Speed to power: how can America accelerate the build-out of the next grid? | special episode from the ACORE Grid Forum in Washington DC

Summary

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Podcast Summary: Energy Gang – "Speed to power: how can America accelerate the build-out of the next grid?"

Host: Ed Crooks (Wood Mackenzie)
Special Episode From: ACORE Grid Forum, Washington DC
Release date: November 4, 2025

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Overview

This special Energy Gang episode brings together policymakers, innovators, and industry leaders at the ACORE Grid Forum in Washington, DC to dissect the urgent need for accelerating the build-out of the American electrical grid. The show covers politics, finance, regulation, and technology—all centered on the critical theme: “speed to power.” As escalating electricity demand from data centers and manufacturing collides with aging infrastructure, permitting delays, and regulatory fragmentation, the conversation explores bipartisan solutions, financing models, advanced technology options, and the need for rapid, coordinated action.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Political Dynamics and Permitting Reform

Guest: Heather Reams (President, Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions)

• Permitting as the Bottleneck:
  “I don’t talk to anyone in Washington or outside of the Beltway who doesn’t say permitting, permitting, permitting.” – Heather Reams [00:04]
  Everyone agrees that permitting delays are the primary obstacle to rapid grid expansion and investment.
• 'All of the Above' Energy Strategy:
  Heather champions an inclusive approach to energy, valuing any technology that reduces emissions, from wind and solar to gas and nuclear—even as partisan debates persist over which technologies should be prioritized.
• Bipartisan Desire vs. Political Reality:
  Both Republicans and Democrats see the need for permitting reform, but ongoing political tensions make consensus difficult.
  “The political dynamics is the challenge. So soothing political dynamics and getting to a place where we can pass some common sense bipartisan permitting legislation is what’s on next.” — Heather Reams [03:26]
• Impact of Regulatory Uncertainty:
  The pendulum swing between different administrations on the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and other policies creates uncertainty that hurts investment and global competitiveness.
• Likelihood of Reform:
  Heather is cautiously optimistic, suggesting meaningful permitting reform may be possible ahead of the 2026 midterms if economic conditions provide incentive.
  “If the economy doesn’t continue to improve as the President would want, I can see him putting his hand on the scale and making sure that permitting is a priority before the midterm elections.” — Heather Reams [10:19]

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2. Grid Investment & Green Bank Innovation

Guest: Richard Kaufman (Chair, Coalition for Green Capital)

• The Financing Gap:
  The biggest obstacle to the energy transition is not technology but securing financing, especially for distributed energy solutions (rooftop/community solar, storage, etc.).
• Distributed Solutions:
  Distributed generation can be the fastest and most cost-effective way to meet rising electricity demand—often avoiding expensive distribution upgrades.
• Green Bank Model:
  The Coalition for Green Capital (CGC) acts like a “national green bank,” lending where capital is available but not accessible, and building out structures for distributed and community energy financing.
  Case study: New York Green Bank’s work on community solar financing provided a blueprint that commercial lenders eventually adopted.
  “The grid that we have is a grid architecture that was never designed for renewables or distributed solutions.” — Richard Kaufman [17:32]
• Affordability vs. Climate:
  The economics and affordability of electricity now dominate the agenda, but Kaufman warns against seeing decarbonization and cost as a false dichotomy:
  “At some point, the bill is going to come due if we don’t do things in terms of addressing climate change.” [21:05]

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3. Grid Planning, Regulation, and the Demand Shock

Guest: Rob Gramlich (Founder & President, Grid Strategies)

• A New Era of Growth:
  After decades of flat electric demand, the US is now confronting a massive demand spike—driven by AI data centers and manufacturing—that is “sharpening minds” for long-term grid planning.
• FERC, Fragmentation, and Order 1920:
  Proactive, regional planning is essential, but fragmented interests and insufficient federal authority slow progress.
  FERC’s new Order 1920 lays groundwork for comprehensive planning, but uncertainty remains around its implementation under new commissioners. “The challenge now is really just in the last two years, this load growth caught everybody by surprise, certainly the transmission planners.” [25:09]
• Affordability and Transmission Investment:
  Investing in transmission saves money long-term by alleviating congestion and supporting large-scale clean energy. Scrimping on proactive investment is pennywise, pound foolish.
  “It would be pennywise, pound foolish to stop spending money on transmission... you’re costing them more on the energy cost side.” — Rob Gramlich [31:10]
• Culture Shift for Speed:
  Rapid deployment now requires technical innovation—like advanced conductors—and a cultural shift away from decade-long planning cycles.

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4. Technology Innovation: Advanced Conductors & Google’s Role

Guest: Theodore Paradise (Chief Policy & Grid Strategy Officer, CTC Global)

• Advanced Conductors as a Fast Track:
  CTC Global’s carbon-composite “hyper performance” conductors double the power-carrying capacity of lines without new rights-of-way. Widely adopted internationally, but less so in the US.
• The Inertia Problem:
  US utilities tend to stick with familiar technology, favoring new construction or simple like-for-like upgrades despite faster, cheaper options.
• The Google Partnership:
  Google and CTC Global have partnered to fast-track deployment of advanced conductors, focusing on speedy requests-for-information and willingness to help with cost allocation. “We can’t buy a time machine, but we have capital to deploy these things to support reconductoring.” — Theodore Paradise [46:04]
• Proof of Speed:
  Projects responding to Google’s RFI are progressing from pitch to negotiation in months, not years—demonstrating the possibility of near-term transmission upgrades if stakeholders cooperate.

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5. Summing Up: The Market Exists, Bottlenecks Remain

Guest: Ray Long (President & CEO, ACORE)

• Unprecedented Demand Spike:
  Ray highlights that US electricity demand is set to rise by 120 GW in just four years—equivalent to 12 new New York Cities—far faster than ever before.
  “It’s more than we’ve ever built in that short period of time before.” — Ray Long [53:15]
• Financing and Development Ready:
  The market has buyers, investors, and developers eager to build—what’s missing is government enabling action.
• Permitting Nightmares:
  Permitting times can stretch to up to 17 years for transmission, 5+ for generation. They “should be permitted in about 24 months.”
  “Without addressing those two things, we’re not going to get to a solution by 2030.” — Ray Long [54:16]
• Risks of Inaction:
  Without rapid action on permitting and bottlenecks, the US faces higher power prices and real risks of outages due to untenable supply-demand gaps.
• Optimistic Vision:
  Ray longs for a “technology neutral permitting reform bill” passed within a year, enabling “all of the above” solutions and rapid grid expansion to serve the nation’s needs.
  “We’ve got the opportunity to do this and thrive. And the other technologies should not be taken off the table. This is an all of the above approach.” — Ray Long [59:41]

