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This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.volts.wtf Volts published eight conversations in October, which is a lot for anyone to listen to. We’ve rounded up the highlights into less than an hour. Enjoy! Chapters 00:00 – Introduction 01:52 – Leah Stokes on passing the IRA 07:52 – Daniel Palken on the permitting bill 13:26 – Matt Traldi on local clean energy fights 19:38 – Kristian Jensen on Denmark’s utilities 24:56 – Nick Chaset on consumer protection 30:11 – Sam D’Amico on engineers and factories 35:41 – Tom Matzzie on the clean energy super PAC 41:19 – Ketan Joshi on data centers and climate

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.volts.wtf/subscribe Power electronics have taken over almost everything in our lives, with the exception, oddly, of the power grid itself — it is still held together by tens of millions of analog, iron-and-copper transformers, the design of which has barely changed in a century. Solid-state transformers replace the dumb gray box with something that can monitor and steer power or convert it from AC to DC and vice versa. In this episode, Enphase co-founder Raghu Belur, who built his company by dividing big solar inverters into thousands of small ones, explains how he’s trying the same thing with transformers, why AI data centers and big solar and battery projects are the first markets, and what it would take to put a smarter transformer on every pole. Chapters: 00:00 – Introduction 03:02 – What a transformer does 07:53 – What conventional transformers can’t do 11:43 – What makes a transformer solid state 15:27 – How much is software, how much is hardware 19:40 – Why power electronics hasn’t reached the grid 23:54 – Enphase’s distributed approach 31:23 – Building transformers from 5-kilowatt modules 34:58 – Copper, gallium nitride, and supply chains 43:44 – Cybersecurity 47:23 – Data centers and 800 volts DC 59:29 – Solar and battery storage 1:05:18 – The cost question 1:07:02 – Neighborhood transformers and the utilities 1:15:37 – Efficiency, lifespan, and heat 1:22:24 – Handling grid faults 1:25:27 – Standards, policy, and the next few years

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.volts.wtf Volts guests have argued that data centers can be good for the grid if they’re built right. Here I hear the case against, from Ketan Joshi, a former wind-industry analyst who now tracks Big Tech’s climate claims. He sees data centers as the wrong kind of demand growth: lumpy, concentrated, unwanted by neighbors, and largely met with gas. Underneath it all is the worry that the backlash against data centers will become a backlash against electrification itself. Chapters: 00:00 – Introduction 02:14 – How Ketan became a big tech critic 06:01 – The case against data centers 07:39 – What data centers add to emissions 11:57 – Isn’t more electricity demand good? 20:12 – Backlash and the NEXTDC power-pole protest 24:21 – AI claims 1: will AI help the climate? 27:53 – AI claims 2: machine learning vs. generative AI 33:47 – AI claims 3: inflated climate wins 36:51 – The gas rush: how much gets built? 44:49 – Would easier renewables fix it? 49:14 – Can data centers be flexible load? 55:41 – Do we actually want AI data centers? 59:39 – What should data centers do to plug in? 1:05:31 – Fake crackdowns and the risk to renewables 1:09:24 – What if AI is a bubble?

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.volts.wtf/subscribe Clean energy is the cheapest, fastest-growing source of power in the country, yet politically it barely registers. Republicans gutted its tax credits last year without fearing any consequences. The Invest in Tomorrow Coalition, a super PAC backed by clean energy investors, is trying to change that the old-fashioned way: by punishing the industry’s enemies. It went six for six in this year’s primaries; it’s now spending at least $15 million against seven Republican House candidates in the midterms. Its chair, Tom Matzzie, makes the case for fear as a political asset, explains why the industry has been so slow to throw elbows, and describes what it would take for clean energy to become a lion instead of a gazelle. Chapters: 00:00 - Introduction 02:55 - How the Invest in Tomorrow Coalition started 06:23 - Why a super PAC, and the idea of mythic power 09:50 - Punishing opponents to send a message to Congress 12:55 - Proving impact, and the permitting bill 17:13 - How ITC picks its general election races 21:41 - Does knocking out extremists help Republicans? 24:53 - Free riders and barriers to industry politics 28:58 - Who funds ITC, and why the industry underinvests 32:44 - Why clean power stays politically weak 38:28 - Did the IRA’s red-state investments pay off? 40:35 - Fear of Trump’s retaliation 45:05 - Avoiding the Democratic PAC label 49:30 - Presidential primaries and the ethanol playbook 53:20 - Gas inside the clean power trade groups 58:37 - Where ITC goes after November

