Thanks to everyone who reached out to ask about my next professional chapter in response to today’s article Update: I’m heading west and will be publicly sharing details on my new role just before Halloween 🎃 🤐 www.ft.com/content/b2a3...

🚨 Professional News 🚨 Friday marked my last day at Columbia University. The past 5 years have been transformational for me, full of impact & major milestones. Reflections on the past 5 years + a preview of my next professional chapter 👇 www.linkedin.com/posts/meliss...

Sales of heat pump water heaters surged in 2023 in the USA (hello Inflation Reduction Act??), and gas heaters continue to lose market share cleantechnica.com/2024/09/24/s... 🔌💡

🚨 New SHIFT KEY episode just dropped 🚨 This week, @robinsonmeyer.bsky.social and @jessejenkins.bsky.social bring you a user’s guide to new green banks, with help from the EPA's Jahi Wise and Elemental Impact's Dawn Lippert. Listen below, or wherever you get your podcasts.

"The U.S. solar manufacturing boom could be big enough to allow the country to soon become a net exporter of solar panels for the first time in decades." www.canarymedia.com/articles/sol... via Eric Wesoff

Just discovered these extended clips from Chasing Carbon Zero on PBS NOVA. Fun memories recording this with Miles O’Brien and the whole NOVA team + our team at Columbia including Natalie Volk and Jen Wu. #netzero #energytransition youtu.be/x-oFuAgnzkk?...

US EIA: Combined US sales of hybrid vehicles, plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, and battery electric vehicles increased from 17.8% of total new light-duty vehicle sales in 1Q 2024 to 18.7% in 2Q 2024, according to estimates from Wards Intelligence: www.eia.gov/todayinenerg...

Good deep dive into the state of local permitting barriers and what states can do to address them 🔌💡: www.utilitydive.com/news/states-...

Some nice copy here …apparently California now has batteries roughly equivalent to 5 Diablo Canyons (in capacity, not run time…)

“The increasing number of days with above-average temperatures means that the lack of air-conditioning can be a matter of life and death,” said Sheila Foster, a professor at the Columbia Climate School. www.nytimes.com/2024/07/17/n...

California ISO on managing this month's heat wave: "California’s power grid held up against prolonged record temperatures because of new clean energy resources, more battery storage, and enhanced coordination with state government." www.caiso.com/about/news/m... h/t Wes Venteicher

“Human bodies tend to use sleep time to lower temperatures and recover from a brutally hot day; if temperatures don’t drop enough, people sleeping without air conditioning — or, say, people in major cities that didn’t get their power back for a week after a storm — don’t get that chance”

The drivers of climbing electricity rates are… 1. spikes in gas prices 2. rising costs to maintain and rebuild grid infrastructure 3. a utility business model that incentivizes big capital investments that customers have to pay off over decades www.canarymedia.com/articles/uti...

It can be cheaper for a utility to pay to electrify homes rather than updating gas pipelines that serve those homes. Enjoyed speaking with James Ford at WPIX-New York about why electrification can make a lot of economic sense for utilities like ConEdison pix11.com/news/local-n...

“The damage to human health, agriculture and the global economy is just beginning to be understood.” www.nytimes.com/2024/06/21/c...

Great (and very interesting) thread by @katharinehayhoe.com 👇

4 hours and counting… ⏰📺 Excited to go live with Dr. Nee on PBS NOVA today - will be streaming on Twitch and YouTube if you want to join the conversation live! www.youtube.com/live/hFmAOrA...

Ecuador was plunged into a nationwide blackout on Wednesday afternoon, the country’s public work minister said, blaming the emergency on a failure of a key transmission line. www.nytimes.com/2024/06/19/w...

Driving in Tennessee this week — and each of our last 3 Tesla charging stations have increased in size by 2-3x since our August ‘23 trip Can’t help but wonder how much this region’s history (read: TVA) is influencing the build out @joshdr83.bsky.social #energytransition #electrification

Really enjoyed diving into these two books with @edcrooks.bsky.social and @josephmajkut.bsky.social on The Energy Gang last week! Happy listening, y'all!

For those who are also interested in reading Alon's latest --- Island Press just let me know that folks can use code TECH for 20% off islandpress.org/books/making...

What an awesome start to the week! Just had coffee with Alon Tal. Thanks 🙏 for the great conversation and the copy of your latest book with @IslandPress, Alon! Can’t wait to dive into it 📖 😀 #climatetech #energytransition

How do we make rooftop solar cheap in America? Here, it costs ~$4/watt to install a rooftop PV system, 4X as much as a similar system in Australia today! On today's Shift Key, we talk to Mary Powell, CEO of Sunrun, about how to unlock rooftop solar's full potential. heatmap.news/podcast/shif...