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Notable Quotes & Timestamps

• “It’s a grid which was never designed for renewables.”
  — Richard Kaufman [00:01]
• “I don’t talk to anyone…who doesn’t say permitting, permitting, permitting.”
  — Heather Reams [00:04]
• “This is a moment of pivotal change in the utility world like I’ve never seen before.”
  — Theodore Paradise [00:09], [41:39]
• “In just four years…we need to increase power…by 120 gigawatts. It’s more than we’ve ever built in that short period of time.”
  — Ray Long [00:13], [53:07]
• “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.”
  — Rob Gramlich [23:50]
• “At some point, the bill is going to come due if we don’t do things in terms of addressing climate change.”
  — Richard Kaufman [21:05]
• “Speed is now something where, how can we do that faster and more cost-effectively is entering the equation in a way that it hasn’t to date.”
  — Theodore Paradise [40:56]
• “Without addressing those two things, we’re not going to get to a solution by 2030… that’s some pretty heavy increase in prices and some pretty heavy outages.”
  — Ray Long [54:16]

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Structural Breakdown & Key Segments

• 00:00–10:54: Political and permitting obstacles (Heather Reams)
• 10:56–22:52: Financing and the green bank approach (Richard Kaufman)
• 22:53–33:39: Grid planning, FERC Order 1920, regulatory uncertainty (Rob Gramlich)
• 33:43–48:48: Advanced conductors, tech partnerships, and culture shift (Theodore Paradise)
• 49:04–60:27: Forum wrap-up, demand and investment landscape, bottlenecks, outlook (Ray Long)

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Tone & Takeaway

The episode’s mood blends urgency with optimism, candid about the bottlenecks but enthusiastic about the potential for bipartisan action, innovative finance, and rapid technological adoption. “Speed to power” is not just a slogan—it’s a new paradigm as grid expansion is recast as a race against time, with outsize implications for economic competitiveness, national security, and climate resilience.

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For grid wonks, policymakers, tech investors, or anyone keeping an eye on America’s energy transition, this episode is essential listening—a crash course on why speed, collaboration, and bold reforms are needed now.

Transcript

[Richard Kaufman]

It's a grid which was never designed for renewables.

[Heather Reams]

I don't talk to anyone in Washington or outside of the Beltway who doesn't say permitting, permitting, permitting.

[Theodore Paradise]

This is a moment of pivotal change in the utility world like I've never seen before.

[Ray Long]

In just four years, 2030, we need to increase power in the United States by 120 gigawatts. It's more than we've ever built in that short period of time.

[Ed Crooks]

Hello and welcome to the Energy Gang, a discussion show from Wood mackenzie about the fast changing world of energy. I'm Ed Crooks and today we're coming to you with a second special episode from the ACOR Grid Forum in Washington, D.C. the event brings together policymakers, innovators and industry leaders who are all focused on one key question. How can America accelerate the build out of its electricity grid? From politics to finance, from regulation to technology, the theme is the speed to power. And before we dive in, a quick reminder that this episode is also available on YouTube. Search Energy Gang to find us there. To talk first about the political conditions for grid development, I spoke to Heather Reams. She's the president of Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions, which is a group that works with Republican lawmakers and the public to advocate for clean energy. Heather, welcome to the show.

[Heather Reams]

Thank you, thank you. Great to be here.

[Ed Crooks]

So tell us a little bit about Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions. Chris, as I think you call it, what do you do?

[Heather Reams]

So we are a Washington, D.C. based right of center organization that engages Republicans and the public about common sense energy policy that also reduces emissions. We're all the above. So we like all kinds of energy, but we really like energy sources and technologies that help to reduce emissions.

[Ed Crooks]

So I guess in one sense this could really be your moment because of all the excitement over data centers, new large loads, rising electricity demand. That argument about all of the above energy being needed must seem very compelling. On the other hand, we're also in a position of political breakdown in Washington. Government's been shut down, Republicans and Democrats apparently very much at loggerheads at the moment. How do you see your ability to make progress on your agenda right now?

[Heather Reams]

I want to make sure everyone knows I know it's a political challenge right now. That seems to be the headlines. But there is a lot of good that's been happening. There's a recognition that we need every electron on the grid by many members of Congress who are representing districts that have all the above in their districts. Whether it's wind or solar, it's a little bit different. I recognize coming out of the White House and what they're talking about that might be part of the loggerhead moment. Republicans not agreeing about it in all the above versus some of the above that we're seeing in Washington. I think another piece is permitting reform. This was supposed to be a permitting reform package, was supposed to accompany the ira, the Inflation Reduction act. And this is what Senator Manchin's intention was in passing a 1, 2 IRA plus permitting. We didn't get the permitting part, so we weren't able to realize some of the benefits of the ira. And of course, that came to bite Democrats in the most recent elections. So permitting reform is outside. It's an outstanding must do. I don't talk to anyone in Washington or outside of the Beltway who doesn't say permitting, permitting, permitting. And it is on the agenda of both Republicans and Democrats in both the House and the Senate. The political dynamics is the challenge. So soothing political dynamics and getting to a place where we can pass some common sense bipartisan permitting legislation is what's on next.

[Ed Crooks]

So I want to come back to prospects for permitting reform in a moment. Before I do that, just want to pick up on something else you were talking about, which is this sense of every electron being needed and the idea, as you say, that we need all of the above energy strategy because of the particular pressures the country is facing. Now, as you say, not everyone in the administration clearly accepts that. You'll hear a lot of people, for instance, who will talk about the idea that wind and solar power are, are actively detrimental to the grid because they can't always be relied on, but they get dispatched where they are available. They undermine the economics of dispatchable generation, coal plants, gas fired plants. And so there is a sense in which, as I say, the grid is actually made weaker when it has more electrons from wind and solar power on it. What do you make of that argument? Is that an argument you find difficult to rebut? And when you're kind of discussing that with people, how do you try and argue against it?

[Heather Reams]

Well, first of all that wind and solar are what are available right now. So if you're talking about every electron is needed on the grid, but we have to wait five years for supply chains to catch up for a gas turbine that really isn't meeting the moment. So I think there's one just the reality of where we are right now, one doesn't have to agree that what the Biden administration was doing and emphasizing solar and wind as being primary, but it is where we are right now, and that's why all the above is such an important piece. Use the tools in the toolbox when you have them. Wind and solar are here. Battery storage is improving. We can dispatch it right now. I think that's one piece. The second piece is that the Trump administration has challenged those that need significant energy, like data centers, to actually come and bring their own energy. So you're seeing a lot of co location as well. So fine, will, but what can we build? They're stuck with the same supply chains, so it interconnects. They can't get into the interconnect, so they're going to have to co locate in some way, build their own solar, build their own wind, bring in their own batteries to make sure they're building what they need. And who's against a company taking the incentives and momentum to say, yeah, we're going to build everything and make sure we have it so we can move forward as a country? No one.

