Ciarán Cuffe , prominent Green Party Member of the European Parliament (MEP) from Dublin, known for his pivotal role in shaping European climate and energy policies, joins the pod. We discuss the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive , aimed at cutting the 40% EU emissions from buildings, and the pressing challenges and prospects leading up to the 2024 European Parliament elections. Key Topics Discussed * Climate Breakdown and Optimism: Cuffe opens with a stark observation of climate breakdo...
Mar 16, 2024•39 min•Season 2Ep. 7
In this episode of Wicked Problems , Richard talks with Joe Pretorius , one of the visionaries behind the “toco” currency and co-founder of The Carbon Reserve , a non-profit central bank that will manage the money supply of tocos by matching them with carbon credits, with those assets backing the currency - marking a huge difference in approach to assets from the decentralised, vibes-driven approach of cryptocurrencies. As it launches in Switzerland this week, soon to be followed by a launch in ...
Mar 13, 2024•51 min•Season 2Ep. 6
Welcome back to Wicked Problems - Climate Tech Conversations. As the SEC votes today on new climate risk disclosure requirements for US public companies, here’s our conversation about the evolving landscape of climate disclosures with Ryan Skinner , Head of Research for Net Zero and Climate Risk at Verdantix — a leading market research firm advising on sustainability, operations, risk, and facilities management. Join us as we explore the complexities and challenges of climate risk, the role of f...
Mar 06, 2024•34 min•Season 2Ep. 5
Richard Delevan sits down with Solitaire Townsend , author of The Solutionists: How Businesses Can Fix the Future and the co-founder of the sustainability consultancy Futerra . * [00:03:00] Introduction: Solitaire Townsend's background and journey into environmental activism. * [00:08:00] Optimism vs. Possibilism: Why embracing possibilism is crucial in the fight against climate change. * [00:15:30] Storytelling as a Tool: The role of storytelling in shaping our environmental future. * [00:22:45...
Feb 27, 2024•50 min•Season 2Ep. 4
Richard Delevan sits down with Steven Meersman , co-founder of Zenobē Energy , to discuss the electrifying path from a basement coffee shop meeting to leading a revolution in the renewable energy sector. Listen in as we explore the innovative strides Zenobē has made in battery storage and electric transportation, pushing the boundaries of what's possible in our pursuit of a sustainable future. Episode Highlights * [00:06:12] Overcoming challenges and scaling up in the renewable energy sector. * ...
Feb 25, 2024•40 min•Season 2Ep. 3
What if we’re too late for a “Just Transition”, and the best we can hope for is a “Just Collapse”? Dr. Tadzio Mueller started as an alter-globalisation protest leader in 1999 before embracing climate activism. A spat on BlueSky with climate analyst and previous guest Ketan Joshi led to the suggestion to come on the show. Richard differs on the inevitability, but this is a conversation, not a shouting match. It roams from LNG to “electric capitalism” to Paul Kingsnorth and crises of faith to Mich...
Feb 18, 2024•1 hr 28 min•Season 2Ep. 2
Welcome back for Series 2 of Wicked Problems - Climate Tech Conversations . Farmers may wind up making or breaking our chance to tackle climate change. In this episode Claire Brady and Richard Delevan speak with Antony Yousefian, partner at The First Thirty VC , shares his journey from finance to the forefront of climate tech and sustainable investment in the UK. Delving into the impacts of climate change on agriculture, the potential of regenerative farming, Antony provides invaluable insights ...
Feb 15, 2024•41 min•Season 2Ep. 1
In case you missed it, here's our most popular episode of 2023 - our chat with the one and only Michael Barnard . Back in October, we talked about IEA's World Energy Outlook, COP28, Hydrogen hopium, CCUS, predatory delay, HVDC, electrification, LDES, Michael Liebreich, and MPs "with the STEM background of illiterate newts" Subscribe to our newsletter at news.wickedproblems.uk , and get new #climatetech conversations first with co-hosts Richard Delevan and Claire Brady. Michael Barnard is a Forbe...
Dec 25, 2023•56 min•Season 1Ep. 25
Welcome back to Wicked Problems . Did we bite off more than we could chew this year? Ask us after the Chouchou and mince pies are gone. Our attempts to try out some Icelandic did not go well - so in this conversation with ENSO Tyres founder and Earthshot Prize finalist Gunnlaugur Peter Erlendsson , we respected his wishes and probably avoid prosecution in Iceland by just calling him “G”. In this conversation with Richard Delevan , G: discusses the importance of open-heartedness and inclusivity i...
Dec 23, 2023•38 min•Season 1Ep. 24
Welcome to Wicked Problems . While other climate tech shows are winding down, we’re still pumping out the content about an issue - let’s be honest - you’re going to be thinking about over the break. Because that’s the sort of person you are. For our newsletter and ad-free listening, subscribe at news.wickedproblems.uk. In co-host Richard Delevan 's conversation with John Hartley of Levidian , we cover: Levidian's Mission and Technologies * Introduction to Levidian and its role in decarbonizing w...
