This is the final episode of a five-part series exploring the lithium-ion battery supply chain. If you haven’t listened to the first four episodes, we recommend you start there. So far over this season we've traced the global lithium-ion battery supply chain from mining to processing to manufacturing. And we've put it all into a geopolitical and economic context. In this final installment of our five-part series, we come to the end of the road for a battery.  There are a lot of...

This is the fourth episode of a five-part series exploring the lithium-ion battery supply chain. If you haven’t listened to the first three episodes, we recommend you start there.  China has been the world's biggest battery manufacturer for over a decade. Chinese companies got in the game early, building an industry from scratch in the 2000s. By 2022, according to the IEA, China manufactured 76% of the world's batteries. But that’s changing. Battery factories in the U.S. and around the...

This is the third episode of a five-part series exploring the lithium-ion battery supply chain. If you haven’t listened to the first two episodes, we recommend you start there. Batteries can replace gasoline in our cars, or diesel in our generators, with electricity. But batteries and petroleum-based fuels share something in common: they both rely on energy-intensive processes to turn extracted materials into something useful. The middle stage of the lithium-ion supply chain is called...

This is the second episode of a five-part series exploring the lithium-ion battery supply chain. If you haven’t listened to the first episode, we recommend you start there. To produce enough batteries to reach global net-zero goals, the International Energy Agency says we'll need to increase production of critical minerals by six fold by 2040. It's a monumental task.  It can feel like a contradictory mission. To save the planet, we have to mine more minerals; but mining and processing...

We need to electrify much of the global economy in order to hit net-zero emissions by 2050. That means installing a lot of batteries in our cars, buildings, and across the grid to balance vast amounts of wind and solar. The supply chain behind all those batteries could be worth nearly half a trillion dollars by 2030. Whoever controls that supply chain has enormous power – figuratively and literally.  In this episode, we explore the stakes of the battery-based transition. We’ll open up a...

Batteries are finding their way into everything – from cars to heavy equipment to the electric grid.  But scaling up production to meet the demands of a net-zero economy is complicated and contentious. In this 5-episode season, we’re digging into the ways batteries are made and asking: what gets mined, traded, and consumed on the road to decarbonization?  Season 4 of The Big Switch drops Feb 28th. Listen on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.

This week, we’re running an episode of Degrees: Real talk about planet-saving careers, from our friends at Environmental Defense Fund: “The fastest electric vehicle fleet makeover in the west”. Degrees is an action hub for green job seekers to find career guidance and connect to a community of mentors, especially now that green jobs are among the fastest growing jobs globally, surging over 237% in the past five years.  The new season of Degrees, “How to Green Your Job,” is out now wherever...

This is the fifth episode of a five-part series exploring the European energy crisis in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. If you haven’t listened to the first four episodes, we recommend you start there. In March of 2022, European officials unveiled a plan to push their energy transition much further, much faster – and rid their dependence on Russian fossil fuels.  REPowerEU was ambitious, but it raised lots of questions about whether it would lock Europe into new dependencies.  In...

This is the fourth episode of a five-part series exploring the European energy crisis in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. If you haven’t listened to the first three episodes, we recommend you start there. After the Russian invasion of Ukraine, many Germans and Poles installed heat pumps and residential solar panels to reduce their dependence on Russian fossil fuels.  But do the countries have the skilled workforce they need to meet rapidly growing demand? In this episode, we...

This is the third episode of a five-part series exploring the European energy crisis in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. If you haven’t listened to the first two episodes, we recommend you start there. Even with a plan to phase down fossil fuel use, Poland still gets 70% of its electricity from coal. Can a country so dependent on coal make the transition to green energy effectively—and quickly? In this episode, we explore the consequences of Poland’s historical reliance on coal....

This is the second episode of a five-part series exploring the European energy crisis in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. If you haven’t listened to the first episode, we recommend you start there.  Germany has grown its wind and solar sectors dramatically over the past 20 years. And yet, when Russia’s invasion of Ukraine sparked an energy crisis, Germany fired up idle coal plants and began importing natural gas from around the world. So why couldn’t renewables in Germany—and in...

