Most electricity used in America today is sold on a wholesale power market. These markets are one of the most important institutions structuring the modern U.S. energy economy, but they’re also not very well understood, even in climate nerd circles. And after all: How would you even run a market for something that’s used at the second it’s created — and moves at the speed of light? 

On this week’s episode of Shift Key Summer School, Rob and Jesse talk about how electricity finds a price and how modern power markets work. Why run a power market in the first place? Who makes the most money in power markets? How do you encourage new power plants to get built? And what do power markets mean for renewables? 

Shift Key is hosted by Jesse Jenkins, a professor of energy systems engineering at Princeton University, and Robinson Meyer, Heatmap’s executive editor.  

Mentioned: 

Jesse’s slides on electricity pricing in the short run

Jesse’s lecture slides on electricity pricing in the long run

“The duck curve”

Shift Key Summer School episodes 1, 2, and 3

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This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by …

Accelerate your clean energy career with Yale’s online certificate programs. Gain real-world skills, build strong networks, and keep working while you learn. Explore the year-long Financing and Deploying Clean Energy program or the 5-month Clean and Equitable Energy Development program. Learn more here.

Join clean energy leaders at RE+ 25, September 8–11 in Las Vegas. Explore opportunities to meet rising energy demand with the latest in solar, storage, EVs, and more at North America’s largest energy event. Save 20% with code HEATMAP20 at re-plus.com.

Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Trump administration has formally declared that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases are not dangerous pollutants. If the president gets his way, then the Environmental Protection Agency may soon surrender any ability to regulate heat-trapping pollution from cars and trucks, power plants, and factories — in ways that a future Democratic president potentially could not reverse.

On this week’s episode of Shift Key, we discuss whether Trump’s EPA gambit will work, the arguments that the administration is using, and what it could mean for the future of U.S. climate and energy policy. We’re joined by Jody Freeman, the Archibald Cox Professor of Law at Harvard and the director of Harvard’s environmental and energy law program. She was an architect of the Obama administration’s landmark deal with automakers to accept carbon dioxide regulations.

Shift Key is hosted by Jesse Jenkins, a professor of energy systems engineering at Princeton University, and Robinson Meyer, Heatmap’s executive editor.

Mentioned:

The EPA Says Carbon Pollution Isn’t Dangerous. What Comes Next?

The EPA on its reconsideration of the endangerment finding

Jody’s story on the change: Trump’s EPA proposes to end the U.S. fight against climate change

Jesse’s upshift (and accompanying video); Rob’s sort of upshift.

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This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by …

Accelerate your clean energy career with Yale’s online certificate programs. Gain real-world skills, build strong networks, and keep working while you learn. Explore the year-long Financing and Deploying Clean Energy program or the 5-month Clean and Equitable Energy Development program. Learn more here.

Join clean energy leaders at RE+ 25, September 8–11 in Las Vegas. Explore opportunities to meet rising energy demand with the latest in solar, storage, EVs, and more at North America’s largest energy event. Save 20% with code HEATMAP20 at re-plus.com.

Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In the next few years, the United States is going to see the fastest growth in electricity demand since the 1970s. And that’s only the beginning of the challenges that our power grid will face. When you step back, virtually every trend facing the power system — such as the coming surge in liquified natural gas exports or President Trump’s repeal of wind and solar tax credits — threatens to constrain the supply of new electricity. 

On this week’s episode of Shift Key, Rob and Jesse talk about why they’re increasingly worried about a surge in electricity prices. What’s setting us up for an electricity shortfall? What does the recent auction in the country’s largest electricity market tell us about what’s coming? And what would a power shock mean for utility customers, the economy, and decarbonization? 

Shift Key is hosted by Jesse Jenkins, a professor of energy systems engineering at Princeton University, and Robinson Meyer, Heatmap’s executive editor.  

Mentioned: 

Jesse on The Ezra Klein Show

From Rob: The Electricity Affordability Crisis Is Coming

U.S. power use to reach record highs in 2025 and 2026, per EIA

Why the EIA expects natural gas prices to rise

The Messy Truth of America’s Natural Gas Exports

Governor Josh Schapiro’s legal action to constrain power prices

Jesse’s upshift; Rob’s downshift.

