Hot Rocks in Box: The Rise of Thermal Batteries - ep168: Anand Gopal

As the world transitions away from fossil fuels, one of the biggest challenges is decarbonizing industrial processes that require consistent, reliable sources of energy to produce high-temperatures. Typically these processes run on fossil gas, but now thermal batteries offer a solution by using electricity to store renewable energy in the form of heat. Anand Gopal, Executive Director of Policy Research at Californian think tank Energy Innovation, joins Baroness Bryony Worthington to discuss his team's research on using thermal batteries to provide heat for manufacturing. Or as he calls them, hot rocks in a box. By storing intermittent solar or wind energy as the heat of molten salts or crushed rocks, thermal batteries can deliver reliable heat on-demand. While the tech is almost at commercial availability, there's still one big obstacle: cost. In many countries it is still much cheaper to use gas over electricity, and that makes powering up thermal batteries uneconomical. So what needs to be done to employ them at scale? And will they take the wind out of hydrogen's sails? Find out on this week's episode of Cleaning Up. Read more: Energy InnovationIndustrial Thermal Batteries: Decarbonizing U.S. Industry While Supporting a High-Renewables GridEnergy Innovation's report on electric vehicle leasingEnergy Innovation's report on electric vs gas carsEnergy Innovation's report on industrial heat in ChinaEnergy Innovation's report on electrification of industrial heat

Depending on who you ask, methane is either a useful transition fuel to a low-carbon future, or a super polluter. The science of methane says that for natural gas to have a lower climate footprint than other fossil fuels, particularly coal, there can be leakage of no more than 3.2% from end to end. Yet studies across the US show wildly different leakage rates. One of the most influential, by Robert Howarth of Cornell University, puts it at 4.8%, making methane worse for the environment than coal. The EPA tells a different story, and says leakage rates are just 0.93%. All of this really matters for the climate, especially since Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The US has become the world's biggest producer and exporter of natural gas, and hundreds of billions of dollars have been invested globally on the premise that natural gas is a cleaner stop-gap between our fossil present and our low-carbon future. So who's right? And how can we find ways to reduce those methane emissions in either case. Grant Swartzwelder, founder of OTA Environmental Solutions and ESG Dynamics, based in Dallas, Texas, joins Cleaning Up to tease out the problem. More links/resources: OTA Environmental Solutions - https://otaenvironmentalsolutions.com ESG Dynamics - https://esg-dynamics.com Robert Howarth study into US methane leakage rates - https://www.research.howarthlab.org/documents/Howarth2022_EM_Magazine_methane.pdf International Energy Agency methane tracker 2024 - https://www.iea.org/reports/global-methane-tracker-2024 Cleaning Up Episode 157 - Leaking Methane Needs an Urgent Fix - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIK8Z7oZMps Cleaning Up Episode 146 - Jason Anderson: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWUzOZmJSlI

Has science cracked the code on mass producing realistic meat substitutes? Or are lab-gown alternative proteins an impossible dream? In this week's episode of Cleaning Up, Baroness Bryony Worthington sits down with president of the Good Food Institute, Bruce Friedrich, to explore the future of food. Friedrich details his vision for a more sustainable food system through technologies like plant-based and cultivated meat and outlines the promising progress and significant challenges remaining in scaling these novel proteins. Worthington and Friedrich debate the roles of policy, public opinion, and big agriculture in determining whether alternative proteins can truly transform our food system or remain forever niche.Links and more: The Good Food Institute (https://gfi.org) TEA of cultivated meat. Future projections for different scenarios (https://cedelft.eu/publications/tea-of-cultivated-meat/) A new land dividend: the opportunity of alternative proteins in Europe (https://green-alliance.org.uk/publication/a-new-land-dividend-the-opportunity-of-alternative-proteins-in-europe/) Recipe for a Livable Planet: Achieving Net Zero Emissions in the Agrifood System: (https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/entities/publication/406c71a3-c13f-49cd-8f3f-a071715858fb) UNEP Report on alternative proteins (https://www.unep.org/resources/whats-cooking-assessment-potential-impacts-selected-novel-alternatives-conventional) Episode 136 with Jim Mellon (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqFPic5iqds)

