Speaker 1: With a rund segle end from London and Gerard read
Speaker 1: from Berlin.
Speaker 2: This is redefining.
Speaker 3: Energy today on refin Energy, George, we're going to talk
Speaker 3: about deal trends in MNA and energy financing.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, this is very important because we have a nice
Speaker 1: saying in the finance world follow the money.
Speaker 3: And here we're really following the money. But first of all,
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Speaker 3: Back to the show, and we have a wonderful guest
Speaker 3: that we loved a lot and came. Would you believe
Speaker 3: it's six years ago when we were just amateur podcaster.
Speaker 1: It was right at the beginning, just six years ago
Speaker 1: and we started. Yeah, unbelieva. Yeah, so I can't believe
Speaker 1: time flies that so much. Anyway, it's great to have
Speaker 1: Natasha Luther Jones again on the podcast.
Speaker 3: And for those few who don't know who Natasha is,
Speaker 3: she's partner Global Culture, Energy and Natural Resources at the
Speaker 3: law firm DLA Piper. But she's mostly known for a nickname,
Speaker 3: which is.
Speaker 1: The the quit a PPAs.
Speaker 3: But you're going to see we're gonna go much further
Speaker 3: than just PPAs.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was the old nickname from six years ago.
Speaker 1: The world has changed anyway. It's actually great to have
Speaker 1: her to come on to talk about what has changed
Speaker 1: and what's hard and what's not.
Speaker 3: So a bit of music and then we bring her
Speaker 3: on the show.
Speaker 1: Natashet, it's great to have you on the show again.
Speaker 1: It's been a long while.
Speaker 4: Oh thank you for having me. It's nice to be
Speaker 4: back on the show with you both.
Speaker 3: Natasha. We look into the archive. You came episode twenty
Speaker 3: eight in June to or twenty and now we're episode
Speaker 3: to twenty two or something, So I mean, what a journey.
Speaker 3: And before you comment, I found a speech by Winston
Speaker 3: Churchill talking about six years. We may allow ourselves a
Speaker 3: brief payod of rejoicing, but let's us not forget for
Speaker 3: a moment the toilet efforts lie ahead. We have come
Speaker 3: through the worst of six years of suffering and peril,
Speaker 3: so that's a bit dramatic, but six years that's the
Speaker 3: length of World War Two.
Speaker 4: I have to say that a really interesting intro, Lauren.
Speaker 4: But you're absolutely right. A lot has changed since the
Speaker 4: last time I was on this podcast six years ago,
Speaker 4: including actually you two, and I'm not talking about the
Speaker 4: fact that we've all aged. I'm talking about how you
Speaker 4: two now become this sort of celebrity podcaster as it's
Speaker 4: some more professional than it was back during COVID in
Speaker 4: twenty twenty.
Speaker 1: I can't believe it's six years ago. I really can't.
Speaker 1: It's just unbelievable. Time flies when you haven't done. It's
Speaker 1: a pity about Lauren's Winston Churchill accent, doesn't it, because
Speaker 1: it was a really lovely quolt.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I agree.
Speaker 3: Let's dive into what's happening and how the market is changing,
Speaker 3: because you are in the art of it and you
Speaker 3: used to be the queen of PPA but now it's
Speaker 3: so much more complex sophisticated. So what are the trends
Speaker 3: you're seeing right now in terms of deal structure, deal
Speaker 3: financing all over Europe.
Speaker 4: If you look back over the last six years, a
Speaker 4: lot has changed globally, and many of your episodes have
Speaker 4: covered some of the things that we've all faced. I
Speaker 4: suppose what hasn't changed from a DLA Piper perspective is
Speaker 4: that I'm still here and I'm still running the energy practice.