[Ed Crooks]

So what about regulatory issues? It's something I hear a lot from people in the renewables industry that they're concerned about is new barriers to wind and solar development being put up in particular by the Department of the Interior, some other government departments as well. Talk about permitting reform and trying to clear. Clear away bureaucracy and all that. It feels as though the Trump administration is actually adding new bureaucracy in the path of renewables development. And I think a lot of people in the renewables industry would say the end of the tax credits is one thing. We sort of always knew that those tax credits for wind and solar were very, very generous and they were going to go away at some point, and maybe they've gone away a bit faster than we would have liked, but we can cope with that. The industry can adjust. But these new, as I say, bureaucratic barriers to development, that's a real problem for us, and that's something we're really concerned about. Do you hear that? And do you think there's a chance of maybe changing the administration's mind on some of this and encouraging them to think that these new barriers are not a good idea and actually should be cleared away?

[Heather Reams]

The barriers, the new. The barriers that we're seeing from primarily the Department of interior and some EOs are surprising. We didn't see this in Trump one. So this wasn't something I think, that the industry was expecting. I know I certainly wasn't expecting it. And I agree with you. I think we all knew that the tax credits had a moment when they were going to sunset. And I feel like the industry is ready to move on as well. And this does give them time to really make their case of why these additional barriers that the administration are setting up are really, really unneeded. And now we need to think about the balance of power and the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue, which is Capitol Hill, and making the case, members of Congress making the case of why in representing their district, both red and blue districts, and talking about the benefits that wind is bringing to them or solar is bringing to them, I can't help but think about the visit that the secretary of Energy, Chris Wright, going to the Ames lab in Iowa, and as he was coming from the airport, you know, he was passing all kinds of wind turbines. Also, Iowa enjoys very low electricity rates and exports at least 40% of their energy to other states around them who need that energy. How do you say that it's not working? How do you tell the governor of Iowa that the prices that her constituents enjoy are attracting businesses? Well, they are. So I think there's kind of seeing is believing and there's the orthodoxy and the ideology, then there's the reality. And I think we haven't run into that yet. And a full plate, and I think we will very soon.

[Ed Crooks]

And so, as you say, there's a real role for Congress here in trying to clear away some of those barriers to development. And, and that obviously feeds into that broader conversation about permitting reform and what can be done. So you seem to be saying, as you say, you're not denying there are very significant challenges, but in the longer term, you are optimistic that some real progress can be made and actually a very constructive bit of legislation could get passed that would help investment in all kinds of infrastructure and including low carbon energy infrastructure. Is that right?

[Heather Reams]

That's right. In fact, you said investing and investment, and that kind of gets me excited because we've had a lot of regulatory uncertainty and a lot of just uncertainty with the changes of the IRA and then OB3. So this pendulum of back and forth between parties, really Republican Party and the Democratic Party, there's one entity that's really getting hurt, and that's the American people and the ability to be globally competitive. So a permitting reform package, a bipartisan permitting reform package would send a signal to markets and to investors that we're getting serious about getting rid of the uncertainty and really building in this country. And I think they all know it. It's just a matter of getting there.

[Ed Crooks]

Yes, as you say, that does seem to be the thing that a lot of people across the energy industry would really like to see Just as a final thought, how likely is it if you were to put odds on it, let's say, meaningful reform passing in Congress by the end of next year, perhaps.

[Heather Reams]

I was afraid you were going to say this year.

[Ed Crooks]

No, no, I'm not even going to go there on that.

[Heather Reams]

I think, listen, I think there's so much will of wanting it. It's the politics that's always our uncertainty. If the economy doesn't continue to improve the way that the President would want, I can see him putting his hand on the scale and making sure that permitting is, is a priority before the midterm elections. So I see that right now that's what I'm aiming for before the midterms of 2026.

[Ed Crooks]

That's a very interesting point. And as you say, the condition of the economy next year could be a very important factor in a lot of political debates.

[Heather Reams]

Indeed.

[Ed Crooks]

Anyway, unfortunately, we have to leave it there, but it's been great talking to you. Heather Eames, thanks very much indeed.

[Heather Reams]

Oh, a pleasure. Thank you.

[Ed Crooks]

That was Heather Eames of Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions. Now, political support is important, but it doesn't guarantee that the grid will secure the investment that it needs. To explore how new types of financing can accelerate the transformation of the grid, I sat down with Richard Kaufman, who's the chair of the Coalition for Green Capital. Richard, welcome to the show.

[Richard Kaufman]

It's great to be with you.

[Ed Crooks]

Very good of you to join us. Thanks very much indeed. Just perhaps for the benefit of listeners who may not know, the Coalition for Green Capital, this is a job that you took on just at the start of the year. Could you talk a little bit about what you're doing there? What is the organization? What's it aiming to achieve?

[Richard Kaufman]

Well, the Coalition for Green Capital, we call it cgc, is a nonprofit financial institution funded by public dollars that's essentially trying to be the national green bank. And that means we lend into projects where the problem of financing is not the cost of financing, but the availability of financing. And it really builds on the experience that we had in New York in setting up the New York Green Bank. But the coalition's been around for 15 years and through its network of local green banks has deployed almost $25 billion in capital.

[Ed Crooks]

Right. And so this very much then goes to what I wanted to talk to you about, which is the issue of the availability of financing for low carbon energy technologies, something I know you've talked about a lot in the past. Big theme of yours is that what is holding the energy transition back often is nothing to do with technology, the technologies are available. The issue is securing the financing, perhaps. I mean, let's talk a bit about the problem first. I mean, why is that? What are the barriers that stops low carbon investments getting the financing that they ought to get?

[Richard Kaufman]

Why don't we talk about where we are here? We know that there's tremendous increased demand for electricity. In many cases, the fastest and cheapest way of bringing electricity onto the grid is through distributed solutions. When I say cheapest, it's not just the technology per se, it's also the avoided distribution costs, because two thirds of the capital spending that utilities have relates to distribution. So the bulk of the rate increases that we see really relate to upgrades in distribution costs. And distributed solutions can avoid many of those costs. So that's really where there are issues in financing, because many of those projects are financed using project financing techniques. And project finance is where the cash flows from the project, pay off the debt and the equity that build the project. And project finance is used because the developers that develop many of these projects don't have a balance sheet, so they can't finance it themselves. That's why they need to rely on project finance or the ability to have energy as a service, because that's how we procure energy regularly. So it helps the customer not have to deal with upfront costs. So the challenge with project financing is that there's really a limitation on the quantum of dollars available. There are a limited number of banks that provide project financing. Many of those banks are European banks. And the structure itself really wasn't designed for small projects or projects that had different kinds of technology, different kinds of revenue streams. So that's really where, where we can fit in.

[Ed Crooks]

Right. And so you're talking about distributed energy resources as a crucial part of the solution to meeting growing demand. Is that an area where project financing is often hard to organize? You think about rooftop solar or something like that, where you have a lot of very small distributed assets that have to be bundled up in some way. Even if you're doing that at a commercial scale, those distributed resources are often quite small. Is that a crucial area for something like the CGC to work in?

