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Power Perspectives: The Biggest Stories and the Boldest Bets: 2024 Year in Review

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Will new transmission infrastructure ever come to pass? When will we reach a tipping point with data center energy needs? How can we determine the future of hydrogen's transformative race toward dominance? And what will *really* be the impact of decreasing energy storage costs?

Today on Energy Central's special year-end episode, we look back at a major 2024...and forward, toward what's looking to be a big 2025. Using ideas and predictions from our community's Energy Central Top Voices (check out the full list here), the Power Perspectives team is telling you about the most impactful stories of the year.

So grab your headphones and get ready to think big.

Prefer to Read vs. Listening? Scroll Down to Read Transcript

Thanks to the sponsor of this episode of the Power Perspectives: West Monroe

 

Key Links:

Top Voices of 2024 Homepage: https://energycentral.com/o/energy-central/energy-central-top-voices-2024-all-network-summary 

Episodes Mentioned During Episodes...
Tony Sleva: https://energycentral.com/o/energy-central/episode-154-imagining-next-generation-energy-grid-tony-sleva-president-prescient 

Steve Martz: https://energycentral.com/o/energy-central/episode-170-navigating-complexities-integrated-planning-steve-martz-vp-integrated 

Vicken Kasarjian: https://energycentral.com/o/energy-central/episode-170-navigating-complexities-integrated-planning-steve-martz-vp-integrated 

Veronica Ung-Kono: https://energycentral.com/o/energy-central/episode-180-balancing-clean-energy-expansion-wildlife-protection-veronica-ung 

David Schleicher: https://energycentral.com/o/energy-central/episode-177-powering-data-center-alley-david-schleicher-president-ceo-northern 

Todd Allen, Greg Keoleian: https://energycentral.com/o/energy-central/episode-155-machh2-and-future-hydrogen-michigans-pioneers-todd-allen-and-greg 

Idaho National Lab: https://energycentral.com/o/energy-central/episode-158-decoding-iras-unlocking-nuclear-uprating-and-hydrogen-cogeneration 

Prasanna Venkatesan, Arch Rao: https://energycentral.com/o/energy-central/episode-174-embracing-future-residential-energy-management-prasanna-venkatesan 

Amy Myers Jaffe: https://energycentral.com/o/energy-central/power-perspectives%E2%84%A2-podcast-navigating-energys-post-election-crossroads-2024-AND() 

Diego Ibarra: https://energycentral.com/o/energy-central/episode-160-decarbonizing-across-borders-climate-future-diego-ibarra-executive 

Erik Krause: https://energycentral.com/o/energy-central/episode-163-zero-carbon-2030-leaving-no-customer-behind-erik-krause-director 

Cynthia Klein: https://energycentral.com/o/energy-central/episode-164-duke-energys-strategy-harness-iija-opportunity-cynthia-klein-director 

Aaron Choo: https://energycentral.com/o/energy-central/episode-176-gas-grid-energy-transition-aaron-choo-vice-president-gas-network 

Ask a Question to Our Future Guests: Do you have a burning question for the utility executives and energy industry thought leaders that we feature each week on Power Perspectives? Leave us a message here for your chance to be featured in an upcoming episode: www.speakpipe.com/EnergyCentralPodcast 

 

TRANSCRIPT

Jason Price:

Hello everyone and welcome to Energy Central's Power Prospectives podcast. I'm your host, Jason Price and joined as always by Matt Chester from Energy Central. We've got a special episode for you today as we end an eventful year of 2024 with a roundup of some of the most important conversations that took place in our Energy Central community this year. So things are going to sound a little bit different today. See, we've recently published the top 24 Voices on Energy Central, and these top voices have gone above and beyond in sharing their expertise, insights, and thoughtful leadership with our community. They've delivered high value content and sparked meaningful discussions about the future of energy.