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.volts.wtf/subscribe Collectively, the electric stack (batteries, motors, chips, power electronics) has gotten about 99% cheaper since 1990. It is quietly remaking every machine that turns electricity into motion, heat, or work. Problem is, China makes most of it. Sam D’Amico, co-author of “The Electric Slide” and founder of Impulse Labs, is betting the US can still claim a piece of that stack. He’s starting with a battery-powered induction cooktop. We talk about why domestic manufacturing matters, what America would actually have to build to compete, and how Silicon Valley’s founder world really thinks about climate change, geoengineering included. Chapters: 00:00 – Introduction 02:52 – From VR headsets to kitchen appliances 07:07 – How a pizza oven inspired a battery stove 10:07 – Peak demand, at home and on the grid 13:25 – Which appliances could use a built-in battery 16:46 – Electric stack 1: the four technologies 20:28 – Electric stack 2: power electronics and motors 25:21 – China bets on hardware, the US bets on AI 30:08 – Why not just buy it all from China? 33:51 – Why engineers need to be near the factory 38:39 – How much does the US need to make at home? 45:19 – US EV policy and letting Chinese cars in 47:49 – Batteries in appliances vs. one home battery 52:04 – Impulse’s plan: its tech in other brands’ stoves 55:17 – What’s next after the stove 57:14 – Has Silicon Valley stopped caring about climate?

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.volts.wtf/subscribe American homes are filling up with batteries, EVs, and smart thermostats that could be coordinated to make the grid cheaper and more reliable — but almost none of them are. To understand why, it helps to watch what happens when the company best in the world at this tries to do it here. In Britain, Octopus Energy has built a giant virtual power plant out of its customers' devices. In the US, it has spent six years running into walls. Now it’s bought Uplight, which runs customer programs for 85 utilities. I talked with Nick Chaset, who runs both, about what's in the way and whether distributed energy can ever scale with US utilities … the way they are. Chapters: 00:00 – Introduction 02:02 – Octopus’s past year and the Uplight investment 05:18 – What makes the UK market work for Octopus 11:12 – Texas: fast growth, flattened volatility 14:57 – Will flexibility put itself out of business? 19:16 – Why Octopus stays out of Pennsylvania and New York 22:17 – Does residential retail competition have a future? 24:41 – Why utility programs trail Octopus on participation 32:17 – The demand stack and what planners can count on 39:11 – Kraken, Uplight and the overlap 46:04 – Consumer protection and the aggregator model 51:17 – Data centers and the social license to operate 55:11 – Do we need dynamic pricing? 58:30 – Five years out

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.volts.wtf/subscribe Denmark gets a large share of its power from wind and other renewables and has cut its emissions roughly in half since 1990, but independent analysts doubt it will hit its 70 percent target for 2030. Kristian Jensen, CEO of Green Power Denmark and a former Danish minister of taxation, foreign affairs, and finance, argues the next stage is electrifying how Denmark uses energy: heat, transport, and industry. I talk with him about district heating and heat pumps, EVs and vehicle-to-grid, municipally owned grid companies and hourly power prices, biomass, carbon capture, power-to-X, solar’s “fields of iron” backlash, a grid oversubscribed with data center requests (an October 1 agreement has since put most data centers at the back of the queue), and whether the country’s political consensus will hold. Chapters 00:00 – Introduction: Denmark and industrial symbiosis 02:44 – Is the 70% target for 2030 out of reach? 06:24 – Carbon capture and storage, and the peatlands lag 09:57 – Why electrification has lagged: biomass and wood pellets 14:45 – Few batteries, many interconnectors 16:48 – Data centers and the grid-connection prioritization bill 21:34 – Municipally owned grid companies 24:32 – Smart meters, hourly prices, and thermal batteries 28:40 – The solar backlash and local ownership 35:04 – Agrivoltaics and biodiversity 37:24 – District heating: heat pumps, geothermal, and finance 43:24 – The EV transition and vehicle-to-grid 47:45 – Road pricing and fiscal room 50:07 – Power-to-X and eSAF 54:21 – Can Denmark build enough clean power? 57:12 – Will the political consensus hold?

