company. Today, non-wires alternatives such as microgrids can provide more sustainable, resilient and economical ways to deliver reliable power. S&C helps utilities and commercial customers find the best solutions to meet their energy needs. Learn more.

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Carbon capture has long been criticized as too nascent, too expensive, and too distracting. Is that changing?

This month, the Swiss company Climeworks officially launched a direct-air capture plant in Iceland, called Orca. 

The company has already signed deals with SwissRe, Bill Gates, Stripe, and Shopify to sell them credits from the plant. But the tech is still pretty expensive and relatively small scale. 

Climeworks wants to build megaton-scale plants by the end of the decade. Lots of other plants are in the works. So what does this commercial launch signal for the carbon-capture industry? 

Plus, new research shows just how drastically we need to slash fossil fuels to limit dangerous warming. 

And, California tries to fix the busted recycling system with a “truth in advertising” law aimed at plastics companies.

The Energy Gang is a Wood Mackenzie podcast.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Sungrow. As a leading provider of PV inverter solutions across the world, Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone and 154 gigawatts in total across the globe. Email them to learn more.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by S&C Electric Company. Today, non-wires alternatives such as microgrids can provide more sustainable, resilient and economical ways to deliver reliable power. S&C helps utilities and commercial customers find the best solutions to meet their energy needs. Learn more.

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The electric grid is a central pillar of a zero-carbon economy. But in an era of unrelenting weather extremes, it’s also one of the most fragile.

This week: what does power after carbon look like?

Katherine and Stephen are joined by Dr. Peter Fox-Penner, author of a new book called, “Power After Carbon.”

Peter is the founder of the Boston University Institute of Sustainable Energy. And he’s a partner and chief strategy officer at the VC firm Energy Impact Partners. 

At the turn of the last decade, Peter wrote a book called “Smart Power” that looked at the new pressures that utilities were facing around climate policy, emerging distributed energy, and digitization. We’ll look at what’s changed the most over the last decade.

Plus, we’ll talk about why Entergy’s resistance to distributed energy in Louisiana created vulnerabilities after Hurricane Ida.

The Energy Gang is a Wood Mackenzie podcast.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Sungrow. As a leading provider of PV inverter solutions across the world, Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone and 154 gigawatts in total across the globe. Email them to learn more.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by S&C Electric Company. Today, non-wires alternatives such as microgrids can provide more sustainable, resilient and economical ways to deliver reliable power. S&C helps utilities and commercial customers find the best solutions to meet their energy needs. Learn more.

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The world’s most scrutinized and peer-reviewed document is out: the IPCC report on climate change. 

Thousands of scientists have spent decades pouring over every measurement and research report known. The findings are clearer than ever: It is “virtually certain” that the increases in extreme temperatures and droughts are caused by human activity. 

The economic and human toll from climate change is here. So how is this report different from previous IPCC reports?

Plus, is the push for hydrogen a real pathway, or a clever way to lock in more emissions? We’ll look at the debate over “blue” hydrogen emissions.

And, how far have the politics of climate really shifted in Washington? Will a change in tone mean a boost in action?

Katherine Hamilton, Ed Crooks, and Stephen Lacey are this week’s co-hosts. 

The Energy Gang is a Wood Mackenzie podcast.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Sungrow. As a leading provider of PV inverter solutions across the world, Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone and 154 gigawatts in total across the globe. Email them to learn more.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by S&C Electric Company. Today, non-wires alternatives such as microgrids can provide more sustainable, resilient and economical ways to deliver reliable power. S&C helps utilities and commercial customers find the best solutions to meet their energy needs. Learn more.

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This episode originally aired on The Interchange.

Back in 2016, Mateo Jaramillo left Tesla, where he was leading the stationary energy storage business, and started looking for a new challenge to tackle. He took on long-duration energy storage -- not long duration like 8 hours or 12 hours, but days or weeks or more. In 2017 he came on the show to talk about it. 

He formed a company, now Form Energy, that has been toiling on this problem in stealth mode. Apart from saying they were building a "metal air" battery, his team held the technology close to the vest.

That is, until last week. 

The company announced a $200M Series D financing led by ArcelorMittal, the world's largest steelmaker, and in the process finally made public the technology, which is an iron air chemistry. 

Full disclosure: Shayle led Energy Impact Partners’ investment in Form.

Shayle and Mateo discuss the technology itself and the counterintuitive economics that Mateo believes will make it work. They also examine how it beat out the alternatives and how it might complement more efficient, but more expensive lithium-ion. It turns out financial modeling was far more important than spec sheets in understanding the tradeoffs.

They tackle the critical question: Where exactly are the profitable applications of this technology before we hit very high 80% renewables? 

They also talk about the semantics of long-duration storage vs. multi-day storage, why Mateo hates holy grails, and potential partnerships with tofu companies.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Sungrow. As a leading provider of PV inverter solutions across the world, Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone and 154 gigawatts in total across the globe. Email them to learn more.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by S&C Electric Company. Today, non-wires alternatives such as microgrids can provide more sustainable, resilient and economical ways to deliver reliable power. S&C helps utilities and commercial customers find the best solutions to meet their energy needs. Learn more.

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In this third special episode of the Energy Gang from the Reuters Global Energy Transition 2024 conference in New York, we focus on the crucial theme of financing the energy transition. We discuss how various stakeholders are addressing the financial challenges and opportunities presented by the shift to renewable energy.

Our first guest is Utopia Hill, the Chief Executive of Reactivate, a Chicago-based company developing renewable energy projects for low to moderate-income communities in the US. Utopia shares insights into how Reactivate is creating inclusive solutions that ensure the benefits of the energy transition reach underserved populations.

Next, we speak with Nia Jones, the Environment and Climate Director of the African-American Alliance of CDFI CEOs. Nia emphasizes the importance of partnerships and cooperation among businesses, governments, and non-governmental organizations in advancing the energy transition. She discusses how her organization is working to deliver renewable energy to people who might not otherwise have access to it.

The scale of the financing required for the energy transition means that the private sector will have to play a key role. Valerie Smith, Chief Sustainability Officer at Citi, joins us to explore what this means for a major international bank. She tells us how Citi is contributing to sustainable finance initiatives around the world.

For additional perspectives on the role of finance, we hear from Eric Cohen, Head of Green Economy Banking at JP Morgan Chase, and Greg Randolph, Managing Director of New York State’s NY Green Bank. They share their views on how financial institutions to supporting the transition to a low-carbon economy, and what more could be done to accelerate that progress. Many thanks to Utopia Hill, Nia Jones, Valerie Smith, Eric Cohen, and Greg Randolph for their invaluable contributions to this discussion.

