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How to Add 300 Gigawatts to the Grid Without Building a Single Power Plant · Energy Empire

0:00
I feel like, Amit, it's like you're kind of like looking in
0:03
the couch cushions and finding 1,000,000 bucks.
0:05
That's what it feels. Like $25 million per MW.
0:10
It's, it's like, it's like the change that you find in your
0:12
drawer when you open, except that here it's like trillions of
0:16
dollars. And it is also a natural
0:17
competitiveness issue, which can literally define the course of
0:21
humanity for the next 100 years. So the stakes are much bigger.
0:28
Energy isn't just an industry, it's how the world works.
0:32
I'm Jigger Shaw, a clean energy entrepreneur.
0:34
And I'm Jamie Nolan, a clean energy communications executive.
0:38
Welcome to Energy Empire. Wow.
0:40
We just like had one of these crazy experiences where, you
0:44
know, I just dropped my kids off at Legoland and I have one.
0:50
But then, you know, we have cousins who joined him and then
0:53
had to like, rush over to the recording studio to like, you
0:57
know, record the podcast. And so Legoland I think is like
1:01
pretty decent, I have to say. Oh really?
1:03
Well, I mean, I appreciate your level of commitment.
1:06
I see that you are joining us wearing what is on your shirt.
1:09
Are you? What are those crabs?
1:11
Americana, look at this, Rosie. Americana, look at you with your
1:16
patriotism and your commitment to the pod that you are even
1:21
recording from vacation. How's your?
1:24
Wife feel about that? I mean, she's not happy, but at
1:28
the end of the day, you know, I found that like, there was only
1:31
so many reschedulings we could do.
1:34
And so I was like, let's get this done all.
1:36
Right. Well, please make it clear to
1:38
her that it was not my idea, OK? I hope she knows every time that
1:43
you're working overtime, it was definitely your idea.
1:47
I am always happy to be like, oh, it's an off week.
1:50
No, I know, but it's pretty good.
1:51
Like my, I have a 10 year old and he he, he's fine, He's doing
1:55
great. He was excited.
1:56
He was like, you're giving me the freedom to just roam around
1:59
the park. I was like, yes, he's like, this
2:00
is amazing. Great day.
2:03
So I agree. You.
2:05
The conversation we're having with Ahmed Narayan from Grid
2:08
Care is a really interesting one for me.
2:11
It's, you know, these kinds of topics can be so boring because
2:14
it's really about this esoteric thing within the grid, right?
2:18
Which is that we operate a grid in the way in which you would
2:23
think about worst possible outcomes, right?
2:25
So you say if these five things occur, we need to make sure that
2:29
there's extra capacity such that you know, we can continue to
2:33
ride through even if all five things occur and then everyone
2:36
keeps having power. But what that means is that
2:39
there's 100,000 megawatts of extra capacity in the grid that
2:43
could be unlocked right away with the right software.
2:47
And it's the craziest things because this stuff sounds so
2:50
boring. But I think he went to Portland
2:53
General and found 450 megawatts of capacity they didn't know was
2:57
there, right? And as a result, rates are going
2:59
down by 5% for everybody who lives in Portland General,
3:02
right? He found 650 megawatts of
3:04
capacity in National Grid New York's territory.
3:08
And as a result, their rates are going to go down 5% for everyone
3:11
who lives in that territory. Like it has real world
3:13
consequences on affordability. I mean, those numbers speak for
3:17
themselves. If you're seeing that data and
3:19
you're a utility executive, I don't know how you aren't
3:21
calling them. I mean, I'm, I'm really excited
3:24
to talk to him because I swear grid utilization is the topic of
3:28
the year. Like you cannot turn around
3:30
without hearing about how we can get more value out of the grid
3:33
that we've already paid for. And here is a company that
3:36
actually has a solution and has very, very clear ROI on the
3:42
investment in their solution to improve the efficiency of what
3:46
we have already paid for on the grid and get more out of it.
3:50
Totally. And I think that it really
3:52
follows on from the fantastic episode we had with Secretary
3:56
Granholm, which is right, what governors can do, right?
3:59
A lot in this moment. Governors need to become pH DS
4:03
and how electric utility systems work and they need to know that
4:06
solutions like this exist. And if they don't know, well,
4:10
then it's pretty hard to mandate it on to your utility to force
4:13
them to get more out of the grid we've already paid for.
4:16
Absolutely. I mean, they either need to get
4:18
the PhDs or they need to hire the PhDs or the equivalent of
4:22
it, right? Because there's a lot of subject
4:25
matter expertise out there and a lot of these solutions have just
4:28
been waiting in the wings for their moment to shine.
4:31
And so I'm excited that we're finally at a moment where
4:34
they're getting their due and we're we're seeing the real
4:37
world benefits of them. And so, you know, Amit has like
4:41
the best example of of what this looks like and how it's applied
4:46
and what it means for everyday people in terms of money back on
4:51
their utility bills. Energy Empire is powered by
4:58
Octopus energy. Natasha, I'll give you a #3
5:03
Million electric vehicles in American driveways parked 22
5:08
hours a day. Why does that keep you up at
5:11
night? Because we paid for it.
5:13
Billions of dollars on batteries, on wheels, and the
5:16
grid treats them like they don't exist.
5:18
That's not a fleet. That's a stranded asset.
5:21
Plenty of assets sit idle. My lawnmower is stranded too.
5:25
Yes, but your lawnmower can't power your house.
5:28
Those cars charge at the worst hours because nobody's
5:32
coordinating them. Fix the coordination and their
5:35
capacity. Already built, already connected
5:38
and already in the garage. No new plants, no new wires,
5:42
right? The power plants already built,
5:45
someone just has to turn it on. That's what we do.
5:48
Thanks Natasha Crowe, vice president of marketing and comms
5:52
at Octopus Energy North America. Link is in the show notes.
6:02
Amit, everyone is acting as if the grid is maxed out.
6:05
Interconnection queues are years long at this point, and we need
6:08
to build massive new infrastructure.
6:10
You're arguing something different, which is that a big
6:13
chunk of the problem is that we just can't see what's already
6:16
sitting there on the grid. So make that case for us.
6:20
Well, first of all, just want to say I'm so excited to be here
6:24
with both of you. And Jagger, you have been such a
6:27
personal inspiration for me over the years.
6:30
All the work that you have done across startups and then in the
6:35
government and public service. A big part of what I'm doing
6:39
today is just trying to follow your footsteps and inspired by
6:44
you. So thank.
6:44
You for you know, like you can, you can expand that answer
6:47
further, Amit, like you know, all all kind words are
6:50
appreciated. No, but no, we, we love what
6:53
you're doing now. I mean, you obviously had all
6:56
these success stories in terms of, you know, companies you
6:58
started auto grid, you sold to Schneider Electric.
7:00
So we're excited that you're back in the game.
7:03
Like, I mean, you know, having the best entrepreneurs in the
7:05
country back in the game is critical.
7:07
Yeah. And look, I mean, I've been on
7:09
both sides of this AI infrastructure build out story.
7:13
First, I was doing software to design these semiconductor chips
7:17
to drive the demand for compute. And now for the last several
7:22
years I've been working on the supply side, making sure that
7:26
the energy supply can keep up with with that demand.
7:28
So when the two movements collided, I just felt it was too
7:33
big to sit out, even though when I sold my previous company, the
7:37
only thing that I'd explicitly ruled out for my career was to
7:41
become ACEO of another startup. But I think with the with the AI
7:46
race going on, the next three to five years is going to decide
7:51
actually the shape of humanity for probably 100 plus years.
7:56
And right now we have this challenge, I call it the time to
7:59
energize challenge in the US, which is what we are addressing.
8:02
And I feel that we have a pretty unique insight into how this can
8:06
be addressed. So that inspired me to come back
8:08
into the game. So your case is that a big part
8:12
of our problem with the grid is that we just can't see what's
8:14
already there. Make that case for us, and how
8:18
does Grid Care help to address that?
8:21
Yeah. I mean, our fundamental thesis
8:23
is that America doesn't have a power shortage.
8:28
We have lack of visibility in what already exists.
8:32
And I think the one thing I want to clarify is that I'm not
8:37
against infrastructure build out.
8:39
If our power demand is going to grow and double or triple in the
8:44
next decade, we absolutely have to build more transmission
8:48
lines, We absolutely have to build more generation, we have
8:50
to build more substations, all of that.
8:53
But here is the challenge, the pace at which infrastructure can
8:57
be deployed with pouring concrete, getting the permits,
9:01
new technologies, that pace is simply not keeping up with the
9:07
speed at which AI needs to get deployed.
9:09
And so when we started looking at it, we realized that maybe
9:13
the solution is hiding in plain sight.
9:16
If we can optimize what we already have in the ground, that
9:21
is the fastest and the cheapest and the cleanest way in which we
9:26
can power this AI revolution. And so our team started looking
9:30
at this in a lot more detail and we published a study to show
9:36
that if you look at the grid in full granularity, it's only
9:41
about 1/3 utilized. That doesn't mean it's lying
9:46
idle all the time. It doesn't mean that the
9:48
reliability constraints go away, but it also means that if you
9:52
are able to shine a light on it, we understand it better, We can
9:56
create more visibility and we are smarter about this
9:58
infrastructure. We can squeeze a lot more out of
10:01
it. And if you can do it in code,
10:04
not copper and concrete, we can do it in 6 to 12 months, not 6
10:07
to 12 years. And that's really what inspired
10:10
us to go and address this challenge.
10:12
Yeah, I think they call it speed to power, right?
10:14
So I think you guys are right in the middle of it.
10:17
I mean, and then you just got validation, right?
10:19
You raised $64,000,000 in your latest round and you know you've
10:23
had some early wins with Portland General and National
10:26
Grid New York. So talk about the investment
10:29
environment and what are these investors really investing into?
10:33
What is the revenue model that they believe you know actually
10:36
gets them the returns that they want?
10:38
First of all, let's talk about the value of a MW right now.
10:44
If you look at the revenue of what AI is generating, it's
10:50
somewhere in the range of 10 to $20 million per year per MW of
10:56
capacity that can be unlocked. And so if you look at 100 MW
11:00
data centre, that's billions of dollars of value per year.
11:05
The urgency of the problem is so high that the hyper scalers and
11:10
AI infrastructure companies are willing to spend money on almost
11:16
anything that gives them hope, which includes sending chips to
11:19
space because they think they've run out of all the capacity on
11:22
Earth. It means they want to invest in
11:26
all kinds of technologies, from nuclear fission to fusion.
11:30
And look, I'm a technologist and I believe in all of these things
11:33
and I do think that many of these things are going to
11:36
happen. But the timeline in which some
11:39
of these technologies can be deployed even in the best case,
11:42
even in the most optimistic scenarios are 510 years out.
11:46
And as I mentioned earlier, the the AI race is happening right
11:49
now. We need to find a solution
11:51
today. And there is simply nothing else
11:54
that can be done at this speed and the scale than making use of
11:58
the infrastructure that is already in the ground.
12:01
So that's really where the business case comes in.
12:04
A lot of our investors were some of the earliest investors in the
12:08
AI revolution actually potentially in every wave of
12:11
technologies. Our lead investor in this round
12:14
is a firm called Sutter Hill Ventures who incubated NVIDIA
12:18
way back and then many other companies and John Doerr who was
12:22
the original investor in Amazon and Google and many other
12:26
companies. So they really see where AI is
12:28
going. They have realized power has
12:31
become the defining constraint for this AI revolution to
12:34
happen. And we are providing a solution
12:37
which is not speculative, which is already there.
12:41
It can be deployed at scale. And if we can capture even a
12:45
small part of the value that we are creating, it will create
12:49
tremendous upside for us, our investors and all our
12:52
stakeholders. So let's dig into the analogy
12:56
because you had said that the grid is only used about 1/3 of
12:59
the time and it's, you know, obviously used more than that
13:02
during peak, but less than that at other times, right?
13:05
And you know, I saw that Drew Maloney from Madison Electric
13:08
Institute had used a bus analogy, I think in the podcast
13:12
recently. I'd love to see how Drew's using
13:15
grid utilization at EEI and then you know the other rest, the
13:19
other analogy people use is a restaurant, right?
13:22
Like you have a kitchen, you have a certain staff, you have
13:24
the ability to cook food, you have the ability to sell seats.
13:27
And if those seats aren't sold well, then that's low
13:30
utilization, right? So paint a picture for how those
13:35
that utilization is only at 1/3 or 1/2 right, depending on the
13:39
market that you're in? Yeah, I think the restaurant
13:42
analogy is actually quite apartment in this scenario.
13:45
I use the airplanes on a Thanksgiving Day, but it's the
13:48
same same idea. Look, the grid does get
13:51
constrained, but the precise scenarios under which the grid
13:57
gets constrained are fairly rare.
