Data centers are adding an extra 220 gigawatts of electricity demand in the US. How can the grid cope? A second special episode from the ACORE Policy Forum

Summary

Podcast Summary: Energy Gang – "Data Centers are adding an extra 220 gigawatts of electricity demand in the US. How can the grid cope?"

Date: February 27, 2026
From the ACORE Policy Forum, Washington, DC
Host: Ed Crooks (Wood Mackenzie)
Featured Guests: Anna Spitzberg (Wood Mackenzie), Arthur Haubenstock (Equinix), Ray Long (ACORE), Kimberly Johnston (NextGen Energy), Saxon Metzger (Polaris Ecosystems), Ebony Seymour (Element Group)

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Episode Overview

This special episode, recorded live at the ACORE Policy Forum in Washington DC, dives deep into one of the most urgent challenges facing US energy: explosive electricity demand growth from AI and data centers, with projections of an additional 220 gigawatts needed. Host Ed Crooks and a range of expert guests discuss the scale and implications of this demand, grid reliability, affordability, supply chain and workforce constraints, policy barriers, and the need for government and industry to accelerate solutions for a resilient, secure, and affordable clean energy transition.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Scale of Data Center-Induced Power Demand

Guest: Anna Spitzberg (Wood Mackenzie)

• Explosion in Demand:

  • Current projects with financial commitments and service agreements will add 183 GW of peak demand by 2025—about 22% of US peak demand. Including advanced-stage discussions, this rises to 220 GW.
    • “If we look at what has construction agreements…we hit 183 gigawatts. That accounts for about 22% of peak demand in the US in 2025.” (01:00, Anna Spitzberg)
    • “If you add advanced discussions…you're at 220 gigawatts.” (01:38, Anna Spitzberg)

• Supply Uncertainty:

  • Load realization may be impacted by supply chains, policy, pricing, but utilities are planning around this high-confidence load.

2. How Will the Grid Meet Demand?

Guest: Anna Spitzberg

• Thermal Capacity Utilization

  • Some existing gas and coal can be ramped up for about 47 GW.
  • New gas build expected (potential ~49 GW), but significant retirements continue (~60 GW potential retirements impact supply).
  • Retaining older coal plants is costly and yields low reliable capacity.

• Gap for Renewables & Storage:

  • Even with increased thermal capacity, renewables and storage must be deployed to meet over 100 GW additional demand in the next five years.
  • Timing and permitting are critical bottlenecks.
  • “We do see room for renewables and storage to meet that gap. It’s all about timing.” (04:14, Anna Spitzberg)

• PJM Example:

  • Massive mismatch: 3x signed demand vs actionable, accredited supply, leading to shortages and crisis-level auctions.

3. Reliability vs. Affordability Tension

Guests: Anna Spitzberg, Ed Crooks

• Price Caps Lead to Shortages:

  • Capacity auction price caps (as in PJM) intended to keep costs down result in insufficient supply.
    • “If you cap a price in a market, you're going to get insufficient supply. That's exactly what happened [in PJM].” (05:56, Ed Crooks)

• Broader Capacity Shortfalls:

  • Aging infrastructure, fuel price increases, wildfires, T&D needs—all driving costs.
  • Equipment and material price inflation: Gas turbine CAPEX reaching $2,500/kW, electrical equipment up 20–100% year-on-year.
  • Tariffs often exacerbate costs across the supply chain.

4. The Role of Policy and Supply Chain Strategy

Guest: Anna Spitzberg

• Deploying Strategic Policy Tools:
  • Government incentives and investment can help de-risk and bring down project costs but must be deployed at scale and to the right parts of the system.
  • Tariffs, workforce shortages, slow permitting, and high costs make the US a challenging place to build grid and generation infrastructure.
  • “We’ve become one of the most expensive places to build power infrastructure… significantly more than China right now.” (08:05, Anna Spitzberg)

5. Data Centers’ Perspective: Reliability, Proximity, and Grid Dependence

Guest: Arthur Haubenstock (Equinix)

• Five-Nines Reliability:

  • Data centers provide critical services (911, banks, etc.)—downtime is unacceptable.
  • AI intensifies both the demand and the requirement for ultra-low-latency and proximity, particularly in regions like NYC.
  • "Every time you make a banking transaction on your phone…there's a pretty good chance that you're going through one of our data centers and you do not want that to go down." (11:37, Arthur Haubenstock)

• Limited Grid Flexibility:

  • Some remote data centers can rely more on on-site generation and flexibility, but urban/latency-sensitive sites have little leeway.

• Emergency Backup:

  • Backup generation and storage must only be for true emergencies—routine switching would compromise reliability.

6. Systemic Solutions, Federal-State Coordination, and Innovation

Guest: Arthur Haubenstock

• Need for "Cooperative Federalism":

  • Urges federal and state governments to unify on expediting permitting, transmission, and distributed storage.

• Bottlenecks and Innovations:

  • US has generation "distribution problem" akin to old debates on food vs. logistics—not just about adding capacity but unlocking grid congestion through advanced transmission and grid-enhancing technologies.

  • "We have actually plenty of food. We just have a real distribution problem…We have that problem today in energy." (17:50, Arthur Haubenstock)

• Positive Signs:

  • Administration is spending more on advanced transmission; distributed storage and localized solutions gaining traction.

7. Conference/Industry Key Takeaways & Macro Trends

Guest: Ray Long (ACORE)

• Unprecedented Demand:

  • 166 GW needed in next four years—equivalent to building 15 more New York Cities.
    • “It’s the equivalent of adding fifteen more New York Cities onto the grid.” (21:22, Ray Long)

• Barriers to Scaling:

  1. Permitting delays (currently 8–17 years for approval)
  2. Trade/tariff policy and supply chain constraints
  3. Agency bottlenecks (DOE, Department of Interior, DOD, etc.)

• Two Priorities:

  • Reliability and affordability are paramount.
  • Record price increases: 39 states saw >6% electricity price rises in 2025.

• Policy Volatility and Bipartisan Opportunity:

  • Recent years saw wild policy swings (on tariffs, tax credits, etc.).

  • But AI/data center demand is forging bipartisan consensus on the need to scale all types of energy supply.

  • "There is the basis for bipartisan consensus now on energy...essentially because of AI." (28:00, Ed Crooks)

• The China Comparison:

  • China has outbuilt the US 3:1 in transmission/generation in a year—building "everything" at scale, particularly solar + storage, and has achieved supply-demand equilibrium while planning for more.
  • US needs similar urgency and breadth in its response.