In a year full of challenges and opportunities, their contributions have shaped the conversations around the most pressing topics in the energy sector. We've asked these top voices to answer three questions. What are the biggest stories of 2024? What story do you expect to impact the power sector most in 2025? What's the recommendation you have for Energy Central community, article, podcast episode, book, video, or other, that's elevated the way you think about our industry? You can see all the top voices answers on Energy Central, but today we've pulled together a handful of the most interesting and impactful answers to discuss as a team. And to join us in that discussion, we have Chloe Ginsburg, Energy Central's General Manager, and Kinsey Grant Baker, Smooth Media's head of content. Matt, Chloe, Kinsey. How's it going?

 

Kinsey Grant Baker:

Going great. Happy to be here. Jason. I feel like I'm among celebrities finally sitting in on a recording of Power Perspectives. It's a whole new world in here. I'm really excited.

 

Chloe Ginsberg:

Same here. I feel like I'm finally getting a little peek behind the curtain. So great to be here, guys.

 

Matt Chester:

Yeah, and I mean for our listeners, Kinsey and Chloe are always there behind the curtain, so they might be new faces to you, but they're always back there working, so I'm happy to have you guys on too.

 

Jason Price:

Yeah, we're thrilled to have you here and I think we're up for a pretty good discussion today. So let's kick off the discussion. Before we jump into discussing the biggest top stories of 2024 and the most impactful trends of 2025, let's start with Energy Central's biggest story from this year. Just a few months ago, Smooth Media acquired Energy Central. Kinsey and Chloe, do you want to tell us more about the deal and what it meant for the team?

 

Kinsey Grant Baker:

Yeah, absolutely. I will hop in and for anybody who's not watching the video recording, this is Kinsey's voice. I am one of the co-founders and the head of content at Smooth Media and we were really, really excited to merge with the Energy Central team to bring their team on and to learn more about this industry. The deal really happened pretty quickly over the end of the summer and in the time since then, I have just learned so much about the energy industry. Have really, really enjoyed getting to spend time with the team to learn how they have really cemented Energy Central's reputation in this space. And it's been a really wonderful experience. We were initially really, really drawn to the energy sector and Energy Central specifically, because there's just a ton of opportunity in the electric power space. I mean, this is a really big audience of really smart and really specialized people and that is really where we think the future of media is headed.

Just for a small bit of context, without going too, too deep into the history books, but a lot of the kind of founding team at Smooth, we cut our teeth really like building out B2B media products at Morning Brew. Building out Morning Brew's editorial strategy, we were within the first handful of employees at the team when they first launched, and after Morning Brew was sold to Business Insider in 2020, we decided to start Smooth essentially with the thesis that professionals in specific niches are eager for education, really engaging content, really empowering community and all of that that really speaks to them and their specific experiences within their professional lives. So that's really why we were so drawn to Energy Central in the first place. And in terms of what to expect, I would say more of all the good stuff and maybe even more of the stuff that you don't even know is good yet.

We feel really excited about where we're going, what we're building, adding more and bigger and more ambitious ideas and projects in 2025 and continuing to really invest in what makes Energy Central what it is, and that's all the people who are listening to this episode today. That is the community of our power professionals who make us really wonderful and certainly teach me something new every day. So I'm excited about what lies ahead. I know Chloe, you probably have some feedback and some ideas as well as just about what the transition has been like, but that's kind of the why behind the acquisition and where we are now.

 

Chloe Ginsberg:

Yeah, Kinsey well said. And I think, like you said, I don't come from an energy background, so again, it's been so much fun learning more about the industry. Matt has been huge in showing us what are the top stories, what's trending on the platform, what's trending outside of the platform. I think I've learned so much about energy itself and it's so exciting and excited to dive more into it. I think the transition itself has been so interesting, the joining of two teams of two different cultures, it's been really awesome to get kind of a front row seat into kind of how do two teams work, how do we bring them together, how do we bring processes together, operations together? And I think it was some learning pains that happened at the beginning and now we've kind of all found a really great way of working together. We learn from each other. Synergy is the word I want to bring here between the Smooth team and Energy Central. It's been really cool to see.

So yeah, there's a lot coming and we want to obviously better serve our partners. We're building new products, improving on old ones. And yeah, anyone out there, whether you're a partner, whether you're an audience member, a listener, please, please, please give us feedback. We're trying to improve where we can. So always down to chat. This is really exciting.

 

Jason Price:

All right, so let's get into some of the big ideas by our top voices. This is a good one to start with. All about transmission permitting needs and their status. So Mark Gabriel, president and CEO of the United Power Rural Electric Cooperative and a former podcast guest on Energy Essential told us the following.

"The biggest trend in 2024 has been the announcement of massive plans for building new transmission. The story in 2025 will be the failure to permit or build any amount of transmission in a reasonable period of time. Cancellations will abound." And he goes on to say, "In 2024, by my rough estimate, 35,000 miles of transmission has been announced, totaling nearly $35 billion. This is in the phase of a total of over 4,000 miles from 2019 to 2024, including only 53 miles of bulk electric system build in 2023 totaling $4 billion. So even assuming permitting is sped up, which is doubtful and money is unlimited, which it may be, the trades to build such lines do not exist and supply chain limitations will prevent this from happening. This is the face of 80 gigawatts of plant closures and 80 new gigawatts needed to meet electrification demand. A 160 gigawatt deficit will exist by 2028, if not sooner. This store will need to be focused on in a hyper localization and grid enhancing technologies as well as for reconducting."

So team, what do we think about that?

 

Matt Chester:

What I did as we were gathering these answers from our top voices, and you're right Jason, Mark is an established one for our podcast listeners already, but what I found exciting was, hey, these topics are one that we happen to have already covered on the podcast or we have some exposure to, and it's a great opportunity to point some of our new listeners back to those top episodes of the year that are featuring these hot topics as well as remind people if they need a refresher. So the grid topics specifically, that's definitely a big one. And what's interesting is that in a landscape where we're always hearing about the new exciting technologies, the innovations and those are dominating the headlines, it's the technology like the grid, the basic backbone of energy that's really dominating those headlines in reality and according to people like Mark who are entrenched in it and know.

So I found that that was reflected in a number of the podcasts we discussed. So all of these that I list out, I'll make sure to put in the show notes, but we heard early this year from Tony Sleva, the president of Prescient Transmission Systems, to how some of the advanced technology can be used to make what seems like the same grid, we're actually rewiring it with more advanced technology, able to improve efficiencies. In episode 170, we heard from Steve Martz of Xcel Energy, basically about the integrated planning process. There's so much grid, there's so much demand, there's so much generation, how do we get it all where it needs to be and how do the utility leaders juggle all of that? And that's a mind-blowing process to me. And so listening to people like Steve is great to learn from that.

Looking ahead at the more advanced technologies that can, maybe not replace the grid but supplement it, is things like the virtual power plants. So we heard about that from Viken Kasarajian of MCE, just kind of how do we rethink the status quo. And then one of my favorite ones more recently, we talked to Veronica Ung-Kono of the National Wildlife Federation, not somebody you'd necessarily expect to hear on an energy-focused podcast, but the work she does is looking at as we're building new transmission, new grid infrastructure, how does it impact ecologies, wildlife, migration patterns, and making sure that we're not focused too narrowly on the grid at the expense of something that might be short-sighted in the long run. So I know that's a lot there. Like I said, I'll put in the show notes, but really exciting that those are the type of topics that we're covering.

 

Kinsey Grant Baker:

And Matt, I think you have an interesting point here in the breadth of the topics that you mentioned in just those episodes. We're talking about everything from re-techifying existing infrastructure to the perspective of the National Wildlife Federation. It's I think a good indicator as to just how big this story really is. And the answer that we got here was essentially that that was the biggest story of 2024 and going to be the biggest story of 2025. We see this really being illustrated in just how wide of an impact it has on the industry really from top to bottom and side to side.

I would be curious to hear a little bit about your perspectives, and really anybody feel free to chime in too, on what are some of the people, the companies, who are you paying attention to when it comes to the ultimate question of solving grid infrastructure challenges and problems? Are there any entities that really pop out? Is there anybody, anything, any idea, that you think is worth maybe double clicking on in 2025?

