Catalyst with Shayle Kann

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The rise of metal fuels Aug 27, 2026

Show notes

Diesel generators remain ubiquitous because they offer an unusually powerful combination of low cost, high energy density, long-duration storage, and reliable off-grid power. But their pollution, noise, maintenance requirements, permitting challenges, and growing footprint are becoming increasingly problematic as data centers drive demand for backup generation.

In this episode of Catalyst, Shayle Kann talks with Richard Wang, co-founder and CEO of Voya Energy, about the company's effort to replace diesel generators with generators powered by aluminum.

Richard explains why diesel has been so difficult to displace, why natural gas and batteries fall short for some backup applications, and how Voya's electrochemical generator uses aluminum pellets and air to produce electricity. Unlike combustion-based generators, the system is designed to operate without air emissions, while offering high energy density, quiet operation, rapid startup, and long-duration capabilities.

The conversation also explores aluminum's potential as a globally transportable energy carrier and why low-grade scrap aluminum could provide Voya's initial fuel supply.

Richard and Shayle discuss:

The global diesel generator market and why diesel remains dominant
Why natural gas generators and batteries haven't displaced diesel
Aluminum as a high-energy-density fuel
How Voya Energy's electrochemical aluminum generator works
Voya vs. diesel on cost, footprint, power quality, and runtime
Using Voya generators as grid assets and battery alternatives

Why metal fuels are becoming viable now

Using low-grade scrap aluminum as fuel and the long-term vision for recyclable aluminum energy storage

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

This episode of Catalyst is brought to you by ENGIE, the smarter energy supplier. ENGIE doesn't just provide the power to run your business — they supply the energy to move it forward, with reliable, flexible solutions built for what's next. Learn more at engieresources.com.

Catalyst is brought to you by EnergyHub. Peak season puts every grid to the test — and the utilities that pass are the ones that built flexible capacity before they needed it. EnergyHub works with more than 170 utilities to coordinate 2.5 million devices and 3.4 gigawatts of dispatchable flexibility through a single platform designed to perform when it counts most. See what that looks like at EnergyHub.com.

Catalyst is brought to you by Bloom Energy. Bloom Energy fuel cells deliver affordable, ultra-reliable onsite power for hospitals, utilities, and data centers – at speed and at scale. Learn more by visiting BloomEnergy.com.

Can AI revolutionize grid operations? Aug 20, 2026

Show notes

Everyone loves to talk about the “broken grid.” But if you look inside a utility’s planning and operations functions, a different picture emerges: infrastructure that is remarkably reliable, built and run by engineers solving impossibly complex problems with often outdated tools.

In this episode, Shayle Kann sits down with Josh Wong, CEO and founder of ThinkLabs AI, a company building physics-informed AI for utility planning and operations. They break down how utility studies get built today, the data cleanup headaches, the silos between teams, and the “worst case” mentality that drives an overbuild of infrastructure.

Shayle and Josh discuss:

Why utility planning is split into silos across transmission, distribution, and DER planning.
The gap between studies that identify grid problems and the work of actually solving them.
What “physics-informed AI” actually means.
The shift from AI that identifies problems to AI that actually solves them.
The disconnect between utility planning and real-time operations.
Should data center microgrids be treated as micro utilities?

Resources:

Latitude Media: GE spinout ThinkLabs has a new copilot offering for the grid

Latitude Media: Do microgrids make sense for data centers?

Latitude Media: The case against relying on behind-the-meter power for data centers

Latitude Media: Unpacking DOE's proposal to transform data center interconnection

Credits: Hosted by Shayle Kann. Produced and edited by Max Savage Levenson. Original music and engineering by Sean Marquand. Stephen Lacey is our executive editor.

Is now the time for DERs to scale? [re-published] Aug 13, 2026

Show notes

A decade ago, DERs were hot. The hype was that things like batteries, smart devices, and other distributed energy technologies would offset the need for expanding traditional grid infrastructure.

But DERs never took off, at least not at the scale that many hoped for. They had high price tags and short track records compared to the existing substations, transmission lines, and generation options that utilities were familiar with. In short, the market didn’t need them yet.

Fast forward 10 years, and things have changed. Load growth is increasing while major grid bottlenecks — like in transmission, interconnection, and supply chains — may be opening up a new opportunity.