14:01
And even when these scenarios happen, they happen for only
14:05
very few hours. Historically, the challenge was
14:08
that to get the full visibility and granularity on when these
14:14
rare events are happening was just not feasible using the
14:18
technologies that existed. So if you look go back 20-30
14:22
years, you just had limited compute power.
14:26
So that led to planning assumptions and planning
14:29
methodologies that kept the system reliable and safe.
14:33
But it also meant that we had designed very conservative
14:36
practices and we were leaving a lot of room on the table.
14:41
So, So what we are able to do now with modern AI technologies
14:44
is look across time and look across multiple locations
14:49
instead of 1 location at a time. And we are able to find precise
14:54
conditions under which the grid get can get constrained.
14:57
And just just to do some quick math, if you let's say, have
15:00
10,000 things on your grid, the NARC standard requires that you
15:05
study all possibilities of two simultaneous outages, which
15:09
means that one thing can blow up in 10,000 ways and the second
15:11
thing can blow up in another 10,000 ways.
15:13
So you right off the bat half 100 million scenarios that you
15:16
have to calculate. That's shocking.
15:19
Like, I mean, honestly crazy. And people used to do that
15:22
analysis by hand with General Electric or Siemens engineers,
15:27
right? Yeah, it's brute force.
15:29
I mean, of course there's a lot of technology, but they will run
15:32
these simulations and you cannot run 100 million simulation.
15:36
So you will make some worst case assumptions and you will say,
15:39
well, my load might be one in 10 year maximum.
15:44
And if the two worst outages happen at the same time, what is
15:47
the capacity of the grid? But they would not look at the
15:50
probability, they would not look at all the hours across all the
15:53
10 years that they are analyzing because that computation didn't
15:57
exist. Now the other thing which is
15:58
very interesting that has happened over the last 10-15
16:01
years, thanks in large part to the work that you have done
16:04
Jaguar, is that there is a lot of new technology that has been
16:07
deployed on the grid. I mean, you funded batteries,
16:10
you funded virtual power plants. We have a lot more dynamism on
16:14
the grid, on the operation side. And these are not unproven
16:18
technologies. These are getting deployed at
16:19
scale. The utilities are used to
16:22
dispatching these things, but these technologies are not
16:26
properly accounted for in the part of the utility which is
16:30
calculating how much capacity is available in the in the future.
16:34
And so this is a big part of what we are trying to do, create
16:38
a visibility across the utilities and the customers
16:41
because the planning processes are worst case they're looking
16:44
10 years ahead, operators are looking seconds, minutes, day
16:47
ahead, but they don't look across ten 10s of years.
16:51
And now because of the computation, we can do that
16:54
granular second by second analysis, but look at
16:58
quadrillions of scenarios that might happen over the next 10
17:00
years and figure out exactly what can go wrong.
17:04
And then once we know that, we can also figure out what are the
17:06
best ways in which we can mitigate these rare events and
17:09
rare scenarios. And that would mean maybe making
17:12
the load a little bit flexible, maybe adding a battery
17:15
somewhere, using the virtual power plants that are already in
17:17
place and dispatching them more intelligent.
17:20
So this is not rocket science, but it was also not possible
17:23
with the tools that the utilities had at their disposal
17:27
until very recently. So Amit, like, let's dig in
17:30
further because I think part of what you're saying is, is that
17:33
there are these multiple silos within the utility that each one
17:36
of them has different data. But I think also what you're
17:40
saying is that they have different responsibilities,
17:43
right? And so like none of the three of
17:47
them actually truly understands how to fit a data center into
17:53
their grid, right? And so like, so why don't you
17:56
take a step by step as to why you guys need to exist?
17:59
Why do folks need to use you? Yeah.
18:02
So I mean, as Jigar was mentioning earlier, this is
18:06
something which is not just planning, it is not just
18:09
operations. You have to bring many different
18:14
parts of the utilities who have historically existed in silos
18:19
and they don't have the same view and visibility together.
18:23
But it is actually a lot more than just the internals of the
18:28
utilities themselves. The way we unlock capacity is
18:32
not by saying utilities need to become more efficient.
18:35
We also expect the customers to behave in different ways and
18:41
become better citizens of the grid.
18:44
And one of the challenges that we see is the communication gap
18:49
that exists between the customers of the utilities and
18:52
how the utilities work across all the different functions.
18:56
And so part of our value proposition is that we come in
18:59
with a fresh pair of eyes and we act as a a neutral third party.
19:06
And we are trying to figure out how we can build the bridges
19:10
between the utilities and their customers.
19:12
And we can provide visibility to all the stakeholders which
19:15
includes the regulators, which includes the ISO's of course
19:18
different silos within the utility.
19:20
And then once we are able to create that common picture, we
19:25
can overcome the objections that each one of these stakeholders
19:28
might have and give them the visibility and what it means for
19:32
them. So for example, for the
19:33
planners, they want to make sure that the reliability of the
19:36
system is not going to be compromised if they added a
19:39
particular new load into the system.
19:42
And we quantify that for them. We go to the operators, they
19:46
want to know this new type of flexibility, is it qualified?
19:50
Is it going to show up? What happens if it doesn't show
19:52
up? Who's going to take the risk
19:54
from an operations perspective? And we are able to quantify that
19:57
precisely in terms of how that works.
19:59
The customers want to know what kind of flexibility do they have
20:02
to bring? Are they going to get curtailed?
20:04
How many times are they going to get curtailed?
20:06
Is their compute going to get impacted?
20:08
And we can provide that visibility to the customer so
20:11
that they can figure out what is the impact on their business
20:14
operations. The regulators want to know what
20:16
is the impact to rates. Affordability is a big issue
20:20
right now. And the current narrative in the
20:22
market is that data centers are coming in and they're taking
20:24
away all the power and it's driving up rates for everybody
20:28
else. And so that is 1 big part of our
20:30
value proposition is that by using the infrastructure that we
20:34
already have more effectively, we can help with the
20:38
affordability question. We can actually help reduce the
20:40
rates for everybody. So when you're talking about
20:43
customers, are you talking about hyperscalers?
20:46
Are you talking about all like other types of large load?
20:49
Are you talking about home owners?
20:51
Yeah. When I talk about rates and
20:53
customers, that is anybody who is getting electricity from the
20:57
network, because this network is a fixed cost that we all pay for
21:03
as consumers of electricity based on the usage.
21:06
And if you can get more usage out of this asset, if you can
21:09
increase the utilization from 30% to 40%, that helps bring the
21:14
cost down for all the consumers of the electricity.