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This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by …

Accelerate your clean energy career with Yale’s online certificate programs. Gain real-world skills, build strong networks, and keep working while you learn. Explore the year-long Financing and Deploying Clean Energy program or the 5-month Clean and Equitable Energy Development program. Learn more here.

Join clean energy leaders at RE+ 25, September 8–11 in Las Vegas. Explore opportunities to meet rising energy demand with the latest in solar, storage, EVs, and more at North America’s largest energy event. Save 20% with code HEATMAP20 at re-plus.com.

Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The two fastest-growing sources of electricity generation in the world represent a radical break with the energy technologies that came before them. That’s not just because their fuels are the wind and the sun.

This is our third episode of Shift Key Summer School, a series of “lecture conversations” about the basics of energy, electricity, and the power grid. This week, we dive into the history and mechanics of wind turbines and solar panels, the two lynchpin technologies of the energy transition. What do solar panels have in common with semiconductors? Why did it take so long for them to achieve scale? And what’s an inverter and why is it so important for the grid of the future? 

Shift Key is hosted by Jesse Jenkins, a professor of energy systems engineering at Princeton University, and Robinson Meyer, Heatmap’s executive editor.  

Mentioned:

How Solar Energy Became Cheap, by Gregory F. Nemet

More on what wind energy has to do with Star Trek

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This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by …

Accelerate your clean energy career with Yale’s online certificate programs. Gain real-world skills, build strong networks, and keep working while you learn. Explore the year-long Financing and Deploying Clean Energy program or the 5-month Clean and Equitable Energy Development program. Learn more here.

Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It’s official. On July 4, President Trump signed the Republican reconciliation bill into law, gutting many of the country’s most significant clean energy tax credits. The future of the American solar, wind, battery, and electric vehicle industries looks very different now than it did last year.

On this week’s episode of Shift Key, we survey the damage and look for bright spots. What did the law, in its final version, actually repeal, and what did it leave intact? How much could still change as the Trump administration implements the law? What does this mean for U.S. economic competitiveness? And how are we feeling about the climate fight today? 

Jillian Goodman, Heatmap’s deputy editor, joins us to discuss all these questions and more. Shift Key is hosted by Jesse Jenkins, a professor of energy systems engineering at Princeton University, and Robinson Meyer, Heatmap’s executive editor.  

Mentioned:

The REPEAT Project report on what the OBBBA will mean for the future of American emissions

The Bipartisan Policy Center’s foreign entities of concern explainer

The new White House executive order about renewables tax credits 

And here’s more of Heatmap’s coverage from the endgame of OBBBA.

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This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by …

The Yale Center for Business and the Environment’s online clean energy programs equip you with tangible skills and powerful networks—and you can continue working while learning. In just five hours a week, propel your career and make a difference.

Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Just two types of machines have produced the overwhelming majority of electricity generated since 1890. This week, we look at the history of those devices, how they work — and how they have contributed to global warming.

This is our second episode of Shift Key Summer School, a series of “lecture conversations” about the basics of energy, electricity, and the power grid for listeners of all backgrounds. This week, we dive into the invention and engineering of the world’s most common types of fossil- and nuclear-fueled power plants. What’s a Rankine cycle power station, and how does it use steam to produce electricity? How did the invention of the jet engine enable the rise of natural gas-generated electricity? And why can natural gas power plants achieve much higher efficiency gains than coal plants?

Shift Key is hosted by Jesse Jenkins, a professor of energy systems engineering at Princeton University, and Robinson Meyer, Heatmap’s executive editor.

Mentioned:

Powering the Dream: The History and Promise of Green Technology, by Alexis Madrigal

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This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by …

The Yale Center for Business and the Environment’s online clean energy programs equip you with tangible skills and powerful networks—and you can continue working while learning. In just five hours a week, propel your career and make a difference.

Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

What is the difference between energy and power? How does the power grid work? And what’s the difference between a megawatt and a megawatt-hour? 

On this week’s episode, we answer those questions and many, many more. This is the start of a new series: Shift Key Summer School. It’s a series of introductory “lecture conversations” meant to cover the basics of energy and the power grid for listeners of every experience level and background. In less than an hour, we try to get you up to speed on how to think about energy, power, horsepower, volts, amps, and what uses (approximately) 1 watt-hour, 1 kilowatt-hour, 1 megawatt-hour, and 1 gigawatt-hour. 

