You are listening to Redefining Energy. Your co hosts from Berlin Gerard Reid and
from London Laurel segaln Happy New Year, Jiold, Happy New Year, my
friend. Well for our classic beginning of the your episode, we brought our
friend and partner Michael vonab Did we bring him as a referee or why did
we bring him? Happy New Year's Gael, pleasure to be part of this
absolutely critical listening episode of Redefining Energy. Apparently I get to referee. There's
a questions about the scoring in the past, and so I've been brought in
as an independent. It was a requirement of the sponsorship. They just felt
that there was some inequity going on. So happy you're here, Michael.
I really am like we just unfairly treated. But first there was from a
partner. This podcast is powered by Expo and international leader in providing sustainable energy
solutions for the future, John Michael. We had sixteen thousand downloads of our
prediction last year. It's time to put our prediction to the test. Mikeel
can you read job first prediction? I certainly can record installation of everything energy
transition, solar batteries, heat pumps and evs. Oh, that's an easy
one. That was If you look globally, battery installation is probably up one
hundred percent. I'm talking pot stationary storage. Solar is four hundred gigawats.
I think it was two hundred and fifty gigawatts last year. EVS is up
fourteen million evs sold this year, ten million last year. Heat pumps,
which was you know, had a difficult year. Still a record year globally
you'll have ten and a half million heat pumps. And then wind, even
wind actually had a record year one hundred and three gigawatts. So yeah,
it's a good I think the only thing that didn't work out so well was
nuclear, you know, that was that did not so well. Everything else
was good. Yeah, but Yob, you took us the embassador of China
because seventy percent of all those installations were in China. I love the Chinese,
so simple came over. I will say as the referee that given where
we've been going, this prediction was like saying the sun rises in the east,
and the east being China. Obviously, I have to say this is
just such an obvious one. I can't give it a ten out of ten,
even though it's accurate. Eight out of ten is all I can give
it one to one. Okay. Next prediction lore massive consolidation and ev sector.
Toyota will buy Panasonic, okay, and I said most of us will
buy Riviana and we will see an apple the car. Okay, let's try
to sugar coat it a bit. So I sorry, no, I'm not
if you told me not to laugh at this prediction. We had some bankruptcy
like Poterra. We finally see Lucy imploding. The CFO just resign at the
end of last year. They just put six hundred million do our revenue and
almost three billion dollars of loss in the first three quarters of twenty three.
Volkswagen is struggling a lot of zombie companies like Fiscer. Toyota got a new
CEO. That's right, but unfortunately it seems to drink the same kool aid
as his former boss. And you know talking about Ammonia engine Peumonia. Yeah,
yeah, I talk about Ammonia Engine and teslack continue to outperform shares upon
one twenty percent to twenty three. They want the competition for the charging standout.
In the US, Model Y is the most sold car in the world
innovation with like giget casting and on and on and on. So shoo shoo
shoe. Maybe I'll be right in two twenty four. But job would you
think. I think Toyota have to take off a Panasonic now otherwise around of
the game. I think the consolidation is coming. We were just a year
or two world of prediction, It's all right. My take on this is
slightly different. So Toyota and Panasonic. No, but many brands are starting
to invest in Chinese firms, which really means they're slapping stagnant Western brands on
purely Chinese cars for import to the West, pretending they're contributing something besides a
familiar logo. So I think he's right in spirit, wrong in details.
He took the risk but failed on the risk. I would say a two
out of ten for this one. I get a bit more. No,
I'm sorry. The sponsors were very clear that the thumb on the se far
too heavy for the French person. The Irish have been the underdogs of Europe
for so long they can't be oppressed any longer. Thank you very much,
Micha. Okay, go to prediction number three. Okay, your d volatility
in the energy market is here to stay. Okay, So volatility for me
is not just prices going up. Volatility is there going up and down.
And you've continued to see volatility across all commodities. You think of the price
of oil, it's been up and down like a yo yo all year.
I'd also say this something about natural gas. But most important thing I want
to say is in and around electricity markets, which is electricity now because we've
just got so much wind and solar in the system, particularly in a continent
of Europe. What this means is we've periods where we have zero prices,
minus prices, massive curtailment, and this is where the volatility is coming about.
