Redefining Energy

Laurent and Gerard set out to explore one of the biggest ideas emerging alongside the excitement around a potential SpaceX IPO: datacenters in space. To refuel those satellites emerged the concept of an orbital grid where beams are directed to provide electricity to space crafts, like a gas station in space.  

It may sound like science fiction, but it is rapidly becoming a medium-term engineering challenge being tackled by some of the brightest minds of our generation.  

One of those pioneers is Andrew Rush, CEO of Star Catcher, a company building what wi...

In June 2026, Gerard and Laurent recorded a live episode at DLA Piper’s Charging Up Capital 2026 Global Energy and Digital Investments Forum with Rowan Parkhouse, Managing Director at Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP).  

CIP has emerged as one of the world's leading specialist energy transition investors, ranking among the top infrastructure fund managers globally by both assets under management and fundraising. So, what is CIP’s Playbook?  

We explore how infrastructure investing has evolved over the past five years—what has become easier, what has become harder, and where the biggest opportun...

Gerard and Laurent first welcomed David Scaysbrook to the podcast in Episode 66, back in January 2022, for a conversation about the future of 24/7 power. Four years later, it felt like the right moment to reconnect and take stock of how profoundly the market has evolved.  

Since then, Quinbrook Infrastructure Partners has continued to establish itself as one of the leading specialist investors in the energy transition, orchestrating and deploying billions of dollars of capital through project finance structures and platform companies.   As of today, the firm has participated in more than $27 billion of transactions, developed or acquired over 240 projects, an...

In May 2026, our co-host Laurent Segalen had the privilege of chairing a high-profile panel hosted by SolarPower Europe at its annual Solar Power Summit in Brussels, one of the leading gatherings for the European solar and energy storage sectors.  

In this episode, we bring you highlights from the hour-long conversation, featuring two distinguished industry leaders: Fredrik Andrén Sandberg from RWE and Hanna Kunzmann from EQT. Between them, their organisations oversee more than 10 GW of battery storage projects either in operation or under development, offering a unique perspective on the re...

Gerard and Laurent welcome Michel Boutouil, co-founder and CEO of Polarise, a leading European AI infrastructure provider and NVIDIA Cloud Partner based in Berlin. After discussing about what happens outside of a datacenter, it is time to dive inside one.  

Polarise is one of the few genuinely European NeoCloud companies — essentially a European counterpart to CoreWeave — specializing in GPU infrastructure for AI inference. Through its partnership with NVIDIA, Polarise designs its datacenters around the GPU rack itself, using liquid cooling from the outset rather than starting with a traditional real estate-first approach. The company has already developed AI facto...

At the Eurelectric Power Summit 2026 in Helsinki, Laurent had the opportunity to sit down with Catherine MacGregor, CEO of ENGIE and Vice President of Eurelectric, for a wide-ranging discussion on the key issues shaping Europe's energy future.  

We began with the themes at the heart of Eurelectric’s agenda this year: security of supply, affordability, competitiveness, and the challenges and opportunities created by the rapid growth of data centres.  

One of the most striking insights from our conversation was that Europe does not have an electrification technology problem — it has an electrification coordination problem. This was also t...

The International Energy Agency (IEA) and the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) have made significant progress in recent years. Yet they remain largely top-down institutions shaped by policy priorities. When trillions of dollars in investment decisions are at stake, investors and operators increasingly turn to Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) and its team of more than 400 specialists.  

Why does BNEF command such trust? BNEF combines Bloomberg’s unparalleled market data capabilities with deep expertise in batteries, solar, electric vehicles, and electrification. Unlike many international agencies, BNEF operates without a political mandate or advocacy agenda. Its bottom-up analysis provides inv...

Gerard and Laurent have the pleasure of welcoming Fintan Slye, CEO of NESO — Great Britain’s National Energy System Operator.  
In a lively and wide-ranging discussion, we explored NESO’s governance and its critical role across the British energy system: from real-time system operation — balancing supply and demand every second — to whole-system planning, market design, and transmission network operation.  
We covered an extraordinary breadth of topics: balancing costs, electricity prices for consumers, energy security, and the challenge of delivering Power 2030 in a system increasingly reliant on renewables. We discussed batteries, the evolution of balancing markets, the explosive growth of datacente...