 

Matt Chester:

One that in Mark's answer you kind of express a little bit of a doubt about or frustration about, but the idea of energy permitting reform is a major story. Even as we record this in the past week, there's been a lot of back and forth in Congress where it seems like one of those stories where everyone agrees we need more grid infrastructure, we need permitting reform, but then when you get down to the details, it seems like we're still in gridlock. And it's not even just the traditional gridlock of partisan politics, it's the minutia of it. So that's going to continue to be one of those major stories. And it's not necessarily a sexy one, and maybe that's part of the problem is it's a little bit wonky, but that's going to be a big part of it.

And then, yeah, I think it also speaks to the idea that the utility sector today, it's so much different from 20 years ago where innovation was a little bit scary, people didn't want to be the first to move. You're seeing a lot more attitudes throughout the utility from top to bottom, eager to adopt innovative new technologies, try out new things, pilot new projects. I mentioned virtual power plants is one of those options earlier, tying into things like demand response, load management, and it's a complicated web, but there's a lot of tools out there. So in the classic trope, it's not going to be a silver bullet. It's how do we pick and choose all of these different solutions that could inch us along to where we need to be? That's at least what I've been hearing.

 

Kinsey Grant Baker:

I appreciate the new definition for gridlock. Really gives it a double meaning there, right?

 

Matt Chester:

Yeah.

 

Jason Price:

All right, let's hop into our next discussion and that's about data center growth. We had Jay Stein, Energy Technologist, Energy Technology Revolution, told us the following. "The most significant trend in the electricity sector in 2024 was a series of widely reported dramatic increases in forecasted load growth, due in large part to data center expansion." He wrote about AI's advance is a big factor in that expansion in the Energy Central Post titled "What Clean Energy Supporters Need to Know About AI." His expectation is that, "Just like the last information technology power related panic around the turn of the century, data center operators will improve their energy efficiency enough that somehow they and the utilities will serve them and muddle through without catastrophe."

So Matt, over to you. Highlight some past episodes from this year touching on the issues around data centers.

 

Matt Chester:

Yeah, if you remember Jason, there's one key one that I'd love for our listeners to check out with David Schleicher, the president and CEO of Northern Virginia Electric Cooperative. I think that was just a month or two ago, but he's serving an area that's colloquially known as Data Center Alley. It serves a lot of the federal government as well as tech companies in that Northern Virginia area. And the really fascinating conversation that he brought to us about his utility didn't come up and build its infrastructure anticipating that something like a Data Center Alley would arrive. They were just serving their residential customers, their commercial customers, but now for a myriad of reasons, they have loads of massive data centers there and they're obligated not only to serve them but to keep serving their existing rate payers.

And it's just an interesting back and forth and a little bit of tension of how do you continue to do that? And it ties into the last topic we talked about of there's growing demand, we have a set amount of transmission and generation, how are we going to balance all of that? But the data center topic, you couldn't open the New York Times, the Washington Post without seeing that be one of the headlines this past year.

 

Kinsey Grant Baker:

Yeah, I think this has to be one of the topics that I have ended up engaging in the most conversation with just friends and family about, when we say that we acquired at Energy Central and where I'm trying to learn more about electric power and this is always what people end up inevitably talking about because I think it really has transcended just the power industry to now be a story of national notoriety. I was recently at Thanksgiving speaking with my brother-in-law who works in construction in Northern Virginia building these data centers, and he was kind of talking about the plans that some of these big tech companies have to get really, really specific on in order to utilize the PPAs that they've signed into. How can they put this building here to maximize this and how many people will work in this one and it's really technical obviously. But I think it brings up an interesting question that we got to talking about a little bit, the Thanksgiving dinner table waiting for the turkey to be ready, which is where is all of this going to come from?

This is the question of the day. And I know that we've had some really interesting stories over the past year or so about the resources required to power these data centers. Whether it's reopening the nuclear conversation, getting creative about more quote-unquote, "green" solutions.

