Interchange Recharged

Geothermal technology is a hugely untapped sustainable energy source. In this episode of the Interchange: Recharged, we drill Carlos, the CEO of Quaise Energy, on all things geothermal and the opportunities it presents to decarbonise energy production. Quaise seeks to unlock the potential of geothermal at the Terawatt scale. Carlos studied at MIT and then spent 15 years with Schlumberger, before he moved to The Engine, MIT’s fund where Quaise was born.Quaise is an emerging clean energy company leveraging decade-long research, combined with cutting-edge new tech, to access the 90% of clean untapped geothermal energy under our feet. What was possible only on paper a decade ago is emerging as a reality today. Quaise is currently creating ground-breaking millimetre drilling technoogy, developed in partnership with MIT, to dig deeper, faster, and safer than ever before. This innovative technology will break down the many barriers currently inhibiting access to geothermal energy: location, outdated technology, infrastructure costs, and scalability.They analyse the potential for geothermal in solving the world's energy crisis and accelerating the energy transition. How many terawatts of energy does the world need to operate in the next 50 years? What is Quaise even looking for 12 miles under our feet? Does this new technology mean we can access geothermal energy in most places on the globe? How does Geothermal compare to solar or wind?" The discussion goes deep, so strap in for this week’s Interchange: Recharged. The Interchange is brought to you by the Yale Program in Financing and Deploying Clean Energy, training working professionals to accelerate the deployment of clean energy worldwide. To connect with Yale expertise right from your laptop, grow your professional network, and deepen your impact, visit yalecleanenergy.info/Interchange and apply before March 13, 2022.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

America's energy transition is a complex and intricate process with a lot of moving parts. When discussing decarbonizing the globe, the electrical grid is usually overlooked and left out of the conversation. With an influx of renewable energy entering the grid, a constantly growing energy demand, coupled with record-breaking weather events and ageing infrastructure we have seen the strength of the existing grid tested to the limit. The American Electrical Grid is in need of physical updates and digital modernization. This week, we are accompanied by two leaders of grid modernisation industry, Peter Wells (CEO of Smart Wires) and Hudson Gilmer (CEO of LineVision) whose companies are using data and new tech to enable the grid to cope with the new demands.Smart Wires uses Modular Power Control to direct power where it's needed and decrease the chances of possible outages and LineVision uses the power of innovative data and analytical tools to ensure the power lines and grid are being optimized and used at their fullest capacity. Hudson and Peter discuss the biggest challenges utility companies across the US are facing. How is the introduction of new renewable energy projects affecting the grid? How reliable is our grid in times of extreme weather events? Is the grid currently on track to keep up with the future projections of energy demand? What are the policy changes required to modernise the grid? All these questions and more, on The Interchange: Recharged.The Interchange is brought to you by the Yale Program in Financing and Deploying Clean Energy, training working professionals to accelerate the deployment of clean energy worldwide. To connect with Yale expertise right from your laptop, grow your professional network, and deepen your impact, visit yalecleanenergy.info/Interchange and apply before March 13, 2022.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

On the Interchange this week, we are joined by Alight CEO and founder Dr Harald Overholm. Harald was previously a cleantech venture capitalist and an advisor on solar markets to the WWF and the Swedish Government. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge with a thesis on solar diffusion and PPA. Alight is the leading solar Power Purchase Agreement provider in the Nordics. The company builds, operates, and owns solar projects, onsite and offsite, specialising in solar PPA. They are currently on track to develop more than 500 MW of PPA-based onsite and offsite projects across Europe.We discuss the future of large scale commercial solar projects, the benefits of a PPA for businesses and investors, the role of co-located storage and the policies and legislation in the US that impede (or accelerate) progress in the sector. They discuss the past, present and future of solar funding and the M&A landscape.The Interchange is brought to you by Schneider Electric. Are you building a microgrid? With a microgrid you can store electricity and sell it back during peak times. Keep your power on during an outage. Integrate with renewables. Control energy on your own terms. Having built more microgrids in than anyone else, Schneider Electric has the expertise to help.The Interchange is brought to you by Bloom Energy. Bloom’s onsite energy platform provides unparalleled control for those looking to secure clean, reliable 24/7 power that scales to meet critical business needs. It eliminates outage and price risk while accelerating us towards a zero carbon future. Visit Bloom Energy to learn how to take charge today.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

