Redefining Energy

223. Solar + Storage: The Economic Core of the Future Grid

2026-04-06 · 00:24 UTC ·Redefining Energy ·36 min read

Brief

Gerard’s core argument is that solar paired with storage is becoming the central economic building block of the future grid, not just another clean-energy option. He traced his own skepticism back to a solar factory visit in Berlin about 20 years ago, when module assembly still looked manual and uneconomical to him. Over time, he said, cost declines and the rise of complementary technologies such as batteries and power electronics changed his view completely. In his telling, solar has moved from a niche technology to the cheapest usable energy source, and its logic is reinforced by a broader civilizational shift: electrification, digitalization, and AI all require electricity, while the old system was built around oil. He argued that this transition is already happening faster than previous industrial revolutions and could take only about a decade.

The conversation then turned to why storage is inseparable from the solar story. Gerard said electricity storage has always existed in other forms — fridges, fuel tanks, and tanker networks in the fossil system — but modern power systems need batteries because solar produces a predictable daily surplus that can be shifted from midday to nighttime at relatively low cost. He contrasted that with wind and hydro, where the storage problem can be much harder because wind arrives in multi-day weather fronts and hydro has its own constraints. He also broadened the discussion beyond the West, arguing that in places like Pakistan or across the Global South, solar is not about replacing an entrenched system so much as delivering electricity and internet for the first time. In that context, rooftop and “plug-and-play” solar paired with batteries becomes a development tool, not just a decarbonization technology.

A major portion of the exchange focused on systems thinking, resilience, and market design. Gerard warned that energy transition failures often come from coordination problems rather than technology gaps, citing Spain’s blackout, storm-related outages in Ireland, jellyfish-linked shutdowns at French nuclear plants, and transformer attacks in the U.S. as reminders that climate and security risks are already here. He said Europe lacks the kind of shared contingency planning U.S. states and utilities have for critical infrastructure, and he argued that decentralized systems, redundancy, islanding, local batteries, and better protection of weak points are essential. On the market side, he said the biggest risk is midday oversupply pushing prices to zero or below, making solar finance harder without old-style subsidies or PPAs. His preferred response is flexibility: smart meters, aggregators, EV batteries, home storage, and service-based models that let customers benefit from cheap solar automatically. The episode closes on the idea that the future belongs to those who understand the whole system — economics, resilience, and incentives — not just the technology itself.

Why it matters

Gerard argued that solar plus storage is becoming the “economic core” of the future power system because solar is now the cheapest electricity source, can be installed almost anywhere, and is increasingly paired with batteries and power electronics for grid integration.

Key details

He said his view changed over roughly 20 years: after visiting a Berlin solar factory and seeing hand-built modules, he initially doubted solar could ever fall fast enough in cost, but later concluded it is now the lowest-cost form of usable energy.
Gerard framed the energy transition as a shift from an oil-based system to one driven by electrification, digitalization, and AI, arguing that modern technologies “need electricity, not oil,” and that this industrial revolution could play out in about 10 years rather than 50 or 150.
He emphasized that storage is essential to renewables because electricity must be converted into another form if it is to be shifted in time; with solar, the daily cycle makes batteries especially valuable because excess daytime generation can be saved until night.
He contrasted solar with wind and hydro, saying solar is easier to store for because the timing problem is typically overnight rather than multiple-day weather fronts, while wind storage may need to cover two or three days.
A major theme was systemic risk and resilience: Gerard cited Spain’s blackout, severe storms in Ireland, jellyfish forcing French nuclear plant shutdowns, and attacks on U.S. transformers as examples of why Europe and other regions need better contingency planning, islanding capability, and decentralized infrastructure.