21:18
In fact, we published a white paper recently which shows that
21:21
every new GW of capacity added on an existing network using the
21:27
approach of grid care brings the rates down by roughly 5% for a
21:32
typical mid size utility, which is very substantial.
21:35
Wow, that's really impressive. If utilities run the airline
21:38
business, they get paid for having enough planes on the
21:41
busiest travel day of the year and charging everyone more all
21:44
year to keep that capacity. Of course, that's just how the
21:47
business works. The incentive is to build more
21:49
infrastructure and not to get more out of what they already
21:52
have. So how do you sell a product
21:54
that helps utilities use their grid better when their business
21:57
model rewards them for building new grid infrastructure?
22:02
Yeah, I think that is another one of these myths are legacy
22:06
assumptions that are due for a challenge.
22:11
So you're absolutely right that in an economy where there is no
22:15
growth happening for the utilities, the only way they
22:18
could make money historically was by building more
22:21
infrastructure. And the only justification that
22:25
often existed was to build this infrastructure in the name of
22:29
reliability. And that by definition means
22:32
that we end up over building. But what has changed in the last
22:36
one to two years is that we are seeing this unprecedented growth
22:41
in demand for AI and now the utilities are realizing that
22:45
they are in a competitive environment even though they
22:49
still want to deploy capital and they want to build more things.
22:53
The timelines of deploying capital is several years out.
22:59
The earliest that they can build a new transmission line might be
23:02
5 years out. If they can get more revenue on
23:05
their existing infrastructure then their earnings can go up
23:09
higher today. So that's one big change which
23:12
is happening especially for investor owned utilities.
23:14
They realize that they are in a competitive environment and if
23:17
they don't attract this growth now some other utility might
23:21
attract the data centers, but the we're going to call.
23:23
That your hot take of the episode I think.
23:27
That's great. But I think that the the second
23:29
big driver, which I think is maybe even more important and
23:34
that is more universal, it's not just for investor owned
23:36
utilities, it works for Public Utilities as well, is the crisis
23:41
of affordability in electricity rates which has become a
23:44
bipartisan issue. So even if the utilities want to
23:48
deploy more capital, they are not getting these rates approved
23:53
because the historical way of deploying capital was but to
23:57
rate base it, which increases the rates for everybody.
24:00
And the theory is that eventually the benefits will
24:02
outweigh and the rates will come down.
24:04
But I mean that that doesn't happen most of the times.
24:08
So now the legitimate upgrades that the utilities have are
24:12
getting pushed out because there is just a lot of community
24:16
backlash around affordability. We are making it possible to not
24:21
be not have data centers be viewed as a trade off between
24:24
growth and affordability. We are saying that if we can use
24:28
the asset more effectively and we can bring these large loads
24:31
sooner, that is beneficial for everyone.
24:35
The of course the data centers benefit, the utilities get their
24:39
earnings sooner. But because we are now
24:41
amortizing the cost of a fixed infrastructure or more
24:44
electrons, we are able to reduce the rates for everybody.
24:48
And this is where our white paper shows that every new GW of
24:53
data centers that come online or for that matter any new critical
24:57
infrastructure doesn't have to be data centered.
24:59
But if they come online on the existing infrastructure, that
25:03
can reduce rates by about 5% for all consumers, all ratepayers,
25:09
all residential as well as commercial customers of the
25:12
utility. One thing I thought about, Amit,
25:14
was it sounds like you're in some ways a mediator, right?
25:18
Like the value of a mediator is that the data centre trusts that
25:22
you'll do a better job speaking utility, and that the utility
25:25
trusts that you'll do a better job speaking data centre.
25:29
Is that right? Yeah, I think mediator is a
25:31
pretty good analogy, except that I don't like the assumption that
25:35
the two sides are necessarily fighting each other.
25:38
That might be the case. Sometimes I think we are in a
25:41
moment of time where actually both sides are trying to work
25:45
with each other. They just don't know how to work
25:47
with each other. So I like to think of ourselves
25:50
more as a bridge where we say we'll create the bridge.
25:53
Both sides will have to do a few things differently and if they
25:56
both are willing to make those changes then they can meet in
26:00
the middle, which is good for utilities as well as the
26:03
datacenters. OK.
26:05
So there's definitely a major irony here that we're sitting
26:09
with AI is creating the biggest surge in electricity demands in
26:12
a generation. We talk about that all the time
26:14
on the show. And the solution to finding the
26:17
power for AI, it turns out might actually be AI.
26:21
And you're using generative AI to solve AI is own
26:24
infrastructure bottleneck. So is that as circular as it
26:28
sounds like? Do you personally believe that
26:31
AI is going to save us from some of these very problems that it
26:35
has created? Yeah, absolutely.
26:37
I mean, we can call it irony. I like to think of it as a
26:39
virtuous cycle. That is really the promise of
26:42
AI. The more we become intelligent
26:46
and the more we can squeeze out from the existing
26:49
infrastructure, the more abundance it creates.
26:51
And that's true for I think many areas.
26:54
But I do think that the solution of getting out of the current
26:59
situation is to just become smarter about what we have and
27:03
get more out of the system that we have already deployed.
27:07
And then of course, as we grow, it will also make possible to
27:11
deploy more and more things because it will allow us to
27:14
deploy that capital in in this more efficient manner.
27:18
And where does this end up going, Ahmed?
27:20
Like, so when you think about what you're doing for one
27:23
client, right, let's call it a data center, are you in the end
27:26
mapping out the utility grid for your clients?
27:32
And then are you giving them a map in the end saying, well, you
27:35
can put A5 MW EV charging system here and you could probably fit
27:39
another 185 kilowatts worth of manufacturing load growth here.
27:44
And you know, all this other stuff.
27:45
I mean does this become like a real time map for them on load
27:49
growth? Yeah.
27:50
And not just load group, by the way.
27:52
I think you have the other side of the equation as well where
27:55
you have, I don't know what is the current number, but 2.6
27:58
terawatts of generation, which is also stuck waiting to get
28:01
connected to the grid. And like right now all these
28:04
processes are run in a very siloed manner.
28:08
When you study generation, you don't look at the load and vice
28:10
versa. So this is really an MRI for the
28:13
grid in many ways. If you know where the
28:16
constraints are and when they're happening, you have
28:19
opportunities to add load in conjunction with the data
28:22
centers, you can have power that can be used for other critical
28:26
infrastructure, for your hospitals, for your
28:28
manufacturing plants, for electrification of
28:31
transportation and other things. So really we need to look at the
28:35
grid as a system that it was designed to be.