President Biden’s Build Back Better bill includes tax incentives for consumers to switch to electric vehicles, and a multi-billion dollar plan for charging stations and infrastructure. The intent is there, but why is EV adoption in the US still lagging behind the rest of the world? This week on The Interchange, we are joined by Professor Gil Tal from UC Davis, and Professor Peter Wells from Cardiff University, to compare the attitudes towards electric vehicles in the US and Europe.What are the barriers standing in the way of mass EV adoption? And what tech and policy breakthroughs are we seeing to overcome these hurdles? Tesla’s market share of EVs hovers around 80%, so what are other manufacturers doing to increase their share of the ever-growing market?The Interchange is brought to you by Schneider Electric. Are you building a microgrid? With a microgrid you can store electricity and sell it back during peak times. Keep your power on during an outage. Integrate with renewables. Control energy on your own terms. Having built more microgrids in than anyone else, Schneider Electric has the expertise to help.The Interchange is brought to you by Bloom Energy. Bloom’s onsite energy platform provides unparalleled control for those looking to secure clean, reliable 24/7 power that scales to meet critical business needs. It eliminates outage and price risk while accelerating us towards a zero carbon future. Visit Bloom Energy to learn how to take charge today. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

You can develop enough renewable energy to power the world, but without energy storage systems, those developments are rendered somewhat moot. To achieve President Biden’s target of 90% renewables by 2035, the US needs an additional 9 terawatts of solar storage.What do our current storage solutions look like? Are batteries leading the charge?To answer those questions we turn to Rebecca Ciez, Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Purdue University.We look at the current storage options. Are batteries powerful enough to deliver power during outages or periods of no sunlight? Rebecca talks about the materials needed for solar batteries and how we can improve the technology to reduce the strain on supply chains. Investment and government incentives are then thrust under the microscope by David, before the discussion wraps with examining the technological advancements in the space.The Interchange is brought to you by Schneider Electric. Are you building a microgrid? With a microgrid you can store electricity and sell it back during peak times. Keep your power on during an outage. Integrate with renewables. Control energy on your own terms. Having built more microgrids in than anyone else, Schneider Electric has the expertise to help.The Interchange is brought to you by Bloom Energy. Bloom’s onsite energy platform provides unparalleled control for those looking to secure clean, reliable 24/7 power that scales to meet critical business needs. It eliminates outage and price risk while accelerating us towards a zero carbon future. Visit Bloom Energy to learn how to take charge today.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Why wouldn’t everyone invest in solar? Well, for that reason exactly: it’s an investment. Although it’s praised for its low maintenance costs and long-term savings, it is still a hefty investment in terms of individual finance cost, manufacturing, and installation. The production of solar panels requires expensive raw material, such as high-grade silicon, and silver for the wiring and cells.If the industry could just get the cost of materials down, the climate and environmental benefits would extend far beyond the energy sector.An Australian organization called SunDrive solar recently made headlines for their use of copper wiring in solar cells, opening up the opportunity for solar production costs to plummet and increase global solar adoption. We are joined by PV Magazine Founding Editor Jonathan Gifford to examine this achievement, and what it could mean for solar.They also explore supply chains issues, tackling NIMBYism and together they predict the Next Big Things in solar tech.The Interchange is brought to you by Schneider Electric. Are you building a microgrid? With a microgrid you can store electricity and sell it back during peak times. Keep your power on during an outage. Integrate with renewables. Control energy on your own terms. Having built more microgrids in than anyone else, Schneider Electric has the expertise to help.The Interchange is brought to you by Bloom Energy. Bloom’s onsite energy platform provides unparalleled control for those looking to secure clean, reliable 24/7 power that scales to meet critical business needs. It eliminates outage and price risk while accelerating us towards a zero carbon future. Visit Bloom Energy to learn how to take charge today.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

An announcement: this is Shayle Kann's last episode of the show.In Shayle's final episode, he shares a few words about the history of the show.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