So is the time finally right for DERs? In this episode, Shayle talks to his colleague Andy Lubershane, partner and head of research at Energy Impact Partners. Last week, Andy published a blog post making the case that DERs were a good idea that was just too early, but the market is ready now. Original episode date: 9/18/2025.

Shayle and Andy cover topics like:

- What held DERs back a decade ago

- Why now is different, including falling system costs and growing grid bottlenecks

- The difference between demand response and virtual power plants

- The potential hurdles to scale, like supply chain bottlenecks, foreign entity of concern regulations, and fire codes

Resources:

Latitude Media: Can distributed energy answer AI’s power problem?

Open Circuit: The grid flexibility solutions staring us in the face

Catalyst: Making DERs work for load growth

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

Critical Capital: Senator Tillis' case for "all-of-the-above" energy Aug 11, 2026

Show notes

This week, we’re presenting an episode of Critical Capital, a new podcast from Crux and Latitude Studios.

Energy policy has become increasingly polarized just as the U.S. faces record electricity demand, a rapidly expanding AI economy, and growing competition from China.

In this episode, Alfred Johnson speaks with North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis about why the country's biggest energy challenge is the inability to build durable, bipartisan policy that survives changes in political leadership.

Drawing on more than a decade in the Senate, Tillis argues for an "all-of-the-above" energy strategy that embraces renewables, natural gas, nuclear, and other generation sources rather than treating them as competing ideologies. He discusses the economic consequences of abruptly cancelling energy projects, the need for stable investment signals, and why rising electricity demand requires policymakers to focus on practical solutions instead of partisan rhetoric. Tillis also discusses domestic manufacturing, critical minerals, AI governance, and the importance of strengthening America's energy supply chains while remaining globally competitive.

Subscribe to Critical Capital on Apple, Spotify, or any podcast platform.

The electrician shortage slowing the AI boom Aug 06, 2026

Show notes

The race to build AI infrastructure is often framed around the availability of power, chips, and capital. But another critical constraint is becoming impossible to ignore: skilled labor. In this episode, Shayle sits down with Raymond Hawkins, chief customer officer at Compass Datacenters, about why a shortage of qualified electricians has emerged as one of the biggest bottlenecks to data center construction, and how the industry is responding.

Hawkins explains that labor shortages aren't preventing new data centers from being built, but they are driving up costs, extending project timelines, and forcing developers to compete aggressively for experienced electricians. As AI demand accelerates, companies are increasingly moving workers across the country, housing them near construction sites, and relying on a traveling workforce much like the healthcare industry relies on travel nurses. At the same time, demand is surging for highly specialized professionals capable of installing the sophisticated electrical systems that modern AI data centers require.

Hawkins also explores how modular construction and prefabrication are reshaping the way data centers are built, and how, as data centers expand into new markets, developers must become more transparent about their projects to earn a community's trust.

Shayle and Raymond discuss:
- Why electricians have become one of the biggest constraints on AI data center growth

- How workforce shortages are changing hiring, training, and construction practices

- Compass Datacenters' partnership with community colleges to develop skilled labor

- The role of modular construction and prefabrication in reducing labor demands

- Strategies for earning community support through transparency, workforce investment, and responsible infrastructure development

Resources:

Catalyst: The State of Play of Data Center Development

Catalyst: AI Scaling Pathways: On Grid, On Edge, Off Grid, Off Planet

Latitude Media: As community scrutiny grows, data center developers turn to on-site power

Latitude Media: The mechanics of data center flexibility

Latitude Media: The off-grid data center fantasy

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

The commercial battery comeback Jul 30, 2026

Show notes

Commercial and industrial (C&I) battery storage has long been the missing middle of the energy storage market. It’s been too complex and expensive to scale like residential systems, but too small to compete with utility-scale projects.

That may finally be changing.

In this episode, Shayle sits down with Tim Hade, senior vice president at Voltus and founder of Brightfield Infrastructure, to discuss why C&I storage has historically struggled, why the economics are shifting dramatically, and why the next wave of distributed energy could be driven by commercial customers rather than utilities.