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Important Segments & Timestamps

• Anna Spitzberg on New Data Center Load
  [00:59–04:27]

• Supply Capacity and Price Pressures
  [05:16–08:05]

• US as Cost Outlier, Supply Chain/Workforce Issues
  [08:05–10:35]

• Arthur Haubenstock on Data Center Reliability and Grid Dependence
  [11:13–15:23]

• Systemic Bottlenecks, Advanced Transmission
  [17:50–19:50]

• Ray Long on Demand and Policy Priorities
  [20:19–25:28]

• Bipartisan Consensus and Comparison with China
  [28:00–39:52]

• Policy Recommendations – What the Industry Needs
  [41:00–42:12]

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Notable Quotes

• Ray Long:

  • “The only thing standing in the way to achieving the objectives that politicians as well as consumers want is policy.” (00:00)
  • “We need to build everything…If we do certain policies like balance the trade piece…if we take the boot off of the roadblocks in the agencies and if we streamline permitting reform, we’re there, we win.” (41:00)

• Anna Spitzberg:

  • “We’ve become one of the most expensive places to build power infrastructure…It takes longer to build infrastructure here…and it’s more expensive, significantly more than China right now.” (08:05)
  • “We do see room for renewables and storage to meet that gap. It’s all about timing.” (04:14)

• Arthur Haubenstock:

  • “Our claim to fame is five nines reliability. We do not go down.” (11:37)
  • "It’s been too difficult, it’s taken too long, it’s been too expensive, it’s been too easy for people to stop it. And that needs to change." (31:57)

• Ed Crooks:

  • "If you cap a price in a market, you're going to get insufficient supply. That's exactly what happened [in PJM]." (05:56)

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Innovative Startups & Future Solutions

Featuring ACOR Accelerate Entrepreneurs ([42:12–51:24])

• Kimberly Johnston, NextGen Energy:

  • Commercializing distributed solar + storage to safeguard critical infrastructure amid aging grid and rising demand. Success hinges on local partnerships and policy support.
  • "We're trying to prevent loss of life, lower electricity costs, and really use these assets...so cities and communities have something they can monetize." (42:28)

• Saxon Metzger, Polaris Ecosystems:

  • Bridging investment and infrastructure gaps in tribal and rural areas with stakeholder engagement and better risk/certainty for developers.
  • "What we really need is for folks in the traditional development space to reach out to us if they're trying to work with tribal communities..." (46:35)

• Ebony Seymour, Element Group:

  • Addressing talent shortages in renewables via targeted recruitment and industry upskilling, aiming to bring new entrants and adjacent sector talent into clean energy.
  • "One of the things that I wanted to do is really highlight talent across the industry, but also help bring individuals from adjacent industries into the space." (48:41)

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Conclusions and Core Messages

• The US power system faces a transformative decade: Data centers and AI are driving record demand growth, presenting both huge economic opportunity and reliability/affordability risks.
• Systemic policy, permitting, and grid improvements are critical—the private sector is ready to invest and build, but government action is needed to unlock and accelerate supply.
• Bipartisan consensus is building, driven by national priorities (AI, security, economic competitiveness), but real progress depends on tackling bottlenecks in permitting, investment certainty, tariffs, and transmission.
• US needs to adopt some of China’s scale and urgency to avoid shortages and price spikes—building “everything,” fast, and at scale.
• Next-gen entrepreneurs are poised to deliver granular, community-focused, and inclusive solutions, but their impact depends on policy support and market access.

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For listeners: This episode provides a panoramic, highly relevant look at the greatest transformation and challenge facing the US energy industry in decades—offering both stark warnings and clear, actionable directions on how policy, innovation, and pragmatic bipartisanship can—and must—work together for a resilient, affordable, and decarbonized grid.

Transcript

[Ray Long]

The only thing standing in the way to achieving the objectives that politicians as well as consumers want is policy.

[Anna Spitzberg]

Right now we've become one of the most expensive places to build power infrastructure and that is a fundamental problem. It takes longer to build infrastructure here on the demand side and the supply side and it's more expensive.

[Ed Crooks]

Hello and welcome to the Energy Gang, a discussion show from Wood Mackenzie about the fast changing world of energy. Hi, I'm Ed Crooks and this is the second of two special episodes which we're bringing you from the ACOR Policy Forum in Washington DC. On this show we're going to be talking about the future of the power industry in the US AI data centers, soaring power demand and the technologies we're going to need to meet it. First of all, I spoke to my Wood Mackenzie colleague Anna Spitzberg, who's one of the speakers at the event. She's our global head of power and renewables research. And I asked her what the data showed about new data center capacity being added and what it means for power demand in the future.

[Anna Spitzberg]

So if we just look at announcements, it's significant, but I think that doesn't get us anywhere. We want to have a realizable rate. And so if we back up and we look at and these are brand new numbers that just came out, if we look at what has construction agreements, so ecloa and then we add it with they have a financial commitment, they have a long term Service Agreement. In ESA we hit 183 gigawatts. That accounts for about 22% of peak demand in the US in 2025. Significant. That number does not include advanced discussions. If you add advanced discussions. So those with engineering studies and those that are almost completed and far along in those discussions and negotiations for those agreements, you're at 220 gigawatts. So again, there's a lot of things that can happen that have that load not come on in the way that's expected. Supply chains, policy, pricing. But it is what everyone has put a lot of resourcing around and it's what utilities are planning around.

[Ed Crooks]

Yeah, and so I want to come on to that supply chain issue in a moment. Just before we do just be absolutely clear what numbers we're talking about then. So as you say, there's a lot of announcements out there, there's a lot of kind of vaporware projects. People are putting things forward that may or may not happen and probably won't. But you're saying even if you discard all of those proposals, ideas for projects that people have got even just that. That's adding what was a number 22%

[Anna Spitzberg]

of peak demand of what we had in 25%. And with advanced discussion, that's our high confidence load. So that is significant on that basis.

[Ed Crooks]

Where does the supply come from to meet that increased demand? I mean, is the supply going to be to meet that demand?

[Anna Spitzberg]

That's the big question. We're seeing a few ways that that could get met. One is we have a thermal capacity that can get ramped up. If that thermal capacity gets ramped up, you can get about 47 gigawatts of additional power. So that's any areas where it's running in lower utilization like MISO and spp, you have new gas build. So there's an expectation of new gas

[Ed Crooks]

build and just on the existing capacity first. So that's current gas and coal fire that are in service that are not being used to their full capacity to

[Anna Spitzberg]

the level that they can be. Exactly.