You can find Ed and the show on most social media platforms: we’re @theenergygang on X. Subscribe to the Energy Gang on Apple Podcasts or Spotify so you don’t miss the next show.

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We started the Covid pandemic at negative oil prices. Today, benchmark prices are above $70. And top oil companies are reporting billions of dollars in profits.

And now there is more scrutiny than ever on how they’re going to spend that money.

Activist shareholders are starting to get climate champions on oil major board seats -- most notably, climate tech investor and former wind executive Andy Karsner on Exxon Mobil’s board.

A dutch court is now forcing Shell to reduce the emissions from its products by 45%, after a successful lawsuit from environmental groups. Oil executives now have their lawyers on speed dial.

And big asset managers, like BlackRock, which lend to many of the world’s energy giants, are scrutinizing their climate plans. 

So what does it all amount to as oil markets rebound?

Ed Crooks, the vice chair of Americas at Wood Mackenzie, joins us this week to discuss.

Plus, we’ll talk about a new report card on America’s infrastructure. It’s a slight improvement, but the grade is still pretty awful. 

And, carbon offsets are going up in flames. Literally. What comes next for forestry offsets?

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Sungrow. As a leading provider of PV inverter solutions across the world, Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone and 154 gigawatts in total across the globe. Email them to learn more.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by S&C Electric Company. Today, non-wires alternatives such as microgrids can provide more sustainable, resilient and economical ways to deliver reliable power. S&C helps utilities and commercial customers find the best solutions to meet their energy needs. Learn more.

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We're at a new phase of the clean energy transition. Extreme heat, drought and floods are increasing in frequency. Public attention on clean energy is stronger than ever. The Biden Administration is putting zero-carbon energy at the core of its policies.

And there's another powerful force: making sure the energy transition is as racially and economically just as possible.

Anton Cohen is a partner at CohnReznick LLP, and national director of the firm’s Renewable Energy Industry Practice. He's been advising companies across a wide range of industries: tech, manufacturing, public tax credits, and energy. 

Today, he focuses exclusively on renewables: “All we do is renewables. Live, eat, sleep, breathe renewables.”

The large investors and energy users that Anton advises are feeling the urgency.

“I think it's the corporates who are pushing hard. People know what direction we're heading in. It's just a matter of how quickly we get there with the energy transition,” says Anton.

Amidst all of this change in the corporate world, we have an ongoing pandemic, a lumpy economic recovery, massive cybersecurity breaches, and an infrastructure bill under consideration that could transform the clean energy economy.

Anton is watching all of it. So we caught up with him for a take on how all these factors are influencing each other. 

This episode was produced in collaboration with the international advisory, tax and accounting firm CohnReznick LLP. Learn more about how clean energy experts and advisors like Anton, can help your organization grow.

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After 30 years of R&D and commercial proof, hundreds of billions in institutional dollars are pouring into now-conventional tech like wind, solar and batteries.  

But there’s a whole class of technologies that are ready to scale. And investors who are increasingly ready to back them.

As we heard in our previous show, there was a record $17 billion in venture capital going into climate tech in 2020. 

With all this money dropping into the space, where can it have the highest impact? What are the areas where we have commercial viability, but still need significant breakthroughs?

Our guest co-host this week is Nneka Uzoh Kibuule, a senior vice president at Aligned Climate Capital. She joins Stephen and Katherine to talk about the sectors where she sees the most promise.

She'll also talk about the launch of GreenTech Noir, an organization that helps black professionals grow their career connections across clean energy, smart cities, transportation, infrastructure, environmental justice, and more.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Sungrow. As a leading provider of PV inverter solutions across the world, Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone and 154 gigawatts in total across the globe. Email them to learn more.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by S&C Electric Company. Today, non-wires alternatives such as microgrids can provide more sustainable, resilient and economical ways to deliver reliable power. S&C helps utilities and commercial customers find the best solutions to meet their energy needs. Learn more.

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During the height of the pandemic in 2020, venture capital poured into climate technologies at record levels. It was a happy surprise amidst a collapsing economy and years of investment stagnation. 

Venture investments in climate tech topped $17 billion in 2020 across more than 1,000 deals. Five years ago, it had fallen to $5.2 billion — a 30 percent decrease from a previous peak in 2011.

Our guest co-host this week is Emily Kirsch, the founder and CEO of Powerhouse. She’s also the host of Watt It Takes, the entrepreneurship series about founders tackling climate change.

Suddenly, it’s cool to be putting your money into the sector again. And there’s something different about today’s rise in enthusiasm. The first wave was all about the “coolness” of cleantech — thin-film solar, electric sports cars, printable batteries. It was also about proving cost curves.

Kara Swisher put it bluntly in the NYT last year: the world’s first trillionaire will be a greentech entrepreneur.”

Today, there’s much more technological maturity — bigger scale, bigger and better data, and more resources to tap for startups.

There is also a deeper moral responsibility infused with investments. If you are running a major VC firm or a corporate venture arm, you are out of the loop if you don’t have a climate component of your portfolio. Andrew Beebe of Obvious Ventures argues we’ve entered the “climate decade” in VC.

This week: climate tech isn’t just having a moment. It’s having an age, a period, a generation. Why we are at the start of a climate tech era in venture capital.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Sungrow. As a leading provider of PV inverter solutions across the world, Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone and 154 gigawatts in total across the globe. Email them to learn more.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by S&C Electric Company. Today, non-wires alternatives such as microgrids can provide more sustainable, resilient and economical ways to deliver reliable power. S&C helps utilities and commercial customers find the best solutions to meet their energy needs. Learn more.

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In March of 2020, Covid shut down economies, closed off supply chains, and sent unemployment to historic levels. No one knew what would come next for energy.

Oil prices went into negative territory. Industrial electricity use plummeted. Residential demand shot up. And there were big pipelines of renewable energy projects waiting to get built.

“I think we were all a little bit nervous about how COVID was going to affect all of the deal flow in the market,” says Britta von Oesen, a managing director at CohnReznick Capital.

Britta is the person at the table brokering tax structures and project sales that move money into renewable energy. So did Covid destroy her ability to get deals done?

“Honestly, it's gone a lot better than I would have expected,” she says. 

M&A activity increased. And as 2021 kicked off, the M&A deals only accelerated. Most of the top independent wind and solar developers have been scooped up by utilities, private equity firms, oil majors, or bigger corporates. And the ones that haven't been acquired may be soon. 

There is an intense turf battle over wind, solar and storage platforms in the US. So what is driving all this activity? 