Source evidence

title: 223. Solar + Storage: The Economic Core of the Future Grid
author: Redefining Energy
contenttype: podcast
publication: Redefining Energy
published: 2026-04-06T00:24:41+00:00
sourceurl: https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/api.spreaker.com/download/episode/71046096/223gerardpvcase2.mp3

word_count: 8234

[0:00] Introduction

1 With a round segle and from London and Gerard read 2 from Berlin. 3 This is redefining. 4 Energy Today on really find Energy Job, we're going to 5 talk about solar and especially an extraordinary conversation you had 6 with Anaconde of PVK. So can you give us a 7 bit of a context? 8 Yeah, what sort of PV case is one of the 9 world's leading software. 10 Platforms for anyone who's designing. 11 Large scale PV systems, and they have a podcast they 12 invited me to come on, and really the whole teases 13 for me is that going forward, the economic core of 14 the future power system is solar and storage. And the 15 reason for this is just because of cost simpler ast 16 that it's just solar. We've never seen an electricity production 17 technology as cheap as it. And also it can be 18 put anywhere and add a bit of storage into that 19 and you can do a huge amount. And actually i'd 20 make a point as well, ple really you just can't 21 block it because we're moving into a world of plug 22 and play solar, and plug and play solar really means 23 I put up my back garden, I plug it into 24 a socket and put a battery beside it, and I've 25 got a small power plant and guess what, My utility 26 hasn't a clue on what's going on, My grid operator 27 hasn't a clue what's going on. 28 That's a no European perspective. 29 But if I go to the global South, my god, 30 how you're going to revolutionize the world by being able 31 to put these systems in. 32 It's incredibly exciting. 33 So

[2:26] Listen to your conversation with Annaconde

let's listen to your conversation with Annaconde. But first 34 of all, from my partner, A. 35 B Loco Energy is Europe's premier leaser of ten foot 36 container mobile batteries built in Europe with COTL best LFP cells. 37 A Bloco Energy serves fourteen European countries, including France, Germany 38 and the UK. Our Blocko's batteries can be leased for 39 any duration between six weeks and six years, and they 40 are monitored by the Dutch award winning platform school a 41 block Over Energy. Make your life easier, make your business 42 more flexible. 43 Back to the show, Gerard, welcome to our show. 44 My pleasure looking forward to You really do. 45 Bring a very perspective and I'm very excited to dive 46 into what energy transition looks like when you zoom out 47 and connect the dots. You've been quite open about the 48 fact that you were initially skeptical of solder. What were 49 you skeptical about and what ultimately changed your mind. 50 What I was. 51 Skeptical about really was the ability to get costs down quickly. 52 And where I was. 53 Coming from this this is twenty years ago. We've actually 54 had solar panels for over fifty years, but sort of 55 nothing happened in the space and I just didn't really 56 see a path. When I went to see a solar 57 factory in Berlin twenty years ago, I really just didn't 58 see the ability to be able to get the cost down. 59 But I didn't understand what was going on. If I'd 60 be really honest. What I saw was a group of 61 people who were making modules and they were doing this 62 by hand, and I just thought this is a joke. 63 So that's where I was coming from. Now, I was 64 thankfully able to listen to people who knew more than 65 I did and convince me otherwise. And here we are 66 twenty years later, and it really is the lowest cost form. 67 I might even just save an electricity of energy out there. 68 You're just not going to get anything lower cost. 69 Yeah, that's interesting and Honestly, I think it sounds like 70 that evolution sort of mirrors what we've seen across finance 71 more Brady, there's early doubt that is followed by a 72 rapid reassessment once the data becomes a little bit more 73 impossible to ignore. 74 Yeah, and I go back, and if you look at 75 the history of SOLO, we talk about a solar coaster, 76 as in a roller coaster. It's up, down, up, down 77 a scene. I don't have any updown cycle to seen 78 at this point down, but maybe this is every three 79 or four years you have another upcycle or another down cycle. Now, 80 the good news today is SOLDO is in a much 81 more sustainable position than it's ever been because it's costs 82 us solow And also what's increasingly happening is you we 83 do have facilitating technologies alongside it. For me, the facilitating 84 technologies with batteries, power electronics, stuff like this that just 85 make it much easier to integrate solar into a wider system. 86 So that's sort of why it's in a much better 87 position than it's ever been. 88 Really, and at some point you also shifted from seeing 89 solar as a niche solution to calling it the bedrock 90 of the future energy system. What was the moment or 91 realization that led you to that shift. 92 Well, the bedrock really is what's your foundation of an 93 energy system. If we really look globally today, the foundation 94 of our energy system. 95 Is really oil. 96 And what actually happens is every time you have an 97 industrial revolution, you do have a new form of energy 98 that takes over. So you had the first industrial revolution, 99 we really moved from wood to coal, okay, but then 100 around alongside coal you had the steam engine, and then 101 we had an internal combustion engine. Obviously it needed oil. 102 And now what we've got is electrification and an AI 103 I would say, at this point in time, digitalization, all 104 our tech anologies need electricity, don't They don't need oil. 105 So that's the big shift. But the other other shift 106 is it's the lowest cost form of producing a usable 107 form of energy. And that's the key difference because you 108 can't stop that. Because