I would love to hear a little bit more about what some of the Energy Central communities' perspectives have been about where the power comes from. It's got to come from somewhere. There are a lot of interests to be balanced here, but I'm curious about some of the potentials. What are some of the paths that could be taken to ensure that these massive buildings with massive power needs get what they need while ratepayers, to your point, also get what they need?

 

Matt Chester:

Yeah, it's interesting because it kind of echoes the Facebooks and the Googles who have been able to move the market when it comes to renewables. They'll build their own solar farms, kind of create their own energy rather than just rely on the grid. And so in the same way, these collection of data centers can be a new market driver. So if that's going to be used in a way that most benefits the grid, I guess that's the big question remains to be seen. And the other side of it is interesting, which is one of the big uses of all these data centers is the explosion of AI and the computing processing that's needed for that. But you also hear, and we see it mentioned in the Energy Central community, well some of those AI tools can also be an opportunity to be used in the power sector to optimize and make more efficient operations. So whether or not that's a net positive in terms of the generation and transmission reaching where it needs remains to be seen. But it's definitely on both sides of that story is the utility sector.

 

Jason Price:

Yeah, there's a lot there. And Kinsey, perhaps when you're sitting around the table waiting for the Christmas goose to be served up, you could ask your family members who are involved in this space, where does the opportunity lie around maybe converting some of the manufacturing, the Brownfield's or former manufacturing facilities that could be converted and given a second life to then serve as a data center. There seems to be a lot of discussion and interest around that at the state level. I'm sure there's a lot more to come in this topic and there's a lot more that we're expected to see as these data centers enter into the business and economic development of every state across this country as the demand continues to grow.

But all right, enough with data centers, let's move on to our next topic, and let's turn now to hydrogen energy. This is a huge discussion for our energy-centric community and one we've talked about quite a bit. So Alextin Mendonza, CEO of Ampinity Energy Private Limited told us the following, "The global race for hydrogen dominance will headline 2025. As countries and corporations invest heavily in green energy infrastructure, aiming to establish leadership in the renewable hydrogen economy. This competition will be pivotal in driving innovation and scaling sustainable energy solutions."

Matt, dig in here. What are we hearing from the community? What do you want to talk about?

 

Matt Chester:

Yeah, The hydrogen topic's been a buzzing one on the general energy-centric community for some years now. It's regularly something people are asking you about, sharing their insights on. And in specific on the podcast in the past year, we've had two episodes that really highlighted the government role in all of that, which I thought was interesting. And the first was episode 155, we chatted with two members of the MI hydrogen team. This came out of the federal hydrogen hub projects that basically picked a number of different locations and test pilot projects trying to ramp up both the production of and destinations for hydrogen and eventually green hydrogen. So it's one of those chicken and egg things that we need to make sure that there's an appetite for all this hydrogen before we generate all of it, but where's the money generating it until there are the customers?

So that was a major investment by the government towards the future hydrogen economy. And again, we were lucky to hear straight from some of those researchers leading that way. And then just a few weeks later on episode 158, we got to chat with Idaho National Laboratory, part of the Department of Energy's National Laboratory System, and DOE, their need even hydrogen as well. So it was fascinating to hear in this one specifically the angle of how hydrogen and nuclear power can be complementary technologies. We often think of decarbonizing the grid as, well, where can we throw renewables? Where can we throw solar and wind? But hydrogen and nuclear, they're not under the renewable label, but they're carbon free generation. So if we can use them to build off of each other and optimize each other's processes, then that creates again, some great opportunities that I recommend listening to that episode to learn a little bit more about.

 

Kinsey Grant Baker:

Yeah, these are episodes I personally want to return to. I think as somebody who Chloe mentioned kind of being new to energy, I am very much in the same boat. I feel a little out of my depth sometimes in talking about something as technical as these, the literal where it all comes from. But it's great to have kind of the catalog of power perspectives to go back to because this is I think going to continue to be a persistent element of conversation in 2025, as noted by our top voices and many people on the community platform as well. Jason, I'm curious what you think or Chloe, any perspective on the hydrogen conversation or where we're headed?