In this episode, brought to you by CohnReznick Capital, we speak with Britta Von Oesen about who's doing the acquiring, who's doing the selling, and what it all means for the growth of U.S. clean energy.

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It’s been a very intense year for America’s power grid. Across the country, the electricity system just faced another stress-test as extreme heat taxed power plants and grid operators in the Pacific Northwest, Texas, and New York.

Since 2000, outages across the U.S. have increased by 67%. Is the power system ready for tomorrow’s extreme weather -- today?

Stephen and Katherine are joined by Dr. Melissa Lott, a senior research scholar and the director of research at the Center on Global Energy Policy.

Plus, we’ll discuss a secret recording of an Exxon lobbyist bragging about the company’s efforts to delay climate policy. What does it tell us about the oil industry’s grip in Washington?

We’ll finish with a look at a new report from Columbia University: can we use natural gas pipelines to accelerate the low-carbon transition?

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Sungrow. As a leading provider of PV inverter solutions across the world, Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone and 154 gigawatts in total across the globe. Email them to learn more.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by S&C Electric Company. Today, non-wires alternatives such as microgrids can provide more sustainable, resilient and economical ways to deliver reliable power. S&C helps utilities and commercial customers find the best solutions to meet their energy needs. Learn more.

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America is a place where if you can dream something — no matter how big or ambitious — you can do it. 

Unless you’re trying to string 700 miles of high-voltage transmission lines to bring wind power from Oklahoma to Tennessee. 

Our guest this week is Russell Gold, author of a new book about the saga that unfolded when wind energy pioneer Michael Skelly tried just that. 

The book, Superpower, is all about Skelly’s attempt to build one of the most ambitious energy infrastructure projects in recent history — and how he faced nearly every obstacle imaginable. What does Skelly’s journey tell us about America’s diminishing ability to do great things?

Russell Gold is a veteran newspaper reporter who was a Pulitzer Prize finalist for his reporting on the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. He wrote a book in 2014 on the rise of fracking, called The Boom. He’ll join us to talk about the reasons why Skelly’s transmission plan failed.

This is a rebroadcast of a 2019 episode.

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This week, we are offering the first episode of a new podcast: The Big Switch.

It’s a five-part series about how to clean up the energy system -- told in a clear, understandable and fun way. 

The show is hosted by Dr. Melissa Lott, research director at Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy.

Stephen Lacey is the show's executive editor.

Listen to the first episode of The Big Switch right now -- and subscribe to the show on Apple, Spotify, and any other place you get podcasts.

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We can measure the energy transition in any number of ways. The hundreds of millions of solar panels and wind turbines installed. The gigatons of carbon reduced. Or the number of jobs created.

But how do we measure the equity outcome?

Our guest co-host, Dr. Destenie Nock, is focused on exactly this question. She is an assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering at Carnegie Mellon University. 

Dr. Nock is creating new models for energy-systems planning that factor in positive social objectives, not just cost or reliability metrics.

Any decarbonization strategy is a de facto justice/equity strategy, as frontline communities will see the most benefit. But how do we maximize the benefit? And how do different pathways determine the outcome for low-income citizens and people of color who are disproportionately impacted by pollution? We’ll dig in.

Plus, what is happening with the infrastructure bill? All of a sudden, negotiations are at an impasse. President Biden broke off talks with Republican Senate leadership after strong disagreements over climate spending.

Now progressives and climate groups are wondering: are we going to lose another historic climate bill? And if so, how long will it be until another chance emerges?

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Aurora Solar. Aurora is offering all the presentations from its recent Empower Summit for free on its website. Go here to see conversations with people like Sunnova CEO John Berger and CALSSA Executive Director Bernadette Del Chiaro. 

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Enel X, a leader in energy storage, DER management software, and smart electric vehicle charging stations to increase project value. Learn what Enel X can do for your business. 

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America gets 20 percent of its electricity from coal. That’s a 50 percent drop since the peak in 2007. But if coal is becoming so economically uncompetitive, why does it still make up so much of our grid mix?

This week: Coal is no longer king. But it still has a lot of power across the land. How do we banish it for good?

Katherine and Stephen welcome Joe Daniel as a guest co-host this week. Joe is a senior energy analyst at the Union of Concerned Scientists.

Joe joins us to talk about the problem of coal plant “self-scheduling,” which locks in operation of dirty power plants even when the economics don’t make sense.

We’ll also look at how we unburden ourselves from the long-term agreements these coal plants are under? One solution is to buy back debt through securitization — basically like refinancing a mortgage. How will it work?

Finally, we’ll discuss the numbers behind nationalizing the coal industry. Could we buy up the entire sector, shut it down, and then offer wages, healthcare, pensions, and job placement to displaced workers? It would only cost somewhere between $33 billion and $83 billion over 15 years, according to estimates from the Union of Concerned Scientists.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Aurora Solar. Join Aurora on June 8th and 9th for the second annual virtual summit. Hear from, and interact with, industry leaders, policy makers, sales experts, and more. Get your questions ready, and save your spot by registering now.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Enel X, a leader in energy storage, DER management software, and smart electric vehicle charging stations to increase project value. Learn what Enel X can do for your business. 

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In this second special episode of Wood Mackenzie's The Energy Gang, recorded at the Reuters Global Energy Transition 2024 conference in New York, we speak with leaders at some of the key companies shaping the energy transition. We hear about how they are tackling the challenge of meeting rising demand for electricity while at the same time reducing emissions.

Greg Jackson, CEO of Octopus Energy, talks about his ambitions in the US market, which are centered around selling the company’s Kraken technology platform to utilities. He highlights the global potential of digitalization in propelling the energy transition forward.

The transition towards renewable energy is governed not only by technological progress, but also by regulatory and policy frameworks. Our second guest, David Carroll, Chief Renewables Officer at Engie, talks about how legislation including the Inflation Reduction Act, and regulatory initiatives such as the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's (FERC) Order No. 1920, can catalyze the adoption of renewable energy sources.

Next we talk to Ana Quelhas, Managing Director of the Hydrogen Business Unit at EDP Renewables, about the role of hydrogen in the shift away from carbon-intensive energy.  Some of the hype around low-carbon hydrogen has been dying away over the past year or two. But Ana Quelhas argues that, if done right, hydrogen can still be an important part of a zero-carbon energy system, for uses where direct electrification may not be feasible.

And finally, Bill Newsom, President and CEO of Mitsubishi Power Americas, tells us about what the energy revolution means for equipment suppliers. His company is developing and deploying solutions that address the demand for “clean firm” power that is available round-the-clock, through hydrogen and carbon capture. He talks about the prospect that these technologies could help provide the massive increase in 24/7 low-carbon electricity that will be required for new data centers and factories, and to charge electric vehicles.