[8:37] That's really interesting 109
the other thing that's really interesting 109 for me about solar is the fact that you can 110 use it anywhere. And of course you can say, oh 111 my god, well we don't have a lot of sun 112 in northern Europe. Yeah, so what talk to the plants 113 in the back garden or your front garden about that. 114 They go, listen, we're quite happy. 115 We survived with this, you know, son Ony being here 116 whatever it is eight hours a day in winter. So 117 I don't take that argument because I just think what 118 happens is you adapt. It's all about low cost and flexibility. 119 That's what solar has. 120 I agree. Yeah, it's funny how quickly that perception changed, 121 and almost before many people even realized it was happening. 122 The costs feel faster than almost anyone had forecasted deployment 123 scale globally, and then suddenly solar wasn't just a technology story, 124 it was a system story. 125 Yeah, And I want to say I only think we're 126 at the beginnings of that system story because if I 127 take let's called the Western world. 128 North America, Europe. 129 What we've got there is you're replacing an old system 130 that's more difficult. But okay, if I got a Pakistan, 131 I'm not replacing an old system. What I'm doing is 132 I'm bringing power to my people, and you can't stop 133 it in that environment. Because people want to have a 134 better life and a better life for your kids means 135 you need to have electricity and you need to have internet. 136 They are the basic things you want if you want 137 your kids. 138 To lip so, guess what you do. You've got to 139 put solar on your rooftop. 140 And even if you've only have electricity for eight hours 141 a day, it's better than zero, right, And if you 142 add batteries in there, it goes. So I think, really 143 the big story of solars only starting, but it's a 144 different story. It is creating an energy system where solar 145 is the betrol I agree. 146 And how has your background and investment, banking and capital 147 markets shaped how you look at the energy tancision compared 148 to say from a purely technical or policy lens. 149 Okay, so if you're a scientist or an engineer, what 150 you're interested in is physics, and you're interested in efficiencies, 151 and you're looking at it from a first principle point 152 of view as a finance person. But for me, it's economics. 153 Does it make economic sense? Because if the physics is 154 great and the economics makes no sense, it ain't going 155 to scale. So I really look at the economics of stuff. 156 That's what I really really focus on. And every single 157 technology I always think, does this make economic sense? Or 158 could this in the future make economic sense? And I 159 think that's the key thing that you focus on. Just 160 keep focus on the economics, economics, economics. So I give 161 you a very practical example. If I take the case 162 of hydrogen green hydrogen, it's really difficult for that to 163 compete in a market with brown hydrogen, right, it's very difficult. 164 Maybe it isn't it even extra impossible? And you sort 165 of argue, Okay, do we really need to do that? 166 Are people really willing to pay for that? They are 167 questions that I ask, And that means that I'm constantly 168 focusing on what's the best economic decision. That's what I'm 169 trying to do in everything that I'm looking at. Don't 170 necessarily get it right all the time, because again, you're 171 looking at the future all the time. But I think 172 a lot of people don't do that. What they do 173 is they get carried away with a story and stories 174 maybe how you get some capital. 175 In the door. 176 But stories are not how you create the future. You 177 create the future by really bringing something at low cost 178 to market. 179 That's how you create the future. 180 I really like that for I mean, because capital, in 181 the end has a way of revealing the truth. Money 182 moves towards what scales and away from what doesn't. And 183 you've mentioned solar and batteries before, so when you talk 184 about this energy revolution, now we really talk about solar alone. 185 It's really solid plus batteries. Why is this parents critical 186 these days? 187 So, first and foremost, storage has always been a critical 188 part of our energy system, and we just let's start 189 with the basics of how we live our life every day. 190 The most important storage device I have is probably my fridge. Okay, 191 that's what I'm doing and keeping my food there, of which. 192 I use every day. 193 But if you go beyond that, in the fossil fuel world, 194 we've got massive amounts of story that we've built up 195 over the last hundred years. Right, We've got oil tanks, 196 we've got gas tanks, we've got oil tankers that transport that. 197 So we've got massive capability to do so. So storage 198 is to all of us as clear. Storage is a 199 clear part of the energy system. Electricity is slightly different. 200 There's not a huge amount of electricity storage out there 201 because what you have to do is you have to 202 take that electricity and convert it into another form of energy. 