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.volts.wtf/subscribe On this episode, recorded live at Climate Week NYC, I talk with Matt Traldi. He’s the founder and CEO of Greenlight America, which finds the local meetings where clean energy’s fate is being decided and recruits supporters to attend. Traldi argues that siting and permitting approvals turn on who shows up, and that local partners, conservative groups included, outperform outside advocates. We discuss how to measure impact, recent wins and losses, blue-state resistance, data center backlash, and Greenlight’s growth. Chapters: 00:00 – Introduction 02:09 – What Greenlight does and why Matt started it 04:41 – How Greenlight finds the decisions that matter 07:27 – Growth, and the tax credit deadline sprint 13:38 – Who shows up to local hearings 19:39 – Winning in conservative communities 22:35 – Bodies in the room, measuring impact, and win rates 27:46 – Losses, wins, and “there is no bag” 32:44 – Blue-state obstacles and organized opposition 36:31 – When data center backlash spills over onto clean energy 42:31 – Which projects Greenlight won’t back 45:38 – Lessons from housing and growing an organization 50:17 – Audience Q&A: disinformation and state permitting reform 54:39 – Audience Q&A: developers and elections 59:30 – Audience Q&A: funding local groups and designing community input

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.volts.wtf/subscribe The proposed bipartisan federal permitting bill is 417 pages filled with extremely consequential provisions that have left the climate community some mix of excited, infuriated, and confused. In an attempt to bring some clarity, I asked Daniel Palken of Arnold Ventures, a veteran of Senate permitting fights, to walk through what’s in it. We cover the blockbuster transmission reforms, the rule making data centers pay more than their share of grid costs, the wins for geothermal, and the fossil carve-outs. Then we get into NEPA reforms that render the act toothless, limits on state water permits, and the permit-certainty sections that have lawyers worried about “forever permits.” And finally: whether it restrains Trump, why Democrats shouldn’t wait for a better deal, what the modeling says about emissions impacts, and Daniel’s odds of passage. This is a long one, folks. Buckle up. Chapters: 00:00 – Intro: the bipartisan permitting bill 04:15 – Why permitting reform matters 12:23 – Agency staffing and capacity 16:59 – Past permitting attempts 20:26 – Transmission 1: planning and federal backstop 28:28 – Transmission 2: who pays and grid upgrades 38:17 – Data centers 1: paying more for grid access 43:20 – Distributed energy and geothermal 49:06 – Oil, gas, and mining provisions 57:06 – Data centers 2: will they go off-grid? 1:00:19 – NEPA 1: courts can’t halt projects 1:08:57 – NEPA 2: the main objections 1:17:10 – State water permits 1:23:35 – Endangered species 1:27:37 – Permit certainty 1: limits on revoking permits 1:36:43 – Permit certainty 2: lawsuits and damages 1:48:12 – Politics 1: Trump’s wind blockades 1:52:57 – Politics 2: why not wait for a better deal? 1:58:33 – Politics 3: elections, courts, and modeling 2:10:57 – Politics 4: next steps and odds of passage

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.volts.wtf/subscribe On September 14, I sat down with Leah Stokes in front of a live audience at Seattle’s Town Hall to talk about her new book, The Carbon Wave. It’s an insider account of how the Inflation Reduction Act got made, braided with the story of the high-risk twin pregnancy she went through while helping to make it. We get into why electrification is the heart of decarbonization, the enduring mystery of what’s going on in Joe Manchin’s head, what it means to trade your carbon footprint for a carbon wave, and how much of the IRA survives. It was followed by questions from the audience. Chapters: 00:00 – Welcome and housekeeping 03:05 – The twins, the NICU, and writing the book 08:51 – Carbon footprint vs. carbon wave 13:39 – Sam Ricketts and 100% clean electricity 18:13 – Why electricity is the core of the solution 23:28 – Utilities and the politics of change 26:18 – Tech companies and data centers 29:11 – Inside the Manchin negotiations 33:57 – Why Manchin got to yes 38:46 – Trump, setbacks, and where things stand 42:55 – Clean energy politics and the global shift 46:25 – Audience Q&A: the transmission gridlock 48:59 – Institutions, speed, and structural reform 53:27 – If Democrats win the House, what next 55:43 – Permitting reform 59:06 – State utilities, coal, and getting involved

Volts published seven conversations in September, which is a lot for anyone to listen to. We’ve rounded up the highlights into less than an hour. Enjoy! This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.volts.wtf/subscribe

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.volts.wtf/subscribe Heat pump water heaters use a fraction of the energy of conventional electric resistance heaters — which use more electricity in a year than an EV — but they're only 2 percent of the market, mainly because they tend to cost more, be slow and loud, and require a plumber and an electrician. Reservoir is a Boston company trying to fix all that, with a smarter, quieter machine and its own plumbers. I talk with CEO Luke Winston-Almanzar about how it works, what it costs, and its potential role in demand response programs. Chapters: 00:00 – Introduction 03:06 – Why water heaters 06:34 – How gas, resistance, and heat pump water heaters work 09:33 – Size and slow recovery: predictive heating and party mode 15:31 – Installation and vertical integration 22:19 – Cutting electric resistance backup 20:31 – What Reservoir builds and what it sources 23:41 – Tankless gas, virtual capacity, and the booster heater 27:11 – Recirculation, freeze protection, leak detection, and Legionella 32:03 – What it costs and what it saves 36:01 – Placement: small rooms, basements, and cold climates 42:37 – Noise and durability 48:19 – Demand response and virtual power plants 53:22 – A. O. Smith’s CO2 split system and Reservoir’s moat 55:54 – Policy headwinds after the IRA 59:29 – What’s next for Reservoir