Look out for the next special episode from day three of the conference, available on Friday June 28.

You can find Ed and the show on most social media platforms: we’re @theenergygang on X. Subscribe to the Energy Gang on Apple Podcasts or Spotify so you don’t miss the next show.

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What if someone told you that we have everything we need to decarbonize most of the economy? 

We would just need to start electrifying every new car, furnace, water heater, drier, and cookstove, and industrial process starting right now. And yeah, and put solar on every roof that can handle it.

This week: a wartime plan for winning the climate fight with clean electricity. What’ll it take? How possible is it?

Saul Griffith is our guest co-host. He’s the founder and chief scientist of Rewiring America. He’s also the author of the upcoming book “Electrify,” from MIT Press. 

If we are on a wartime footing for decarbonizing the economy, Saul could be considered a 5-star general of the “electrify everything” movement.

He founded or co-founded around a dozen companies and organizations. And he has a PhD from MIT in materials science and information theory.

Saul is now trying to marshal the world around his “a defensible and believable” pathway for decarbonizing America with clean electricity.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Aurora Solar. Join Aurora on June 8th and 9th for the second annual virtual summit. Hear from, and interact with, industry leaders, policy makers, sales experts, and more. Get your questions ready, and save your spot by registering now.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Enel X, a leader in energy storage, DER management software, and smart electric vehicle charging stations to increase project value. Learn what Enel X can do for your business. 

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First they ignore you. Then they laugh at you. Then they fight you. Then they transform?

This week: a look at some positive trends guiding the utility sector. What are power providers that are leading the energy transition doing right?

We’re joined by Julia Hamm, the president and CEO of the Smart Electric Power Alliance.

We’re talking about SEPA’s 2021 utility transformation profile -- a survey and ranking system of over 130 electric utilities in the US.

There are thousands of power companies. That means different flavors of corporate goals, management styles, and approaches to building clean energy. Julia’s going to help us understand what they are.

Why is utility progress more like “change management” than traditional Silicon Valley-style disruption? 

Then: how utilities will benefit from Biden’s big infrastructure push.

Plus, the solar census: what will job growth look like in a post-pandemic world?

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Aurora Solar. Join Aurora on June 8th and 9th for the second annual virtual summit. Hear from, and interact with, industry leaders, policy makers, sales experts, and more. Get your questions ready, and save your spot by registering now.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Enel X, a leader in energy storage, DER management software, and smart electric vehicle charging stations to increase project value. Learn what Enel X can do for your business. 

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The lack of progress on offshore wind in America is one of the most baffling and frustrating stories in energy. 

The technology and resource availability are tremendous. Europe has de-risked the technology and proven it can be deployed at scale, and at low cost, with minimal disruption. U.S. states are setting big targets. And at a national-scale, people want it.

And yet, we have not been able to get any meaningful amounts of offshore wind capacity in the water. 

That may be about to change. In late March, the Biden team said it plans to accelerate offshore wind development -- with a goal of getting 30 gigawatts of projects finished by 2030, and 110 gigawatts by 2050.

By comparison, we have 30 megawatts in the water now. And Europe currently has 25 gigawatts operational.

So what does the government need to do to finally make this industry a reality?

Energy futurist Ramez Naam is our guest co-host this week. 

We’ll also talk about Biden’s first 100 days in office. He marked the occasion with a speech to Congress that emphasized his “blue-collar blueprint to rebuild America.” H e’s drawing a very clear connection between taking action on climate change and building tons of jobs. 

So what has Biden accomplished so far that is meaningful? What is rhetorical and what is creating a clear pathway to real outcomes?

Finally, we’ll look at why the UN is shifting its focus to methane emissions. 

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Aurora Solar. Join Aurora on June 8th and 9th for the second annual virtual summit. Hear from, and interact with, industry leaders, policy makers, sales experts, and more. Get your questions ready, and save your spot by registering now.

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In 2015, then-Secretary of State John Kerry called the Paris climate treaty a “tremendous victory.” In the years since, $3.8 trillion has flowed into fossil fuels globally.

Now Kerry and other White House officials are focusing on banks and insurers that are still offering a lifeline to new fossil fuel projects. Can they slow the flow of cash?

This week: why finance is the main pressure point for climate.

Today, all the major banks are collectively supporting hundreds of billions of dollars worth of renewables projects every year. 

But few are giving up on fossil fuels. One environmental campaigner put it this way: “the banks are gorging on doughnuts and then eating an apple afterwards.”

A new analysis from DeSmog finds that 77% of board directors at the top-7 US banks have ties to “climate-conflicted” groups.

Earlier this year, New York University released a study showing that only 7 percent of board members in the top 100 US companies -- which includes many banks -- had any climate expertise at all.

This week, Justin Guay joins Katherine and Stephen as a guest co-host. Justin is the director of global climate strategy at the Sunrise Project. He’s been following the flow of money into climate-conflicted projects for a decade.

Looking to grow your career in solar tech? Aurora Solar is the leader in solar design and sales software. Aurora is hiring across multiple roles including customer success, marketing, sales, operations, and more. See open roles and apply to join Aurora, voted one of the best places to work in 2021, at www.aurorasolar.com/energygang.

This podcast is brought to you by Sungrow, a leading provider of PV inverter solutions around the world. Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone — and 120 gigawatts in total across the globe. Learn more about Sungrow’s cutting-edge solar projects.

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In 2005, it looked like heat-trapping gases from power plants were only going up.

That year, the EIA put out a projection: CO2 emissions from power plants would steadily rise every year, thanks to the incumbency of coal and gas.

Today, they’re half of what was projected. A new report from Lawrence Berkeley National Lab calls it “halfway to zero” -- meaning we are already halfway to a zero-carbon grid.

This week: why the path to net-zero may surprise us once again.

Then: America’s climate image on the world stage is in tatters. What will it take for the Biden team to stitch it back together before COP negotiations this fall?

Finally: a ton of specific policy ideas that can help us expand solar to the people who need it most.

BlocPower CEO Donnel Baird joins Katherine and Stephen as our guest co-host this week.

Looking to grow your career in solar tech? Aurora Solar is the leader in solar design and sales software. Aurora is hiring across multiple roles including customer success, marketing, sales, operations, and more. See open roles and apply to join Aurora, voted one of the best places to work in 2021, at www.aurorasolar.com/energygang.

This podcast is also brought to you by CPower. CPower’s latest book, "Demand-Side Energy Management in the Time of COVID," takes a peek into eight of the biggest commercial industries in North America and reveals key energy management strategies successful organizations executed during the wildest year of the young century. Download it here.