[Richard Kaufman]

Yes. I mean, I can give an example. When you talk about solar, Community solar is a really good example where a green bank helped to develop the financing structure, because the banks, as you say, traditional banks, have gotten comfortable with rooftop solar. But of course, not every customer can take advantage of rooftop solar. In fact, most customers can't. So community solar has tremendous interest in many parts of the country. The problem with that is that, and for those that don't know Community Solar, it's essentially a ground mounted installation that's located some miles from where people live, but you have participation in that project and it's cheaper because it's ground mounted. So banks had gotten comfortable lending to rooftop solar, but they were not comfortable or quite uncertain about this ground mounted community solar project because, well, how do we know that customers are going to pay or what happens when they move? A whole series of questions. And so the New York Green bank established the financing structure, which is a lot of work when you talk about project financing. It's a very complex, very document heavy. You have to think about all the risks and that's not something that the private sector was going to spend the time doing. So we spent the time developing the financing structure and then built a portfolio of loans to demonstrate that these loans were credit worthy. And now conventional lenders are prepared to lend to Community Solar. And it's an example of the kinds of things a green bank can do.

[Ed Crooks]

So what's the role that the CGC and other green banks can play in supporting the grid? As you were saying, we're at a time of growing strain on the grid because of demand growth, new large loads in particular placing great strain on the grid. We're also seeing the new issues created by the rise of variable renewables and keep hearing these warnings about threats to grid stability being greater than they have been in a very long time because of all these developing issues. How can the kinds of investments that you're supporting help with that?

[Richard Kaufman]

I think it really goes to the fundamental challenge we have with the grid that we have as opposed to the grid that we need to have. Because the grid that we have is a grid architecture that was never designed for renewables or distributed solutions. And large power plants pushing electrons in one direction over hundreds of miles to where the demand is. It's a grid which in terms of how it's been constructed and the regulatory framework around it has really very low average capacity utilization. So it's built for the hottest days of the year, but we pay for it all year long. Yeah, it's average capacity utilization is a little bit more than half. So there's actually in many places plenty of generation capacity. But the problem is that there are these grid constraints in terms of distribution when we try to satisfy things conventionally. So that's why what I said before, that the bulk of the increases in rates relate to the need to upgrade the distribution system. So the kind of grid that we need to build is a mix of large power plants and small distributed solutions. Where the distributed solutions are located near where the load is. So intuitively that makes sense that it should be cheaper. It's also a system which, rather than electrons flowing in one direction, needs to flow in more than one direction and where the intermittency of renewables can be balanced with the flexibility at customers. That's the kind of grid we need to build and that's the kind of grid that will make the United States competitive. Because if we do what a conventional way, if we pursue that approach, it's going to be really, really expensive and it's really going to be inequitable. So the answer to your question is the kinds of solutions that we can finance over time are going to be distributed solutions that not just help those customers, but provide services to the grid as a whole.

[Ed Crooks]

Right. So you mean if you can avoid a lot of additional spending on grid infrastructure by having the resources situated locally close to where the power is being used, that actually can be cheaper? Net, yes.

[Richard Kaufman]

And as I say, and then the next variation on that theme is it's not just solar, but other smarter things that surround solar. And so when we start thinking about solar plus storage or solar plus, as you say, demand response, then it changes the economics, I think quite considerably.

[Ed Crooks]

How much do questions of affordability now factor into your decision making about what gets financed? If you think about the debate around electricity today in the US data centers, new large loads are one huge issue. Affordability, the retail price of electricity to consumers is the other. Decarbonization, for various reasons, seems to have kind of slipped down the agenda. It's something that obviously the current administration is not concerned about. And it's something that just in general, in terms of the direction of the industry, something that is no longer the top priority for you, the Coalition for Green Capital, in terms of what you're thinking about, how do you balance those competing objectives?

[Richard Kaufman]

Well, we haven't talked about climate change at all in this conversation. We haven't talked about carbon reductions in this conversation. What we've really been talking about is the economics and affordability. And again, distributed solutions aren't going to be the answer to everything. But in terms of the electricity crisis that we have, which is both increasing the amount of electricity and doing it on a cost effective basis, distributed solutions can play a very important role. And that's where we fit in the whole question of, of trade offs of affordability versus climate change and I think is a little bit of a false dichotomy in many cases, because at some point the bill is going to come due if we don't do things in terms of addressing climate change. And that's going to be a very big financial bill. So that's the first one, but I don't even want to get into that. I think that many of the distributed solutions are going to be cleaner. Not always, but they are going to be cleaner and reduce emissions. I mean, a large power plant, conventional power plant, half the energy content goes up the chimney in the form of heat. Even if you use a distributed solution that uses fossil fuels closer to the demand, you can use that heat for other purposes, even talking about fossil fuels. So there are many solutions that are distributed that are also going to reduce emissions, not just solar or batteries.

[Ed Crooks]

Right. That is fascinating and it's certainly going to be very interesting to see how those lower cost solutions emerge over the years to come. For now though, we do have to leave it there, but it's been great talking to you. Richard Coffman, thanks very much indeed.

[Richard Kaufman]

Thank you.

[Ed Crooks]

Thanks a lot for joining us. Now, someone else who's been thinking about the issues around grid planning for a very long time is Rob Gramlich, who's the founder and president of Grid Strategies, which is a consultancy. Hi, Rob, welcome back to the show.

[Rob Gramlich]

Thanks, Ed. Great to be here.

[Ed Crooks]

Yeah, absolutely. Great to see you again. So we're here at the ACORN Grid forum talking about future of the grid. After this long period of stagnation, we're now expecting pretty significant growth in power demand and that is creating a whole new set of challenges. This is obviously something you have been talking about for many years and the need to think in a more strategic way about planning the grid. Do you think that the fact that we are now apparently facing some kind of a crisis is kind of sharpening minds is going to mean we're actually going to get action to put the right structures and frameworks in place that we will actually get the kind of grid planning we need.

[Rob Gramlich]

So, great question. You know, we, we will, because of this crisis, we will get significant action on the order of sort of what we needed before. But now the needs have just increased, so are we going to get what we need to meet the current challenges? It's kind of hard to see, but it's sort of like the old adage, the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now. So, you know, we can get going and actually we can talk about this. But the transmission opportunity and challenge is a bit of A timing one, right. Like it's not quick, but everything in Washington at least, is about speed to power. How do you get the service to the low growth and the data centers now very quickly? And transmission, there are ways to do some of it quickly, but it's not the quickest option out there.

[Ed Crooks]

And to unpack that a bit, then when you talk about getting reforms to meet the old challenges, what are those?