As everyone knows, battery prices are plummeting and manufacturing volumes are soaring, whether for EVs or for grid-connected storage. And everyone knows there's a problem: only 5% of lithium-ion batteries are recycled. The rest go to landfill, right? Wrong. This week's guest on Cleaning Up is the world's preeminent expert on battery recycling. Hans Eric Melin is the Founder and Managing Director of Circular Energy Storage. Circular Energy Storage is a London-based data collection and analytics consultancy focused on the lithium-ion battery end-of-life market. They help companies and organisations in the entire battery value chain to take better decisions in everything that relates to reuse and recycling of lithium-ion batteries. They do this by continuously collecting, analysing and publishing data from all parts of the value chain worldwide and by working actively with customers in their strategy and business development.  Please like, subscribe and leave a review. Follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook or Instagram, and sign up for the Cleaning Up newsletter at https://cleaninguppod.substack.com.  Links and more: Circular Energy Storage: https://circularenergystorage.com/about Hans' LinkedIn post on the false narratives around lithium-ion battery recycling rates: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/5-rate-other-untruths-battery-recycling-hans-eric-melin-m5lde Hans' more extensive research report explaining the real rates: https://www.energimyndigheten.se/globalassets/forskning--innovation/overgripande/state-of-the-art-in-reuse-and-recycling-of-lithium-ion-batteries-2019.pdf The 2023 Battery Materials Review Yearbook, featuring a chapter authored by Hans: https://www.batterymaterialsreview.com/products/ The 2016 paper Hans mentioned, featuring the 95% landfill rate: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11837-016-1994-y

Last week the leading lights of Europe's electricity industry gathered for the annual Eurelectric Power Summit at the Lagonissi Beach Resort just outside Athens. The conference - under the hashtag this year of #lights on - lasted two days and covered the key issues facing Europe's and the world's power sectors. Two topics in particular stood out: the need to accelerate the build out of transmission, and the pressures and opportunities offered by digitization and AI. At the event, Eurelectric published a brace of reports on these two topics. On the final day of the conference, Michael caught up with Leonhard Birnbaum, Chairman and CEO of German utility and distribution grid operator E.ON and President of Eurelectric, on a sunny and windy terrace just outside the conference centre to discuss all this and more.Leonhard began his professional career at McKinsey in Düsseldorf. After holding various positions, he was Senior Partner for the energy and industrial sector. In 2008, he joined RWE AG and was appointed to the Board of Management the same year. He served as Chief Strategy Officer and as RWE Group’s Chief Commercial Officer until 2013, when he was appointed as member of the Board of Management of E.ON SE and took on a variety of responsibilities within the Board. From 2018 until 2021 he was responsible for the innogy integration project, and from 2019 to 2020, he was also Chairman of the Board of Management of innogy SE. In 2021, he was appointed to his current role as CEO of E.ON SE, in which he is responsible for Communications & Political Affairs, Corporate Audit, Strategy, Group and Executive HR, HSE & Sustainability, Legal & Compliance and Nuclear Coordination. He is also Vice-President of the Executive Committee of BDEW, the German Association of Energy and Water Industries, a member of the Executive Committee of the Federation of German Industries (BDI) and President of Eurelectric, the European Electricity Association, and Vice Chair of the World Energy Council. Please like, subscribe and leave a review. Follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook or Instagram, and sign up for the Cleaning Up newsletter at https://cleaninguppod.substack.com.  Links and more:Eurelectric: https://www.eurelectric.org/E.ON: https://www.eon.com/en.htmlEurelectric Power Summit 2024 - LightsOn: https://powersummit2024.eurelectric.org/Eurelectric's new report - Grids for Speed: https://powersummit2024.eurelectric.org/grids-for-speed/Eurelectric's new report - Wired for Tomorrow: https://powersummit2024.eurelectric.org/wired-for-tomorrow/ElElectrify Almost Everything for Net-Zero - Ep34: Kristian Ruby: https://www.cleaningup.live/episode-34-kristian-ruby/

China's policies that direct capital towards cleaner industries have been game changing, and this week we're continuing the China theme, sharing two conversations Bryony had earlier this month at a conference at Xiamen University in Fujian Province. China's role in the clean energy transition could not be more important. The think tank Ember's latest report on the state of the global electricity transition states: over half of the world's new wind and solar power capacity last year was added in China, and together with hydro and nuclear, clean electricity in China now meets 35% of their electricity demand. And yet, the scale and the nature of the Chinese economy is so enormous it's hard to grasp, the majority of which is still powered by roughly 1000 gigawatts of coal-fired power stations, half of the global total. The focus of the conference was on a specific lever that could help China further along its decarbonisation path: the repowering of existing coal stations with clean sources of heat. Bryony's first guest, Staffan Qvist is a published academic, co-author of the book A Bright Future, and founder of a number of companies dedicated to the clean energy transition. He's been studying this concept of coal repowering since he first co-authored papers on the subject with Polish colleagues in 2019. Bryony's second guest is Assistant Professor Yaoli Zhang of Xiamen University, a thermal generation engineer by training who later "repowered" himself and switched to nuclear engineering. He currently oversees a team researching the repairing of coal in China from both a practical and economic perspective. Please like, subscribe and leave a review. Follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook or Instagram, and sign up for the Cleaning Up newsletter at https://cleaninguppod.substack.com.  Links and more: How China Became a Green Finance Superpower - Ep160: Dr. Ma Jun: https://www.cleaningup.live/how-china-became-a-green-finance-superpower-ep160-dr-ma-jun/ The 2019 book Staffan co-authored - A Bright Future: https://brightfuturebook.com The March 2024 US Department of Energy guide on converting coal-fired power plants to nuclear power: https://www.energy.gov/ne/articles/8-things-know-about-converting-coal-plants-nuclear-power ...and the associated press release: https://www.energy.gov/ne/articles/doe-study-finds-replacing-coal-plants-nuclear-plants-could-bring-hundreds-more-local The 2022 Paper Dr Zhang and Staffan co-authored on the potential of repowering China's CFPPs with nuclear: https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jeners/v15y2022i3p1072-d739738.html A recent IAEA article on repurposing CFPPs to nuclear: https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/repurposing-coal-power-plant-sites-with-low-carbon-nuclear

