The Green Blueprint

There are many forces that could hold back AI in the power system: computing infrastructure, power availability, regulation, and corporate inertia.

The biggest one? Good data. 

Utilities and grid operators are awash in data. But getting access to it – or making sense of it – is very difficult. 

For a better understanding of how to change that, we turn to someone who spends a lot of his time in the so-called data cloud: Tititaan Palazzi, the head of power and utilities at Snowflake.

“Data naturally ends up in different boxes, in different silos. And when you then want to ask questions of the data, it becomes really hard. You can't ask questions across the enterprise,” he explained.

In 2018, Palazzi co-founded Myst AI with Pieter Verhoeven, an engineer who built critical demand response applications for the Nest Thermostat. Myst was focused on AI-driven time-series forecasting for the grid. 

“In the energy industry, there is a lot of time-series data coming from the grid. At the same time, using AI for forecasting is quite challenging because every time you need to create a new prediction, you need to have the latest data. And so from an engineering perspective, it was quite complicated to do,” said Palazzi.

Palazzi and Verhoeven arrived at Snowflake after Myst was acquired by the company last year. 

This week, we feature a conversation with Snowflake's Titiaan Palazzi on busting data silos, some early wins for AI in the power sector, and what phase of the transition we're in. 

This episode is brought to you by The Big Switch. In a new 5-episode season, we’re digging into the ways batteries are made and asking: what gets mined, traded, and consumed on the road to decarbonization? Listen on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your shows.

Early in her career, Amanda Li worked on many deals in solar and storage as part of a billion-dollar sustainable infrastructure fund. And she discovered a problem that often hinders deployment: the underwriting process is cumbersome and slow.

“All of it was in spreadsheets, word documents, emails. When you look at a solar deal, there's a lot of documentation, a lot of counterparties to deal with, and that information needs to be processed somehow. It felt like we were spending a lot of time just trying to process the information,” explained Li.

This problem has only grown over time as more distributed assets need financing, and policies like the Inflation Reduction Act support smaller clean energy projects at the community level. These small- to mid-sized projects often require as much diligence and paperwork as much larger deals.

So in 2018, Amanda co-founded Banyan Infrastructure, a software platform that simplifies transactions for a wide range of sustainable infrastructure projects – replacing spreadsheets, email, and PDFs with digitized loans and workflows.

The company has raised more than $42 million and works with green banks, Wall Street firms, and local lenders to make deals simpler. 

“If at every single layer there aren't standards, there aren't connected processes, it's going to move really slowly,” said Li.

In this episode, produced in partnership with Banyan Infrastructure, we explore the shifting world of sustainable finance. 

Stephen Lacey talks with Banyan COO Amanda Li about solving financial bottlenecks, how the IRA is bringing in new players to the market, and what it will take to unlock trillions of new dollars per year for the energy transition.

Banyan Infrastructure is simplifying and accelerating the financing of sustainable infrastructure. Read the company’s white paper on unlocking the full potential of sustainable finance, or request a demo to learn how the software works.

When Brian Janous took charge of Microsoft’s clean energy strategy in 2011, the company’s data center demand was modest. He was measuring new demand in the tens of megawatts.

Over the years, that grew to hundreds of megawatts of new demand as hyperscale computing expanded. And then everything changed in the spring of 2023, with the public launch of ChatGPT 3.5, which ran on Microsoft’s data centers.

“That was the moment that I realized we were going to need a bigger boat. This is a massive leap in a period of like six months – and the amount of time that it takes to actually build infrastructure was measured in years,” said Janous.

Projections show data center energy demand could double in the next couple of years, driven by artificial intelligence. Janous saw the hockey stick growth coming, and he realized the disconnect between how fast AI is moving and how the core input to data centers – electricity supply – is struggling to keep pace.

After decades of flat demand, load forecasts are doubling because of data centers, expanding ports, new manufacturing plants supported by the IRA, and electric cars. 

Janous recently co-founded a company, Cloverleaf Infrastructure, to help utilities unlock grid capacity with grid-enhancing technologies, batteries, and other flexible resources to meet the onslaught of new demand. He also advises LineVision, a dynamic line rating company that is helping expand transmission capacity.

This week: we talk with Janous about why we don't need energy miracles – we need to think creatively about planning, and squeezing more out of the system.

This episode is brought to you by The Big Switch. In a new 5-episode season, we’re digging into the ways batteries are made and asking: what gets mined, traded, and consumed on the road to decarbonization? Listen on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your shows.

In the early 2000s, Steve Cotton ran a company serving the fast-growing data center industry with backup battery systems.

And when those systems reached the end of their lives, the company monetized kilotons of lead-acid batteries by sending them to recycling facilities – industrial plants that break down and burn the components.

“It's very dangerous. You've got lead dust all over the floor. You've got a bunch of people wearing hot suits, literally chucking batteries into high temperature furnaces. And it is not a healthy environment,” said Cotton.

Two decades later, the technology has shifted – and lithium-ion batteries are now the dominant form of storage. But recycling hasn't changed a lot.

Today, there are two types of dominant battery recycling methods. One is using high heat, similar to the process that Steve witnessed at the lead-acid facilities. The other is giving batteries a chemical bath, in a process known as hydrometallurgy. Both create a lot of waste.

Steve saw how big the battery recycling waste problem could become. And in 2015, he invested in a company called Aqua Metals. And he became so convinced by Aqua Metals' novel approach to recycling, he became the CEO.

“We're using electricity to drive the process and the electricity itself comes from renewable resources. And that can produce this metal supply chain with a true opportunity to have a net zero environmental impact,” said Cotton.

The battery recycling industry is experiencing rapid growth, as companies and countries look to build secure, circular supply chains for critical minerals.

In this episode, produced in partnership with Aqua Metals, Steve Cotton sits down with Stephen Lacey to talk about the growing battery waste problem, and the urgency to invest in recycling techniques that don't lock in new sources of waste.

This is a partner episode, brought to you by AquaMetals. Aqua Metals is pioneering cleaner and safer battery metals recycling through innovation. The company is building the first sustainable battery recycling operation in North America in Tahoe-Reno. Watch a tour of the company’s pilot facility, and learn more by reading the company’s recyclopedia.

Can a couple trillion dollars feel small?

Global investments in the energy transition – from the buildout of factories and power projects to project finance and government debt – hit nearly $1.8 trillion last year. 

That’s almost as big as the GDP of South Korea. It’s nearly 20% more than the year before, and nearly eight times more than a decade ago. But even with those record levels of spending, we are astonishingly behind what’s needed to stay on a net-zero trajectory this decade. 

This week, we’ll talk about what’s growing, what’s lagging, and what the trillion-dollar scale means at the ground level.

Then, geoengineering is nudging closer to the mainstream of scientific and environmental discourse. Are we giving up, or just being realistic?

Katherine Hamilton of 38 North and Shalini Ramanathan of Quinbrook Infrastructure Partners join us this week to sift through these trends.

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If we want any chance of affordably and reliably building a grid powered 100% by zero-carbon resources, we need to triple the capacity of virtual power plants. 

That’s the conclusion of a report released last fall by the Department of Energy, which examined the different business models and integration approaches for tying solar, batteries, thermostats, electric cars, water heaters, and other distributed assets into dispatchable power plants.

The US already has tens of gigawatts of VPP capacity, mostly in the form of “bring your own device” programs that harness thermostats or water heaters for demand response services. But there are new models emerging that harness rooftop solar, batteries, and EV charging to enable bigger, longer-lasting load shifts.

“I like to say that the term VPP is kind of like the term sandwich. There are lots of different kinds, they're full of different ingredients, and they serve lots of different purposes,” said Jen Downing, an engagement officer at the DOE, who leads the agency’s work on the space. 

The concept of VPPs has been around for nearly 30 years. But as the US faces a dramatic increase in peak demand by 2030 – and with distributed resource capacity set to double – the urgency for deploying them has increased.

“We're going to need clean, firm [power]. We're going to need more transmission capacity to transport that electricity. But one way to address that increase in peak is to use distributed energy resources to either serve that peak locally or to shift that peak outside of peak hours. And so that's where VPPs come in,” said Downing.

This week on The Carbon Copy, we spoke with DOE’s Jen Downing about the different ways that virtual power plants are getting built – and the need to build many more.

Read our show notes and all our industry coverage at Latitudemedia.com.

The storage market is full of surprises. Last year, global storage installations were a third higher than expected, driven mostly by Chinese policy to attach batteries to renewables. 

Meanwhile, a ramp-up in manufacturing is causing oversupply – and a potential shakeout for smaller battery makers.

By 2030, the world could see 1.8 terawatt-hours of storage capacity installed, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance. 

Rapid manufacturing expansion, a shift in chemistries and designs, and increases in duration for grid-connected systems are making battery storage one of the most dynamic sectors of the clean energy economy.

“We do have to constantly be reconsidering our assumptions,” said Yayoi Sekine, head of energy storage at Bloomberg New Energy Finance. “I think now we're currently in an environment where the industry is actually able to sustain itself in terms of its own battery manufacturing and supply chains. That's a pretty big shift and that's happened very recently.”

This week on The Carbon Copy, we feature a conversation with Yayoi Sekine pricing, tech, manufacturing, and deployment trends that are shaping battery storage.

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As President Biden’s green industrial policies reignite the US manufacturing base, AI computing workloads soar, and machines across the economy turn electric, the power grid is facing an historic increase in demand.

After almost two decades of flat electricity consumption, suddenly America’s grid planners are doubling their forecasts for demand – raising the urgency for new infrastructure.

This week, we’ll ask: what’s needed, and what happens if we can’t build it?

Then, some major changes in the world of tax finance. We’ll look at how transferable tax credits are opening up new kinds of deals for clean energy – and take a deeper dive into the long-awaited and controversial details of hydrogen tax credits.

Katherine Hamilton of 38 North and Shalini Ramanathan of Quinbrook Infrastructure Partners join us this week to sift through these trends.

Subscribe to Latitude Media’s newsletter to get weekly updates on tech, markets, and deals across clean energy and climate tech.

Artificial intelligence is quickly accelerating drug discovery, healthcare services, product design, and manufacturing efficiency. Now it's here for materials development – and it could be one of the most influential uses of AI in energy.

A decade ago, Greg Mulholland started playing around with machine learning as a way to accelerate product development of materials inside LEDs. After seeing its potential – and witnessing the rapid evolution of AI – he co-founded Citrine Informatics. Citrine built an AI platform that helps researchers advance cutting-edge materials for use in solar cells, batteries, electric cars, and more.

“It allows us to move through generations of materials discovery so much faster that we're not just incrementally improving things, but we're actually driving forward the whole industry and raising the bar on ourselves in a pretty exciting way,” says Greg.

This week: Greg Mulholland, CEO of Citrine Informatics, describes the many ways that artificial intelligence is pushing the performance of clean energy and climate technologies – and helping clean up the materials that make up the world around us.

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Sign up for Latitude Media’s Frontier Forum on January 31, featuring Crux CEO Alfred Johnson, who will break down the budding market for clean energy tax credits. We’ll dissect current transactions and pricing, compare buyer and seller expectations, and look at where the market is headed in 2024.

Turbulent. Equilibrating. Those are the words that investors Gabriel Kra and Carly Anderson use to describe the last year for venture capital in climate tech. 

We now have a full picture of the year for climate tech venture investing in 2023. Fresh data from Sightline Climate shows a decline in deal counts, round sizes, and a dropoff in repeat investors. 

It was a year of rising interest rates, declining valuations, a bank collapse, and falling exits. But it was also when many companies started building factories, and forging a path toward a green industrial economy.

“If rates go up and IPO markets dry up, we all suffer from that just like everybody else does,” said Kra. “But when we look back, we're going to realize, that's when products started rolling off the lines.”

“I think it was a year of looking around and figuring out, ‘hey, what's real and we, where is, where is the ground?’ And I think we're at a pretty solid place now to go forward, “ said Anderson.

This week: we feature perspectives from two investors on the mixed environment for fundraising, the impact on different sectors, and why we may actually look back on 2023 in a positive light.

Sign up for Latitude Media’s Frontier Forum on January 31, featuring Crux CEO Alfred Johnson, who will break down the budding market for clean energy tax credits. We’ll dissect current transactions and pricing, compare buyer and seller expectations, and look at where the market is headed in 2024.

When the numbers for 2023 are finalized, there could be another 320 to 413 gigawatts of solar installed around the world – bringing global capacity to nearly 1.5 terawatts.

Solar is now on track to surpass coal and fossil gas capacity in the next few years, bringing generation to 10% of global electricity supply. 

There's universal recognition that we're firmly in the solar era. But outlooks on how fast the technology will grow are mixed. And that's because a mix of constraints – market design, trade barriers, and grid capacity – could cap yearly growth.

This week on The Carbon Copy, we talk with Wood Mackenzie's Michelle Davis about the tech and deployment trends that will shape the next decade of solar PV expansion.

Sign up for Latitude Media’s Frontier Forum on January 31, featuring Crux CEO Alfred Johnson, who will break down the budding market for clean energy tax credits. We’ll dissect current transactions and pricing, compare buyer and seller expectations, and look at where the market is headed in 2024.

The competing trends in the energy transition from 2023 were stark: a looming peak in demand for oil, gas, and coal; a global agreement to transition away from fossil fuels; and an increasingly realistic pathway to triple renewables development.

But we also experienced the hottest global temperatures in 125,000 years, record US oil & gas production, inflation headwinds that challenged large renewables projects, and a very tough year for clean energy stocks.

Every new investment in energy infrastructure matters in an increasingly consequential way. This is the decade to get it right, and we’re almost halfway through it.

So, as is tradition, we spend some time outlining our picks for storylines of the year – with that urgency in mind. And we’ll talk about what they signal about the path ahead here in the US and beyond.

Sign up for Latitude Media’s Frontier Forum on January 31, featuring Crux CEO Alfred Johnson, who will break down the budding market for clean energy tax credits. We’ll dissect current transactions and pricing, compare buyer and seller expectations, and look at where the market is headed in 2024.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a specialized climatetech PR firm dedicated to bringing meaningful results for companies in sectors spanning grid edge, solar, energy storage, battery, EVs, alternative fuels, VC and green building. FischTank helps clients stand out in an increasingly competitive and noisy space. Visit FischTank PR to learn more.

In less than a decade, America has become the world’s biggest exporter of liquified natural gas. 

In the mid-2000s, the US was building terminals to import more fossil gas. But that all changed after the fracking boom unlocked vast reserves of hydrocarbons. 

The US became a net exporter in 2017. Then, Russia’s war on Ukraine forced a scramble for new supplies of gas in Europe – and American companies stepped in.

The consequence: a historic push for new terminals, a vast new source of heat-trapping gasses that could wipe out US climate gains, and a growing conflict over how the government approves new LNG infrastructure.

This week: we explore the latest climate flash point: liquified gas.

We’re joined by Bill McKibben, author, organizer and founder of Third Act; Nicole Pollack, a contributing writer at Canary Media; and Jeremy Symons, analyst, political strategist, and principal at Symons Public Affairs.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• Canary Media: Nicole Pollack’s deep dive into the controversies over FERC approval of LNG exports.
• New Yorker: Bill McKibben’s article on Robert Howarth’s latest research on LNG emissions.
• Jeremy Symons’ recent research on how LNG exports are causing US emissions to rise.

Sign up for Latitude Media’s Frontier Forum on January 31, featuring Crux CEO Alfred Johnson, who will break down the budding market for clean energy tax credits. We’ll dissect current transactions and pricing, compare buyer and seller expectations, and look at where the market is headed in 2024.

It’s Canary Media’s listener drive through the end of the year. Make a tax-deductible donation today.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a specialized climatetech PR firm dedicated to bringing meaningful results for companies in sectors spanning grid edge, solar, energy storage, battery, EVs, alternative fuels, VC and green building. FischTank helps clients stand out in an increasingly competitive and noisy space. Visit FischTank PR to learn more.

The nuclear industry is grappling with several issues: high interest rates, rising commodity prices, limited supply chains, fuel availability, and a regulatory environment that has been slow to adapt to new technologies. 

In the west, nuclear knowhow has faded over the decades. Even with a surge in policy support and public interest, development is stagnant and capacity has fallen. Momentum has moved over to Asia, mostly China. But that’s not nearly enough.

While global renewables have tripled in just over a decade, net global nuclear capacity has barely budged upward. The reality is that we may need to see capacity double – or even triple – by 2050 to keep us on a net-zero path, on top of tripling wind and solar.

So this week, we’ll revisit the stories shaping nuclear power in 2023 and ask: are we getting anywhere closer to unlocking real growth? Or will the industry stay in a perpetual holding pattern?