Speaker 4: But DLAs now firmly established itsself as one of the
Speaker 4: largest global law firms in revenue terms, and over the
Speaker 4: last four or five years we've managed to move up
Speaker 4: to the league table, so we're like either number one
Speaker 4: or two for energy transition deals on M and A
Speaker 4: and PS. So it's allowed us to really see how
Speaker 4: the landscape operates globally. Where are those priorities now they
Speaker 4: are BEZ. Wow, it's mind blowing. Over the last couple
Speaker 4: of years, the growth in BEZ we've seen, that's so
Speaker 4: client wise. If you look at the figures, fifty percent
Speaker 4: growth on installation last year. Actually that's just mirrored in
Speaker 4: the legal sector and advisors sector as well. It's been
Speaker 4: our biggest growth we are now for the last couple
Speaker 4: of years. What we've seen in the M and A
Speaker 4: is six years was a long time. We still had
Speaker 4: a ready to build model then, which was super popular.
Speaker 4: We had a single asset buying and selling model. We've
Speaker 4: now moved into the Wilder's platform, investments developers moving into
Speaker 4: that world of IPPs. And then I suppose what follows
Speaker 4: that is then that move of financing in the whole
Speaker 4: code structures we're seeing rather than the single asset financings.
Speaker 4: And final trend I have to say is data centers,
Speaker 4: hyperscalers AI the impact that's having on renewable energy electricity.
Speaker 4: Those would be my top key trend one.
Speaker 1: Now, Natasha, maybe let's dig into each of them because
Speaker 1: they're really really interesting. Let's start with the battery energy
Speaker 1: storage area. I just only want to say from my
Speaker 1: own cor perspective and a Lexa perspective, we did our
Speaker 1: first financing ten years ago in the space and nobody
Speaker 1: was doing anything, and now suddenly it's the heart of
Speaker 1: this energy transition. And the thing I love about it
Speaker 1: is it's complex. But I'd love to hear your views
Speaker 1: and what you see in best and what you see
Speaker 1: the trends are across Europe.
Speaker 4: You are right, it's complex, but it's only complex because
Speaker 4: it's new and we're figuring it all out. We've been
Speaker 4: doing solar and wind for years, so there are tried
Speaker 4: and tested positions for that, and I suppose BEZ does
Speaker 4: bring in that more element of technical knowledge when you're
Speaker 4: trying to optimize it. So what have we genuinely seen.
Speaker 4: You've got very mature markets now with the UK has
Speaker 4: been really successful and developing out the Bears market with
Speaker 4: all the revenue stacks available there and the co location
Speaker 4: of Bez under CSDS in the UK. Two. I suppose
Speaker 4: what I've found really interesting is going into the new
Speaker 4: markets and then seeing how we can finance and develop
Speaker 4: Bears in different markets. I know Germany's very close to
Speaker 4: your heart, Gerards, So I don't know if you saw
Speaker 4: the deal we did a couple of months ago that
Speaker 4: was super interesting because it combines all sorts of different
Speaker 4: parts of bed Natasha.
Speaker 1: That's the one random berg you're talking about in the
Speaker 1: old airport. Yeah, it's amazing. Yeah, maybe talk a little
Speaker 1: bit about it.
Speaker 4: Five hundred mega walk of Bear, one hundred and fifty
Speaker 4: megawatts of so co located. But what you're doing is
Speaker 4: you're taking Brownfield's an old military airport, developing that and
Speaker 4: then having a data center development on it as well,
Speaker 4: so we work with Prime Capital on that, and that's
Speaker 4: the sort of deal that's really exciting because it's not
Speaker 4: Bears on its own, it's Colo and we all love Colo.
Speaker 4: But actually it's also encouraging data centers to come there
Speaker 4: and then buy the green power.
Speaker 3: Yes, Nata Sha, I mean, there's so much stuff to
Speaker 3: say about Germany and people ask us all the time,
Speaker 3: but it's not just there. Because you've seen markets like Italy, Finland.
Speaker 3: Can you go in certain structure? Are they the same?
Speaker 3: Aw they different? How do you see in?