[Ed Crooks]

So you can get quite a significant

[Anna Spitzberg]

chunk just from those 47 gigawatts is our current estimate of what we can get out of that. Then you add new gas build maybe Last outlook was 49 gigawatts. We think that could increase based on turbine orders and just what manufacturing could look like. But then we have retirements, right? It's not just about the new demand. We have capacity supply that's retiring. So we have to make up for it. And that is significant. That, you know, could be close to 60 gigawatts of what we're seeing today. We are seeing as a result cold deferments. But those are really expensive to do and they're very low utilization. Because these are older plants, they're not at their top line. So they're not considered by operators at something or utilities that can meet demand reliably at a hundred percent. It's not like, oh you have this nameplate capacity, a hundred gigawatts of that plant and that's what it gives you or even close to that, it's much lower. But then we still have a gap that gets us to 37 gigawatts in thermal of what you can add on. We expect in the next five years over 100 gigawatts of demand that needs to be met of load. So what meets that we do see room for renewables and storage to meet that gap. It's all about timing. And we've seen what the timing problem looks like with the pjm. Conversations that have come about those conversations

[Ed Crooks]

being about what about the fact that

[Anna Spitzberg]

there's a shortage in capacity. So right now the White House not too long ago invited governors and PJM to figure out what do we do with the fact that we do not have the amount of capacity in PJM as we need. PJM essentially has three times the load signed on by utilities than it has in capacity to meet it if we actually accredited. So give it the percentage that we think it can reliably meet load and we risk it based on where is it, where it is in the transition cluster and the interconnection queue. Once we do that, we're looking at a huge gap. So they, they need to get it somewhere. So they're going to be looking for another auction. And the pricing on that auction, the timing of that auction, the long term commitments around that, those are going to be really important details to see whether they can start meeting that gap.

[Ed Crooks]

It seems to me one of the crucial issues there then is that this issue of reliability and the availability of supply is coming into conflict with the other big consideration, which is affordability. And so we had several of these governors in the PJM area complaining about cost of power going up, complaining in particular about prices in the capacity auction, which have been absolutely rocketing. And so PJM brought in caps on prices in that auction essentially to try and hold down the cost. I always say I can't remember a lot of my economics education, but one of the things I can remember pretty clearly is that if you cap a price in a market, you're going to get insufficient supply.

[Anna Spitzberg]

That's exactly what happened.

[Ed Crooks]

And exactly that seems to be exactly what's happened in pjm. So how do you think that then plays out? And you can absolutely imagine similar situations being played out right across the country and probably around the world as well, where you're having this big increase in demand, a need for additional investment to provide supply to meet that demand, but also very strong and growing concerns about affordability and then how that investment is going to be paid for. Those two things are really coming into conflict, aren't they?

[Anna Spitzberg]

They are, they are, because there's a lot of things that are contributing to it. We think that we need a lot of capacity just to deal with new demand. But it's not just that. We have a lot of aging infrastructure on the grid. We have fuel cost increases, we have wildfires. There's a lot that needs to be handled, not just on this generation side, but on T and D transmission and distribution. So this is a problem, but I think the best way to look at it is where the cost increase is coming from. Why are they not actually able to come in at a certain price point? And a lot of it is just what we're seeing across supply chains, across raw components, all of the price points are increasing. So gas, we've never seen gas capex, you know, at this rate, I mean, this $2,500 per kilowatt hour for combined CYC cycle is where we're nearing right now. That is incredible increases. And even with turbine manufacturing coming in to the United States right now, our imports are going up significantly. So even from what we're bringing in from others, increases here. If we look at turbines, they're made up of components, components that are also increasing in price, whether it's specialty alloys or steel or copper. So all of those components go up and then everything else on the grid is also going up. So we have 20 to 100% increases on electrical equipment that we're seeing just across last year. That is significant. And so every time there's a conversation over tariffs, we have to remember that impacts those price points and that then trails up not just to gas, to renewables, to grid infrastructure, it's across everything.

[Ed Crooks]

So how ultimately might this be resolved and what is the role for policy here? I guess in particular, yeah, we have

[Anna Spitzberg]

to essentially decompose the problem of it. We have to think about what can be built in the United States. Right. We think about supply chain resilience. We need supply chain resilience at the same time that we're trying to meet this incredible demand growth. So we have to think what makes sense. What can you actually build up in the US where can you use strategic partnerships? We've already seen global manufacturing ramp up to meet our demand. We've seen imports more than double from Brazil and South Korea to meet our need for power transformers. We've seen incredible billions of announcements in the US you can build here, but at what cost? Who absorbs that cost? So that needs to be much more strategic. But across the board in terms of competition, we've become one of the most expensive places to build power infrastructure. And that is a fundamental problem. It takes longer to build infrastructure here on the demand side and the supply side. And it's more expensive, significantly more than China right now. So that, that is problematic. We need to be thinking about it when we think about affordability and also what are those trade offs? You know, one thing I was talking about with someone yesterday was we always, we used to talk about suppressed demand. You talk about emerging markets that they would have more demand if the supply was There it's more of a chicken and egg problem. We never talk about it in a market like the United States. But to me, what we have now is suppressed economic growth and opportunity. How much we suppress it is dependent on how we treat all these subcomponent issues.

[Ed Crooks]

And it does seem like people in Congress and the administration are aware of that. Whether they actually do anything material about it to really make a difference, I guess, is a separate question.

[Anna Spitzberg]

Well, and it's how many tools you use right there. There's so many different pieces. I think there's an effort to ramp up investment in the US to have the US Government participate in investment. That can help de risk some projects, that can help reduce the cost of some projects that come online. But it's at what scale and at what part of the problem. You still have different components. You have the tariffs. Tariffs can be used as a policy tool. But there's a lot of. There's different incentives that you have. Workforce, goodness, we don't. Workforce is one of the biggest issues we have right now. We talk about manufacturing buildup, but we have a serious workforce and skill set problem and labor problem that we have not been able to address. There's a lot that goes into actually fixing the current situation and getting us to where we need to be, which is why we probably won't be at our max opportunity growth area. We're going to be somewhere in between. And the rate that policy is reacting to some of these components is going to be the driver of that.

[Ed Crooks]

Yeah. And it's going to be very important to watch how that develops, even just in this year, given how fast everything's changing. Progress has got to be made fast.

[Anna Spitzberg]

Yes.

[Ed Crooks]

Well, we hope you'll come back on again soon to talk about it then. How things have been evolving.