• Breakthrough Institute: Advanced nuclear is in trouble
• Canary Media: Eric Wesoff's nuclear year-in-review
• E&E News: What’s next after the NuScale cancellation
• Canary Media: The future of small reactors at stake as NuScale deal flops
• Bloomberg: US, UK lead pledge to triple nuclear power by 2050

It’s Canary Media’s listener drive through the end of the year. Make a tax-deductible donation today.

Sign up for Latitude Media’s newsletter to get updates on the tech and business frontiers of the climatetech industry.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a specialized climatetech PR firm dedicated to bringing meaningful results for companies in sectors spanning grid edge, solar, energy storage, battery, EVs, alternative fuels, VC and green building. FischTank helps clients stand out in an increasingly competitive and noisy space. Visit FischTank PR to learn more.

It took 12 years to triple global renewables – and now we need to do it in eight years. 

As the latest UN climate summit begins, there’s a proposal on the table to triple renewable energy capacity by 2030. Countries may agree to it in theory, but can the market meet it in practice?

This week, we’ll look at why this tripling is necessary, how it could be done, and what technologies will dominate.

Then, we’ll address a confusing narrative that has emerged around electric cars. We’re seeing a historic ramp-up in domestic EV production, and record sales. But many are fretting that the market is weakening – and automakers are pulling back. What gives?

We’ll end with the forecast: our picks for stories that tell us something about the near or far future.

Resources mentioned in the show:

• BNEF: Tripling global renewables by 2030 Is necessary to achieve net zero
• Carbon Brief: Why deals at COP28 to triple renewables and double efficiency are crucial 
• Latitude Media: To triple renewables capacity, solar is a boon – and a potential problem
• NYT: A new law supercharged EV manufacturing, but not sales
• Business Insider: Automakers are scrambling over EVs

Sign up for Latitude Media’s Frontier Forum on January 31, featuring Crux CEO Alfred Johnson, who will break down the budding market for clean energy tax credits. We’ll dissect current transactions and pricing, compare buyer and seller expectations, and look at where the market is headed in 2024.

This episode of Carbon Copy is brought to you by the Energy Show, hosted by Barry Cinnamon. Questioning if that cool new product or service really pencils out for customers? Curious about customer adoption of IRA policies? Wondering how the grid can keep up with home electrification? For the real-world scoop on clean energy technologies with a focus on the customer perspective, don’t miss the Energy Show at www.energyshow.biz.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a specialized climatetech PR firm dedicated to bringing meaningful results for companies in sectors spanning grid edge, solar, energy storage, battery, EVs, alternative fuels, VC and green building. FischTank helps clients stand out in an increasingly competitive and noisy space. Visit FischTank PR to learn more.

Weather forecasts for the grid depend on supercomputers to calculate the flow of heat, water, and radiation in the atmosphere, and then spit out predictions about what could happen next.

These supercomputers are powerful. But they are also expensive and slow, relative to how quickly the weather changes. A new class of AI-based weather forecasts could change the game for grid operators and renewable energy developers. Will they take hold?

This week, we explore a variety of emerging applications for artificial intelligence in energy. 

First, we'll look at how machine learning can improve and democratize weather prediction with journalist Emma Woollacott, Dr. Jack Kelly of Open Climate Fix, and Dr. Noelia Otero Felipe of the University of Bern.

Then, we'll hear from a few companies that are using AI for demand response, virtual power plants, and EV charging. Latitude producer Erin Hardick explores AI trends at the grid edge with Apoorv Bhargava of WeaveGrid, Jae Beom Bae of Leap, Paul McDonald of Opower at Oracle Energy and Water, and Carlos Nouel of National Grid.

It’s Canary Media’s listener drive through the end of the year. Make a tax-deductible donation today!

This episode of Carbon Copy is brought to you by the Energy Show, hosted by Barry Cinnamon. Questioning if that cool new product or service really pencils out for customers? Curious about customer adoption of IRA policies? Wondering how the grid can keep up with home electrification? For the real-world scoop on clean energy technologies with a focus on the customer perspective, don’t miss the Energy Show at www.energyshow.biz.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a specialized climatetech PR firm dedicated to bringing meaningful results for companies in sectors spanning grid edge, solar, energy storage, battery, EVs, alternative fuels, VC and green building. FischTank helps clients stand out in an increasingly competitive and noisy space. Visit FischTank PR to learn more.

This is a partner podcast episode, brought to you by Intersect Power.

The U.S. grid is in trouble. It's old; it's really hard to build new transmission lines; and that is limiting the amount of wind and solar we can add to the system.

Sheldon Kimber, Founder and CEO of the clean energy developer Intersect Power, says the grid is “broken.” But he has a plan to get around those constraints. 

In this episode, produced in partnership with Intersect Power, Sheldon Kimber talks with Stephen Lacey about creative strategies for building renewables that don't rely on overhauling the grid. 

If you want to read more about Sheldon's vision on how this strategy will play out, he has an op-ed published at Latitude Media. 

Intersect Power is a clean energy company bringing innovative and scalable low-carbon solutions to its customers in global energy markets. The company develops, owns, and operates some of the world’s largest clean energy resources – providing low-carbon electricity, fuels, and related products to customers for U.S. consumption and international export. Learn more about Intersect's projects and business model.

Microsoft was an early mover in integrating OpenAI’s LLM into its Azure cloud services. And now every part of Microsoft’s technology stack — from cloud infrastructure to data analytics to consumer apps — will be “reimagined” for the AI era, said Nadella. As a result, every industry will inevitably be impacted by AI.

Utilities will also find themselves at the center of this shift, even if most aren’t yet actively investing in AI for grid management. Generative AI will increasingly start to influence back-office operations and customer support inside utilities for “focus and efficiency,” explained Microsoft’s Hanna Grene, on stage at Latitude Media’s Transition-AI: New York conference.

This week, we feature a conversation from our Transition-AI conference with Hanna. We talk with her about how large language models and other forms of artificial intelligence are making their way inside utilities – and why AI isn't as intimidating as it seems.

If you want more news and analysis like this in your inbox, subscribe to Latitude Media's newsletter and Canary Media's newsletter.

This episode of Carbon Copy is brought to you by the Energy Show, hosted by Barry Cinnamon. Questioning if that cool new product or service really pencils out for customers? Curious about customer adoption of IRA policies? Wondering how the grid can keep up with home electrification? For the real-world scoop on clean energy technologies with a focus on the customer perspective, don’t miss the Energy Show at www.energyshow.biz.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a specialized climatetech PR firm dedicated to bringing meaningful results for companies in sectors spanning grid edge, solar, energy storage, battery, EVs, alternative fuels, VC and green building. FischTank helps clients stand out in an increasingly competitive and noisy space. Visit FischTank PR to learn more.

Wind, solar and batteries have seen steady, fairly predictable cost drops over the last two decades. But a combination of pressures – supply chain turmoil, grid constraints, interest rates, labor costs – has raised costs for products and projects. And they’re challenging the commercial viability of emerging sectors like offshore wind and hydrogen.

So how will the market work through this inflationary blip? And are there other policy interventions to ease pressures? This week: we’ll explore the inflation problem for clean energy.

Then, the International Energy Agency says peak fossil fuel consumption is upon us. But what does that actually mean? We’ll put the “peak” into perspective. 

Joining us this week are Katherine Hamilton of 38 North, Michael O’Boyle of Energy Innovation, and Maria Gallucci of Canary Media.

Stories we mention in this episode:

• Latitude Media: The ripple effect of rising wind costs
• WSJ: Green power gets pricier after years of declines
• Canary Media: Offshore wind pushes ahead despite industry turmoil
• NYT: IEA forecasts peak fossil fuel demand
• Washington Post: “Peak” fossil fuels isn’t what it sounds like

Subscribe to our newsletters:

• Canary Media
• The Latitude

This episode of Carbon Copy is brought to you by the Energy Show, hosted by Barry Cinnamon. Questioning if that cool new product or service really pencils out for customers? Curious about customer adoption of IRA policies? Wondering how the grid can keep up with home electrification? For the real-world scoop on clean energy technologies with a focus on the customer perspective, don’t miss the Energy Show at www.energyshow.biz.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a specialized climatetech PR firm dedicated to bringing meaningful results for companies in sectors spanning grid edge, solar, energy storage, battery, EVs, alternative fuels, VC and green building. FischTank helps clients stand out in an increasingly competitive and noisy space. Visit FischTank PR to learn more.

The industrial sector is set to overtake power generation and transportation as the biggest source of planet warming emissions in the US by 2035, according to The Rhodium Group.

The sector’s impact is even greater on the global scale. Industry around the world accounts for more carbon dioxide emissions than all forms of transportation combined – largely driven by steel, cement, and chemicals.

There are a lot of ways to decarbonize industry, but the pathways are much less clear than for electricity or automobiles. 

In this episode, we’re joined by Jeff St. John, Maria Galluci, and Julian Spector, who’ve been exploring the varied paths for cleaning up the products that are foundational to the world around us.

Stories we mention in this episode:

• Canary Media: Cleaning up steel, cement and chemicals is tough — and entirely doable
• Rhodium Group: Taking stock of US emissions
• Canary Media: ‘Electrowinning’ could help win the race to clean up dirty steel
• Latitude Media: The electrolyzer market is caught in limbo
• Canary Media: To decarbonize cement, the industry needs a full transformation

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a specialized climatetech PR firm dedicated to bringing meaningful results for companies in sectors spanning grid edge, solar, energy storage, battery, EVs, alternative fuels, VC and green building. FischTank helps clients stand out in an increasingly competitive and noisy space. Visit FischTank PR to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Savant Power. Savant’s end-to-end power systems provide energy generation, inverter and battery storage, generator control, flexible load management for every circuit, and level two EV charging. Learn more about the only company that can deliver an integrated smart home and energy solution controlled via a single award-winning app at Savant.com.

There are a lot of quarterly ups and downs in venture dollars deployed across climatetech. But the trend is generally up. Since 2021, more than 200 new climate investment funds have been created with $121 billion under management, according to CTVC.

Earlier this month, Canary Media Editorial Director Eric Wesoff explored the evolved state of climate investing at Canary Media's live event in Berkeley. 

The panel included: Nancy Pfund, managing partner at DBL Investors; Mona EINaggar, a partner at Valo Ventures, and Elaine Hseih, a senior advisor at the US Department of Energy.

They discussed what sectors are most promising, the pathways to commercial success, and what America’s green industrial strategy means for investors.

This episode is brought to you by SPAN, a smart electrical panel that helps homeowners save on their energy bills. Interested in having a SPAN Panel installed in your home? Visit span.io to learn more.

This episode is brought to you by Nextracker, a leading provider of intelligent, integrated solar tracker and software solutions used in solar projects around the world. Learn more at Nextracker.com.

California is at a crossroads. The state has already installed nearly 1.8 million rooftop solar systems, 5 gigawatts of batteries, and 1.6 million electric cars. But it is also facing some serious challenges.

The list is long: controversial policy changes, extreme weather threats, and backlogs – lots and lots of backlogs.

It is facing serious backlogs in interconnecting utility-scale solar and storage projects, keeping fossil gas-fired power plants open that were supposed to shut down years ago. And that’s not even counting the gigawatts of offshore wind, geothermal power, long-duration energy storage and other clean, firm resources called for in the state’s long-term plans — none of which we’ve built yet. 

This week, Jeff St. John, Canary Media’s director of news, sits down with three prominent people who are trying to move the state forward: State Senator Josh Becker; GRID Alternatives Executive Director Arthur Bart-Williams; and California Solar and Storage Association Executive Director Bernadette Del Chiaro. 

This conversation was recorded live at Canary Live: Bay Area.

We have a flash sale for Transition-AI: New York through October 9th. Use the code FLASH30 to get 30% off your ticket price to our event on AI + energy. Spots are limited, so don't miss out!

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Sungrow. Now in more than 150 countries, Sungrow’s solutions include inverters for utility-scale, commercial & industrial solar, plus energy storage systems. Learn more at us.sungrowpower.com.

Just as the auto industry resolves supply chain problems from the Covid pandemic, a new disruptive force has emerged: labor disputes.

Nearly 20,000 American auto workers are on strike as they ask for higher pay. At the heart of their concerns: will the shift to electric cars make them worse off? 

We’ll look at a strike that is raising big questions about how to support the companies making electric vehicles for the masses – and support the workers who make them. 

Then: the push for green steel. Are automakers critical for getting low- and zero-carbon steel into mass production?

Finally, as the presidential campaign gets noisier, we look at how Republicans are talking about climate and energy.

Joining us this week are Maria Gallucci of Canary Media and Katherine Hamilton of 38 North.

Stories we mention in this episode:

• Canary Media: DOE offers $15.5 billion to retool existing auto plants for EVs
• New York Times: Battle over electric vehicles is central to auto strike
• Canary Media: Major steel users band together to place first big “green steel” order
• Energy Monitor Op-ed: The road to clean steel runs through automakers
• Bloomberg: Ron DeSantis pledges more fossil fuel production
• New York Times: A roundup of what GOP candidates say about climate change

Don’t forget to grab your tickets for Transition-AI: New York and Canary Live: Bay Area, coming up in October.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a specialized climatetech PR firm dedicated to bringing meaningful results for companies in sectors spanning grid edge, solar, energy storage, battery, EVs, alternative fuels, VC and green building. FischTank helps clients stand out in an increasingly competitive and noisy space. Visit FischTank PR to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Savant Power. Savant’s end-to-end power systems provide energy generation, inverter and battery storage, generator control, flexible load management for every circuit, and level two EV charging. Learn more about the only company that can deliver an integrated smart home and energy solution controlled via a single award-winning app at Savant.com.

Renewables and electric vehicles are on a tear, and they’ll soon likely attract $2 trillion in yearly investment. But global emissions have not peaked. 

So what are the new frontiers of technology that will make renewables and storage more valuable – and draw down emissions at the speed needed?

This week, we’re going to reflect on that question coming out of RE+, a major American conference where our editors were covering emerging tech. 

Then, the battery recycling boom is on. It’s attracting billions of dollars in investment. Will it address supply chain security and a looming waste problem?

Finally, Hawaii’s difficult transition away from coal. Why couldn’t it build renewables and batteries fast enough to fill the gap?

Joining us this week to talk through these stories are Jeff St. John, Julian Spector, and Lisa Martine Jenkins. 

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• A preview of Latitude Media
• Financial Times: Peak fossil fuels will happen this decade.
• Canary Media: Redwood Materials lands $1 billion 
• Canary Media: Another US battery recycler just raised a massive round
• Canary Media: Hawaii quit coal a year ago – how’s it going?

Don’t forget your tickets to Transition-AI: New York on October 19th. Our listeners get a 10% discount with the code pspods10.

And make sure to get your seat at Canary Live: Bay Area on October 3rd.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a specialized climatetech PR firm dedicated to bringing meaningful results for companies in sectors spanning grid edge, solar, energy storage, battery, EVs, alternative fuels, VC and green building. FischTank helps clients stand out in an increasingly competitive and noisy space. Visit FischTank PR to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Savant Power. Savant’s end-to-end power systems provide energy generation, inverter and battery storage, generator control, flexible load management for every circuit, and level two EV charging. Learn more about the only company that can deliver an integrated smart home and energy solution controlled via a single award-winning app at Savant.com.

In the last few months, three major projects in Europe and America have been delayed or canceled, thanks to rapidly rising costs. 

Those projects make up more than 10% of current offshore wind capacity in the EU and US, according to Bloomberg. Another 9.7 gigawatts are at risk in America, as developers look to renegotiate contracts.

The complexity of offshore wind magnifies the technical and financial risks. And the financial picture for some projects has worsened over the last two years as inflation has driven up the cost of materials and labor across the supply chain.

This week: offshore wind is taking a hit. We'll talk with Jan Matthiesen, director of offshore wind and maritime decarbonization at The Carbon Trust, about whether financial challenges in the industry will encourage more technical innovation to bring costs down.

Are you looking to understand how artificial intelligence will shape the business of energy? Come network with utilities, top energy firms, startups, and AI experts at Transition-AI: New York on October 19. Our listeners get a 10% discount with the code pspods10.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a specialized climatetech PR firm dedicated to bringing meaningful results for companies in sectors spanning grid edge, solar, energy storage, battery, EVs, alternative fuels, VC and green building. FischTank helps clients stand out in an increasingly competitive and noisy space. Visit FischTank PR to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Savant Power. Savant’s end-to-end power systems provide energy generation, inverter and battery storage, generator control, flexible load management for every circuit, and level two EV charging. Learn more about the only company that can deliver an integrated smart home and energy solution controlled via a single award-winning app at Savant.com.

As the carbon dioxide removal industry grows, engineered solutions like direct-air capture are getting more attention.

According to the IPCC, novel methods for carbon dioxide removal are necessary to meet the Paris climate targets. 

But another UN body, the UNFCCC, recently sparked controversy by concluding in draft language that “engineering-based removal activities…pose unknown environmental and social risks.” That language could have ramifications for how carbon removal gets considered in upcoming international climate negotiations.

