NTNU Energy Transition Podcast

"Solar energy is a substantial global industry, one that has generated trade disputes among superpowers, threatened the solvency of large energy companies, and prompted serious reconsideration of electric utility regulation rooted in the 1930s. One of the biggest payoffs from solar’s success is not the clean inexpensive electricity it can produce, but the lessons it provides for innovation in other technologies needed to address climate change.", says the description of UW–Madison professor Gregory F. Nemet's 2019 book: How Solar Energy Became Cheap. Nemet is a former teacher of mine and was kind enough to guest in today's episode. We talk about different ways countries utilize PV's, and solar's relationship to other emerging technologies. For although the first commercial solar cell was available in 1957, wide use hasn't been implemented until recent years. Why did it take so long to build traction? What can other technologies and innovations learn from solar energy? And what's the point of solar when the weather is bad? All this and more in episode 8: The Rise of Solar PV. — The NTNU Energy Transition Podcast aims to function as a knowledge hub that empowers individuals and organizations in Europe and beyond to tackle climate change and move our global society toward carbon neutrality. New episodes every Thursday. The NTNU Energy Transition Initiative was established to deliver world-leading research on energy transition strategies, to achieve the Paris ambitions in an efficient and realistic way. Every spring we organize the NTNU Energy Conference in Trondheim, Norway. You can find us on Twitter, LinkedIn, and on our webpage. Please reach out by mail to energytransition@ntnu.no.

The German energy transition, commonly known as the "Energiwende", is challenging many parts of German society. Until March 2011, one-quarter of Germany's electricity was obtained from nuclear energy, which is now due to be phased out in 2022. Coal-fired power generation is expected to diminish, as wind and solar receive generous financial support. Whether Germany's efforts have been a success or a failure has been a popular debate in recent years. Luckily for us, we found the perfect person to ask for a status update. Dr. Eva Schmidt, Team Leader German and European Energy Policy in Germanwatch: a non-profit, non-governmental organization that actively engages in international political and economic discussions, met with Julius for a chat in Berlin. — The  NTNU Energy Transition Podcast aims to function as a knowledge hub that empowers individuals and organizations in Europe and beyond to tackle climate change and move our global society toward carbon neutrality. New episodes every Thursday. The NTNU Energy Transition Initiative was established to deliver world-leading research on energy transition strategies, to achieve the Paris ambitions in an efficient and realistic way. Every March we organize the NTNU Energy Conference in Trondheim, Norway. You can find us on Twitter, LinkedIn, and on our webpage. Please reach out by mail to energytransition@ntnu.no.

Technology alone can't magically solve all our challenges. It is highly intertwined with user practices, other technologies, business models, value chains, regulations and structures in organizations, institutions, and policy. Therefore, while radical innovation and its diffusion is necessary, socio-technical systems always undergo long term incremental changes. In light of this, understanding these transformations becomes vital when trying to accelerate an Energy Transition that depends on change to both existing and future technologies. Giving us an introduction to how to understand these dynamics, Deputy Director for FME NTRANS, Professor Tomas M. Skjølsvold from NTNU's Department of Interdisciplinary Studies of Culture (KULT) joins in this week's episode. He researches society-wide transformations and transitions, much in the field of Energy Systems, and how one can work to make such transitions as democratic, inclusive and responsible as possible. Underlying this is a concern for the way science, technology and society interacts, and how this tends to privilege certain voices and interests, while marginalizing others. Link to articles mentioned in the episode: Technology Innovation System Analysis 1 & 2, Niche Destabilization 1 & 2. — The  NTNU Energy Transition Podcast aims to function as a knowledge hub that empowers individuals and organizations in Europe and beyond to tackle climate change and move our global society toward carbon neutrality. New episodes every Thursday. The NTNU Energy Transition Initiative was established to deliver world-leading research on energy transition strategies, to achieve the Paris ambitions in an efficient and realistic way. Every March we organize the NTNU Energy Conference in Trondheim, Norway. You can find us on Twitter, LinkedIn, and on our webpage. Please reach out by mail to energytransition@ntnu.no.

In late 2021, US President, Joe Biden signed a 1.2 trillion infrastructure bill in law, a key part of his agenda for the US' future economy, but also climate change mitigation. At that same time, NTNU adjunct professor Steven Gabriel from the University of Maryland paid us a visit. So naturally, I sat down to chat with him about this bill and what it could mean for the American Energy Transition. —  The NTNU Energy Transition Podcast aims to function as a knowledge hub that empowers individuals and organizations in Europe and beyond to tackle climate change and move our global society toward carbon neutrality. New episodes every Thursday. The NTNU Energy Transition Initiative was established to deliver world-leading research on energy transition strategies, to achieve the Paris ambitions in an efficient and realistic way. Every March we organize the NTNU Energy Conference in Trondheim, Norway. You can find us on Twitter, LinkedIn, and on our webpage. Please reach out by mail to energytransition@ntnu.no.

