Catalyst with Shayle Kann

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How AI is solving real utility challenges [partner content] Mar 11, 2025

Show notes

Laurent Boinot, a power and utilities leader at Microsoft, remembers the moment he discovered the power of artificial intelligence. Years ago, as a student using a basic AI model to assess World Bank project risks, he was amazed to discover the technology outperformed human experts.

"With a very basic AI tool, we were able to replicate that risk analysis and do a better job than the human graders did," says Boinot.

Today, Boinot works with utilities to implement AI solutions — an industry traditionally resistant to new technologies. "Our customers want to be fast followers, and in order to be fast followers, you need to follow someone, so someone has to go first. That's definitely an issue in this sector in particular," explains Boinot.

Despite this hesitation, Boinot sees AI transforming everything from regulatory processes to grid management. In this episode, produced in partnership with Microsoft, Laurent Boinot talks with Stephen Lacey about where AI can have the biggest impact on utilities.

They discuss how AI is supporting field workers, enabling scientific breakthroughs in battery technology, and helping companies like Constellation provide "24/7 matching" of green electricity — moving from "net zero to actual zero emission."

This is a partner episode, brought to you by Microsoft. Learn more about how Microsoft is working with utilities and other energy companies to deploy AI to accelerate the energy transition.

A skeptic’s take on AI electricity load growth Mar 06, 2025

Show notes

The predictions are coming in hot. Data centers could grow to consume more than 9% of U.S. electricity generation by 2030, according to EPRI. That’s more than double its current estimated data center load. AI will increase global data center power demand 165% by 2030, says Goldman Sachs. And billions of dollars are at stake. Utilities, megasite developers, and data center operators are all basing major decisions on predictions like these.

But they’re also the kinds of predictions we’ve seen before. In 1999, when the internet was growing fast, a couple researchers claimed it would grow to consume half of all U.S. power generation within a decade — until a team at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory debunked it.

Jonathan Koomey was one of those researchers. Although today’s predictions about energy usage are tamer than those in 1999, Jonathan still has questions about the current hype around AI power demand. He's is now the founder and president of Koomey Analytics, which has published multiple papers on the topic, including a recent report for the Bipartisan Policy Center: Electricity Demand Growth and Data Centers: A Guide for the Perplexed.

So what are the assumptions that go into these new predictions? And how do they hold up to scrutiny?

In this episode, Shayle talks to Jonathan about why he questions the hype around AI load growth predictions and why he believes energy constraints will incentivize the AI industry to focus on efficiency. Shayle and Jonathan cover topics like:

The time lags and proprietary data that hinders precise data center load estimates, both in historical analyses and future predictions
The difficulty of reproducing the predictions of even prominent institutions like the IEA
The two basic assumptions that go into predictions: AI demand and AI power requirements
Why Jonathan believes conventional wisdom relies on questionable sources, like Nvidia’s business plan
The unexplored areas of AI energy efficiency, like computer architecture, software improvements, algorithms, and special purpose computers

Recommended resources

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory: 2024 United States Data Center Energy Usage Report

Nature: Will AI accelerate or delay the race to net-zero emissions?

Joule: To better understand AI’s growing energy use, analysts need a data revolution

WSJ: Internet Hype in the ’90s Stoked a Power-Generation Bubble. Could It Happen Again With AI?

Open Circuit: The data center boom: ‘All the cheap power is gone’

Credits: Hosted by Shayle Kann. Produced and edited by Daniel Woldorff. Original music and engineering by Sean Marquand. Stephen Lacey is executive editor.

Catalyst is brought to you by EnergyHub. EnergyHub helps utilities build next-generation virtual power plants that unlock reliable flexibility at every level of the grid. See how EnergyHub helps unlock the power of flexibility at scale, and deliver more value through cross-DER dispatch with their leading Edge DERMS platform, by visiting energyhub.com.