This looks really cool --- and, as the posting says "This is not an academic exercise—we’re looking for proposals with a near term path to implementation such that they could translate into real demand for carbon removal suppliers within the next 3-5 years." #netzero #speedandscale

Today --- while doing some paperwork --- I discovered that papers that I have (co-)authored have been cited in policy documents nearly 800 times. And thinking through what this number means got me thinking about broader conversations about "impact" and "success" in research and academia... 🧵

There’s a growing trend of replacing shuttered coal plants with solar, batteries, or other forms of clean energy. The ground is already cleared and the hookup to the electrical power grid is already there, so it makes all the sense in the world! More of this please 😊🌎 Here’s Nevada USA…

Awesome to see the trailer for #RisingTides drop! Enjoyed recording with Philip Boucher-Hayes on campus here at Columbia University last fall. And am excited to see how it all has come together. Huge thanks to Natalie Volk for all her hard work sorting the logistics for recording that day!

On Thursday 3/27 - C3E is hosting a rockstar panel on "Leveraging Data & Digitalization to Make the Grid More Visible, Resilient, & Clean” w/ Lisa Frantzis, Page Crahan, Alexina Jackson, Maria Pope, & Silvia Valerio c3e.org/webinars

Yesterday, I spoke with Phaedra Trethan @usatoday.com about how April's eclipse will impact solar power in its path. #Eclipse2024 #solar www.usatoday.com/story/news/n...

Almost all of our electricity flows through a distribution transformer, a tech that is facing unprecedented demand. New analysis from NREL estimates that transformer capacity will need to increase 160%–260% by 2050 compared to 2021 levels. That's a BIG deal. www.nrel.gov/news/program...

From Latitude Media: Electrification requires batteries, and batteries require critical minerals, which means that however much the battery economy is heralded as a decarbonization solution, it's still an extraction economy. The question is: can we change that? www.latitudemedia.com/news/the-min...

"It makes perfect sense that the IEA should seek to include India as a full member given the outsized role the country will play in the global energy transition over the next decade or so..." www.business-standard.com/opinion/colu...

“Together, automobiles and electric power generate more than half of the country’s greenhouse gas emissions. That makes the rules designed to curb pollution from those sources some of the most important tools that the E.P.A. can wield to tackle climate change” www.nytimes.com/2024/03/01/c...

It’s live! Episode 1 of the latest season of #TheBigSwitch is now available wherever you get your #podcasts. In this season we are diving into batteries. 🔋 In episode 1 we explore how we make batteries and ask “Are batteries the new oil?” podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/t...

The U.S. has big plans to make EV charging available across the country, but that effort is moving more slowly that needed to solve climate change. I spoke with CBS News environmental correspondent David Schechter about this 👇 www.youtube.com/watch?v=twcM...

It’s the weekend everyone, so you know what that means. Time to drink two polar seltzers and do a thread on the power transformer shortage. Without transformers, we don’t get a clean energy transition. And as energysky knows, there’s been a shortage due to covid, supply chain, & labor constraints 🔌🔋

Join us for a virtual event on March 4 on Nuclear Power --- including the role of nuclear energy, past cost overruns experienced in US reactor projects, and prospective strategies to achieve cost-effective outcomes in the future. mailchi.mp/columbia/iea...

Another beautiful, snowy morning here at Columbia ❄️⛄️

2023 was another huge year for batteries. 🔌💡

Welcome to BlueSky @globalecoguy.bsky.social !

Catch Episode 2 of SHIFT KEY, where we explore the headwinds buffeting the US offshore wind industry and ask whether the sector has finally hit rock bottom. The only way to go now is up, right?? Listen here or wherever you get your podcasts: heatmap.news/podcast/shif... 🔌💡 climatesky

Join us on March 1 for a discussion focused on “Resource Extraction and Energy Equity" as we explore India's current energy landscape and potential ways for ensuring its energy transition is equitable and just. www.energypolicy.columbia.edu/events/clima...

Great suggestion! My Follow Friday: @shastingssimon.bsky.social @robinsonmeyer.bsky.social @drsimevans.bsky.social @kevinjkircher.com @knowledgeproblem.bsky.social @cityatlas.bsky.social And anyone else active on the EnergySky feed (can just put 🔌💡in your posts for it to show up there)

Energy expert Michael E. Webber gives his firsthand impressions of COP28. He says getting wealthy petrostates (like the UAE and U.S.) onboard with climate action is the only way to reach emissions goals. www.asme.org/topics-resou...

My colleagues took a look at the BIG WIRES Act to understand how close the bill might come to realizing its intended benefits and accelerate the construction of new electricity transmission projects that cross existing electric grid boundaries 👇 www.energypolicy.columbia.edu/estimating-i...

If you'd told me 5y ago when I was starting to get grumpy about the way we handle "waste" methane in GHG accounting that this would be one of the single most important things I spend my time on, I wouldn't have believed it. From @ghgpolicy.org & me: how methane offsets could upend the H2 industry

⚡️🙌🔌💡🤙

The most direct application of the Social Cost of CO₂ (SCC) I've seen yet: Incorporate it in federal purchasing decisions subscriber.politicopro.com/article/eene...

Essential @katharinehayhoe.com: “The true threat is the delusion that our opinion of science somehow alters its reality… The window to prevent widespread dangerous human interference with the climate system is closing fast. Rejecting this reality puts us all at risk.” www.wired.co.uk/article/kath...