The 5th Hydrogen Energy Ministerial in Tokyo announced that by 2030, the world would produce and use 90 million tonnes of renewable and low-carbon hydrogen. Then, last year, the 6th Hydrogen Energy Ministerial not only reiterated the 90 million tonne target, but went further, promising that the overall market for hydrogen would grow to 150 million tonnes by 2030. All very exciting, and it helped to ensure that hydrogen was one of the hot topics at COP 28 in Dubai a few months later. But these targets are unachievable. The issue is simple: it's money. The biggest challenge facing low emission hydrogen is that it is expensive to produce, expensive to transport, expensive to store, expensive to distribute, and expensive to use. Whether you're switching existing users to clean hydrogen or pushing hydrogen into sectors where it's not currently used, it takes money - and lots of it. In this week's episode of Cleaning Up, we find how much and how much more governments would have to spend for hydrogen to live up to its hype. This audio blog is adapted from a piece Michael wrote at the end of last year for BloombergNEF, entitled "Clean Hydrogen's Missing Trillions", which estimated that hitting the Hydrogen Energy Ministerial target of 90 million tonnes of clean energy by 2030 would require subsidies of at least $2.3 trillion to be on the table right now, while the actual figure at the end of last year was 1/10th of that. Although the figures have changed a bit since then, the message remains the same: the subsidy gap remains in the multiple trillions of dollars. It should not therefore be surprising that the news is full of projects being cancelled and delayed. In fact, that will be one of the main hydrogen stories through to 2030 and beyond. Please like, subscribe and leave a review. Follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook or Instagram, and sign up for the Cleaning Up newsletter at https://cleaninguppod.substack.com. Find our archive of over 160 hours of conversations with extraordinary climate leaders at https://cleaningup.live. LinksMichael's December 2023 BloombergNEF piece - "Clean Hydrogen's Missing Trillions", on which this audio blog is based: https://about.bnef.com/blog/liebreich-clean-hydrogens-missing-trillions/Michael's September 2023 BloombergNEF Piece - "The Five Horsemen of the Transition": https://about.bnef.com/blog/liebreich-net-zero-will-be-harder-than-you-think-and-easier-part-i-harder/Michael's December 2022 BloombergNEF piece - "The Unbearable Lightness of Hydrogen": https://about.bnef.com/blog/liebreich-the-unbearable-lightness-of-hydrogen/The Chair's Summary of the 6th Hydrogen Energy Ministerial: https://hem-2023.nedo.go.jp/wp-content/themes/suiso2023--THEME/files/charis-summary-en.pdfThe US National Petroleum Council Report - "Harnessing Hydrogen": https://harnessinghydrogen.npc.orgThe PwC Report - "Navigating the Global Hydrogen Ecosystem": https://www.strategyand.pwc.com/de/en/industries/energy-utilities/navigating-the-hydrogen-ecosystem.htmlThe IEA's 2023 Net Zero Roadmap: https://iea.blob.core.windows.net/assets/13dab083-08c3-4dfd-a887-42a3ebe533bc/NetZeroRoadmap_AGlobalPathwaytoKeepthe1.5CGoalinReach-2023Update.pdfThe IEA's Global Hydrogen Review: https://iea.blob.core.windows.net/assets/8d434960-a85c-4c02-ad96-77794aaa175d/GlobalHydrogenReview2023.pdf Related EpisodesAudioblog 11 - The Five Horsemen of the Transition: https://www.cleaningup.live/audioblog-11-net-zero-will-be-harder-than-you-think-and-easier-part-i-harder-1/Audioblog 8- The Unbearable Lightness of Hydrogen: https://www.cleaningup.live/cleaning-up-audioblog-episode-8-the-unbearable-lightness-of-hydrogen/

