December 18, 2025 • 34 mins
Despite endless financial difficulties, Argentina has seen a remarkable increase in clean energy over the past decade. It has gone from practically zero to almost 18% of its electricity sourced from renewables. In doing so, Argentina has overcome a challenge faced by many countries that are considered uninvestable by major financial institutions.
Sebastian Kind, former undersecretary at the ministry of energy in Argentina, joins Akshat Rathi on Zero to tell the story of Argentina’s renewables blitz.
Explore further:
- Sebastian’s organisation, RELP: https://www.relp.ngo/
- Sebastian’s TED Talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACC5KCPRt_U
Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Our producer is Oscar Boyd. Special thanks to Sommer Saadi, Mohsis Andam, Sharon Chen and Laura Millan. Thoughts or suggestions? Email us at zeropod@bloomberg.net. For more coverage of climate change and solutions, visit https://www.bloomberg.com/green.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to zero. I'm akshatrati. This week, how Argentina got
money for renewables Around the world, there's a quiet revolution
(00:20):
taking place. Day after day, more and more renewable energy
is being installed. And yes, it's happening in the US two,
but the reality in twenty twenty five is that it's
happening faster in developing countries. Today we'll look at the
transition from Argentina's perspective. A country known for its epic landscapes,
(00:40):
superstar footballers, and endless financial troubles.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Argentina's central Bank has raised the country's interest rate to
sixty percent. President Trump welcoming his political ally Argentina's president
Javier Mile to the White House to announce a twenty
billion dollar bailout for his country. It's going to be
the biggest ever bailout that the IMF has ever issued.
In fact, Argentina is to receive an extra seven billion
(01:06):
dollars on top of the fifty billion that has agreed
in June.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
Still, over the past decade, Argentina has undergone a remarkable
clean energy transformation, going from practically zero in twenty fifteen
to almost eighteen percent of its electricity coming from renewables. Now,
in doing so, Argentina has overcome a challenge faced by
many countries that are considered practically uninvestable by major financial institutions.
(01:33):
How did this happen? To tell us that story. Joining
me on zero this week is Sebastian Kind, a former
undersecretary at the Ministry of Energy in Argentina who helped
draft the country's renewable energy law, which was passed with
the unanimous support in the Senate in twenty fifteen. Since then,
he has gone on to found an organization called RELP
(01:53):
that helps advise governments around the world on expanding their
renewable energy sector. I wanted to ask what's made Argentina's
renewables drive possible, whether President Javia Mila is still in
favor of renewables, and how Argentina's relations with the US
and China are playing out. Welcome to the show, Sebastian.
Speaker 3 (02:19):
Thank you very much, Absha, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
So Before we talk about clean energy in Argentina and
your work there, I'd like to go back a century.
Argentina used to be among the top ten countries in
per capita income at the start of the twentieth century,
richer than Italy, than Japan, than even Argentina's colonial master Spain.
(02:42):
Now it ranks seventieth in the world in terms of
GDP per capita. What happened to Argentina.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
Wow, that's an amazing question. I mean, just so for
the audience to understand, Argentina is a country almost biggers India.
We only for five million inhabitants. It was a flourished country, definitely.
That's why my grandparents came to Argentina the beginning of
last century. I think what happened after that is that
(03:14):
we had decades and decades of I would say bad management.
This is my fair approach to what had happened in Argentina.
I mean, the country is full of natural resources, and
that's amazing what we can do, what we could do,
and what we were able to do. But mismanagement is
really taking the country in a difficult situation, I would say,
(03:37):
And one of the most perhaps difficult situations we have
is to deal with inflation.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
So a lot of Argentina's wealth was built through agriculture
in the late nineteenth early twentieth century, you know, very
fertile lands. But of course you talk about natural resources
as oil and gas, as metals. If you come to
this century, say it's been mismanagement over the past few
decades that have you know, politically or militarily that have
(04:08):
involved poor use of the natural resources that Argentina has.
This century specifically, though, it's been financial crisis after financial crisis.
What has it been like living through it as a citizen.
Speaker 3 (04:23):
It's super complex. I mean, I remember being a kid
in the in the eighties and remember my father even
in the in the supermarket with me telling me hurry
up and get the meal before the you know, the
person that was marketing prices come to the shelf where
the milk were. So imagine leaving in that kind of
(04:44):
concept and that kind of environment definitely teaches you a
lot of things and shapes you in the way we
will leave. And I think most of the things that
are done or we've done as a team in the
energy sector came through that kind of experiences that we had.
The country has i would say, very difficult times in
(05:08):
dealing with inflation and physical deficits. So this is one
of the most complicated issues in the country. I mean,
both in terms of its effects on the real economy
so the so called tax on poor right, and also
in terms of how difficult it is to solve it.
I mean, the main problem behind this physcal deficit is
(05:32):
I would say what the government today is aggressively tightling,
but for the audience to understand, the physical deficit means
that you spend more than you received, something as simple
as that. And at national level, this has been happening
for decades. So eliminating the inflation is not easy in
a country where almost half the population currently leaves below
(05:55):
the poverty line. The more poverty there is, the more
money you need to provide for basic needs, which generates
a higher deficit. It's like how can I say, like
a diverge in spiral.
Speaker 1 (06:09):
So you have spent most of your career in the
renewable energy industry, specifically building things in Argentina since at
least two thousand and six. What drew you to renewable energy?
Speaker 3 (06:22):
I'm an engineer by Trenning, and I was researching renewable
resources since late nineties, and I knew that even though
the country didn't have renewables almost at all at the time,
that was something super important. I mean, the people in
Argentina were struggling with all the difficulties of getting fossil
(06:44):
fuels out of the ground while the wind was extremely
strong and super annoying for them. And I said, this
is completely crazy. I mean, and we were important fossil
fuels while at the same time the country is super
rich and natural resources. So since the very beginning in
(07:06):
my career, that was something, you know, that blowed my
mind saying, okay, we should do something to put two
things together. Right, all the economic strains that the country
was seen to combined with the use of natural resources,
we have to cut basically all the imports and all
the dependency on external people.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
So there is a common refrain that says energy is destiny,
that countries that command great energy resources can become great powers.