[Rob Gramlich]

Well, I mean, it is as you were suggesting, it is the proactive planning, the grid for the future framework, which is sort of encapsulated In Fork Order 1920, which we've been, you know, we spoke about it probably last time on your show. That's sort of regional planning. And then there's a lot of regional initiatives along those lines that integrate the interconnection for generators with the planning process. So and then multiple purposes now, including significant load growth. It is that proactive, getting ahead of it type of approach that is needed. The problem in the electric industry is there's so many fragmented interests and nobody really singly in charge, not even any federal agency. FERC is stepping out into that void as it can under the Federal Power Act. But its steps are sometimes tentative and one step forward and two steps back and we can talk about where they are. But it is that proactive framework again. The challenge now is really just in the last two years, this load growth caught everybody by surprise, certainly the transmission planners. And so now they're scrambling to catch up and get ahead of it in.

[Ed Crooks]

Terms of what could be done about that at the federal level. Then there's, broadly speaking, you're saying two tracks. There's reform in Congress, some kind of legislation getting passed. We've talked quite a lot about that already. And then there's also the regulatory track and what could be done through ferc. FERC is going through quite a lot of changes at the moment. Two new commissioners just been confirmed by the Senate, expected to take up their roles very soon. What is that going to mean, do you think, for the future direction of ferc? As you say, these issues are things that FERC has been working on for many years. Orders have been passed. There's been a big push to try and improve transmission planning. Do you think the commission is going to try and continue in that same direction or we're going to see a change of direction and new initiatives to address this issue coming out of this new set of commissioners?

[Rob Gramlich]

Let me start with what they should do. What they should do is say we have dramatic load growth. If the administration's agenda The President's agenda is winning the AI race with China. And if, as is the case, almost every data center really wants full network access to the grid and only according to wood Mac, like 6% of them are actually looking at behind the meter options, then you need to expand the grid. And so let's expand it. And Order 1920 conveniently does include load growth as sort of an important factor. Here's look at the number, the amount of load growth and plan for the future for that. So in a way, I mean, I think Order 1920, even though passed during the Biden years, is technology neutral and includes low growth. And I would think a, you know, a reasonable commissioner coming in, even if they're Trump appointed and whatever they might think about renewable energy or, you know, wherever they fall on the resource wars, they should just look at that as a pure transmission order and follow through and you know, tell the courts, yep, we still want, you know, we're still defending this order and tell all the regions, yes, you still need to like really implement this in just as strong a way as we required. Will they do that? I don't know, honestly, it's keeping me up at night. There's high drama here for the, for the fur geeks among us. We're, we're waiting for every little, you know, hint or whisper from the new commissioners about what they might do on this.

[Ed Crooks]

Right. Yeah, that's really interesting because we just don't have a lot to go on. Right. I mean, the views of the two new commissioners are not super clear, as you say, the kind of direction they'll be getting from the administration in terms of the way they want to shape policy. All that slightly vague still, right?

[Rob Gramlich]

That's right. It's the tradition in Washington for nominees to agencies to say nothing in their confirmation process. Right. That's the way to get confirmed because you don't, you know, give anybody a reason to vote against you. You know, the uncertainty is especially great now just because the individuals David Lacert and Laura Sweatt have not spoken publicly about these topics, which is, you know, sometimes that happens, it's somewhat rare, but in this case it just happens to be the case that they have no public record to go on to sort of read the tea leaves on what they might do. Now, I really do believe that the Trump administration and the National Energy Dominance Council and the Department of Energy under Secretary Wright and the Grid Deployment office there, I really do believe they all see the value of transmission. Obviously it's for different reasons than, than, you know, climate or clean Energy or reasons the Democratic administrations would have emphasized. Again, you know, there are, you know, sort of people are policy and you know, they can, they can get there and it takes three votes to do things at ferc and you know, it's just hard to predict what's, what they're going to do.

[Ed Crooks]

And as you say, that whole issue of AI data centers, load growth, the sense of being in intense competition against China is one very big issue in Washington, particularly for the administration. The other big issue that's clearly emerging is the question of affordability. Electricity prices, electricity bills now rising significantly ahead of inflation. It's an issue that's very much rising up the political agenda. How do you think that might affect the whole debate over grid planning?

[Rob Gramlich]

Yeah, well, again, it could go either way. I think there are a lot of people at the agencies and in the administration and at FERC who recognize that you have to invest a little money in order to save money. And grid congestion is very expensive. What it means is you're having to dispatch higher cost units to serve load. And we've seen periods of the, you know, recent decades in the electric industry where congestion costs can get very high and you have to invest in capacity on the grid to alleviate that. So you know, it would be pennywise pound foolish to stop spending money on transmission, you know, under the false theory that oh, you're saving consumers money because actually you're costing them more on the energy cost side. Now there are better and worse ways to do that. And that gets back to the whole proactive planning idea of there are massive economies of scale and transmission. In other words, the dollars per delivered megawatt is much less if you do the high voltage kind. And we do have some regions that are looking at 765kV regional plants for the first time in decades that we've really planned that big. So there's some science of encouraging developments there. But you know, with cost pressure, what often happens is, you know, people say, regulators and stakeholders might say, well we just can't stomach, you know, the cost of the bigger lines. Let's just build the little, the smaller lines. And of course that's very short sighted and ultimately costs consumers money. So you know, it's hard to, hard to predict as we sit here, how's that going to shake out?

[Ed Crooks]

Yeah, as you say, it's certainly a very exciting and fast moving area. Feels surprising in a way to say that about the grid, which has often been very slow moving. Projects take a long time to get built. Infrastructure's there for a very Long time, many decades. Policy even changes generally slowly. But we're not in that world anymore, are we? Policy is changing fast.

[Rob Gramlich]

That's right. Policy is changing fast. The needs on the ground are happening fast. And I should say, while we're talking about timing, you know, there are advanced transmission technology opportunities here. And interestingly, in my direct and indirect conversations with the current administration, they are very interested in these technologies because they really do want speed to power. They really do want anything that creates capacity in the near term. And they're looking for ways to do that which is really supported on a bipartisan basis. So the question is really, okay, what actually is that? So policy geeks like me are having a field day trying to figure out, okay, well, what can actually be done on that score.

[Ed Crooks]

Yeah, I was about to mention exactly that because as you say, there's a lot of very exciting technologies out there, a lot that can be done. Making sure that it actually does get done, those technologies get implemented and the benefits from them are delivered. That's somewhat more tricky. That's right.

[Richard Kaufman]

Excellent.

[Ed Crooks]

Well, thank you very much indeed. Rob Granick, great talking to you.

[Rob Gramlich]

Okay, good to be with you. Thanks.

[Ed Crooks]

Good to see you again. So, as Rob was just saying, there technological innovation is going to be critical for meeting the challenges that the grid faces. Theodore paradise, who's Chief Policy and Grid Strategy Officer at CTC Global, joined me to talk about advanced conductors and the role that they can play in accelerating changes in the grid. So we were just talking about the potential for advanced technologies to help address some of the growing challenges that the grid faces today. It's a great pleasure to be joined by someone who's working for a company doing exactly that. Theodore paradise is the Chief Policy and Grid Strategy Officer at CTC Global. Hello, Theodore. Welcome to the show.