They explore the four revenue streams that are making batteries more valuable, from demand charge management to emerging capacity markets, and examine how declining hardware costs, stable federal tax incentives, and AI-powered automation are reshaping project economics. Tim also explains how aggregating thousands of commercial batteries into virtual power plants could help hyperscalers bring new data centers online faster while easing pressure on an increasingly constrained electric grid.

Shayle and Tim discuss:
- Why commercial battery storage lagged behind residential and utility-scale markets

- The four revenue streams driving today's C&I storage economics

- How rising electricity prices and capacity shortages are changing customer demand

- Why battery hardware costs have fallen by roughly one-third in 18 months

- How AI could reduce project transaction costs by as much as 90%

- The opportunity — and challenge — of aggregating thousands of distributed batteries into virtual power plants

- Why data center growth and "bring your own capacity" programs could accelerate C&I storage adoption

- Tim's outlook for the fastest-growing segment of the battery storage market
Resources

Latitude: Voltus is acquiring energy storage startup Brightfield AI

Latitude: Google is Voltus' first Bring Your Own Capacity

Latitude: Can VPPs unlock grid capacity for data centers?

Catalyst: Battery booms and the rise of flexibility

Latitude: The Off-Grid Data Center Fantasy

Credits: Hosted by Shayle Kann. Produced and edited by Max Savage Levenson. Original music and engineering by Sean Marquand. Stephen Lacey is our executive editor.

The multi-billion dollar promise of vehicle-to-grid integration Jul 23, 2026

Show notes

Most electric vehicles spend nearly all of their lives parked, doing nothing. But under the hood of those idle cars, a massive store of energy sits untapped. The Kia EV9, for instance, holds a 100-kilowatt-hour battery—which is equivalent to about seven home backup batteries—just waiting to be utilized.

Yet despite this enormous potential, Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G) technology has remained mostly limited to small-scale pilot programs for decades. But with advanced tech hitting the market, that could soon change.

In this episode, Shayle sits down with Steve Letendre, senior advisor at the Vehicle-Grid Integration Council and editor of V2G News, to explore why the V2G revolution is finally moving from concept to reality. They break down the technical battle between AC and DC architectures, tackle the looming questions around battery degradation and warranties, and debate the business models that will finally convince everyday drivers to plug their cars back into the grid.

Shayle and Steve discuss topics like:

- The unused energy capacity hidden in parked EVs

- The technical debate, cost trade-offs, and hardware differences between off-board power conversion (DC architecture) and on-board power conversion (AC architecture).

- Current compatible EV options, including the Nissan Leaf, Tesla Cybertruck, Ford F-150 Lightning, and Kia EV9

- The high upfront cost of V2G systems

- Consumers' fears regarding whether discharging power to the grid will ruin their EV batteries or void manufacturer warranties.

- Streamlining the V2G enrollment process via VPP programs or at point-of-sale

- How financing can unlock mass V2G adoption

Resources

Catalyst: Repurposing EV batteries for grid storage

Catalyst: How China is reshaping the global auto market

Catalyst: Enter the electric supercycle

Latitude Media: Electric Era is turning its EV-charging tech into a data center power play

Latitude Media: The future of optimized EV charging

Credits: Hosted by Shayle Kann. Produced and edited by Max Savage Levenson. Original music and engineering by Sean Marquand. Stephen Lacey is our executive editor.

When will quantum computing have its breakout moment? Jul 16, 2026

Show notes

Over the course of the past decade, quantum computing (or the concept thereof) has ridden hype cycles, just like AI or the internet writ large.

In the past year, however, as governments across the globe have committed north of $50 billion to the sector, and billions more have poured into quantum startups, the technology is finding itself in the midst of a particularly dramatic hype wave.

Yet even as the money pours in, quantum remains a nascent technology that hasn’t seen any use in the real world. Among other applications, it offers enormous potential to revolutionize material discovery and molecular design, and to turbo charge clean energy tech. But how close we are to actually moving from isolated chips in a lab to bringing these real-world commercial applications to life remains a bit of a mystery.

In this episode, Shayle speaks to Bob Sorensen, chief analyst for quantum computing at Hyperion Research. They dig past the VC hype to map out the current state of quantum hardware, look at the timeline for fault-tolerant computing, and evaluate where the true performance gains lie.