28:37
And once we understand it, we can double the the capacity of
28:42
this grid. And and even even if we double
28:45
the capacity of the grid, we are only talking about going from
28:48
30% utilization to 60% utilization.
28:50
So it's not like climbing Mount Everest in terms of efficiency
28:54
of the system. But that would mean more than
28:57
300 gigawatts of capacity unlocked on the existing
29:00
infrastructure, which we can do in the next three to five years.
29:03
Literally there is no new technology that needs to be
29:05
deployed or developed for that basically.
29:08
Oh, it's completely massive. No, I totally agree with you.
29:10
I mean, but I guess what I'm trying to understand though, is
29:14
this this really a software problem, right, right.
29:17
Or is it, you know, sort of a contract and risk question,
29:21
right? Like is it really just that the
29:24
utility companies sort of need to change their posture, right,
29:30
to how they unlock this 300 gigawatts in your mind?
29:32
I am conservative and I say 100 gigawatts, but I'll take your
29:36
number. You know, like, but is it really
29:39
a risk posture that there's a bunch of people in the bowels of
29:42
the utility in the building who are like, oh, we could never run
29:45
the grid that way? Like the grid would break if we
29:48
did that. You know, we need all this stuff
29:50
that my grandfather taught me how to do.
29:53
Well, it's, it's definitely a technology issue in the sense
29:57
that technology is what enables the unlock and we did not have
30:02
this compute power in the past to analyze the great in this
30:07
detail. But it's not necessarily stops
30:11
at technology. Ultimately it's a trust
30:14
challenge and all the different stakeholders who are part of
30:18
this great ecosystem need to feel comfortable that what we
30:22
are doing is fair for them. And I think technology allows us
30:27
to create that trust and the contracts that are needed
30:31
between all the different parties so that if a data center
30:34
is getting power, they are not unfairly taking that power away
30:41
from some other customer. In return, they are bringing in
30:44
the flexibility that is needed to keep the system running
30:48
reliably and potentially reducing the rates for everybody
30:51
else. So I think technology enables
30:54
the contracts and the trust, but we do need to make sure all the
30:59
different pieces of this ecosystem is brought together
31:04
and that includes the various silos within the utilities.
31:07
But it goes beyond utilities. The data centers themselves have
31:11
to trust that this is something that is going to work for them
31:15
and they are able to get the capacity if they were flexible.
31:19
The ratepayers and their advocates have to believe that
31:22
this is going to bring the rates down and we are not allocating
31:27
willingly the capacity to one particular part of the society.
31:31
And then regulators have to feel confident that this is done in a
31:35
transparent, neutral manner. So I think this is the journey
31:39
that we have been going through and every part of US and every
31:43
part of the world, they have differences in how the energy
31:47
markets are structured, how they're regulated and so on.
31:51
And, and that's why I think we have to just go and prove it one
31:55
at a time in every, every specific situation.
32:00
But the thing which gives me hope is that at the end of the
32:03
day, most of these utilities, if not all, are facing the same
32:07
challenge. They want to solve
32:08
affordability, they want to continue to grow.
32:11
They want to enable economic growth in their regions.
32:14
The physics of the grid, thankfully it works the same
32:17
way. I've deployed grid technologies
32:19
in 20 plus countries and it's the same physics.
32:23
So if it works in Portland, it works everywhere else and at
32:26
least in the North America, the the reliability rules like Nurk
32:31
rules are pretty much consistent.
32:32
So everything that we do are under the current federal Nurk
32:36
fork regulation. So that is very transferable in
32:39
various jurisdictions, but some of the other stakeholders have
32:42
to be brought along to to make it truly scalable.
32:46
Yeah. So Amit, VPPS are not new.
32:50
We have been talking about Jigger and I have been banging
32:52
the drum on VPPS for years now. So it seems like this is the
32:57
moment and we're really starting to feel the scale and momentum.
33:00
Why do you think that that this is the time and it's it's
33:03
finally VPPS moment to shine? Just like both of you, I've been
33:07
in the VPP business for the last 10 plus years.
33:11
So I'm, I think over this time VPPS were a solution that we're
33:18
looking for a problem. And we had always promoted VPPS
33:22
as a mechanism for adding more renewable to the grid when the
33:28
renewable is intermittent or as a mechanism for hedging prices
33:33
for the participants because we didn't want to create a scenario
33:38
where supply is constrained and the demand is not flexible.
33:42
Now these were good use cases and we got quite far with this.
33:46
But the economic value that you can get out of these VPPS was
33:52
never high enough for these data centers to really care about it
33:59
or to take the operational burden or perceived risk that
34:03
comes with it. So as we deployed, I don't know,
34:06
we had about 8 giga watts of VPPS in 20 countries.
34:10
The only times you were able to get data centers to participate
34:13
in these VPPS were with Bitcoin mines when the Bitcoin prices
34:20
were in the toilet because that was the way for them to make
34:23
money. But now.
34:23
It all comes down to Bitcoin, Amit.
34:26
I mean, didn't Criso start off as like a Bitcoin miner and
34:29
then, you know, now they're a big data center company?
34:32
Right. And which is great by the way, I
34:34
love that because these Bitcoin companies are already very
34:38
forward thinking about energy and flexibility and they were
34:42
doing it. So they are like some of the
34:43
most innovative companies out there who are realizing that by
34:47
being flexible, they can get another leg up.
34:49
And the the real value now is that every MW that you bring
34:52
online creates 25 to 30 million of new economic outcomes for
34:58
these data centers. So that price is big and is
35:01
worthwhile. And every data centre when they
35:04
are given a choice of waiting for eight years and spending
35:07
hundreds of millions of upgrade cost versus getting connected
35:12
right now, but they just need to add some more flexibility on
35:15
their data centers are choosing the latter option because it's
35:20
just a no brainer. Like in Portland, we offered a
35:23
flexible way of getting connected to six data centers.
35:26
All six took that, took it. They are all energized now and
35:29
they all want to get more. So I don't think there's any
35:32
debate, in my mind at least, whether data centers want to be
35:35
flexible or not. No, I think that's right.
35:38
I mean, the one thing that you talked about earlier, though is
35:41
about trust. And I'm curious whether you're
35:45
seeing and all the engagements that you have that the broader
35:49
population views your work as a way for the data center
35:52
companies to cut the line and get capacity faster or whether
35:57
they view this as a way to, you know, reduce rates and and, you
36:02
know, ultimately make the grid more affordable.