Dec 22, 2023•36 min•Season 1Ep. 23
Welcome back to Wicked Problems . The climate tech show not afraid to ask the big questions. Like, what last-minute gifts should climate nerds ask Santa to bring them? We asked Ben Cooke , who writes about climate tech and the environment at The Times, to talk through his recommended books of the year : The Deluge , by Stephen Markley A climate thriller that goes much faster than its 900 pages might suggest. “It's really, it's really worth it”. Avocado Anxiety , by Louise Gray Climate Capitalism...
Dec 19, 2023•32 min•Season 1Ep. 22
Welcome back to Wicked Problems. The climate tech show and newsletter that was so early walking out of COP before it was cool. Things look bleak at a deadlocked #COP28 in Dubai right now - so we thought this was a good time to share this optimistic conversation Claire Brady and Richard Delevan had with Hannah Scott , CEO of Oxfordshire Greentech. We talk about Hannah’s experiences in building one of the world’s most exciting climate tech clusters, where innovation isn’t just talked about but bro...
Dec 12, 2023•42 min•Season 1Ep. 21
Welcome back to Wicked Problems . The climate tech podcast and newsletter that while not at Climate Coachella in person has spent enough time at Expo City in Dubai to wonder if COP28 kept the Irish pub on site. Wicked Problems is a listener-supported show. To receive new shows to your inbox and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber at news.wickedproblems.uk . Serious work was continuing at COP in between Siberian Jurassic Park Wooly Mammoth exhibitions and unalloyed trade ...
Dec 08, 2023•37 min•Season 1Ep. 20
Welcome back to Wicked Problems. The climate tech show and newsletter with dogs that remind us that even the end of the world can’t take priority over a timely walk. Wicked Problems is listener-supported - consider becoming a paid subscriber at news.wickedproblems.uk. Andy Reisinger is a respected climate scientist who just published a new paper arguing that the gap between “staying under 1.5” and what the science says is likely means it’s time to talk seriously about managing overshoot. He spok...
Dec 07, 2023•52 min•Season 1Ep. 19
Welcome back to Wicked Problems . The climate tech podcast and newsletter that Al Gore agrees with - like we told you yesterday , do not mess with Mary Robinson . Elizabeth Thompson and Chris Hayes of Visions2030 , a project that seeks to bring to harness the creative imagination of all of us to envision a future less Blade Runner’s Cyberpunk and more Wakanda’s Solarpunk. Wicked Problems is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid...
Dec 06, 2023•28 min•Season 1Ep. 18
Welcome back to Wicked Problems . The climate tech show and newsletter that knows better than to mess with former president of Ireland Mary Robinson . In this episode, Richard Delevan is joined by Dr. Sugandha Srivistav of the Oxford Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment . Sugandha rediscovered the story of George Cove, a forgotten inventor who may have stumbled on a working photovoltaic cell - whose “sun-ray machine” gained the equivalent of tens of millions in investment dollars and w...
Dec 05, 2023•35 min•Season 1Ep. 17
Welcome back to Wicked Problems - the climate tech podcast and newsletter that’s less stressful for King Charles than a fountain pen. As things heat up at COP28 in Dubai, and world leaders discuss how to agree to stop putting carbon dioxide up into the atmosphere, what do we do with the 1000 Gigatons of CO2 we’ve already stuck up there? Cara Maesano of RMI (formerly known as the Rocky Mountain Institute) speaks with co-hosts and about RMI’s new comprehensive 400-page applied innovation roadmap o...
Dec 01, 2023•47 min•Season 1Ep. 16
Welcome back to Wicked Problems . Ulrich Seitz has worked in climate tech for 15 years - as an entrepreneur, a venture investor, and as an advisor. And he thinks a boom in investment in climate adaptation technologies that face the consequences of climate change is right around the corner, even while not giving up on mitigation efforts. Ulrich Seitz Co-hosts Richard Delevan and Claire Brady talk with Ulrich about his views on the most investable sectors in adaptation, like water management and s...
Nov 25, 2023•35 min•Season 1Ep. 15
Welcome back to Wicked Problems . Despite sounding like we’re auditioning to be the new noise of the TARDIS, we hope our conversation with Startup Coalition deputy policy director, and friend of the show, Charlie Mercer is easier to listen to than running a key over the bass strings of a piano. Charlie helped us decode the implications for the climate tech sector of this week’s UK “Autumn Statement”, which is not a new line of outerwear but a fancy name for the mini-budget unveiled this week by ...
Nov 24, 2023•25 min•Season 1Ep. 14
Welcome back to Wicked Problems. We know when we’re outclassed so we’ll leave the jokes to the professionals. Claire Brady and Richard Delevan were joined by Ben Carey and Nick Oldridge , the co-founders of Climate Science Breakthrough . Like most really good comedy it’s deadly serious at its core - like spending your family fortune on a climate science comedy project instead of your kids. We hear about how the project came about, why they thought putting comedians like Nish Kumar and Jonathan P...