Shayle and Bob discuss:

- Why recent claims of "quantum advantage" are often based on artificial constructs without much real-world relevance

- The difference between physical and logical qubits, and why reducing the "noise" is a defining hurdle for the hardware industry

- How data-driven AI models and science-driven quantum architectures complement each other differently in materials discovery

- Why 85 independent hardware vendors are far too many for the current ecosystem, and how market consolidation might impact investor confidence

Resources

- Catalyst: Quantum computing could be a critical climate solution

- Catalyst: Can AI revolutionize materials discovery?

- Latitude Media: Can quantum computing help solve the load growth problem?

Credits: Hosted by Shayle Kann. Produced and edited by Max Savage Levenson. Original music and engineering by Sean Marquand. Stephen Lacey is our executive editor.

Inside the AI power wars Jul 09, 2026

Show notes

For those steeped in the world of AI development, the major differences between tech giants’ chip strategies are easy enough to see: the speed of Google’s TPUs, the affordability of Amazon’s Trainium, and Nvidia’s market dominance. But those same companies’ respective energy strategies often fly under the radar.

As data center buildouts surge across the U.S., the tech industry is hitting a massive wall: a power grid that can’t move fast enough to support them. In this episode, Shayle sits down with Jeremie Eliahou Ontiveros, who leads coverage of infrastructure and power at SemiAnalysis, to lift the curtain on the hyper-competitive world of AI energy procurement.

They cover topics including:

The hyperscaler leaderboard: Why Google remains the most energy-sophisticated tech giant, as others continue to innovate
Why power has effectively become revenue for frontier labs
How Google uses its massive balance sheet to provide financial backstops for Anthropic’s data center buildouts
Why the interconnection queue is forcing AI labs like OpenAI and Anthropic to bring their own generation
The sudden market frenzy over modular speed-to-power options—ranging from aeroderivative gas turbines and massive reciprocating engines to billions of dollars of fuel cells

Catalyst: How data centers are complicating transmission expansion
Catalyst: Live from Transition-AI 2026: Inside Google’s massive AI capex
Catalyst: The rise of flexible data centers
Catalyst: AI scaling pathways: On grid, on edge, off grid, off planet
Open Circuit: The new reality for data centers: No easy answers
Open Circuit: Can data centers regain their social license?
Open Circuit: Grid utilization vs expansion: The 100GW debate
Latitude Media: FERC to grid operators: Connect large loads to transmission faster
Latitude Media: The rise of the data center power exchange

Credits: Hosted by Shayle Kann. Produced and edited by Max Savage Levenson. Original music and engineering by Sean Marquand. Stephen Lacey is our executive editor.

Inside the most sophisticated plan for solar geoengineering Jul 01, 2026

Show notes

One of the biggest challenges with technologies that reduce greenhouse gas emissions is that they require mass adoption. Solar radiation management (SRM) has the opposite problem.

By Stardust Solutions’ estimate, dispersing three million tons of reflective particles into the stratosphere could cool the planet by 1.5 degrees Celsius for the relatively small price of $30 billion; that's less than the cost of a single hyperscale data center.

Despite concerns about such an endeavor, the company is building a proprietary particle injection system with the goal of being deployment-ready this decade. While Stardust says they won’t deploy without the explicit authorization of multiple governments, questions nonetheless remain around the safety and ethics of SRM.

In this episode, Shayle sits down with Yanai Yedvab, CEO and co-founder of Stardust, to unpack how the technology works, its potential risks, and when to deploy it.

Shayle and Yanai discuss topics like:

- Why Stardust is eschewing sulfur dioxide in favor of naturally occurring, biodegradable amorphous silica and calcite particles

- How Stardust’s technology incorporates real-time and holistic testing

- Stardust’s commitment to only deploying under strict international regulation

- How the company balances the risk that solar geoengineering will reduce the economic incentive to decarbonize heavy industries with the imperative of an immediate climate solution

- Why Stardust structured itself as a private company rather than an academic or non-profit lab

- Catalyst: Making sense of solar engineering

- Catalyst: Serving data center load with carbon capture
Credits: Hosted by Shayle Kann. Produced and edited by Max Savage Levenson. Original music and engineering by Sean Marquand. Stephen Lacey is our executive editor.

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