[Anna Spitzberg]

For now, though, I hope it'll be even better. Much better.

[Ed Crooks]

You've been fantastic this time. Been great talking to you. Ada Schmidt, thank you very much indeed.

[Anna Spitzberg]

Thank you.

[Ed Crooks]

Anna Spitzberg. Thanks very much. So, onto my next conversation. So I'm joined now by Arthur Haubenstock, who is the senior counsel at Equinix, which is one of the world's largest developers, operators and owners of data centers. So very much right in the hotspot, the right place at the right time right now, aren't you?

[Arthur Haubenstock]

Things are bit busy. Yes. Thank you so much for having me. This was a great time to be having this conversation and we're all trying to dig in and solve these problems.

[Ed Crooks]

Yeah, absolutely. So let's talk about those problems. Then, so you're here speaking at an energy conference, as I say, a large operator and developer of data centers. What do you need in terms of energy? What do you need from the energy system?

[Arthur Haubenstock]

Primarily what we really rely on is a reliable, low cost grid. So our claim to fame is five nines reliability. We do not go down. So our customers include things like 911 data centers, not just the streaming entertainment that you think about, but every time you make a banking transaction on your phone, you purchase a train ticket, you otherwise get involved with the Internet. There's a pretty good chance that you're going through one of our data centers and you do not want that to go down. You don't want that to have that terrible spinning dial. You want to get the answer that you need very quickly. And that's even more so when we start talking about AI. Now we're starting to see the second phase of AI, of AI inference. And when you ask a question of whatever AI engine you want to use, it is going to a data center and connecting very quickly and you want a quick response. That means you need to be very close by. That means you have to have very low downtime. That means you need a very reliable energy system. And the most reliable energy system out there ever since the grid began is the grid.

[Ed Crooks]

And as you say, the grid is clearly a marvel. I've heard it described as the greatest achievement of human civilization, which may be putting it a bit strongly, but even

[Arthur Haubenstock]

so, it's only the energy people who say that. But I'm an energy person myself. Right.

[Ed Crooks]

So yeah, you are sympathetic to, to that argument. And so I want to come onto the question of then being off grid because that seems to be the kind of the buzzy thing that a lot of people are talking about at the moment in terms of can data centers go off grid, bring your own power, all that discussion, having power behind the meter and so on. What about then the data centers load being flexible again? That's an idea that seems to be very popular at the moment. A lot of people talking about that. You say you need Five9's reliability, so you want to be running all the time or operational all the time. But presumably you could then at times could you use backup power to diminish the load that the data center puts on the grid or does that not really work?

[Arthur Haubenstock]

Well, it's a great question. And people talk about data centers as if they're a monolith. They're really not. There's a tremendous diversity of business models. There are certainly some Data centers that are located very far from load centers. They're located very far from other elements of the grid. They have plenty of land, and they don't need to be very close to anything in particular. They can have their own generation next door. You know, they can be providing flexibility because they can alternate between the grid and the generation that they've got. There are other data centers, like we have data centers that are very, very close to Wall street. And those data centers need to be very close to where those transactions happen, because those transactions, milliseconds, can make a difference in whether one transaction or another transaction go forward. So latency matters. Proximity really matters. And as you know, as a native New Yorker now, maybe not native, but

[Ed Crooks]

probably been there long enough, longtime resident

[Arthur Haubenstock]

real estate is tough to come by in the New York metropolitan area. You know, it's. It's not. It's very, very difficult to build new generation in New York. It's very, very difficult to find the room to put in enough storage to last you for a significant period of time. Emergency generation is just that. It's there whether it's generation or whether it's storage. It is there to carry you through a period when the grid goes down, if we're using it to support the grid generally, or at times when you don't have a blackout and the blackout actually happens, then the 911 calling centers, the financial transactions you need to make, the grid operations that may be located in the data center, those go down too. So it's really, really. It's something that people have been glib about, but we take, again, the five nines very seriously. We want to make sure that our emergency backup generation and storage are therefore true emergencies.

[Ed Crooks]

Other particular examples of best practice you can point to. If you look around the country and look at particular markets, particular regions where deals have been structured to add new capacity to the grid and to get data centers operational. There's some. We'd say they're getting it right, they're doing it the right way.

[Arthur Haubenstock]

I think there was a lot of experimentation, and I think there's been a lot of great case studies. I don't know that we have really seen the systemic responses that ultimately we should be resolving on. Jeff Dennis is. Is one of the folks I really look to for wisdom on a lot of these issues. And he talked about the need for cooperative federalism. And I think missing that a bit, you know, that there's an opportunity here. There have been a number of proceedings where there's lots of concern about whether the Federal government or the states or who it is should really be trying to solve a particular issue. This is a time where we really want to be able to move fast, to address the customer energy affordability issues, to address the economic competitiveness issues, to make sure that we're competitive on the data side as well as in every other aspect of our economy. This is a time we should be coming together and worrying a little bit less about whose hat somebody's wearing and more about what's the sensible solution that's going to drive down costs and create a more reliable energy system. Because we know that our reliability is at issue with all the challenges that are coming at us.

[Ed Crooks]

Right. Which brings me to the question I was about to ask you, which is then what can be done to really expedite data center investment and development and the installation of new power infrastructure to support that? If you talk to people here at this event, we heard people from the administration talking. We had members of Congress speaking earlier. Everyone talks about data centers as the most important infrastructure for the country, for the world right now. People talk about AI as being this existential issue for the US Both in economic terms and in national security terms. They want to make sure that development happens as quickly as it can. What could they be doing then? What could Congress be doing? What could the administration be doing to make sure that you are able to progress, add all that capacity quickly and get that energy infrastructure to support it?

[Arthur Haubenstock]

This is an all hands on deck moment and we're really excited to see not just the innovative ideas that have been bubbling up for a long time, but the barriers to deployment of those innovative ideas starting to come down. There are some companies that are doing really interesting things with distributed storage, for example, and creating the means to have that capacity bid into the auctions or otherwise supplied to whoever the jurisdictional entity is. There are innovative things that are being done with trying to increase the amount of capacity and transmission. Really excited to see that this administration is going to be is committed to spending more of the money that has been made available for advanced transmission technology, for example. Those are things that we can do now and very quickly to get more capacity online. In many ways, I'm struck you may recall that there was a lot of discussion and 10, 20 years ago about the world's nutrition and the fact that we have actually plenty of food. We just have a real distribution problem. We cannot get the food to where it is needed. We have that problem today in energy. We have actually a fair amount of generation capacity. We don't have the ability to move it around the way some other countries do. And so we should be thinking about, do we need more advanced transmission? Do we need transmission to move forward? Do we need more advanced distribution technologies? Do we need other ways that we can better utilize what we have so that we can free up the capacity for what we need?

