Six years after her last appearance on the podcast (Episode 28, 15 June 2020), Natasha Luther-Jones returns to join Laurent and Gerard for a lively catch-up on how both her career and the energy sector have evolved. What began with her being dubbed the “Queen of PPA” has expanded into a far broader role — prompting the hosts to crown her the “Energy Empress” as she now operates across the full spectrum of global energy and infrastructure. Natasha reflects on the evolution as the Global co-chair ...
Mar 16, 2026•29 min
While Gerard is fixing his knee, Laurent invites Chris Seiple, Vice Chairman of WoodMac Power & Renewables group, to try to make sense of the scale of the coming power demand surge and the strain it is placing on today’s US market structures. AI-driven datacenter growth is pushing the US power system into uncharted territory. Roughly 180 GW of U.S. electricity commitments tied to datacenters represent about 30% incremental demand. Hyperscaler CAPEX is exploding. Demand is accelerating far fa...
Mar 09, 2026•31 min
Last month, Gerard Reid joined Shayle Kann , Managing Partner at Energy Impact Partners , for a world class and fast-moving conversation on the state and future of Climate Tech. The discussion was organised by Carbon Equity and led by its co-founder Liza Rubinstein Malamud. Originally it featured a third guest, Will Dufton of Giant Ventures, whose contributions were fully edited for this episode (with apologies — and an open invitation to return). First strong statement: the Silicon Valley-style...
Mar 02, 2026•38 min
Lithium has doubled in three months. Copper is printing record highs. Silver went vertical—then collapsed. The move was fast. The reversals were faster. Volatility isn’t elevated. It’s systemic. But this isn’t just another commodity cycle. These metals sit at the core of the energy transition. They’re embedded in batteries, EVs, transmission lines, datacenters, wind turbines, and solar modules. When they move, the entire transition complex moves with them. So, what are we really looking at? Is t...
Feb 23, 2026•27 min
Clean Energy equities have comfortably outperformed the major indices in 2025. Laurent and Gerard are joined by friend of the show Shanu Mathew, an equity portfolio manager everyone in the sector knows to unpack what’s really driving this performance. We begin by putting recent returns into a longer-term context — and by flagging an important caveat: some of the strongest results are coming from highly concentrated portfolios. Shanu makes a critical distinction that often gets blurred in market ...
Feb 16, 2026•34 min
Luca Pedretti, Co-Founder, Pexapark, returns to discuss how volatility, market design, and new contract structures are transforming power markets and renewable economics. What begins with PPA pricing quickly evolves into a broader conversation about where value is now created in the clean energy system. We start with the growing importance of IFRS 13 fair value accounting . In increasingly volatile markets, long-term forecasts are no longer sufficient. Market-implied PPA prices are moving faster...
Feb 09, 2026•28 min
Resilience is the buzzword of the moment—from Gerard’s personal resilience on display in Davos last week to the critical issue of grid resilience. The great Doug Houseman draws a useful distinction between reliability and resilience. “Reliability is about how well you keep the lights on, while resilience is about how quickly you can restore power after an outage.” Over the past year, blackouts caused by extreme weather, human error, and physical attacks have exposed an uncomfortable truth: elect...
Feb 02, 2026•30 min
The infrastructure fund industry has become one of the most powerful engines behind the rise of renewables and datacenters. With Zak Bentley, Americas Editor, Infrastructure Investor (part of the PEI Group), Laurent and Gerard cut through the noise to deliver a clear-eyed view of where the infrastructure market really stands today. 2025 smashed fundraising records, with c.USD300bn raised, but it also laid bare an uncomfortable truth: this is a market in consolidation mode. Capital is concentrati...
Jan 26, 2026•30 min
Heat pumps sit at the heart of Europe’s strategy to cut emissions and reduce dependence on imported gas. Under the EU’s REPowerEU plan, the bloc is targeting 60 million heat pumps by 2030. By the end of 2025, almost 30 million units were already installed — progress, but still only halfway to the goal. Gerard and Laurent are joined by Paul Kenny , Director General of the European Heat Pump Association (EHPA), to unpack why adoption has surged in countries such as Japan, Scandinavia and parts of ...
Jan 19, 2026•32 min
Laurent and Gerard sit down with Jo-Jo Hubbard , CEO of Electron , to explore why the centre of gravity in the energy transition is shifting decisively toward the distribution grid. Jo-Jo explains why the “last mile” is becoming the true engine of system flexibility, how demand at the edge must become a core resource, and why DSOs aren’t confused about flexibility at all — they simply respond to the incentives regulators design. Flexibility, she argues, isn’t replacing grid reinforcement but mak...
