Interchange Recharged

Since 2015, large corporations have signed deals for more than 7 gigawatts of renewable energy. As activity picks up, these companies are grappling with increasingly complex deals. They're no longer just thinking about renewable energy credits or average consumption over the year; they're now looking at matching wind, solar and hydro supply directly with their on-site demand in a more granular way. Consequently, energy storage is becoming more attractive.This week, we're talking with two leading buyers of renewable energy, Google and Microsoft.We'll talk with Neha Palmer, Google's head of energy strategy, about hitting 100 percent renewable energy. Then, we'll talk with Brian Janous, Microsoft's general manager of energy, about how deals around the world are structured.We'll also grapple with a bigger question that corporate buyers are facing: what happens to their procurement when the gigawatts and gigawatts of renewables they’re buying literally reshape how markets function?This podcast is also brought to you by Shoals, the gold standard for solar and storage balance-of-systems solutions. Learn more about how Shoals can make your project operate at the highest level.This podcast is brought to you by Fiveworx, a turnkey customer engagement platform for utilities. Find out more about how Fiveworx can help your customer engagement program succeed -- and get you beyond the meter.Recommended reading:GTM: The Latest Trends in Corporate Renewable Energy ProcurementGoogle: We’re Set to Reach 100% Renewable Energy -- and It’s Just the BeginningMicrosoft: Transitioning to Zero-Carbon EnergySubscribe to The Interchange podcast via Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher or wherever you find your audio content.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Ryan Hanley is convinced that the distributed electric grid will create vastly more economic, security and societal value than today's centralized system.Over the course of his career as a civil engineer -- working at Pacific Gas & Electric, SolarCity, Tesla and now Advanced Microgrid Solutions -- Hanley has worked to understand and extract that value. "A macro theme that I've been tracking in my career is that exchange of value over the grid [that] I'm convinced will only become more transactive over time. More value will be exchanged in markets as the system relentlessly tries to take out economic fat from the system."In this week's conversation, Shayle Kann talks with Hanley about the tools at hand to re-engineer the distributed, transactive grid system. Topics addressed in this interview include:What distributed energy resources actually look like to utility distribution engineers and planners.The ultimate outcome of net metering battles and the market's natural "equilibrium."How markets can extract maximum value from solar, storage and load control.What it takes to build a 100-megawatt battery in South Australia in 100 days based on a tweet from Elon Musk.The role of blockchain in future electricity marketsPlus, we'll play a bonus round of "who said it" and quiz Hanley on quotes from executives from PG&E, SolarCity, Tesla and Advanced Microgrid Solutions.This podcast is also brought to you by Shoals, the gold standard for solar and storage balance-of-systems solutions. Learn more about how Shoals can make your project operate at the highest level.This podcast is brought to you by Fiveworx, a turnkey customer engagement platform for utilities. Find out more about how Fiveworx can help your customer engagement program succeed -- and get you beyond the meter.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