Speaker 4: What's really interesting in both of the markets that you've mentioned,
Speaker 4: and this is the same in quite a few different markets,
Speaker 4: is the deals can be structured and the deals are
Speaker 4: very different, even if as they're in the same country.
Speaker 4: So if you take Italy for example, that's the real
Speaker 4: boom area. The amount of clients who wanting to do
Speaker 4: deal in italy's really really increased recently, and a lot
Speaker 4: of people when they talk about Bears in Italy talk
Speaker 4: about the max result. You know, oh, well you've got
Speaker 4: the max there. That's great. Well, actually you can finance MAXI.
Speaker 4: I'm sure we'll see a whole pipeline of projects coming
Speaker 4: through financing MAX. But we actually project financed last month
Speaker 4: the first ever Bears facility in Italy and that didn't
Speaker 4: have a MAXA that that basically got finance and it
Speaker 4: was the Air for a transaction two fifty megawatts where
Speaker 4: we got a tolling agreement with Shell and that's what
Speaker 4: enabled the financing on that project rather than the government
Speaker 4: auction of MAX. But you could see them both Finland again,
Speaker 4: different model. You don't have a government auction like the
Speaker 4: MAX there, but we've seen financing structures where we've project
Speaker 4: financed assets there where we've had contracted revenue with tolling agreement,
Speaker 4: but we've actually also financed on a merchant basis. They're
Speaker 4: clearly different finance structure. But seeing the likes of these
Speaker 4: new tech players that come in and facilitate it, like Capello,
Speaker 4: that enables the financing. So that structure that deal is
Speaker 4: very different to a deal that then has a tolling agreement.
Speaker 4: I think that's what's really interesting about the best market.
Speaker 4: It's not one size fits all.
Speaker 1: Natasha, can we dig into the financing there, because that's
Speaker 1: for me, the biggest trend since we'd asked spot Woken
Speaker 1: is that if you think of a lot of what
Speaker 1: we've been doing for twenty years, renewables has just been
Speaker 1: financed with a government PPA at the end of the
Speaker 1: day a CFDA or a feeling TERV and now you're
Speaker 1: going into having to take merch and risk, and then
Speaker 1: you've got these so called tolls and stuff like that.
Speaker 1: Maybe talk about what you're seeing out there and what
Speaker 1: the trends are and how you see it going forward.
Speaker 4: It's a really interesting question. And again on a country
Speaker 4: by country basis, it does depend and it also depends
Speaker 4: if you've got co location as well, because that hybrid
Speaker 4: solution for a co location facility in Spain will look
Speaker 4: very different to a co location facility in the UK,
Speaker 4: where maybe you don't have a gate to offer for
Speaker 4: your bears in co location, but you have been given
Speaker 4: a gate to offer for solar. But generally, i'd say
Speaker 4: most lenders prefer a toll, maybe not for the full output,
Speaker 4: it might be a certain percentage. But we do see
Speaker 4: also financings taking place with optimization agreements. Now clearly it
Speaker 4: does affect the gearing and different positions on the covenants,
Speaker 4: and it will depend what the project owner wants to
Speaker 4: achieve and it there isn't one approach for financings. You
Speaker 4: don't tend to see standalone financings for solar anymore. That's
Speaker 4: moved definitely into the hold co financing because it's tried
Speaker 4: and tested and the lenders are really comfortable with it.
Speaker 4: Subject to clearly like say standalone solar in Spain and
Speaker 4: the need to bring on BEZ for that. But you
Speaker 4: tend to see hold co structures more for the solar
Speaker 4: with BEZ maybe coming in. I still see that stand
Speaker 4: alone financing for BEZ being quite an active market because
Speaker 4: people are trying to figure out what the right revenue
Speaker 4: and ric model is.