203 So you know, you push it up. 204 Water and bring it back down as pumped hydro or something, 205 and we realize in the past probably easier just to 206 rely on the fossil fuel storage. In other words, what 207 you do is when you need more electricity, you take 208 that coal in the bunker and you burn more of it. 209 That's sort of what we've been doing. But in a 210 world of renewables, where renewables is so low cost and 211 where you know, the reality is because it makes so 212 much economic sense for people to put more and more 213 solar in the system, whether it be in the home 214 or whatever it is, you then have periods of excess. 215 Then you go, what's the most efficient and cost effective 216 way to do it. Let's use a battery, and that's 217 that's the reality of it. You know, you could put 218 it up the wall, you could put it up a mountain, 219 or you could do something like that, but it's more 220 expensive and you've got inefficiencies in terms of the efficiency. 221 The losses that you have are higher, and. 222 In particularly in the case of lithium ion lithie iron is. 223 I do use the story that nothing happened in batteries 224 between probably nineteen hundred in about twenty ten, and then 225 we have litiumine and obviously LiTi mine is in every 226 device that we have as a lithium ion battery in it, 227 and they're getting. 228 Better and better. 229 And also then we've also got new forms of batteries 230 which are lower cost, higher performance coming our way as well, 231 so that battery revolution continues. But the thing that really 232 lends itself to batteries with solar is the fact that 233 every day the sun goes up and the sun goes down, 234 and when it's down, that means you always have potential 235 to actually use any excess that you've saved to the 236 time when the sun is not there, so you can 237 do this one. You can bank on this every day. 238 Let me contrast that with say wind or hydro wind. 239 You have no idea what's going to happen, because what 240 often happens is wind comes comes in fronts, and these 241 fronts could be richy for two or three days. So 242 that means is I go and go, hey, I'm going 243 to take this storage, I'm going to save it for night. 244 It don't work wind because you might have to save it. 245 For three days. Now, that's okay, you save it for 246 three days, but with solar, it's much easier. You save 247 it until it's dark. The exact same thing you would 248 also say with hydro as well, you use hydro as well, 249 the same thing you say again, going to save it. 250 You could do that, but there are better ways of 251 doing it, what I would say. So that's why I 252 say it really does lend itself to solar as opposed 253 to other technologies. 254 That's what I would say. 255 Yeah, And I think this distinction matters a lot, especially 256 when people still talk about these technologies as if there 257 are optional add ons. Really, with solar without storage you 258 have generation, but solar with batters you do have like 259 a real infrastructure exactly exactly. Now, you often emphasize the 260 need for us stemic view of indergy transition. Can you 261 unpack what that really means and why focusing on one 262 technology in isolation can be misleading? 263 Yes, what you have is don't forget again. I'm going 264 to come back to the Western world, because the Western world, 265 what we've got is a whole pile of technologies that 266 are used out there in the system. So you've got 267 fossil fuels, we already have electricity, and I'm sort of saying, well, 268 the future is based on solar. Then the question is 269 how do you get there? And should you get there? 270 And doesn't make economic sense. And what we end up 271 doing is we make changes all across this system and 272 we just make it more and more complex. And what 273 this mean is we end up with unforeseen consequences, and 274 even when we do see the consequences, we don't act. 275 So I give you a very simple example, the Spanish 276 blackout that took place last year. Every grid operator in 277 Europe has been talking about really behind the scenes that 278 we would have this type of event. Some have been 279 preparing for it and some haven't. The Spanish have not been. 280 Let's be really clear on that. 281 Now. 282 That is a criticism of the Spanish great operator and 283 the regulator. But the point is we know what's going on. 284 And I can go on and on and give you 285 a really simple example. I'm in Ireland today and if 286 I go back twelve months ago, Ireland had a storm 287 that came in and a large power of West Ireland 288 lost power for whatever it was a day and a half. 289 Some people lost it for much more than that, and 290 it's like shock horror. Ireland had a storm. I go 291 We've always had storms number one and number two. All 292 the climate models have been saying for fifteen years that 293 the storms in Ireland would get more severe, so it 294 didn't prepare. That's what I'm talking about when I'm talking 295 about even where there were consequences that we could foresee, 296 the powers that we haven't made the changes that need 297 to be made, then we talk about unforeseen conc foreseeen 298 is something you just could predict. So give you a 299 very very practical example of that. We had a whole 300 series of nuclear power plants in France last summer that 301 had to close because of jellyfish. Now you go, what 302 the hell are jellyfish doing? What jellyfish were doing was 303 they were congregating in and around the water inlets for 304 cooling the plants.

