The Big Switch

In this episode, we’re touring a home with a buildings doctor. Ian Hamilton is a professor of energy, environment and health at University College London. Together, Melissa and Ian show us the parts of our homes we need to upgrade to zero out carbon emissions—and to keep us safe in a more dangerous, changing climate. They talk about insulation, heat pumps, solar panels and more. 

The Big Switch is produced by Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy in partnership with Post Script Media. This episode was produced by Alexandria Herr and Daniel Woldorff. Theme music and mixing by Sean Marquand. Story editing by Anne Bailey. A special thanks to Natalie Volk, Kirsten Smith and Kyu Lee. Our executive editor is Stephen Lacey. 

Correction: Texas experienced major power outages due to a winter storm in Februrary 2021. In the episode, Melissa mistakenly says February 2020.

This week on the show, we meet someone on a mission: to decarbonize America’s buildings. Decarbonizing buildings is is actually a huge piece of decarbonizing our economy: carbon pollution from heating, cooling, and powering our buildings accounts for 30 percent of U.S. carbon emissions – that includes our homes, schools, hospitals and office buildings. 

So is it possible to decarbonize all of our buildings – and make strides in health and economic development at the same time? Our guest this week, Keith Kinch, thinks so. He’s the co-founder of BlocPower, a company that’s electrifying buildings across the country. He walks us through a road map of what it’s going to take to get our buildings to net zero. 

Guest: Keith Kinch is General Manager and co-founder of BlocPower.

The Big Switch is produced by Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy in partnership with Post Script Media. This episode was produced by Alexandria Herr and Daniel Woldorff. Theme music and mixing by Sean Marquand. Story editing by Anne Bailey. A special thanks to Natalie Volk, Kirsten Smith and Kyu Lee. Our executive editor is Stephen Lacey.

It turns out, there’s a whole rainbow of hydrogen fuel – gray hydrogen, blue hydrogen, even pink hydrogen. But the kind of hydrogen that’s most important for a net zero future is green hydrogen. It’s made with carbon free-electricity, and it could go a long way toward  decarbonizing sticky parts of the economy, like industry and shipping.

In this episode, we talked to a very musical scientist – Dr. Julio Friedmann, chief scientist and chief carbon wrangler at Carbon Direct, about the promises and challenges of hydrogen. Prepare for lots of singing.

Guests: Dr. Julio Friedmann is chief scientist and chief carbon wrangler at Carbon Direct, and non-resident fellow at the Center for Global Energy Policy at Columbia University. 

The Big Switch is produced by Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy in partnership with Post Script Media. This episode was produced by Alexandria Herr and Daniel Woldorff. Theme music and mixing by Sean Marquand. Story editing by Anne Bailey. A special thanks to Natalie Volk, Kirsten Smith and Kyu Lee. Our executive editor is Stephen Lacey. 

Hydrogen could be essential for the zero-carbon economy, especially for cleaning up concrete, steel, and chemicals. It’s also a promising fuel source for transportation and electricity that's attracted hundreds of billions of dollars in global investment.

But there’s a problem. Every year, the world produces millions of tons of hydrogen through a dirty process that creates  lots of CO2 and carbon monoxide.

For hydrogen to be a truly clean fuel, we have to find a cleaner way to make it. And today we’re bringing you the story of one person who's spent a decade trying to do just that. 

It’s an episode of one of our favorite podcasts, Watt It Takes. The show tells the stories of founders who are building our climate-positive future — their upbringings, their risks, their failures, and their breakthroughs.

Today’s episode is with Rob Hanson, co-founder and CEO of Monolith, a clean hydrogen and industrial materials manufacturer that was recently awarded a $1 billion conditional loan guarantee by the Department of Energy. Emily talks to Rob about his journey to founding Monolith, what the DOE loan means for the company, and the future of clean hydrogen.

Steel goes into pretty much everything around us – from buildings and bridges to the furniture in our homes. And decarbonizing the steel industry is essential because we need steel to decarbonize the world. Think about it. Solar panels, electric vehicles, even our power grid; steel goes into everything we need to fight climate change.

But there’s a problem. Steel manufacturing uses a lot of fossil fuels. It’s responsible for 8 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions.