36:04
I mean I get your white paper, but are people believing it on
36:07
the ground? I think there is definitely more
36:09
work that needs to be done in terms of educating the public
36:14
and you know, data centres can be done in the right way and
36:18
they can be done in the wrong way.
36:19
I think we have a lot more examples of situations where
36:23
data centres have come online and they have increased the
36:25
rates for everybody. There are far fewer examples of
36:29
the kind of things that we are trying to do and this is clearly
36:32
an education and awareness issue, but the science is on our
36:36
side and it's not even that difficult.
36:38
It's like a numerator versus denominator.
36:41
If you increase the denominator and you keep the numerator the
36:44
same, then no. I think that's exactly right.
36:49
I mean you want to limit investment in the numerator and
36:51
you want to sell more kilowatt hours than a denominator.
36:54
You know, we, we've spent a lot of time in the last few months
36:57
talking about grid utilization. And so it's, and I know that
37:00
there's this, there's this data disconnect and the utilities
37:05
claim to not have the distribution level data that
37:08
they need to optimize grid utilization.
37:10
So it's so refreshing to speak to someone who's like, hi, we're
37:14
over here and we've got that for you.
37:16
But feel free to give us a call, you know, because we keep
37:19
hearing like the grid is so, so poorly utilized in so many
37:23
places in this country. So I'm, I'm excited to see what
37:26
happens with the growth of your company.
37:29
I mean, I know that you, you won one of the most innovative
37:32
companies of 2026 from Fast Company magazine.
37:34
Amazing, amazing, congratulations.
37:37
But innovation and energy so often means piloting something
37:41
for years and never scaling it, which is like Jiggers personal
37:44
mission in life to fix. And we talk about this all the
37:47
time. So what makes grid Care
37:49
different from every other promising grid tech company that
37:53
got stuck in pilot mode? Because you guys are just up,
37:56
up, up and away. Well, so we don't do pilots and
38:00
my challenge to the utilities is that bring your toughest, most
38:05
visible, most valuable problem and we will find you an answer
38:10
in less than 90 days. And we have done more than a GW
38:15
in the last six months. These were places which were
38:19
considered hopeless when we walked in and we found more
38:23
capacity than even we thought would be possible.
38:27
And even in these locations we are finding more.
38:29
At this point we are in more than a dozen markets.
38:32
We have more than 10 gigawatts of projects that we are actively
38:36
analysing. And part of the reason why we
38:39
have been being received so well is that we do offer a fairly
38:45
risk free value proposition to everybody who is engaging with
38:48
us. Our message to the utility is
38:51
that, look, give us a chance. All we need is some data that
38:55
you already have because you have to run these studies
38:57
anyway. And in 90 days we are going to
39:00
find an answer for you. And if we find more power, then
39:04
you all are going to be heroes. You will increase your revenue
39:08
internally, you will reduce the rates.
39:11
Your governors will love you, and if we can't find the power,
39:15
then you will have the satisfaction that you tried
39:17
everything and your stakeholders will know that you tried
39:21
everything. So what do you have to lose?
39:23
And our bet is that because the grid is being used for 30% of
39:27
its capacity, we are almost always going to find power.
39:30
And so far that has been true. And the same thing with data
39:33
centers. They can stay in the queue that
39:36
they have and wait for space data centers to happen, or they
39:40
can give us a chance and it's a net new voluntary option that
39:45
they have, which if they get the power, they figure out how to
39:49
pay us for the value that we have created.
39:51
But otherwise, nobody is worse off.
39:53
I feel like Amit, they want to go to space for other reasons.
39:58
I feel like, Amit, it's like you're kind of like looking in
40:01
the couch cushions and finding 1,000,000 bucks.
40:03
That's what it feels. Like $25 million per MW.
40:08
It's, it's like, it's like the change that you find in your
40:10
drawer when you open, except that here it's like trillions of
40:14
dollars. And it is also a natural
40:16
competitiveness issue which can literally define the course of
40:19
humanity for the next 100 years. The coins are made of rare
40:22
metals. So, you know, we talk a lot
40:27
about the United States, which I love.
40:28
But you know, is this really a Western grid opportunity, right?
40:33
Like Europe and the United States and things like that?
40:36
Or you know, like even if you went to China where it seems
40:39
like you could just build, you know, grids easily, would they
40:43
find a similar grid utilization and find a similar opportunity?
40:49
Yeah. Look, I think the fact that grid
40:51
is getting suboptimally used, that is a fairly universal
40:55
problem. Now places where building is
40:58
easier, you can live with that inefficiency for a long period
41:02
of time and just continue to build.
41:04
But places in US, even a big part of Asia, I mean we are
41:08
getting a lot of inbound from Southeast Asia, India, Japan,
41:13
Australia, most of Europe, Eastern and Western Europe.
41:16
These are places where the grid is constrained and building new
41:20
stuff is not that easy and it takes time, whether it's supply
41:24
chain, whether it's permits, whether it's some other
41:27
regulation that is out there. In those places, what you can do
41:31
with the existing grid becomes extremely valuable, because that
41:35
is something which is already there and all you need to do is
41:38
become intelligent and unlock it.
41:40
So my final question slash statement here is to get you to
41:45
explain to us if you're a governor, right, you're one of
41:49
the 36 governors races across the country, right?
41:52
They just listened to this podcast because they obviously
41:55
all listen to this podcast and they just realized that you can
41:59
unlock 300,000 megawatts of capacity, right?
42:03
Why should they continue to work on expanding the grid broadly,
42:09
right? Why should they continue to like
42:11
figure out a way to put more generation and like, I mean, you
42:14
know, like, I'm curious, like, why you think that they should
42:18
continue to like do all of the measures at the same time when
42:22
they've got such a silver bullet in great care?
42:25
Yeah, my message to them is that it's not one or the other.
42:29
I think you want to optimize. What you have kind of is one or
42:32
the other, right? They want like affordability.
42:34
They'd like to put all of the weight of the world on your
42:37
shoulders on it. Then you've got nice broad
42:39
shoulders. You can handle the weight, but
42:41
I'm just saying like, you know, in some ways, like I think the
42:45
big pressure that I see is that people are constantly arguing
42:48
with us about unlocking gradualization because they're
42:51
like, oh, but you're not keeping the pressure up on new
42:53
transmission lines. And we're going to regret it one
42:56
day. Well, I don't think that is the
42:59
question. I think the question that people
43:01
should ask is utilization. I think if there is a demand
43:06
that you are seeing and it's a real demand and building a
43:09
transmission line brings that demand sooner, but in a way
43:14
where the utilization of the system is going up, then I'm
43:18
fine with that. And I think that's the right
43:19
decision. But if you're building something
43:22
and the utilization goes from 30% to 25%, then by definition
43:26
all the other ratepayers are paying for it in some form or
43:28
the other, like no matter how it comes back to the numerator
43:31
versus denominator question. So I think the right question to
43:34
ask is that any project, whether it's a new data center that is
43:37
coming in, a new transmission line that you're trying to
43:40
build, is that effective utilization of the grid?