The weather is determining really the energy price, and I think that's here
to stay. That's the way I'll describe. Yeah. I mean this is
a very poetique description of the world. Volatility which is a technical terms when
you are treating energy, and it helps to calculate the prices of options.
So in fact, the premium of option has gone down, and that's correct
you talk about volatility. The price of gas in Europe has gone down something
like seventy five percent to date, but pretty much in a straight line.
So technically it's not volatility. I understand what you're saying about negative prices,
certainment and some but it's not the technical definition of vlatility. So I strongly
hurge the independent referee to give a bad grade. Year I may I just
say something on this, please. I come from the mathematics world, and
mathematics, volatility is defined as a statistical measure of the dispersion of data around
its mean over a certain period of time. And over the last year,
what's happened is that volatility has gone up, not down. Just give me
numbers and that would be my comment. It's a very fairly vague expression.
So if you'd been a bit more precise about the range of volatility for specific
commodities, I would give you a higher score on this. But we all
know that volatility has been structurally baked in since the USA became the biggest oil
producer in twenty eighteen. Fracking and strale extraction proved to be debt laden and
short lived producers in twenty nineteen, and Opek started picking on high priced producers
in twenty twenty. Then, on top of that, the invasion of Ukraine
and the most recent unpleasantness in the Middle East. We live in a much
more volatile world for energy than we used to. So because of the lack
of precision of your stuff, I will say seven out of ten, it's
such an obvious one. It's a gimme. But that's jahas prediction, a
vague yes, okay, next one, lot all there will be new alternatives
to lithium ion in stationary storage. Okay, good. The reason I did
that excellent prediction was because the price of lithium into twenty two when crazy and
I said, I thought, and I predicted that that would trigger alternative technologies.
Well, clearly, on one hand, we didn't have any long dreation
storage breakthrough like vanadium or or iron air. These are just the same prototypes
stagging along. But into our twenty three it's really the earware sodium exploded,
and for me, it's the biggest story of the next five years. And
it's always those price spikes who trigger a rapid transformation in battery chemicals. And
let me elaborate into twenty eight with the spike in cobalt which triggered the development
of ronkel batteries, into a twenty one with the spike in nickel which triggered
the LFB battery and two twenty two spiking medium trigger sodium. Sodium is coming,
and I have a good prediction here, despite the fact that the spot
price of lithium is now back at the fifteen thousand dollars paton, which is
down eighty percent this year. But still when you compare lithium and sodium sodium,
the basic mataialist from pon. So sodium is going to appear, and
my prediction is spot on or jar. What you gonna say, I'm gonna
say, Yeah, you're absolutely right. Sodium is common, but sodium is
not here. Tell me where the installations were this year. You sent this
year, so they're coming next year? Do you want to use it as
a prediction for next year? I can help you that or a year after
maybe, But I mean, come on, Michael, there's no sodio batteries
out there. Did have you seen one? As you guys know, I
sat on the story board of a electro chemistry battery firm and I've dealt with
grid storage globe. I've made predictions. I think it was even long duration
storage. I was on Redefining Energy talking about it a couple of years ago,
and I know a lot about this stuff, and I'm just gonna say
electrochemistry is weird science. It's alchemy. It takes time to stabilize, to
get right, it takes time to scale. Lithium mine has such a transcendent
lead because it's in all of our watches and everything, that it's hard to
overcome that it's gone way down the rights experience curve. But that said,
there are actual grid and behind the meter installations of vanadium redox flow batteries.
Energy Vault actually managed to sell some of their stupid concrete block nonsense and it's
under construction, which just boggles my mind. And pumped hydro is still going
from strength to weakness to strength. There are pumped hydro facilities who went lives
today. So right in principle, wrong in optimism, and missing some of
the other technologies. I'm going to give this a three out of ten.
Oh no, come on, I mean, are you teaving together? Typical
friends right? Reckon? They always go on the attack. They just can't
face facts. There's a thing in comedy called punching up, and how can
you not be punching up when you're punching up at a grand old culture with
the best cheese and wine in the world. That don't worry, Okay,
Gerard. The energy transition has no plan. It just goes and it seems
awfully familiar. I'm not sure why. Yeah, it's not my quote.