In this episode we break down the race to green, zero-carbon steel. It’s a competition among four key technologies: recycling, carbon capture and storage (CCS), electrolysis, and — everyone’s current favorite — hydrogen. Or, as we call it in this episode, the Usain Bolt of technology. 

Guest Julia Attwood, head of advanced materials at Bloomberg New Energy Finance, profiles each of the competitors in this race and weighs in on which ones are best equipped to clean up the steel industry. We also take a look at how these competitors might actually work together. 

Guests: Julia Attwood is head of advanced materials at Bloomberg New Energy Finance. Martin Pei is chief technology officer at the Swedish steel manufacturer SSAB. Usain Bolt was not a guest but makes many cameos on this episode. 

The Big Switch is produced by Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy in partnership with Post Script Media. This episode was produced by Alexandria Herr and Daniel Woldorff. Theme music and mixing by Sean Marquand. Story editing by Anne Bailey. A special thanks to Natalie Volk, Kirsten Smith and Kyu Lee. Our executive editor is Stephen Lacey. 

St. James Parish, Louisiana sits in the middle of an 85-mile corridor along the Mississippi river that’s home to more than 150 petrochemical plants. This concentration of petrochemical facilities has taken a toll on the health of nearby communities – a toll that falls disproportionately on Black communities. Cancer risk in some parts of this corridor is more than 50 times the national average, giving it the moniker ‘cancer alley.’

In 2018, a new petrochemical plant was announced – one that would double pollution in St. James Parish and emit tons of carcinogens like benzene and formaldehyde. For Sharon Lavigne, a retired special education teacher turned environmental justice organizer, it was time to fight back.  

Last week, we talked about decarbonizing the petrochemicals industry. This week, we’re talking about the public health and environmental justice costs of petrochemicals. What does an environmentally just future look like? And how can we get there?

Guests: Sharon Lavigne is an environmental justice advocate and the founder of Rise St. James. Dr. Robert Bullard is a distinguished professor of urban planning and environmental policy and director of the Bullard Center for Environmental and Climate Justice at Texas Southern University.

The Big Switch is produced by Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy in partnership with Post Script Media. This episode was produced by Alexandria Herr and Daniel Woldorff. Theme music and mixing by Sean Marquand. Story editing by Anne Bailey. A special thanks to Natalie Volk, Kirsten Smith and Kyu Lee. Our executive editor is Stephen Lacey. 

Petrochemicals. You might not have heard of them, but you certainly use them every day. These chemicals, made from oil, are in almost everything – plastics, medicines, clothes, toothpaste, even the insulation in your home. 

So how can we decarbonize an industry that makes such a pervasive product? 

This week, we spoke with climate solutions expert Deborah Gordon about how we can cut carbon emissions from the petrochemicals industry. And producer Alexandria Herr and Melissa Lott go on a mission to become zero-waste influencers – and find the petrochemicals hidden in their everyday lives.

Guest: Deborah Gordon is a senior principal in the Climate Intelligence Program at the Rocky Mountain Institute.

The Big Switch is produced by Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy in partnership with Post Script Media. This episode was produced by Alexandria Herr and Daniel Woldorff. Theme music and mixing by Sean Marquand. Story editing by Anne Bailey. A special thanks to Natalie Volk, Kirsten Smith and Kyu Lee. Our executive editor is Stephen Lacey.

Things have shifted dramatically since we aired our last episode. There’s now a crisis in Ukraine and sanctions on Russian oil and gas. This is all on top of record demand for petroleum products and electricity as the world emerges from lockdowns.

So this week, we’re bring you an episode about energy security from the other podcast that we have here at the Center on Global Energy Policy, the Columbia Energy Exchange. If you like the show, please head give it a rating and review.

An increased demand for energy following COVID-19 lockdowns created a severe energy supply crunch in Europe this winter. And now, decisions from corporate executives and government leaders to reduce or outright ban the purchase of Russian oil has forced energy prices even higher.  For a look at how energy markets can be leveraged to end Russia’s war in Ukraine and accelerate the transition to clean energy– all while reducing the risks of nuclear proliferation– host Jason Bordoff spoke with former US Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz.