Amidst the debate over the role of carbon removal, the US government is stepping up with some large investments in direct-air capture hubs and R&D support for novel technologies, creating a positive signal for the market.

This week, Savvy Bowman, a program manager at ClearPath, joins us to explain what this all means for the future of carbon removal technologies and policies.

Are you looking to understand how artificial intelligence will shape the business of energy? Come network with utilities, top energy firms, startups, and AI experts at Transition-AI: New York on October 19. Our listeners get a 10% discount with the code pspods10.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a specialized climatetech PR firm dedicated to bringing meaningful results for companies in sectors spanning grid edge, solar, energy storage, battery, EVs, alternative fuels, VC and green building. FischTank helps clients stand out in an increasingly competitive and noisy space. Visit FischTank PR to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Savant Power. Savant’s end-to-end power systems provide energy generation, inverter and battery storage, generator control, flexible load management for every circuit, and level two EV charging. Learn more about the only company that can deliver an integrated smart home and energy solution controlled via a single award-winning app at Savant.com.

This is a partner podcast episode, brought to you by South32.

Pat Risner spent 25 years as an engineer, general manager, and executive at one of the largest mining companies in the world, BHP. Today, he's the president of the Hermosa Project, a mining development in Arizona run by the global mining firm, South32. 

That mine is the only advanced project in America that could produce manganese and zinc – two critical minerals that are essential to batteries and renewables.

In this episode, produced in partnership with South32, Pat Risner talks with Stephen Lacey about the importance of the Hermosa project for America's clean energy supply chain – and what it means to run a next-generation mine.

To learn more about how Hermosa can help power the nation’s clean energy future and strengthen the domestic supply chain of critical minerals, go to south32hermosa.com.

A year after it was passed, the Inflation Reduction Act is already reshaping the energy and automotive industries in the U.S.

New factories for a wide array of clean energy components are being planned. Old factories are being reopened, retooled, or expanded. According to a Canary Media analysis, that is amounting to over $70 billion in new investments in the manufacturing sector for electric cars, EV parts, batteries, battery recycling, and wind and solar assembly.

Wind, solar, and battery developers are planning major increases in deal flow and projects, thanks to expanded tax credits. 

Meanwhile, companies building an emerging set of technologies – like carbon removal, hydrogen, and novel long-duration storage – are also expanding.

But there are still plenty of debates and uncertainties around implementation, ranging from how to structure subsidies, who benefits from them, and whether they’ll be enough to keep supply chains in America for the long haul. 

On this week’s episode of The Carbon Copy, we have a conversation with three journalists who are reporting on the lasting impacts of the IRA: Maria Gallucci, a clean energy reporter at Canary Media; Jeff St. John, director of news and special projects at Canary Media; and Julian Spector, a senior reporter at Canary Media.

Read all of Canary’s coverage of how the IRA is impacting America’s domestic energy industry.

Are you looking to understand how artificial intelligence will shape the business of energy? Come network with utilities, top energy firms, startups, and AI experts at Transition-AI: New York on October 19. Our listeners get a 10% discount with the code pspods10.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a specialized climatetech PR firm dedicated to bringing meaningful results for companies in sectors spanning grid edge, solar, energy storage, battery, EVs, alternative fuels, VC and green building. FischTank helps clients stand out in an increasingly competitive and noisy space. Visit FischTank PR to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Savant Power. Savant’s end-to-end power systems provide energy generation, inverter and battery storage, generator control, flexible load management for every circuit, and level two EV charging. Learn more about the only company that can deliver an integrated smart home and energy solution controlled via a single award-winning app at Savant.com.

In August, the US government is set to issue standards for hydrogen tax credits. Over the last year, a debate has been raging over how strict those standards should be for matching renewables with hydrogen production.

With rules set to be released in the coming weeks, ad campaigns have popped up from industry trying to persuade the feds to adopt looser standards, and green groups pushing for 

Without clear standards for matching renewables to hydrogen production, emissions could double, says Adithya Bhashyam, an associate hydrogen analyst at Bloomberg New Energy Finance.

Adi closely tracks the industry, and has been modeling the market impacts of different standards. This week, we’ll talk with him about how standards might unfold in the US, how Europe’s newly-passed rules might influence the outcome, and why we need green hydrogen in the first place.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a specialized climatetech PR firm dedicated to bringing meaningful results for companies in sectors spanning grid edge, solar, energy storage, battery, EVs, alternative fuels, VC and green building. FischTank helps clients stand out in an increasingly competitive and noisy space. Visit FischTank PR to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Savant Power. Savant’s end-to-end power systems provide energy generation, inverter and battery storage, generator control, flexible load management for every circuit, and level two EV charging. Learn more about the only company that can deliver an integrated smart home and energy solution controlled via a single award-winning app at Savant.com.

For years, rooftop solar was overlooked as a reliability solution in New England. But in a very sudden reversal, the region's grid operator says it’s critical to keeping the lights on across the region.

New England doesn't have its own fossil resources, so the region is dependent on oil and natural gas imported from other regions of the country. Over the last decade and a half, aging coal, nuclear, and oil-fired units have been retired there. Because of interconnection constraints and lots of NIMBYism, gas has mostly filled in the gap – not utility-scale renewables. 

But distributed solar is suddenly providing a benefit for the New England system operator that will help it close an aging, expensive gas power plant remains open for reliability reasons. 

This week, we'll talk with reporter Ben Storrow about his reporting on the value of solar. First, we'll look at what's changed in New England. Then we'll turn our attention to Texas, where renewables have been critical for managing the grid during a sweltering summer that has brought record-breaking power demand.

This podcast is brought to you by KORE Power, an American manufacturer of battery cells for electric vehicles and stationary storage. Stay tuned to the end of the episode for a conversation with KORE CEO Lindsay Gorrill about how America can slash its dependence on imported critical minerals and batteries.

Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a specialized climatetech PR firm dedicated to bringing meaningful results for companies in sectors spanning grid edge, solar, energy storage, battery, EVs, alternative fuels, VC and green building. FischTank helps clients stand out in an increasingly competitive and noisy space. Visit FischTank PR to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Savant Power. Savant’s end-to-end power systems provide energy generation, inverter and battery storage, generator control, flexible load management for every circuit, and level two EV charging. Learn more about the only company that can deliver an integrated smart home and energy solution controlled via a single award-winning app at Savant.com.

For decades, we have wildly underestimated the growth of renewables. Now that cost curves and deployments have exceeded all expectations, what’s next for the clean energy industry?

This week, we feature a conversation between journalist David Roberts and futurist Ramez Naam about what's ahead for tech trends – from renewables and batteries, to grid management, to space-based solar power and geoengineering.

This conversation was recorded in Seattle at a recent Canary Media Live event. Be sure to get your tickets to the Bay Area event in October. 

Thanks to our sponsors:

• This podcast is brought to you by KORE Power, an American manufacturer of battery cells for electric vehicles and stationary storage. Stay tuned to the end of the episode for a conversation with KORE CEO Lindsay Gorrill about how America can slash its dependence on imported critical minerals and batteries.

• Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a specialized climatetech PR firm dedicated to bringing meaningful results for companies in sectors spanning grid edge, solar, energy storage, battery, EVs, alternative fuels, VC and green building. FischTank helps clients stand out in an increasingly competitive and noisy space. Visit FischTank PR to learn more.



• The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Savant Power. Savant’s end-to-end power systems provide energy generation, inverter and battery storage, generator control, flexible load management for every circuit, and level two EV charging. Learn more about the only company that can deliver an integrated smart home and energy solution controlled via a single award-winning app at Savant.com.

Mateo Jaramillo is the co-founder and CEO of the long-duration storage company Form Energy. 

Mateo has spent the last two decades building battery storage companies, with home base being California. But he just moved from Silicon Valley to the Rust Belt, where Form is scaling production of its iron-air batteries at an old steel mill in West Virginia.

The location sits at the intersection of major highways, rail lines, and waterways. And Form’s batteries sit at the intersection of the old energy economy and the new energy economy.

“We are making a type of battery which is based on iron and air. It means that we're moving a lot of iron in and very heavy things out. And so you think about sort of the core infrastructure that's needed to do that – it maps very nicely over the steel infrastructure of the country.”

America is working to build back its industrial capacity with clean energy. Armed with lessons from the past and a lot more government support, companies are planning $70 billion in new factories for electric cars, solar and wind components, and batteries – including very large batteries like the ones that Form is making. 

This week: we talked with Mateo Jaramillo about Form Energy's transition from an R&D and engineering company to a high-volume manufacturer. Is it a sign of what's to come for the US industrial base?

This podcast is brought to you by KORE Power, an American manufacturer of battery cells for electric vehicles and stationary storage. Stay tuned to the end of the episode for a conversation with KORE CEO Lindsay Gorrill about how America can slash its dependence on imported critical minerals and batteries.

Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a specialized climatetech PR firm dedicated to bringing meaningful results for companies in sectors spanning grid edge, solar, energy storage, battery, EVs, alternative fuels, VC and green building. FischTank helps clients stand out in an increasingly competitive and noisy space. Visit FischTank PR to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Savant Power. Savant’s end-to-end power systems provide energy generation, inverter and battery storage, generator control, flexible load management for every circuit, and level two EV charging. Learn more about the only company that can deliver an integrated smart home and energy solution controlled via a single award-winning app at Savant.com.

Putin’s assault on Ukraine triggered an energy crisis that sent Europe’s economies into a tailspin and put the European energy transition to the test. But how did the European Union, a leader in climate action, become so dependent on Russian oil and gas to begin with? 

This week, we're posting the first episode in a new five-part series for The Big Switch. The show is a collaboration between Post Script Media and the Columbia Center on Global Energy Policy.

The series looks at the energy systems of Germany and Poland. Both have very different energy economies, but both became dependent on Russian energy for heating homes, firing power plants, and fueling businesses.

In this episode, we look at the immediate impact of the Ukraine invasion and the historical influences behind the dependence – from Germany’s pursuit of natural gas to Poland’s centuries-long relationship with coal.

Then we ask whether Europe's initial response to the crisis will accelerate or slow down the region's push toward green energy.

You can subscribe to The Big Switch anywhere you get your podcasts.

Last week, we started the show with a simple question: what do we want from the artificial intelligence systems advancing so quickly? 

Inevitably, when we start grappling with that question, we have to talk about ethics and data quality.

This week, we feature two conversations about the ethics and implementation of AI across the energy economy. 

We'll talk with Pamela Isom, an AI ethicist and former director of the DOE’s artificial intelligence and technology office, about the “happy path” of implementation that avoids racial, gender, and economic bias.

Then we’ll feature a roundtable of experts about building AI systems on the grid. The participants include: David Groarke, managing partner at Indigo Advisory Group; Elizabeth Cook, the director of advanced grid systems at Duquesne Light Company; Titiaan Palazzi, head of power utilities at Snowflake; and Jess Melanson, the chief operating officer at Utilidata.

For all these experts, the deployment of effective and fair AI systems is all about the quality of the data.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Sungrow. Now in more than 150 countries, Sungrow’s solutions include inverters for utility-scale, commercial & industrial solar, plus energy storage systems. Learn more at us.sungrowpower.com.

We are at the start of a commercial arms race in artificial intelligence that has thrilled some, and alarmed others. For many, it's both.

There's no shortage of heady proclamations about where the technology is headed. Google CEO Sundar Pachai calls AI “more profound than fire or electricity.”

We are in the middle of a period of exuberance in AI, which will inevitably lead to some kind of market correction. But the technology will be transformative. There are dozens of use cases for AI in energy already in operation today across the grid, mobility, and industry.

The emergence of AI will have an enormous impact on creativity, corporate structures, and economic productivity – and on the engine that drives our economy, energy. Will we use it in the right way?

This week, we feature two conversations from our recent Transition-AI conference in Boston. 

Priya Donti, the executive director of Climate Change AI, describes the best-case and worst-case scenarios for an AI-infused energy sector. 

And Savannah Goodman, a data and software climate solutions lead at Google, describes the role for machine learning in optimizing renewables and data centers.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Sungrow. Now in more than 150 countries, Sungrow’s solutions include inverters for utility-scale, commercial & industrial solar, plus energy storage systems. Learn more at us.sungrowpower.com.

As we evaluate the Biden team's approach to building back domestic manufacturing and climate-positive infrastructure, we keep coming back to the question: what makes the current push different from the Obama era one? 

You can’t answer the question without exploring the factors behind the demise of some companies of the cleantech 1.0 era – in particular, the story of A123 Systems.

This week, we’re talking with Gabrielle Coppola, a Bloomberg auto journalist, about her new magazine feature about America’s tortured journey to build EV batteries.

A123 Systems was supposed to represent the next generation of domestic manufacturing. Instead, it showed how America excels at inventing new energy technologies, but not building them.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Sungrow. Now in more than 150 countries, Sungrow’s solutions include inverters for utility-scale, commercial & industrial solar, plus energy storage systems. Learn more at us.sungrowpower.com.

Republicans dominate every part of government in Texas. It's been that way for two decades.

It also happens to be a state with the most wind and utility-scale solar development in the country. Over their 20 years of dominance, Republicans in the state have mostly supported renewables, often in a very warm way. But lately, they've turned against them.

In a very short period of time, America's fastest-growing renewables state became the most hostile. What happened?

This week, we'll look at the history and political fads that are driving the Texas renewables backlash. We'll talk with the Houston Chronicle's Chris Tomlinson about much it could unravel the market.

Are you a utility or climate tech startup looking to understand how artificial intelligence will shape your company? Come to our one-day event, Transition-AI: Boston on June 15. Our listeners get a 20% discount with the code PSPODS20.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Sungrow. Now in more than 150 countries, Sungrow’s solutions include inverters for utility-scale, commercial & industrial solar, plus energy storage systems. Learn more at us.sungrowpower.com.

We are at an inflection point for electric vehicles. The mass adoption phase is underway in many countries, including America. The US government is putting billions of dollars behind EV charging and battery production. And nearly every automaker is releasing or developing an EV model. 

But the race to electrify cars and trucks is about so much more than transportation. For an executive like Annette Clayton, CEO of Schneider Electric North America, it's about developing an economy-wide electrification strategy – with EVs as a catalyst. And it’s why Schneider is getting deeper into the electric car market.

In this episode, produced in collaboration with Schneider Electric, Annette sits down with Stephen Lacey to talk about where the market is headed for EVs, technology trends in electrifying homes and industry, and how to tie them all together for the benefit of the grid.

For more information on Schneider's efforts to electrify and digitize the economy, including the microgrid and resilience hubs that Annette mentioned, go to se.com.

This week, we’re running a bonus episode from our friends at Environmental Defense Fund and their podcast Degrees: Real talk about planet-saving careers. Transportation is the largest single source of carbon emissions in the U.S. People who can electrify vehicle fleets are in demand — especially in school districts, where diesel emissions are causing skyrocketing rates of childhood asthma.

In this episode, host Yesh Pavlik Slenk talks with the ebullient Gilbert Blue Feather Rosas, who raised millions of dollars to bring electric buses to one of America’s biggest school districts. 

Make sure you check other Degrees episodes about how the green jobs transformation is shaping the future. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

Are you a utility or climatetech startup looking to understand how artificial intelligence will shape your company? Come to Post Script Media’s one-day event, Transition-AI: Boston, on June 15. Our listeners get a 20% discount with the code PSPODS20.

In the nine months since the Inflation Reduction Act was signed into law, $28 billion in new manufacturing investments have been unveiled. Credit Suisse expects the IRA to support $1.7 trillion in new US manufacturing in a decade.

Shalini Ramanathan of Quinbrook Infrastructure Partners is watching the space, excited about that industrial growth. She’s also eager to see a whole new category of customers – because this green industrial strategy needs new green electrons and molecules to run it. 

The wave of planned build-outs in US manufacturing is setting the stage for a new class of renewables designed to run those plants. And it could shift how and where projects get built.

“This could really reshape our landscape,” explains Shalini. “We're all asking the question: now that we have low-cost, green power, what other sectors can we decarbonize?

This week, a secondary impact of America's green manufacturing strategy: a coming boom in projects to meet that new industrial demand. We'll ask how renewables, batteries, and hydrogen could meet the moment. 

Are you a utility or climate tech startup looking to understand how artificial intelligence will shape your company? Come to our one-day event, Transition-AI: Boston on June 15. Our listeners get a 20% discount with the code PSPODS20.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Sungrow. Now in more than 150 countries, Sungrow’s solutions include inverters for utility-scale, commercial & industrial solar, plus energy storage systems. Learn more at us.sungrowpower.com.

Are you a utility or climate tech startup looking to understand how artificial intelligence will shape your company? Come to our one-day event, Transition-AI: Boston on June 15. Our listeners get a 20% discount with the code PSPODS20.

Our show this week was recorded live at the Nuclear Energy Assembly in Washington, DC. It comes in three parts. 