[Ed Crooks]

And as you say, that's the great opportunity in what's happening at the moment, which is it's really encouraging and incentivizing innovation. It's getting to people, getting people to think about all those problems and to think about solutions, which does make it a very exciting time, I think.

[Arthur Haubenstock]

I used to say a crisis is a terrible thing to waste. It looks like for once, we're actually getting ahead of the crisis. And that's very good news.

[Ed Crooks]

Yeah. Certainly never a dull moment.

[Arthur Haubenstock]

Yes.

[Ed Crooks]

Arthur Happenstock, thanks very much indeed. Great talking to you.

[Arthur Haubenstock]

Thanks so much for the time.

[Ed Crooks]

Then to sum up what we've been hearing in the past two days of the conference, I spoke to Ray Long, who's ACOR's president and chief executive, and I started off by thanking him for hosting us at what's been a fascinating event, a really interesting couple of days. I think I've got some thoughts about what struck me most and what I found most interesting and what people have been saying. But what were your thoughts? What's been your key takeaways from this conference?

[Ray Long]

Yeah, Ed. So, you know, 2026 is an interesting year for energy. You know, we had a lot of boom in build last year. A lot of interest from the banks, the developers, the hyperscalers and all that stuff, and that interest in energy. And frankly, need for energy has come into 2026 like a lion, and. And everybody's hit the ground running. So, you know, we're usually at capacity for our events, and we're at capacity for this one. Again, we got a ton of people because of the weather this week who come and came in virtually as well. And. And I think, you know, if I'm, as I go around talking to everybody, you know, the things that are driving it are reflective of the time that we're in. So the end is a huge economic opportunity here for a lot of businesses. There's a needle, and then there's a downside, too. Right. There's a threat to all this. So the economic opportunity is. Demand's increasing like we've never seen it before. We can define it. We can talk about that.

[Ed Crooks]

Certainly not, let's say, in our professional lifetimes, not in our careers. Like, maybe if you go back 70 years or something, we saw this kind of growth. But yeah, absolutely.

[Ray Long]

Yeah. I mean, you know, in the next four years, the geeky people in our industry like to say, hey, it's 166 gigawatts that we need to put on in four years. Well, you know, how does somebody process that? It's the equivalent of adding 15 more New York Cities onto the grid. And in. That's. That's a legitimate number from a legitimate company that does demand forecasts. And the neat thing is, you know,

[Ed Crooks]

and I should say Wood MacKenzie, being one of those legitimate companies, I'm pretty sure that's our number. We're very much in that ballpark. Yeah.

[Ray Long]

So, you know, demand's increasing in a big way. And what is that demand bringing? So there's interest in the investment community. Of course, we represent a lot of banks and financial institutions that are investing in energy infrastructure. They're all here just like they have been for the last few years, saying, we've got a lot of capital deploy, we see the opportunity, and there are buyers out there. Right. So there are investors, there are developers, there's a set of buyers out there to buy everything that gets done. And at the same time, we still have to build 15 New York cities worth a new generation in four years. So there's a viable market for this. So you might say, so where's the interest and why do people need to come to the ACOR policy conference and all that? The interest in our conference is really around what's holding that up or what's preventing it. And there are a few things that fall into that. And we unpacked that over the last two days. So one is permitting. Right. We had two congressmen in, you mentioned that before, who came in and talked yesterday about bipartisan policy that aimed at getting to streamline permitting and what that would look like. So that's a big thing. So expediting, streamlining, permitting so that you can get to a reasonable approval on a new project within a couple of years instead of the eight to 17 years that it takes now. It's a lot of time. The second thing is policy. Okay, so we've got. And I break that into two buckets. The first one is trade policy. So you've got a lot of stuff going on in trade. It's super weedy. We can unpack that if you want to. But the bottom line is at the point that we're in now, where you're seeing a tremendous amount of supply chain and manufacturing still continue to shift to the United States that we still, while that's happening, we still need to source a certain amount of the components that go into all these projects from overseas. Tariffs and other trade controls that are being put in place, you know, put a huge economic burden on that. You can actually price things out of the market through those. And they have their supply constraints as a result of those. So that's the second thing that's slowing things down. And then the third thing is really permits that are being held up and approvals that are being held up in different agencies. So you think about all the things that you need to go through to bring an energy project online. So it could be conventional, it could be a natural gas project, could be a pipeline project, could be a solar project, a wind project. Right. And there are areas in the government that are bottlenecks. Department of Interior is one of them right now. The Department of Defense is one of them right now. So all those things. So if we can solve for those kind of three buckets of things, we'll get to 2030 with a slight surplus. If we continue to have those roadblocks in place, we're going to wind up with shortages. And that's where the big thing comes in. Everybody's talking about two things. Reliability, and that's pretty much supply. And the other one is affordability. What's the price going to be? And the Wood Mac person that came in earlier today had some new data, which was fantastic. 39 states in 2025 alone. This is what I loved about it because it was very present and real. We just came out of 2025. 39 states in 2025 experienced energy price increases last year. And here's the kicker. Most of those states, it was 6%. So 3% above a cost of living increase. We never have that kind of increases in electricity rates. And that's indicative of what we're going to continue to see if we don't wind up building more supply and more transmission out of the system. And I think that's why you've got so much interest in what we did over the last two days.

[Ed Crooks]

Right. I think that's really interesting, and I think that fits very well with what I'd been thinking about. One of the things that I was most struck by over the past couple of days is the debate about policy and about policy volatility. And of course, it's something that everyone in the industry always complains about. Everybody hates policy volatility. People want stability. People want to be able to plan for the long term. You've got these multi year, in some cases multi decade investments that people are trying to make. And they hate policy changing from year to year. And we have had in the past 15 months some pretty extreme shifts in policy, as you say, on the tariff side, tariffs going up. And then just in the past week, the decision from the Supreme Court striking down some of those tariffs and a lot of uncertainty created in the wake of that. And also then with tax credits, the big beautiful bill passing last year that took away tax credits for wind and solar power in particular. So it does feel like there's been a lot of volatility. What I thought was really striking about the conversations I've been hearing here is people saying actually there is the basis for bipartisan consensus now on energy. It may be possible to have less volatility in the future, essentially because of AI. Basically that AI is being identified as a national priority. It's a priority in economic terms going to drive, hopefully economic growth. It's absolutely a priority. People say in national security terms because it's very important for great power competition. If you're like a dual use technology, it can have military as well as civilian applications in AI. And if the US gets left behind in the race to develop those most advanced capabilities, then it's going to fall behind as a great power. And that's not a future that anyone here wants to contemplate. And those issues are pretty bipartisan. And as you said, you have those two members of Congress speaking on the platform yesterday, Republican and a Democrat, both giving off pretty similar messages about the importance of AI, the importance of getting that developed, and therefore the importance of developing the energy infrastructure needed to support that and saying that that's something you probably won't have big fights over in Congress in the future. And you may not have these big swings in policy to the same degree because everyone agrees we need to get that infrastructure built. I mean, am I reading it right? Do you think that's right, that there's that kind of changing mood?

[Ray Long]

People are picking up on Ed, as usual? I think you're pretty spot on. Yeah. And it's just adding some color to that. What we hear from the administration, and we had an assistant secretary from the Department of Energy here yesterday that talked about this as well. So a good representative from the administration. There's a lot of commonality where everybody wants to go and what the vision is. And I think you just did a good job at highlighting that. If you go out four years to 20, 30 and we talk about the demand increasing, here's what we hear, we hear from Democrats and Republicans as the administration as well as representatives in Congress and the Senate. We want to get to the point where electric supply meets the demand that we have. And they want it for several reasons. You highlighted it. One is supply meeting demand means that there is at least equilibrium. There are market forces in place that are putting downward pressure on prices so you don't get these wild price swings like the 6% increase in retail electric rates. Right. So that's the first thing. The second thing is we want reliability. We want to have all that power there, not only to keep the lights on at home. I don't know, you live in New York, I live up in Boston. Most of the time, everybody. A lot of people lost power during the storm. You know, all that. So you want enough power out there and you want the grid in place that Everybody's got power 247 and all that. That. And that's a big piece of it. So commonality on that piece as well. And then the third piece and you touched on this is really international competitiveness for the United States. The Trump administration and the President would talk about America first. They would talk about, you know, developing in America, buying America, all those different things. I hear commonality about that issue from Democrats and Republicans as well. Where it starts to get a little wonky is when you get into the details. Now everybody wants to talk about this stuff at a high level, right? I've been in. I've been in energy for over 25 years. There is nothing really simple about our energy system. You know, when you start to break down how an electron moves through the lines and the pressures that, I mean, you get into some pretty wonky stuff fast. Balancing the grid is not just a question of, I've got a market for widgets and I need to produce so many widgets to meet that market. It's much more complex than that. So when you take it down a level, details start to really matter. And when you start to talk about things like permitting reform, and you get into NEPA reform and then you get into other things that are related to that, so you can get to a yes or no decision within a couple of years, details really start to matter there. And that's where I was very excited to hear the two congressmen who came in yesterday and talk about that. I think just to pick on permitting reform for a minute. And on the detail piece, the interesting thing is going to be when that gets to the Senate, where it technically is now, a couple of senators on the Democratic side have said, look, we can come together on the details of what this is going to look like, but at the end of the day, because there are really projects that are ready to go that are under construction or that are about to begin construction, that are being held up at the Department of Interior and in other places, we want what they're calling is really permitting certainty around those so that those agencies that are reviewing the permits do what they've always done. You go through, you do your analysis, you move the permits along and they go through. They either go through, they don't go through right now. It's just they're not moving. So we need to get to a point where they're there. I think if people are in deal mode, air quotes on the administrative side, the Senate and the House side, we'll get to yes on permitting reform. And, and I think that kind of dynamic that I just mentioned for permitting reform could play out on some of the other big issues. As long as you've got people that, number one, recognize that the solutions are highly complex, require detail, and if we can get there, like I said before, the market is really in place, that will just take this stuff and will make sure it all gets done right.

[Ed Crooks]

And again, going back to that point about policy volatility, something I heard people say, which I thought was a really important point a couple of times raised on the platform over the past couple of days, is that it really helps to have legislation passed and in place. Administrations can do a lot and you can do a lot with regulation, but that can change, and that'll change rapidly according to which party has control of the administration. If you get legislation passed to get rid of that, you need to get more legislation passed in Congress, which can be difficult. So once you've got it enshrined in law, it can generally be a lot more stable. The policy has a good chance of lasting for longer. And so that's the thing I think a lot of people want to see and again, talking about sort of alliances forming and people sharing a common cause. Something I heard someone say yesterday was it's been really striking to see how the oil and gas industry and the renewable energy industry are very much aligned on this. And there's a lot of commonality in terms of thinking that we need to get progress on this for everyone's benefit. No matter what type of energy infrastructure you're trying to build in the United States, it's been too difficult, it's taken too long, it's been too expensive, it's been too easy. For people to stop it. And that needs to change. And that's what legislation could do, is change that in a lasting way. I mean, as you say, a lot of complexity to it, a lot of detail around that, I suppose. Give me your view on how that's likely to play out. Do you think we actually get a bill passed this year, for instance?

[Ray Long]

Oh, Ed, I'm going to go back for a minute so you can probably tell I got some gray hair on my head. So I've been around long enough and I've been in the energy industry long enough to remember back when renewables weren't even a thing. Right. And everything was coal, oil, natural gas, nuclear, stuff like that. Right. And, and, and then the renewables grew and got there. I think what we're talking about now and what those that just two congressmen talked about, about coming together on common solutions is, has been too long in the coming. And the, you know, the bifurcation or the politicization of, of conventional versus renewables never should have taken place. It always should have been. What's the best electron that were out there? But past is the past. And it is the issue that I'm getting to that ties in with the, the volatility portion and the policy volatility is we sort of reap what we sow here. Democratic administrations have favored renewables and have, have disfavored fossil and conventional generation. Republican administrations for the most part have done the opposite. And we're seeing that play out once again. Now that world before, when that was going on, was much different than today. That world before the pie of demand for electricity was finite. You didn't see really more than a couple of percentage points a year of demand growth for the longest time. You and I have been around for a while. We remember that the last 24 months that that world changed completely. We are now no longer dealing with if this electron doesn't make it onto the system, then it'll be replaced by something else. Or if something new is coming on, it was replacing something else. Right now it's hey, this is all ores in the water to meet this demand increase for the AI stuff, for data center, for electrification, for everything. We not only need everything that we've got now that's in operation and operating, generating electricity, we need all this other new stuff as well. And the only way we're gonna get there is to build everything. So my hope is where I hear Democrats and Republicans saying the same thing and my friends at the American Petroleum Institute and others, we're all tired of being whipsawed from the policy going back and forth. My hope is that we do get to that point where this is just about America now getting every electron onto the grid and then moving forward. If you want later we can talk about China because the juxtaposition between the America and China is stark. But back to you.