 

Jason Price:

So hydrogen is a fascinating topic, but it's also taken both a step forward and a step back this past year. If you've been following what's been going on at the federal level with hydrogen hubs, we've seen a slowdown in the spending in some of the commitments. We've seen community backlash on some of these hubs. There's been a degree of a public relations challenge that's going on, and some of the members and participants in some of the hubs have dropped out. I think that there's a number of concerns that are creeping into the hydrogen conversation, whether all seven of these hubs, federally funded hubs will survive, I guess is now up for question or maybe they'll look a lot smaller or different. But I think we should continue pressing forward. I think the country needs additional mix in the energy sector. Hydrogen definitely presents it, but I think we've got some challenges ahead of us in 2025 with hydrogen, we shall see. But thanks for the question. And let's move on to the next one.

So another big one for the community has been about the decreasing energy cost of storage. So Jim Lazar from the Electricity Brain Trust had this to say. "The sharp decline in battery poses a huge impact on the electricity industry. Wind and solar prices had already dropped into the two to 4 cent range by 2023. And even a well-selected portfolio of wind and solar still needs a fair amount of storage. Battery prices dropping below $100 a kilowatt really spells the end of fossil and nuclear generation. At $100 a kilowatt and a lifetime of 5,000 discharge cycles, that's about 2 cents to shape the power plus carrying costs. That really means the quick demise of existing fossil peaker units, and reasonable certainty that all of the current height about advanced nuclear will face an impossible market challenge. Remember, nuclear is baseload, not load mesh. So it will need storage also to serve loads that vary through the day." And that is again from Jim Lazar of the Electricity Brain Trust.

So Matt, why don't you jump in here and give us some context from our community about this?

 

Matt Chester:

Yeah, I think energy storage is in a really exciting moment. It kind of reminds me of where maybe solar energy technology was 10 or 15 years ago, where maybe the solar technology is mature now and we're trying to squeeze out additional efficiency drops, but with every year that passes, the storage costs, as Jim mentioned, are going down, the technologies are advancing, there's new chemistries behind the technology. So there's a lot of exciting stuff in the storage world. And two episodes came to mind from our 2024 slate to highlight. One was episode 174, where we had representatives from Landis+Gyr, and as well as Span, the two companies that worked to get some energy storage and demand side management into the residential sector, and what that does to the residential customer to have them equipped with energy storage. What does it mean for them? How does it change the way they think about energy?

And then just recently we had one of our most immediately popular and exciting episodes was with Amy Myers Jaffe, globally known energy thought leader. But when we were talking to her about, all right, post-election energy outlook, what is she keeping her eye on? She mentioned multiple times how energy storage is going to remain a critical area of focus, both for investment from the government, from private technologies. You can take that even further to the critical minerals that make up those battery technologies and securing those supplies. So it's not only going to be a technology opportunity, but it's going to be a political and geopolitical topic of increasing importance.

 

Kinsey Grant Baker:

I would say to tack onto that, the Amy, you mentioned Matt, which was a great episode, I highly recommend people listen to, the idea of materials as something that we have talked a lot about just in our internal conversations on the content community team. We've had a lot of back and forth about how much coverage is necessary for the material story when we're talking about batteries, when we're talking about storage and beyond. I think this is something that we will continue to visit and revisit as an editorial team focused on creating content and community that really speaks to the interests of the audience. But I wanted to just take the moment here to plug that my email is always open. If anybody listening to this has any perspectives on how best Energy Central can talk about the materials conversation can engage with that conversation, I would love to hear from you.

My email is [email protected]. I'll have Matt put that in the show notes. But I think it's one that has again kind of transcended just the energy space that we're now talking about coverage in the major papers of record across the country. So I'm curious to see how it plays out. And I think I'm hesitant to kind of jump into our final topic looking ahead in our outline here. But this is something that I think is heavily dependent on how the next four years go, which saying this without any political influence is kind of a wild card just given historical reference points. So we have some indication of what a Trump presidency 2.0 is going to look like. But ultimately it feels in some ways, like a little bit of a wait and see kind of attitude that I often have toward what the presidency will mean for our industry. But there's certain things we can predict and many more things that we cannot predict.