Catalyst is brought to you by Antenna Group, the public relations and strategic marketing agency of choice for climate and energy leaders. If you're a startup, investor, or global corporation that's looking to tell your climate story, demonstrate your impact, or accelerate your growth, Antenna Group's team of industry insiders is ready to help. Learn more at antennagroup.com.

Cultivated meat’s “trough of disillusionment” Feb 27, 2025

Show notes

Between 2013 and 2023, cultivated meat companies raised a total of nearly $3 billion. In 2020, Singapore approved the world’s first cultivated meat products, with the U.S. and Israel following close behind.

But head to the meat department of any American grocery store today, and you won’t find cultivated meat for sale. After short-lived restaurant tasting menus in the U.S., it’s no longer available. Distribution in Singapore is growing but small, and no products have launched in Israel yet.

So what happened to the high hopes for cultivated meat? And what comes next for the industry?

In this episode, Shayle talks to Isha Datar, executive director of New Harvest, a non-profit focused on developing research in the industry. She has written blog posts arguing that the industry is in the start-up hype cycle’s “trough of disillusionment.” She calls for focusing on basic research, targeting high-value products, and even adopting a different name — cellular agriculture — to signal a shift toward a broader set of biotech products and techniques. Shayle and Isha cover topics like:

What went wrong with the first-generation startups focused on low-value, whole-meat products like beef and chicken
Persistent challenges in the industry, like the siloing of expertise, scarcity of research funding, and lack of standardization
Why she’s hopeful about a more diverse second generation that’s focused on high-value products like sashimi and foie gras and biotech ingredients like fetal bovine serum and cell culture media
The cellular agriculture cost stack and the $30,000 batch of cookies
Basic research, shared resources, and the standardization needed to bring down costs

Recommended resources

New Harvest: Where Are We On the Hype Cycle? Part I and Part II
The Counter: Lab-grown meat is supposed to be inevitable. The science tells a different story.
Biotechnology and Bioengineering: Scale-Up Economics for Cultured Meat

Credits: Hosted by Shayle Kann. Produced and edited by Daniel Woldorff. Original music and engineering by Sean Marquand. Stephen Lacey is executive editor.

The promise and perils of sodium-ion batteries Feb 20, 2025

Show notes

Sodium-ion could be the next big thing. Last August, Natron announced a $1.4B factory in North Carolina. Other U.S. companies like Peak Energy, Bedrock Materials, and Acculon Energy are jockeying for position in the market. Meanwhile, almost all of the world’s sodium-ion manufacturing capacity, current and planned, is in China. CATL’s CEO Robin Zeng suggested that sodium-ion could ultimately take up to half of LFP’s market share.

The potential advantages are exciting: Sodium-based chemistries could be cheaper and safer. They could also use domestically sourced materials, avoiding the geopolitical headaches of minerals critical to the lithium-ion supply chain, like nickel, cobalt, and copper.

So, amid all the sodium-ion hype, what's credible and what’s not?

In this episode, Shayle talks to Adrian Yao, founder of Stanford’s STEER program, a battery research group specializing in techno-economic analysis. He’s also a board member of lithium-ion manufacturer EnPower, where he was once a co-founder and CTO. Shayle and Adrian talk about the findings from a recent Nature paper Adrian co-authored exploring a techno-economic analysis of sodium-ion batteries. They cover topics like:

The differences between sodium-ion and lithium-ion, as illustrated by the battery sandwich
Misconceptions about sodium-ion, for example, that it’s necessarily safer
The biggest challenges: energy density and cost competitiveness
How players in the lithium-ion supply chain could pivot to sodium-ion
Why the technology’s success may hinge on the price of nickel, copper, and other lithium-ion materials

Recommended resources

Nature Energy: Critically assessing sodium-ion technology roadmaps and scenarios for techno-economic competitiveness against lithium-ion batteries
Latitude Media: Peak Energy’s quest to build US sodium-ion battery dominance
Heatmap: Is Sodium-Ion the Next Big Battery?
WSJ: U.S. Battery Rush Spurs $1.4 Billion Sodium-Ion Factory in North Carolina

Credits: Hosted by Shayle Kann. Produced and edited by Daniel Woldorff. Original music and engineering by Sean Marquand. Stephen Lacey is executive editor.