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Every few seconds, a new residential HVAC system or water heater is installed around America. Most of them are designed to burn oil and gas -- locking in 15-20 more years of carbon pollution.

So how do we electrify 100% of that new equipment rapidly?  This week: a wide-ranging conversation about how to unlock the residential market. 

Katherine and Stephen are joined by Nate Adams, the co-founder of HVAC 2.0. He’s called “the house whisperer” for a reason. They discuss the benefit of home electrification, the opportunity, and the market constraints.

Later in the show, a new trend in real estate: Redfin released a survey of prospective homebuyers, asking them about how they’d factor climate risk into their decisions. Half of them said that intensifying natural disasters influenced their decision to relocate. What are the consequences for the market?

Resources:

• Grist: The Barriers to Home Electrification
• Workshop: Nate Adams’ Electrify Everything Course
• Redfin Survey: Climate Change Influencing American Home Buyers
• Lisbeth Kaufman: Why I’m Buying a Climate Haven

Looking to grow your career in solar tech? Aurora Solar is the leader in solar design and sales software. Aurora is hiring across multiple roles including customer success, marketing, sales, operations, and more. See open roles and apply to join Aurora, voted one of the best places to work in 2021, at www.aurorasolar.com/energygang.

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California is the proving ground for every major change that President Biden wants to accelerate nationally: 100% carbon-free electricity, fossil fuel phaseouts, climate-resilient grid hardening. 

The state wants to make 100% of retail electricity sales carbon-free by 2045. To that, it’ll need to match its best year ever for renewable energy installations -- for 25 years more years in a row. It’ll amount to $4.5 billion in yearly spending.

California is moving fast. Is there such a thing as too fast? 

This week, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer Sammy Roth joins us to talk about California’s fast, sometimes-messy, and still-evolving energy transition. 

Plus, tensions over public lands. It’s going to take a lot of investment, difficult choices, and grit to hit California’s zero-carbon goals. It’s also going to take a lot of land.

That’s putting the Biden team in a dilemma: how to balance a historic build-out of wind and solar farms with protection of public lands? 

Plus, we look at the details of Biden’s “once in a generation” plan to reconstruct the economy one seawall, EV charging station, and transmission project at a time.

Resources:

• Sammy Roth’s “Boiling Point” newsletter
• Sammy’s article on the collision over renewables on public lands
• Sammy’s article on California’s pathway forward to 100% clean power
• E&E News: How Biden’s $2T infrastructure plan would overhaul the grid
• NYT: Biden’s $2T plan to reshape the economy

Looking to grow your career in solar tech? Aurora Solar is the leader in solar design and sales software. Aurora is hiring across multiple roles including customer success, marketing, sales, operations, and more. See open roles and apply to join Aurora, voted one of the best places to work in 2021, at www.aurorasolar.com

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The systems that support growing, shipping and processing food make up one-third of heat trapping gases.

How can Agtech help us tackle this tangled and underserved sector? We’ll look at investment activity, technological solutions, and policy levers.

Then, we revisit long-duration storage. A net-zero grid will require new ways to store and discharge energy over long periods. How’s it shaping up?

Plus, is carbon pricing back on the table here in the US?

This week, Katherine and Stephen are joined by guest co-host Amy Duffuor, a principal at Prime Impact Fund. 

Resources:

• Ag Funder: How to Unleash Agtech in the Fight Against Climate Change
• Greentech Media: California Could Need 55 GW of Long-Duration Storage
• Axios: Oil Industry Endorses a Carbon Price

Looking to grow your career in solar tech? Aurora Solar is the leader in solar design and sales software. Aurora is hiring across multiple roles including customer success, marketing, sales, operations, and more. See open roles and apply to join Aurora, voted one of the best places to work in 2021, at www.aurorasolar.com

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This week, the nuts and bolts of climate policy: infrastructure.

With a $2 trillion covid relief package under his belt, Biden looks to harness another $3 trillion on building clean energy, hardening the electric grid, installing electric car chargers, and updating roads and bridges.

We’ll game out what’s needed and what’s possible.

Then: is this the moment for the black climate agenda? And if so, what are the priorities?

Finally, how will pressure campaigns over new fossil fuel infrastructure play out in the next four years? And what lessons have we learned from previous fights over the last decade?

The gang this week: Katherine Hamilton and Stephen Lacey are joined by climate strategist Tamara Toles O’Laughlin.

Resources:

• New York Times: Biden’s Biden’s Recovery Plan Bets Big on Clean Energy
• E&E News: How the Infrastructure Bill Might Tackle Climate Change
• Redfin Study: Redlined Communities Face Greater Flood Risk
• CNN: A New Pipeline Battle Fires Up in Minnesota

This podcast is brought to you by Sungrow, a leading provider of PV inverter solutions around the world. Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone — and 120 gigawatts in total across the globe. Learn more about Sungrow’s cutting-edge solar projects.

This podcast is also brought to you by CPower. CPower’s latest book, Demand-Side Energy Management in the Time of COVID, takes a peek into eight of the biggest commercial industries in North America and reveals key energy management strategies that successful organizations executed during the wildest year of the young century. Download it here.

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This week: natural gas bans are the newest flash point in the energy transition. What does it mean for the electrify-everything movement -- and the gas industry’s public relations battle?

Then: how do we build back better for everybody? We’ll look how Biden’s recent stimulus and climate agenda could mend America’s growing wealth and race divide.

Plus: it’s been a year since the start of the pandemic. What transformed, and what didn’t? What did we get right and wrong? We’ll revisit the last 12 months.

Katherine Hamilton and Stephen Lacey are joined by Donnel Baird, the CEO of Blocpower. 

Resources:

• Mother Jones investigation on gas industry front groups.
• NPR story on political conflicts over gas bans, and pre-emptive actions in red states
• The Atlantic: Biden’s stimulus is a big deal for public transit
• NYT: How Biden ties economic goals to racial equity 
• Politico: Congressional democrats unveil sweeping climate bill
• Podcasters declare campaign

This podcast is brought to you by Sungrow, a leading provider of PV inverter solutions around the world. Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone — and 120 gigawatts in total across the globe. Learn more about Sungrow’s cutting-edge solar projects.

This podcast is also brought to you by CPower. CPower’s latest book, Demand-Side Energy Management in the Time of COVID, takes a peek into eight of the biggest commercial industries in North America and reveals key energy management strategies that successful organizations executed during the wildest year of the young century. Download it here.

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This is a special episode of Wood Mackenzie's The Energy Gang, recorded at the Reuters Global Energy Transition 2024 conference in New York. It has a great lineup of speakers from the worlds of business, finance, and government, giving us an opportunity to talk to some of the key people who are driving the energy transition. 