That's not my quote, but I do like it because it's just The reason
I said that was because I think the energy transition is just going to happen
because of technology change. It's as simple as that technology change. The technology
change means better product at lower costs. And you've seen that particularly, I
would say, let's say solar. You've seeing that in batteries, and you've
seen it another technologies as well. So that's number one. And the other
thing it has no plan. What you've got is governments who come out with
goals. We're going to go and do this, We're going to reduce carbon
emissions by that, but they don't actually have plans and how to do this.
And that's what I said. I suppose it's a very vague comment.
I know you're probably going to get me on the vagueness. But what here
I am at the end of the year, and we just had COP twenty
eight and I sort of go, oh my god. If you're talking about
having no plan, I mean, that's as vague as you came. You
know, it offers a transition away from fossil fuels, but no phase out.
That's where I was coming from that when I said that, can I
totally disagree. You can say whatever you want is the Chinese government who is
having very strict and coherent plans. You have the IRA in the US,
which is going to work or not work. We can discuss that at length.
So there is a real government push behind those technologies, and without the
political support and financial support, they would not have reached where they are now.
I'm on Laurent's side on this right. You have a very European centric
perspective, as we've discussed before around different subjects. I give you the example
of guide co GEI d COOD Memory Serves Global Energy Integration and Development Corporation founded
in twenty sixteen by China under UN auspices to build HVDC interconnects between countries over
one hundred and forty countries globally and at their funding research for like a twelve
sub Saharan country HVDC super grid. They're funding a whole bunch of stuff.
In the Belton Road initiative, there is a plan, it's just in the
West we're pretty light on actual plans and we're kind of hoping the market innovates
us to success. And so you're right, but geographically constrained, I can
only give you a six out of ten on this one man. Then last
prediction, it's on me. Nuclear Westinghouse takes over Europe, and I was
one hundred percent spot on. Belgaria has dropped Russia for Westinghouse, Slovenia has
chosen Westinghouse, such as Don Poland, and the Westinghouse is now with the
Jurenko. They are supplying the fuel for all Eastern europe nuclup plants, probably
at the exception of Hungary and Romania was a Canadian reactor has chosen the last
evolution of can do to repower their new clup plants. So I think I'm
spot on here. But when we say Westinghouse, we're really talking about Brookfield
because Brookfield owns westing House. Yeah, absolus. Without Brookfield, I don't
think westing House would have done so well. But you're spot on it,
you know. In that regard. Gerard I'm just going to make exactly the
point that Lauran got the company around. He doesn't even know the name of
it is called Brookfield. I'm glad you went in with that. Thank you
very very much, very good Michael. You've just I don't need say anymore.
How much of do I get? I think there's a lot going on
here, and I think you're vastly more right than wrong. But there's some
you know, other stuff going on. Westinghouse has also got Ontario now with
a small new modular reactor, enabling them to defer any real climate action for
another decade. You know. So Westinghouse under Brookfield is going from strength to
strength and it's definitely taking over Europe. That's bang on. It's a good
prediction. I'm going to give that one a nine out of ten. Yeah,
annoying, Okay, total, Okay, the total four Girard twenty one,
Well, laurraw fourteen. Did he get that much? He come into
double digitch. I didn't think he was going to do a double disish.
Nine on the last one took him into the double digits. So twenty one
to fourteen still high risk, could have been really high reward and low risk
vagueness got rewarded. As we said, noster damis as Irish. So the
winner for two twenty three is Gerard Read Okay, after this sad episode,
Prediction number one, Michael, you're on. My first prediction is Stilantis,
also known as merger and acquisitions aggregator of dying brands mostly European. It's going
to stop pretending to be an automotive manufacturer and solely become a firm which slaps
stable of brands on Chinese cars and distributed somewhere in the West. Wow.
Job, I was going to say the same more. Wow. That's a
very interesting one, Michael. I like it very good and I think it'll
be right. Yeah. And Santis on the top of having to harness fourteen
or fifteen brands, which is difficult as a cultural problem because the CEO is
a petrol head. This is the guy on the weekend he tweak a diesel
engine and then on the Sunday you go to make races in nineteen seventies car
so he just cannot fathom what electrification is about. And by the way,
they didn't sign for NAX yet. Yeah, but don't forget they did do
a twenty percent investment in a Chinese manufacture of automobiles and that's electric, pure
electrics up. Yeah, So the the writings on the wall for them,
they're dying out, and this is a strategy I think they would actually work
for them. Okay, So my first prediction is elections could derail the energy
transition. So two twenty four is the year of a lot of elections.
So I'm not talking about Russia, which is of course going to be a
joke. There's got to be election in India, Taiwan, probably in the
UK he new parliament. That's more interesting, especially if the new parliament is
more conservative than the one we have now. But of course I'm talking about
the US election, and if Trump is elected, it's going to be something.
And I just want to read Carlas Sand's advisor and vice chair of the
Center for Energy and the Environment at the America First Policy Institute, and she
says, on the first day of a second Trump administration, the president has
committed to rolling back every single one of Joe Biden's job killing, industry killing
regulation. She said Trump would work with congressional leaders to curtail what she called
the socialist big government IRA scrap few eganomy standards, work cars, and end
the war on American energy. That's my prediction. Comments. First of all,
the IRA is best understood as a massive subsidy to the oil and gas
industry. The hydrogen strategy was explicitly set up by Congress with a mandate letter
saying make hydrogen from coal and natural gas and preserve fossil fuel infrastructure the hydrogen
hubs. The vast majority of money and hydrogen is coming from the fossil fuel
hubs. Four seven. I think Trump will face some headwinds in terms of
actually reversing some of those policies, but that doesn't mean those policies shouldn't be
reversed. It's just they're bad policies that are giving more money to the oil
and gas industry. They're not environmental policies. But you're right, it will
disrupt it. What I will say, Laurent, is your optimistic and timing
because the election is in November, but he takes power in January. Sure,
I agree with Roan. I think i'd add into it. There's also
the possibility that you also get a German election as well, So without a
doubt, there's a lot of political risk out there against the energy transition.
That's what I would say. Yeah, definitely very strong. The USA is
a weird, weird one though. Okay, Gerard, you're next, so
I'm next. So let me start at my first prediction. We have oversupply
of everything energy related, and I'm going to start with everything clean evs.
I think there's going to be a surplus globally of evs next year, which
means prices go down. You've already seen solar panels go down in twenty twenty
three. I think that's going to continue in twenty twenty four. You're also
seeing a surplace of wind turbines, and again same thing. You can see
price pressure in that area. Batteries the exact same thing. And then actually,
if I look at the fossil fuels, same thing. You've got a
surplus of fossil fuels, whether that's natural gas, oil, coal, So
I can just see continued price pressure across everything energy related. I have only
one exception, that is transformers. You cannot get your hand on a transformer
anywhere in the Western world. But other than that, everything else is surpas.
Okay, good, I like it, Michael. My next prediction is
the EU will formally create an EU HVDC and HVAC Grid and interconnect Planning and
funding agency with a mandate for continent scale grid interconnection. Basically, that's the
role of in Soye right now. Is it more like a club You think
they're gonna go top down? I think they're gonna go top down like Guideco
Michael. They should, there's no doubt. You are dead right. They
should do this, and I hope they do it. But I'd be interesting
to know just where you got that idea from. Where do you think it's
coming I haven't heard that anywhere, So where's it coming from in your head?
I've been looking for these organizations in the developer world for a couple of
years, and they don't exist. They're starting to emerge as clubs, as
utilities that work together. But I look at the world of interconnects and planning,
I look at the toolkits we have. When I did my analysis of
the major Chinese African study and the twelve country super grid, they were trying
to assemble a European tool which was inadequate for the scale of the job.
There aren't good tools for continental scale grid simulation with multiple energy sources somebody needs
to fund and create that. Somebody needs to do this doing strategic stuff,
and somebody needs to be assisting and overcoming and bridging the regulatory patchworks. Guide
Co is doing that in the Belton Road initiatives, but guide Co and Belton
Road aren't in Europe or in North America. North America has got a complete
lack of regional or continent scale grid planning. We have some people who talk
together in the Pacific Northwest, and the United States don't even include Canada.
This kind of bigger scale thinking is a requirement, and Europe has the capacity
to do this out of Brussels. The EU can do this North America can
I like it? Yeah? Interesting? Interesting? So that's your prediction for
two or thirty four, Michael, I just want to say one thing before
we hear Laura's prediction. Lauran, your last prediction was very vague. Can
you get something sort of a bit more sort of juicy this time? Yeah?
Good. My second prediction for two twenty four is the return of clean
energy shares. And what I want to say is two twenty three has been
awful. Clean energy indexes YIELDKO they're all minus twenty five to minus forty percent.
But interest rates have stabilized and they're probably going to start easing into a
twenty four. Supply chains getting better, and those assets are now super cheap.
If you look at mass Dar buying at the end of twenty three,
a lot of show wind farms and it's the opposite of excellent journey when Mazda
buy, it's the bottom of the market. And we had a few indexes
like the Invesco while the Hill Clean Energy that's twenty eight percent, the I
Shares Global Clean Energy is same twenty eight percent. I think a lot of
those chairs are going to rebound very much into a twenty four. That's my
prediction. I'm not sure about that because and the reason I'm not sure about
it is because what you're seeing is we'll go back to my prediction, which
is that the surplus of everything energy. When there's surplus of everything energy,
margins go down. You don't want to hold those stocks in that period of
time. Yeah, but a lot of those stocks are operators. They are
all the operators I can get long with. We're up to you, okay,
get love with the operators, right, good, look, we'll see
in your That's my prediction. Certainly, when I look at eield cos and
ETFs for clean energy, a lot of them were based upon deployed assets generating
electricity, and those people will be fairly rewarded, I think. But yeah,
it's going to be an interesting thing. Tough to call either way.
So good prediction from my perspective, Gerard, I think it's your time,
so last, but not least. And you're going to tell me this is
vague. I know this. China rules the world. Oh come on,
well, when let me just go on, let me give you a muff
finished it, I'd say, China rule the world and they will install half
of the global production of wind on shore and offshore solar EVS batteries next year.
And what will end up happening is their companies. I'm talking BYD and
evs, cohl and Batteries, gold Win and Wind. These companies will internationalize
and we'll be driving BYD dolphins and cars like that by the end of the
year. And what we'll see is envision in Goldwin turbines in Europe and in
other parts of the world. That's my prediction. I can't disagree. I've
been watching these statistics for top ten wind companies for a decade, and I've
been seeing Vestis staying at the top, ge drifting downwards, but gold Wind
drifting upwards. And now two of the top five last year were Chinese.
I think three of the top five next year will be Chinese for Wind,
and Goldwyn will probably hit number one. Based upon the challenges that Vestus and
Siemens have been having in cars, Well, they're already making more cars and
batteries than anybody else, so I think that's just saying they'll continue to make
more cars and batteries than anybody else. So I'm not sure what you really
meant by that. I just want to win next year. Mike sip that
you know, it's all about winning, but this is predictions, not saying
life will continue as usual. That's true, that's true, that's true.
Okay, guys, it was a pleasure doing those predictions with you. We
thank Expo, our partner, for supporting the show, and we have new
partners coming in very soon, which is great, a good recognition of the
show. Michael, you want to say something about redefinding cheat Tech After a
year with us, It's been a great year. I've had amazing in depth
conversations. My conversation with Sahara Rashie Baby was excellent dropping December on containership,
container port, ground transportation, decarbonization, very interesting conversation. Generally, I
like the fact that you have those almost two hours interviews so you can really
dig deep into the technical aspect, which of course we don't have time to
do on the main show. And guys, I wish you the two of
you, the best year for two twenty four as well as for our listeners.
Likewise, could look to everybody, to the two of you and to
all our listeners this year, a happy new year, Joy in the well.
But I have a gratuitous third prediction, which is it Gerard will now
henceforth be known as Gerard Nostradamus. Reed for my vagueness. Okay, guys,
bye, take care, Guys, thank you for listening to Redefining Energy.
Don't forget to rate the show and subscribe on Apple Podcast, Spotify or
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