[24:56] Why am I saying that Well

Okay, now why am I saying that? Well, 305 the reason jellyfish are there is because the waters are 306 getting warmer. And again, unforeseen something. There's so many unforeseen consequences. 307 So the only way you can really think about this is, 308 I think, is to really think of this at a 309 very very systematic level. And the systematic level is where 310 do we want to go? Is the first question? Where 311 do we want to go? And then the question is 312 what's the best way to get there? From both an 313 economic and a society a point of view? And I 314 don't see this anywhere in the world. What you've got 315 is regulators saying one thing, government's saying another, and this, 316 you know, and it's being pulled in every different direction. 317 And as I said, it just gets more and more complex. 318 And this is not helpful to producing a low cost 319 energy system is suitable for our future. That's where I 320 come from. 321 Yeah, So that's really a helpful way of thinking about it, 322 because we're often debating about pieces of the puzzle without 323 really stepping back to look at the whole picture. And 324 we could really say that we don't have a technology problem, 325 what we have is a coordination problem exactly. 326 That's a good way I put the coordination problem. I 327 know it's difficult to coordinate all the different parties, but 328 i'd also call, like, let let's take in the case 329 of Europe, if you really want to go and move forward. 330 So I think what you have to sort of put 331 together is I call it a Future Energies Commission that 332 really has keith and that can actually go and put 333 in that can make change happen across you. Now that's 334 maybe a pipe dream for me. But I'm going back 335 to what I briefly said earlier. Around was we're in 336 an industrial revolution, and this is probably the biggest industrial 337 revolution the history of mankind, and that industrial levelation is 338 AI and electricity. And so you could do two things. 339 You can become a luddite and you can block all 340 of this, but good luck to you on that, because 341 what you're doing is you're putting all of us in 342 the future into a very economically weak situation. So then 343 the question is what to do. That's where I'm coming from, 344 and I'm thinking about this, and by the way, I 345 spend an awful lot of my time really thinking about 346 AI and what it does and what it doesn't do, 347 because it's the speed of change in that area is 348 just so quick and it's not going to slow down. 349 So that's where I'm coming from all this. This industrial 350 revolution is quicker than any industrial revolution we've ever seen. 351 The first steam coal revolution took one hundred and fifty years. 352 The automobile revolution maybe it took fifty years. This is 353 not going to take fifty years. This is a ten 354 year revolution. 355 But somehow, for me, the irony is striking because we 356 have cleaner, cheaper technologies available, but then crisis planning still 357 sort of default. The twentieth century. Now, you mentioned the 358 power outage in Spain. I know Berlin hats martages a 359 couple of weeks ago. Boulder, Colorado also had some. So 360 what do these moments really tell us about resilience. 361 I'm going to just say they're warning signs to all 362 of us, okay, and we have to heed these warnings. So, 363 and I give a very practical example of this. There 364 have been attacks, physical attacks on transformers in the United States. 365 And what do the United States do. All the states get. 366 Together, all the energy regulators, all the utilities, and they say, okay, 367 we need to support each other if there's an attack 368 on one of these pieces of critical infrastructure. That means 369 they have strategies in place in case there's an attack 370 on one of these piece of critical infrastructure. There's nothing 371 like that in place in Europe. Okay, And I'm going 372 to say totally unacceptable. Totally unacceptable, because the issue is 373 the risks if something goes wrong are just so big 374 because society will, as we know it, in a major 375 city collapse if you don't have power for three days. 376 That's the reality of the world we live in. So 377 accept this, don't run away from it, except for it, 378 and then you have to go and change your approach 379 to how you run that system, because then you go 380 and say, Okay, what are the risks in this system? 381 What are the major ones? 382 And how do. 383 I deal with those risks? If a horrendous event takes place, 384 what do I do? How do I react? And how 385 do I get the system back running as quickly as possible? 386 Okay? That's it. 387 Have these open conversations, And by the way, that's also 388 systemic thinking, because that requires people to be really open 389 and honest about this and rather than hiding the threads 390 and the weaknesses of the system as it is. 391 You know, That's where I'm coming from. 392 So the last thing I'd say if I said to 393 you today I was running my businesses with faxes, you 394 would break out laugh and you go, what are you 395 talking about? And I go, Okay, I can tell you 396 the names and many grid operators that are still using taxes, 397 and they'll turn around and they'll say it's more secure. 398 Yeah a bit. 399 So isn't it for the world that we're in a 400 present where you know, electricity is moving base at the 401 speed of light and you're telling me you're waiting for 402 your facts before you make a decision. I mean, come on, 403 this is a joke. And if there's a grid operator 404 here listening, there will be cringing on, Oh my god, 405 how dare you say this? He's not even an engineer. 406 I mean, I go listen if you're an engineer, shows 407 that you're an engineer and actually improve the situation and 408 really come out there and deal with the risks around 409 what you're doing for a job every day. 410 And there's a lot of talk about microgrids and distributed 411 generation as a way forward. How important do you think 412 this is for decentralization to build real resilience. 413 Anybody who's in the system's theory area will tell you 414 that the best form of systems are decentralized. That's the 415 reality of it. If you have a centralized system with 416 just a small number of connections, well that's a pretty 417 weak system. So the more redundancy you can have in 418 the system, the better. But redundancy also it's about this 419 whole idea I would say of being able to island 420 the system and island for me is if the power 421 system in Norway goes out, that would be felt across Europe. Okay, 422 because we're all connected in together, so it goes out. 423 But then the question is can Sweden protect itself from that? 424 Can Denmark protect itself of that? Let's go back to 425 the Spanish situation. Portugal was not able to island eye. 426 It's great when they had problems in Spain. Okay, So 427 that's not very resilient either from the Portuguese. So the 428 question is what can you do in these extreme situations 429 to make sure that these systems stay stable? And I 430 said this at a national level, but then well what 431 happens at the local level as well. So if you 432 take the case of Berlin, obviously part of Berlin, one 433 cable in West Berlin is taken out and there's no 434 power in that region. 435 For five days. 436 That ain't very resilient because you have to ask, quote, 437 why did that region not have another cable coming in 438 that's got to supply the power, or if you knew 439 about that one cable coming in and hand the importance, 440 But then the question is why would you not put 441 a battery in there to deal with it, to make 442 sure that if something happens, you still have backup power 443 or whatever it is there in cage or by the 444 way you protect that cable you keep a camera on 445 it because you know it's your weak point. 446 Because the reality is there's. 447 A pile of websites out there where I can go 448 in and I can go and look at the distribution 449 transmission grids, the gas grids, I can look at critical 450 infrastructure and I can see exactly where things are. That's 451 the reality.