And Argentina used to have a lot of oil and
gas and then it's found more oil and gas through
what are called unconventional resources or shale. But you have
been focused on renewable energy because there are also renewable
(07:52):
resources like the wind in the sun. But getting government,
especially at a time of financial crisis and as a
result of which political crisis, to agree on a forward
looking clean energy plan that requires years, if not decades
of planning is hard, and yet you've found a way
to get a renewable energy law passed in twenty fifteen.
(08:14):
How did that come about?
Speaker 3 (08:15):
The benefit is so clear. Actually, imagine that when you
build you know nation, you have the chance to build
your power system. You say, okay, we can go to
build fossil fuel power plans or combined cycles or whatever.
In that sense, that's quite easy. You put little capital
and little means when you compare to other sources like renewables,
(08:38):
and then you feed the machine. Right, you put fossil
fuel for the decades that you want to run your facility.
But the point here is that you are sticking to
something that you don't know. You are linked to the
use of resources that you don't know the price or
those volatile prices will drive your economy for the future.
(09:02):
Instead of that, you can use your own renewable resources.
And using renewable resources means that it is true that
is capital intensive and you need to find a way
to structure them in the long term otherwise will not
be competitive. But once you can do it, you resolve
many things at once.
Speaker 1 (09:21):
And so you work on this renewable energy law which
has received support from all political parties. It becomes low
in twenty fifteen, and yet that in itself is still
not enough to actually start building renewables. You needed other
financial tools. Why was that the case.
Speaker 3 (09:40):
Because imagine is that if together in this conversation we
say we want to go to the moon, I mean
that's not enough. You need a rocket, right, and you
need something really put in place for that trick. In
this case, the law was more than just the desire,
was a couple of interesting things putting place. And the
first and the main was the political consensus for the
(10:05):
long term, which is not common, I would say at
all in the world, not only in Argentina. If we
look at what is going on in Europe or in
the States in this regard, it's pretty much the same.
It's quite uncommon to have both enemies in the Congress
to vote on favor for something. So when you have
the basic things which are not simple but basic perhaps,
(10:29):
which is not the same, in place, then you need
to build the other things that the market requires for
this long term view. As we mentioned before, and this
is exactly what happened after the law and not within
the law. The law was good for marking the basic things,
the certain things that we needed at the time, and
(10:49):
then someone has to get the law and put it
into practice. Unfortunately, or fortunately that was me, So I
suffer about my own words. But that's another story.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
So what were the financial tools that you had to
build to actually get money to build these renewable projects.
Speaker 3 (11:07):
Interesting, the most important thing we built is what I
always like to call the worlst case waterfall of guarantees,
which is basically a waterfall of three steps that we
decided to provide as part of the procurement program to
foster the investment opportunity in the capital market. The first
(11:28):
one was what we called the involving Energy payment guarantee,
which is like a liquidity facility or let's say many
that in the case of Argentina, the government put in
an account to cover the payments of the electricity. In
case the buyer of the electricity that was the independent
(11:51):
system operator in Argentina the case couldn't cover for whatever reason, right,
So basically we said the investors that if there's any
delay in payment, they can get the payment under date anyway.
Why this is important because when you want to structure
(12:11):
your project in let's say project finance non recourse, as
it is one of the most common ways of structure
in these long term infrastructure projects. You need to have
certainty on the payments you receive. If you believe that
this will not happen along the twenty years of contract
(12:33):
you're about to sign, you will not get into that.
So that was the first step. We said, Okay, this
is good, but it's not enough because we knew that
in the past. Of course, the country has many crisis
as you mentioned before, and we went through different difficult
situations and investors knew that. So we decided to bring
(12:56):
that contract, that obligation, that thing out of the payer's risk,
which was again the independent system operator in Argentina like
the national utility, might be into the sovereign risk.
Speaker 1 (13:10):
Right, So it went from a company risk, even if
it was a state owned company, to a government risk.
Speaker 3 (13:15):
Exactly why because the company might have problems to pay.
That doesn't mean that the government, the national government cannot pay,
cannot cover those obligations, right.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
But then you also had to go one step further
because the government also gets into trouble in Argentina and
far too frequently.
Speaker 3 (13:35):
Exactly in the past, the government of Argentina frequently held
the currency conversions and restricted money transfers abroad, So of
course we knew that and we said, okay, but if
we want to bring international investors into the game, as
we wanted to, because of course we wanted to create
(13:55):
a heavy competition to get prices done and to get
the best out of what we were offering, we needed
to convince international investors. And to convince international investors, you
need to provide something extra that can let them feel
that once again, if something happened, the government of Argentina
(14:18):
will not get that restriction to them and they will
get the investment back. So we decided to offer a
third step guarantee is what we call the early termination
payment guarantee, which is a guarantee that we structure through
a negotiation that we had with the War Bank as
(14:39):
ultimate guarantor that offers that possibility to pay you in
the currency of your choice wherever you decide to get
that non amortized value of the asset, which is basically
what the guarantee covers.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
Right, So there's three layers of guarantees that help a
foreign to feel confident to put money into Argentina because
there is a law that sets a clear target because
there is a payment guarantee at the company level, then
there's a payment guarantee at the government level, and if
nothing else, then there's a payment guarantee coming all the
way from the World Bank. And that results in Argentina
(15:20):
starting to build its renewable portfolio. So before twenty fifteen,
less than two percent of Argentina's power came from renewables,
and then you set a target to reach twenty percent
by twenty twenty five. Yeah, how has it worked out?
Speaker 3 (15:37):
Okay, this week we reach an amazing number of over
forty four percent of pick coverage in the country and
we are reaching the eighteen percent average by the end
of the year, so almost in line with the crazy
ambitions that we set in the law ten years ago.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
At the same time, the amount of gas in the
system has gone up as well.
Speaker 3 (16:04):
Well. You know, Wakamorta is an interesting reservoir that we have,
with the second largest shale gas reserve in the world
and the fourth largest shale oil reserve in the world.
But still Argentina is important in fossil fuels because the
capacity we have in both in pipelines and the seasonality
(16:25):
of the demand cannot be fed by our own resources.
So it is true that the country has a lot
of gas and a lot of oil as well. We
are exporting oil for a long time and now there
are many projects to export gas in an LNG shape.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
So by one count, about eleven billion dollars worth of
investment has come into solar and wind projects. A lot
of that investment has come from foreign investors. What type
of foreign investors?
Speaker 3 (16:57):
Wow, a lot of Imagine that's a lot of money.
So we have different kind of banks all over Europe,
the States, some banks in the same Latin America, some
Argentinian banks as well. We have the advice commercial banks, multilaterals,
all kinds of and in terms of the equity, we
(17:17):
have local companies, international companies, companies from the US, companies
from Spain, from Germany, from France, big ones like as
or Total in France or you know, big organizations, and
some I wouldn't say small ones because the rule was
clear that you need to have certain things in place
(17:40):
as a track record to head into this game. But
eleven billion dollars a lot of money. So investment from
all over the world.
Speaker 1 (17:47):
You didn't mention China, but China has had a lot
of investments also in Argentina, and we know China is
the largest maker of a lot of electricity generation or
transmission equipment. How big has the Chinese and and spin.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
It was important, was not the main one in terms
of direct investment as power producer though, although it was significant,
and of course the solar business is mainly supplied by China,
not in Argentina but in the world. And some of
the wind turbines as well, with some important turby manufacturers
(18:23):
working in the country not only supplying but also developing
reneable projects. So definitely important, but not the main one.
Was white scattered all around the world.
Speaker 1 (18:34):
This year there's been another news about more financial problem
that Argentina is facing and Javier Mile who is the
president now, is being built out by the US. But
regardless of the politics side, one thing that Scott bess In,
the Secretary of Treasury in the US said is that
they are keen on supporting Argentina to get China out.
(18:55):
What does that mean?
Speaker 3 (18:56):
Well, who knows, We should ask him. I think it's
quite over use what the US is doing in the
West in general terms and means the presence of China
in Latin America, but in the world is increasing and
there is a kind of commercial war behind. But that's
in parallel to the problems that Argentina is facing today,
which is this concept that we mentioned before about ending
(19:19):
the fiscal deficit, which is the right move. I mean,
though it is painful because you know, many people fall
out of the system. It is unpopular to do it.
And the situation that the government has today is that
they needed someone to support them, and they found it
in the In the US.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
There is an aspect of the renewable story that starts
to play out in every country where a certain amount
of solar and wind power is built, which is unique
transmission lines to make sure it is taken to the
places where it is consumed from the places where it's
being generated. China has made huge investments in transmission and
distribution of electricity in Brazil and Chile, Argentina's neighbors. Why
(20:04):
has it not done so in Argentina where there is
clearly a lot of need for transmission.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
Okay, that's perhaps a question that has not just one answer.
The main thing to understand here actually is that there's
no place in the world that transmission exists for projects
that does not exist. So you build transmission when you
have the need, either because you have the demand that
is requiring that transmission or you have the supply that
(20:32):
in order to be deployed to be installed, you need
of course wires to get the electrons out of that
place and you know, bringing those electrons into the demand.
In the case of Argentina, at the time when I
took office, the government, the country had enough transmission, so
we didn't have to build those transmission lines. The more
(20:55):
you fill those spaces, of course, the more you need
to create more transmission. Today we have another thing which
is batteries, which helped us a lot in terms of
the transmission need. I mean, the first thing you need
is to use as much as you can the things
you already have instead of build new infrastructure. So if
(21:17):
you ask me, I mean, how can you deal with
new transmission and why? And what happened? The China put
money into transmission in different markets and not in Argentina.
So far we didn't need it. In the last ten years.
Now is the question of okay, how can we get
more and more not only renewables but electrons anyway out
(21:38):
of the places where we produce them.
Speaker 1 (21:45):
After the break, I asked Sebastian whether President Milee is
still in support of renewables and whether the sector needs
more support to keep up the momentum. While I have you,
please take a moment to read and review Zero. It
helps new listeners find the show. You can review on
Apple Podcasts and Spotify, and we appreciate every single one.
Thank you. Let's come to the very now, right. You
(22:23):
were in government trying to set this goal and then
trying to create these guarantees from twenty sixteen to twenty nineteen.
You've left government roles. Since then, there's been a bunch
of political changes in Argentina. If you look at the
renewable story post twenty seventeen, there's a rapid rise, and
yes it's reached eighteen percent by the end of this year,
(22:43):
not quite twenty but close, but it has plateaued in
its rise over the last few years. Do you think
under Mila there is support for renewables.
Speaker 3 (22:53):
I wouldn't say there's support or there's not support. In
general terms, there is a market that was built at
the time that has its own life no matter who
comes in power, unless someone want to kill it on purpose.
If you want to kill something, of course you can
do it, but you need to first of all understand
(23:14):
why and if you want to do that. That means
that if renewables become the cheapest option, you are killing
the cheapest option, which is not convenient for you and
your own accounts. And the deficit that we were talking about.
Speaker 1 (23:30):
Yeah, the politics can sometimes overcome economics, as we are
seeing in the US where they are trying to attack
what are the cheapest sources of power, even as the
country is looking to build a lot of electricity infrastructure.
But in Argentina, the twenty fifteen law itself is set
to expire this year, and that means the legal target
and the fiscal protections that you built, those might go away.
(23:52):
There are conversations about extending the law.
Speaker 3 (23:54):
Well, those things will not go away, because there are
two things that we build here your ago. One is
what we call the purchases of the national state, which
was the renovair program, and the other one was the
what we call the corporate ppa, the corporate power purchase
agreements between large consumers and free producers in the market.
(24:17):
That channel is a super free market driver that is
building over a gigawatt of power every year since the beginning.
And this is not because of this government or because
of the previous one. Is because of the market rules
that were built in that sense.
Speaker 1 (24:39):
But the government program also was important in getting renewables going.
So what do you think happens if the government site
is not renewed and there's no new target to meet renewables?
How much do you think in the next ten years,
just based on private forces, could you build renewables? You
got to almost twenty Where does the next ten years go?
Speaker 3 (25:03):
That's very interesting. The program from the government might not
be needed if the market forces as they are built
in the corporate site are strong enough. As they are,
so in my view, they were super needed at the beginning.
And you know, I'm more market oriented, so I truly
(25:25):
believe that the market can keep on doing amazing things
in that second channel that already for a long time,
for years, have been demonstrating being super efficient in this build.
Speaker 1 (25:37):
So you're making the case that, you know, maybe government
will not come through and there will be no extension,
and you know, the government anyways, and financial crises of
all sorts, but that now renewable stories and sort of
the private market space. There is the fact that it
is cheaper to build and so you'll get more momentum.