But I welcome any indication of what you all think might happen and what kind of coverage you want to see, what kind of conversations you want to hear us engage in on the material stuff, certainly, but beyond that as well, we welcome it all.

 

Chloe Ginsberg:

I will say I find it really interesting to hear more about stories about the end consumer and how they're getting impacted by all of these changes in pricing. And I think we'll continue to cover that I think on the Energy Central side. But yeah, just always interesting to hear conversations around that, and whether it's local here or global stories happening, that's something I'm always following and interested in hearing more about.

 

Kinsey Grant Baker:

Yeah, and it's a good point, Chloe too, for the two of us kind of being slightly newer to this space. I always joked when we first started working on Energy Central that my limited experience with this industry was sometimes reading my Con Ed bill. I live in New York City sometimes opening the bill that they sent me each month and trying to decipher it. But I think what I have really come to understand is that fewer people than you think actually can open their Con Ed bill and decipher it. And so understanding the bigger more macro impacts of these conversations is always going to be at the core of what we do. But I think it really does kind of trickle down to the micro as well, the individual who gets the bill, the rate payer, their experience, and how utilities can cater to the needs of that person. They do obviously play a very important role in all of this. So I agree it's something that we'll continue to speak about.

 

Jason Price:

Now let's end with one massive trend that's surely shaping 2025 in a major way, local clean energy and climate action. Stephan Heberer, CEO of Ampacimon hit us up with the following. "In the US, localized climate and decarbonization efforts will remain a priority regardless of the new Trump administrations de-prioritizing the effort at the federal level. State governments are taking up the climate and grid modernization mantle. For example, California and New York are driving grid mod through ambitious clean energy goals and independent mandates. California's SB-100 2018, and New York's Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act 2019 are examples of state level legislation driving gas adoption through aggressive renewable and grid modernization mandates. This localized approach ensures adaptation to climate challenges."

Matt, take it away from here.

 

Matt Chester:

Yeah, obviously climate clean energy, it's a major topic on the podcast and on Energy Central in general. So I'll just highlight four specifically, and again, these will be in the show notes. But we heard from Diego Ibarra of ENGIE Impact Americas, how we can Look across borders for the climate future, kind of the international collaboration there. From Erik Krause of SMUD, we got the utility perspective specifically on their ideals of getting no customer behind in the decarbonization plans.

Another utility perspective came from Cynthia Klein of Duke Energy, who taught us all about IIJA and how the Jobs Act Legislation was really being utilized by Duke Energy to advance their sustainability and their clean energy initiatives. And then we also heard more recently from Aaron Choo, who's the vice president of the gas network operations at National Grid, sharing with us that the renewables might get the headline, but still has a role in this clean energy transition and how and where that can take place.

So those obviously decarbonization and future clean energy goals, like I mentioned, it's a common thread of virtually all of our episodes, whether that's overtly stated or not. But again, these bring some interesting perspectives about the geopolitics, the equity, the government role, and again, the role of fossil fuel that it might still play as we think about long-term plans for decarbonization.

 

Kinsey Grant Baker:

Yeah, and I think, Matt, to your point that this is pervasive kind of across episodes, across themes, across subtopics and all of that good stuff. I had a recent conversation with somebody in the energy space just casually talking about some of the big stories that are shaping 2025 and beyond. And their perspective was essentially they put it in a succinct way, which I'll repeat here. "The train has already left the station. It's really where it stops along the way." The transition is underway. Decarbonization is a fact of life. It's something that we're all talking about, something we're all thinking about. The shape that it takes over the next four years and beyond, I think in some ways, again, remains to be seen, but it's not as if we're not going to go in reverse on this train, at least not all the way back to the station from which we left.

