The Interchange: Recharged

Less than 1% of clean energy investments goes to developing countries. Guarantees and partnerships could increase this. The global energy transition effort is all about ‘the new’. New technology, new financing models, new ways of looking at energy systems. The need for ‘the new’ is greatest in developing countries. For many of them, the challenge isn’t just transitioning to clean energy, it’s providing energy access in the first place. By 2030, we could see nearly a billion people left without access to energy, never mind clean energy. So how can we get the investment flowing to where it’s desperately needed? Damilola Ogunbiyi is CEO of the organisation Sustainability For All. SE4All works with public and private sector to provide access to reliable, affordable, sustainable and new energy for all by 2030. David sits down with Damilola to discuss her holistic view of the energy transition, the innovative financing models needed to mobilise capital, carbon markets, and how the industry should address the challenge of improving energy access while transitioning to clean sources. Energy access is directly linked to quality of life. This is especially true as the climate crisis worsens. Both public and private sectors need to work together to mobilise capital for the energy transition. So how can we do it? Subscribe to the Interchange Recharged so you don’t miss an episode on Apple Podcasts [https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/ai-is-transforming-demand-side-management/id1221460035?i=1000640423609__;!!K61u_eNLIYw!TimH4SVbf0yHDsvGPkVR-Rh25XnXZwYSGB5Lzvalz4qhpUU_LbsHUZX1wyrtLwNIWF20oeX6IxQZI9Yslk6rVEL0Cyg$] or Spotify [https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/spoti.fi/48BQTMG__;!!K61u_eNLIYw!WPvO0dpjvsmc86MLPy2NUnjsicow-LETgAukjqT9hxo_TP4sXk926TERZ2wo11VboZ85OI1bHN0D7ZF1VqLV7DQRGMI$]. Find us on X – we’re @interchangeshow. [https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/twitter.com/interchangeshow?lang=en__;!!K61u_eNLIYw!TimH4SVbf0yHDsvGPkVR-Rh25XnXZwYSGB5Lzvalz4qhpUU_LbsHUZX1wyrtLwNIWF20oeX6IxQZI9Yslk6r_TdxjBM$]   To keep up to date with everything we talk about on the show, sign up for our weekly Inside Track [https://www.woodmac.com/nslp/the-inside-track/sign-up/] newsletter. You’ll get extra analysis from Wood Mackenzie and be notified when a new episode of the podcast is out.    The Interchange Recharged is brought to you by Anza Renewables. Are you wasting valuable time tracking down solar module information that quickly goes stale? Anza’s revolutionary platform can help with up-to-date pricing, technical, risk, and domestic content data from 110 solar modules. Compare products in minutes and redirect your time to higher value work. Find out more [https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/hubs.ly/Q02JrqSz0__;!!K61u_eNLIYw!TimH4SVbf0yHDsvGPkVR-Rh25XnXZwYSGB5Lzvalz4qhpUU_LbsHUZX1wyrtLwNIWF20oeX6IxQZI9Yslk6r5q10MnY$]   See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy [https://art19.com/privacy] and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info [https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info].

How can we reimagine Scope 3 in order to make faster progress? The intention of the original framing of Scope 1, 2 & 3 emissions reporting was to support business understanding of their broader impact on the climate, so they would take responsibility for transformation to net zero and the impact of the complete value chain. Scope 3 emissions reporting in particular has become more of a focus of progressive companies that have developed robust plans for - and taken meaningful steps to address - scope 1 and 2 emissions. As they dig into scope 3, they are often overwhelmed by the accounting that’s required and struggle to develop strategies to meaningfully address impacts in their value chains, especially in ways they can quantify and count towards targets.  So how can the industry streamline this process? To find out David Banmiller is joined by Jenny Ahlen, Managing Director at the We Mean Business Coalition. Jenny directs the strategy, coordination, and execution of their net zero programs and campaigns; these include a focus on improving the way scope 3 emissions are approached. We Mean Business were introduced to Ed Crooks - host of our sister podcast The Energy Gang - at COP28, where CEO Maria Mandiluce outlined their mission. That conversation, which also examined the pledge to phase out fossil fuels, you can find on The Energy Gang podcast, wherever you're listening to this. The argument is that the reporting standards have created a huge amount of work for organisations without any real benefit to decarbonisation efforts. Companies need to draw up net zero plans, understand Scope 3, manage their supply chain emissions and so on, but to what goal? So, the key question David and Jenny discuss in this week’s episode: is it possible that in focusing so much on the influence big corporations can have on their value chains, we’ve let many companies and stakeholders in the global north off the hook for proactively reducing emissions without that prompt from customers?   Jenny explains to David why the need for new, alternative approaches to reporting is crucial to accelerating the energy transition. Scope 3 is about global climate impacts and getting companies engaged to catalyse the system transformations needed. What would this then need to look like to incentivise that type of action at scale? And how do we create an ecosystem to reward those participating and making meaningful progress? Listen to find out. Subscribe to the Interchange Recharged so you don’t miss an episode on Apple Podcasts [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/ai-is-transforming-demand-side-management/id1221460035?i=1000640423609] or Spotify [https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://spoti.fi/48BQTMG__;!!K61u_eNLIYw!WPvO0dpjvsmc86MLPy2NUnjsicow-LETgAukjqT9hxo_TP4sXk926TERZ2wo11VboZ85OI1bHN0D7ZF1VqLV7DQRGMI$]. Find us on X – we’re @interchangeshow. [https://twitter.com/interchangeshow?lang=en] To keep up to date with everything we talk about on the show, sign up for our weekly Inside Track [https://www.woodmac.com/nslp/the-inside-track/sign-up/] newsletter. You’ll get extra analysis from Wood Mackenzie and be notified when a new episode of the podcast is out.  The Interchange Recharged is brought to you by Anza Renewables. Are you wasting valuable time tracking down solar module information that quickly goes stale? Anza’s revolutionary platform can help with up-to-date pricing, technical, risk, and domestic content data from 110 solar modules. Compare products in minutes and redirect your time to higher value work. Find out more [https://hubs.ly/Q02JrqSz0] See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy [https://art19.com/privacy] and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info [https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info].