One of the panellists on the first day was Kristina Skierka, CEO of Power for All, a campaign group working on energy access in low-income countries. Host Ed Crooks talked with her about how decentralized renewables can reduce energy poverty, and how partnerships between business, philanthropy and government can help countries make progress towards the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.

Power for All is working on what it calls its “Utilities 2.0” initiative, looking for ways to combine centralized and decentralized energy to create robust, integrated systems that will improve service delivery and stimulate increased demand.

Another session at the event was a technology showcase, where we heard from companies developing innovative ways to cut emissions. One of them was Cella, which has a new method for permanent carbon removal. Its approach accelerates the natural geologic process that turns carbon dioxide into a mineral: it injects captured carbon dioxide into volcanic rocks, where mineralization permanently locks it underground.

Ed talked with Corey Pattison, Cella’s co-founder and CEO, and they discussed the different methods of carbon mineralization, the geology needed for the process to work, and the potential advantages for this method over conventional carbon dioxide storage.  

There was also a Town Hall session for attendees, allowing open discussion on any topics the participants wanted to bring up. Ed raised a question suggested on LinkedIn, about the potential trade-off in the transition between speed and scale in the deployment of low carbon technologies, and energy equity. We report back on some of the responses to that question.

Look out for the next special episode from day two of the conference, available on Thursday June 27.

You can find Ed and the show on most social media platforms: we’re @theenergygang on X. Subscribe to the Energy Gang on Apple Podcasts or Spotify so you don’t miss the next show.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week, we present a crossover episode of our sister podcast, The Interchange.

In this episode, host Shayle Kann talks with fellow venture capitalist Abe Yokell about the state of climate tech investing. It’s safe to say that this year has brought some of the biggest changes to the space we’ve ever seen. Shayle and Abe try to separate what’s real from what’s hype.

Thanks to everyone for their kind emails and social media reactions after Jigar's final episode.

The show goes on! We’re currently booking a diverse range of high-profile guests to join us each week. We think you're going to like what we have in store for you.

While you are waiting for new Energy Gang episodes, this is the perfect time to follow the The Interchange where ever you listen to podcasts.

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Jigar Shah has been our co-host since 2013. But now he's moving on to new pastures.

Starting this this week, Jigar will be leading the Department of Energy's loan programs office -- running the government's strategy to finance the deployment of up-and-coming clean energy technologies.

In this episode, we reflect on Jigar's career and his role on the show. Plus, we'll learn more about his mission in the Biden Administration.

Read the announcement.

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This week, we have a bonus episode of Watt It Takes featuring Stephen Lacey, our founding host and executive producer.

Back in December, Powerhouse CEO Emily Kirsch interviewed Stephen for a holiday edition of Watt It Takes. They talked in front of an audience about his career in journalism, how the world of podcasting has evolved, and his entrepreneurial journey launching a production company. 

And great news! Watt It Takes is now a standalone series. You can subscribe on Apple, Spotify, Google Podcasts or anywhere you get your shows. We'll be featuring the top voices in climate tech throughout 2021.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Even for energy veterans, the depth of failures in Texas last week were breathtaking. 

As arctic air froze power plants, gas lines, and mechanical instruments, the grid was shut down -- leaving 4 million people without electricity, unknown millions without heat, and three times that many without water. 

Texas has been through freezes like this before in 2011, 2014 and 2018. Regulators were warned. So who is to blame for this historic catastrophe?

This week, we’ll talk about what happened in Texas -- reflecting on the responses and projecting the consequences for how we engineer the grid. 

Then: did the shale boom fail to create all those promised jobs? 

New research shows that the natural gas boom did not bring a massive employment wave to counties in the Marcellus and Utica shales. Wealth yes, but not so many jobs. 

• Wall Street Journal: In Frigid Texas, Desperate Families Take Risks to Stay Warm
• Associated Press: Texas governor’s biggest donors: Energy industry that failed
• NBC: The GOP is rapidly becoming the blue-collar party. Here's what that means.
• Inside Climate News: A Decade Into the Fracking Boom, Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia Haven’t Gained Much, a Study Says

Thanks to our sponsors:

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Wärtsilä Energy. Wärtsilä is leading the energy transition with the Atlas of 100% Renewable Energy. Stick with us at the end of the show to hear how this tool is helping us understand how to best spend stimulus dollars on the clean-energy transition.

 This podcast is brought to you by Sungrow, a leading provider of PV inverter solutions around the world. Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone — and 120 gigawatts in total across the globe. Learn more about Sungrow’s cutting-edge solar projects.

This podcast is also brought to you by CPower. CPower’s latest book, Demand-Side Energy Management in the Time of COVID, takes a peek into eight of the biggest commercial industries in North America and reveals key energy management strategies that successful organizations executed during the wildest year of the young century. Download it here.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week: climate change is certainly the most urgent issue we face. But should it be formally declared an emergency? 

There’s a real conversation over the label in the US -- and it could have a very real impact on what the president can do.

This has been a growing priority for environmental groups. Grist reported that in December, more than 380 of them sent a letter to Joe Biden’s transition team, urging him to issue an executive order mobilizing the National Emergencies Act. 

And now, Rep. Earl Blumenauer and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in the House and Sen. Bernie Sanders in the Senate among others just introduced The National Climate Emergency Act of 2021, 

Then: what could be the counter-impact? Changes across the energy economy are set to accelerate. If we don’t do it correctly, are we facing a “Yellow Vest” protest movement like we saw recently in France?

And last: a new study shows that some cities are grossly under-reporting their carbon emissions. Do cities even have the resources to measure them properly?   

Resources:

• Grist: AOC, Sanders, and Blumenauer press Biden to declare a ‘climate emergency’
• Vice: AOC and Bernie Are Teaming Up to Get Biden to Declare Climate Change a National Emergency
• Vox: “We risk a yellow vest movement”: Why the US clean energy transition must be equitable
• New York Times: U.S. Cities Are Vastly Undercounting Emissions, Researchers Find

Thanks to our sponsors:

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Wärtsilä Energy. Wärtsilä is leading the energy transition with the Atlas of 100% Renewable Energy. Stick with us at the end of the show to hear how this tool is helping us understand how to best spend stimulus dollars on the clean-energy transition.

 This podcast is brought to you by Sungrow, a leading provider of PV inverter solutions around the world. Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone — and 120 gigawatts in total across the globe. Learn more about Sungrow’s cutting-edge solar projects.