But it's something that I think will also continue to be a big theme that we talk about, something our community has shown a ton of interest in and has engaged with a lot when we talk about it on Energy Central on the platform. So I'm excited to see what happens. I'm excited to see what kind of cool tech people come up with. I'm excited to see what interesting startups enter this space. I think that's one of the big areas where I find a lot of really interesting traction is newcomers. New people who are coming up with tech forward and interesting solutions that can be applied across the industry and really across the spectrum. So lots to unpack with that one.

 

Jason Price:

Yeah, you're spot on. Chloe, do you have anything you want to add?

 

Chloe Ginsberg:

No, I think it'll be interesting story to watch, I think, and with the new administration, we're going to see a lot of changes. And for reference, I'm Canadian for our users, so I might have a different experience over here. But we watch US politics very closely, and I think it'll be interesting to watch.

 

Matt Chester:

It's such a global topic that you can't look at it in the size of one country, one state, one city. It all comes into play in a tapestry. But we always welcome on Energy Central international perspectives, and if you go to our pages, you'll see stories about what's happening in Europe, in Asia and South America. And if it's a trend that's happening somewhere else in the world, chances are we're going to be impacted by it. We're going to see it ourselves. So we always celebrate that international perspective too.

 

Chloe Ginsberg:

For sure.

 

Jason Price:

You're absolutely right. These challenges are not just unique to the United States, but to certainly the region and around the globe. So we'll have to get you, Chloe onto the show and talk about what we can learn from our neighbors in the north.

That is the conclusion of this episode in our year-end wrap up. Some of the biggest moments of 2024 and 2025 were discussed today. And you can get more in the Energy Central community. And if you want to know more about these trends and their impact throughout the power industry, you need to head to the show notes and take a look at the roundup of conversations and discussions on Energy Central's top voices. Until then, I want to thank the crew for joining us today and thank all of you for making 2024 such a standout year for Power Perspectives, and we look forward to 2025 and all that lies ahead. Happy Holidays. We'll see in the New Year on Energy Central's, Power Perspectives podcast.

 

About Energy Central Podcasts

Power Perspectives features conversations with thought leaders in the utility sector. At least twice monthly, we connect with an Energy Central Power Industry Network community member to discuss compelling topics that impact professionals who work in the power industry. Some podcasts may be a continuation of thought-provoking posts or discussions started in the community or with an industry leader that is interested in sharing their expertise and doing a deeper dive into hot topics or issues relevant to the industry.

Power Perspectives is the premiere podcast series from Energy Central, a Power Industry Network of Communities built specifically for professionals in the electric power industry and a place where professionals can share, learn, and connect in a collaborative environment. Supported by leading industry organizations, our mission is to help global power industry professionals work better. Since 1995, we’ve been a trusted news and information source for professionals working in the power industry, and today our managed communities are a place for lively discussions, debates, and analysis to take place. If you’re not yet a member, visit www.EnergyCentral.com to register for free and join over 200,000 of your peers working in the power industry.

Power Perspectives is hosted by Jason Price, Community Ambassador of Energy Central. Jason is a Business Development Executive at West Monroe, working in the East Coast Energy and Utilities Group. Jason is joined in the podcast booth by the producer of the podcast, Matt Chester, who is also the Community Manager of Energy Central and energy analyst/independent consultant in energy policy, markets, and technology.  

If you want to be a guest on a future episode of Power Perspectives, let us know! We’ll be pulling guests from our community members who submit engaging content that gets our community talking, and perhaps that next guest will be you! Likewise, if you see an article submitted by a fellow Energy Central community member that you’d like to see broken down in more detail in a conversation, feel free to send us a note to nominate them.  For more information, contact us at [email protected]. Podcast interviews are free for Expert Members and professionals who work for a utility.  We have package offers available for solution providers and vendors. 

Happy listening, and stay tuned for our next episode! Like what you hear, have a suggestion for future episodes, or a question for our guest? Leave a note in the comments below.

All new episodes of the Power Perspectives will be posted to the relevant Energy Central community group, but you can also subscribe to the podcast at all the major podcast outlets, including: