Climate Positive

The automotive industry is undergoing a major transformation, with electric vehicles poised to dominate the future of transport. But this transition requires more than just building great EVs; it demands a comprehensive approach to ensure our electric grid can reliably support the demand from millions of new EVs. In this episode of Climate Positive, host Guy Van Syckle speaks with Apoorv Bhargava, CEO of WeaveGrid, a company at the...

In this episode of Climate Positive, hosts Gil Jenkins and Daniela Shapiro sit down with Tom Hunt, CEO, and Bret Labadie, CFO, of Pivot Energy—a Colorado-based renewable energy provider and IPP that develops, finances, builds, owns, and manages solar and energy storage projects. As an ECP portfolio company and Certified B Corporation, Pivot Energy seeks to leverage its renewable expertise to deliver innovative solutions that help b...

In this episode of Climate Positive, hosts Gil Jenkins and Guy Van Syckle chat with Zeyneb Magavi, Executive Director of HEET, a Massachusetts-based non-profit focused on designing a strategic evolution of aging gas systems into bidirectional ambient thermal grids, with the aim of driving rapid and equitable decarbonization of heating and cooling in urban areas. The enlivening conversation centers around the networked geothermal, a...

Growing demand requires growing supply. With more and more data centers and industrial facilities coming online, the United States will likely need 40 GW of incremental peak power generation – requiring hundreds of billions of dollars of related investment – just over the next few years. As large corporate buyers of power seek to meet their climate goals, they are increasingly looking at nuclear power as a scalable and cost-effecti...

With rising investor demand and regulatory pressure in certain jurisdictions, company disclosure of their exposure to climate risks and their environmental impact has emerged as an expectation with tangible economic benefits. Increasingly, companies can improve their access to lower-cost capital by disclosing their exposure to climate risks and opportunities. Indeed currently over 23,000 companies now report through CDP, underscori...

Critical minerals are absolutely vital for the energy transition. Without nickel, copper, lithium, cobalt and other rare earth elements, we simply cannot produce the solar modules, wind turbines, batteries and other technologies necessary to decarbonize the global economy. It’s no surprise then that demand for these critical minerals is expected to almost triple by 2030. 

But mining, processing and incorporating these critical mine...

In this this episode of Climate Positive, hosts Gil Jenkins and Conor Fryer sit down with Tim McDonnell, Climate & Energy Editor at Semafor and the author of Semafor’s Net Zero newsletter, to delve into the current state of climate journalism, real-time energy crises, and the forces driving the energy transition. Tim reflects on how far climate reporting has come, moving past basic awareness to explore intricate, interwoven stories...

In this episode, Dr. Tallamy and Hilary Langer tap into the world of caterpillars, birds, and native flora to illuminate how individuals can be agents of change and address urgent issues of species loss and ecosystem collapse. From publishing research on insects to reviving his own property that was overrun by non-native plants, Dr. Tallamy's journey has been a fascinating exploration of the intricate web of life that begins from t...

Over the last few years, the United States has led the world in the fight against climate change by passing some of the most impactful and largest investments in infrastructure and related regulatory reforms ever. Together, the Inflation Reduction Act and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law seek to deploy nearly $1 trillion in climate positive infrastructure investment over the next decade.
 

At the same time, however, the U.S. Supreme...

For the world to meet its growing need for low-cost clean energy and achieve ambitious decarbonization targets, land-based onshore wind energy must be an increasingly large part of the electricity generation mix—potentially as much as 20-41% by 2050, according to BloombergNEF and the International Energy Agency (IEA). But there is a challenge: the most efficient and cost-effective wind turbines, currently applied only in offshore w...

The maritime industry transports over 80% of goods worldwide and is essential to the deployment of climate technologies.  At present, the industry contributes approximately 2 to 3% of global emissions, but this figure is projected to grow without major changes to the industry and its ancillary services. However, decarbonizing the maritime industry is unusually challenging.  As the president of Marine and executive vice president at...

As the accelerating deployment of variable wind and solar resources pushes us ever closer to Net Zero – or the state whereby we’re not emitting any more greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere than we are simultaneously removing – we increasingly need to deploy both battery storage as well as dispatchable renewable baseload generation. But despite its ability to serve as dispatchable renewable baseload, geothermal energy today...

We started the Climate Positive podcast just over three years ago at HASI, seeing an opportunity to contribute our unique perspective to the climate and clean energy podcast scene. As a pure play climate investment firm, we aimed to cultivate a forum for mission-driven leaders, innovators, and changemakers to engage in conversations about the challenges and opportunities on the path to a climate-positive future. Our inaugural episo...

For over a century, the U.S. government has provided subsidies – often in the form of tax credits – to support domestic energy production. For renewable energy sources, these tax credits have traditionally subsidized investment (i.e., a project’s capital expenditure) and production (i.e., the amount of energy produced by a project). But the Inflation Reduction Act altered these tax credits in a number of ways: it significantly exte...

Barbara Humpton, President and CEO of Siemens USA, sits down with Gil Jenkins and Susan Nickey to discuss Siemens' pivotal role in advancing sustainability across industry, infrastructure, and transportation sectors. The conversation dives into Siemens' approach to decarbonization as an engine for growth and spotlights how innovation at the grid edge will be key to delivering a more sustainable future, guiding energy flows and bala...

Just as not every battery is created equal, neither is every renewable energy credit (REC). Even though RECs today are commodified financial products companies purchase to reduce their carbon footprint, the actual avoided emissions impact of an individual REC can vary dramatically based on the time and place it is generated. As our carbon accounting frameworks seek to become more precise and impact-driven and as transmission constr...

In this episode, Hilary Langer met with Dr. Antonius Gagern, the Executive Director of the Carbon to Sea Initiative, for a lively conservation about a hot topic: the promises and sensitivities of tinkering with the ocean’s chemistry to enable it to store more carbon dioxide. Initial research on ocean alkalinity enhancement supports its potential as a significant means of capturing carbon. Carbon to Sea is a $50M non-profit effort t...

In this episode, Gil Jenkins sits down with Bill Weir, Chief Climate Correspondent at CNN, for a rich, engaging, and meaningful conversation about his new book, “Life As We Know It (Can Be): Stories of People, Climate, and Hope in a Changing World.”

While reporting from every state and every continent, Bill Weir has spent decades telling the stories of unique people, places, cultures, and creatures on the brink of change. As the fir...

Steel is the world’s most used metal, and enables the construction of everything from buildings to wind turbines. Unfortunately, steel manufacturing is incredibly carbon intensive, contributing to approximately 8% of global green house gas emissions. As CEO of InventWood, Josh Cable envisions a future where the demand for steel can be satisfied with a renewable resouce: fast growing woods like Poplar. By densifying wood, Josh Cable...