Speaker 3: It's just going to get more complex, to tell you
Speaker 3: the truth, because now that people run BESS or operate bes,
Speaker 3: it's a totally different animal from Winner Solar case. Between these,
Speaker 3: it's any what I kepture prices, but the best You
Speaker 3: decide every day what you're going to do. You're in charge,
Speaker 3: you and all the algos who are managing the best
Speaker 3: and plus you've get your own new stack. So am
Speaker 3: I charging? Am I discharging? Am I putting option? And
Speaker 3: you know, do I work on the physical market? Do
Speaker 3: I work on the congestion market? Do I sell premiums
Speaker 3: the level of sophistication, and weirdly the guy who start
Speaker 3: to master best management are former gas operators.
Speaker 4: Yeah, what's interesting, Lauren. As you see this market develop,
Speaker 4: you'll see the hyperscale's coming into this market. So I
Speaker 4: totally agree at the moment, take if you take a
Speaker 4: hybrid asset, you need a very sophisticated player to take
Speaker 4: a ibrid asset and then optimize that. But we are
Speaker 4: seeing signs that some of the hyperscalas are now moving
Speaker 4: into this market too, So I think that's a watch
Speaker 4: the space.
Speaker 1: Let's follow up on that. So how are they going
Speaker 1: to come into that minor market? In other words, are
Speaker 1: they going to sign PPAs, Are they going to go
Speaker 1: and actually vertically integrate, are they going to partner with people?
Speaker 1: How do you see them sorting out that energy side
Speaker 1: going forward?
Speaker 4: Basically, I don't think it will be one size fits
Speaker 4: all for all of them. And this is me kind
Speaker 4: of anticipating where the market will go. Signing pure PPAs
Speaker 4: for Bears probably needs this GEO protocol to come in
Speaker 4: in Europe which will allow that transfer of certificates attaching
Speaker 4: to when generation occurs to actually time shifting it to
Speaker 4: when it dispatches, and I think so some of them
Speaker 4: will need to wait for that to happen before PPAs
Speaker 4: are signed. So I think it will be the latter
Speaker 4: that you mentioned, which is partnership working CLIs mostly with
Speaker 4: people then to try and help firm and provide a
Speaker 4: better profile for them.
Speaker 1: Just the other trend that you said that I thought
Speaker 1: was quite interesting, which was you talked about whole co financing,
Speaker 1: and I'm totally with you on this because I just
Speaker 1: I'm coming from a copper finance point of view where
Speaker 1: you would normally what you would do is you would
Speaker 1: just finance something at a project level, right, That's how
Speaker 1: you did it in the past. But as you said,
Speaker 1: now what you're doing is you're not doing it at
Speaker 1: that level. You're doing it at at the whole co
Speaker 1: level that has a whole portfolio list. Talk a little
Speaker 1: bit about why this is happening and also just how
Speaker 1: you see the trends going forward in terms of financing.
Speaker 1: As I said, these type of platforms does call them
Speaker 1: like that.
Speaker 4: It starts off with with the trends that we've seen,
Speaker 4: which is the m and A market consolidation and the
Speaker 4: move for investors actually investing in developers and turning developers
Speaker 4: into IPPs and then building these platforms, and it's far
Speaker 4: more flexible. It's a to deal financially to provide a
Speaker 4: bigger facility for that whole co platform than to be
Speaker 4: able to draw down to fund construction on a multiple
Speaker 4: project basis. So I think it goes hand and hand
Speaker 4: in the trend of the consolidation of these big players
Speaker 4: investors investing in developers and IPPs.
Speaker 3: Which means that if you had missed the boat three
Speaker 3: four years ago creating this platform, so not only owning assets,
Speaker 3: but managing them and optimizing them and doing what I
Speaker 3: used to do twenty years ago when I was training commodities,
Speaker 3: which is called cross collateralization. Maybe it's a new world
Speaker 3: for the arulnerable energy, but I can tell you it
Speaker 3: was done twenty years ago in the fossil fuel area.
