The Energy Revolution

The UK is in a cost of living crisis, and energy prices in particular are constantly hitting the headlines.

Fuel poverty has been climbing, and many on middle or even higher incomes are struggling with costs too.

How did we get here? And what can be done to tackle the problem?

In this episode we are joined by Tilly Cook of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. We hear some real stories about what fuel poverty looks like for people in the UK, and talk about some possible solutions the government could consider.

The show is hosted by Sulaiman Ilyas-Jarrett, a former senior government advisor and Policy Fellow at the University of Cambridge Centre for Science and Policy.

Keywords:

Renwables | Gas | Power | Bills | Politics |

Do PPAs have a future?

More power than ever is being procured through government backed CfDs, so how and why will corporates continue to buy power directly?

This week we’re joined by serial entrepreneur and CEO of Renewabl Juan Pablo Cerda to discuss the unique benefits of PPAs, and how the market is evolving to offer more sophisticated power profiles to buyers.

Alongside our host, former government advisor and expert in market design Sulaiman Ilyas-Jarrett, Juan Pablo explains how better data and tech are allowing us to move to 24/7 power matching, where corporates can be confident that the power they use is matched by renewable generation in real-time.

There are still challenges to the market, which is remarkably old school in places, but corporate contracts have the ability to go beyond base regulation to get more renewables built and be more responsive to what companies actually need.

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Keywords:
Renewables | Solar | Wind | Net Zero | Data centres | Tech | AI

How does innovation actually happen? Energy technologies are changing fast, but we'll need to change even faster if we're going to achieve a decarbonized economy.

This week, we're joined by Michael Rea, CEO of the Carbon Trust, who has over 25 years experience building clean energy innovation systems in the UK, in everything from carbon accounting to the early days of offshore wind.

Alongside our host Sulaiman Ilyas-Jarrett, former government advisor and Policy Fellow at Cambridge Centre for Science and Policy, the discussion draws on examples from the real world as well as the latest research on what makes innovation systems tick.

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Keywords:

Energy | Renewables | EV | Carbon Capture | Innovation | Tech

The current approach to funding gas plants is breaking, but what should replace it? And when?

For a long time, gas has been the backbone of the energy system. That's changing rapidly as renewables become cheaper and more widely deployed, but removing gas completely from the energy system is not an easy task.

Despite becoming less important, a small amount of it is likely to linger on the system for a while yet. Without a plan to manage its decline, this could come at considerable cost to the consumer.

This week Adam Bell (Director of Policy at Stonehaven) joins Sulaiman Ilyas-Jarrett (former UK government advisor and Policy Fellow at the University of Cambridge Centre for Science and Policy) for a discussion on the future of gas generation in the UK.

Key words:

Energy | electricity| gas | AI | generation | security | renewables

The Democratic Republic of Congo produces over 70% of the words Cobalt, a key material in many modern bateries and clean energy technologies.

It is a mining powerhouse, central to the global energy system, and yet the economy remains one of the poorest in the world.

So what do these mines look like on the ground? Why have Chinese firms been buying up more of the country's mines? and what does all of this have to do with the EV in your driveway?

In our final episode before Christmas we are joined by Dr Ben Radley, Associate Professor at the University of Bath and author of Disrupted Development in the Congo: The Fragile Foundations of the African Mining Consensus (Oxford University Press).

Alongside our host, former UK government advisor and Cambridge Fellow Sulaiman Ilyas-Jarrett, Ben talks to us about all of this and more, to understand the critical role of DRC in the energy system, and whether a fairer mining deal is possible.

Are businesses leaders or laggards in the energy transition?

Despite attempts by some to paint clean energy and net zero as anti-business and anti-growth, business leaders themselves are broadly supportive of the shift and see it as a place of economic opportunity.

This week our host Sulaiman Ilyas-Jarrett sits down with Rachel Solomon Williams, CEO of the Aldersgate Group, who work directly with leading businesses such as IKEA,Tesco and Aviva to affect positive change on the ground.

They discuss the unique position of companies to deploy changes quickly and the potential to save costs alongside emissions, as well as the real short-term challenges of competing with those that have lower environmental standards and the limits of businesses given the profit motive.

The politics of net zero is changing. The term itself falling out of favour.

According to the media, the consensus is fraying at the edges, with Nigel Farage and Kemi Badenoch banging the anti-net zero drum at every chance they get.

And yet, beneath the surface there is still a relative amount of agreement. Labour, the Lib Dems, SNP, Plaid Cymru, and the insurgent Greens all agree that climate and clean energy are core to the UK's future.

So what's changed? With our guest Harry Shackleton (Inflect) we look at how fractitious modern politics is bleeding into the net zero debate, the weak leadership of Starmer, and what lessons can be learned from the likes of Zohran Mamdani in the US on delivering a message effectively.

The show is hosted by Sulaiman Ilyas-Jarrett, former senior government advisor and Policy Fellow at the Cambridge Centre for Science and Policy.

Is a country's energy future determined by its geography?

When it comes to energy resources, not all countries are made equal. Some are blessed with windy seas, others with regular sun, and a handful with the resources needed to build clean energy technology.

This episode looks at some of the archetypes for energy systems, the limits of geography, and the opportunity for countries to still decide how they make the most of what they have.

We're joined by Phoebe O'Hara of the Energy Transmissions Commission to talk about their latest research and what it means for the global energy transition.

The show is hosted by Sulaiman Ilyas-Jarrett, former government advisor and current Policy Fellow at the University of Cambridge Centre for Science and Policy.

The UK has an ambitious goal to achieve Clean Power by 2030, and cement itself as a clean energy superpower in the decade that follows.

The success of this will depend not just on national leadership, but an ability to make the case for the energy transition locally, for the people that will see infrastructure built in their back yards, or want to know how they’ll feel the benefits on their bills.

On today’s episode we’re joined by Merlin Hyman, CEO at  Regen and a staple of the UK energy world for almost two decades.

Alongside our host Sulaiman Ilyas-Jarrett, former government advisor and Policy Fellow at the University of Cambridge Centre for Science and Policy, they discuss everythingfrom collective ownership models for renewables and local government schemes, to practical changes needed to the electricity market and the huge changes in the wind and solar industries to date.

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An uncomfortable truth in the energy transition is that Coal is still a major part of the global energy system.

Despite being majorly polluting and often no cheaper than cleaner alternatives, it's persisted particularly in countries like China, India, and Indonesia, but also the USA and Australia. Why? And how do we truly phase it out of the system.

Our guest this week is Lucy Shaw, who's working on a book looking at the role of coal in the world and why it's been so hard for some countries to give up.

We talk about the politics that's keeping coal on line from mechanised mines in China to aging sites in Trump's new America, complete with some real stories from Lucy's research on the ground.

The show is hosted by Sulaiman Ilyas-Jarrett, former senior government advisor at the UK Department for Energy Security and Net Zero and the No10 Policy Unit, and a Fellow at the University of Cambridge Centre for Science and Policy.