43:43
Is it going up or is it going down?
43:45
If it's going up, then it's good.
43:47
If it is going down, then it's some cross subsidy that is being
43:52
afforded to some people in the system.
43:56
A man after my own heart. Well, you are the inspiration,
43:59
so I hope we can make this the default.
44:04
Well, it's so wonderful to have you on it and thank you for
44:08
jumping back into the CEO fray. You know, you have such an
44:13
excellent track record of delivery.
44:17
You know, I think your previous companies were so successful and
44:20
you figured out how to get electric utilities to sign big
44:24
contracts, which I think is what we need today.
44:26
This trust gap that you talk about is so real.
44:28
And so thanks for getting back in the fray.
44:31
Well, thank you so much for all the support and good wishes and
44:34
all your vision and inspiration. It's been a privilege to be on
44:39
this show with you. Energy Empire is supported by
44:46
S2G Investments. If you haven't checked out their
44:49
podcast, I highly recommend it. They have a great recent episode
44:53
on the long term effects of the Iran war and the blockade of the
44:57
Strait of Hormuz. In the episode, Sanjeev Krishna
45:00
and Frank O'Sullivan and Bala Nagarajan make a compelling case
45:05
that this disruption could be the most powerful accelerant for
45:09
renewable energy in a generation.
45:11
And in future episodes they'll be exploring how those forces
45:14
are reshaping our food systems and ocean intelligence.
45:18
Sound interesting? Go find the S2G podcast and
45:21
start with the global energy order has changed now what?
45:30
Wow, he has so many numbers. Like it is crazy.
45:34
I mean, I always thought we were sort of managing the 50%
45:38
utilization of the grid. I think he used 30%.
45:41
Like, I mean, he was basically glass half empty in terms of how
45:44
much of our existing grid that we're already using.
45:47
But in some ways it's even better because it means there's
45:50
so much more capacity to unlock. You know, one thing that I've
45:54
learned in working on grid utilization this year is that a
45:57
lot of these utilities and the system operators and like the
46:01
utility service areas that we have across the United States,
46:05
they don't know how much of their grid they're using.
46:07
Like they truly do not have the data and they don't have the
46:10
tools internally to actually understand how much of their
46:14
system they're using. It's crazy when you actually
46:17
they think about it. And so here we have a company
46:20
that has a solution that can come in and basically map that
46:23
local grid and is literally, it's like finding, as I was
46:27
saying in the episode, finding $1,000,000 in your couch
46:29
cushions. It's just wild.
46:31
Like it's there the whole time and it's just being
46:33
underutilized. Oh, yeah, at 650 megawatts, I
46:36
think that's a billion or, or even more.
46:38
I think it's $50 billion now to build a 1000 MW data center.
46:43
So if you like reduce that to 650 megawatts, I think that's,
46:48
you know, something in the order of like $35 billion of value.
46:51
I mean, it's crazy. It's wild.
46:55
I mean, I, I'm so happy that finally these technologies are
46:59
getting their due and we're and they're getting these big
47:01
contracts and you know, they're finally getting these, you know,
47:05
relationships with utility companies where they can
47:08
actually provide value to both utility, the customer, the end
47:12
customer, whether that be a data center and manufacturing plants,
47:16
etcetera, as well as the benefits flowing directly to
47:19
everyday people in terms of reductions in their utility
47:23
rates or downward pressure. So those utility rates are going
47:26
to rate are going to increase more slowly as a result of
47:30
increased and improved grid utilization.
47:33
So the thing I don't understand is why it's not just mandatory
47:37
for all 160 plus investor owned utilities to hire somebody like
47:41
this by the end of the year? I mean, maybe because their
47:44
regulators just don't know that solutions like this are out
47:47
there, but there are so many. I mean, I think about the work
47:50
that the utilized coalition is doing and they're kind of a
47:52
group of service providers that also have different solutions
47:56
that can help to meet this moment in terms of like better
48:00
utilizing the grid that we already have.
48:02
We're seeing some states take action.
48:04
Virginia recently passed a law that they are going to actually
48:09
even just try and analyze how much capacity is available on
48:14
their grid. As I was mentioning, like a lot
48:16
of these utilities, they don't even know they they don't know
48:18
what their current grid utilization is.
48:20
So putting them into a posture where they have to prove that
48:24
they need the poles and the wires before they actually
48:28
construct them. It seems like common sense to
48:30
me. Oh, totally, totally.
48:32
I mean, it does feel like a big unlock and I'm glad to see folks
48:36
starting to use it. Absolutely.
48:37
Well, it was absolutely wonderful talking to Amit and
48:41
learning about his solution and all the hard data he has about
48:44
the value. So yeah, let's hope that more
48:48
utilities get wise to this. Welcome to Ask Jigger, our
48:57
weekly segment where Jigger answers your questions about
48:59
energy and honestly anything else you're wondering about.
49:02
Huge thanks to our sponsor, Octopus Energy for making this
49:05
segment possible. And a quick reminder, anyone who
49:09
sends in a question that Jigger answers on the show gets an
49:11
Energy Empire hat from our brand new merch store.
49:15
So send them in. OK, let's get into it.
49:18
Our first question comes from Tommy Burbis.
49:21
And he asks Jigger, what's your read on Freedom Forever's recent
49:25
bankruptcy? They were one of the largest
49:27
residential installers in the country.
49:29
So what does it signal for the retrofit residential market,
49:33
which you may need to define for people, Jigger?
49:35
And why is it so hard for retrofit residential companies
49:38
to survive in the first place? Yeah, it's a great question and
49:42
one that I think is, you know, come to the fore in the last
49:45
year just because we've had so many bankruptcies, not just
49:48
Freedom Forever, but also Synova and Sun Power and I think over
49:52
100 installers. Basically the market that they
49:55
serve is existing residential homes, right?
49:58
So you have a home that already exists, someone knocks on your
50:02
door and says would you like to put solar panels on the roof and
50:06
a battery in the garage? And if you say yes, then they
50:09
put it in motion, file permits, do all the things.