This podcast is also brought to you by CPower. CPower’s latest book, "Demand-Side Energy Management in the Time of COVID," takes a peek into eight of the biggest commercial industries in North America and reveals key energy management strategies successful organizations executed during the wildest year of the young century. Download it here.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Net-zero pledges are becoming common for utilities. But a huge number of them are failing to decarbonize on any timeframe that truly matters. They’re not phasing out coal, they’re building lots of new gas plants, and they’re not building enough clean energy.

We’ll talk about a damning new analysis of utility climate goals from the Sierra Club that digs into the actual numbers.

Then, the urgency of a national clean energy standard. What are the new political pieces in place to get a nationwide target in place? And can we build it to serve marginalized communities? A new analysis maps out how.

Finally, the bombshell news that General Motors will only sell zero-emissions cars by 2035. How hard is it to turn around a company born and raised in internal combustion? A cautionary tale from Volkswagen offers some answers.  

Dr. Leah Stokes, professor at UC Santa Barbara, joins Stephen, Katherine and Jigar this week. Leah is the co-author behind the two reports we are discussing.

Leah is also co-host of A Matter of Degrees, a new podcast that looks at the forces behind climate change -- and how “climate curious” citizens can tackle it.

Resources:

• Sierra Club: The Dirty Truth About Climate Pledges
• Stokes, Ricketts: A Roadmap to 100% Clean Electricity by 2035
• New York Times: G.M. Will Sell Only Zero-Emission Vehicles by 2035
• Wall Street Journal: How Volkswagen’s $50 Billion Plan to Beat Tesla Short-Circuited 

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The Energy Gang is brought to you by Wärtsilä Energy. Wärtsilä is leading the energy transition with the Atlas of 100% Renewable Energy. Stick with us at the end of the show to hear how this tool is helping us understand how to best spend stimulus dollars on the clean-energy transition.

 This podcast is brought to you by Sungrow, a leading provider of PV inverter solutions around the world. Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone — and 120 gigawatts in total across the globe. Learn more about Sungrow’s cutting-edge solar projects.

This podcast is also brought to you by CPower. CPower and its team of energy experts are back with a webinar series aimed to help organizations make sense of the chaos and optimize their energy use and spend in 2021. This hour-long webinar series features market-by-market breakdowns to help energy planners make the right decisions. Register today.

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It was hard to keep up with the destruction of the Trump era. And it’s already getting hard to keep up with the rebuilding. 

This week brought a series of actions on climate change from the White House that are building a framework for the climate economy. 

Sam Ricketts, a prominent climate policy advisor, told the Los Angeles Times: “This is the most ambitious climate platform put forward by an American president...It is mobilizing the entirety of the federal government in an unprecedented way. Every agency is now a climate agency.”

We’ll sort through it.

Then, last week we covered distributed energy modeling. Now we get to the practice: how do we rebuild markets to accommodate a ton of small-scale resources? They’re doing it in the UK. We’ve lagged in the US. We’ll compare.

Finally, Elon Musk says he’ll give $100M to carbon-capture tech that shows promise. He can’t run rockets on electricity. Will he get his carbon-neutral jet fuel?

• Greentech Media: Biden Executive Orders Set Broad Federal Role in Clean Energy and Climate Change Mitigation
• LATimes: Biden Orders Sweeping Actions to Pause Drilling and Fight Climate Change
• Greentech Media: New UK DERMS Project Targets Flexibility Across Distribution and Transmission Grids
• Twitter: Cisco DeVries’ Feed on the Dissing of OhmConnect
• NBC News: Elon Musk to Offer $100 Million Prize for 'Best' Carbon Capture Tech
• Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research A Review of the Role of Fossil Fuel Based Carbon Capture and Storage in the Energy System.

This podcast is brought to you by Sungrow, a leading provider of PV inverter solutions around the world. Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone — and 120 gigawatts in total across the globe. Learn more about Sungrow’s cutting-edge solar projects.

This podcast is also brought to you by CPower. CPower and its team of energy experts are back with a webinar series aimed to help organizations make sense of the chaos and optimize their energy use and spend in 2021. This hour-long webinar series features market-by-market breakdowns to help energy planners make the right decisions. Register today.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week, we finally left behind a destructive regime that thwarted environmental policy at every turn. We exchanged it for a government putting climate experts and clean-energy doers in its highest ranks in a way that no prior administration has done before.

What comes next?

First up this week: If Biden wants his $2 trillion climate spending plan to make a bigger impact, should he emphasize rooftop solar and small-scale batteries? A leading modeler says a local solar-storage plan could save hundreds of billions of dollars as we build out the net-zero grid.

Then: the board members of major corporations are often ignorant about climate change and what it takes to address it, according to a new report from NYU’s Stern business school. Why is that true – still? What can be done about it?

And last: Should you sign up for your utility’s green power program? Is there a better way to guarantee that your monthly power bill supports the world you envision? We’ll answer a listener question.

Recommended reading:

• VCE: Why Local Solar for All Costs Less
• Local Solar For All Roadmap
• LA Times: Boiling Point: How rooftop solar could save Americans $473 billion
• Bloomberg: Many Corporate Boards Don’t Fully Understand the Climate Crisis
• Harvard Business Review: Boards Are Obstructing ESG — at Their Own Peril
• NREL: Voluntary Green Power Procurement - 2019 Utility Green Pricing Ranks
• Energy Sage: What to look for, and availability of community solar

This podcast is brought to you by Sungrow, a leading provider of PV inverter solutions around the world. Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone — and 120 gigawatts in total across the globe. Learn more about Sungrow’s cutting-edge solar projects.

This podcast is also brought to you by CPower. CPower and its team of energy experts are back with a webinar series aimed to help organizations make sense of the chaos and optimize their energy use and spend in 2021. This hour-long webinar series features market-by-market breakdowns to help energy planners make the right decisions. Register today.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

BlocPower CEO Donnel Baird is on a mission to clean up old, inefficient buildings in America’s cities -- and help people who are exposed to the worst pollution. 

BlocPower was founded in 2012. It’s raised venture capital from Kapor Capital and Andreesen Horowitz. But that process was not easy for a company with a mostly non-white leadership team. As a black founder, Donnel was turned down 200 times before any venture firms were willing to back his vision.

“It was really difficult for us raising capital. One of our investors when I talked to him two or three years ago and said I was struggling to raise capital, he was like ‘yeah man, just hire some white people and send them into the fundraising meetings and it’ll clear things up,’” explains Donnel.

BlocPower is a Brooklyn, New York startup electrifying and weatherizing buildings in underserved communities -- slashing pollution and saving money. This includes housing units, churches, community centers. 