[37:19] Face reality There are people out

So let's face reality. There are people out there, 452 bad actors, and they go in and do and see 453 all this. So that's the world we're in. You have 454 to deal with that, okay, And again it goes back 455 to the reality is that you can't do it electricity. 456 And by the way, that's only a minor situation. I 457 would say it's a part of Berlin one hundred thousand 458 people without electricity. That's not three million people in Berlin 459 with electricity for three days or five days in the winter. 460 Then you'd see what would happen. Right then you'd have 461 the German government. 462 Falling, you would have exactly exactly. Yeah, it all comes 463 down to just those islands and just making sure that 464 everything is a little bit more intelligently connected. 465 Good way partners absolutely. 466 I guess from a financial market perspective, what are the 467 biggest risks and opportunities in solar storage and clean energy today. 468 From your point of view, let's start with the risk, 469 so get the bad news out of the way. The 470 biggest risk is the fact that we've got in regions 471 across the world. Again, I could take the case of Pakistan, 472 I could take the pace of Europe, take the case 473 of Texas. You have periods of the day too much 474 electricity in the system, and the too much electricity in 475 the system means that prices collapse down to zero or 476 they might even know minus. In that type of environment. 477 If I got a solar system and I'm hoping to 478 get thirty euros for forty euros first and get zero, 479 then I've got it in trouble. So i might eat 480 it the lowest cost form of electricity generation, but nobody 481 wants my electricity on a June day at twelve o'clock. 482 That's the biggest risk, is that what we're really seeing 483 is this, By the way,