Speaker 3: Assets are natural hedge one against another, and of course
Speaker 3: if they are natural hedge, it's much cheaper because they
Speaker 3: complement themselves, which means that going from a single asset
Speaker 3: to a portfolio level requires a level of knowledge and
Speaker 3: sophistication not only on the operators, but on the lenders
Speaker 3: and even the lawyers like you or organized. So what
Speaker 3: you see is you said conceliation. Have those people improved
Speaker 3: the same way or some really got it and others
Speaker 3: have totally missed the boat and they end up with
Speaker 3: a series of assets, and maybe they're weaker than the
Speaker 3: one who conceited better. So question is long, but the
Speaker 3: problem is complex.
Speaker 4: It is indeed if I pick up that sort of
Speaker 4: cross collateralization point though, and people get it in this market,
Speaker 4: and this is a whole move to hybridization of renewable
Speaker 4: energy assets, and in a way it applies equally to
Speaker 4: the whole co portfolio financings that are occurring. This does
Speaker 4: allow lenders to take a more sort of pragmatic view
Speaker 4: across the whole portfolio. So if you think about Bears
Speaker 4: and Solo, you might agree a certain percentage of merchant
Speaker 4: revenues and then you might agree a certain percentage of
Speaker 4: contracted revenues. So you look at it from a whole
Speaker 4: portfolio base is and a hybrid solution and really set
Speaker 4: out those parameters at the top which allow then the
Speaker 4: IPPs that you believe in, the sophisticated IPPs to build
Speaker 4: that ideal platform that they can.
Speaker 1: Do Lauran actually an attached to both here. Really, I
Speaker 1: think it's a really interesting talking point here because I
Speaker 1: think we're only at the beginnings of these financing structures
Speaker 1: and I actually don't believe that the renewable industry has
Speaker 1: that capabilities internally, which means and Lauren, you pointed to
Speaker 1: it earlier when you sort of talked about, you know,
Speaker 1: the whole area and the whole gas trading area, et cetera,
Speaker 1: et cetera. I suppose my question to both here and
Speaker 1: Laurn obviously this you're a commodity trader for many years.
Speaker 1: How do you see this market going? For a start,
Speaker 1: and then the Natasha, I'd be interested also to hear
Speaker 1: your thoughts on it as well well.
Speaker 3: John, I'm supposed to ask questions, so.
Speaker 1: You are, but you're an expert in that area given
Speaker 1: what you did beforehand, right, so you can see boat worlds.
Speaker 1: That's where I'm coming from, anot.
Speaker 3: It's a different mindset. Some infrastucture investors are smart, and
Speaker 3: I know a lot of them, and they will adapt,
Speaker 3: but it's a different mindset portfolio management. It's like, at
Speaker 3: some point you go to BP, who's processing all those
Speaker 3: molecules we're gonna do electron, Man, it's not simple. An
Speaker 3: electron is not virtual molecule. It reacts differently. And if
Speaker 3: your model was AK twenty year feed in tariff, which
Speaker 3: is the equivalent of a government bond plus or minus
Speaker 3: at the capture rate or the lot factor, you're gonna
Speaker 3: have a really tough time not only understanding what's happening
Speaker 3: in your portfolio, but also the way you're going to
Speaker 3: raise fund because if your slides are ten years old,
Speaker 3: you are gonna be hurt. That's my view now, not
Speaker 3: a shure you're in the in think of it.
Speaker 4: Please, I've got a more optimistic view than you, and
Speaker 4: it's probably because I've got these three deals on the
Speaker 4: table currently. By the time this podcast gets released, one
Speaker 4: of them will have closed and it'll be out in
Speaker 4: the press. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised to see
Speaker 4: depending on how much of it is disclosed, man, how
Speaker 4: much of it's confidential. But I think there are plenty
Speaker 4: of players who have the mindset and we're moving into
Speaker 4: that world quite quickly.
Speaker 1: Exciting times ahead. Indeed, I'm always.
Speaker 3: The guy's bearing venues and you're always optimistic, But that's
Speaker 3: the dynamics. The one who really get it will consolidate
Speaker 3: with the one who don't get it.