A key architect of the Paris Agreement and Iran nuclear deal, Moniz is currently the CEO of the Energy Futures Initiative and the Nuclear Threat Initiative. Before joining the Obama administration as Secretary of Energy, Dr. Moniz  served as Under Secretary of Energy and as Associate Director for Science in the Office of Science and Technology Policy at the Department of Energy. Prior to his appointment, Dr. Moniz was a Physics and Engineering Systems Systems Professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he founded the MIT Energy Initiative.

In this conversation, Dr. Moniz sheds light on the energy security threats created by the Russia-Ukraine conflict, where things stand on the Iran deal and the future of energy innovation amid turbulent times for the markets.

This week: A love story about concrete. Melissa and Rebecca Dell, an industrial decarbonization expert, break down our relationship with concrete, and why it’s so dysfunctional.

The problem? Making concrete – especially its key ingredient, cement – is toxic to the climate. Only two countries in the world – the US and China – produce more greenhouse gas emissions than the concrete industry as a whole.  

So what do we do about this toxic relationship? Do we cut ties? Do we try to mend it?

Rebecca explains concrete – and how it’s different from cement – with an amazing Rice Krispy analogy. Producer Daniel Woldorff heads to a concrete plant to see some low-carbon technology in action. And Rebecca walks us through our options for reducing carbon emissions in concrete. 

Guest: Rebecca Dell directs the industry program at the ClimateWorks Foundation. She works on ways to remove carbon pollution from industries like concrete, steel and chemicals.

The Big Switch is produced by Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy in partnership with Post Script Media. This episode was produced by Alexandria Herr and Daniel Woldorff. Theme music and mixing by Sean Marquand. Story editing by Anne Bailey. A special thanks to Natalie Volk, Kirsten Smith and Kyu Lee. Our executive editor is Stephen Lacey.

What does a toaster oven have to do with carbon emissions? This week, Melissa and producer Alexandria Herr dissect one to find out. Turns out carbon emissions are embedded in everything around us – from the clothes we wear to our kitchen appliances. 

Melissa also talks to energy expert Chris Bataille about what it will take to decarbonize the heavy industries that produce these everyday objects. 

Guest: Chris Bataille is an expert on climate and energy policy. He is an associate researcher at the Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations in Paris (IDDRI) and a lead author on the Industry chapter of the upcoming Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Report. 

The Big Switch is produced by Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy in partnership with Post Script Media. This episode was produced by Alexandria Herr and Daniel Woldorff. Theme music and mixing by Sean Marquand. A special thanks to Natalie Volk, Kirsten Smith and Kyu Lee. Our executive editor is Stephen Lacey. 

We have something different today: A crossover between The Big Switch and The Carbon Copy. If you like this episode, go over to The Carbon Copy and hit subscribe. 

When Covid disrupted the economy and shifted energy use, it sharply brought down economy-wide carbon emissions. Many wondered: would the pandemic-related changes to our energy system help or hurt the path to a net-zero carbon economy?

Two years later, we have clearer data: a new report from the Rhodium Group on how emissions from fossil fuels have shifted since the pandemic started. In some cases, they've roared back faster than expected.

Today: what the latest emissions data tells us about what has shifted -- and what hasn't -- across America's carbon-dependent economy.

The Big Switch is produced by Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy in partnership with Post Script Media. This episode was produced by Jaime Kaiser and Daniel Woldorff. Theme music and mixing by Sean Marquand. A special thanks to Natalie Volk, Kirsten Smith and Kyu Lee. Our executive editor was Stephen Lacey.

Aviation is a notoriously difficult sector to decarbonize. So as Melissa plans a family trip, she wrestles with her options. Which flights emit the least carbon? How well do offsets work? Should we even be flying at all?

Melissa and colleague Kirsten Smith task producer Daniel Woldorff with calling up airlines to look for answers. 

Engineer Alejandra Uranga imagines airplanes in a net-zero future. Melissa and Alejandra cover electric planes, sustainable aviation fuel, hydrogen and more.

Guests: Alejandra Uranga is an Assistant Professor of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering at USC. Kirsten Smith is a Research Associate at Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy. Daniel Woldorff is a producer for The Big Switch.

The Big Switch is produced by Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy in partnership with Post Script Media. This episode was produced by Daniel Woldorff and Alexandria Herr. Theme music and mixing by Sean Marquand. A special thanks to Natalie Volk, Kirsten Smith and Kyu Lee. Our executive editor was Stephen Lacey.

When one of the biggest ships in the world got stuck in the Suez Canal, it threw a giant wrench into international supply chains. It exacerbated shortages of everything from semiconductors to snuggies. 

Journalist Maria Gallucci explains how this overlooked sector plays an essential part in supplying – and decarbonizing – the global economy. 

Lawyer and economist Aoife O’Leary covers our decarbonization tools, including new fuels, slow steaming and kites, plus the regulations to get us there. And don't forget the memes!

Guests: Aiofe O’Leary is the CEO of Opportunity Green. Maria Gallucci is a clean energy reporter at Canary Media and contributes to Grist and IEEE Spectrum

The Big Switch is produced by Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy in partnership with Post Script Media. This episode was produced by Alexandria Herr and Daniel Woldorff. Theme music and mixing by Sean Marquand. A special thanks to Natalie Volk, Kirsten Smith and Kyu Lee. Our executive editor was Stephen Lacey. 

Heavy trucks emit an outsize share of greenhouse gasses and toxic pollutants. But we rely on them for nearly everything we buy. What will it take to decarbonize them?

We hear from staff at the Community Center for Action & Environmental Justice. They’re demanding clean air in “America’s shopping cart,” a polluted region dominated by warehouses and trucking.

And Dr. Ben Sharpe of the International Council on Clean Transportation covers the technologies and policies we need to reach zero-emission trucking.

Guests: Dr. Ben Sharpe is a Senior Researcher at the International Council on Clean Transportation. Anna Gonzalez is the Interim Executive Director of the Center for Community Action and Environmental Justice (CCAEJ). Faraz Rizvi is CCAEJ’s Special Projects Coordinator.

The Big Switch is produced by Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy in partnership with Post Script Media. This episode was produced by Daniel Woldorff and Alexandria Herr. Theme music and mixing by Sean Marquand. A special thanks to Natalie Volk, Kirsten Smith and Kyu Lee. Our executive editor was Stephen Lacey. 

Electric autonomous vehicles shuttle us to high-tech mass transit hubs. Our fare system is contactless. We’ve already paid via a customized, equitable subscription model. All the trains and buses are on time. And we don’t have to wait in traffic. This is a world in which we can hop in a car to get somewhere, but we don’t have to.

In this episode, the second in our five-part series on transportation, Dr. Giovanni Circella paints a picture of a net zero world in which public transportation improves our quality of life, while also reducing carbon emissions. 

What will it take to get there?

Dr. Circella and Dr. Melissa Lott talk about electrifying transit, coordinating autonomous vehicles for the public benefit, land use planning, fare pricing, and why so many in developing countries aspire to car ownership. 

And we tell the story of TransMiCable, an electric cable car system in Bogotá, Columbia, and the researchers who are tracking the impact on the long commutes and air quality for residents of some of its poorest neighborhoods.

Guests: Dr. Giovanni Circella directs the 3 Revolutions Future Mobility Program at UC-Davis and is a Senior Research Engineer at Georgia Tech. Dr. Olga Lucia Sarmiento is a Professor of the Department of Public Health at the School of Medicine at Universidad de los Andes. Brett Marsh is a journalist and photographer based in Oakland, CA. 

The Big Switch is produced by Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy in partnership with Post Script Media. This episode was produced by Daniel Woldorff and Alexandria Herr. Theme music and mixing by Sean Marquand. A special thanks to Natalie Volk, Kirsten Smith and Kyu Lee. Our executive editor was Stephen Lacey.

In the next five episodes, we'll take a deep dive into decarbonizing the entire transportation sector -- everything from bulldozers and planes to ships and trains.

In this episode we start with cars. How do we switch the world's over 1 billion fossil-fuel-powered cars to zero-carbon alternatives, and fast? 