[40:02] About the first 484
let's talk about the first 484 phase of renewables was build, build, build to replace fossil fuels. Okay, 485 that was fine, and we subsidized this, that and the other. 486 But the next phase is not about that. 487 The next phase is about producing low cost electricity for people. 488 And don't get me wrong, solar and all these are 489 a very big part of that. But the business model 490 is going to change. So just take the case of 491 say solar, you're definitely going to see more behind the meter, 492 you know, in other words, at home, in our businesses, 493 on our rooftops, in our gardens, and you connect them 494 with a battery, okay, in with storage. 495 You can see this very very very clearly. That's where 496 we're going. I can see if you. 497 Take large scales the same things. You could say, we 498 can have the German government or whichever government is financing 499 us to build more and more solar, and you go, well, 500 why would you finance someone to build more of something 501 when the. 502 Price is going to be zero? 503 So that requires us to that you stop subsidizing, or 504 actually you change the way the market works. In other words, 505 enable the customer to benefit from the fact that there's 506 a load of solar on a sunny day every weekend 507 and allow them benefit. And how do you do this? 508 Think radically about it. If you look what's going on 509 in Australia, what are they going to do? They're going 510 to give away electricity when there's too much solar in 511 the system. So why would we not say to our 512 industry across Europe, Guys, every weekend, you've got free electricity 513 during the day. Okay, it's either that or you have 514 too much of it and you pay someone to take it. 515 You know, you curtail it. I think we need to 516 be creative in. 517 Our solutions in and around this. This We have to 518 rather than over regulating it, just be a little bit 519 more afraidive. 520 I go back to. 521 The risk is financing solar and renewables is now more 522 difficult than what it was because you don't have this 523 long term PPA call it a feed in tariff or 524 whatever it is. You don't have that in place anymore. 525 There's something else there and this requires everybody in the 526 industry to change because this is called growing up, growing 527 up and maturing. So that's what's going on. 528 That's the risk. 529 If you ask me, what's the opportunity, The real opportunity 530 again is how do you integrate storage and other forms 531 of generation in and around solar. That's really the thing 532 that I really think about in a different way. And 533 again I'm going to start with solar because it's the 534 lowest cosse pump and it's the one that you can't block. 535 I can block off show win by just saying no 536 to it. 537 You're not going to be at a block solar. 538 Because that customer who generates electricity at ten cents using 539 solar on the rooftop is going to keep doing it 540 because guess what the electricity in the grid is thirty 541 Because be really clear, that's why we can't block it. 542 Then we've got balcony solar and the whole part of 543 stuff so plug and soap lave solar is there. 544 So you can't block this. 545 That's the most exciting. 546 Thing in and around this. 547 And it also means that, let me call it, the 548 optimization of these assets is really important. What I mean 549 by that is trading the assets. These assets are solar 550 assets going to be around for forty years. Okay, so 551 I have a power purchase agreement for eight years, Well 552 what do why do you have to year eight? There's 553 a whole part of creativity that's needed in and around 554 what you do with this going forward, and that is 555 the area where I think is very exciting and ultimately 556 I do think the future this is going to be 557 a large part in developing countries. So I'm going to 558 go and talk about the Global South, unbelieve what's going there, 559 Or just take Australia in terms of their whole system 560 is being turned upside down because the customer wants solar because. 561 It is cheap. 562 That's sort of way you have to look at if 563 you want to get an understanding of what's happening or 564 what's not happening in this space. 