Norway is Unique: It has abundant natural energy resources and a relatively small population. It’s electricity runs mainly on carbon free hydro energy, and it is one of the wealthiest countries on the planet. But most of its wealth comes from exporting fossil fuels such as natural gas and oil. While the Norwegian government aims to accelerate the low carbon energy transition, social resistance rises against new wind farms in order to preserve nature and the cultural heritage of the country. To give an overview over these tricky topics I met with Asgeir Tomasgard. Asgeir is Professor at NTNU in the department of Industrial Economics and Technology Management. He is the director of the NTNU Energy Transition Initiative, and hence  he is the one that gave my producer Martin and me the slack to start this podcast. For the recording of this episode, I met him at the Gloshaugen Campus, where he has an office on the 9th floor of one of the main buildings. The view up there is pretty nice across the city of Trondheim. — The  NTNU Energy Transition Podcast aims to function as a knowledge hub that empowers individuals and organizations in Europe and beyond to tackle climate change and move our global society toward carbon neutrality. New episodes every Thursday. The NTNU Energy Transition Initiative was established to deliver world-leading research on energy transition strategies, to achieve the Paris ambitions in an efficient and realistic way. Every March we organize the NTNU Energy Conference in Trondheim, Norway. You can find us on Twitter, LinkedIn, and on our webpage. Please reach out by mail to energytransition@ntnu.no.

In this episode, I talk to Prof. Christina Voigt. Christina is a Professor at the University of Oslo and has been a member of the climate negotiation delegation of Norway for years.  The climate negotiation process occurring through the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is the primary forum for international cooperation on stabilizing atmospheric greenhouse gas emissions. The goal is to prevent catastrophic anthropogenic interference with the climate system aka. climate change.  In this episode, Christina explains how the climate negotiations processes were established in the 1990s and how it developed over time. Furthermore, you will get an overview of COP 26 in Glasgow and the results it yielded. At last, you will learn where the next COPs will take place and what topics will be negotiated.  Thanks for spending time with the NTNU Energy Transition Podcast. If you like this podcast, I would appreciate your five-star rating on Apple Podcast or Spotify, so that more people get to learn about how we can get the Energy Transition accelerated, both in Europe and beyond.  — The  NTNU Energy Transition Podcast aims to function as a knowledge hub that empowers individuals and organizations in Europe and beyond to tackle climate change and move our global society toward carbon neutrality. New episodes every Thursday. The NTNU Energy Transition Initiative was established to deliver world-leading research on energy transition strategies, to achieve the Paris ambitions in an efficient and realistic way. Every March we organize the NTNU Energy Conference in Trondheim, Norway. You can find us on Twitter, LinkedIn, and on our webpage. Please reach out by mail to energytransition@ntnu.no.

There is no doubt. Climate change is happening. And yes, the vast majority of researchers agree that it is us who cause it. But there is hope. We can fix this. In this episode, I talk to Kimberly Nicholas, who is a climate scientist and professor at Lund University in Sweden. Kimberly was born and raised in California, in a place surrounded by grapes and wine. She has a PhD from Stanford University, published a lot of peer reviewed papers, and is an energy package herself. I got to know her at a conference in Bergen, where she delivered a keynote and I thought "I just have to have her on the podcast". In this episode you will learn why the climate is warming, why we are sure that it is us, that it is bad, but also how we can fix it. Precisely about this topic, Kimberly has recently published a book. It is called Under the Sky we make. I am sure you can get it delivered to your local bookstore. If you want to reach out to Kimberly, you find her on Twitter and LinkedIN, and also through her webpage. Find Kimberly's newsletter on wecanfixit.substack.com. — The NTNU Energy Transition Podcast aims to function as a knowledge hub that empowers individuals and organizations in Europe and beyond to tackle climate change and move our global society toward carbon neutrality. New episodes every Thursday. The NTNU Energy Transition Initiative was established to deliver world leading research on energy transition strategies, to achieve the Paris ambitions in an efficient and realistic way. Every March we organize the NTNU Energy Conference in Trondheim, Norway. You can find us on Twitter, LinkedIN and our webpage or you can send us an email to energytransition@ntnu.no.

The NTNU Energy Transition Podcast aims to function as a knowledge hub that empowers individuals and organizations in Europe and beyond to tackle climate change and move our global society toward carbon neutrality. New episodes every Thursday. Join us in our Discord Channel, or find us Twitter, LinkedIN or our webpage. If email is your thing, than shoot us an email to energytransition@ntnu.no. The NTNU Energy Transition Initiative was established to deliver world leading research on energy transition strategies, to achieve the Paris ambitions in an efficient and realistic way. Every March we organize the NTNU Energy Transition Week in Trondheim, Norway.  The podcast is hosted by Julius Wesche. Julius is a researcher at the NTNU Energy Transition Initiative and the NTNU Department of Interdisciplinary Studies of Culture. He also runs the enPower Podcast on the German Energy Transition and the scicomX Podcast on digital science communication. You can find him also on Twitter, LinkedIN, and Instagram.