The case for colocating data centers and generation Feb 13, 2025

Show notes

Sheldon Kimber says the grid is broken — at least for new data centers and other large, industrial loads that need lots of clean power, fast.

But the founder and CEO of Intersect Power believes there’s a workaround that enables larger data centers and speeds up time to power: colocating behind-the-meter generation and storage on megasites rich with renewable resources.

In short, instead of bringing clean generation to load, bring load to clean generation. Major partners are on board with the strategy. Last December Intersect announced $800M in investment from Google and private equity firm TPG, along with a goal of catalyzing $20B in projects by 2030.

So how does colocation work? And how far does it go?

In this episode, Shayle talks to Sheldon about how colocation can help sidestep the challenges associated with grid upgrades, transmission, and permitting. They dig into topics like:

Major forces shaping the market, like AI demand, the IRA, and tariffs
Optimal PPA prices and tenures
The right mix of grid-connected and behind-the-meter power
The extreme version of colocation: off-grid data centers
Megasite developers for hydrogen and crypto and how they took advantage of the AI boom
Whether DeepSeek will cause energy demand to temper or accelerate

Recommended resources

Latitude Media: Google’s new data center model signals a massive market shift
Latitude Media: Load growth is changing how Silicon Ranch develops solar projects
Latitude Media: Amazon’s data center strategy: ‘Get back to being grid-tied’
Catalyst: The US power demand surge: The electricity gauntlet has arrived

Credits: Hosted by Shayle Kann. Produced and edited by Daniel Woldorff. Original music and engineering by Sean Marquand. Stephen Lacey is executive editor.

More 2025 trends: DeepSeek, plug-in hybrids, and curtailment Feb 06, 2025

Show notes

Didn’t catch last week’s episode on Nat Bullard’s mega slide deck on energy transition? Start there.

This is the second half of our extended conversation with Nat, the former chief content officer at BloombergNEF and current co-founder at data insights company Halcyon.

In this episode, Shayle and Nat dig into topics like:

Rising solar installations and stagnating wind
Why we’re wasting so much renewable power amid skyrocketing load growth
The rise of Chinese plug-in hybrids and exports
Whether DeepSeek’s efficiency will temper or turbocharge load growth
The woeful state of transmission buildout, despite demand for it
Why one quarter of Virginia’s power demand comes from data centers

Recommended resources

Latitude Media: Does DeepSeek call the data center boom into question?
Latitude Media: To get data centers online, one Virginia co-op is proposing a new business model
Latitude Media: A dizzying year at the AI energy nexus
Catalyst: Demystifying the Chinese EV market
Reuters: Exclusive: Global solar capacity hits 2 TW on path to climate goal, data shows

Credits: Hosted by Shayle Kann. Produced and edited by Daniel Woldorff. Original music and engineering by Sean Marquand. Stephen Lacey is executive editor.

Are utilities ready to fully harness demand flexibility? [partner content] Feb 04, 2025

Show notes

When it comes to decarbonization planning, utilities tend to focus heavily on the supply side. But they may be overlooking one of their most powerful tools for managing a cleaner grid — demand flexibility.

Demand response and time-varying rates have been in use for decades. But many utilities still haven't fully embraced demand flexibility in their planning. As utilities push toward higher penetrations of renewable energy, the ability to shift demand becomes increasingly vital for maintaining grid stability.

The challenge? It requires a fundamental shift in mindset: from controlling power plants with knobs and dials to empowering customers through smart rate design.

"For years and years and decades and decades, the utilities' incentive has been to sell customers more of their product," says Scott Engstrom, chief customer officer at GridX. "But this idea of much more targeted demand flexibility as a requirement to manage a grid dominated by intermittent renewable resources is quite new."

In this episode, produced in partnership with GridX, Scott Engstrom talks with Stephen Lacey about why demand flexibility deserves more attention — and how utilities can better harness it as they transition to cleaner energy.