In 2009, Sara Ross and her husband bought a dilapidated farmhouse in Massachusetts, intending to turn it into a net-zero home.Solar was an important part of the plan. And then came the price tag: $81,000 in cash. Their local solar installer had no financing options at that time.Ross cobbled the money together, but she became obsessed with the buying process: "How are other members of our family going to do this? How are our friends supposed to do this? How is this supposed to work? How are we going to scale this awesome thing if it's so very hard?"Finally, she harnessed that obsession (and her six-year-old daughter's college fund) and started a solar loan company, Sungage Financial. This was before anyone was serious about loans. Today, more rooftop solar in the U.S. is financed through loans than leases. In this week's edition of the live podcast series Watt It Takes, Ross sits down with Powerhouse CEO Emily Kirsch to discuss how she built Sungage -- evolving from solar customer to solar entrepreneur. Watt It Takes is a live interview series produced by Powerhouse in partnership with GTM. The conversation was recorded live in Oakland, California.Listen to our other episodes of Watt It Takes:Previous episodes of Watt It Takes: Nancy Pfund’s Pro Tips for Getting Started in CleantechSunPower Founder Dick Swanson’s Guide to Launching a Cleantech StartupLessons From the Fall of SungevityDan Shugar, the K​ing Midas of SolarA History of Greentech Media With Scott ClavennaThis podcast is also brought to you by Shoals, the gold standard for solar and storage balance-of-systems solutions. Learn more about how Shoals can make your project operate at the highest level.This podcast is brought to you by Fiveworx, a turnkey customer engagement platform for utilities. Find out more about how Fiveworx can help your customer engagement program succeed -- and get you beyond the meter.Like our shows? Make sure to give The Interchange and The Energy Gang a rating and review on Apple podcasts. And make sure to subscribe to both shows on Apple podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, or anywhere you get your podcasts.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Nothing can stop solar's growth trajectory -- except maybe solar itself.This week, we have a deep discussion on the future of solar photovoltaics. Solar is exploding around the world, but have we grappled with the technology and market limitations that could stop the next order of magnitude in growth for PV?On this week's episode of The Interchange, Shayle Kann sits down with Varun Sivaram, author of the new book, Taming the Sun: Innovations to Harness Solar Energy and Power the Planet.Shayle and Varun examine every angle of the solar transition. They consider numerous possible futures, good and bad, for the technology. "If we do not take the right actions and urgently in innovation today, I warn that in the medium term we might run into a penetration ceiling for solar. And by the time that happens, it might have been too late to start investing in these long-term innovations that only pay off after you've invested for a little while," explains Varun.Varun Sivaram is the Philip D. Reed Fellow for Science and Technology at the Council on Foreign Relations, and an adjunct professor at Georgetown University.This podcast is brought to you by Fiveworx, a turnkey customer engagement platform for utilities. Find out more about how Fiveworx can help your customer engagement program succeed -- and get you beyond the meter.Subscribe to The Interchange podcast via Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher or wherever you find your audio content.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Nancy Pfund is perhaps the most recognizable venture capitalist in the clean energy space.Before she raised multi-hundred-million-dollar funds at her firm DBL Partners and made early investments in the likes of Tesla, SolarCity, Off Grid Electric, PowerLight, NEXTracker and Advanced Microgrid Solutions, Pfund had to start somewhere."In college, I didn't know what a venture capitalist was -- I was an anthropology major," she said at the January recording of Watt It Takes, the live podcast from GTM and Powerhouse in which cleantech founders tell their stories.In this edition of Watt It Takes, Powerhouse CEO Emily Kirsch interviews Pfund about her successful venture capital career.Watt It Takes is a live interview series produced by Powerhouse in partnership with GTM. The conversation was recorded live in Oakland, California.The next live Watt It Takes taping will feature Sara Ross, co-founder and CEO of Sungage Financial, who turned her frustration at the lack of rooftop solar financing into a business opportunity -- with a little help from her daughter's college savings fund. It's happening Wednesday, February 21. Click here for tickets.Recommended reading:This podcast is brought to you by Fiveworx, a turnkey customer engagement platform for utilities. Find out more about how Fiveworx can help your customer engagement program succeed -- and get you beyond the meterSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

The Breakthrough Institute was founded on the idea that traditional environmentalists were wrong about how to protect the planet.Back in 2004, the co-founders called for ending the "politics of limits" pushed by environmental groups. Rather, they saw economic growth, technological innovation, and human ingenuity as the most important tools for environmental progress -- not necessarily regulatory limits. That angered large swaths of the environmental community.Over the last decade, the Breakthrough Institute has thrust itself into the tribal warfare that grips the energy and climate movement. Energy innovation versus deployment? Renewables versus nuclear? GMOs versus organic food? The organization brings strong views in those areas.In this episode, we’re going to talk with Alex Trembath, the communications director at Breakthrough, about where the think tank stands on renewables, nuclear, climate policy, and energy intensity. We'll also spend some time on tribalism itself -- and how to get beyond it.This podcast is brought to you by Fiveworx, a turnkey customer engagement platform for utilities. Find out more about how Fiveworx can help your customer engagement program succeed -- and get you beyond the meter.Recommended reading:The Death of Environmentalism (2004)An Ecomodernist ManifestoNature Unbound: Deocoupling for ConservationGTM: What the Struggling Nuclear Industry Can Learn From Boeing, SpaceX and Big PharmaSubscribe to The Interchange podcast via Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher or wherever you find your audio content.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Blockchain is coming to the energy industry in a big way.We're at the beginning of a fierce hype cycle, when new startups are emerging weekly to tout their Initial Coin Offerings and tokenization platforms for energy trading. Utility executives are grappling with yet another distributed technology that proponents say will demolish the traditional power delivery business.Still having a hard time understanding why all this matters? Getting lost in the maze of new terminology? We've got you covered.On this week's Interchange podcast, we're starting a new segment called "consensus." We'll bring a blockchain-related topic that we don’t understand -- a term, a business model, or an application -- and present it to GTM’s resident blockchain enthusiast, Scott Clavenna, to see if he can help us out. Hopefully we'll reach consensus.In this week's segment, we're bringing two questions to Scott: How does WePower's tokenized energy trading work? And how to different variations of cryptocurrency mining?If you need a blockchain 101 course, try listening to our earlier Interchange episode on the subject.This podcast is brought to you by Fiveworx, a turnkey customer engagement platform for utilities. Find out more about how Fiveworx can help your customer engagement program succeed -- and get you beyond the meter.Recommended reading:GTM: Can We Prevent a Global Energy Crisis From Bitcoin Mining?GTM: WePower Expansion Hints at Adoption of Blockchain for Energy TradingCome to our Blockchain in Energy Forum in New York CitySubscribe to The Interchange podcast via Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher or wherever you find your audio content.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