At the beginning of the pandemic, energy prices crashed. We did an episode of this show trying to figure out how oil prices fell to negative $40 per barrel.Times have changed. Oil is up over $100/barrel. But far more acute is what’s happening with natural gas, particularly in Europe and Asia. In the US, natural gas prices have doubled in the last year. But in parts of Europe, the price has risen more than 5 times.The disruptions are clear. We're seeing stories of power shortages in China, fertilizer plants being shut down in the UK, and fears about home heating costs in the Northeast US as winter approaches.So what the heck is going on? How long might it last? And what does it tell us about the future?To answer those questions Shayle turns to Leslie Palti-Guzman, the President of Gas Vista and a non-resident fellow at NYU SPS Center for Global Affairs.Shayle and Leslie cover the many demand-side and supply-side issues. Then they talk about what comes next: What does this crisis reveal about the vulnerability of the energy system? And will countries double down on renewables, gas, or both to shore up their resiliency?The Interchange is brought to you by Schneider Electric. Are you building a microgrid? With a microgrid you can store electricity and sell it back during peak times. Keep your power on during an outage. Integrate with renewables. Control energy on your own terms. Having built more microgrids in than anyone else, Schneider Electric has the expertise to help.The Interchange is brought to you by Bloom Energy. Bloom’s onsite energy platform provides unparalleled control for those looking to secure clean, reliable 24/7 power that scales to meet critical business needs. It eliminates outage and price risk while accelerating us towards a zero carbon future. Visit Bloom Energy to learn how to take charge today.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

We’re rebroadcasting one or our favorite episodes, called “Would I Lie to You?” We originally ran it right after the 2020 election as a light-hearted distraction during a dark news cycle.Shayle Kann gets together with Adam James, the Chief of Staff and Senior Vice President at Energy Impact Partners (where Shayle also works) to play an energy-themed version of the British game show Would I Lie to You?Here are the rules:Each player selects three energy-related facts or stories. Any number of the three can be lies, and at least one has to be a lie.They have to be clear lies, not slight adjustments of the truth.The other person can ask three questions, and they must get an answer.At the end of the round, the truths and lies are revealed. If the score is a tie, it moves to a penalty shootout where each person offers a fact/story and the other person has to determine whether it is the truth or a lie. If someone misses and the other person gets their next answer right, they win.The Interchange is brought to you by Schneider Electric. Are you building a microgrid? With a microgrid you can store electricity and sell it back during peak times. Keep your power on during an outage. Integrate with renewables. Control energy on your own terms. Having built more microgrids in than anyone else, Schneider Electric has the expertise to help.The Interchange is brought to you by Bloom Energy. Bloom’s onsite energy platform provides unparalleled control for those looking to secure clean, reliable 24/7 power that scales to meet critical business needs. It eliminates outage and price risk while accelerating us towards a zero carbon future. Visit Bloom Energy to learn how to take charge today.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Shayle has been brewing up an investment thesis around how decarbonization will create stratification in traditional commodity sectors, like chemicals and materials. If you can produce the same thing in the same cost range -- but you can do so in a CO2-free or carbon-negative -- you'll reap the rewards.Lanzatech is a great test case for that thesis, as well as a great story to tell about the history of this sector. It was founded in 2005 as a biofuels company. Now, it captures industrial waste gasses, such as CO2 and CO, and recycles them into the chemicals used to make everything from plastics to medical supplies to fabric for Lululemon. It has even spun out an entire company focused on jet fuel.Shayle talks to CEO Dr. Jennifer Holmgren about carbon recycling and the big dent it could make in global greenhouse gas emissions. They break down the economics of competing with undifferentiated ethanol, jet fuel, and chemicals and the brand interest driving interest in carbon recycling tech.Jennifer hints at the potential for applying genetics expertise from medicine to industrial biotechnology; one day Lanzatech hopes to produce acetone, isopropyl alcohol and other valuable chemicals directly from its carbon-eating microbes. She reflects on leading one of the few companies to survive booms and busts of cleantech over the years. And she explains why the Lanzatech team decided not to ask their bacteria to do cartwheels. The Interchange is brought to you by Hitachi ABB Power Grids. Are you building a renewable plant? Looking for a battery energy storage system? Thinking about how to integrate renewables to your grid? Hitachi ABB Power Grids is your choice. The Interchange is brought to you by LONGi Solar, the world’s leading solar technology company. A global market leader, LONGi has unmatched bankability, quality and performance validated by third-party laboratories, and has breakthrough innovation at both the wafer and module level.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.