Maybe you don't need to rely on the government for
transmission lines. Maybe you can get to batteries. But that's
(26:00):
the case, then are you seeing a ground up desire
for these products? So take the case of Pakistan where
there's been a huge boom in solar panels on rooftops
in one year and now they're buying batteries. In Argentina
there is almost no rooftop solar less than one hundred
megawards of distributed power production. Yeah, why is there not
(26:23):
being a ground up desire for this clean, cheap energy
If you think markets can help.
Speaker 3 (26:29):
Well, there are a couple of things here. The reason
why we don't have rooftop solar as other markets is
because we have very cheap electricity yet because it's subsidized.
So when someone is given something for free, which is
never for free, right, I mean we know it, there's
not really clear deconvenience for you to go for that.
I mean, this is going out, is facing out as
(26:52):
the government is making huge efforts for reflecting the real prices,
which brings another problem, which is now start charging for
the use of electricity that for decades nobody pay. So
that's another kind of concept, I would say. But in
terms of the transmission and the need for that transmission,
the transmission is of course it's something that it will
(27:14):
be built according to the need you have, and it's
a long term infrastructure project in the same way as
many others. And that's the problem we face always in
emergent markets, and not only in Argentina, that to build
long term infrastructure you need long term rules and the
long term investors needs feeing confidence. It is.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
It's true that government subsidies can distart markets. Sometimes they
are distorting markets for the reasons government chooses to, which
is to make renewable energy cheaper than it was in
the past. Sometimes it does it to ensure that people
have access to energy, which is what Nigeria did whenever
subsidizing diesel that people use as generators to produce power.
(27:57):
But then there are also ways in which these stortions
can be fixed, and we've seen that in Nigeria when
subsidies got cut for diesel, suddenly there was a boom
for solar and so maybe in Argentina have subsidies for
electricity are cut and real prices are visible, people will
probably deploy prooftop solar to make cheap clean electricity.
Speaker 3 (28:18):
We brainstormed a lot about that, and of course you
can imagine that a person that was born in the
early two thousand never almost never paid the electricity in
his life. So suddenly with the country that has fifty
percent of the people below the line of poverty, it's
not easy to say, okay, overnight, you know what, you
(28:42):
have to pay the electricity. But electricity it was like
the air, right, I mean a breath. Don't pay for
what a breath. So that concept is something that makes
you open the window when your room is warm up
rather than turn off the heater. Definitely is not a
few at all, I would say, but it's difficult, and
(29:03):
subsidies are also a way of acting in populism, and
that's something that we need to cut it. Definitely, someone
has to pay it, right, I mean the point is
who's going to pay? But this is not what have
happened in Argentina. For decades, rich people didn't pay electricity.
It's not only that the poorest didn't. So there are
(29:23):
a lot of cross subsidies here. So poor people are
paying the cheap electricity to the rich people, and this
is something crazy that you need to stop immediately, particularly
with the natural resources we do have. I mean, Argentina
perhaps is one of the top in terms of the
natural resources of wind or solar, everything is there. Everything.
(29:47):
The capacity factor, which is the measurement of how much
let's say, when you can get out of a winter
binner or a solar panel, is picking among the podium
in the world. We have we in firms that are
above sixty percent sixty five percent capacity factor, solar business
about thirty four thirty five percent, this is crazy, is
(30:10):
twice what you can get in Europe. And still under
that condition, the lack of possibility to structure long term
infrastructure projects, which is not only the case for renewables,
it is the case for long term infrastructure projects, highways, hospitals,
everything is killing the same country. So that's a situation
that most of emerging markets have. Can't imagine what it
(30:32):
means in Africa to have, you know, people paying twice
the price for their own electricity that what they can paign.
Speaker 1 (30:40):
So you have, since stepping down from government role in Argentina,
have founded an organization to try and create this kind
of momentum for renewables in other parts of the world.
Can you give examples of where you've succeeded and how
you know?
Speaker 3 (30:57):
First to say is that we created WELP years ago
inspired by our own experience, basically to offer others what
we would have love to have when we've been in
government and we didn't have. So we decided, under this
concept of offering others what we would have loved to have,
(31:17):
we decided to work across emergent markets in Southeast Asia,
in Africa, and in Latin America and the Caribbean, where
governments really need about support in designing and structuring renewables
at scale. We're working in the three regions in Southeast Asia,
in Pakistan, we've done things. In the Philippines. We work
(31:38):
in West Africa, in Togo, we are dealing in corporational
agreement that hopefully we will go online, with Senegal, with South Africa,
with Kenya. We're working in the Caribbean, in Jamaica, in Barbados,
and in this last two we support the government directly
with the design. In the case of Jamaicable energy auction
(32:02):
was fully supported by RELP to the government we are
now working in the second round of functions to keep
on incorporating renewables and batteries as well in the country.
In Barbados, we've been working together with the government, with
the Ministry of the Government of Minamoti to support them
(32:22):
in the design and implementation of the batteries of the
best auction, the first auction they run ever, So that's
the kind of things that we do. We work hands
on with the governments.
Speaker 1 (32:34):
So it's not copying and pasting what you did in Argentina,
but sort of figuring out what is the need for
that country at that point in this supply chain that
you need to build off all kinds of financial tools
and regulations and markets to actually implement renewable energy projects exactly.
Speaker 3 (32:53):
Welp and bess technical policy and financial expertise directly within
national governments to design competitive auctions and to integrate the
risky instruments we bring. I would say this tined mindset
focused on delivery and effective implementation that concept of the
hands song, so we you know, we have people in
(33:15):
the field in the countries working together with the governments
to help them run the six.
Speaker 1 (33:20):
Thank you for sharing your story of Argentina and for
the story of supporting other developing countries and getting renewable energy.
Thanks for joining the show.
Speaker 3 (33:30):
Thank you so much, ak Shat for having me really,
thank you very much.
Speaker 1 (33:40):
And thank you for listening to zero. Now for the
sound of the week. Now, that's the call of the
endangered Florida panther, which lives in Florida's Big Cypress National Preserve.
(34:01):
The preserve is just one of many places in the
US that may lose protection as part of President Donald
Trump's plan to trim the National Park Service. The White
House is proposing a cut of one point two billion
dollars to the Park Service's budget. Read more about it
on Bloomberg dot com, Forward slash Green. If you liked
(34:21):
this episode, please take a moment to rate and review
the show on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. This episode was
produced by Oscar Boyd with help from Annamazarakus. Our theme
music is composed by wonderl Special thanks to Somersadi Mosses
andam Laura Milan and Sharon chen. I'm Akshadrati back soon.
Welcome to zero. I'm akshatrati. This week, how Argentina got
money for renewables Around the world, there's a quiet revolution
(00:20):
taking place. Day after day, more and more renewable energy
is being installed. And yes, it's happening in the US two,
but the reality in twenty twenty five is that it's
happening faster in developing countries. Today we'll look at the
transition from Argentina's perspective. A country known for its epic landscapes,
(00:40):
superstar footballers, and endless financial troubles.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Argentina's central Bank has raised the country's interest rate to
sixty percent. President Trump welcoming his political ally Argentina's president
Javier Mile to the White House to announce a twenty
billion dollar bailout for his country. It's going to be
the biggest ever bailout that the IMF has ever issued.
In fact, Argentina is to receive an extra seven billion
(01:06):
dollars on top of the fifty billion that has agreed
in June.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
Still, over the past decade, Argentina has undergone a remarkable
clean energy transformation, going from practically zero in twenty fifteen
to almost eighteen percent of its electricity coming from renewables. Now,
in doing so, Argentina has overcome a challenge faced by
many countries that are considered practically uninvestable by major financial institutions.
(01:33):
How did this happen? To tell us that story. Joining
me on zero this week is Sebastian Kind, a former
undersecretary at the Ministry of Energy in Argentina who helped
draft the country's renewable energy law, which was passed with
the unanimous support in the Senate in twenty fifteen. Since then,
he has gone on to found an organization called RELP
(01:53):
that helps advise governments around the world on expanding their
renewable energy sector. I wanted to ask what's made Argentina's
renewables drive possible, whether President Javia Mila is still in
favor of renewables, and how Argentina's relations with the US
and China are playing out. Welcome to the show, Sebastian.
Speaker 3 (02:19):
Thank you very much, Absha, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
So Before we talk about clean energy in Argentina and
your work there, I'd like to go back a century.
Argentina used to be among the top ten countries in
per capita income at the start of the twentieth century,
richer than Italy, than Japan, than even Argentina's colonial master Spain.
(02:42):
Now it ranks seventieth in the world in terms of
GDP per capita. What happened to Argentina.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
Wow, that's an amazing question. I mean, just so for
the audience to understand, Argentina is a country almost biggers India.
We only for five million inhabitants. It was a flourished country, definitely.
That's why my grandparents came to Argentina the beginning of
last century. I think what happened after that is that
(03:14):
we had decades and decades of I would say bad management.
This is my fair approach to what had happened in Argentina.
I mean, the country is full of natural resources, and
that's amazing what we can do, what we could do,
and what we were able to do. But mismanagement is
really taking the country in a difficult situation, I would say,
(03:37):
And one of the most perhaps difficult situations we have
is to deal with inflation.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
So a lot of Argentina's wealth was built through agriculture
in the late nineteenth early twentieth century, you know, very
fertile lands. But of course you talk about natural resources
as oil and gas, as metals. If you come to
this century, say it's been mismanagement over the past few
decades that have you know, politically or militarily that have
(04:08):
involved poor use of the natural resources that Argentina has.
This century specifically, though, it's been financial crisis after financial crisis.
What has it been like living through it as a citizen.
Speaker 3 (04:23):
It's super complex. I mean, I remember being a kid
in the in the eighties and remember my father even
in the in the supermarket with me telling me hurry
up and get the meal before the you know, the
person that was marketing prices come to the shelf where
the milk were. So imagine leaving in that kind of
(04:44):
concept and that kind of environment definitely teaches you a
lot of things and shapes you in the way we
will leave. And I think most of the things that
are done or we've done as a team in the
energy sector came through that kind of experiences that we had.
The country has i would say, very difficult times in
(05:08):
dealing with inflation and physical deficits. So this is one
of the most complicated issues in the country. I mean,
both in terms of its effects on the real economy
so the so called tax on poor right, and also
in terms of how difficult it is to solve it.
I mean, the main problem behind this physcal deficit is
(05:32):
I would say what the government today is aggressively tightling,
but for the audience to understand, the physical deficit means
that you spend more than you received, something as simple
as that. And at national level, this has been happening
for decades. So eliminating the inflation is not easy in
a country where almost half the population currently leaves below
(05:55):
the poverty line. The more poverty there is, the more
money you need to provide for basic needs, which generates
a higher deficit. It's like how can I say, like
a diverge in spiral.
Speaker 1 (06:09):
So you have spent most of your career in the
renewable energy industry, specifically building things in Argentina since at
least two thousand and six. What drew you to renewable energy?
Speaker 3 (06:22):
I'm an engineer by Trenning, and I was researching renewable
resources since late nineties, and I knew that even though
the country didn't have renewables almost at all at the time,
that was something super important. I mean, the people in
Argentina were struggling with all the difficulties of getting fossil
(06:44):
fuels out of the ground while the wind was extremely
strong and super annoying for them. And I said, this
is completely crazy. I mean, and we were important fossil
fuels while at the same time the country is super
rich and natural resources. So since the very beginning in
(07:06):
my career, that was something, you know, that blowed my
mind saying, okay, we should do something to put two
things together. Right, all the economic strains that the country
was seen to combined with the use of natural resources,
we have to cut basically all the imports and all
the dependency on external people.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
So there is a common refrain that says energy is destiny,
that countries that command great energy resources can become great powers.
And Argentina used to have a lot of oil and
gas and then it's found more oil and gas through
what are called unconventional resources or shale. But you have
been focused on renewable energy because there are also renewable
(07:52):
resources like the wind in the sun. But getting government,
especially at a time of financial crisis and as a
result of which political crisis, to agree on a forward
looking clean energy plan that requires years, if not decades
of planning is hard, and yet you've found a way
to get a renewable energy law passed in twenty fifteen.
(08:14):
How did that come about?
Speaker 3 (08:15):
The benefit is so clear. Actually, imagine that when you
build you know nation, you have the chance to build
your power system. You say, okay, we can go to
build fossil fuel power plans or combined cycles or whatever.
In that sense, that's quite easy. You put little capital
and little means when you compare to other sources like renewables,
(08:38):
and then you feed the machine. Right, you put fossil
fuel for the decades that you want to run your facility.
But the point here is that you are sticking to
something that you don't know. You are linked to the
use of resources that you don't know the price or
those volatile prices will drive your economy for the future.
(09:02):
Instead of that, you can use your own renewable resources.
And using renewable resources means that it is true that
is capital intensive and you need to find a way
to structure them in the long term otherwise will not
be competitive. But once you can do it, you resolve
many things at once.
Speaker 1 (09:21):
And so you work on this renewable energy law which
has received support from all political parties. It becomes low
in twenty fifteen, and yet that in itself is still
not enough to actually start building renewables. You needed other
financial tools. Why was that the case.
Speaker 3 (09:40):
Because imagine is that if together in this conversation we
say we want to go to the moon, I mean
that's not enough. You need a rocket, right, and you
need something really put in place for that trick. In
this case, the law was more than just the desire,
was a couple of interesting things putting place. And the
first and the main was the political consensus for the
(10:05):
long term, which is not common, I would say at
all in the world, not only in Argentina. If we
look at what is going on in Europe or in
the States in this regard, it's pretty much the same.
It's quite uncommon to have both enemies in the Congress
to vote on favor for something. So when you have
the basic things which are not simple but basic perhaps,
(10:29):
which is not the same, in place, then you need
to build the other things that the market requires for
this long term view. As we mentioned before, and this
is exactly what happened after the law and not within
the law. The law was good for marking the basic things,
the certain things that we needed at the time, and
(10:49):
then someone has to get the law and put it
into practice. Unfortunately, or fortunately that was me, So I
suffer about my own words. But that's another story.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
So what were the financial tools that you had to
build to actually get money to build these renewable projects.
Speaker 3 (11:07):
Interesting, the most important thing we built is what I
always like to call the worlst case waterfall of guarantees,
which is basically a waterfall of three steps that we
decided to provide as part of the procurement program to
foster the investment opportunity in the capital market. The first
(11:28):
one was what we called the involving Energy payment guarantee,
which is like a liquidity facility or let's say many
that in the case of Argentina, the government put in
an account to cover the payments of the electricity. In
case the buyer of the electricity that was the independent
(11:51):
system operator in Argentina the case couldn't cover for whatever reason, right,
So basically we said the investors that if there's any
delay in payment, they can get the payment under date anyway.
Why this is important because when you want to structure
(12:11):
your project in let's say project finance non recourse, as
it is one of the most common ways of structure
in these long term infrastructure projects. You need to have
certainty on the payments you receive. If you believe that
this will not happen along the twenty years of contract
(12:33):
you're about to sign, you will not get into that.
So that was the first step. We said, Okay, this
is good, but it's not enough because we knew that
in the past. Of course, the country has many crisis
as you mentioned before, and we went through different difficult
situations and investors knew that. So we decided to bring
(12:56):
that contract, that obligation, that thing out of the payer's risk,
which was again the independent system operator in Argentina like
the national utility, might be into the sovereign risk.
Speaker 1 (13:10):
Right, So it went from a company risk, even if
it was a state owned company, to a government risk.
Speaker 3 (13:15):
Exactly why because the company might have problems to pay.
That doesn't mean that the government, the national government cannot pay,
cannot cover those obligations, right.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
But then you also had to go one step further
because the government also gets into trouble in Argentina and
far too frequently.
Speaker 3 (13:35):
Exactly in the past, the government of Argentina frequently held
the currency conversions and restricted money transfers abroad, So of
course we knew that and we said, okay, but if
we want to bring international investors into the game, as
we wanted to, because of course we wanted to create
(13:55):
a heavy competition to get prices done and to get
the best out of what we were offering, we needed
to convince international investors. And to convince international investors, you
need to provide something extra that can let them feel
that once again, if something happened, the government of Argentina
(14:18):
will not get that restriction to them and they will
get the investment back. So we decided to offer a
third step guarantee is what we call the early termination
payment guarantee, which is a guarantee that we structure through
a negotiation that we had with the War Bank as
(14:39):
ultimate guarantor that offers that possibility to pay you in
the currency of your choice wherever you decide to get
that non amortized value of the asset, which is basically
what the guarantee covers.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
Right, So there's three layers of guarantees that help a
foreign to feel confident to put money into Argentina because
there is a law that sets a clear target because
there is a payment guarantee at the company level, then
there's a payment guarantee at the government level, and if
nothing else, then there's a payment guarantee coming all the
way from the World Bank. And that results in Argentina
(15:20):
starting to build its renewable portfolio. So before twenty fifteen,
less than two percent of Argentina's power came from renewables,
and then you set a target to reach twenty percent
by twenty twenty five. Yeah, how has it worked out?
Speaker 3 (15:37):
Okay, this week we reach an amazing number of over
forty four percent of pick coverage in the country and
we are reaching the eighteen percent average by the end
of the year, so almost in line with the crazy
ambitions that we set in the law ten years ago.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
At the same time, the amount of gas in the
system has gone up as well.
Speaker 3 (16:04):
Well. You know, Wakamorta is an interesting reservoir that we have,
with the second largest shale gas reserve in the world
and the fourth largest shale oil reserve in the world.
But still Argentina is important in fossil fuels because the
capacity we have in both in pipelines and the seasonality
(16:25):
of the demand cannot be fed by our own resources.
So it is true that the country has a lot
of gas and a lot of oil as well. We
are exporting oil for a long time and now there
are many projects to export gas in an LNG shape.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
So by one count, about eleven billion dollars worth of
investment has come into solar and wind projects. A lot
of that investment has come from foreign investors. What type
of foreign investors?
Speaker 3 (16:57):
Wow, a lot of Imagine that's a lot of money.
So we have different kind of banks all over Europe,
the States, some banks in the same Latin America, some
Argentinian banks as well. We have the advice commercial banks, multilaterals,
all kinds of and in terms of the equity, we
(17:17):
have local companies, international companies, companies from the US, companies
from Spain, from Germany, from France, big ones like as
or Total in France or you know, big organizations, and
some I wouldn't say small ones because the rule was
clear that you need to have certain things in place
(17:40):
as a track record to head into this game. But
eleven billion dollars a lot of money. So investment from
all over the world.
Speaker 1 (17:47):
You didn't mention China, but China has had a lot
of investments also in Argentina, and we know China is
the largest maker of a lot of electricity generation or
transmission equipment. How big has the Chinese and and spin.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
It was important, was not the main one in terms
of direct investment as power producer though, although it was significant,
and of course the solar business is mainly supplied by China,
not in Argentina but in the world. And some of
the wind turbines as well, with some important turby manufacturers
(18:23):
working in the country not only supplying but also developing
reneable projects. So definitely important, but not the main one.
Was white scattered all around the world.
Speaker 1 (18:34):
This year there's been another news about more financial problem
that Argentina is facing and Javier Mile who is the
president now, is being built out by the US. But
regardless of the politics side, one thing that Scott bess In,
the Secretary of Treasury in the US said is that
they are keen on supporting Argentina to get China out.
(18:55):
What does that mean?
Speaker 3 (18:56):
Well, who knows, We should ask him. I think it's
quite over use what the US is doing in the
West in general terms and means the presence of China
in Latin America, but in the world is increasing and
there is a kind of commercial war behind. But that's
in parallel to the problems that Argentina is facing today,
which is this concept that we mentioned before about ending
(19:19):
the fiscal deficit, which is the right move. I mean,
though it is painful because you know, many people fall
out of the system. It is unpopular to do it.
And the situation that the government has today is that
they needed someone to support them, and they found it
in the In the US.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
There is an aspect of the renewable story that starts
to play out in every country where a certain amount
of solar and wind power is built, which is unique
transmission lines to make sure it is taken to the
places where it is consumed from the places where it's
being generated. China has made huge investments in transmission and
distribution of electricity in Brazil and Chile, Argentina's neighbors. Why
(20:04):
has it not done so in Argentina where there is
clearly a lot of need for transmission.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
Okay, that's perhaps a question that has not just one answer.
The main thing to understand here actually is that there's
no place in the world that transmission exists for projects
that does not exist. So you build transmission when you
have the need, either because you have the demand that
is requiring that transmission or you have the supply that
(20:32):
in order to be deployed to be installed, you need
of course wires to get the electrons out of that
place and you know, bringing those electrons into the demand.
In the case of Argentina, at the time when I
took office, the government, the country had enough transmission, so
we didn't have to build those transmission lines. The more
(20:55):
you fill those spaces, of course, the more you need
to create more transmission. Today we have another thing which
is batteries, which helped us a lot in terms of
the transmission need. I mean, the first thing you need
is to use as much as you can the things
you already have instead of build new infrastructure. So if
(21:17):
you ask me, I mean, how can you deal with
new transmission and why? And what happened? The China put
money into transmission in different markets and not in Argentina.
So far we didn't need it. In the last ten years.
Now is the question of okay, how can we get
more and more not only renewables but electrons anyway out
(21:38):
of the places where we produce them.
Speaker 1 (21:45):
After the break, I asked Sebastian whether President Milee is
still in support of renewables and whether the sector needs
more support to keep up the momentum. While I have you,
please take a moment to read and review Zero. It
helps new listeners find the show. You can review on
Apple Podcasts and Spotify, and we appreciate every single one.
Thank you. Let's come to the very now, right. You
(22:23):
were in government trying to set this goal and then
trying to create these guarantees from twenty sixteen to twenty nineteen.
You've left government roles. Since then, there's been a bunch
of political changes in Argentina. If you look at the
renewable story post twenty seventeen, there's a rapid rise, and
yes it's reached eighteen percent by the end of this year,
(22:43):
not quite twenty but close, but it has plateaued in
its rise over the last few years. Do you think
under Mila there is support for renewables.
Speaker 3 (22:53):
I wouldn't say there's support or there's not support. In
general terms, there is a market that was built at
the time that has its own life no matter who
comes in power, unless someone want to kill it on purpose.
If you want to kill something, of course you can
do it, but you need to first of all understand
(23:14):
why and if you want to do that. That means
that if renewables become the cheapest option, you are killing
the cheapest option, which is not convenient for you and
your own accounts. And the deficit that we were talking about.
Speaker 1 (23:30):
Yeah, the politics can sometimes overcome economics, as we are
seeing in the US where they are trying to attack
what are the cheapest sources of power, even as the
country is looking to build a lot of electricity infrastructure.
But in Argentina, the twenty fifteen law itself is set
to expire this year, and that means the legal target
and the fiscal protections that you built, those might go away.
(23:52):
There are conversations about extending the law.
Speaker 3 (23:54):
Well, those things will not go away, because there are
two things that we build here your ago. One is
what we call the purchases of the national state, which
was the renovair program, and the other one was the
what we call the corporate ppa, the corporate power purchase
agreements between large consumers and free producers in the market.
(24:17):
That channel is a super free market driver that is
building over a gigawatt of power every year since the beginning.
And this is not because of this government or because
of the previous one. Is because of the market rules
that were built in that sense.
Speaker 1 (24:39):
But the government program also was important in getting renewables going.
So what do you think happens if the government site
is not renewed and there's no new target to meet renewables?
How much do you think in the next ten years,
just based on private forces, could you build renewables? You
got to almost twenty Where does the next ten years go?
Speaker 3 (25:03):
That's very interesting. The program from the government might not
be needed if the market forces as they are built
in the corporate site are strong enough. As they are,
so in my view, they were super needed at the beginning.
And you know, I'm more market oriented, so I truly
(25:25):
believe that the market can keep on doing amazing things
in that second channel that already for a long time,
for years, have been demonstrating being super efficient in this build.
Speaker 1 (25:37):
So you're making the case that, you know, maybe government
will not come through and there will be no extension,
and you know, the government anyways, and financial crises of
all sorts, but that now renewable stories and sort of
the private market space. There is the fact that it
is cheaper to build and so you'll get more momentum.
Maybe you don't need to rely on the government for
transmission lines. Maybe you can get to batteries. But that's
(26:00):
the case, then are you seeing a ground up desire
for these products? So take the case of Pakistan where
there's been a huge boom in solar panels on rooftops
in one year and now they're buying batteries. In Argentina
there is almost no rooftop solar less than one hundred
megawards of distributed power production. Yeah, why is there not
(26:23):
being a ground up desire for this clean, cheap energy
If you think markets can help.
Speaker 3 (26:29):
Well, there are a couple of things here. The reason
why we don't have rooftop solar as other markets is
because we have very cheap electricity yet because it's subsidized.
So when someone is given something for free, which is
never for free, right, I mean we know it, there's
not really clear deconvenience for you to go for that.
I mean, this is going out, is facing out as
(26:52):
the government is making huge efforts for reflecting the real prices,
which brings another problem, which is now start charging for
the use of electricity that for decades nobody pay. So
that's another kind of concept, I would say. But in
terms of the transmission and the need for that transmission,
the transmission is of course it's something that it will
(27:14):
be built according to the need you have, and it's
a long term infrastructure project in the same way as
many others. And that's the problem we face always in
emergent markets, and not only in Argentina, that to build
long term infrastructure you need long term rules and the
long term investors needs feeing confidence. It is.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
It's true that government subsidies can distart markets. Sometimes they
are distorting markets for the reasons government chooses to, which
is to make renewable energy cheaper than it was in
the past. Sometimes it does it to ensure that people
have access to energy, which is what Nigeria did whenever
subsidizing diesel that people use as generators to produce power.
(27:57):
But then there are also ways in which these stortions
can be fixed, and we've seen that in Nigeria when
subsidies got cut for diesel, suddenly there was a boom
for solar and so maybe in Argentina have subsidies for
electricity are cut and real prices are visible, people will
probably deploy prooftop solar to make cheap clean electricity.
Speaker 3 (28:18):
We brainstormed a lot about that, and of course you
can imagine that a person that was born in the
early two thousand never almost never paid the electricity in
his life. So suddenly with the country that has fifty
percent of the people below the line of poverty, it's
not easy to say, okay, overnight, you know what, you
(28:42):
have to pay the electricity. But electricity it was like
the air, right, I mean a breath. Don't pay for
what a breath. So that concept is something that makes
you open the window when your room is warm up
rather than turn off the heater. Definitely is not a
few at all, I would say, but it's difficult, and
(29:03):
subsidies are also a way of acting in populism, and
that's something that we need to cut it. Definitely, someone
has to pay it, right, I mean the point is
who's going to pay? But this is not what have
happened in Argentina. For decades, rich people didn't pay electricity.
It's not only that the poorest didn't. So there are
(29:23):
a lot of cross subsidies here. So poor people are
paying the cheap electricity to the rich people, and this
is something crazy that you need to stop immediately, particularly
with the natural resources we do have. I mean, Argentina
perhaps is one of the top in terms of the
natural resources of wind or solar, everything is there. Everything.
(29:47):
The capacity factor, which is the measurement of how much
let's say, when you can get out of a winter
binner or a solar panel, is picking among the podium
in the world. We have we in firms that are
above sixty percent sixty five percent capacity factor, solar business
about thirty four thirty five percent, this is crazy, is
(30:10):
twice what you can get in Europe. And still under
that condition, the lack of possibility to structure long term
infrastructure projects, which is not only the case for renewables,
it is the case for long term infrastructure projects, highways, hospitals,
everything is killing the same country. So that's a situation
that most of emerging markets have. Can't imagine what it
(30:32):
means in Africa to have, you know, people paying twice
the price for their own electricity that what they can paign.
Speaker 1 (30:40):
So you have, since stepping down from government role in Argentina,
have founded an organization to try and create this kind
of momentum for renewables in other parts of the world.
Can you give examples of where you've succeeded and how
you know?
Speaker 3 (30:57):
First to say is that we created WELP years ago
inspired by our own experience, basically to offer others what
we would have love to have when we've been in
government and we didn't have. So we decided, under this
concept of offering others what we would have loved to have,
(31:17):
we decided to work across emergent markets in Southeast Asia,
in Africa, and in Latin America and the Caribbean, where
governments really need about support in designing and structuring renewables
at scale. We're working in the three regions in Southeast Asia,
in Pakistan, we've done things. In the Philippines. We work
(31:38):
in West Africa, in Togo, we are dealing in corporational
agreement that hopefully we will go online, with Senegal, with South Africa,
with Kenya. We're working in the Caribbean, in Jamaica, in Barbados,
and in this last two we support the government directly
with the design. In the case of Jamaicable energy auction
(32:02):
was fully supported by RELP to the government we are
now working in the second round of functions to keep
on incorporating renewables and batteries as well in the country.
In Barbados, we've been working together with the government, with
the Ministry of the Government of Minamoti to support them
(32:22):
in the design and implementation of the batteries of the
best auction, the first auction they run ever, So that's
the kind of things that we do. We work hands
on with the governments.
Speaker 1 (32:34):
So it's not copying and pasting what you did in Argentina,
but sort of figuring out what is the need for
that country at that point in this supply chain that
you need to build off all kinds of financial tools
and regulations and markets to actually implement renewable energy projects exactly.
Speaker 3 (32:53):
Welp and bess technical policy and financial expertise directly within
national governments to design competitive auctions and to integrate the
risky instruments we bring. I would say this tined mindset
focused on delivery and effective implementation that concept of the
hands song, so we you know, we have people in
(33:15):
the field in the countries working together with the governments
to help them run the six.
Speaker 1 (33:20):
Thank you for sharing your story of Argentina and for
the story of supporting other developing countries and getting renewable energy.
Thanks for joining the show.
Speaker 3 (33:30):
Thank you so much, ak Shat for having me really,
thank you very much.
Speaker 1 (33:40):
And thank you for listening to zero. Now for the
sound of the week. Now, that's the call of the
endangered Florida panther, which lives in Florida's Big Cypress National Preserve.
(34:01):
The preserve is just one of many places in the
US that may lose protection as part of President Donald
Trump's plan to trim the National Park Service. The White
House is proposing a cut of one point two billion
dollars to the Park Service's budget. Read more about it
on Bloomberg dot com, Forward slash Green. If you liked
(34:21):
this episode, please take a moment to rate and review
the show on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. This episode was
produced by Oscar Boyd with help from Annamazarakus. Our theme
music is composed by wonderl Special thanks to Somersadi Mosses
andam Laura Milan and Sharon chen. I'm Akshadrati back soon.
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