[Theodore Paradise]

Ed, thank you. It's fantastic to be here. Thanks for having me on.

[Ed Crooks]

Thank you very much for joining us. So, want to get into some of these issues around challenges facing the grid and how technology can help solve them. Before we do that, perhaps could you introduce us to CTC Global a little bit for the benefit of listeners who might not know the company? What is it that you do?

[Theodore Paradise]

Absolutely, no. I'm happy to. So CTC Global is a US based company with operations in over 65 countries worldwide. And we are the largest manufacturer of what we call advanced conductors. Sometimes they're called hyper performance conductors, but these terms are synonymous. Essentially, what it is that we invented over two decades ago and do is for your listeners and people who can see this will be Able to see what I'm holding here.

[Ed Crooks]

Yeah. So this is the point where you should be watching this show on YouTube and when you'll be able to see this, I will try to do my audio is harder. Yeah. Tell us what we're looking at here.

[Theodore Paradise]

But what I'm holding here. Here is the transmission or distribution, the high voltage or lower voltage power lines that move power around. You see these along the road, usually in some sort of towers. This is essentially what the design is as of 1905 or so. It's a very simple design. It's steel in the middle as the structural support surrounded by aluminum which moves the energy across it. And this is, this is the vast majority of what's deployed in the world today.

[Ed Crooks]

And so just before we move off that and that any kind of high voltage transmission would use that kind of steel and aluminum.

[Theodore Paradise]

Steel and aluminum, very common sort of way to do it. So a couple decades ago, CTC had the notion of why don't we take out the steel which reacts with heat. So as you move more power, it gets hot and it starts to sag, which is why you can make horseshoes and all sorts of things in a black Smith shops. It's pliable with heat. Could we move significantly more power essentially just by changing the wire? And that thesis proved out. So when you change the core from steel to carbon composite, you are able to put more aluminum on it at the same weight and the same diameter and you double, you double the amount of energy that you can move. So it's like building a whole new transmission line just by changing the wire. And you know, there's transformers and breakers as you add more power. But the real speed to power issue is to add a new transmission line. In the U.S. you know, it's seven years, 10 years plus. This is true in Europe, where we're talking about tenant system or ILIA system, any of the TSOs, or globally. It's often very difficult to get new rights of way, the permitting that goes with it. And of course it's much less expensive to be changing the wire rather than building whole whole new right of way. So in doing that, what we unlocked was the ability to quickly add really significant amounts of transmission capacity to the grid, where that has traditionally been a very slow process.

[Ed Crooks]

Right. So that seems like a very compelling proposition, I have to say. So question, why isn't everybody doing it? You know, why hasn't the whole world switched over to this kind of conductor?

[Theodore Paradise]

Sure. Well, I mean, you know, a couple elements to that. And the answer to that is in some parts of the world they have, I mean there is a lot of this happening. You know, take the US and sort of outside the US so we've got 125,000 miles of what we call ACCC is the name for the conductor deployed around the globe.

[Ed Crooks]

And just to pick up on that.

[Theodore Paradise]

ACCC stands for what is the aluminum clad composite core. I think I'm, you know, I'm going to have to check that, but I'm always someone who has to check the notes on that. But ACCC, so we have about 125,000 miles deployed around the globe. That's about 200,000 kilometers, 92% of that is outside the U.S. so in places like India, for example, we grow, you know, double year over year. Bangladesh, we're doing many projects in Europe, in the Middle east, in Africa.

[Ed Crooks]

Which I have to say surprises me when you tell me that on the grounds that you would think a lot of these countries, these low and middle income countries would be looking for lower cost solutions, which your product is not. So what's the advantage for them?

[Theodore Paradise]

Well, and that's a really important point because when you think about it, that's exactly right. They're not looking for what is the most premium product we can put up. They're looking for the most cost effective product they can put up. So whether you're reconductoring and essentially building a new transmission line without building a new transmission line or building a greenfield new line just with much more capability, when you think about the cost of doing it with an advanced or high performance conductor versus a traditional conductor, it's actually less expensive for the amount of power that you can move. And that's why you see it used all over the globe in these various places. So to your question, well said. Why not everywhere? Right? So the good news is, as I mentioned, it's being used in lots of places and in the US it's in over 30 states with 55 utilities. But often for niche projects, we have a very long river crossing and you don't need as many towers. The carbon is very strong. You just can't get a new right of way. But I've been in the utility world for 26 or 27 years now and it is one of a culture that adopts something and sticks with it. I think there's some inertia to that and that often has very good reasons to go with it. You don't want to be changing things up all the time. But we have a planning process in the Us, for example. And this is true around the globe, in many places that is looking out 10 or 15 years, sometimes 20. And speed has never really been a component of that. Right. It's been, I've got an issue, I've projected it 10 years down the road, I've got some time to fix it. I will build a new line is often the answer. Right. Or if I'm replacing the line that's there because it's old, I'll just replace it with what was there. The thing that's changing, I think Ed, is the, the element that speed now matters, whether it's AI data centers, new manufacturing, or just the cost of electricity. Speed is now something where, how can we do that faster and more cost effectively is entering the equation in a way that it hasn't to date.

[Ed Crooks]

Exactly. And as you say, we're now in a different world. So what was, what do you say, 26, 27 years in this industry? So for the great majority of that time, you were operating in an environment of flat load. Basically, demand was not growing at all. Now that's changed. Demand is growing. It is, for all the reasons we've talked about quite a lot already on this show, really difficult to put completely new lines in. Again, it would sort of seem like a no brainer to think, okay, in that case, given how hard it is to build a new line, let's just change the type of line that we use.

[Theodore Paradise]

Yes.

[Ed Crooks]

So why is that not happening always and everywhere right now with extreme urgency?

[Theodore Paradise]

Well, it's a great question and I think the extreme urgency part and the change in sort of load growth that you mentioned are two really important pieces here. I think what's exciting as your listeners and viewers join us right now at this moment is this is a moment of pivotal change in the utility world like I've never seen before.

[Rob Gramlich]

Right.

[Theodore Paradise]

There's a lot of, if you go back 20 years, during that time things would have been very, very similar from year to year to year, kind of flavors of issues being talked about in different ways. We're to a point where not only have we gone from very flat load growth or very small incremental load growth to massive load growth. Right. And it's not just AI data centers. I think sometimes those get painted as sort of the villain of, well, if we didn't have AI, everything would be fine. Manufacturing loads are huge. Right. And this is a great news story. Right. In terms of economic development, jobs. If we're talking about the U.S. for example, 20 years ago, people were not talking about New manufacturing in the U.S. now it's a constant discussion in the U.S. and those new manufacturers or growing manufacturers are facing the same issue as data centers. We can't get power, we can't get power in 10 years or we can't get power in eight years, we need it next year. Right. And that discussion is really the answer to your question. It is a changed environment where the answer simply is now unacceptable. To say, well, we can't add the data center. Right. We're not going to have as much compute as China. Right. Whether it's in Europe or the US or we're just going to forego that manufacturing opportunity, that's not acceptable. So it really forces the question out of this very sort of regimented looking ahead planning process to how do we enable the grid to be able to do that in a timeframe that's usable? That's the conversation that's happening right now. And if it's the US we see various states, some more aggressive than the others, pushing on it. I think we see the US Federal Administration really focused on what can we do in the next 12 months or 24 months and telegraphing that loudly to utilities and same sort of messaging around the globe, whether it's the Europe, Asia Pacific or Middle East.

