Odd Lots Podcast Summary
Episode: Daniel Yergin on What Happened to the Energy Transition
Date: October 24, 2025
Hosts: Joe Weisenthal and Tracy Alloway
Guest: Daniel Yergin (Pulitzer Prize-winning author of "The Prize", Vice Chairman of S&P Global, author of "The New Map")
Overview
This episode tackles the current state and future of the global energy transition, challenging assumptions that a swift move to renewables is imminent or even feasible. Daniel Yergin, a preeminent energy historian and analyst, offers historical context, practical insights, and a sober assessment of why the much-heralded energy transition has, in his words, been more an "energy addition" than a true transition. The conversation covers energy security, policy realities, geopolitics, capital allocation, and the rising significance of old and new energy sectors amid technological and economic shifts.
Key Discussion Points & Insights
1. Persistent Energy Constraints Despite Technological Progress
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Hosts’ Framing: Despite living in a high-tech world (AI, data centers, robotics), providing abundant and affordable energy remains elusive.
- “We seem to be living in this extremely high tech world…yet we still seem to be struggling somewhat to provide cheap and affordable and abundant energy to power all these things.” – Tracy Alloway (02:06)
- Data centers and new tech demand are making energy even more strategically crucial.
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Yergin’s Take: Energy’s not a “solved” problem—never has been. Even with breakthroughs in renewables, global reliance on coal, oil, and natural gas endure.
- “Energy demand is going up. Wind and solar, but also coal, oil and natural gas. And the share of hydrocarbons…has gone from about 81% to about 80.5%.” – Daniel Yergin (05:04)
2. From “Transition” to “Addition”: Why the Shift?
- The “energy transition” narrative is failing. Instead of replacing fossil fuels, renewables are being added alongside persistent hydrocarbon use.
- “Energy transition has been energy addition.” – Daniel Yergin (06:07)
- The scale and speed of phasing out fossil fuels are vastly underestimated; transforming a $115 trillion world economy’s energy base is a monumental, slow process.
3. Tech Meets Energy: Cultural & Practical Clashes
- Tech culture demands rapid change; energy infrastructure moves slowly (multi-year build timelines).
- Rising power demand from tech (data centers, AI) draws new investment and renewed focus on reliable baseload sources, especially natural gas.
- “What we have now is the tech world meeting the energy world…one of the reasons that we've seen…the easy…notion [of] energy transition pushed out is…it's going to take a lot more electricity…” – Daniel Yergin (06:51)
4. Supply Chain & Capital Market Realities
- Difference in funding: Oil and gas largely self-financed by industry; clean energy growth fueled substantially by tax credits, subsidies, public money.
- The cost improvements in solar/wind haven’t eliminated their dependence on government support.
- “Everybody's rushing right now to get steel into the ground so they can get the tax credits, which will expire…” – Daniel Yergin (10:38)
- Grid challenges now front and center: Connecting renewables is expensive and slow, transmission is a critical bottleneck.
- Electricity prices in the US are rising faster than inflation; reliability concerns intensify.
5. Geopolitical Shifts: The Shale Revolution and LNG
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U.S. LNG Exports: Now the world’s largest LNG exporter; critical in blunting Russia’s energy leverage over Europe during the Ukraine conflict.
- “Were it not for US LNG, Putin might well have succeeded using the energy weapon, cutting off gas to Europe and shattered the coalition supporting Ukraine.” – Daniel Yergin (16:23)
- Yergin recounts being yelled at by Putin in 2013 over the potential of U.S. shale gas (17:41).
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China’s Stockpiling: China importing and stockpiling huge amounts of oil and minerals for unclear strategic reasons—possibly prepping for supply disruptions, possibly exploiting low prices.
- “They stockpile minerals too. It's what they do. Is it because they think there may be a conflict…? We don't know.” – Daniel Yergin (22:10)
6. “Peak Oil?” Shale, Efficiency, and the Ongoing Debate
- Past oil panics almost always followed by new discoveries or technology; today, there’s talk of U.S. shale “plateauing,” but not declining yet.
- “Maybe shale has peaked out. Peaked out at a very high number, but peaked out.” – Daniel Yergin (19:26)
- Historical anecdotes: Post-WWI and WWII, 1970s, even 19th century all featured fear of “running out,” always disproven by innovation (21:00).
7. The Rise of Critical Minerals & Policy Shifts
- Rare earths and battery minerals now matter geopolitically, and China’s dominance in processing is causing alarm in the West.
- “They process 90% of the rare earths and they know it. And…when you hear an automobile maker saying we have a week and a half of supply, you realize how urgent it is.” – Daniel Yergin (24:37)
8. Policy, Prices, and Political Volatility
- U.S. policy has swung from climate-first, renewable-focused (Biden) to a new embrace of fossil energy; current prices and political goals are sometimes at odds.