The global auto industry is splitting into two very different worlds — what legendary auto expert Michael Dunne calls “a tale of two countries.” Dunne, CEO of Dunne Insights LLC, has spent decades at the centre of the industry, including leadership roles as President of General Motors Indonesia and Managing Director of JD Power China.  
On one side stands the United States, increasingly resembling a modern-day Cuba: a market dominated by oversized, fuel-hungry SUVs aimed at a shrinking audience, while legacy automakers squeeze the last profits from internal combustion engines. Last year alone, Detroit’s Big Three wrote off more than $50...

The BESS market is growing at a phenomenal pace. You would think battery management is becoming easier. The reality? It is becoming increasingly complex.  
Between data risks, a growing number of suppliers, vertically disintegrated component chains, and constantly evolving software stacks, investors can quickly lose control of their battery fleets.  
Only a handful of companies truly operate in the fast-maturing field of battery analytics. And we are not talking about market optimisation focused on financial returns, but deep predictive analytics: understanding what happens inside the system itself, with expertise in battery health, performance, and safety.  

Laurent and...

Where is Climate Tech heading? Certainly not dead — but constantly reinventing itself. So much so that you begin to wonder whether the label itself has outlived its original meaning.  

Laurent and Gerard welcome Kim Zou, co-founder and CEO of Sightline Climate, the data and research platform mapping the climate-tech economy, and author of some of the sector’s most influential newsletters, including CTVC and the newer Powerstack. Sightline has become essential reading for investors, utilities, corporates, and policymakers trying to understand where capital is flowing and how the energy system is evolving.  

Together, they explore how Climat...

The power system is aging and poorly equipped to handle the rapid, large-scale shift toward renewables. According to Philipp Schröder, CEO of 1KOMMA5°, the real solutions lie “behind the meter.”  

Gerard and Laurent sit down with Schröder to unpack what it will take to unlock the so-called “Behind the Meter” revolution.  

Schröder is among a small group of European founders aiming to build a vertically integrated, consumer-focused clean energy company—something akin to a European hybrid of Tesla Energy and Sunrun. His approach combines hardware (such as solar PV systems, home batteries, heat pumps, and EV ch...

Gerard and Laurent welcome Tinne Van der Straeten, CEO of WindEurope—the leading voice of the wind industry in Europe, representing more than 600 members across the entire value chain. Tinne brings a distinctive perspective to the discussion. As Belgium’s Minister for Energy during the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, she experienced an energy crisis firsthand. Her background in policymaking offers a different vantage point from that of investors, shaped by the practical realities and trade-offs of government decision-making.  

The conversation highlights that, despite ongoing challenges, wind energy continues to expand rapidly across Europe, with €45 billion in final investment decisio...

Ember released its 2026 Global Electricity Review (GER26) last week—an extraordinary report showing that 100% of new global electricity generation has been met by renewables. At the same time, the decade’s “twin energy shocks” (Russia in 2022 and Hormuz in 2026) are accelerating existing trends.  

What do the latest numbers tell us—and what do they mean? Laurent and Gerard are joined by a great friend of the show, Kingsmill Bond, Lead Energy Strategist at Ember, to break it all down.

They begin with the GER’s key findings, looking closely at China, the United States, Europe, and I...

In episode 219, we analysed the relationship between hyperscalers and US utilities from the hyperscaler perspective. To complete the picture, we revisit the debate from the utility’s point of view.

Gerard and Laurent welcome Rajiv Bazaj, VP of Solutions Sales at Constellation, to understand how utilities approach this rapidly evolving landscape. Spun out of Exelon a few years ago, Constellation was initially seen as the “ugly duckling,” but it was sitting on a major advantage: a large nuclear fleet. What was considered a liability in the 2010s has become a strategic asset as hyperscalers search for clean, reliable 24/7 power...