The Environmental Defense Fund wants changes made to the way the industry analyses hydrogen emissions data. A recent study from the Environmental Defense Fund asserts the energy industry is miscalculating the true impacts of deploying hydrogen. Hydrogen systems, with new analysis, could prove to be better – or worse – than the fossil fuels they intend to replace. “Clean, green” hydrogen deployment can be considerably better or worse for the climate based on factors typically overlooked in standard assessments. That’s the finding of a new study from the EDF. The climate benefits of hydrogen vary depending on factors such as methane emissions, carbon capture, and hydrogen loss. Steve Hamburg is Chief Scientist at the EDF. He joins David to discuss his findings, and to examine the impact on the energy industry of these new analyses, as hydrogen continues to gain traction as a reliable source of clean energy. Improvements are needed for standard hydrogen life cycle analyses as they currently don’t account for all climate warming emissions and impacts over time. By including the warming effects of three crucial and frequently overlooked factors in determining the climate impact of hydrogen deployment pathways the results of an assessment can look surprisingly different. Just how different? Listen to find out. Subscribe to the Interchange Recharged so you don’t miss an episode. Find us on X – we’re @interchangeshow. [https://twitter.com/interchangeshow?lang=en] To keep up to date with everything we talk about on the show, sign up for our weekly Inside Track [https://www.woodmac.com/nslp/the-inside-track/sign-up/] newsletter. You’ll get extra analysis from Wood Mackenzie and be notified when a new episode of the podcast is out.  See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy [https://art19.com/privacy] and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info [https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info].

Over 50 million homes in the US use propane. Within a few years, anywhere from 100-300 million gallons of renewable propane are expected to be available for homes and the transport industry. By 2050, renewable propane could meet half the world’s demand for non-chemical propane.  So, the demand is there, but are the means of production? Where is the feedstock coming from and how scalable are production methods? To answer this, David Banmiller is joined by Mike Stivala, President and CEO of Suburban Propane Partners, a nationwide distributor of propane and renewable propane.   The benefits of renewable propane are clear: reliability, portability and power, but with four times less carbon intensity than its regular counterpart.   How is Suburban Propane Partners tackling the issues of supply chain? Where does Mike see the future of the sector and where is the investment coming from? Listen to find out. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy [https://art19.com/privacy] and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info [https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info].

The Department of Energy’s ARPA-E (Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy) is an agency tasked with the research and development of advanced energy technologies. Since 2009, they’ve provided nearly US$4 billion in funding for more than 1500 potentially transformative energy technology projects.  One particular area of focus for them at the moment is advanced nuclear. There’s a lot of potential for nuclear to deliver reliable power to millions of American homes, but projects are still finding costs prohibitive. Could advancements in technology be the thing to change this? Jenifer Shafer is Associate Director for Technology at ARPA-E, and she joins David to discuss initiatives in her department, and the focus on reducing imports, reducing emissions, improving efficiency, and enhancing American competitiveness in clean energy manufacturing.   What are the priorities for nuclear? Is it advancements in technology, getting costs down, or removing regulatory barriers to deployment? To analyse the current state of the sector, Jenifer and David are joined by David Brown, Director of Energy Transition Practice at Wood Mackenzie, for the second half of the show. Together they explore the impact of the Biden administration's US$900 million support for nuclear small modular reactors, and the government’s role in sponsoring new supply sources for uranium.   To keep up to date with everything we talk about on the show, sign up for the newsletter. You’ll get extra analysis from Wood Mackenzie and be notified when a new episode of the podcast is out.  https://www.woodmac.com/nslp/the-inside-track/sign-up/ [https://www.woodmac.com/nslp/the-inside-track/sign-up/] See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy [https://art19.com/privacy] and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info [https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info].