And the mission for Donnel isn’t about just about hitting milestones for investors. It’s about changing the fabric of underserved communities that are plagued by pollution and energy poverty. That’s because Donnel has lived it himself.

In this episode, Powerhouse CEO Emily Kirsch talks with Donnel about how he channeled his frustration and anger around racial unfairness into a business model for the energy transition.

Listen to all our past episodes of Watt It Takes here. This series is normally recorded in front of a live audience, but we’re now recording the interviews remotely. See future events from Powerhouse here.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Sungrow, a leading provider of PV inverter solutions across the world. Sungrow has delivered more than 10 gigawatts of inverters to the Americas alone -- and 120 gigawatts in total across the globe. Learn more about Sungrow’s cutting-edge solar projects.

The Energy Gang is also brought to you by CPower. CPower and its team of energy experts are back with a webinar series aimed to help organizations make sense of the chaos and optimize their energy use and spend in 2021. This hour-long webinar series features market-by-market breakdowns to help energy planners make the right decisions. Register today.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

In the final moments of 2020, the most important U.S. energy legislation in a decade flew in under the radar, attached to the coronavirus relief and government funding bill. 

It’s an astonishing collection of measures. It sets aside $35 Billion in new funding for clean energy R&D, phases out some of the most egregious greenhouse gases, and extends tax credits for wind, solar, nuclear, and carbon capture. What’s the impact?

It would have been a bill big enough to discuss this whole episode. But it’s been eclipsed by the possibility of more ambitious legislation under a Democrat-controlled Congress -- thanks to some big Senate wins in Georgia on Wednesday.

With a window of action open, how much can get done in the next two years? We’ll dig in. 

Lastly, one of the biggest business stories from the last year: Tesla. A stratospheric stock price, strong sales growth, and the second richest man in the world. What do Elon Musk’s fortunes foreshadow for EVs?

Recommended reading:

• Greentech Media: What Renewable Energy and Energy Storage Did, and Didn’t, Get from Congress This Week
• E&E News: 13 Ways the Massive Omnibus Hits Energy
• Dave Roberts Volts Podcast: The Energy Act
• E&ENews: Things to Watch in a 50-50 Senate 
• Bloomberg: Tesla Poised for Expansion After Just Missing 2020 Target
• Barron’s: Tesla Passes a Market-Cap Milestone. It’s Worth More Than Facebook.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Sungrow, a leading provider of PV inverter solutions across the world. Sungrow is supplying inverters for a series of new, world-class solar facilities that will support Facebook’s operations with 100% renewable energy. Learn more about Sungrow’s cutting-edge solar projects.

The Energy Gang is also brought to you by CPower. CPower and its team of energy experts are back with a webinar series aimed to help organizations make sense of the chaos and optimize their energy use and spend in 2021. This hour-long webinar series features market-by-market breakdowns to help energy planners make the right decisions. Register today.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Two books that are essential reading for energy wonks give contrasting views on how to tackle climate change.

The hot book in the energy world right now is Brett Christophers’ The Price Is Wrong: Why Capitalism Won’t Save the Planet. It’s a detailed look at the structural issues in electricity markets and the challenges of generating returns on renewable investments, arguing that inadequate profitability is the key reason why the transition to low-carbon energy is not moving fast enough to address the threat of global warming.

It’s a provocative thesis that has sparked heated debate, on both sides of the debate. If you work in the energy business, you need to get to grips with the argument, even if you ultimately think it’s wrong.

In this episode, Ed Crooks is joined by Melissa Lott, Professor at Columbia University’s Climate School, and Joseph Majkut, director of the Energy Security and Climate Change Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, to discuss the question of whether private investment and market forces can bring about the reduction in emissions that the world needs.

They also review another important book that has broadly the opposite message: Akshat Rathi’s Climate Capitalism – Winning the Global Race to Zero Emissions. That book focuses on the real examples of progress in the energy transition.

At a time when the pace of the energy transition globally may be faltering, and the 1.5 degrees limit to global warming is getting further and further out of reach, Climate Capitalism shows just how much change and innovation there is in the industry. Bill Gates says it’s an important read for anyone in need of optimism.

In spirit, at least, it seems like a very different message from The Price Is Wrong. But are the fundamental conclusions of the two books really so different? Ed, Melissa and Joseph discuss whether there might be some common ground there after all.

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Goodbye 2020. We’re not sad to see you go. 

Even though this year brought a lot of outright bad stuff, it also brought a lot of positive, nuanced storylines in energy.

We’re going to tackle as many of them as possible, using suggestions from our listeners as a guide.

And no, they won’t be pandemic-related. Not explicitly anyway. You can listen to our previous episode for our pandemic picks.

We’ll tackle your suggestions: breakout technologies, political corruption, corporate momentum, energy justice, new financing approaches, and regulatory change.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Wärtsilä Energy, leading the transition toward a 100% renewable energy future. Wärtsilä launched “The Path to 100%” to accelerate the transition to renewables. Become part of the discussion.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Honeywell, a leading supplier of IOT solutions to mission-critical industries around the world. Honeywell Smart Energy helps utilities transform their grid operations through advanced solutions and targeted services from edge to cloud. Learn more.

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We’re featuring an episode of Google’s new podcast about data centers, called Where the Internet Lives. 

What would it take to run data centers on clean electricity, everywhere, every hour of the day? In this episode, we look at the evolution of data center energy use in a world confronting the threat of climate change – and explore promising ideas that could fuel a carbon-free future.

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As we close out 2020, we are diving into the top stories that defined this frenzied and heavy year. 

This week, we’ll start the show with a look back at how Covid re-shaped the energy transition. We’re going to revisit some predictions that did -- and didn’t -- come true. Next episode, we’ll look at a wider range of (non-pandemic) 2020 stories.

Then later in the show, advertising and PR professionals are suddenly being pressured to reveal how much of their income is from fossil fuel clients. Are firms in this industry the next to lose their social license?

And last: what could a Youth Climate Corps accomplish? And how should it be set up? We look to a Depression-era program to rally the passions of America’s climate generation. 

Resources:

• New Yorker: When “Creatives” Turn Destructive: Image-Makers and the Climate Crisis
• Yale 360: How a Climate Corps Could Put Youth to Work in Greening America
• “Where the Internet Lives” podcast from Google

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Wärtsilä Energy, leading the transition toward a 100% renewable energy future. Wärtsilä launched “The Path to 100%” to accelerate the transition to renewables. Become part of the discussion.

The Energy Gang is brought to you by Honeywell, a leading supplier of IOT solutions to mission-critical industries around the world. Honeywell Smart Energy helps utilities transform their grid operations through advanced solutions and targeted services from edge to cloud. Learn more.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.