Shift Key is hosted by Jesse Jenkins, a professor of energy systems engineering at Princeton University, and Robinson Meyer, Heatmap’s executive editor.  

Mentioned: 

Decarbonize Your Life

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This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by …

The Yale Center for Business and the Environment’s online clean energy programs equip you with tangible skills and powerful networks—and you can continue working while learning. In just five hours a week, propel your career and make a difference.

Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Food is a huge climate problem. It’s responsible for somewhere between a quarter and a third of global greenhouse gas emissions, but it concerns a much smaller share of global climate policy. And what policy does exist is often … pretty bad.

On this week’s episode of Shift Key, Rob and Jesse talk with Michael Grunwald, the author of the new book We Are Eating the Earth. It’s a book about land as much as it’s a book about food — because no matter how much energy abundance we ultimately achieve, we’re stuck with the amount of land we’ve got. 

Grunwald is a giant of climate journalism and a Heatmap contributor, and he has previously written books about the Florida everglades and the Obama recovery act. Shift Key is hosted by Jesse Jenkins, a professor of energy systems engineering at Princeton University, and Robinson Meyer, Heatmap’s executive editor.  

Mentioned: 

Preorder We Are Eating the Earth

The real war on coal, by Michael Grunwald

The Senate GOP’s seismic overhaul of clean energy tax credits

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Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

You might not think that often about medium-duty trucks, but they’re all around you: ambulances, UPS and FedEx delivery trucks, school buses. And although they make up a relatively small share of vehicles on the road, they generate an outsized amount of carbon pollution. They’re also a surprisingly ripe target for electrification, because so many medium-duty trucks drive fewer than 150 miles a day.

On this week’s episode of Shift Key, Rob and Jesse talk with John Henry Harris, the cofounder and CEO of Harbinger Motors. Harbinger is a Los Angeles-based startup that sells electric and hybrid chassis for medium-duty vehicles, such as delivery vans, moving trucks, and ambulances. 

Rob, John, and Jesse chat about why medium-duty trucking is unlike any other vehicle segment, how to design an electric truck to last 20 years, and how President Trump’s tariffs are already stalling out manufacturing firms. Shift Key is hosted by Jesse Jenkins, a professor of energy systems engineering at Princeton University, and Robinson Meyer, Heatmap’s executive editor.  

Mentioned: 

Harbinger Motors

CalStart’s data on medium-duty electric trucks deployed in the U.S.

Here’s the chart that John showed Rob and Jesse.

It draws on data from Bloomberg in China, the ICCT, and the Calstart ZET Dashboard in the United States.

Jesse’s case for EVs with gas tanks — which are called extended range electric vehicles

Thor’s extended range electric vehicle RV

Jesse’s upshift; Rob’s downshift.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Why has it been so hard for the world to make progress on climate change over the past 30 years? Maybe it’s because we’ve been thinking about the problem wrong. Academics and economists have often framed climate change as a free-rider or collective action problem, one in which countries must agree not to emit greenhouse gases and abuse the public commons. But maybe the better way to understand climate action is as a fight that generates winners and losers, defined primarily by who owns what. 

On this week’s episode of Shift Key, Rob and Jesse talk with Jessica Green, a political science professor at the University of Toronto. She calls for “radical pragmatism” in climate action and an “asset revaluation”-focused view of the climate problem. Green is the author of the forthcoming book Existential Politics: Why Global Climate Institutions Are Failing and How to Fix Them. Shift Key is hosted by Jesse Jenkins, a professor of energy systems engineering at Princeton University, and Robinson Meyer, Heatmap’s executive editor. 

Mentioned:

Asset Revaluation and the Existential Politics of Climate Change, by Jessica Green, Jeff Colgan, and Thomas Hale

Tax Policy Is Climate Policy by Jessica Green 

Why Carbon Pricing Falls Short, by Jesse Jenkins

Jesse’s 2014 article on asset specificity and climate change 

Jesse’s downshift; Rob’s downshift.

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Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.