[Ed Crooks]

Right. So one thing that's happened in terms of accelerating deployment of your technologies, you had this agreement with Google announced over the last time, a lot of excitement around that. Could you explain a bit about that? What does this cooperation involve?

[Theodore Paradise]

Yeah, so this is a great, I'm glad you asked about that because it's a really interesting story in just how all of this happens and the disruption and changes that we're seeing in the model to some of this and not without precedent, but on the transmission side, this is new. So if you think about power systems, there's planning, there's look aheads, what do we need to add? They sort of took care of themselves for the longest time. You go back 15 years or so to some of the first big Internet companies, meta, Google, Amazon, and you saw the rise of the corporate power purchase agreement where they said we want to use all this power, we want to be good corporate citizens, so we're going to use our own money and directly contract for certain types of generation and we're going to pay for it. And everyone we've got this, you don't need to worry about it. So that was disruptive for the time because that was new. If you fast forward to what we just announced in June, which you mentioned, our partnership with Google, it's something similar but for transmission. So instead of just looking at it and saying, well it is what it is and it's the timelines that exist and we really don't have any inputs into that, we worked with Google to say capital isn't necessarily the issue, it's time. And if we could connect Google with the technology and then with policymakers and utilities to say don't worry about the cost allocation and those sorts of dollar issues that have typically been so intractable and everybody fights about, well I'm benefiting and you're not or you're not benefiting, whatever it is. Right.

[Ed Crooks]

And so I'll let you get to the end of your thought. But I have to say don't worry about the cost allocation. Sounds like one of those things you can say to people. Easier said than done, right? People will not often, oh yeah, fine, let's not worry about cost allocation.

[Theodore Paradise]

That's exactly right. Because that's, that has never really been part of a utility planning discussion. It's usually a very heated argument about who is paying for it. Right. So when you have the hyperscalers like Google say, you know what, we can't buy a time machine, but we have capital to deploy these things to support reconductoring. Let's work together to highlight this and put funds behind it to accelerate it. That's really where the, the partnership was born. So in June we announced a request for information and we put it out there to utilities, independent transmission developers states to say, look, do you have areas or projects where you think if we did reconductoring with advanced conductors, high performance conductors, we could materially impact transmission capacity in a way that would benefit sort of on the ground level, Google and Google data centers. But also tell us if you think it just has a significant impact of benefit to the grid too, because we'd like to hear about that at the right scale. We did this in part to show that if the focus is on the transmission and creative solutions are brought to bear, we can accelerate things. It doesn't have to be 10 years. We did the RFI in the middle of June. Less than a month later the responses were due. We got about 1035 responses from investor owned utilities, co ops, munis states, independent developers and Google looked at those, see which ones are the most interesting to them and those quickly moved forward into commercial negotiations essentially. So we'd like to have those projects under contract by the end of the year. Shovels in the ground next year would be sort of the target next year. If you think about the tone of the administration in the U.S. what can we do quickly? This is light speed. When you're talking about the grid or.

[Ed Crooks]

Transmission, you're talking about 15 years to build a new line or whatever it is.

[Theodore Paradise]

Absolutely right. But it sort of I think proves out the notion that look, there are corridors, we can change the conductor, we don't trigger new permitting, we don't trigger new siting. This is something where supply chain is not a bottleneck. I think validating those points, I think Google is doing this to some degree obviously for Google, but also to act as a catalyst so that this is just more, much more widely adopted. To your question earlier.

[Ed Crooks]

Right. And so the first of these specific projects then that are the fruit of this partnership we should be seeing by the end of the year. There'll be announcements coming soon.

[Theodore Paradise]

Announcements coming soon, you know, under commercial negotiations in various states across the U.S.

[Ed Crooks]

Well, it's a really interesting, exciting technology, a very exciting time for it. Certainly going to be looking forward to hearing more about it. Certainly in particular going to be looking forward to hearing more about these projects with Google as you announce them before the end of the year. For now though, we're going to leave it. But it's been great talking to you.

[Theodore Paradise]

Great talking with you.

[Ed Crooks]

Theodore paradise, thanks very much indeed. Thanks for joining us on the Energy Gang. And finally to wrap up, we're joined by the host of this event, Ray Long, who is the president and CEO of acor, the American Council on Renewable Energy. I started off by asking him what he thought were the most interesting ideas that he'd heard today.

[Ray Long]

So first thing is we had four times a year we have a board meeting which is combined with an event, which is combined with the dinner which is usually combined with a few other things. And this is one of those four times a year. So we had our, we had our third quarter board meeting yesterday. We had our annual gala last night that was, had about 400 people there at dinner and we had a speaking program and all that. And now today everybody's up early, bright eyed and bushy tailed and, and we're having our Grid Forum. And so the Grid Forum is something that ACCOR has done for years as you may recall. I've been here for two years now. So this is my second one. And it's unique in the industry because it pulls together people who want to talk about the transmission grid. So you think about the wires that deliver electricity to people's homes and businesses and factories and all that kind of thing. So what am I hearing and what am I seeing? Hearing a lot of interest in. In the things that are being done to build those. Build the grid out. Why is the grid exciting? I get home at night, I talk to my wife about these things, and, you know, the eyes roll in the back of her head. Because when you think about it, most people know that electricity comes from someplace. Right. And they want to talk about electricity comes from renewables, or it comes from fossil fuels, or it comes from nuclear and all those different things. And a lot of people now like to talk about demand. Oh, demand is rising because everybody's got a heat pump in their house, or AI is growing, or there's a data center down the street. There's all those different things. People forget that there's something that connects the supply, the electricity to their homes, the demand, and that's the wires.

[Ed Crooks]

So, as you say, a lot of focus, a lot of interest now in the grid. It feels like there's a lot of change now happening in a way perhaps that there hasn't been for couple of decades, maybe more. We talked quite a lot about this already, but the fact that demand in the United States for electricity has been very flat since sort of mid-2000s, up until a couple of years ago, has only just started to grow, is now expected to grow much faster. What's different now, Ed?

[Ray Long]

I was at Climate Week a few weeks ago, I think.

[Ed Crooks]

Yeah.

[Ray Long]

And the thing that I. And I spoke at three different events that week, and we're all over the place, walking around New York. I'm sure you were fighting the congestion.

[Ed Crooks]

At the same time, getting a lot of steps in. Yeah.

