“The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.” This proverb is just as apt if you swap out “trees” for “grid investment.” Some $326 billion flowed into the world’s power grids in 2023, up 7% from the year before. Yet while investment may be increasing overall, only a few markets align with a net-zero pathway.

On today's show, co-hosts Dana Perkins and Tom Rowlands-Rees are joined by Felicia Aminoff from BNEF’s Grids and Utilities team. They discuss the growing power demand from new data centers, strategies for protecting the grid from extreme weather events, and how grid authorities are addressing a backlog of renewable energy projects waiting for a connection. This episode draws upon BNEF research found in the 2024 Power Grid Investment Outlook and the New Energy Outlook 2024: Grids.

Complementary BNEF research on the trends driving the transition to a lower-carbon economy can be found at BNEF on the Bloomberg Terminal or on bnef.com

Links to research notes from this episode:

2024 Power Grid Investment Outlook - https://www.bnef.com/insights/34703/view

New Energy Outlook 2024: Grids - https://www.bnef.com/insights/35211

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Tariffs and subsidies loom large in the energy transition. The US Inflation Reduction Act, or IRA, has been of global importance, changing trade relationships and causing some governments to rethink their domestic policies. The European Union responded by introducing the Net-Zero Industry Act (NZIA), although it has fewer subsidies and trade barriers than its transatlantic counterpart.

On today’s show, Dana speaks with Antoine Vagneur-Jones and Matthew Hales from BNEF’s Trade and Supply Chains team. As they discuss key findings from the report US Clean-Tech Industrial Policy Leaves EU Behind – For Now, they look at the risks the IRA faces in the upcoming US election, the relative effectiveness of US and EU tariffs, and whether western markets can realistically expect to challenge Chinese manufacturers on cost competitiveness.

Complementary BNEF research on the trends driving the transition to a lower-carbon economy can be found at BNEF on the Bloomberg Terminal or on bnef.com

Links to research notes from this episode:

US-Clean Tech Industrial Policy Leaves EU Behind - For Now - https://www.bnef.com/insights/34863

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Heavy transport is at a crossroads. There are many possible paths for decarbonizing aviation, maritime shipping and long-haul trucking, including sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), ammonia, methanol and synthetic fuels. Now that companies are working to secure feedstocks, governments are writing clean-fuel policies, and investors are looking for new fuels to back, will these sectors coalesce around a single low-carbon pathway? Or will a cornucopia of options be the way of the future?

On today’s episode, Colin McKerracher, BloombergNEF’s Head of Transport and Energy Storage, moderates a discussion at the BNEF Summit London on the future of clean fuels in heavy transport. He is joined by panelists Freya Burton, Chief Sustainability Officer at LanzaTech; Chris Johnson, Chief Commercial Officer at C2X; and Lara Naqushbandi, Chief Executive Officer at ETFuels. Together, they discuss which clean fuels are seeing the greatest uptake, what they’d most like to see from government policy, and how to stimulate investor activity across the sector at large.

Today’s episode was recorded live at BNEF's London Summit. To learn more about our Summits and to listen to more interviews, please visit https://about.bnef.com/summit/

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