First, we're asking: how do we prepare the US nuclear industry for liftoff? We'll dig into a new government strategy to bridge the gap to commercialization in nuclear, and a range of other deep decarbonization tech.

Then, what does a grid saturated with renewables, storage, and new nuclear look like? What are the ways these technologies can work together?

And finally, we'll look at some investment trends across clean energy: where the capital is flowing, where it's not flowing, and does ESG backlash even matter?

Jigar Shah, director of the DOE’s loan programs office, and Katherine Hamilton, chair of 38 North, join Stephen Lacey on stage for a wide-ranging conversation on the future of nuclear.

Full transcript here

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Sungrow. Now in more than 150 countries, Sungrow’s solutions include inverters for utility-scale, commercial & industrial solar, plus energy storage systems. Learn more at us.sungrowpower.com.

Are you a utility or climate tech startup looking to understand how artificial intelligence will shape your company? Come to our one-day event, Transition-AI: Boston on June 15. Our listeners get a 20% discount with the code PSPODS20.

We’re hard at work on a new season of The Big Switch podcast, which will go deep on the impact of the European energy crisis. And this week, we’re featuring an episode from last season.

There’s been a pretty major shake-up in the world of transit decarbonization. Last summer, the California Air Resources Board – a state organization that regulates air quality – approved a rule mandating that by 2035, all new cars sold in California will be zero-emissions. And last month, California approved a ban on diesel by 2036 in heavy-duty transport.

These rules will transform California's transportation market; and deliver some huge climate and health wins along the way. Between now and 2035, the regulation will result in 9.5 million fewer gas-powered cars on the road. California’s not alone in cracking down on gas cars – soon, as many as seventeen other states may follow suit, resulting in a wave of regulation that could change American transit forever.

In this episode, Dr. Melissa Lott talks with Mary Nichols, the former Chair of the California Air Resources Board, about the history and consequences of the rule.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Sungrow. Now in more than 150 countries, Sungrow’s solutions include inverters for utility-scale, commercial & industrial solar, plus energy storage systems. Learn more at us.sungrowpower.com.

Over the last two years, we’ve created the foundation for a green industrial awakening in America — thanks to the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, the CHIPS and Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act. Collectively, they will leverage hundreds of billions of dollars to support domestic producers.

The green industrial framework is not new, but the policy levers are more powerful than ever. So what makes America’s industrial strategy 2.0 different from the Obama years? What lessons have been learned about what worked and what didn't? 

That is what we're unpacking this week, live from the Prelude Climate Summit.

We’re joined by Katherine Hamilton, chair of 38 North; Jigar Shah, director of the Department of Energy’s loan programs office; and Sonia Aggarwal, CEO of Energy Innovation and a former senior advisor to the president.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Sungrow. Now in more than 150 countries, Sungrow’s solutions include inverters for utility-scale, commercial & industrial solar, plus energy storage systems. Learn more at us.sungrowpower.com.

The landscape for peaker power plants in New York is changing. Over the next two years, dozens of aging oil- and gas-fired plants will be phased out around New York City, thanks to stronger air quality rules and the state’s climate law. 

Under the rules, some of National Grid's peaking generation will shut down permanently, and some will steadily ramp down.

The plan to overhaul these plants is part of National Grid's Northeast clean energy vision – which will create hubs of clean energy projects built with specific local needs in mind. The goal is to make communities the "energy capitals" of a decarbonized grid.

So what will these hubs look like? 

In this episode, Will Hazelip, president of National Grid Ventures for the US Northeast, outlines the high stakes for the utility – and the communities it serves. 

Will talks with Stephen Lacey about clean energy projects underway, the technology trends guiding investments, and the plan to maximize the local economic impact.

Learn more about National Grid’s efforts to build the clean energy capitals of tomorrow. There, you'll find details about offshore wind, batteries, renewables, and transmission.

Around the US, cities are passing laws to phase fossil gas out of buildings. But the culinary industry is pushing back, saying that gas bans hurt chefs and restaurant owners. This week, the California Restaurant Association successfully won a lawsuit challenging Berkeley's pioneering gas ban.

Chris Galarza is on a mission to show chefs that industrial induction cooking is far superior to gas. He’s the founder of Forward Dining Solutions, a company focused on kitchen electrification. Chris is also the head chef at Chatham University’s Eden Hall campus, where all cooking is electric.

Journalist Miles O’Brien interviewed Chef Galarza as part of his new NOVA documentary airing this month, called Chasing Carbon Zero. 

This week: the story of one chef's quest to bring induction cooking to commercial and industrial kitchens around the country. We talk with Miles about what he found in that electric kitchen at Chatham University – and why Chef Galarza thinks induction will soon dominate, even with challenges from the restaurant lobby.

In the second half of the episode, we'll talk about the bigger shifts in broadcast journalism around telling the climate story. Miles is the science correspondent at the PBS NewsHour and a former CNN anchor who has shifted his journalistic focus toward climate solutions. Can TV news rise to the challenge?

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Sungrow. Now in more than 150 countries, Sungrow’s solutions include inverters for utility-scale, commercial & industrial solar, plus energy storage systems. Learn more at us.sungrowpower.com.

We're sharing an episode of a podcast we love, Drilled from our friends over at Critical Frequency. Four years ago, the Drilled podcast asked a question that changed how people thought about climate stories: What if we stopped acting like the climate crisis was inevitable and instead treated it like it truly is… the crime of the century? Now, the original true crime podcast about climate change is back with a new season all about the opportunistic oil industry.

The story is packed with high stakes court cases, intrepid journalists, and a whole lot of intrigue, set in the world's largest oil boom town. Listen to the new season of Drilled.

Up until six months ago, artificial intelligence might not have squeaked into the top five areas of climate tech for most people.

But the Cambrian explosion of large language models – led by ChatGPT – has suddenly hooked hundreds of millions of users, offered mind-boggling creative capabilities that have surprised almost everyone, and kicked off an AI arms race in the tech world.

What are the most compelling applications for AI in energy? This week, we feature a live conversation with Priya Donti, MIT professor and executive director of Climate Change AI; Amy Francetic, managing general partner at Buoyant Ventures; and Jesse Morris, CEO of the Energy Web Foundation. 

In this episode, recorded at Greentown Labs, we explore the wide range of applications for grid modeling, renewable energy integration, research & development, and product development. We also stretch beyond AI and talk about the wider digital layer that is fundamental to building and maintaining an increasingly electric, distributed energy system. 

You can also watch the conversation on video.

This live episode is brought to you by Nexamp. Nexamp is leading the transformation to the new energy economy with proven solar and energy storage solutions that make clean energy more accessible for its customers and partners. Visit nexamp.com to learn more.

In five years, we've tripled the amount of solar capacity connected to America's grid. Wind capacity has grown 60% in the last 5 years. And in just the last year alone, battery capacity has doubled.

But there’s also a surge in opposition to local projects. According to the Sabin Center for Climate Law at Columbia University, there are now 121 local policies that restrict or outright ban wind and solar in 31 states – a nearly 18% increase from 2021. What’s causing it?

The opposition is coming in many different forms. In this episode, we'll focus on two of them: the coordinated spread of disinformation in local Facebook groups, and dark money going to news websites that are protecting utility political power.

We’ll talk with Michael Thomas, author of the Distilled newsletter, who embedded himself with dozens of local Facebook groups devoted to fighting renewables. 

And we’ll also speak with Miranda Green, director of investigations at Floodlight, about the coordination of bad information spread on Facebook. Plus, she’ll tell the story of how her team uncovered a new method of influence peddling: utilities propping up news sites that cut down critics.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Sungrow. Now in more than 150 countries, Sungrow’s solutions include inverters for utility-scale, commercial & industrial solar, plus energy storage systems. Learn more at us.sungrowpower.com.

In 2021, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory’s supercomputer found that Los Angeles can hit 100% clean power within a decade and a half. But how will it be implemented in reality – in a way that benefits everyone?

That’s the $86 billion question for the city. 

There are many other questions to answer: How will a utility serving four million residents phase out coal and gas, triple its yearly build-out of renewables and batteries, electrify 80% of homes and cars, build new transmission, and ramp up hydrogen and other forms of cutting-edge storage – all by 2035?

This week, we dig into those challenges on stage with Marty Adams, general manager and chief engineer of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power. The conversation was recorded live at the Intersolar North America conference in Long Beach, California.

Come watch a live episode of The Carbon Copy! Canary Media and Post Script Media are hosting a live event at Greentown Labs in Somerville, Ma. on April 6. record a live episode of The Carbon Copy with some very special guests. Get your tickets today.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrids, the distributed energy company dedicated to transforming the way modern energy infrastructure is designed, constructed, and financed. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes it easy. Learn more: scalemicrogrids.com.

Silicon Valley Bank was a mid-sized bank that catered to entrepreneurs in the tech sector. The bank was an early supporter of the climate tech and sustainability space, with over 1,500 clients across the industry.

But things quickly unraveled this month after SVB executives told investors they'd sold off a massive portfolio of mortgage bonds – creating a historic run on the bank and a government takeover.

For a couple days, it looked like many climate startups would lose their cash. They narrowly avoided a complete financial catastrophe after the Federal Reserve stepped in, but now many are pondering the longer-term consequences.

“They were early pioneers in cleantech, what became known as climate tech. They were here from the beginning. We're gonna be missing them for a long time,” explains Prelude Ventures’ Gabriel Kra.

This week, the demise of SVB. What was the bank's role in the industry, and happens with it gone?

We’ll talk with Gabriel Kra, managing director of Prelude Ventures. We’ll also profile two entrepreneurs with money tied up at SVB: Maria Intscher-Owrang, the CEO of Simplifyber; and Bryan Guido Hassin, the CEO of DEXMAT. 

Come watch a live episode of The Carbon Copy! Canary Media and Post Script Media are hosting a live event at Greentown Labs in Somerville, Ma. on April 6. record a live episode of The Carbon Copy with some very special guests. Get your tickets today.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrids, the distributed energy company dedicated to transforming the way modern energy infrastructure is designed, constructed, and financed. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes it easy. Learn more: scalemicrogrids.com.

A few weeks ago, TIME Magazine staff writer Alejandro de la Garza found himself on the floor of a hotel room in Nevada with two guys trying to cook sulfur dioxide out of a tin can. 

Luke Iseman and Andrew Song are the co-founders of Make Sunsets, a startup claiming to be implementing solar geoengineering by launching weather balloons filled with SO2 into the stratosphere.

Their first experimental launch in the Mexican state of Baja resulted in a swift regulatory response from the Mexican government. But when they ran another test launch a few weeks ago just outside of Reno, Nevada, Luke invited Alejandro to meet them. 

This week, we speak with Alejandro about his TIME profile of the risky startup. Plus, we talk with geoengineering experts, Dr. Holly Buck and Dr. Kevin Surprise.

“Any single person you talk to in solar geoengineering research, whether they're bullish or against it, they all think that what makes Sunsets doing is a bad idea,” explains Alejandro.

Make Sunsets represents a turning point for the field of geoengineering, when rogue actors are pushing it from academic debate into the real world. Is the company’s recent balloon launch an act of performance art – or an open door to an uncontrolled climate experiment?

Click here for a full transcript

Come watch a live episode of The Carbon Copy! Canary Media and Post Script Media are hosting a live event at Greentown Labs in Somerville, Ma. on April 6. record a live episode of The Carbon Copy with some very special guests. Get your tickets today.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrids, the distributed energy company dedicated to transforming the way modern energy infrastructure is designed, constructed, and financed. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes it easy. Learn more: scalemicrogrids.com.

Discarded is a series from Lemonada Media. If you like The Carbon Copy, then we think you’re going to enjoy Discarded.

The shadow of Goliath is looming over St. James Parish, Louisiana, and it’s called The Sunshine Project. This $9.4 billion proposed petrochemical plant would sprawl across 2,400 acres, pushing up against the community that has lived and died there for generations. Our David is lifelong resident Sharon Lavigne. After teaching special education at the local school for over 30 years, Sharon becomes an accidental activist trying to save her community and its history.

This series is presented in partnership with Only One, the action platform for the planet. Only One is on a mission to restore ocean health and tackle the climate crisis in this generation — with your help. Visit only.one to learn more and get involved.

Come watch a live episode of The Carbon Copy! Canary Media and Post Script Media are hosting a live event at Greentown Labs in Somerville, Ma. on April 6. record a live episode of The Carbon Copy with some very special guests. Get your tickets today.

In 2020, the top five Western oil & gas supermajors – ExxonMobil, BP, Shell, Chevron, and Total – saw combined losses of $76 billion. That was caused by the radical drop in energy consumption when Covid shut down the global economy.

That year, BP CEO Bernard Looney called for a 40% cut in oil & gas production in a decade, and promised to invest billions of dollars each year into renewables.

Two years later, thanks to a war waged by Russia that disrupted supply and a bounceback in global oil demand, high prices brought $200 billion in profits for those companies.

BP just decided that it would invest billions more in oil & gas production, rather than make the drastic cuts it initially proposed. Shell is doing the same, expanding fossil fuel extraction while keeping clean energy investments flat. And even with windfall profits, clean energy only accounts for 5% of oil company capital expenditures globally.

At one point, it seemed like there was a real shift happening in the sector. And now, with the global appetite for oil still growing, the allure of high profits is shifting investments back into extraction. 

This week: how will this new boom time for oil and gas companies impact investments in clean energy?

Plus, we’ll take stock of some of the hottest emerging sectors, like hydrogen, virtual power plants, and critical minerals recycling.

Jigar Shah and Katherine Hamilton are back on the show this week to dissect all of it.

Click here for a full transcript.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrids, the distributed energy company dedicated to transforming the way modern energy infrastructure is designed, constructed, and financed. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes it easy. Learn more: scalemicrogrids.com.

Come watch a live episode of The Carbon Copy! Canary Media and Post Script Media are hosting a live event at Greentown Labs in Somerville, Ma. on April 6. record a live episode of The Carbon Copy with some very special guests. Get your tickets today.

Batteries are everywhere. In our electronics, our power tools, our electric grid, and in our cars. And almost all those batteries use a lithium-ion chemistry.

To make an all-electric world possible, we're going to need a lot of lithium. Prices are up 400 percent over 2021. And demand is expected to increase fivefold over the next decade.

The Imperial Valley in southern California is home to the Salton Sea, a land-locked body of water that contains vast reserves of lithium. California Governor Gavin Newsom called the region the "Saudi Arabia of Lithium." If mined, it could completely reshape the global supply chain.

But locals who live near the Salton Sea – a region plagued by unemployment and pollution – worry that the rush to extract the resource won't benefit the people living there.

This week on The Carbon Copy: California has ambitious plans to fuel the global EV boom with the Salton Sea’s lithium. But will the people who need it most get left behind?

Guests: Independent reporter Aaron Cantú, who wrote about the Salton Sea’s Lithium industry here. And Luis Olmedo, executive director of Comité Cívico del Valle.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrids, the distributed energy company dedicated to transforming the way modern energy infrastructure is designed, constructed, and financed. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes it easy. Learn more: scalemicrogrids.com.

For the last 12 years, coal generation in America has been in steady decline. In 2022, wind, solar, and hydro collectively generated more electricity than coal plants. There's no escaping it: the coal fleet is getting creaky.

Despite this, hundreds of coal plants are still in operation nationwide. A team of analysts at Energy Innovation and the University of California, Berkeley, wanted to know how many of those aging coal plants are more expensive to run than wind and solar. The results were stunning.

Only one coal plant in America is cheaper to operate than building new renewables. So with 99 percent of coal plants being the more expensive option, it begs the question: why haven’t utilities ditched coal?

This week, we'll speak with Mike O’Boyle, senior director for electricity policy at Energy Innovation, about the nuances of the transition away from coal – and why economics alone aren't enough to push the oldest, dirtiest plants into retirement.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrids, the distributed energy company dedicated to transforming the way modern energy infrastructure is designed, constructed, and financed. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes it easy. Learn more: scalemicrogrids.com.

Last month, new research showing that 12 percent of childhood asthma can be linked to gas stoves took over the news cycle. Suddenly, gas stoves were a hot topic on nightly news programs across America.

The study ignited backlash from conservative pundits, especially after a commissioner from the US Consumer Product Safety Commission said stricter regulation of gas stoves was on the table.

But there’s nothing new about the connection between gas stoves and health. The latest findings build off decades of public health research, which most people have never heard of – in part due to a powerful marketing effort by the gas industry.

This week, we dive beyond the outrage cycle and into the data. Guest Brady Seals talks about what 50 years of research tells us about the impact of gas stoves, and how the latest findings will influence the policy push to get gas out of buildings.

Click here for a full transcript.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrids, the distributed energy company dedicated to transforming the way modern energy infrastructure is designed, constructed, and financed. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes it easy. Learn more: scalemicrogrids.com.

Visions for the energy-smart home of the future haven’t panned out. 

In the mid-2000s, the internet-enabled consumer dashboard was going to be the thing that revolutionized energy in the home. Even Google and Microsoft got in on the action – and then shut down their energy dashboards when no one was using them.

Then came the smart thermostat, pioneered by Nest. Many hoped the rise of smart thermostats marked the start of a wave of technology adoption that would enable millions of energy-aware homes. They have been helpful for demand response programs, but the gadget-centric model hasn't yet unlocked a smart home revolution.

But today, there's a new backdrop that is creating more urgency for the grid-interactive home: electrification. 

As we electrify the economy and build more variable renewables, we need buildings to help balance the grid. And after decades of futuristic visions that never materialized, are we finally at a moment when the smart, grid-interactive home is emerging in a meaningful form?

This week, we dug into that question with Canary Media Senior Reporter Julian Spector. Read Julian’s piece on grid-interactive homes here as part of Canary Media’s week-long coverage of the smart home space.

For a full transcript, click here.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrids, the distributed energy company dedicated to transforming the way modern energy infrastructure is designed, constructed, and financed. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes it easy. Learn more: scalemicrogrids.com.

Canary media senior reporter Maria Gallucci recently took a pretty unconventional road trip – shadowing a truck driver as he drove around New Jersey, sucking grease, beef tallow, and used cooking oil out of dumpsters behind airports and restaurant chains. 

This grease will soon be turned into a sustainable aviation fuel known as hydroprocessed esters and fatty acids, or HEFA. With hydrogen and batteries still not ready to move our airplanes, the airline industry is relying on cooking grease to decarbonize. How clean – and how scalable – is it? 

Maria Gallucci joins us to explain. You can find her feature story for Canary media here.

Click here for a full transcript of this episode.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrids, the distributed energy company dedicated to transforming the way modern energy infrastructure is designed, constructed, and financed. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes it easy. Learn more: scalemicrogrids.com.

Five years ago, venture investors, tech companies and automakers were pouring tens of billions of dollars into driverless cars. Tesla, General Motors, Lyft, Uber, and Google's Waymo were promising large fleets of robotaxis with fully autonomous vehicles by the turn of the decade. 

In 2017, Ford took a big swing. The company invested $1 billion in Argo AI, a startup developing level-four driverless systems. Later, VW entered the partnership. The automakers promised to make a fully autonomous car by 2021. 

But in October of last year, VW pulled out of the partnership. Ford said it would shut down the driverless car program, taking a $2.7 billion loss. 

So how did we get to a point where a promising startup valued at $7 billion is being written off by automakers? And what does it say about the viability of fully-autonomous cars?

Journalist Ed Neidermeyer says Ford's shutdown of Argo AI was due to inflated expectations – which exposed a mismatch in business models.

“I think it's very easy to look at this and say, ‘shutting down Argo AI was an admission that this technology doesn't work…or was a scam. And you look out on social media and people are taking that lesson away – and I think that's the wrong lesson.”

This week, we speak with Ed about the real lessons behind the setbacks for autonomous cars: the mismatch between our fantasies and the reality of the technology.

Full transcript here

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrids, the distributed energy company dedicated to transforming the way modern energy infrastructure is designed, constructed, and financed. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes it easy. Learn more: scalemicrogrids.com.

America enters 2023 faced with two opposing realities: greenhouse gas emissions are going up, but the opportunity to slash those emissions has never been better.

Heat-trapping gasses in the U.S. rose again last year, according to the Rhodium Group. Even though renewables outpaced coal on the grid, emissions climbed in the buildings, heavy industry, and transportation sectors.

Passage of the Inflation Reduction Act could reverse that trend over the next decade. The law, which was the result of years of political pressure and behind-the-scenes dealmaking, devotes nearly $370 billion to domestic clean energy deployment. It could cut emissions by 40% by 2030.

But now the real work begins.

On this week’s episode of The Carbon Copy, Jigar Shah and Katherine Hamilton join host Stephen Lacey to talk about the new era for climate solutions deployment in America. The three former co-hosts reunite for some real-talk about the stakes ahead for implementing the IRA.

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrids, the distributed energy company dedicated to transforming the way modern energy infrastructure is designed, constructed, and financed. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes it easy. Learn more: scalemicrogrids.com.

To decarbonize our economy, we need to electrify everything. That means installing millions of heat pumps, EV chargers, electric water heaters, and rooftop solar panels. 

But there’s one big problem: finding the electricians to make it happen. Electricians across the country are flooded with demand – and just as demand is skyrocketing, the field is also continuing to age out. 

This week, in a special collaboration with Grist, guest contributor Emily Pontecorvo tries to answer the question – where are all the electricians? And can we train enough to meet our climate goals? Read her story here.

A lightly edited full transcript is available here

The Carbon Copy is supported by FischTank PR, a public relations, strategic messaging, and social media agency dedicated to elevating the work of climate and clean energy companies. Learn more about FischTank’s approach to cleantech and their services: fischtankpr.com.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrids, the distributed energy company dedicated to transforming the way modern energy infrastructure is designed, constructed, and financed. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes it easy. Learn more: scalemicrogrids.com.

This week, Stephen provides some end-of-year updates on the new focus of The Carbon Copy.

We’ll be taking a pause until mid-January while we prepare to relaunch the show. In 2023, we’ll be focusing much more tightly on the business, tech, and policy forces that are shaping climate solutions. You asked, we listened!

Thanks for listening. We’ll catch you in January.

This is the final week of our listener survey. Fill it out for a chance to win a $100 Patagonia gift card.

And don’t forget to donate to Canary Media to support in-depth journalism on the energy transition!

In the last year, venture investments in carbon removal have doubled. Top tech companies are buying credits or taking equity stakes in cutting-edge projects to pull carbon out of the air and oceans. 

And it’s not just propellerheads who are talking to themselves about the technology – a new wave of young talent is taking notice.

Was 2023 the breakout year for engineered carbon removal?

“We were all holed up in Covid lockdown. And we get out and suddenly everybody’s like ‘talk to me about carbon,’ says Julio Friedmann, the chief scientist at Carbon Direct. 

This week: the state of carbon removal. There is no way we can hit net-zero emissions without stripping lots of carbon out of the air. 

We’ll hear from Julio Friedmann about the scientific urgency, tech advancements, and barriers to scale. And we’ll hear from Microsoft’s Rafael Broze about how the company is investing in the carbon-removal space. 

For a lightly edited transcript of this episode, click here.

We want your feedback! Fill out our listener survey for a chance to win a $100 Patagonia gift card.

Join us on November 30 for a live, virtual episode of Climavores. Come ask a question about food, nutrition, and eating for the climate.

The age of the electric vehicle is coming, and it’s going to transform more than just the auto industry. EVs are also set to remake the fueling industry. But who will own the electric charging future?

That is the question that journalist David Ferris, reporter for POLITICO’s E&E news, started asking himself a couple years ago. When he started to look into it, he found a simmering tension that is turning into an all-out clash between two pillars of the American energy economy: the electric utility and the gas station.

For over a century, gas stations have been a prominent feature of our car-centric landscape. Meanwhile, the provision of electricity has long been the domain of utilities. The EV is bringing these two titans of the energy industry into conflict for the first time, and the battle over who will sell those electrons is already starting to get nasty. 

You can read Ferris’ story on the contested future of EV charging here.

We want your feedback! Fill out our listener survey for a chance to win a $100 Patagonia gift card.

Join us on November 30 for a live, virtual episode of Climavores. Come ask a question about food, nutrition, and eating for the climate.

There’s no doubt that corporations are thinking differently about climate risk and action. But are they making real progress?

This week, we have two conversations on the murkiness of corporate sustainability. 

We’ll talk with Siduja Rangarajan, a senior investigative data reporter, about the creative accounting that is inflating the emissions reductions of large companies. She and journalist Ben Elgin recently dug through 6,000 climate reports – and found that the world’s biggest companies may be failing to account for 24 million cars worth of emissions.

We’ll also hear from Joel Makower, co-founder of GreenBiz Group and co-host of the GreenBiz 350 podcast. He’s been covering corporate sustainability for nearly three decades. We talk about what is actually making an impact in corporate sustainability – and what is still holding it back.

As the cost of living with hurricanes grows, coastal cities across the country are starting to ask the trillion dollar question: what can we build to protect ourselves, and how much are we willing to pay?

This week, producer Alexandria Herr takes us to Texas, where the largest civil engineering project in U.S. history may soon put those questions to the test. The Houston area is a sitting duck for a hurricane that scientists say could cause an environmental and economic catastrophe. But the $31 billion “Ike Dike,” approved this summer by the House and Senate, would help protect the region. Will it be enough to prevent disaster? 

Guests:

• Kiah Collier, you can read the Peabody award winning reporting on the potential impacts of a hurricane on the Houston area for Propublica and the Texas Tribune here.
• Dr. Bill Merrell is a professor emeritus at Texas A&M University at Galveston. 
• Dr. Jim Blackburn is a professor in the practice of environmental law at Rice and co-director of the Severe Storm Prediction, Education & Evacuation from Disasters Center.

New York has a puzzle that it needs to solve – fast. In less than a decade, the state is aiming to radically increase renewable electricity generation, all while helping New Yorkers electrify their homes and businesses. 

The state's ambitious policy plan for 70% renewables by 2050 will succeed or fail based on how it can develop the supporting infrastructure, like transmission, ports, and batteries.

So how will the nuts and bolts of New York's energy transition play out? 

This week, we have a panel from our recent live event with Canary Media addressing exactly that question, featuring leading reporters covering decarbonization and energy markets in New York: Canary Media journalist Maria Gallucci; The City journalist Samantha Maldonado; and Politico journalist Marie French.

This episode is brought to you by Rise Light & Power, the owner of Ravenswood Generating, New York City’s largest power plant. By repurposing existing infrastructure and replacing fossil fuel generation in the heart of New York City, Renewable Ravenswood makes it easier and more cost effective to meet New York’s ambitious climate goals. Learn more. 

We’re also brought to you by, Sealed. Sealed uses air sealing and insulation to keep the outside out. They can also upgrade your heating system. If you don't save energy with Sealed, they don't get paid. Learn more.

Michael Grunwald is an energy and climate journalist who lives in south Florida. He loves Florida. But he also loves to poke fun at Florida's poor planning. In 2017, he wrote a piece for POLITICO about Cape Coral -- the boomtown built on swampland that is uniquely vulnerable to hurricanes.

Cape Coral is a city of 200,000 people in Southwest Florida. It's basically a wetland, nestled next to Fort Myers – one of the fastest growing areas in the country.

Construction of Cape Coral started in the late 1950s. It was the vision of two brothers who got wealthy peddling baldness tonic from wool grease. They knew how to sell anything, including a city built on water.

And then, in late September, Hurricane Ian rolled in. The near-category 5 hurricane knocked out the city's water supply, electricity, and left most houses underwater. Mike wrote an update to that piece, reminding readers about the “fantasy” propping up Southwest Florida.

This week, We talk with Mike Grunwald about Florida's unwillingness to plan for climate change – and what a nearby solar-powered city that weathered Hurricane Ian tells us about what's possible.

This week, producer Alexandria Herr takes a trip to Sunset Park, Brooklyn, and gets a peek into the future. What is now an empty stretch of concrete sandwiched between a Costco and the Upper New York Harbor will soon be transformed into a hub of green industry: a facility to assemble offshore wind turbines. 

Norwegian energy giant Equinor has designated the South Brooklyn Marine Terminal as the future hub of its offshore wind operations. Community leaders in Sunset Park, a neighborhood that has long faced a multitude of environmental justice issues, are hoping that the project will bring workforce development and green energy jobs to the community. 

Canary journalist Maria Gallucci brings us her reporting on the project in Sunset Park, and how it might be a model for how communities facing environmental justice issues can lead the green industries of the future. You can read her story here.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

In mid-September, the outdoor clothing company Patagonia posted a 10-second video on Instagram featuring Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard. The camera zooms in on Chouinard writing one sentence in a notebook: "Earth is now our only shareholder.”

It was an understated clip unveiling an unprecedented move: Chouinard is giving away his company to an entity that will steer all profits into climate solutions.

The move will funnel $100 million a year into climate-positive investments, make Patagonia a powerful force in climate philanthropy, and establish a new model for corporate sustainability.

This week: we explore corporate sustainability from the perspective of the fashion industry, featuring the co-hosts of Hot Buttons.

We'll start with a conversation on Patagonia's move to turn the company into a corporate vehicle for climate solutions. And then, we’ll dig deeper into fashion law. Is better labeling the key to cleaning up one of the dirtiest industries on earth?

Don’t miss our live episode of Climavores in New York City on October 20! Sign up here for a night of live audio and networking with top voices in climate journalism.

Don’t miss our live episode of Climavores in New York City on October 20! Sign up here for a night of live audio and networking with top voices in climate journalism.

On September 18, almost exactly five years after Hurricane Maria wiped out Puerto Rico's electric grid, Hurricane Fiona once again pushed the island’s electric system to failure.

Earlier this year, we brought Canary Media reporter Maria Gallucci on the show to talk about Puerto Rico’s grid failures in the months and years after Hurricane Maria – and the boom in grassroots solar projects as a response. 

She’s been reporting on Fiona's aftermath. Sadly, it's a similar story to Hurricane Maria. Nearly two weeks after the storm, one third of the island's residents still don't have access to power, and many are still lacking water. 

But the storyline has changed for some. There are now tens of thousands more solar and battery systems on the island. And there were communities that kept the lights on. 

This week, we're talking about Fiona's impact on Puerto Rico's grid system – why it’s still broken, and how solar and batteries could help fix it.

Guest: Maria Galluci, a reporter at Canary Media. You can read her latest reporting here.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by GridX. GridX provides invaluable business insight that improves the uptake of the programs, products and services needed to decarbonize. Delivering on our clean energy future is complex. GridX exists to simplify the journey. Learn more.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by KORE Power. KORE Power is the leading U.S.-based developer of battery cell technology for the clean energy industry. KORE Power is proud to offer a functional solution to real-world problems and fulfill market demand to deliver a zero-carbon future. Learn more at www.korepower.com.  

Don’t miss our live episode of Climavores in New York City on October 20! Sign up here for a night of live audio and networking with top voices in climate journalism. 

One third of the world is currently facing water stress. The horn of Africa is in the middle of a devastating drought, putting millions at risk of famine. In China, low water levels are causing cuts to hydropower in Sichuan Province. Two thirds of Europe is currently under some kind of drought warning, making it the worst in 500 years in that region.

Drought will only become more severe in some regions as the climate continues to warm. The United Nations estimates that drought frequency has increased by a third already since the year 2000. Ongoing drought has dire implications for everything ranging from food security to manufacturing, energy production, and health. 

This week, we’re bringing you a story about the unexpected consequence of drought – how it's revealing secrets previously lost beneath the waterline. 

Falling water levels are reshaping landscapes around the world. As rivers and reservoirs recede, historical relics are coming to the surface. This week, we speak to reporter Dharna Noor about the dinosaur tracks, historical artifacts, and even human remains that are being unveiled as the drought progresses. 

Dharna Noor is a reporter and digital producer at the Boston Globe. You can read her article here.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by GridX. GridX provides invaluable business insight that improves the uptake of the programs, products and services needed to decarbonize. Delivering on our clean energy future is complex. GridX exists to simplify the journey. Learn more.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by KORE Power. KORE Power is the leading U.S.-based developer of battery cell technology for the clean energy industry. KORE Power is proud to offer a functional solution to real-world problems and fulfill market demand to deliver a zero-carbon future. Learn more at www.korepower.com. 

Don’t miss our live episode of Climavores in New York City on October 20! Sign up here for a night of live audio and networking with top voices in climate journalism.

This week, we’re featuring an episode of Climavores. Climavores is a show for eaters who are trying to navigate the complex relationship between healthy food and a healthy planet. Journalists Tamar Haspel and Mike Grunwald are trying to figure it out, too.

Each week, Tamar and Mike explore the complicated, confusing, and surprising relationship between food and the environment. Climavores cuts through hype and ideology, explore the stories behind our perceptions of food, and empower listeners to make food choices that are actually good for the planet.

We are featuring a live episode of Climavores in New York City on October 20. Tamar and Mike will be joined by reporters from Canary Media, POLITICO, and Post Script Media for a night of live audio and networking. Come ask a question!

Years back, a major municipal utility in the U.S. rolled out a new time-of-use rate for commercial customers. At first, everything seemed fine. Then, customers in one category suddenly began seeing a huge spike in their bills: churches.

“They were getting hit with a demand charge and their bills were four, five times what they” had previously been, explains GridX CEO Chris Black.

The price of electricity used to be static. Today, rates are a real-time tool to manage demand on a grid that is being transformed by renewables, batteries and electric cars — and increasingly stressed by extreme weather events.

Nearly 70% of the country has some kind of time-of-use rate in place. But only 7% of customers are actively taking advantage of them. Why is that? And as time-of-use rates expand, how do we avoid the "tax on God" conundrum?

“We have to get it right. We have to figure out how to make all of this more accessible...and better for consumers,” says Black.

In this episode, Chris Black makes the case that dynamic rate design is one of the most important tools for decarbonizing the grid.

This episode was produced in partnership with GridX. Delivering on the clean energy future is complex. GridX exists to simplify the journey. Learn more.

Over Labor Day weekend, California was blanketed by a record-breaking heatwave. Fresno reached 113 degrees Fahrenheit, Sacramento, 114 degrees Fahrenheit. The state asked residents to cut their power use, and only narrowly avoided blackouts.  

Heatwaves are the deadliest weather event in the United States every year. Extreme heat is an environmental justice issue, as it affects low-income and communities of color disproportionately. This week on the show, producer Alexandria Herr took a deep dive to try to understand how heat waves become so deadly, and how cities can protect people from the heat.

She spoke to Dr. Erik Klinenberg, a sociologist whose work on the 1995 heat wave in Chicago helped understand how heat waves cause cities to break down. When he looked at that heat wave, he found a mystery: a handful of neighborhoods, with the same demographics, but with vastly different mortality rates from the heat. 

The answer to that mystery is key to understanding how heat waves become so deadly – and those lessons are being used by people working to protect communities from extreme heat today. 

Guests:

• Dr. Erik Klinenberg is a professor of sociology at New York University and the author of Heat Wave.    
• Sonal Jessel is the Director of Policy at WEACT. You can read their audit of New York City cooling centers here.
• Danielle Renwick is the editor of Nexus Media News. You can read her work on how U.S. cities are preparing for extreme heat here.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by GridX. GridX provides invaluable business insight that improves the uptake of the programs, products and services needed to decarbonize. Delivering on our clean energy future is complex. GridX exists to simplify the journey. Learn more.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by KORE Power. KORE Power is the leading U.S.-based developer of battery cell technology for the clean energy industry. KORE Power is proud to offer a functional solution to real-world problems and fulfill market demand to deliver a zero-carbon future. Learn more at www.korepower.com.  

This week, we’re presenting an episode of The Big Switch, a narrative show from Columbia University about how to decarbonize the economy. 

Steel goes into pretty much everything around us – from buildings and bridges to the furniture in our homes. And decarbonizing the steel industry is essential because we need steel to decarbonize the world. Think about it. Solar panels, electric vehicles, even our power grid; steel goes into everything we need to fight climate change.

But there’s a problem. Steel manufacturing uses a lot of fossil fuels. It’s responsible for 8 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions.

In this episode, Dr. Melissa Lott breaks down the race to green, zero-carbon steel. It’s a competition among four key technologies: recycling, carbon capture and storage (CCS), electrolysis, and — everyone’s current favorite — hydrogen. Or, as we call it in this episode, the Usain Bolt of technology.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by GridX. GridX provides invaluable business insight that improves the uptake of the programs, products and services needed to decarbonize. Delivering on our clean energy future is complex. GridX exists to simplify the journey. Learn more.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by KORE Power. KORE Power is the leading U.S.-based developer of battery cell technology for the clean energy industry. KORE Power is proud to offer a functional solution to real-world problems and fulfill market demand to deliver a zero-carbon future. Learn more at www.korepower.com.  

Western states are experiencing a megadrought. Water levels at Lake Mead and Lake Powell are falling hundreds of feet, and shortages on the Colorado River mean that Arizona, Nevada and New Mexico are facing cuts to their water use. 

But these aren't the only reserves that are under threat – hundreds of feet underground, the drought is impacting our water security in ways we can't even see. 

The Ogallala Aquifer is the biggest aquifer in America, and one of the largest in the world. In addition to providing drinking water for almost two million people, the aquifer supports about $35 billion in agricultural production every year. But the aquifer is drying up in many regions – and that’s creating new conflicts over water rights.

This week, Melodie Edwards, host of the podcast The Modern West, brings us to the front lines of the Western water wars. We go to Laramie County, Wyoming, where a group of ranchers are fighting permits for high capacity wells – and changing the state’s water law in the process.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by GridX. GridX provides invaluable business insight that improves the uptake of the programs, products and services needed to decarbonize. Delivering on our clean energy future is complex. GridX exists to simplify the journey. Learn more.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by KORE Power. KORE Power is the leading U.S.-based developer of battery cell technology for the clean energy industry. KORE Power is proud to offer a functional solution to real-world problems and fulfill market demand to deliver a zero-carbon future. Learn more at www.korepower.com.  

Just a few weeks ago, the Biden administration’s historic climate package looked like it was on the brink of ruin after Senator Joe Manchin walked away from negotiations for a second time. 

But behind the scenes, backdoor negotiations were underway. At the end of last month, Manchin and Schumer announced they had made a deal – and on Sunday, the Senate passed major climate legislation for the first time in American history.  

The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 has over $360 billion for energy and climate provisions. It’s a historic opportunity to supercharge clean energy and give the country a fighting chance at slashing emissions in time to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement. 

So what’s in the bill? And what comes next?

Guest: Katherine Hamilton is chair of 38 North Solutions.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by GridX. GridX provides invaluable business insight that improves the uptake of the programs, products and services needed to decarbonize. Delivering on our clean energy future is complex. GridX exists to simplify the journey. Learn more.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by KORE Power. KORE Power is the leading U.S.-based developer of battery cell technology for the clean energy industry. KORE Power is proud to offer a functional solution to real-world problems and fulfill market demand to deliver a zero-carbon future. Learn more at www.korepower.com.  

This week, we feature an interview from our friends at Columbia Energy Exchange.

Europe’s gas crisis has entered a scary new phase. Last week, the biggest pipeline carrying Russian gas into Germany was closed for maintenance. And many in Europe fear the Russians will keep Nord Stream 1 closed indefinitely – putting further pressure on gas supply in the colder months.

Europeans are burning more coal, scrambling for new sources of gas, and committing to lots of renewable energy in a frantic attempt to slash reliance on Russian fossil fuels. But there are real questions about how quickly those solutions will shift the balance of power. 

Meanwhile, gas prices are soaring in markets around the world – leading to fears about recession and long-lasting economic impacts. What are the possible scenarios that could play out?

This week, Columbia Energy Exchange host Jason Bordoff sits down with Anne-Sophie Corbeau and Dr. Tatiana Mitrova to explain the state of gas markets. 

Anne-Sophie Corbeau is a Global Research Scholar at the Center on Global Energy Policy at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs; Dr. Tatiana Mitrova is a Research Fellow at the Center on Global Energy Policy. 

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by KORE Power. KORE Power is the leading U.S.-based developer of battery cell technology for the clean energy industry. KORE Power is proud to offer a functional solution to real-world problems and fulfill market demand to deliver a zero-carbon future. Learn more at www.korepower.com.  

The Carbon Copy is supported by GridX. GridX provides invaluable business insight that improves the uptake of the programs, products and services needed to decarbonize. Delivering on our clean energy future is complex. GridX exists to simplify the journey. Learn more.

Last Tuesday, the thermometer at London's Heathrow airport clocked in at 104 degrees Fahrenheit, or 40.2 degrees Celsius. The airport runway melted. More than a dozen wildfires broke out across London, while tens of thousands evacuated from wildfires in Spain, France, and Portugal. 

And a lot of meteorologists didn't quite believe it – including Axios' Andrew Freedman.

“A high of 104 degrees has always been this limit that no meteorologist ever thought would be crossed in their lifetime in the UK,” says Freedman.

Europe isn't ready for heat like this. And new research shows western Europe is seeing a 3 to 4 times increase in heat waves compared to anywhere else in the northern midlatitudes. And none of this would be possible without climate change.

This week, we're talking about the extreme heat that gripped Europe – how climate scientists understand it, and the best ways to convey this new reality.

Guest: Andrew Freedman, a climate and energy reporter at Axios. Read his coverage of the heat wave.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by GridX. GridX provides invaluable business insight that improves the uptake of the programs, products and services needed to decarbonize. Delivering on our clean energy future is complex. GridX exists to simplify the journey. Learn more.

On the Carbon Copy podcast this week:

The hits to President Biden's climate ambitions keep on coming. Two years ago, Biden put forward a $2 trillion climate plan. After Democrats failed to move a bill forward last year, that package was whittled down to $300 billion.

This spring was supposed to be the moment that package passed. And then spring turned into summer. Now, as lawmakers prepare to clear out and head off for their August break, it looks like the passage of a climate bill of any size is unlikely — thanks to West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin (D).

Senator Manchin has nearly killed his party's chance of doing something big on climate. The window of opportunity for legislation is closing — and it could bring a painful end to Biden's stalled agenda. What options are left?

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by GridX. GridX provides invaluable business insight that improves the uptake of the programs, products and services needed to decarbonize. Delivering on our clean energy future is complex. GridX exists to simplify the journey. Learn more.

In the global north, 15% of the earth’s surface is covered in permafrost. Permafrost is a frozen layer of rocks, soil, ice and partially decomposed plants – and it's a massive carbon sink.

Permafrost contains 1.5 trillion tons of carbon. That's twice the amount currently in our atmosphere. And, no surprise, climate change is melting it at an accelerated rate.

The decline of permafrost is bad for the atmosphere and for Arctic communities. And because it’s historically been so difficult to predict, the climate impact is not being considered by policymakers.

New research could change our understanding of the problem. This week, we’ll talk with a scientist who’s trying to fill the gaps in our knowledge about the climate impact of permafrost. 

Guest: Dr. Sue Natali, an arctic ecologist who leads the Woodwell Climate Arctic Program. Read about her Permafrost Pathways research.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by GridX. GridX provides invaluable business insight that improves the uptake of the programs, products and services needed to decarbonize. Delivering on our clean energy future is complex. GridX exists to simplify the journey. Learn more.

The term of art for climate goals in the utility business is "net-zero." It's an accounting term. It means on balance, an electric utility is removing as much carbon from the atmosphere as it's adding.

But how do you get to actual zero emissions? To eliminate them from the grid entirely?

That is what the Sacramento Municipal Utility District – known as SMUD – is trying to do by 2030. But it can’t hit that target without the help of customers.

So what would the customer-empowered energy transition look like? 

In this episode, produced in collaboration with Oracle Energy and Water, we're exploring how technology advancements and the urgency of climate change are putting customers at the center of decarbonization.

Stephen Lacey sat down with SMUD CEO Paul Lau and Oracle’s Matt O'Keefe to talk about the trend.

To learn more about Oracle’s vision, visit go.oracle.com/energyofeveryone.

This week, we’re offering up an episode of Post Script Media's new podcast, Hot Buttons.

Your Instagram and TikTok feed are probably littered with feel-good ads for clothes and shoes made from recycled bottles. But they aren’t the solution you think. 

In this episode, co-hosts Christina Binkley, Rachel Kibbe and Shilla Kim-Parker dig into the greenwashing behind clothes made from plastic.

If you like what you hear, subscribe anywhere you get your podcasts.

Hot Buttons is a production of Post Script Media. The show is hosted by Christina Binkley, Rachel Kibbe, and Shilla Kim-Parker. Follow the show on Twitter.

It was a particularly busy – and consequential – June for the Supreme Court. 

In a 6-3 ruling, the Court decided that the Environmental Protection Agency has overstepped its authority in regulating heat trapping gasses from power plants.

This is an odd case involving an interpretation of a 1970s law that set the foundation for a climate regulation that doesn't even exist. In this episode, we’ll look at what led to the Supreme Court to take up the case.

Now that the high court has restricted how America's environmental cop can enforce climate pollution rules, how severe are the consequences? And where can federal agencies continue to make progress?

Guest: Niina Farah, Climate Law and Policy Reporter @ E&E news. 

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by GridX. GridX provides invaluable business insight that improves the uptake of the programs, products and services needed to decarbonize. Delivering on our clean energy future is complex. GridX exists to simplify the journey. Learn more.

Heat pumps are the hot new thing in climate tech right now. The fastest way we can slash emissions out of the economy is to electrify as much as possible. And the fastest way to electrify is to deploy heat pumps.

If we want to decarbonize our homes quickly, we need to start replacing existing HVAC systems. A good place to start: installing heat pumps instead of conventional central air conditioners.

Turns out, the cost of making a two-way heat pump instead of an air conditioning unit is only a few hundred dollars per unit. What if the government incentivized manufacturers to make the switch?

Every minute, 12 central air conditioning units are installed or swapped out at homes across America. That's 18,000 per week. Turning those one-way AC units into two-way heat pumps could help electrify millions of homes every year. A new federal bill could be the answer. 

Guests:

• Nate “the house whisperer” Adams, CEO of HVAC 2.0. 
• Alexander Gard-Murray, a Political Economist at Brown University's Climate Solutions Lab. 

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Nextracker. Nextracker’s technology platform has delivered more than 50 gigawatts of zero-emission solar power plants across the globe. Nextracker is developing a data-driven framework to become the most sustainable solar tracker company in the world – with a focus on a truly transparent supply chain. Visit nextracker.com/sustainability to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrid Solutions, your comprehensive source for all distributed energy financing. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes financing it easy. Visit scalecapitalsolutions.com to learn more.

A version of this episode originally ran on Catalyst w/ Shayle Kann.

Stock markets are in decline. Inflation is on the rise. Interest rates are up. Private tech companies are laying off workers.

Is this the long-awaited market correction that never quite materialized during the bull market of the last 13 years?

And what does it mean for climate tech?

In this episode, Shayle talks to Saloni Multani, a partner at Galvanize Climate Solutions and former chief financial officer for Joe Biden’s 2020 campaign.

Shayle and Saloni place the current moment in historical context. They cover the recent wave of low-cost capital that poured into climate tech and the low interest rates that gave renewables an advantage over fossil-fuel investments. 

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Nextracker. Nextracker’s technology platform has delivered more than 50 gigawatts of zero-emission solar power plants across the globe. Nextracker is developing a data-driven framework to become the most sustainable solar tracker company in the world – with a focus on a truly transparent supply chain. Visit nextracker.com/sustainability to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrid Solutions, your comprehensive source for all distributed energy financing. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes financing it easy. Visit scalecapitalsolutions.com to learn more.

We’re more than three months into Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and you don’t have to look far beyond your local gas station to see the global impact – the average price of a gallon of gasoline topped $5 this week. 

The conflict has complicated the flow of energy at a time when supply chains were already jumbled up because of COVID. But it’s not just oil. The war is leaving its mark on all kinds of commodities – including the global supplies of minerals and metals.

Geopolitical shifts are causing high spikes in prices of lithium and nickel, two key components of the lithium-ion batteries used in electric cars.

But this supply mess could actually be boosting a positive trend in the battery space: Battery recycling. 

This week: Batteries are a pillar of the zero-carbon economy. But are they sustainable? And will technical advancements and geopolitical shifts alter the battery-based economy for the better?

Guests: 

• Julian Spector is a Senior Reporter with Canary Media. Check out his latest report on battery recycling. And you can access all of Canary’s recycling week coverage here.  

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Nextracker. Nextracker’s technology platform has delivered more than 50 gigawatts of zero-emission solar power plants across the globe. Nextracker is developing a data-driven framework to become the most sustainable solar tracker company in the world – with a focus on a truly transparent supply chain. Visit nextracker.com/sustainability to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrid Solutions, your comprehensive source for all distributed energy financing. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes financing it easy. Visit scalecapitalsolutions.com to learn more.

We're presenting a trailer for our newest show from Post Script Media, called Hot Buttons.

The demand for sustainability has come for the fashion industry. Christina Binkley, Rachel Kibbe, and Shilla Kim-Parker are here to talk about it.

Hot Buttons features weekly observations and lively debate about the future of the fashion industry as it reckons with its impact on the climate, natural resources, and worker rights. It's about the culture of fashion, the high-stakes decisions inside the industry, and how we rethink the very idea of growth.

Subscribe to Hot Buttons on Apple, Spotify, or anywhere you get podcasts. Episodes drop every Thursday starting June 16.

Five years ago, Puerto Rico's grid was decimated by Hurricane Maria. Out of the destruction, many hoped that Puerto Rico's new grid could be built around solar and batteries – replacing centralized gas, coal, and oil plants connected with remote transmission lines.

That’s not how the recovery played out. Today, Puerto Rico still relies heavily on centralized fossil fuels. And the island’s utility is still facing long blackouts and accusations of mismanagement.

But a bottom-up movement has emerged supporting tens of thousands of rooftop solar and battery installations. These systems are being installed with minimal support from the government. 

Will this distributed energy help make Puerto Rico more resilient? Or will the island lock in more fossil fuels?