Dr. Melissa Lott explores the most promising pathway -- electrification -- with Dr. Sonia Yeh of Chalmers University. What kind of infrastructure and technology do we need to scale up electric cars? And why aren't there more electric vehicles on the roads right now? 

We'll also tell the story of Tim Treuer, who put his EV to the test on 7,600-mile road trip, risking jail time in the process. 

Guests: Tim Treuer, a biologist, journalist and cross-country EV adventurer. Dr. Sonia Yeh is Professor in Transport and Energy Systems in the Department of Space, Earth and Environment at Chalmer University in Gothenburg, Sweden.

The Big Switch is produced by Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy in partnership with Post Script Media. This episode was produced by Daniel Woldorff and Alexandria Herr. Theme music and mixing by Sean Marquand. A special thanks to Natalie Volk, Kirsten Smith and Kyu Lee. Our executive editor was Stephen Lacey.

In the first five episodes of this show, we talked about cleaning up our electricity system—the power grid.

In upcoming episodes, we're going to explain how to make that Big Switch in every other sector of the economy—everything from cars and heavy trucking to industrial heat and buildings.  

It's a lot to cover, and so we need a roadmap. In this episode, we're doing just that. Our host, Dr. Melissa Lott, talks to energy system modeler Amber Mahone about what those sectors are what we need to do to decarbonize them.

What are the key strategies in each one of those sectors? What are the equity implications and tradeoffs for the strategies?

But first, Kirsten teams up with the producers to hijack Melissa's road trip to an energy conference. We take a peek into the hidden energy embedded in our everyday lives.

Guests: Kirsten Smith of Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy and Amber Mahone of Energy and Environmental Economics.

The Big Switch is produced by Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy in partnership with Post Script Media. This episode was produced by Daniel Woldorff and co-hosted by Kirsten Smith. A special thanks to Genna Morton, Artealia Gilliard, Natalie Volk and Kyu Lee. Our executive editor was Stephen Lacey.

We have a whole year of episodes coming up.

In the first five episodes of The Big Switch, we talked about cleaning up our electricity system--the power grid.

Next, host Dr. Melissa Lott will talk with experts about how to transform every other sector of the economy, including transportation, industry and buildings.

To slow climate change, we need to transform our buildings, our homes, cars, and the economy as quickly as possible. But how do we do it right? 

Subscribe to The Big Switch everywhere you find podcasts.

In episode 2, we explored how to build a championship zero-carbon “team” on the grid. We could have the best players in the world — rooftop solar, batteries, net metering, demand response, high-voltage transmission, and so many others — but if the rules prevent these technologies from playing ball, then we won’t be able to decarbonize fast enough. 

How do we make sure the rules strike the right balance between innovation and reliability — while making the zero-carbon grid system equitable?

In our fifth episode of season 1, Dr. Melissa Lott explores how the rules of the grid impact everyone.

We’ll look at how the lack of rules in Texas caused an economic disaster for some consumers during this winter’s blackouts. And we’ll discuss how to reform and refine them to support a fast transition to clean energy.

Guests: Deandre Upshaw, Dr. Destenie Nock, and Alison Silverstein.

The Big Switch is produced by Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy in partnership with Post Script Media. Our producers are Daniel Woldorff, Dalvin Aboagye and Stephen Lacey.  A special thanks to Kirsten Smith, Genna Morton, Artealia Juilliard and Kyu Lee.

Matching electricity supply and demand is a high-wire balancing act. As we add more solar, wind and batteries, and shut down thermal generation, it shifts the balance. New kinds of distributed resources can help to balance things out -- but they also make grid management more complex.

In our fourth episode of season 1, Dr. Melissa Lott explores the new ways to manage the zero-carbon grid.

We’ll revisit the Texas grid disaster of 2021. Why did the electricity system nearly go down for weeks or months? And could we have blunted the outages with different ways of balancing the grid?

Guests: Catherine Traywick and Elta Kolo.

The Big Switch is produced by Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy in partnership with Post Script Media. Our producers are Daniel Woldorff, Dalvin Aboagye and Stephen Lacey.  A special thanks to Kirsten Smith, Genna Morton, Artealia Juilliard and Kyu Lee.