Jan 12, 2026•31 min
Happy New Year energy nerds As tradition demands (and lawyers insist), the first episode of the year is the annual ritual where Gerard, Laurent, and Michael boldly predict the future of the energy transition… and then publicly roast themselves for last year’s bad calls. Before unleashing our 2026 Predictions, we do a mandatory rewind to the crystal-ball disasters of 2025: The 2025 prophecy graveyard: US oil production down in 2025 (MB — bold, brave… wrong) Oil at $40/bbl in 2025 (GR — oof) Geopo...
Jan 05, 2026•33 min
For our final episode of the year, Laurent jumped onto the Wolfe Power podcast, where he and host Alex Wolfe took a no-nonsense tour through the big energy moments that shaped 2025. Deals of the Year: The spectacular offshore wind meltdown in the US — Orsted’s year of pain — contrasted with the blazing global boom in battery deployment all over the world, up a staggering 50% year-on-year. The AI & Datacenter Surge: An extraordinary rise… but how much of it is grounded in facts, and how much ...
Dec 22, 2025•38 min
Will artificial intelligence reshape the power grid, or will the inertia and complexity of today’s infrastructure slow progress—or even redefine how large language models, chips, and datacenters are designed and located? To meet the exponential rise in energy demand, parts of the industry have taken shortcuts—rapidly adding behind-the-meter capacity through open-cycle gas turbines - OCGT (such as the Titan 350 from Caterpillar) with little regard for environmental regulations. The mantra seems t...
Dec 15, 2025•31 min
Gerard is on stage with Adele Zhao - Trina Solar and Thomas Raffeiner- The Mobility House at the Smarter E Conference. In a conversation hosted by Jonathan Gifford, they discuss about the future for the intersection of e-mobility and renewable energy. The conversation has been released as an Episode of “Powering Through” entitled The Resilience of Renewables. Participants take a closer look at the power of the e-mobility revolution, and what is needed to continue to push it forward. The uptake o...
Dec 08, 2025•29 min
For much of the past two decades, renewable energy investment was viewed as a core infrastructure play—favoured by funds and long-term capital seeking predictable, government-backed cash flows. Yet the gradual phase-out of subsidies and the increasing exposure of renewables to wholesale power price volatility have eroded that stability. Are investors misreading the new market dynamics? And can renewable portfolios be optimized under a fundamentally different investment logic? FlexPower, founded ...
Dec 01, 2025•32 min
Running a power market isn’t just about generating electricity—it’s about making sure every kilowatt is accounted for. Someone has to calculate who owes what, make sure the rules are fair, and keep the system balanced in real time. Think of it as being an accountant, a banker, and a referee—all rolled into one. In the UK, that vital but largely invisible role is handled by Elexon. Elexon is the Balancing and Settlement Code Company (BSCCo) for Great Britain. They are the neutral heartbeat of the...
Nov 24, 2025•30 min
Laurent sits down with Bruce Douglas, CEO of the Global Renewable Alliance, for a live conversation from COP30 in Belém, Brazil. They explore how COP30 is structured, the role of the Global Renewable Alliance, and the dynamics among participants. The 800-pound gorilla in the room—the United States—hasn’t derailed the negotiations, but one might ask: does it really matter? The real action, Bruce explains, takes place in the Blue Zone and the Green Zone, rather than in the endless debates over whe...
Nov 17, 2025•20 min
Solar energy has experienced explosive growth over the past five years — doubling in capacity outside of China and quadrupling within China. But with this rapid expansion come new concerns: Are we scaling too quickly? And is the proliferation of solar now starting to strain power grids, creating more problems than solutions? Enter the concept of the “3 Cs” — Congestion, Curtailment, and Cannibalization — a term coined by Richard Sverisson at Montel. It captures the growing pains of an energy sys...
Nov 10, 2025•29 min
Laurent and Gerard have an explosive conversation with Bryan Long, Executive Director in JPMorgan’s Commodities Group. They explore why U.S. energy market signals are failing to support new capacity investments, despite soaring demand (especially from datacenters). Key issues include misaligned pricing, liquidity constraints, and hedging challenges, all of which deter long-term private capital. Key Takeaways: Current price signals don’t support investment in new generation, even as large load gr...
Nov 03, 2025•28 min
We are in the middle of a battery boom, for EVs and even more for BESS. What's really happening in the electric vehicle (EV) market? Is China dominating the field, or are serious alternatives emerging? What roles are Europe, the U.S., and other global regions playing? Which chemistries are winning out, and how are prices trending? These are the questions we ask ourselves every day — and today, Gerard and Laurent are thrilled to have someone who can help us answer them. Laurent and Gerard are joi...