- “It was all about…renewables, climate change…That was then, this is now when it's just pretty much in the opposite direction.” – Daniel Yergin (26:11)
- Maintaining both low prices and a vibrant domestic oil industry is tricky; recent low prices hurt U.S. shale enthusiasm and labor market sentiment.
9. European Industry in Crisis
- Germany and broader Europe face de-industrialization pressures due to high energy costs, regulatory overload, and ambitious climate targets.
- “They impose these policies with no connection to the marketplace…If you say it, it's going to happen. So I think maybe in Germany we're starting to see some of that easing up. But…that regulatory straitjacket…tells people, go invest in the United States.” – Daniel Yergin (37:08)
10. ESG, Market Forces & Future of Energy Finance
- ESG (environmental, social, governance) investing has faded as costs and risks have reminded investors and corporations of hard realities.
- “ESG clearly has faded away. I can't see it coming back with the full force that it did because it has a built in backlash which we're seeing now.” – Daniel Yergin (39:12)
11. Nuclear and Geothermal: New Hopes, Ongoing Challenges
- Nuclear, especially small modular reactors (SMRs), is making a comeback due to tech industry demand and climate goals—major tech companies are now investing.
- “You have the sort of entrepreneurial Silicon Valley spirit now imbued into Nuclear…” – Daniel Yergin (41:04)
- Geothermal: Some optimism it could leverage shale drilling technology, but still uncertain (36:23).
12. The Unsolvable Energy Challenge
- There is no real “end” to energy’s centrality or its challenges. Periods of consensus are fleeting; energy security and adaptation are perpetual needs.
- “Are we ever going to solve the energy problem?”
“No, I think it will just, I mean it will always be there as long as industrial society will be one form or another.”
– Tracy Alloway & Daniel Yergin (44:23)
- “Are we ever going to solve the energy problem?”
Notable Quotes / Memorable Moments
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On why the energy transition isn’t happening as envisioned:
“You just can't overnight take $115 trillion world economy and change it from one thing to another.” — Daniel Yergin (06:24) -
On energy’s cyclical ‘memory loss’:
“You get a consensus about energy and it lasts about three years and then something new comes along and just changes the view.” — Daniel Yergin (44:44) -
On subsidies and clean energy:
“These industries are going to have to stand on their own right now.” — Daniel Yergin (12:08) -
On shale’s world-changing impact:
"He [Putin] was actually prescient. He saw that shale gas in the form of then LNG would augment US influence in the world, which it certainly has…” — Daniel Yergin (18:05) -
On energy security’s lesson from Churchill:
“In energy…safety lies in variety and variety alone. That you don't want to be over dependent on anything, want variety whether in terms of your suppliers, in terms of your sources.” — Daniel Yergin (45:51)
Key Timestamps
- 02:06 — High-tech demand collides with persistent energy constraints
- 05:04 — Yergin: Hydrocarbons remain ~80% of energy supply; transition progress minimal
- 06:07 — “Energy transition has been energy addition” (Yergin)
- 10:38 — Renewables race for soon-to-sunset tax credits
- 11:55 — US electricity prices rising twice as fast as inflation
- 16:23 — US LNG exports change geopolitics; counter Russia
- 19:26 — Shale revolution, technological impact, and plateau talk
- 22:10 — China's stockpiling: strategic questions
- 24:37 — Rare earths and minerals: China’s dominance becomes a Western crisis
- 26:11 — US energy policy pendulum swings from renewables to dominance
- 29:55 — Oil/gas worker mood: mixed signals in the US
- 33:32 — Shale’s impact on global security—2019 Saudi attack fallout
- 34:48 — Industry cycles: surplus breeds neglect, which breeds next crisis
- 36:23 — Potential of geothermal, borrowing from shale tech
- 37:08 — European industry struggles under climate, regulatory, and energy costs
- 39:12 — ESG’s decline, necessity of market focus for clean energy
- 41:04 — Tech sector’s push into nuclear, SMRs, fusion investment
- 44:23 — “Will we ever solve the energy problem?” — Perpetual challenge
- 45:51 — Churchill’s lesson: “safety lies in variety and variety alone”
Tone & Language
- Yergin is measured, historically grounded, blending wryness with gravity.
- Tracy and Joe balance curiosity, skepticism, and dry humor (“Are we ever going to bring whale oil back?”).
- The episode is candid about disappointments, careful not to indulge hype, yet open to the possibilities of innovation and cycles of surprise.
Conclusion
Daniel Yergin lays out a bracing picture: energy “transition” has not replaced legacy fuels, but supplemented them. Clean technologies grow but are expensive, slow-moving, and hampered by challenging realities of grid integration, commodity security, and policy swings. The past era’s optimism about simple, cheap, rapid decarbonization has given way to renewed appreciation for energy’s foundational limits and geopolitical significance. The recurring lesson: energy systems are always in flux, rarely solved, and inherently cyclical—reminding us that security and practical diversity remain evergreen priorities.