Speaker 4: That's not how I would phrase it. I phrase it
Speaker 4: as consolidation is happening, and the people looking to invest
Speaker 4: in see the technical experience and that in country knowledge
Speaker 4: that they may not have. And we've seen a huge
Speaker 4: amount of consolidation in the energy sector generally. And what
Speaker 4: was interesting when we looked back at the M and
Speaker 4: A figures for last year, you had actual deal amounts
Speaker 4: going down, but you had deal value growing by twenty percent,
Speaker 4: which shows you the deals are bigger and they're more strategic.
Speaker 4: And if I just look across the p for some
Speaker 4: of the clients we've worked at working with Elgin Energy
Speaker 4: for ten years, seeing their development from developer IPP, investment
Speaker 4: by CIP, working with BEV startup Octopus Energy Financing, now
Speaker 4: buying the UK EV charging business from stack Craft, that's
Speaker 4: what we're seeing. We're seeing that sort of journey and
Speaker 4: I think that development will continue.
Speaker 1: By the way, I think it's even got to go
Speaker 1: well beyond what we're talking here in terms of best
Speaker 1: and renewables. I think you're also going to see it
Speaker 1: in the utility space as well, because it's the same
Speaker 1: trends we're talking about, and it's the same complexities that
Speaker 1: they have to deal with. And if you don't have
Speaker 1: the capabilities or the scale needed, whether you're you're renewable
Speaker 1: or customers are grid to' in trouble going forward.
Speaker 4: Oh, you've hit the nail on the head. Actually, one
Speaker 4: deal I didn't mention, which we signed this year we
Speaker 4: sold Flexitricity for Quinbrook to Drax. That's exactly the point
Speaker 4: you're making. Drax decided they needed that sort of business
Speaker 4: within their portfolio and now they're offering some new products
Speaker 4: because of that exactly.
Speaker 1: In other words, what we're saying also is we're seeing
Speaker 1: this the m and a consolidation taking place. The question
Speaker 1: is is it going to accelerate now? In other words,
Speaker 1: have we reached the peak or is the peak in
Speaker 1: twelve months eighteen months? How do you see that?
Speaker 4: I don't think we've seen the peak. We're seeing any
Speaker 4: increase on I hate to mention the US in this
Speaker 4: podcast because we've managed to get to like twenty five
Speaker 4: minutes without Lauren mentioning it. So this is my bad
Speaker 4: everyone forry, But we've seen because of what's going on.
Speaker 4: We've seen that European investment come back into Europe, and
Speaker 4: then we're seeing the investment from the Middle East and
Speaker 4: from the US coming into Europe. So I think, particularly
Speaker 4: from a European basis consolidation, I don't think we've seen
Speaker 4: the peak. I think we've still got lots to come.
Speaker 4: I'm certainly looking forward to an even busier year this.
Speaker 1: Year, Natasha. A lot of the consolidation has taken place
Speaker 1: is because a lot of the smaller players just don't
Speaker 1: have the capabilities. Now, what you're also saying, I agree
Speaker 1: with you totally. What you've got is a lot of
Speaker 1: small our players who realize and now's the time to
Speaker 1: actually really scale the business and have an impact, right.
Speaker 3: Sham, We've really been good so far. We haven't talked
Speaker 3: about hyperscalers yet, so it's time to dive into hyperscalers
Speaker 3: that are centers. And of course it's all the range
Speaker 3: in the US, but it's fever is coming also in Europe.
Speaker 1: What do you see?
Speaker 4: You know? I love a hyperscaler Ppa twenty twelve, my
Speaker 4: first a hyperscaler PPA, and I've loved following the market
Speaker 4: and actually they are the biggest driver of the market
Speaker 4: now for us globally. A lot of people have said
Speaker 4: to me, oh, well, you know the figures for corporate
Speaker 4: PPAs they really fell off last year, but actually there
Speaker 4: were still twice as big as they were in twenty twenty.
Speaker 4: And the difference is the biggest percentage now is being
Speaker 4: driven by the hyperscalers and their demand for power, which
Speaker 4: is outstripping all the other buyers in the market. So
Speaker 4: it's a super exciting time. And then what's been really
Speaker 4: interesting also is seeing renewable energy generators also understand and
Speaker 4: want to work and adapt their strategy to bring in
Speaker 4: the sort of digital energy side of the piece. Could
Speaker 4: you have powered land, can you provide bridging solutions for
Speaker 4: data centers? How can we as an industry facilitate more
Speaker 4: data centers in a green way?
Speaker 1: And I think the other thing I'd add to it
Speaker 1: is a whole move to what I call energy parks
Speaker 1: sort of the words what you're doing is and you
Speaker 1: talked about the better one and Brandenburg going on, that
Speaker 1: trend has going to intensivey going forward, otherwise you're going
Speaker 1: to be building generations very close to demand.
Speaker 4: Totally agree, and what will be interesting to see then
Speaker 4: is the hybrid approaches taken to the generation affets. Will
Speaker 4: we see in Europe more biogas on these sites? Will
Speaker 4: it be simply solar and bears? Will there be wind?
Speaker 4: We know what we're seeing in the US, which is
Speaker 4: some of the gas coming in and nuclear coming in
Speaker 4: for the hyperscalers, So it'll be It will be super
Speaker 4: interesting to see how this market develops over the next
Speaker 4: couple of years as they all race or in this
Speaker 4: sort of data center ia rate that they're in to
Speaker 4: get to where they need to get to.
Speaker 1: And can I ask you just in terms of countries
Speaker 1: where this is going to because Okay, I live in
Speaker 1: between Ireland and Germany, and if I take the case
Speaker 1: of Ireland, look, the grid is completely fallen. You know.
Speaker 1: I know Google wants to have a whole pile of
Speaker 1: power here, but they're not going to get it. So
Speaker 1: where do they go next?
Speaker 4: I have got some hope that the UK is really
Speaker 4: going to continue to develop, and we have got grid
Speaker 4: reform finally coming hopefully to a conclusion with the gate
Speaker 4: two offers that we should be getting. We should hopefully
Speaker 4: see more data center development in the UK, Finland and
Speaker 4: the Nordics cheap power, it makes absolute sense that different
Speaker 4: places across the Nordics should continue to see growth, and
Speaker 4: then maybe Eastern Europe as well. They're going to go
Speaker 4: where the power is cheat. Also, as hybrid solutions get
Speaker 4: developed in Spain, you're not seeing a huge amount of
Speaker 4: hyperscala pure solar PPAs in Spain now for obvious reason.
Speaker 4: But as we see in these hybrid solutions develop in Spain,
Speaker 4: then that seemed like a sensible area for growth too.
Speaker 3: And in a certain way, having all those hyper scalers
Speaker 3: signed PPAs and probably even private wires, it's really you
Speaker 3: know what they say in the US, you know, bring
Speaker 3: your own generation, or at least partially because what we
Speaker 3: see in the US is okay, if you want to
Speaker 3: connect eight thousand, six hundred hours a year, you need
Speaker 3: to add five years. But if you agree to forego
Speaker 3: a few hundred you'll get the connection much faster, which
Speaker 3: means that the hyper scalers must integrate all those backup,
Speaker 3: whether it's recipal getting engine or even we see fuel
Speaker 3: cell for more boeing, everything go the way the dealer
Speaker 3: structure is that a bit of a virtual way to
Speaker 3: bring a bit your own power.
Speaker 4: How do you see that everything's on the table with
Speaker 4: the hyperscaler. That is entirely possible, And in some countries
Speaker 4: it just depends where they want to see their demand
Speaker 4: and where the hyperscal of data centers are getting trains. Again,
Speaker 4: on site generation is really important, especially in some of
Speaker 4: these places. Again, the Nordics is ideal for that, or
Speaker 4: if you have a massive, big industrial facility, on site
Speaker 4: generation absolutely makes sense.