[Ed Crooks]

Well, yeah, go on, tell me about China because then I want to come back to my previous question about, as you say, that's your hope, is that the parties will come together on this. I then want to talk to you about your expectation. But before we get to that, let's talk about China. What's the point you want to make there?

[Ray Long]

The two superpowers in the world, United States and China, both have the same issue or opportunity or threat, which is demand is increasing at a pace that nobody really expected at this point in time. And that's where the similarities go away. United States, we just did a pretty good job of defining that. We're playing catch up now and the catch up that we need to do is extraordinary. 166 gigawatts to build new supply plus transmission. Never done anything like that before. That's a lot in four years. But we just talked. There's a roadmap to get there. China started planning for this a while ago and their approach was build everything and build everything at scale. So some statistics, they've got the same opportunity that we do. Demand is increasing, they want to win the AI race, data centers, all that stuff. Right. That's the driver for it. So what are they doing to meet that transmission? They out built the US in this way last year they built the equivalent of 40% of the entire United States power system in one year in transmission and generation.

[Ed Crooks]

Those are amazing. It's staggering, isn't it? It's just breathtaking.

[Ray Long]

50 states and they built 40% of we've got in a year, in 20, 24 a year. This is the best number I have. They outspent the US 3 to 1 in terms of dollars for transmission and generation and they're building everything. And then let's look at the technologies you're building because I get this question all the time. They're building renewables, solar, wind, battery storage, they're building new coal, they're building nuclear and they're building geothermal and hydro. So all those things kind of things that we have here, but they're doing those things at scale. So the question I get is yeah, but they're doing more coal, right? Or they're doing more Baseload or firm or whatever and they're not. Solar is like five to one over. I think the next closest thing, wind is right in there too. And the other stuff, the coal, the thermal, the nuclear are all down a ways on it. And you gotta ask yourself the question, why are they doing that at scale? And it's the things that we know here that the data plays out, solar and especially solar paired with batteries. It's fast to build, it's extremely cost effective to build and it's cheaper, there's no fuel costs associated with it. It's all those things. But then you get into the discussion about the complexity of the grid and firming and all those other things. They've got all the other technologies out there around it. So you know when solar's going to produce, you know when it's not going to produce, you can take advantage of that, you can use it to, when it's producing at a large level to charge batteries. So when you have a complex and diversified system, the way they've set up at scale, you can get that downward pressure on prices first. So you've got the supply you need and you get the grid so that you can move it around in the way that you need to so that you know, you can, you know, through grid enhancing technologies and other things, you know that what's on the grid at any given point in time, you know, when certain lines can handle more power and when they can't and you can make adjustments on that way. We don't have a modern grid like that. We were, we're talking about grid enhancing technologies, advanced transmission technologies and others. You had Alex Fitzsimmons in here from the administration yesterday talking about this as well. So everybody.

[Ed Crooks]

Yeah, I was just about to say I was interested to hear him mention that very specifically. That was kind of quite an encouraging sign I thought. The administration is definitely kind of on the case on that one. Yeah.

[Ray Long]

So China, you know, not only do they, does do they have equilibrium now with supply meeting demand and they've got the system to move it around, but they're already planning for the future on that. So they know that AI is going to continue to drive more load and they're planning for additional resources to do that. And of course here we've already defined that. And it. Look, if we're going to win the AI race, which is everybody's thing, shouldn't we just be building everything and doing that instead of not building certain technologies which are fully funded and in some cases permitted? It's like Fighting the AI race with two hands tied behind your back.

[Ed Crooks]

So we ought to wrap it up. I ought to let you go just before I do. Final thought then for a message coming out of this event. We're just up the road from Capitol Hill in one direction, the White House in the other. What's the message you would want to send to Congress and to the administration in terms of what the energy industry really needs in terms of policy?

[Ray Long]

It's really simple. And as a lifelong policy government affairs guy, it pains me to say this because I'm usually looking for policy solutions for things. It goes like this. We've got the buyers, we've got the market, the investors, we've got the developers that want to do this. We've got a viable market. The only thing standing in the way to achieving the objectives that politicians as well as consumers want is policy right now. And it's trade policy, it's tariff policy, it's roadblocks at agencies and its permitting reform. If we do the, if we do certain policies like balance the trade piece for the time being while we continue to shift supply chains and build manufacturing here, if we take the boot off of the roadblocks in the agencies and if we streamline permitting reform, we're there, we win. So my hope is that and those things aren't all that complicated to do.

[Ed Crooks]

Well, definitely want to talk to you again soon to find out how much progress is being made in those areas. But going to leave it there for now. But again, as I say, thank you very much indeed for inviting us. Been fantastic to be at this event and great to talk to you just now.

[Ray Long]

Thanks, I really appreciate it. Cheers.

[Ed Crooks]

Finally, we spoke to some entrepreneurs who are building the energy businesses of the future and are being supported by ACOR's Accelerate program. And I started off by talking to Kimberly Johnston, who's the founder and CEO of the solar and storage company NextGen Energy.

[Kimberly Johnston]

NextGen Energy is solving the electricity crisis facing America and quite frankly, worldwide. And for the first time, we're dealing with an aging grid, 140plus years old and an exponential rise in demand at a time where we have power outages and rising electricity costs. What we're trying to do is solve that problem and, and how we're solving it is the commercialization of distributive energy resources. So think about just local generation paired with storage. We started off where we were working with US States. So after the infrastructure bill was passed, we worked with the state of Louisiana. Since I am a former utility executive serving on the Gulf coast on these horrific events. And so we partnered with Louisiana to go after one of the top 10 U.S. dOE awards on grid innovation and we won that. But as we know today, those shovel ready projects are still shovel ready. And so we're pivoting and going to a commercialization model that's a national replicable model. So our clients to your question are really municipalities and critical infrastructure owners and operators. So we want to make sure that hospitals, the lights stay on for hospitals, for fire stations, for water treatment plants. We continue to see in these horrific storms, not only do you lose power, but you lose all the essential services and there's loss of life. So we really want to prevent loss of life, lower electricity costs, and really then use these assets on blue sky days where the cities and the communities have something they can monetize.