50:13
And a lot of them get financed right from people like Synova or
50:16
Sun Power in the past. And today it'd be Sunrun or
50:18
Palmetto. And what you find is, is that
50:22
over time, what happened is we had low interest rates and you
50:26
had a lot of competition between, you know, Good Leap and
50:29
Sunrun and Sonova and others. And so they would give people
50:33
credit. For instance, they would say,
50:34
hey, you know, we'll give you milestone payments while you're
50:38
installing the solar project. And so every time you hit a
50:41
milestone, we'll wire more money into your account.
50:44
And so folks started being a lot leaner with how much money they
50:47
had in the bank account. And then as things got worse for
50:52
folks like Synova, they started paying people late.
50:54
They started paying that 30 days.
50:56
They started paying that 60 days, they started paying that
50:58
90 days. And for people like Freedom
51:00
Forever, they're like, wait, you know, I'm running pretty tight
51:03
here. I don't have all this extra
51:05
money to pay salaries and do all this stuff while you're paying
51:09
me late, right? And my balance sheet isn't
51:11
strong enough to be able to go get $100 million loan from the
51:14
local credit union to be able to cover these losses, right?
51:18
And so one of the big problems is, is that we've basically run
51:22
everything too hot. And when things, you know, went
51:26
S like in this case, higher interest rates, weaker solar
51:30
financing companies, then, you know, there was this domino
51:33
effect that, you know, really took down freedom forever.
51:35
All right. Our next question comes from
51:37
Nikhil Vinod. And Nikhil says Jigger.
51:40
Here's a What if, say, AI infrastructure turns out to be
51:44
overbuilt and the energy it actually needs comes in well
51:47
below the predictions, which is certainly something that people
51:50
are speculating about. In that world, what becomes the
51:53
main use for all of the extra generation that we have built?
51:57
Yeah, it's a good question and one that I think we're not quite
52:01
at that stage yet. So there's, you know, let's call
52:03
it 35 one plus GW data centers that have announced that they're
52:08
under construction. When you look at the actual
52:10
data, most of them are way delayed, right?
52:13
They were supposed to start construction in 2026.
52:16
Now most of them have been delayed into 20272028.
52:19
I think the bigger risk is not that the load doesn't show up
52:23
from AI data centers. My sense is that lots of people
52:26
are using AI, and I think there's going to be a lot of AI
52:29
load. I think the real disruption is
52:31
going to be local versus central, right?
52:34
So there's training for data centers, right?
52:37
So that's training a new model. And right now that's maybe 500
52:40
megawatts of load to train a new model.
52:43
That number is predicted to go to 4000 megawatts by the end of
52:46
the decade to train a new model. And then there's inference,
52:50
right, which is you playing with the cloud app or the ChatGPT app
52:53
or creating an agent or doing whatever it is that you do with
52:56
AI. And a lot of those tasks can be
52:59
A5 MW data center near your home or a 500 kilowatt data center
53:04
that's in an abandoned office building or 100 kilowatt data
53:08
center that's in the back of a telecom tower or even A50
53:11
kilowatt data center like our friend Archer was experimenting
53:15
with with Span IO and his partnership with NVIDIA and
53:19
Pulte Homes. And so if that happens and we
53:22
move to inference closer to the edge and we don't need these one
53:26
GW data centers, then that capacity could be excess
53:30
capacity. Right now we're not there
53:32
because we're so far behind and building a lot of that capacity
53:36
that we haven't built a lot of excess capacity.
53:38
And I would suggest to you that we're going to figure out
53:41
whether we can move data centers to the edge by the end of this
53:44
year. And I think, I think we are
53:46
going to successfully do that. And I think a lot of these one
53:48
GW data centers are going away. Next Uluche Smith, says Jigger.
53:53
I work in hydropower, and I've always wondered why it never
53:56
gets the attention that wind, solar, nuclear and storage do.
54:00
Is it the price? The assumption that the good
54:02
hydro resources are already tapped, which Canadian advocates
54:06
say isn't true? Why doesn't hydro generate the
54:09
same excitement as its peers? And is it doomed to follow coal
54:13
towards obsolescence? Oh, well, I know that when we
54:17
worked at LPO, we maybe heard from the hydro industry that we
54:23
weren't like investing a lot in the development of that
54:26
technology. So I think that that relates to
54:29
this question. What do you think about this
54:30
jigger? Yeah.
54:31
So I spent a lot of time on hydro while we were serving and
54:34
there's a couple of big problems with hydro.
54:36
One is, is that most of the best sites in the United States have
54:40
been used. I mean, that's not true for
54:41
Canada, but it is true for the US.
54:44
The sites that are available now are much smaller sites and
54:47
they're largely owned by the Army Corps of Engineers.
54:50
And so you need permission from them to use some of their non
54:53
power dams. They're called to add power
54:56
infrastructure to the dams. And then if you remember, we
55:00
couldn't actually finance those other loan programs office
55:02
because of the federal Nexus, like we couldn't lend money to
55:05
something that the Army Corps of Engineers was a part of.
55:09
And so there's some of that. The other problem that you have
55:12
is that we have a lot of old hydro dams.
55:14
And if you just upgraded them with new software and new
55:17
equipment, etcetera, you could double, triple the amount of
55:20
energy that they produce. But it takes like 5 years to get
55:23
through the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to get
55:25
approval to do that. And so I know that the Trump
55:28
administration is trying to make all of that more streamlined,
55:30
but I think they're working more on nuclear than they are in
55:32
hydro. And then the last piece of it is
55:35
it the people who own hydro assets are sticks in the mud.
55:38
So they're like electric utilities or they're like old
55:41
people who are 80 years old and love the money that comes off of
55:45
them. So when you go to them to try to
55:47
buy the hydro assets off of them and say you're not doing
55:49
anything with these, we'd love to buy them and upgrade them.
55:52
They make your life a living hell to try to buy these assets
55:55
from them. And so you're just like, screw
55:57
it, I'm going to work on geothermal and nuclear because
55:59
like, I'd rather do that than, you know, like work on hydro.
56:02
And so hydro needs a refresh. And we never did a hydro liftoff
56:05
report, but we need to. And that's all for Ask Jigger
56:09
this week. Remember, you can send in your
56:11
own questions and like I said, if yours gets picked, there's an
56:14
Energy Empire hat in it for you. The link is in the show notes
56:17
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56:19
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56:22
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56:25
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56:29
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56:32
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56:35
Thanks so much.