Speaker 1: Natasha, So you're going to come back then in six
Speaker 1: years time? So what are we going to talk about
Speaker 1: six years time? Oh?
Speaker 4: God, well, I don't know. You've become superstars by then,
Speaker 4: won't you. So we'll have to wait and see.
Speaker 1: I won't.
Speaker 4: I'll definitely promise, I tell you what. I'll promise definitely
Speaker 4: to come back in six years time. But I'm not
Speaker 4: promising about what I want to talk about.
Speaker 3: I need to correct the wrong six years ago I
Speaker 3: named you the Queen of Ppa.
Speaker 1: It's finished.
Speaker 3: You're the Empress of Energy.
Speaker 4: Oh thank you, Lauren. I'll take that Moniker and then
Speaker 4: I'll leave you six years for you to decide on
Speaker 4: a new one. Then, thank you.
Speaker 1: Well, that was a great conversation. We really really really
Speaker 1: enjoyed that and listen, I'd love to think about it.
Speaker 3: She's totally on the top of the game. And what
Speaker 3: is extraordinary is that as the deals are getting more complex, Okay,
Speaker 3: we add the batteries, we had the data centers and
Speaker 3: all this co location hybridization, that all financing is becoming
Speaker 3: extremely sophisticated. And still you have lawyers like Natasha who
Speaker 3: can wrap everything together and a load of financing to happen,
Speaker 3: and the banks are getting better. But I'm really sometimes
Speaker 3: worried that we have a two tier sector where some
Speaker 3: catch the wave and ride with it and surf on it,
Speaker 3: and others, if they stay a bit analog in their
Speaker 3: two or ten model, are really going to suffer going forward?
Speaker 3: Or how do you see it.
Speaker 1: Duran, I think that's actually was driving consolidation. But it's
Speaker 1: as simple as that, because those guys who don't serve
Speaker 1: that wave just think on to survive, they'll either go
Speaker 1: out of business or else they will be consolidated. And
Speaker 1: we actually spend a lot of conversation talking really we're
Speaker 1: talking about really about renewables and all that the product
Speaker 1: and also a lot of the flash institutions that have
Speaker 1: invested in renewables but I think it's much deeper than that.
Speaker 1: I think you're going to see the exact same thing
Speaker 1: in the utility space going forward as well. That's the
Speaker 1: next big one.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we've seen that in the US. Now there's a
Speaker 3: lot of issue in Europe, so I'm not sure it's
Speaker 3: going to be as fluid as in the US, but
Speaker 3: certainly we'll have less actors. They need to un est curtailment,
Speaker 3: they need to honest capture rates, negative prices. The system
Speaker 3: is much more complex to understand. But on the other hand,
Speaker 3: the solutions, which are altgoes, digitization, batteries, solution exists, but
Speaker 3: it's a very very complex set of tools you need
Speaker 3: to master and not all of them will.
Speaker 1: Actually, that's why I think it's such an exciting space
Speaker 1: to be at a present round because I've just moved
Speaker 1: away from the simplicity of feeding entire financing to now complexity.
Speaker 3: It's cool complexity, and that's what you do again and
Speaker 3: again at alex a.
Speaker 1: Capitan exactly, That's what that's what we're doing. That's I said,
Speaker 1: that's why it really excites the hell out of me
Speaker 1: now because it's like you sort of feel your time
Speaker 1: is coming okay.
Speaker 3: John, we like to thank Nata char Luther Jones no
Speaker 3: more the Queen of Ppa, but the Empress.
Speaker 1: Of Energy, the Energy Empress.
Speaker 3: Empress. Yeah, and I took to you next week.
Speaker 1: I look forward to the front.
Speaker 2: Thank you for listening to Redefining Energy.
Speaker 1: Don't forget to rate the show and subscribe on Apple Podcast, Spotify,
Speaker 1: or the platform of your choice.