[Ed Crooks]

Right. So what do you need now to help you scale up? What would really accelerate your growth? It's really what making those connections, making those contacts in your customer base, your target market. Yes, that's what you really need.

[Kimberly Johnston]

Exactly. And generally how we approach that is there are through government affairs. But because it is so a localized solution, you really need local people that make this distributive energy really embraced by the local community so they truly understand the benefits and that these are zero risk technologies. They're here in our market today, they're affordable and they can really provide tremendous value. Alleviate storm anxiety again, reduce that electricity bill so families aren't choosing to put food on their table or pay their electric bill. So that's why we want those kind of relationships.

[Saxon Metzger]

Thanks Ed, for having me on here. My name is Saxon. I'm the CEO of Polaris Ecosystems. What we're trying to solve is really a gap in infrastructure development for particularly tribal communities, but also rural communities broadly. There's a lot of underinvestment, particularly when it comes down to energy infrastructure. We have legacy assets that are aging that have not been maintained. And the problem is a lot of folks don't know how to connect with these communities. So I'm a member of the Osage Nation out in Oklahoma. Here in the United States, we've done a lot of work with for example, the Rappahannock in Virginia, the Shoshone Paiute now with the Idaho and Nevada border. And really what we're discovering everywhere is there's a lack of real attention and energy placed on new generation systems. Transmission infrastructure is, is cutting through tribal lands without maybe enough consultation, at least enough for the tribes to feel like they're engaged and involved. So what we do is everything from the development side to stakeholder engagement to the professional services for planning for tribal utility authorities, and really working to make sure that that investment can actually reach these communities and get that economic development moving in Indian country.

[Ed Crooks]

And in terms of what you need to accelerate the growth of the company, what you need to scale up, what are the most important things for you?

[Saxon Metzger]

Well, I think for me, one of the things for a lot of folks that they don't really realize is that tribal nations really want this investment. They're really seeking this out. They need employment, they need staffing, and they need infrastructure. But the problem is a lot of folks just don't know how to communicate from a traditional development space. So they'll come to communities, they'll make an attempt, usually in their best, you know, their best effort. But the problem is there's a lot of communication gaps. So what we really need is for folks in the traditional development space to reach out to us if they're trying to work with tribal communities, because we can help with that language transition, that language translation for folks, making sure that they can actually reach people, get those benefits into the community and really see that. One of the things that we like to focus on and a lot of the conversations we're having at, you know, this conference and at many other places on this, you know, podcast as well, is how can you add certainty to capital markets? How can you add a level of clarity about what's moving forward? And so people like to focus on, you know, a federal political climate right now in the United States. We like to shift that and say there's other aspects of certainty. Even if you can't de risk from an investment perspective, every, you know, regulatory body right now, and really, that's been challenging for quite some time, what you can do is understand your assets better. And so that's what we're hoping to be able to do, to take some of the risk out of, for example, working with tribal nations. We have met with a lot of folks. They invest millions of dollars beginning the development of these assets, and then all of a sudden, they run into this stakeholder engagement issue, because they start it too late. They do it in the wrong way. They're not necessarily intending to do it in the wrong way. It just ends up happening. So what we can end up doing is pulling that back and saying, look, let's get you that certainty upfront. So, you know, by the time you're actually putting shovels in the ground, there's not going to be those protests there's not going to be those challenges because everyone there is happy to do it. They have the jobs, they have the education, and there's that cultural engagement that really is important for folks.

[Ed Crooks]

So I'm joined now by Ebony Seymour, who's the CEO and founder of Element Group. So tell us a bit about Element. You founded the company. What problem were you trying to tackle?

[Ebony Seymour]

In short, the talent shortage. I think there are a lot of companies within the space that are looking for talent, and the kind of sentence that you hear all the time is we can't find great talent. And so one of the things that I wanted to do is really highlight talent across the industry, but also help bring individuals from adjacent industries into the space.

[Ray Long]

Right.

[Ed Crooks]

What do you think the fundamental reasons for that are? As you say, it's something you hear a lot. You can't find the people we need. You hear about wage inflation going through the roof. Everyone's complaining about how much they have to pay to get good people. What do you think the causes of the problem are?

[Ebony Seymour]

I think there's a couple of things. One, I think that there's a reluctance to enter the space because people that are outside of renewable energy may see it as still turbulent in a newer industry. I think two, people aren't looking. I think companies are a bit more reactive versus being proactive with talent. And I would say the third thing is that the companies that are doing it well, their talent wants to stay, and so they're not able to move across the industry and help with training up new talent as well.

[Ed Crooks]

So what does your business need now to scale up? What would really help accelerate your growth?

[Ebony Seymour]

Yeah, one thing that I definitely need is strong partnerships, and I have strong partnerships today, but I want to increase and scale that. And then operational excellence is something that I'm striving for today.

[Ed Crooks]

And what are the partnerships you need, you think? What do you want? What do you want to develop more of?

[Ebony Seymour]

Yeah, I want to work with investment companies and private equity firms more and help them with placing talent across their portfolio companies. And I think that will, number one, increase visibility for the business. Number two, give a steady stream of workflow across the industry. But also it would help me with growing my team.

[Ed Crooks]

And what kind of a response do you get from those private equity companies and other investors? Do you think they're focused on these issues? Is this question of talent and skill shortages something they're kind of ready to address?

[Ebony Seymour]

Yes and no. I think one of the things that is hard when thinking about increasing the talent within the industry is that you do have to invest into upskilling and you have to invest into training and workforce development. And I think that's an area when you think about investors and you think about private equity, they are, at the end of the day, they have to make a profit on their investments. And so often they want to bring individuals that have the experience that already needed into roles. And so people in the industry move from company to company that have the same experience. And so we need to really upskill, like growing talent within the industry.

[Ed Crooks]

Emily Seaward, thanks very much indeed.

[Ebony Seymour]

Thank you so much for joining us.

[Ed Crooks]

So that's all from us for the ACOR Policy Forum for this year. Thanks to Ebony, Seymour, Saxon Metzger, Kimberly Johnston, Anna Spitzberg and Arthur Haubenstock. Many thanks in particular to Ray Long for hosting us at this fantastic event. Thanks to our producers, Dan Cottrell, Harry Weston Cottrell and Toby Biggins Gilchrist. And above all, as ever, many thanks to all of you for listening and for watching. We really value your feedback, so please do keep that coming. You can leave us a comment here or contact us on social media. And we'll be back next week with a discussion on virtual power plants and energy storage with Tesla. Until then, goodbye.