Oct 27, 2025•29 min
For our 200th episode, we had the pleasure and privilege of speaking with Nat Bullard, one of the sharpest minds in the energy world. A leading analyst in climate and energy, Nat is known for his clear insights on clean energy, decarbonization, and the global energy transition. Formerly Chief Content Officer at BloombergNEF, he is now also a co-founder of the AI company Halcyon. Nat is perhaps best known for his annual 200-slide deck, a rich compilation of global data and charts that paints a cl...
Oct 20, 2025•30 min
The oil and gas industry is clinging to the narrative that we're entering a "Golden Age of Gas" — especially when it comes to LNG. Riding this assumption, companies have been pouring in investments at an aggressive pace, with plans to double LNG export capacity by the end of the decade. US LNG FIDs are breaking all records in 2025, with 55 mtpa of liquefaction capacity sanctioned since the start of the year. This is the second-best year for global LNG FIDs (Final Investment Decision), second onl...
Oct 13, 2025•28 min
Germany is experiencing a battery blitz. The market is expected to triple from 2GW to 6GW in less than two years. To give a bit of context, Zach Williams from Modo Energy, gives us the big picture and fundamentals of the German battery market. Legacy developers have not yet been able to catch that wave, but newcomers have. We bring on one those new pioneers, Philipp Man, CEO of Terralayr. In less than three years, Philipp has managed to set up a company which operates or currently builds 150MW o...
Oct 06, 2025•28 min
With Gerard away, Laurent invited another Irishman, Killian Daly, to dive into a technical—but critically important—topic: carbon accounting, power procurement, the GHG Protocol (v3), and the push for 24/7 green energy. For as long as we can remember, companies have tried to boost their green credentials—high rewards if successful, limited consequences if they fall short. To curb exaggerated claims, standards like the GHG Protocol emerged. Laurent was part of the original task force that develop...
Sep 29, 2025•22 min
Aviation and marine transport together account for approximately 15% of global oil consumption—a substantial share driven by sectors that are among the hardest to decarbonize. Unlike road transport or power generation, these industries face unique constraints: the high energy density required, long operating ranges, and the limitations of onboard storage mean that electrification or hydrogen solutions remain technologically and economically unfeasible in the near to medium term. In response, pol...
Sep 22, 2025•30 min
Battery technology lies at the core of the global energy transition, but managing and optimizing battery systems has become a highly specialized discipline. ACCURE is a cutting-edge startup that is redefining how batteries are monitored and operated. Using artificial intelligence, advanced sensors, and deep electrochemical expertise, ACCURE has established itself in the field of predictive battery analytics. The company currently supports over 6 gigawatt-hours of battery systems across various s...
Sep 15, 2025•30 min
Water, wind, sunlight — the driving forces behind renewable energy. The better we can predict them, the more we can accelerate progress and reduce risk. Weather forecasting is undergoing a quantum leap, powered by breakthroughs in satellites, drones, and artificial intelligence. Once the exclusive domain of national weather services, the industry is now being transformed by a new wave of tech-driven startups. And the market is booming. In this episode, Laurent and Gerard welcome Dr. Martin J. Fe...
Sep 08, 2025•27 min
Three wise men met and discussed the Seven Sins of The Energy Transition. Laurent, Gerard and Michael dissect seven sectors that have captured attention, investments and public money and are at best dead ends, at worst disasters waiting to happen. Greed — “Subsidy Mining in a Lab Coat” (Carbon Capture & Direct Air Capture) A capital-intensive detour that soaks up public money while delivering trivial abatement at extreme cost, great PR for incumbents, weak climate math. Gluttony — “Three Kil...
Sep 01, 2025•30 min
Gerard delivered a keynote on Digitalisation, AI, Supply Chains and Electrification at the EcoVadis Global Summit. Gerard Reid argues that we are living through a new industrial revolution driven by digitalization, AI, and electrification, comparable in scale to the steam and automobile revolutions of the past. He highlights how China is rapidly outpacing Western forecasts in areas like AI, solar power, and electric vehicles, reshaping global competitiveness. Reid stresses that AI will transform...
Aug 25, 2025•23 min
This is a re-release of the legendary interview by Michael Barnard of Pr Bent Flyvbjerg on our sister show ”Redefining Energy Tech” Professor Bent Flyvbjerg, an expert on megaprojects and author of How Big Things Get Done , shares insights from a database of over 16,000 projects, revealing that 99.5% fail to meet expectations in budget, timeline, or benefits. He stresses the value of learning from successful projects, especially in renewable energy, where solar, wind, and transmission projects o...
Aug 18, 2025•1 hr 20 min