[Ray Long]

The thing that I noticed from years past is that the language, the rhetoric around things had changed. So. And to me, it looked like this in years past, there was a lot of discussions about lofty aspirations, about achieving things like 2050 decarbonization goals, about things like that. What I heard this year was less of that discussion about climate and 2050 or 2040 goals and more about the business or the nitty gritty of what's happening now. And you just started touching on some of those things. And the leading point that people wanted to talk about, about the time that we're in now, started with demand increasing. So you've got electricity demand in the United States increasing at an incredible rate now in the last 20 years, we haven't had that. It's best depending on the power market area, you've seen 1 to 2% growth year over year for that period. Very manageable, very doable when it comes to siting new power plants, new transmission lines and all that. Now we're looking at things that are massive. So let's look at the next four years. In the next four years, grid Strategies, Rob Gramlich's group, we spoke to him earlier on.

[Ed Crooks]

We had him on the show just now.

[Ray Long]

Good. So hopefully I used the right numbers that Rob used.

[Ed Crooks]

Right.

[Ray Long]

So Rob estimates that BY in just four years, 20, 30, we need to increase power, electricity output in the United States by 120 gigawatts. Gigawatts are a funny term to use. A lot of people don't know what it is. So let's boil it down. 120 gigawatts is the equivalent of adding 12 New York cities worth of new power on the grid in just four years. If you don't like New York City, it's the equivalent of 133 Oklahoma cities to the grid. Either way you look at it, it's a lot of power. It's more than we've ever built in that short period of time before. So there's demand, and with that demand, of course, there's a set of buyers out there that want to buy that power. So with the demand and with the buyers, there are also a set of banks, the financial institutions that want to invest in it. We looked at this worldwide because this phenomenon is happening worldwide as well, and it's playing out in other countries. We can come back to that. $2.2 trillion over the next 12 months are expected to be spent in electricity generation technologies and grid upgrades worldwide. And a large portion of that is going to take place in the United States or could be taking place in the United States. So you've got demand, you've got investment interest in investing in that supply, and you've got a set of developers all over the United States that want to build those new technologies to provide that supply. And so what that tells me, and a lot of economic types, we've got a market, We've got a market that works. You've matched all the pieces up. We can get this built. So what are the issues that we're running into to that being that stuff actually happening? So a few things. One is we've got bottlenecks. We've got bottlenecks that are predominantly coming from government at the state and of course the federal level. There's been a lot of discussion about, about those things. So we need to clear out those bottlenecks to make sure that those things that are in the pipeline now that are going through different agencies for approval that they continue to move through at a rapid pace in order to meet that. The second thing we have is we have permitting process challenges that have existed for a long time, but now we're really coming to a four because right now it takes up to 17 years to permit a transmission project, five plus years to permit a generation project. And just to put that in context, you know, these things should be permitted in about 24 months, give or take in the. And so we need to fix that and we need to fix it at the federal level and we need to fix it at the state level. Because without addressing the those two things, we're not going to get to a solution by 2030. Now what happens if we don't reach that? Well, grid operators and utilities around the country have already been talking about that and they're all signaling that look, if we're not able to do this, prices are going to continue to go up, supply and demand and then secondly, we're likely to have outages. We've looked at the numbers on this and we talked about the 120 gigawatt challenge by 2030. The only things that can actually get built in the next four years are wind, solar storage and about 8% natural gas. And that's all due to availability of equipment here in the States. Right, we've done that. We've done the numbers. If we take all those technologies, well, if we take wind, solar and batteries off the chart will wind up with 109 gigawatt deficit by 2030. That's some pretty heavy increase in prices and that's some pretty heavy outages that will result in, in that time. Those are the things that people are trying to unpack here in a way that's very thoughtful so that we can align government's objectives, getting those things done with what we're seeing in the marketplace.

[Ed Crooks]

So you talk about four years ahead, who knows where we'll be there. And as you say, there are some kind of clear different options for the way things might go. What's your expectation for one year ahead.

[Ray Long]

In one year, Ed? Short period of time. But let's talk about what's doable in one, in one year when we're sitting here today at the Grid Forum, 2026 and hopefully be back and we'll be doing this again. Hopefully we're sitting here and what Senator Capito told us and Chairman Westerman told us we'll have played out, we will have had, we'll call it a technology neutral permitting reform bill that's substantial. That's passed the House and the Senate, it's been signed by the President and that's being enacted. And that bill is enabling and a true, all of the above solution for permitting. So what do I mean by that? We're doing essentially what China did and we're leaving all technologies on the table in a level playing field. Secondly, that their bottlenecks have been cleared in Washington for all these projects. So we've got whether it's the Department of Interior, EPA or Department of Commerce or DOE or other agencies. Right. That they are acting with a sense of urgency, that projects need to move forward quickly in order to meet that demand challenge. At the end of the day, that's something. Those two things are very doable within a year. And given that, you know, there really could be or should be alignment on those two goals that we talked about politically and from a business context, you know, this is something that if we can get together on, get our heads around and move forward, there is a, there is a real opportunity to do that. And I'll just say this, you know, I, you and I have talked about this before. I spent 25 plus years working in energy. I've worked on pretty much every energy technology out there. I've done coal, oil, natural gas, nuclear. I've worked on carbon capture sequestration and of course I've worked on the renewable technologies as well. The value proposition for doing what we've suggested for the United States is enormous. We're a very resource rich country, including the fossil fuels that we've talked about as well as the amount of wind that we've got in certain areas and of course sunlight which hits everything, we've got the opportunity to do this and thrive. And the other technologies should not be taken off the table. This is an all of the above approach. And as long as they're adding to a system that's diverse and delivering on what consumers at the end of the day want and need lower prices and reliability, then we should be building it.

[Ed Crooks]

Well, look, I very much hope we will get a chance to talk in a year from now about the industry and how things have evolved and hope to see that some of the changes you've been talking about have actually come to pass. So as I say, going to be great to be back again in a year's time. If we can do that. For now though, we're going to leave it there. Ray Long, thanks very much indeed.

[Ray Long]

Thank you, Ed.

[Ed Crooks]

Thank you for having us at your event and it's been great talking to you.

[Ray Long]

Have a great day and you're absolutely invited to come back again.

[Ed Crooks]

Well, thank you. Thank you. So we're going to leave it there. We have heard from a wide range of perspectives here, but it's clear there is one consistent message when it comes to investment in energy infrastructure and in the grid in particular, it's that speed matters. The question now is whether the US Will be able to make the changes that will be needed to deliver the pace of investment in the grid that's necessary to meet the goals of policymakers and the industry. Many thanks again to Heather Reams, Richard Kaufman, Rob Gramlich and Theodore Paradise. Many thanks to Ray Long for hosting us at this fantastic event. And above all, as ever, many thanks to all of you for listening or watching. Remember that if you haven't been watching, you can find us on YouTube. Just search energy Gang to find us there. And we'll be back very soon with all the latest news and views on the energy transition. Until then, goodbye.