Energised: Connecting America - The Future of the Grid in the United States

Expanding our global electricity networks is key to unlocking a renewable future, especially in the United States: the world’s largest economy that produces 14 percent of global emissions.  The Inflation Reduction Act, signed last August, aims to cut greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030 – America’s largest ever investment to fight climate change.  However, one serious obstacle could stymie these ambitions: an outdated and overloaded grid. The impact of insufficient infrastructure across the United States is already showing: queues to connect renewable energy projects to the grid stretch to years, and the number of active large-scale solar and wind projects is decreasing.  In this episode, Kamal Ahmed is joined by Pedro Azagra, the CEO of Avangrid to discuss the specific difficulties facing the grid in the United States, and the upgrades and expansion needed to decarbonise the country’s electricity networks, and facilitate the energy transition.  For more information please visit iberdrola.com — We’d love to hear your feedback and what you think we should talk about next, who we should have on and what our future debates should be about. Send us an email or voice note with your thoughts to [email protected].  At Intelligence Squared we’ve got our own online streaming platform, Intelligence Squared+ and we’d love you to give it a go. It’s packed with more than 20 years’ worth of video debates and conversations on the world’s most important topics as well as exclusive podcast content. Tune in to live events, ask your questions or watch on-demand, totally ad-free with hours of discussion to dive into. Visit intelligencesquaredplus.com to start watching today Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices