E343: How a Text Message Replaces a Power Plant: Octopus Energy

Back in 2018, Ozzeir Khan ran an experiment at the Asian Development Bank: could AI predict GDP better than the bank's PhD economists? It came remarkably close. The economists' verdict — if you can't explain it, it's no good, even if it's right. Eight years on, that argument is over. We talk about what generative AI is doing to document-centric institutions — development banks, law firms, investment banks — and who it displaces first. Ozzeir's answer is uncomfortable: not just the entry-level roles, but the middle management layer, and it's already showing up in the Amazon and Microsoft layoffs. Also: why the skill that matters now is asking better questions rather than finding answers, and why the biggest disruption he sees is to his own profession — software engineering. Ozzeir Khan is Director and CIO | Operations and Country Engagement at the World Bank, previously Director of Digital Innovation at the Asian Development Bank. Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

Most energy retailers earn more the more you use. Octopus Energy built its business on the opposite idea — that a utility should help you spend less. Eric Davids, who leads US strategy, explains how: "plunge pricing" alerts at 50–70% off when renewables are abundant, EV tariffs that cut peak demand 42% and save around £650 a year, and the striking claim that a simple behavioural nudge, at scale, can replace a gas peaker plant. Figures are from Octopus's UK operations. Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

There are 200 cars parked outside right now. Each carries a 60–80 kWh battery. Together, that's a small power station sitting idle. That's Vehicle-to-Grid — and it's closer than most people think. In Brief 02, we distill hundreds of expert conversations into one argument: your EV isn't just transport. It's a battery on wheels that can power your home, stabilise the grid, and earn you money while it sits in the driveway. We cover: Why V2G will spread like SMS did — slowly, then all at once What happens when millions of EVs start feeding electricity back The economics that make it inevitable 340+ conversations. 1 brief. Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

Australia's home battery market is booming — but the gap between the sales pitch and the lived reality is wider than most people think. Christina Li works at the frontline of battery adoption, with visibility across customers, retailers, installers, DNSPs and VPPs that very few people have. We dig into what's really driving uptake, what's stalling it, why some households see payback in under four years while others can't make the numbers stack, and what the rise of VPPs means for the value of a battery sitting in your garage. If you've ever wondered whether a home battery actually makes financial sense — this is the conversation to have. Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

Nick Abson made pop videos for Queen, then children's puppets, then built Europe's largest fuel cell company, which was later killed off. At 79, his argument is that a community could build its own fuel cell and run on nothing but its own waste. His figures are unverified, and the units aren't built yet, but it is one of the more unusual conversations I've had on the show. Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

For almost a decade I've been convinced electricity will end up free — free the way the internet is free. Last week I charged the car for nothing at a shopping mall, same as I would from my own solar, and drove north out of Manila. The trip cost nothing at all. Fifty minutes on where that leads, and an argument with Tesla's AI about a future where knowledge is free too. Only I have finite energy. The AI can go forever. Come find out how far. Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

Australia's aggregated EV fleet capacity is expected to exceed Snowy Hydro 2.0 by the early 2030s. The government spent $12 billion on Snowy Hydro. The EV battery potential is sitting in driveways across the country — for free. But only if we can enable bidirectional charging. Portia Rooney spent three years working on exactly that — and took a Churchill Fellowship to Europe and China to study how the world's most advanced V2G programs actually work. Her verdict: the technology is ready. The OEM approval, interoperability and harmonisation of standards and regulations are the missing pieces. In this conversation: AC vs DC bidirectional charging, why a Nissan LEAF got bricked trying to do V2G, why power companies are going to have to adapt their business model and why the distributed Lego-block model has no single point of failure. "It doesn't have a central point. If you've got a transmission line transporting energy, there's a single point of failure. This doesn't." Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

Ben Hutt runs Janus Electric — converting big diesel prime movers to electric for the same price as a diesel engine rebuild. In North America alone there are four million of these trucks. It would take the OEMs 50 years to manufacture that many new electric replacements. Conversion is the only realistic path. Battery swapping in four minutes. 450km range. 25 trucks sold with zero subsidy. And a business model that works like a Netflix subscription. "Australia needs to get better at exporting technology — not just digging stuff up out of the ground and putting it on a boat." Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

Stella Whittaker spent four years doing a PhD on one question: why is it so hard to raise money for climate adaptation — the part of the climate crisis that's already happening? Her answer is in this episode. And it starts in Copenhagen, where three extreme flooding events in a row caused billions in damage and forced a city to redesign itself from the ground up — 300 projects, new street layouts, underground car parks built to double as flood infrastructure, all funded through a tariff on water. Stella is Lead of Climate Transition at Haskoning and was part of a €10 million European research project with 50 partners and 20 pilot municipalities. She now works to bring those models to Australia and the Asia-Pacific. We cover: why adaptation finance is the Cinderella of climate finance, what a real adaptation project actually looks like and how it gets funded, why Danish banks missed a once-in-a-generation opportunity to lead the world in adaptation bonds, and how developing countries can use the UNDP guide and Cities Climate Finance Laboratory to actually mobilize money — not just write reports. "It is possible. We just need to take a little bit of extra time and effort." Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

Skip Bowman is an organisational psychologist who started interviewing energy leaders for a book on green leadership — and kept running into one question he couldn't answer: why does energy get more expensive when renewables are the cheapest ever created? Three years later, the answer became a book called "In the Dark." His conclusion: you will never get cheap power unless you take it. In this conversation: sky farming as the only job in a jobless economy, why there is no electricity generator trying to reduce your costs, the $21 billion in citizen capital Australia deployed without noticing, and why solar opens the account, the battery leverages the potential, and the EV sends the check.  15 to 20% return on investment. If you don't take it, somebody else will. Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs