With Great Power

Marc Spieler had been at the oil and gas giant Halliburton for 13 years when he first saw inklings of the energy transition – like Shell’s investment in geothermal and Exxon Mobil’s wind and solar PPAs. Once EVs started to go mainstream in 2019, he knew the energy transition was for real. And he wanted in. 

So he got a job at NVIDIA the same year the tech giant launched a new line of semiconductor chips specifically designed for pro...

Hudson Gilmer worked in telecom in the 90’s when the industry transformed how data moved. And it didn’t take long for him to realize that a similar transformation would happen with electric utilities – and he needed to be a part of it.

So he started a dynamic line rating company, LineVision, that uses sensors and data to show what is happening on transmission lines in real time. But, like other start-ups in the power sector, LineVis...

In Nigeria, tens of millions of people live without access to reliable power. Utibe Bassey grew up in Lagos, and knows what it’s like to not have electricity to perform simple daily tasks. 

When she moved to the United States as a teen, she didn’t think much about electric utilities. But she did think about how managers treat employees – a thought spurred by an unfortunate instance she witnessed while working at a fast food chain. E...

Sarah Kapnick has always been drawn to solving complex problems, and as a kid she dreamed of being a mathematician. But a stronger desire to work on more tangible things, led her to blaze a career path that combined climate science and financial risk. 

Since becoming NOAA’s chief scientist in 2022, one way that Kapnick has applied her unique skill set is by helping utilities better leverage climate data and predictions in resiliency...

Luis Reyes is a lifer at Kit Carson Electric, a rural energy co-operative in northern New Mexico. He grew up in a home powered by the utility and has been its CEO for 30 years. Under his leadership – and the direction of co-op members – Kit Carson has moved all of its daytime energy needs to renewables.

Now, in a push to hit 100% round-the-clock renewable energy, he wants to develop a green hydrogen project for long-duration storage...

Mark Waclawiak was tuned into energy issues at an early age. Both his parents worked in the industry: his mom designed electrical systems for buildings and his dad worked at the utility. So the importance of electricity was always apparent to him.

When he started working for a utility in 2015, he quickly identified an opportunity to use data to improve reliability, which led to running the operational performance team. The team move...

Kim Getgen moved to Silicon Valley from Washington D.C. in 2000, just in time for the dot com bubble burst. Despite her timing, she fell hard for the excitement and opportunity of startups and technology innovation. 

Kim launched and worked at many startups, but also took roles in larger organizations where she gravitated toward “intrapreneurship.” But after suffering burnout four years ago, she started thinking about ways to encour...

Ahmad Faruqui has been researching electricity pricing since the mid 1970’s, when the cost of a kilowatt-hour was flat. But in the 80’s and 90’s, he started working on dynamic pricing – pioneering the concept of time-of-use rates.

The big breakthrough for time-of-use rates came during the fallout from the California energy crisis. Later, thanks to the rollout of smart meters, more power providers started experimenting with dynamic r...

Heather Rock has always liked grappling with big, existential questions. Knowing she wanted to “serve a carbon-neutral future,” she left Chevron in 2018 to become senior director of strategy for Pacific Gas & Electric. 

When she joined PG&E, it was on the brink of bankruptcy due to billions of dollars in liability after its equipment sparked wildfires. But Heather says the utility is now building a safer grid that is more resilient ...

From his early days working on regulatory policy on the Hill to his current role as president of Grid Strategies, Rob Gramlich has been focused on future-proofing the electrical grid.  

Twenty years ago, utilities invested heavily in load demand forecasting. But as load growth fell precipitously in the 2000s, those departments shrank. Now, with load growth skyrocketing from increasingly-electrified manufacturing, burgeoning data cen...

In 2016, Dr. Kyri Baker was a researcher at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory working on a new home energy management system. Called Foresee, the system reduced energy usage through machine learning algorithms that tracked consumption patterns and grid conditions. 

Today, Kyri is an associate professor at the University of Colorado Boulder, where she continues her research on machine learning applications for the power grid. ...

In early 2023, things were moving along as planned for a rate restructuring plan at Holy Cross Energy, a rural electric co-op in Colorado. The board of directors had approved the plan, which would separate the cost of energy from the cost of delivering that energy to the customer.

The change meant rooftop solar customers could continue to sell their excess electricity back to Holy Cross, just at a much lower rate that would slow the...

Over the past two seasons of With Great Power, you've heard stories from all kinds of people working at the front lines of change on the power grid. 

We've covered the rise of electric vehicles, explored the dawn of long-duration storage, unpacked the utility digital transformation, and asked: how can power companies learn from other industries about change?

In March, we’re coming back for another season on the tech, business, and ma...

There are more than 250 million cars on U.S. roads today. Only about 1% of them are electric. But with seven million more EVs projected to hit the road by 2030, that percentage is changing.

The problem? Access to all those EVs isn't equal. The majority of EV owners in the country are high-income and white. But to cut transportation emissions in the U.S., we need to make EV ownership and charging a staple in all communities.

That's wh...

Over the past 20 years, Kerri Carnes has worked a lot of different jobs at Arizona Public Service, or APS. She's been an administrative assistant, real-time trader, and regulation manager. Today, she serves as the director of customer-to-grid solutions. 

Besides maintaining service, Kerri and her colleagues are determined to increase customer adoption of technologies like solar, EVs, and smart thermostats.

They're leveraging all the ...

A wave of extreme weather this year has left Jim Kapsis questioning whether utilities are prepared for more frequent, intense weather events in the future.

There's a growing group of startups that are more than ready to provide solutions, but they've struggled to break into the space. They need help figuring out a business model that works in the unique market that is the utility industry. 

Jim's response? A new company called the Ad...

Rappahannock Electric Cooperative recently received a $38 million grant through the Department of Energy's Grid Innovation and Partnership Program. The grant will fund a  massive rollout of technologies that will serve as the backbone of the energy transition. 

Peter Muhoro is one of the executives at REC that will oversee these projects. The money will be used to implement a new distributed energy resources management system, deplo...

In 2016, Edison International was rethinking how to boost their efforts toward fighting climate change. As the parent company behind Southern California Edison, they were making strides in the power sector. 

But Edison International wanted to tackle decarbonization in other sectors. So they added clean energy consulting into the mix with their new venture, Edison Energy.

This past summer, Drew Murphy decided to take the reins over at...

In January, Illinois' largest utility released ComEd 2030 – their roadmap for providing clean power for more than 4 million customers.   

For CEO Gil Quiniones and the company, that means hitting big marks like enabling almost 2 million EVs by 2030, $1 billion in energy assistance for customers, integrating DERs, and procuring more clean power.

If done right, ComEd's path would be a big win for the state's clean energy goals, and ene...