Learn more about how GridX delivers detailed analytics for time-of-use rates, helping utilities harness grid flexibility as part of their decarbonization efforts.

2025 trends: aerosols, oil demand, and carbon removal Jan 30, 2025

Show notes

Out today: Nat Bullard’s 200-page slide deck with data from across the energy transition. Nat is the former chief content officer at BloombergNEF and current co-founder at data insights company Halcyon.

In part one of their two-part conversation, Shayle cherry-picked the most interesting slides and sat down with Nat to unpack them. They cover topics like:

Accidental solar geoengineering and the state of aerosols
The United States’ record-setting fossil fuels exports
Whether Chinese oil demand is peaking
Conflicting indicators for the state of ESG investing
Whether you can have too many carbon removal startups

Recommended resources

Catalyst: Putting a halt to geoengineering — by accident

Catalyst: 2024 trends: batteries, transferable tax credits, and the cost of capital

Catalyst: 2023 trends: biomass, ESG, batteries and more

The climate-ag grab bag Jan 23, 2025

Show notes

Here’s a three-part puzzle for global agriculture: How do you increase calories for a growing population, while zeroing out emissions and minimizing land usage?

The stakes are enormous. According to the UN, the world has to feed an estimated 9.8 billion people by 2050. But agriculture currently accounts for about a third of global carbon emissions and is driving the conversion of important ecosystems – like rainforest and grasslands – into farmland. Converting land is especially problematic because it releases additional carbon into the atmosphere.

So what do we do about it?

In this episode, Shayle talks to journalist Mike Grunwald, who recently penned a defense of industrial agriculture in The New York Times. He’s also the author of the upcoming book “We Are Eating the Earth: The Race to Fix Our Food System and Save Our Climate.” Shayle and Mike cover topics like:

The drawbacks of industrial agriculture, like the overapplication of fertilizer and the mistreatment of animals and employees
Why calories per acre need to grow substantially to feed a growing global population
Why minimizing land usage through industrial agriculture may cut more emissions than alternative methods of farming like regenerative agriculture
Why feed additives are not as important as the land efficiency of beef production
Potential solutions, like biofertilizers, cultivated meat, and addressing food waste
Why vertical farming requires too much electricity to be viable

Recommended resources

Simon & Schuster: We Are Eating the Earth: The Race to Fix Our Food System and Save Our Climate

The New York Times: Sorry, but This Is the Future of Food

Canary Media: Why vertical farming just doesn’t work

Reuters: Fertiliser ban decimates Sri Lankan crops as government popularity ebbs

Catalyst: Mitigating enteric methane: tech solutions for solving the cow burp problem

Catalyst: From biowaste to ‘biogold’

FOAK tales Jan 16, 2025

Show notes

First-of-a-kind projects need infrastructure investment, the kind of money that costs less than venture capital and usually comes in the form of deals worth tens or hundreds of millions of dollars. But infrastructure investors are notoriously conservative and convincing them to bite can be challenging.

So what do infrastructure investors really want?

In this episode, Shayle talks to Mario Fernandez, head of Breakthrough Energy’s FOAK finance program. It has worked with companies like Rondo, Form Energy, and Lanzajet to overcome challenges on the path to infrastructure investment. Coincidentally, the program is also called Catalyst (no relation to our show). Mario and Shayle talk about the journey from lab-proven technology to a fully de-risked infrastructure investment, covering topics like:

Why investors want to see a path to multiple, repeatable projects
Mario’s prescription for a scale-up path: pilot, demo, and FOAK project
The difficulty of following that path on a limited financial runway
The commercial construct and the tension between negotiating a flexible offtake and securing a customer
Developing the right capital stack and accurately estimating capital needs

Recommended resources

The Green Blueprint: Rondo Energy’s complicated path to building heat batteries

CTVC: Venture to Project Finance Duolingo

Catalyst: Financing first-of-a-kind climate assets

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