We'll speak with Canary Media reporter Maria Gallucci, who just got back from a reporting trip there. Read her feature.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Nextracker. Nextracker’s technology platform has delivered more than 50 gigawatts of zero-emission solar power plants across the globe. Nextracker is developing a data-driven framework to become the most sustainable solar tracker company in the world – with a focus on a truly transparent supply chain. Visit nextracker.com/sustainability to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrid Solutions, your comprehensive source for all distributed energy financing. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes financing it easy. Visit scalecapitalsolutions.com to learn more.

In December 2021, Senator Joe Manchin appeared on Fox News to announce that he would not vote for Joe Biden’s signature climate plan, Build Back Better. The reason he cited? A score given by the Congressional Budget Office.

The Congressional Budget Office – or CBO for short – is the most important government agency you’ve never heard of. It acts as a budget referee, giving legislation a score on how it will impact the economy and the federal budget. Senator Chuck Grassley once called the CBO “God” on Capitol Hill. Its scores determine which legislation passes and which legislation dies. 

But there’s one big catch. The CBO is systematically leaving out the impacts of climate change and carbon pollution on the economy – and stacking the deck against climate legislation. Lawmakers have the power to change it. Will they?

Guests: 

• Dr. Mark Paul is an assistant professor of economics and environmental studies at New College of Florida. You can read his article about the CBO in Noema. 

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Nextracker. Nextracker’s technology platform has delivered more than 50 gigawatts of zero-emission solar power plants across the globe. Nextracker is developing a data-driven framework to become the most sustainable solar tracker company in the world – with a focus on a truly transparent supply chain. Visit nextracker.com/sustainability to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrid Solutions, your comprehensive source for all distributed energy financing. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes financing it easy. Visit scalecapitalsolutions.com to learn more.

In early May, a leaked draft opinion showed that the Supreme Court could soon overturn the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. So what does abortion access have to do with climate change? This week, we explore the link between heat, pollution, and reproductive justice.

In recent years, a strong and growing body of research shows that exposure to pollution and extreme heat increases the risk of stillbirth and preterm birth, particularly among Black parents. And restricted abortion access in a post-Roe America could further increase health risks and potential for criminalization.

We spoke to one of the pioneering researchers in this field to understand the link between exposure to heat and pollution and adverse birth outcomes – and what can be done to solve it. 

Guests: 

• Alexandria Herr is a producer on our show. You can find her Atmos article on climate change and high risk pregnancy here.
• Eve Andrews is a staff writer at Grist. You can find her article with Naveena Sadasivam on pregnancy in pollution hot spots here.
• Dr. Rupa Basu is the chief of the air and climate epidemiology section at the California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Nextracker. Nextracker’s technology platform has delivered more than 50 gigawatts of zero-emission solar power plants across the globe. Nextracker is developing a data-driven framework to become the most sustainable solar tracker company in the world – with a focus on a truly transparent supply chain. Visit nextracker.com/sustainability to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrid Solutions, your comprehensive source for all distributed energy financing. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes financing it easy. Visit scalecapitalsolutions.com to learn more.

We have a bonus episode from our friends at Drilled. 

The sixth season of Drilled is all about the natural gas industry. In the last decade, the climate movement has begun to reject the idea of natural gas as a "bridge fuel.” As that story has become tougher to sell, the gas industry has shifted from greenwashing to all-out war with environmentalists. 

The latest season of Drilled traces that shift, starting with the first gas ban proposed in Southern California and ending with the industry leveraging Russia's invasion of Ukraine to its benefit. 

In this episode, we head to the college town of San Luis Obispo, California, where in April 2020 mayor Heidi Hartman announced a plan to become the first city in Southern California to ban gas in new buildings. The region's utility SoCal Gas – the largest gas utility in the country – sprung into action, threatening among other things to bus in large numbers of protestors to crowd the town and city hall, just as the pandemic was taking hold in the U.S.

Listen to Drilled anywhere you get podcasts.

Across California, oil wells pepper residential neighborhoods – often directly next to homes, schools, and businesses. 

These residential wells have been linked to a host of health problems, from asthma to cancer. And these problems disproportionately affect California’s communities of color. 

This week, producer Alexandria Herr goes on a crusade to prove that California is not the green state that everybody thinks it is. 

We’ll explore hidden oil wells, the history of redlining, and the oil boom during World War II, to understand why residential drilling in California looks the way it does today. 

Guests: Dr. David Gonzalez is a President’s Postdoctoral Fellow at UC Berkeley. 

Dr. Sarah Elkind is the president of the American Society for Environmental History. 

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Nextracker. Nextracker’s technology platform has delivered more than 50 gigawatts of zero-emission solar power plants across the globe. Nextracker is developing a data-driven framework to become the most sustainable solar tracker company in the world – with a focus on a truly transparent supply chain. Visit nextracker.com/sustainability to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrid Solutions, your comprehensive source for all distributed energy financing. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes financing it easy. Visit scalecapitalsolutions.com to learn more.

A couple of weeks ago, Elon Musk offered around $44 billion to buy Twitter. A few days later, the CEO of the world’s biggest electric car company became the owner of one of the world’s biggest social media platforms. 

When news of the deal hit, investors got a little spooked. The share price of Tesla dropped by nearly 20% over the following week. Many industry observers began to wonder whether this was going to pose a major problem for the company.

Among them was climate reporter David Ferris. Although many may regard these dramatic moves as simply part of the cost of investing in Musk’s company, David thinks this latest gambit unleashes a whole new set of financial, reputational and strategic risks.

This week on The Carbon Copy: Elon Musk’s Twitter takeover has alarmed investors and consumers. Will his new shiny toy distract from Tesla’s mission-critical work?

Guest: David Ferris is an energy and environment reporter at E&E News. You can read his recent reporting on Musk’s purchase here.

We want to hear from you! Take our quick survey for a chance to win a $100 Amazon gift card. This will help us bring you more relevant content.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Nextracker. Nextracker’s technology platform has delivered more than 50 gigawatts of zero-emission solar power plants across the globe. Nextracker is developing a data-driven framework to become the most sustainable solar tracker company in the world — with a focus on a truly transparent supply chain. Visit nex​track​er​.com/​s​u​s​t​a​i​n​a​b​ility to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrid Solutions, your comprehensive source for all distributed energy financing. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes financing it easy. Visit scale​cap​i​tal​so​lu​tions​.com to learn more.

A couple weeks ago, Canary Media’s Eric Wesoff found himself in the parking lot of a company called Auxin Solar. 

Auxin is a small American solar panel maker based in California. It manufacturers 150 megawatts of solar panels a year – 100 times less than the biggest solar manufacturers. Despite its size, Auxin Solar just filed a petition with the U.S. government that could shake up the solar industry in a big way.

Auxin claims China is dodging U.S. tariffs by funneling products through other Asian countries like Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam. And it wants the government to step in. And the complaint is already derailing large-scale solar projects.

This week: how a solar trade war spanning three presidents is causing problems for a domestic solar market that relies heavily on overseas panels. 

Guest: Eric Wesoff is the editorial director for Canary Media. You can read his piece about Auxin Solar’s petition here.

We want to hear from you! Take our quick survey for a chance to win a $100 Amazon gift card. This will help us bring you more relevant content.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Nextracker. Nextracker’s technology platform has delivered more than 50 gigawatts of zero-emission solar power plants across the globe. Nextracker is developing a data-driven framework to become the most sustainable solar tracker company in the world – with a focus on a truly transparent supply chain. Visit nextracker.com/sustainability to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrid Solutions, your comprehensive source for all distributed energy financing. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes financing it easy. Visit scalecapitalsolutions.com to learn more.

Bitcoin mining today uses a half percent of the world's electricity. Every year, as more shipping containers and warehouses full of high-powered computers are deployed to unlock more bitcoin, energy use grows by double digits.

As bitcoin mining operations scramble to find new power sources, they’re often turning to aging coal or fossil gas plants that offer cheap electricity.

This week, we’ll take you to Seneca Lake, upstate New York, where a group of unlikely activists is fighting back against a “zombie” power plant that is now fueling a Bitcoin mine. 

What’s happening in Seneca Lake is not a one-off story. Across the nation, the companies that own dying, dirty power plants see cryptocurrency as a chance to extend their lives. Bitcoin mining is locking in fossil fuels – so what can we do about it?

Guests: Brian Kahn is the climate editor at Protocol. You can read his piece about the Greenidge power plant here.

We want to hear from you! Take our quick survey for a chance to win a $100 Amazon gift card. This will help us bring you more relevant content.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Nextracker. Nextracker’s technology platform has delivered more than 50 gigawatts of zero-emission solar power plants across the globe. Nextracker is developing a data-driven framework to become the most sustainable solar tracker company in the world – with a focus on a truly transparent supply chain. Visit nextracker.com/sustainability to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrid Solutions, your comprehensive source for all distributed energy financing. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes financing it easy. Visit scalecapitalsolutions.com to learn more.

In 1973, when Arab countries cut off petroleum exports to the US, the price of oil quadrupled. People couldn't get access to gasoline. The economy shrunk. 

The Arab oil embargo was framed almost entirely as a supply problem. But a few years later, a 28-year-old physicist named Amory Lovins published an article in Foreign Affairs magazine that completely shifted how we framed the issue. 

Nearly a half century later, we revisit Amory’s writing in the face of another global energy security crisis. Fossil fuel prices have spiked to record highs as a result of Russia's military invasion of Ukraine. Countries are now racing to stop buying Russian oil & gas as quickly as possible.

This week: Amory Lovins explains the profound changes taking place in the global energy system – and how Russia's war will accelerate them.

Guests: Amory Lovins, co-founder and chairman emeritus at RMI. Read his latest piece on how Russia’s war could accelerate the clean energy transition.

We want to hear from you! Take our quick survey for a chance to win a $100 Amazon gift card. This will help us bring you more relevant content.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Nextracker. Nextracker’s technology platform has delivered more than 50 gigawatts of zero-emission solar power plants across the globe. Nextracker is developing a data-driven framework to become the most sustainable solar tracker company in the world – with a focus on a truly transparent supply chain. Visit nextracker.com/sustainability to learn more.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Scale Microgrid Solutions, your comprehensive source for all distributed energy financing. Distributed generation can be complex. Scale makes financing it easy. Visit scalecapitalsolutions.com to learn more.

Support strong climate journalism! Donate to Canary Media to celebrate its one-year anniversary.

Public companies have a legal obligation to report a wide range of information on financial performance and competitive risks. One risk they are not required to mention in corporate America: climate risk.

But that changed last week when America’s top financial regulator, the Securities and Exchange Commission, released a new proposal requiring companies to disclose their financial vulnerabilities to climate change. 

This move toward greater corporate climate accountability in the U.S. builds on years of momentum. It’s the culmination of voluntary task forces, initiatives and mandatory disclosure regulations passed in other countries. 

This week: How a historic proposal mandating climate transparency could change corporate America – and how it will face political and legal backlash.

Guests: Kathleen Brophy, U.S. climate finance senior strategist with The Sunrise Project. 

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The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Nextracker. Nextracker’s technology platform has delivered more than 50 gigawatts of zero-emission solar power plants across the globe. Nextracker is developing a data-driven framework to become the most sustainable solar tracker company in the world – with a focus on a truly transparent supply chain. Visit nextracker.com/sustainability to learn more.

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In January, fire tore through a major affordable housing development in the Bronx, killing 19 people. Officials were quick to blame the Twin Parks North West fire on a space heater and broken fire door. But the root cause of the fire runs much deeper. 

America has an energy insecurity crisis. A third of U.S. households have trouble paying their energy bills, with energy costs falling most heavily on communities of color. Black households, in particular, spend 43 percent more on energy than white households; Hispanic households spend 20 percent more. These inequities stem from a long history of racist housing policies and disinvestment in public housing. 

When people struggle to make ends meet, they resort to stopgap measures to get by. For residents of affordable housing developments like Twin Parks North West, that often means turning to space heaters to keep warm in the winter. 

This week: The deadly consequences of America’s energy divide, and how we can solve it. 

Guests: Dr. Diana Hernández is an associate professor of sociomedical sciences at Columbia University. You can read her op-ed on the fire’s root causes here. 

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Atmos Financial. Atmos offers FDIC-insured checking and savings accounts that only invest in climate-positive assets like renewables, green construction and regenerative agriculture. Modern banking for climate-conscious people. Get an account in minutes at joinatmos.com.

The Carbon Copy is also supported by Climate Positive, a podcast from Hannon Armstrong, the first U.S. public company solely dedicated to investing in climate solutions. Climate Positive podcast features candid conversations with the leaders, innovators, and changemakers driving our climate positive future. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

This is a branded episode, produced in collaboration with Intersect Power.

Sheldon Kimber has spent the last 20 years developing energy projects. He’s overseen the build-out of billions of dollars worth of large-scale solar plants.

Getting those solar projects in the ground wasn't easy. Abrupt national policy shifts, international trade wars, and local regulatory hurdles made every megawatt a fight.

The stunning price drops in wind and solar weren't inevitable. But they were predictable – partly because people like Sheldon were building renewable power plants at a consistent pace. 

Today, all that cheap renewable power is opening up opportunities in other areas of the economy. And as CEO of Intersect Power, Sheldon is building a portfolio of massive solar and battery projects that can enable predictable cost drops for other low-carbon solutions.

In this episode, produced in collaboration with Intersect Power, Stephen Lacey talks with Sheldon Kimber about his vision for the inevitable industries that will arise from low-cost clean electricity.

Read Sheldon’s article on the “nexus of deep decarbonization.”

Intersect Power is a clean energy company bringing innovative and scalable low-carbon solutions to customers in retail and wholesale energy markets. Learn more about Intersect's projects and business model.

Climate researchers are increasingly using the term “maladaptation” to describe adaptation measures that bring unforeseen negative consequences to local communities.

From building levees that inadvertently increased flood risk in Bangladesh to a hydroelectric dam that cut off land access in Vietnam, examples of maladaptation are popping up all over the world. 

In the U.S., Miami has invested hundreds of millions of dollars in stormwater pumps and elevated roads to combat flooding from rising seas. And it will need to invest billions more to save the city from chronic flooding. But the UN report says those early investments might have caused unintended impacts. 

This week: the story of how Miami’s flood investments might be leading to maladaptation – and what other cities around the world can learn from it. 

Guests: Alex Harris, climate change reporter for the Miami Herald; and Lisa Schipper, IPPC report author, and an environmental social science research fellow at the University of Oxford.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Atmos Financial. Atmos offers FDIC-insured checking and savings accounts that only invest in climate-positive assets like renewables, green construction and regenerative agriculture. Modern banking for climate-conscious people. Get an account in minutes at joinatmos.com.

The Carbon Copy is also supported by Climate Positive, a podcast from Hannon Armstrong, the first U.S. public company solely dedicated to investing in climate solutions. Climate Positive podcast features candid conversations with the leaders, innovators, and changemakers driving our climate positive future. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

President Biden entered the White House promising to use climate solutions as his main tool for raising wages, revitalizing infrastructure, and tackling inequality.

But almost overnight, that framing changed from transforming the American economy to protecting consumers.

Gasoline prices are at their highest levels in US history because of supply disruptions caused by Russia's attack on Ukraine. And Biden’s latest decision to ban Russian oil reflects the shifting mood in Washington.

A geopolitical crisis is transforming the domestic conversation around energy in Washington. Security is the new lens. 

How will it impact Biden's narrow chance to do something ambitious on climate change?

Guest: Maxine Joselow, a Washington Post journalist who anchors the Climate 202 Newsletter.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Atmos Financial. Atmos offers FDIC-insured checking and savings accounts that only invest in climate-positive assets like renewables, green construction and regenerative agriculture. Modern banking for climate-conscious people. Get an account in minutes at joinatmos.com.

The Carbon Copy is also supported by Climate Positive, a podcast from Hannon Armstrong, the first U.S. public company solely dedicated to investing in climate solutions. Climate Positive podcast features candid conversations with the leaders, innovators, and changemakers driving our climate positive future. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

The civilian and military death toll from Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine is growing daily. More than 1.5 million people have fled Ukraine for neighboring countries in the fastest refugee migration since WWII.  

But the effects of this war aren’t just humanitarian; they’re economic. That’s because so much of it is tied up in global energy flows. Russia is one of the biggest fossil fuel producers in the world. Europe depends on Russia for 40% of its gas for heating and one quarter of its oil. 

And since Russia is such a major exporter of oil and gas, its military actions are putting new pressures on a global supply chain already hurt by tight energy supplies driven by COVID-19 disruptions. 

Europe, along with the rest of the world, is being forced to consider what a future without Russia’s fossil fuels could look like.

This week: a conversation with two experts watching the energy market’s impacts around the world. 

Guests: Pierre Noël, Global Research Scholar at the Center on Global Energy Policy and Amy Myers Jaffe, Research Professor at the Fletcher School at Tufts University and Managing Director of the Climate Policy Lab.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Atmos Financial. Atmos offers FDIC-insured checking and savings accounts that only invest in climate-positive assets like renewables, green construction and regenerative agriculture. Modern banking for climate-conscious people. Get an account in minutes at joinatmos.com.

The Carbon Copy is also supported by Climate Positive, a podcast from Hannon Armstrong, the first U.S. public company solely dedicated to investing in climate solutions. Climate Positive podcast features candid conversations with the leaders, innovators, and changemakers driving our climate positive future. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

Six out of seven car commercials during this year’s Superbowl touted electric vehicles (EVs). That’s up from zero EV ads just four years ago. 

Ford, Chevy, GMC and Toyota are all betting big on electric, and they’re hoping electric models of their most popular light-duty trucks will entice a whole new class of drivers.

It’s led many car manufacturers and analysts to call 2022 “The Year of the Electric Truck.”

The question remains: will this big push toward electric overcome infrastructure shortcomings, battery range concerns and a deeply-ingrained diesel car culture, especially in rural areas? 

This week: a conversation with a driver and a dealer about how the electric truck revolution might play out. 

Guests: Christopher Preston, Professor of Environmental Philosophy at the University Of Montana; and Whitney Olson, Vice President of Bison Ford in Great Falls, Montana.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Atmos Financial. Atmos offers FDIC-insured checking and savings accounts that only invest in climate-positive assets like renewables, green construction and regenerative agriculture. Modern banking for climate-conscious people. Get an account in minutes at joinatmos.com.

The Carbon Copy is also supported by Climate Positive, a podcast from Hannon Armstrong, the first U.S. public company solely dedicated to investing in climate solutions. Climate Positive podcast features candid conversations with the leaders, innovators, and changemakers driving our climate positive future. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

Climate change is impacting people’s lives across the globe – from mass migrations to resource conflicts. For the US military, it’s become one of the nation’s top security risks. 

After years of risk assessments, the military is now talking about how it intends to address those risks.

It all culminated in the military’s most ambitious plan to date: A new, comprehensive climate agenda that envisions microgrids on all Army bases, all-electric tactical vehicles, and a net-zero military by 2050. 

This week: What does the Army's new net-zero plan reveal about how climate will influence America's national security strategy?

Guest: Erin Sikorsky, Director, The Center for Climate and Security.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Atmos Financial. Atmos offers FDIC-insured checking and savings accounts that only invest in climate-positive assets like renewables, green construction and regenerative agriculture. Modern banking for climate-conscious people. Get an account in minutes at joinatmos.com.

The Carbon Copy is also supported by Climate Positive, a podcast from Hannon Armstrong, the first U.S. public company solely dedicated to investing in climate solutions. Climate Positive podcast features candid conversations with the leaders, innovators, and changemakers driving our climate positive future. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

Note: this is a crossover episode between The Carbon Copy and Columbia Energy Exchange.

The conflict between Ukraine and Russia is intensifying. President Biden says that Putin could send troops into Ukraine any day.

Some NATO countries, including the US, are sending military equipment to Ukraine. But Germany is holding back. And that is partly because of fears over gas supply.

Jason Bordoff has been watching the diplomatic dance. And it is closely tied to the geopolitics of energy.

It reveals the tricky dynamics between Russia and the rest of Europe. Countries like Germany have invested vast amounts of money in renewables in the hopes of cutting dependence on imported fossil fuels. But they’re still deeply tied to Russia’s gas. 

This week on The Carbon Copy: how a clean energy transition might actually strengthen petrostates like Russia, before finally changing who wields the power.

Guest: Jason Bordoff, Director of the Center on Global Energy Policy and host of Columbia Energy Exchange. 

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Atmos Financial. Atmos offers FDIC-insured checking and savings accounts that only invest in climate-positive assets like renewables, green construction and regenerative agriculture. Modern banking for climate-conscious people. Get an account in minutes at joinatmos.com.

The Carbon Copy is also supported by Climate Positive, a podcast from Hannon Armstrong, the first U.S. public company solely dedicated to investing in climate solutions. Climate Positive podcast features candid conversations with the leaders, innovators, and changemakers driving our climate-positive future. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

For the first time ever, the Winter Olympic games will rely entirely on artificial snow. 

It’s a reality that could become more common as the planet warms. And it has environmental experts concerned. 

Nearly 50 million gallons of water are being piped in to serve the Beijing games, possibly setting reserves in this water-stressed region back by hundreds of years.

Meanwhile, China says this year's event is the most environmentally-sound winter games ever. But there's no system to track those claims – and some researchers say the Olympic games are actually getting worse for the environment over time.

This week on The Carbon Copy: why claims about the sustainability of the Olympics are often greenwashing. 

Guest: Christian Shepherd, China Correspondent for The Washington Post. Read his article about the winter games here. 

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is supported by Atmos Financial. Atmos offers FDIC-insured checking and savings accounts that only invest in climate-positive assets like renewables, green construction and regenerative agriculture. Modern banking for climate-conscious people. Get an account in minutes at joinatmos.com.

The Carbon Copy is also supported by Climate Positive, a podcast from Hannon Armstrong, the first U.S. public company solely dedicated to investing in climate solutions. Climate Positive podcast features candid conversations with the leaders, innovators, and changemakers driving our climate positive future. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

Batteries are everywhere. In our electronics, our power tools, our electric grid, and in our cars. And almost all those batteries use a lithium-ion chemistry.

To make an all-electric world possible, we're going to need a lot of lithium. Prices are up 400 percent over 2021. And demand is expected to increase fivefold over the next decade.

The Imperial Valley in southern California is home to the Salton Sea, a land-locked body of water that contains vast reserves of lithium. California Governor Gavin Newsom called the region the "Saudi Arabia of Lithium." If mined, it could completely reshape the global supply chain.

But locals who live near the Salton Sea – a region plagued by unemployment and pollution – worry that the rush to extract the resource won't benefit the people living there. 

This week on The Carbon Copy: California has ambitious plans to fuel the global EV boom with the Salton Sea’s lithium. But will the people who need it most get left behind?

Guests: Independent reporter Aaron Cantú, who wrote about the Salton Sea’s Lithium industry here. And Luis Olmedo, executive director of Comité Cívico del Valle.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

Support for Carbon Copy comes from Climate Positive, a podcast from Hannon Armstrong, the first U.S. public company solely dedicated to investing in climate solutions. Climate Positive podcast features candid conversations with the leaders, innovators, and changemakers driving our climate positive future. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

Note: this is a crossover episode between The Big Switch and The Carbon Copy. If you like what you hear, consider subscribing to both.

When Covid disrupted the economy and shifted energy use, it sharply brought down economy-wide carbon emissions. Many wondered: would the pandemic-related changes to our energy system help or hurt the path to a net-zero carbon economy?

Two years later, we have clearer data: a new report from the Rhodium Group on how emissions from fossil fuels have shifted since the pandemic started. In some cases, they've roared back faster than expected.

This week on The Carbon Copy: what the latest emissions data tells us about what has shifted -- and what hasn't -- across America's carbon-dependent economy.

Guest: Melissa Lott, Senior Research Scholar at Columbia University and host of The Big Switch. 

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

Support for Carbon Copy comes from Climate Positive, a podcast from Hannon Armstrong, the first U.S. public company solely dedicated to investing in climate solutions. Climate Positive podcast features candid conversations with the leaders, innovators, and changemakers driving our climate positive future. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

Note: this is a crossover episode between Volts and The Carbon Copy. If you like what you hear, consider subscribing to both.

Pop culture is increasingly grappling with climate change themes. And some of it is appealing to wide audiences.

But Hollywood films with climate themes are often dystopic and heavy-handed. They fail to consider the forces causing it right now in nuanced ways.

So when David Roberts heard about a new Netflix film last December called Don't Look Up, he figured it would be more of the same. But he was delighted when screenwriter and director Adam McKay flipped the disaster-movie premise.

It worked. Don’t Look Up became one of the most popular movies ever on Netflix. And it sparked an overwhelming online response among climate scientists, culture writers, and audiences responding to the angst.

This week on The Carbon Copy: a conversation between David Roberts and Adam McKay about the inspiration, themes, and impact of the film. Will it convince Hollywood to approach climate differently? 

Guest: David Roberts, founder of the Volts Newsletter & Podcast. Read his review of the film. Listen to the extended version of his interview with Adam McKay.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

Support for Carbon Copy comes from Climate Positive, a podcast from Hannon Armstrong, the first U.S. public company solely dedicated to investing in climate solutions. Climate Positive podcast features candid conversations with the leaders, innovators, and changemakers driving our climate positive future. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

Hawaii wants a carbon-free electric grid by 2045. First, the island of Oahu must replace a major coal plant later this year.

But will there be enough renewable energy to fill the gap?

This week on The Carbon Copy: we examine the delays that are causing complications with Hawaii’s transition away from coal. 

We’re joined by Canary Senior Reporter Julian Spector, who recently traveled to Oahu to investigate the story.

Hawaii has long been a nationwide leader in solar development. In 2015, lawmakers crafted a law mandating an all-renewable grid within a few decades. And last year, they passed a bill that would end coal production.

As large-scale solar and battery projects like the Kapolei Energy Storage facility break ground, Hawaii is inching closer to a fossil-free grid. But impediments to projects are causing concern that the grid will get dirtier – and maybe less reliable – when the AES coal plant shuts down. 

“If things don't go smoothly, it certainly could give fodder to people who say that, it's dangerous to move too fast. That would be an unforced error for the energy transition because, technically there's no reason that this shouldn't work,” explains Julian.

Guest: Julian Spector, senior reporter at Canary Media. 

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

Support for Carbon Copy comes from Climate Positive, a podcast from Hannon Armstrong, the first U.S. public company solely dedicated to investing in climate solutions. Climate Positive podcast features candid conversations with the leaders, innovators, and changemakers driving our climate positive future. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

President Biden wants to slash America’s carbon emissions by half in a decade. He can’t achieve that goal without passing Build Back Better, a massive social-spending bill that devotes half a trillion dollars to clean energy.

Build Back Better would be the biggest American investment in climate technologies and programs ever. The stakes couldn’t be higher.

But with a slim Democratic majority in the Senate, a single dissenting vote legislator threatens to derail the bill. And right before Christmas, Senator Joe Manchin declared that he will not vote for it.

So are Biden’s climate ambitions dead? Not quite.

There’s still hope that Senator Manchin will come around – even if it means another period of intense negotiations.

This week: an insider gives an optimistic assessment of how we move ahead with America's most ambitious piece of climate legislation.

Guest: Katherine Hamilton, chair of 38 North Solutions.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Oracle. Oracle unlocks the energy of everyone. With the most comprehensive technology solutions and a deep understanding of human behavior, Oracle is putting people at the center of the energy transition. Learn more about Oracle’s vision of making the distributed, people-centered grid a reality: go.oracle.com/energyofeveryone.

Every December, TIME magazine picks an individual or group of people to be the "person of the year." 

This year, TIME picked a guy who equally inspires and infuriates: Tesla CEO Elon Musk. Musk is a culture-shifting CEO who brought the business of climate solutions into the zeitgeist in surprising – and sometimes weird – ways

He became the wealthiest person in the world partly because he sold his mission to make climate-positive technologies a reality – even when incumbents and skeptical investors never thought it could happen.

But Tesla's history is also filled with failed or missing products – or even outright lies.

This week: a brief history of Tesla. Has it lived up to Musk's original vision of building a sustainable energy company to vanquish fossil fuels?

Guest: Eric Wesoff, Editorial Director at Canary Media. 

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Oracle. Oracle unlocks the energy of everyone. With the most comprehensive technology solutions and a deep understanding of human behavior, Oracle is putting people at the center of the energy transition. Learn more about Oracle’s vision of making the distributed, people-centered grid a reality: go.oracle.com/energyofeveryone.

The term “carbon footprint” is everywhere. But it’s not rooted in the environmental movement. It’s rooted in a two-decade corporate marketing campaign created by an oil giant.

Mashable Reporter Mark Kaufman recently dug into the backstory of the term. He looked at the history of how companies have used advertising to shift the burden of responsibility for industry pollution away from them, and onto us. 

And that brought him to BP, which launched a highly successful marketing campaign around “beyond petroleum” -- and put the carbon footprint at the center. 

This week: The story of how that campaign is still fooling us about the real solutions to climate change.

Guest: Mark Kaufman, a climate reporter for Mashable. You can read his article about the history behind the carbon footprint here. 

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Oracle. Oracle unlocks the energy of everyone. With the most comprehensive technology solutions and a deep understanding of human behavior, Oracle is putting people at the center of the energy transition. Learn more about Oracle’s vision of making the distributed, people-centered grid a reality: go.oracle.com/energyofeveryone.

At the start of the year, a city councilman in Tampa, Florida crafted a resolution for 100% clean energy by 2030.

The resolution was non-binding and quite common. Nearly 200 cities around America have vowed to get 100% of their electricity from zero-carbon resources. 

But it also included language that would set off a political chain reaction in the state: an aspiration to phase out fossil fuels.

It scared the local gas and power utility, Tampa Electric, which used its lobbying power and money to launch a more aggressive counter-strike. And it spawned new Republican legislation that will restrict what cities can do about climate change.

This week: what Florida tells us about the new front in the conflict over climate policy across America. 

Guest: Grist Reporter Emily Pontecorvo, who co-authored a story about the gas industry’s influence on Florida’s new laws. 

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Oracle. Oracle unlocks the energy of everyone. With the most comprehensive technology solutions and a deep understanding of human behavior, Oracle is putting people at the center of the energy transition. Learn more about Oracle’s vision of making the distributed, people-centered grid a reality: go.oracle.com/energyofeveryone.

In 2019, the Green New Deal became a mobilizing force. Even without federal action, organizers started pushing cities across America to craft their own versions. 

One of those cities was Ithaca, New York. Ithaca is making a bold promise: to eliminate all emissions from buildings by 2030. 

To make the program a reality, the city needs to raise hundreds of millions of dollars. Ithaca's budget is $80 million. 

In stepped Luis Aguirre-Torres, the director of sustainability for Ithaca. He found a way to tap private dollars in an unprecedented way to overhaul buildings. 

This week: where the money is coming from, and how it could make the Green New Deal a reality in cities across the country.

Guests: Ithaca Climate Czar Luis Aguirre-Torres; 38 North Solutions Chair Katherine Hamilton.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Oracle. Oracle unlocks the energy of everyone. With the most comprehensive technology solutions and a deep understanding of human behavior, Oracle is putting people at the center of the energy transition. Learn more about Oracle’s vision of making the distributed, people-centered grid a reality: go.oracle.com/energyofeveryone.

COP26 ended in Glasgow, Scotland last week with a final deal. It established a framework for reporting emissions and trading carbon credits, called on countries to step up their targets next year, and included a mention of fossil fuels for the first time.

That mention of a “phase out” of fossil fuels almost killed the deal altogether.

In the final moments of the conference, India lobbied to weaken the phrase. Behind the scenes, China and the US supported the change. That created a showdown over the final language that could have prevented passage of the final agreement.

This week: what the conflict says about how power is wielded in global climate talks.

Guest: Akshat Rathi, a London-based reporter for Bloomberg News. He has a PhD in organic chemistry from the University of Oxford, and a BTech in chemical engineering from the Institute of Chemical Technology in Mumbai.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Oracle. Oracle unlocks the energy of everyone. With the most comprehensive technology solutions and a deep understanding of human behavior, Oracle is putting people at the center of the energy transition. Learn more about Oracle’s vision of making the distributed, people-centered grid a reality: go.oracle.com/energyofeveryone.

When the pandemic shut down the global economy in March of 2020, demand for oil and gas collapsed. It raised questions about whether we'd hit peak demand for petroleum.

But things look very different at the end of 2021. Oil and gas prices are now at multi-year highs.

And as world leaders gathered for climate talks in Scotland to discuss lowering fossil fuel use, there were calls to increase oil production to stabilize prices -- including from President Joe Biden.

This week: why oil is complicating global climate goals and threatening the pandemic recovery. 

Guest: Deborah Gordon, a senior principal in the Climate Intelligence Program at RMI. Deborah’s new book is “No Standard Oil: Managing Abundant Petroleum in a Warming World.

The Carbon Copy is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

The Carbon Copy is brought to you by Oracle. Oracle unlocks the energy of everyone. With the most comprehensive technology solutions and a deep understanding of human behavior, Oracle is putting people at the center of the energy transition. Learn more about Oracle’s vision of making the distributed, people-centered grid a reality: go.oracle.com/energyofeveryone.

Climate change is not a distant science story. It's a story about how everything in our carbon-based economy works -- and how it's getting re-worked.

The Carbon Copy is a weekly news analysis show that explains the changing planet through the lens of current events. In each episode, we talk to a journalist, executive, subject expert, practitioner or newsmaker to understand what their story tells us about how the planet is transforming.

The show is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.