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.volts.wtf/subscribe Home batteries like the Tesla Powerwall are nice, but what about people who can’t afford them, or renters who aren’t allowed to install them, or people who just don’t want the hassle of dealing with a permit and an electrician? A company called Pila is selling small (1.6 kWh) batteries that simply plug into a normal electrical socket. They can serve as backup for a refrigerator or other appliance in the event of a blackout, but they can also “mesh” with one another to form a network, pair with rooftop solar, or participate in VPP programs. CEO Cole Ashman explains the value proposition. Chapters: 00:00 Introduction 02:26 Lessons from Powerwall and Span 05:33 What Pila is and how it works 07:14 How long a fridge runs on one battery 09:28 Fire risk, LFP chemistry, and New York City 16:02 Why the price went up, and cost per kilowatt hour 19:55 Who is actually buying Pila 23:00 Financing models and free batteries 27:04 Do the bill savings add up? 32:05 Why utilities want small batteries in VPPs 36:58 Pilots with Holy Cross Energy and Brooklyn SolarWorks 41:09 Solar pairing and the Pila mesh network 47:14 Camping batteries and built-in storage 54:19 Utilities and visibility at the grid edge 55:58 Bidirectional outlets and the next five years 1:00:10 Clean energy as invisible infrastructure

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.volts.wtf Back in 2011, I wrote that fossil fuel interests had a much better media game than clean energy. My example was Frank Maisano, a media relations guy for coal utilities and the natural gas industry. Thirty years on, he’s still at it — still writing his newsletter, still connecting reporters to sources, still better at it than anyone on the clean side (sigh). So I’m finally talking to him about it: clean energy trade groups nobody in Washington fears, Trump’s daft efforts to kill renewables, the PAC picking off dirty-energy Republicans, permitting and data center fights, and the climate denial shop he worked for in the ‘90s. Spoiler: he regrets nothing. Chapters: 00:00 – Introduction 03:46 – What a DC media strategist actually does 09:50 – Republicans, Trump, and a narrow House majority 15:29 – Why tax cuts beat energy in the OBBBA fight 18:54 – Competing with China on AI without the electric stack 21:15 – Paying $4 billion to hand back offshore wind leases 28:07 – Red-state wind and the orders keeping coal plants open 32:52 – Clean energy trade groups and the building trades 38:41 – Gas as a bridge, and what longer term means 44:55 – Whether a half-gas trade group can serve clean energy 48:43 – A coherent clean vision against an incoherent coalition 51:14 – Do the green groups still scare anyone 55:18 – Permitting reform and the Whitehouse-Capito path 59:46 – Data centers, animal spirits, and the midterms 1:06:48 – The revenge PAC, and whether it is working 1:12:31 – Congress, the courts, and what Democrats could do 1:18:53 – COP, climate change, and the client he would turn down

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.volts.wtf/subscribe Verrus is building data centers designed to address every objection the public has raised: they use batteries instead of diesel generators, which makes them grid assets that help hold down power prices; they use closed-loop cooling, which uses a tiny fraction of the water; their equipment is quieter; and as a bonus, they squeeze more servers into the same grid connection. Yet both of Verrus’s proposed sites, in Michigan and Oregon, are mired in fierce local opposition. In this episode, CEO Nelson Abramson walks through the engineering — and the politics that the engineering hasn’t quite solved. Chapters: 00:00 – Introduction 02:43 – Three decades in data centers 05:05 – What a Verrus data center looks like 07:39 – The medium voltage power plane 12:13 – UPS batteries vs. the big LFP battery 17:27 – Priority aware capping and provisioned utility capacity 22:31 – Why not buy the pieces off the shelf? 25:42 – Duration: what happens when four hours runs out 34:28 – Diesel backup and what customers ask for 37:15 – How flexible is compute, really? 42:37 – Noise, fans, and the sound studies 48:42 – Water use and the 12 million gallon question 52:19 – Industrial land and by-right zoning 56:07 – Public opposition, recall petitions, and community benefits 1:00:07 – Oregon, Salem, and the moratorium 1:03:56 – Ride-through, NERC, and losing the moat 1:07:11 – What V2 looks like