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PODCAST

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins

Every week, Heatmap News Executive Editor Robinson Meyer and Princeton University Professor and energy systems expert Jesse Jenkins make sense of the biggest shift of our time -- navigating the energy transition away from fossil fuels. Drawing on their years of experience reporting on and researching climate change and decarbonization, Meyer and Jenkins unpack the most important issues of the week and how the impacts of climate change and efforts to address it are transforming our economy, politics,

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All Episodes

1:04:04

Live From New York Climate Week: The AI and...

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/09/26

Artificial intelligence is helping to drive up electricity demand in America. Energy costs are rising, and utilities are struggling to adjust. How should policymakers — and companies — respond to this moment?On this special episode of Shift Key, recorded live at Heatmap House during New York Climate Week, Rob leads a conversation about some potential paths forward. He’s joined first by Representative Sean Casten, the coauthor of a new Democratic bill seeking to lower electricity costs for consumers

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46:02

What J.P. Morgan’s Chief Climate Advisor Is Telling...

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/09/17

We live in a new energy era — one in which the inputs and technologies key to clean electricity production are at the heart of international politics. What will that mean for decarbonization? And how should climate tech companies prepare?On this week’s episode of Shift Key, Rob chats about those questions and more with Dr. Sarah Kapnick. She is the Global Head of Climate Advisory at J.P. Morgan, where she advises the bank's clients on climate, energy, biodiversity and sustainability topics. She was

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59:27

What Carbon Dioxide Has to Do With the Meaning of Life

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/09/03

How did life first form on Earth? What does entropy have to do with the origins of mammalian life — or the creation of the modern economy? And what chemical process do people, insects, Volkswagens, and coal power plants all share?On this week’s episode of Shift Key, Rob chats with Peter Brannen, the author of a new history of the planet,The Story of CO2 Is the Story of Everything. The book weaves together a single narrative from the Big Bang to the Permian explosion to the oil-devouring economy of

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1:05:45

Shift Key Classic: How to Hook Up More Power Plants

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/08/27

Shift Key is off for Labor Day, so we’re re-running this classic episode.For the first time in 15 years, American electricity demand is rising again as new data centers, factories, and electric vehicles come online. The easiest option is to meet that new demand with new supply — new power plants. But in many parts of the country, it can take years to hook up new wind, solar, and batteries to the grid. The reason why is a clogged and broken system called the interconnection queue.On this week’s

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59:40

How Sun and Wind Become Electricity

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/07/23

The two fastest-growing sources of electricity generation in the world represent a radical break with the energy technologies that came before them. That’s not just because their fuels are the wind and the sun.This is our third episode of Shift Key Summer School, a series of “lecture conversations” about the basics of energy, electricity, and the power grid. This week, we dive into the history and mechanics of wind turbines and solar panels, the two lynchpin technologies of the energy transition

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53:04

How Does a Power Plant Work?

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/07/09

Just two types of machines have produced the overwhelming majority of electricity generated since 1890. This week, we look at the history of those devices, how they work — and how they have contributed to global warming.This is our second episode of Shift Key Summer School, a series of “lecture conversations” about the basics of energy, electricity, and the power grid for listeners of all backgrounds. This week, we dive into the invention and engineering of the world’s most common types of fossil-

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1:07:18

If You Care About Food, You Have to Care About Land

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/06/25

Food is a huge climate problem. It’s responsible for somewhere between a quarter and a third of global greenhouse gas emissions, but it concerns a much smaller share of global climate policy. And what policy does exist is often … pretty bad.On this week’s episode of Shift Key, Rob and Jesse talk with Michael Grunwald, the author of the new book We Are Eating the Earth. It’s a book about land as much as it’s a book about food — because no matter how much energy abundance we ultimately achieve, we’re

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1:03:09

It’s Easiest to Electrify This Type of Truck

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/06/18

You might not think that often about medium-duty trucks, but they’re all around you: ambulances, UPS and FedEx delivery trucks, school buses. And although they make up a relatively small share of vehicles on the road, they generate an outsized amount of carbon pollution. They’re also a surprisingly ripe target for electrification, because so many medium-duty trucks drive fewer than 150 miles a day.On this week’s episode of Shift Key, Rob and Jesse talk with John Henry Harris, the cofounder and CEO

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56:19

The Supreme Court’s Double-Edged Change to Permitting...

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/06/04

Did the Supreme Court just make it easier to build things in this country — or did it give a once-in-a-lifetime gift to the fossil fuel industry? Last week, the Supreme Court ruled 8-0 against environmentalists who sought to use a key permitting law, the National Environmental Policy Act, to slow down a railroad in a remote but oil-rich part of Utah. Even the court’s liberals ruled against the green groups.But the court’s conservative majority issued a much stronger and more expansive ruling, urging

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42:52

Shift Key Classic: The World Will Miss 1.5C. What...

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/05/28

Shift Key is off this week for Memorial Day, so we’re re-running one of our favorite episodes from the past. With Republicans in the White House and Congress now halfway to effectively repealing the Inflation Reduction Act, the United States’ signature climate law, we thought now might be a good moment to remind ourselves why emissions reductions matter in the first place.To that end, we’re resurfacing our chat from November withKate Marvel, an associate research scientist at Columbia University and

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1:03:19

The Fight Over the Inflation Reduction Act Has Arrived

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/05/13

The fight over the Inflation Reduction Act has arrived. After months of discussion, the Republican majority in the House is now beginning to write, review, and argue about its plans to transform the climate law’s energy tax provisions.We wanted to record a show about how to follow that battle. But then — halfway through recording that episode — the Republican-controlled House Ways and Means Committee dropped the first draft of their proposal to gut the IRA, and we had to review it on-air.We were

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1:08:56

Spain’s Blackout and the Miracle of the Modern Power...

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/05/07

Last week, more than 50 million people across mainland Spain and Portugal suffered a blackout that lasted more than 10 hours and shuttered stores, halted trains, and dealt more than $1 billion in economic damage. At least eight deaths have been attributed to the power outage.Almost immediately, some commentators blamed the blackout on the large share of renewables on the Iberian peninsula’s power grid. Are they right? How does the number of big, heavy, spinning objects on the grid affect grid

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59:46

How Texas Could Destroy Its Electricity Market

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/04/30

Texas is one of the country’s biggest producers of zero-emissions energy. Last year, the Lone Star State surpassed California to become the country’s No. 1 market for utility-scale solar. More solar and batteries were added to the Texas grid in 2024 than any other energy source, and the state has long dominated in onshore wind.But that buildout is now threatened. A new tranche of bills in the Texas House and Senate could impose punitive engineering requirements on wind, solar, and storage plants —

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1:05:33

How China’s Industrial Policy Really Works

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/04/09

China’s industrial policy for clean energy has turned the country into a powerhouse of solar, wind, battery, and electric vehicle manufacturing.But long before the country’s factories moved global markets — and invited Trump’s self-destructive tariffs — the country implemented energy and technology policy to level up its domestic industry. How did those policies work? Which tools worked best? And if the United States needs to rebuild in the wake of Trump’s tariffs, what should this country learn?On

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48:32

How to Crash America’s Manufacturing Renaissance

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/03/19

Republicans in Washington are pushing for at least two big changes to the country’s car-related policies. In Congress, some lawmakers want to repeal the $7,500 tax credit that helps consumers buy or lease a new electric vehicle — as well as a matching tax credit that lets companies buy heavy-duty zero-carbon trucks. And at the Environmental Protection Agency, officials are trying to roll back Biden-era rules encouraging dealerships to sell more EVs through 2032.What will that mean for the climate —

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45:54

How Trump Has All But Halted Offshore Wind

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/03/12

Donald Trump’s second term has now entered its second month. His administration is doing much to slow down renewables, and everything it can to slow down offshore wind. Jael Holzman is a senior reporter at Heatmap and the author of our newsletter, “The Fight,” about local battles over renewable permitting around the country.On this week’s episode of Shift Key, Rob and Jesse talk to Jael about the bleak outlook for offshore wind, the use of presidential authority to impede energy development, and why

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47:46

Why Solar Might Be Better Off Than You Think

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/03/05

Longtime listeners of Shift Key will recognize the name Intersolar and Energy Storage North America, one of the country’s premier solar industry conferences. Shift Key was live at this year’s event, hosting a panel on the present and future of the solar industry featuring a pair of marquee panelists: Tom Starrs, currently the vice president for government and public affairs at EDP Renewables, North America, who has more than 30 years of experience in the renewables industry; and Maria Robinson,

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42:55

The Early Lessons of Trump’s ‘Energy Dominance’

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/02/26

Congress is still debating the fate of the Inflation Reduction Act, but the Trump administration has already torn up energy and climate policies across the federal government. It’s time to step back and try to take stock. How much damage has the Trump administration already done to decarbonization? What’s most worrying? What was going to happen anyway? And what might still be saved?On this week’s episode of Shift Key, Rob and Jesse go agency by agency to understand the most important changes and try

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1:08:55

How to Talk to Your Friendly Neighborhood Public...

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/02/19

The most important energy regulators in the United States aren’t all in the federal government. Each state has its own public utility commission, a set of elected or appointed officials who regulate local power companies. This set of 200 individuals wield an enormous amount of power — they oversee 1% of U.S. GDP — but they’re often outmatched by local utility lobbyists and overlooked in discussions from climate advocates.Charles Hua wants to change that. He is the founder and executive director of

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1:02:37

What Senator Brian Schatz Wants Climate Advocates to...

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer and Jesse Jenkins ·

2025/02/12

The first few weeks of the new Trump administration have seen an onslaught of anti-climate actions: an order punishing the wind industry, an attempted reversal of the Environmental Protection Administration’s climate authority, and a brazen — and possibly unconstitutional — attempt to freeze all spending under Biden’s climate laws. Democrats’ climate legacy seems to be under assault. How will they respond?Senator Brian Schatz has represented Hawaii in the U.S. Senate since 2010. He is the chief

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