The Trump Administration just imposed 30 percent tariffs on imported solar cells and modules. How much will it stunt solar growth in America? Will it spark a broader trade war?There are a lot of questions about the impact. In this podcast, we’re giving you the answers – or, as many answers we have, just a day after the decision.This week, we'll bring together our teams from The Interchange and The Energy Gang together to answer listener questions about the tariffs. We'll also talk with GTM Research's Cory Honeyman about how (and where) the 30 percent penalty will impact projects around the U.S.Thanks to podcast sponsor, Fiveworx. Find out more about how Fiveworx can help your customer engagement program succeed.In this episode, we address:What does a 30 percent tariff mean for project economics in the residential and utility-scale sectors?How will the 2.5 gigawatt cell quota work?Will the decision help domestic U.S. manufacturing? Will it hurt domestic installation jobs?What kind of challenges will we see at the World Trade Organization?Is there a pathway toward a negotiation with China?How could local policy blunt the negative impact of these tariffs?Read all our previous coverage and analysis of the Trump Administration's solar tariffs:GTM Research: New Tariffs to Curb US Solar Installations by 11% Through 2022GTM: Trump Administration Issues 30% Solar Panel Import TariffGTM: Foreign Solar Manufacturers Weigh Opening US Facilities as Tariff Decision LoomsLike our shows? Make sure to give The Interchange and The Energy Gang a rating and review on Apple podcasts. And make sure to subscribe to both shows on Apple podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, or anywhere you get your podcasts.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Grid nerds have spent the last few months whipped into a frenzy over Energy Secretary Rick Perry’s hastily-written plan to prop up aging coal plants in the name of grid resiliency.And then, last week, federal energy regulators rejected it. Secretary Perry’s team couldn’t come up with the basic legal argument needed for FERC to consider the proposal.The door is not fully closed, however. Regulators say they want to revisit the idea of grid resiliency -- and now they’re asking regional grid operators to report back on their actual needs.So, it’s worth stepping back and asking the same question. What does the grid actually need? In an age when renewables -- and already, in some cases, batteries -- are the lowest-cost resources, how should we really be planning?This week, we're joined by two grid experts who’ve been asking this question for years: Sonia Aggarwal and Robbie Orvis of the analysis firm Energy Innovation.Sonia is the vice president of Energy Innovation. She heads up the firm’s work on power sector transformation and energy policy. And she also launched America’s Power Plan, a collection of insights about rapid change underway in the electric sector. Robbie is the policy design projects manager at Energy Innovation, where he works on power sector transformation issues. He’s a contributor to America’s Power Plan.This podcast is brought to you by Fiveworx, a turnkey customer engagement platform for utilities. Find out more about how Fiveworx can help your customer engagement program succeed -- and get you beyond the meter.Recommended reading:A Year-End Update on Electricity Policy from the FieldWind and Solar Are Our Cheapest Energy Generation Sources: Now What Do We Do?Grid Flexibility: Methods for Modernizing the Power Grid (PDF)A Roadmap for Finding Flexibility in Wholesale Markets (PDF)Subscribe to The Interchange podcast via Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher or wherever you find your audio content.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

When President Trump took office, U.S. coal was in a state of decline. Between 2007 and 2016, coal production and consumption each fell by more than a third, and mining jobs fell from 125,000 to 75,000.Trump promised to reverse that trend. Did his deregulatory agenda work?In 2017, U.S. coal production grew by 6 percent. That increase, however, came from a factor unrelated to Trump Administration policy: demand in foreign markets. Meanwhile, domestic coal consumption fell by 2.4 percent last year.This week, we talk with Trevor Houser, a partner with the Rhodium Group, about where things stand in America's coal sector. It still doesn't look good.In this conversation, we unpack some of the big themes we're grappling with as 2018 unfolds: coal demand, electric system reliability, and possible directions for climate policy. Houser will also explain why we've "achieved escape velocity" in renewable energy, and why that matters for our emissions trajectory.This podcast is brought to you by Fiveworx, a turnkey customer engagement platform for utilities. Find out more about how Fiveworx can help your customer engagement program succeed -- and get you beyond the meter.Recommended reading from the Rhodium GroupThe Year in CoalElectric System Reliability: No Clear Link to Coal and NuclearPreliminary US Emissions Estimates for 2017Subscribe to The Interchange podcast via Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher or wherever you find your audio content.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.