Laurent and Gerard sit down with Paul O’Donnell, Partner at SchrodersGreencoat, a fund manager that has invested more than €13 billion and controls over 400 renewable energy assets across Europe, the Americas, and Asia. Paul has spent 17 years at Greencoat and became Partner in 2022, following Schroders’ acquisition of the platform, which itself was acquired by Nuveen in 2026. 

Greencoat has a distinctive structure, as it manages listed vehicles—historically known as YieldCos—designed to provide stable dividends to investors through long-term infrastructure assets.  

The discussion begins with a deep dive into the evolution of the renewable energy sector over the pas...

Gerard is invited by Ana Conde from PVcase to make the case for solar paired with storage as the economic foundation of the future energy system.

We are in the midst of a technological revolution driven by electrification and AI. But building the energy system that can power this shift requires more than adding new capacity — it demands system-level thinking, new coordination mechanisms, and new financial models to ensure a smooth transition.

They explore how solar moved from a niche technology to the backbone of modern energy infrastructure and why pairing it wi...

Laurent and Gerard speak with Dr. Michal Meidan, Head of China Energy Research at the China Energy Research Programme at the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, about the profound transformation reshaping China’s energy system. At the heart of the discussion is the country’s pivot from “molecules” to “electrons” — a structural shift from fossil fuels toward electrification powered by renewables, batteries, and electric mobility. This transition is not just about decarbonization; it represents a broader industrial and technological reconfiguration with global consequences. At the same time, China remains central to fossil fuel markets: it is the world's largest fossil fuel importer...

Gerard and Laurent host Ira Joseph, a leading expert on gas and LNG markets at the Columbia Center on Global Energy, to explore how the Middle East conflict is reshaping the industry.

In normal times, LNG supply is led by Qatar, the U.S., and Australia, with prices anchored to benchmarks like Henry Hub, TTF, and JKM. Before the war, markets were relatively well supplied, keeping prices stable.

Three weeks into the conflict, that balance has shifted. Brent crude has climbed to about $110, European gas (TTF) to around $20/MMBtu, while U.S. Henry Hub remains near $3—hi...

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 in the Energy & Natural Resources practice at DLA Piper, describing how client demand has shifted from...

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 faster than new supply can come online, setting up a near-term imbalance. In response, the U.S. utility sector is preparing fo...

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 climate tech era of 2021–2022 is over. Gerard is clear that carbon removal and hydrogen, at lea...

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 this a positioning squeeze in thin markets? Or the early tremors of a structural repricing?  

Th...

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 commentary: equipment providers versus sellers of electrons. On one side sit companies like GE Vernova, Siemens Energy, Schneid...

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 than fundamentals and are becoming a key signal for future capture rates and risk, forcing investors to reassess how renewable assets are valued.

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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: electricity is no longer invisible background infrastructure. It is the backbone of modern society, and when it fails, eve...

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 concentrating fast, and the biggest platforms are pulling further ahead.  

Global Infrastructure Partners set a new benchmark with its USD25.2bn...

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 the US, while many European markets continue to lag.

After...

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 making it smarter, helping utilities target and sequence investments far more efficiently at a time when distributio...

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)Geopolitics + broken supply chains + energy chaos = a better, more innovative world (LS — still hoping)A bloodbath for hydrogen in transportati...

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 is built on faith?Scandals & Disgraces: From the SMR pump-and-dump circus to...

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 to be speed at any cost.  

Is the AI boom we are witnessing justified—or sustainable? From a technological standpoint, certainly yes: AI capability...

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 of e-mobility in Europe and China is discussed, along with the implications for energy storage and i...

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 in 2022 in Hamburg and, as of October 2025, fully owned by Citadel, the global hedge fund, represents this shift. The firm operates at the intersection of short-term po...

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 electricity market, making sure the lights stay on and energy i...

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 whether the final text will call to “phase out,” “phase down,” or “phase up” fossil fuels.
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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 system being transformed at unprecedented speed.

To unpack this, Laurent and Gerard welcome one of the world’s leading voices in so...

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 growth (e.g., datacenters) is accelerating. Market structures must evolve to better reflect long-term price signals and attract private capital. Supply-side issues: New natural gas peakers and b...

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 joined by the brilliant Iola Hughes, Head of Research at B...