Nov 22, 2023•43 min•Season 1Ep. 13
Maritime shipping accounts for 3% of global emissions.Moving away from diesel for powering the 90% of global trade that happens by ship is beginning in earnest as the industry starts to decarbonise, and shipping gets included in emissions trading schemes. BAR Technologies CTO Simon Schofield talked to us about their WindWings technology, applying high-performance racing design thinking to shipping, and how could be part of the decarbonisation mix for shipping. Tell us what you think and sign up ...
Nov 18, 2023•31 min•Season 1Ep. 12
Mark Little was a foreign correspondent for RTE, the Irish national broadcaster, before a second career in tech. He founded citizen journalism verification service Storyful, sold that to NewsCorp, was the Ireland MD for Twitter, founded an online safety startup, Kinzen, before it was acquired by Spotify, where he continues to work. Tonight he’s back on TV, presenting a fictional newscast from the future, Tomorrow Tonight - Ireland 2050. It promises to be great television - grounded in the scienc...
Nov 15, 2023•37 min•Season 1Ep. 11
Gil Michel-Garcia is co-founder of EVelution Energy , which is building a solar-powered cobalt processing facility in Yuma, Arizona that could supply enough material for 1 million EV batteries a year to US auto manufacturers. And how competition for critical mineral supplies between China and the West will shape his sector as well as a lot of the politics of the next decade. Cobalt is one of those minerals that has seen wild price swings over the past couple of years: We spoke just as US Treasur...
Nov 13, 2023•40 min•Season 1Ep. 10
Welcome back to Wicked Problems - the climate tech podcast that has to be as good as other podcasts, but backwards and in heels. Richard and Claire chat through Akshat Rathi’s new book, Climate Capitalism . They also reflect on their reactions to the new research that says staying under 1.5C of warming might be out of reach, their conversations with Ketan Joshi and Susan Joy Hassol. And the answers to the question, what should we be saying about the 1.5C target in light of their new research - f...
Nov 08, 2023•45 min•Season 1Ep. 9
Get these first if you subscribe to news.wickedproblems.uk . The 2015 Paris Agreement set a goal of limiting warming to 1.5 degrees C. In the years since, the language of that goal has crept into thousands of corporate sustainability reports, media discourse, and the language of international climate diplomacy. Then, last week two research papers - in Nature Climate Change from a team mostly at Imperial College London and Oxford Open Climate Change from a team led by legendary climate scientist ...
Nov 06, 2023•28 min•Season 1Ep. 8
Get these episodes first and our newsletter at news.wickedproblems.uk . That James Hansen paper , Global Warming in the Pipeline , saying 1.5° C is toast - is it just saying the quiet part out loud, or is he recklessly playing into the hands of doom-mongering delayists? We built up expectations and endlessly repeated 1.5° C as a real thing. Will trust suffer if the message changes, like public health messaging during COVID? Clean energy analyst, author of Windfall : Unlocking a Fossil Free Futur...
Nov 04, 2023•46 min•Season 1Ep. 7
Welcome back to Wicked Problems. It’s been quite a week and we’re not even halfway through yet. So on Halloween, for a treat, Richard Delevan did some reporting at Day One of the BusinessGreen Net Zero Festival . This episode offers you some excerpts of some of the best conversations from the day, as well as some chats with those intrepid folks working the booths. You’ll hear from James Murray , editor of BusinessGreen Lucy Siegle , writer, broadcaster and environmentalist Alex Scot t, E3G Solit...
Nov 01, 2023•46 min•Season 1Ep. 6
IEA's World Energy Outlook, COP28, Hydrogen hopium, CCUS, predatory delay, HVDC, electrification, LDES, Michael Liebreich, and MPs "with the STEM background of illiterate newts" Subscribe to our newsletter at news.wickedproblems.uk , and get new #climatetech conversations first with co-hosts Richard Delevan and Claire Brady. Michael Barnard is a Forbes and Cleantechnica contributor, chief strategist at The Future is Electric , and climate futurist advising global corporates and financial institu...
Oct 28, 2023•56 min•Season 1Ep. 5
In this episode, Richard Delevan gives you an audio read of today’s Wicked Problems newsletter with some bonus content. For links to all the content mentioned, do check out the newsletter - https://wickedpr0blems.substack.com/p/will-new-disclosure-rules-or-cop28-force-more We talk through IPCC Chair Jim Skea’s maiden interview on BBCRadio 4 , and look at the slow quiet march of the rule makers in California and Brussels that might have more lasting impact - and climate tech opportunity - than CO...
Oct 24, 2023•16 min•Season 1Ep. 4
Until the rise of carbon removal, carbon offsets have been the foundation of voluntary carbon markets, but have withered under scrutiny from John Oliver to the Guardian . Can that market be fixed? Or will it always be hot air? Tech policy brains at the UK's Startup Coalition and finance brawn of the City of London launched the Carbon Markets Innovation Forum , bringing together 12 climatetech startups to help future governments see how technology could bring more integrity and transparency. Incl...
Oct 20, 2023•38 min•Season 1Ep. 3