Up this week is Simon Holmes à Court, the Australian investor and philanthropist with a passion for using data to change the world. In 2022, the federal elections in Australia delivered an upset, as around a third of the electorate turned their back on the established parties and voted in seven new independent MPs taking the total to 10. Simon was responsible for a crowdfunding initiative - Climate 200 - that supported 23 candidates in all, pledging to act on climate, political integrity and gender discrimination. He remains very involved in the challenge of pivoting Australia from a fossil fuel based economy to a clean energy superpower. Simon is an energy analyst, clean-tech investor, climate philanthropist, and director of the Smart Energy Council and the Australian Environmental Grantmakers Network. He was co-founder of the Australian Wind Alliance and inaugural chair of the Melbourne Energy Institute’s Advisory Board. He is a respected commentator on the economic, political and engineering aspects of Australia’s energy transition.  Links: Simon's 2022 book The Big Teal: https://publishing.monash.edu/product/the-big-teal/ Simon's ABC interview on the success of Climate 200 in the wake of the 2022 elections: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3Mhz6b7cg4 Simon's 2021 talk - Independents and Climate - The Hope to End the Lost Decade: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RN_-1eLbLL8 Simon's 2018 op-ed which triggered his expulsion from Kooyong 200: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/apr/09/why-liddell-is-likely-to-close-in-2022-and-why-you-shouldnt-careThe Superpower Institute, working for Australian leadership in the transition: https://www.superpowerinstitute.com.au/

Episode Notes How can we build a more united climate movement? What should be the role of geoengineering? And how can indigenous voices be brought into the climate conversation?Bryony puts these questions to model, actor, director, ambassador and businesswoman, Lily Cole. Lily's career began at age 14 when she was recruited as a model, pitching her into the high-octane world of fashion. She remains a self-confessed geek, however, and completed her studies including a degree from Cambridge University. In 2016, she started researching a book ‘Who Cares Wins,’ which was published in 2020. In both the book and the podcast that followed, she gives a platform to a wide range of people, always seeking to see both sides of the many debates, and also to inspire optimism thanks to the wide range of solutions that are out there, be they technologically driven, or founded on ancient traditions and wisdoms.Please like, subscribe and leave a review. Follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook or Instagram, and sign up for the Cleaning Up newsletter at cleaninguppod.substack.com.  Links and more:Lily’s website and companyWho Cares Wins: Lily’s book and podcastThe Righteous Mind by Jonathan HaidtThe Dawn of Everything by David Graeber and David WengrowSky Diamond — Carbon capture diamondsBryony’s recommended documentary on diamonds

Welcome to Season 12 of Cleaning Up! If you want a sense of the trajectory of climate action, you have to understand China, and you have to understand finance. There is no one better to share insights on both than Dr Ma Jun, Founder and President of the Institute of Finance and Sustainability in Beijing.Between 2014 and 2020, Dr Ma served as Chief Economist and then Member of the Monetary Policy Committee of the People’s Bank of China. Over the subsequent years, Dr Ma played a key role in the development of sustainable finance in China and around the world. He led the drafting of China’s green finance and green bond guidelines; he led work on green finance at the G20; he pushed for the greening of China’s Belt and Road initiative; he set up initiatives with the global accounting and standards bodies; and he helped enlist the world’s major financial centres in the drive to green the capital markets. Dr Ma is a towering figure in the area of green finance in China and in the world, and provides an invaluable perspective on one of the most significant players in the clean energy transition.Please like, subscribe and leave a review. Follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook or Instagram, and sign up for the Cleaning Up newsletter at https://cleaninguppod.substack.com.  Links and related episodes:Dr Ma’s 2017 book, “The Economics of Air Pollution in China: Achieving Better and Cleaner Growth” https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.7312/ma--17494Dr Ma and Simon Zadek: Decarbonizing the Belt and Road https://www.climateworks.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/BRI_Exec_Summary_v10-screen_pages_lo-1.pdfEpisodes 14 with Jonathan Maxwell – Cheaper, Cleaner, More Reliable  https://www.cleaningup.live/episode-14-jonathan-maxwell/Episodes 113 with Jonathan Maxwell — Checkpoint 2023: Energy Efficiency Investment https://www.cleaningup.live/ep113-jonathan-maxwell-checkpoint-2023-energy-efficiency-investment/Episode 153 with Lauri Myllivyrta – Shedding Light on Energy's Dirty Secrets https://www.cleaningup.live/shedding-light-on-energys-dirty-secrets-ep153-lauri-myllyvirta/Episode 84 with Mark Carney - The 130 Trillion-Dollar Man https://www.cleaningup.live/ep84-mark-carney-matching-net-zero-supply-and-demand/Episode 145 with Professor Avinash Persaud – The Bridgetown Initiator  https://www.cleaningup.live/the-bridgetown-initiator-ep145-prof-avinash-persaud/