Putin’s assault on Ukraine triggered an energy crisis that sent Europe’s economies into a tailspin and put the European energy transition to the test. But how did the European Union, a leader in climate action, become so dependent on Russian oil and gas to begin with?  This season, we look at the energy systems of Germany and Poland. Both have very different energy systems, but both became dependent on Russian energy for heating homes, firing power plants, and fueling businesses. In this...

Russia's invasion of Ukraine sparked supply shortages, fears of blackouts, and a scramble to find new sources of energy. In this season of The Big Switch we’re trying to answer the trillion-dollar question: Will the energy crisis speed up or slow down Europe’s clean energy transition? And what will it mean for the rest of the world? Over the next five episodes, we’ll look at Poland and Germany specifically to figure out how they’re navigating supply shocks, and planning for the future. ...

Geothermal energy doesn’t get near the attention that wind and solar do. But to decarbonize our energy systems, we need a team of net zero technologies. And despite geothermal’s low profile, it’s an always-on, zero carbon technology that can complement intermittent renewables like wind and solar.  So could geothermal become a bigger player on the net zero energy team? In this episode we go to Kenya, a country that built its geothermal energy from scratch in the 1980s and now gets nearly...

There’s been a pretty major shake-up in the world of transit decarbonization. This summer, the California Air Resources Board – a state organization that regulates air quality – approved a rule mandating that by 2035, all new cars sold in California will be zero-emissions.    This rule will transform California's car market; and deliver some huge climate and health wins along the way. Between now and 2035, the regulation will result in 9.5 million fewer gas-powered cars on the road....

In this episode, a former oil-and-gas man named Efrem Jernigan catches the solar bug. Inspired by the potential for lower energy bills and green jobs, he looks into bringing solar to the neighborhood he grew up in, a historically black part of Houston called Sunnyside.    But for many Sunnyside residents, the technology is out of reach: Many are renters. Others lack roofs with sufficient sun. And still others simply don’t have the money to purchase expensive solar systems.    And it’s not...

On this show we talk a lot about the “big switch” to zero-carbon energy sources. But there’s another kind of switch that needs to happen, too. You might have heard the term “just transition” before – the idea that as we make the switch to new energy sources, we also have to help transition the workers and communities that produce that energy to new sources of employment and revenue. Planning for a just transition isn’t easy, but in Colorado, a group of state officials, coal workers, and...

Frogs. Bees. Finicky software. There are a lot of things that can cause an electric vehicle charging station to break. We need to replace fossil-fuel powered vehicles with EVs as soon as possible—but if the stations don’t work, it will slow the adoption of EVs.   In Los Angeles, two Black women have started training a small army of technicians to fix broken charging stations, and they’re taking their model around the country. They couldn’t have started at a better time: The U.S. is...

We’re switching things up a bit for the next few weeks. Instead of continuing our sector-by-sector decarbonization tour, we’re taking you to the front lines of the energy transition – to communities where the big switch to a zero carbon future is already underway. We’re starting with New York City, where there’s a project underway that’s tackling decarbonization and equity at the same time. Residents in New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) apartments have long lived with dangerous heating...

Building codes: they might sound boring, but they’re actually the front lines in a nationwide battle to decarbonize our buildings. And they do a lot more than keeping your  home from falling down over your head. They regulate everything from energy efficiency, to the kind of fuel your stove runs on, to whether your building has an electric vehicle charging port – all super important facets of building decarbonization. And if designed correctly, building codes can also help address issues like...

There are 5.5 million commercial buildings in the U.S. Why are only 700 of them net-zero? We have the technology to slash carbon emissions from commercial buildings, which account for 16% of all U.S. emissions. And retrofitting commercial buildings saves money and energy for building owners. So what gives? In this episode, Melissa talks to Dr. Paul Mathew, who studies buildings as a staff scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. He explains the reasons for this “yawning adoption...

It’s officially summer in North America, and that means one thing – it’s getting hot. Every year, heat waves are the deadliest extreme weather event, and they’re only getting more severe. Often, the people who fall victim to heatwaves are those who are left without access to air conditioning. Dr. Diana Hernández has a name for this phenomenon: energy insecurity.  Energy insecurity – inequitable access of affordable energy for basic needs like heating and cooling – is a massive environmental...

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...

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...