565 That's really a great point. It's often not the technology 566 that trips people up, but it's all of the assumptions 567 around it. Now, if you could change one major thing, 568 and let's say policy, market design, regulation, to accelerate the transition, 569 what would it be. 570 I would enable the system to be flexible. And what 571 I mean by flexible is that we need to get 572 the customers involved in this energy transition in a much 573 more active way than they are at present now. It 574 doesn't mean that the customer has to decide, oh good, 575 look the power price is low, I'm gott to switch 576 off my refrigerator and I got to put on my air. 577 That's not what I mean. It's enabling that so that 578 what can happen is an energy service customer can can 579 come in to you and do this for you and 580 manage it and can do it as an energy as 581 a service type thing. All this that's the really really 582 interesting thing is is to enable that. What does that 583 mean to enable flexibility? Well, that means to be able 584 to allow storage into the system as quickly as possible 585 right across it. Secondly, to remove all barriers in and 586 around solar and generation generally in the home. Make sure 587 you have smart meat in place to enable this. And 588 then basically to allow aggregators to be able to take 589 this demand and energy and use it in the different way. 590 And I forgot as well, it's very important to be 591 using electric cars. I've got these one hundred kill what 592 our batteries just sitting there, so use them? How can 593 we use them? You should be using them for backup power. 594 So okay, you know you have a blackout. Guess what 595 you've got your car? You can plug in brilliant. Okay, 596 you can use it in the power system. Do smart 597 charging enabling all of this smartness, particularly the demand side, 598 and to do this almost without the customer knowing. And 599 I will give a vision of the future for me. 600 Every device in our homes in the next year is 601 will have a battery in it. The reason they'll have 602 a battery in it is because it makes economic sense. Now, 603 what's really interesting is if you look at the white 604 good manufacturers already I'm talking Samsung, Ergy, Panasonic, what do. 605 They do as well? Guess what they do batteries. 606 It's very obvious that they put into device that. I mean, 607 you think of a smart TV today, Samson's smart TV today. 608 I have control of that. I can do different things 609 with it. You can see where I'm coming from. More devices. 610 Instead of them selling you a refrigerator, they said you 611 was cooling as a service. They say, okay, don't buy 612 the refrigerator for me. What you do is you pay 613 ten euros a month. And by the way, you might 614 laugh and go, oh, there's no way you're going to 615 do that. Well, okay, I can go back and say 616 to here, that's what we do with mobile phones. Sorry, right, 617 And you could maybe say twenty years ago we wouldn't 618 have done it, but we do. Of us models is 619 what people are understand and it makes sense to them. 620 And then what happens is I'm just making sure it's 621 all working for me and I don't need to think 622 about it. 623 So that means you've. 624 Got a whole pile of actors that are able with 625 their devices and their services to make sure that the 626 customer is involved in being part of the solution, in 627 and around making sure that we electrify in a low 628 cost efficient way. That's where we're going from. 629 And by the way, you have resilience in the system 630 when you do that. 631 I really couldn't agree more. I think sometimes progress is 632 and about inventing something new. It's more about removing the friction, so, 633 as you say, just making things a little easier. 634 Agreed. 635 This has really been a powerful conversation, not just about 636 solar storage, but about how the entire energy system is 637 being written in real time. The takeaway for me is clear, 638 the transition is moving faster than most institutions are prepared for, 639 and the winners will be those who understand the system 640 and not just the technology. 641 It's a good way to end that. I agree with you, 642 Na absolutely. 643 Thank you for sharing your perspective and challenging us to 644 think bigger. 645 I suppose around in conclusion, I'd like to hear your thoughts. 646 You know you listen to it. 647 Do you think I'm being completely stark rating mad or 648 what's your thoughts. 649 My thoughts are you are right below the Fortiers parallel. 650 Above you have the season win is going to be 651 much more important, So below the fortio sparallel. I'm with you, 652 but it's not going to work for northern Europe, northern US. 653 So yes, I no, yeah, you talk to me. 654 Sometimes you're blessed by history and sometimes you're cursed. 655 So I think the global South is blessed and the 656 global North is. 657 Probably be cursed. Right, but we'll finish with a song. 658 Very good, very good, good, Okay, John, talk to you 659 next week. Welcome forward to us. 660 Thank you for listening to Redefining Energy. 661 Don't forget to rate the show and subscribe on Apple, Podcast, Spotify, 662 or the platform of your choice.