Shift Key with Robinson Meyer14 Nov 2025

Shift Key Live: The 2025 Elections, the Gates Memo, and More

It’s been a huge few weeks for climate news. Democrats swept state and local elections in New Jersey, Virginia, California, and New York City — and won two crucial regulatory races in Georgia. A few weeks before, the climate tech investor and philanthropist Bill Gates released a memo arguing for a pivot on climate funding vis a vis global health.

On this special episode of Shift Key, Rob talks to Heatmap staff writers Emily Pontecorvo and Matthew Zeitlin about what the 2025 elections might mean for climate policy, why “affordability” politics could hamper decarbonization, and whether the Gates memo represents anything but a rebrand. They recorded this conversation live at the Yale School of Management’s annual clean energy conference in New Haven, Connecticut.

Shift Key is hosted by Robinson Meyer, the founding executive editor of Heatmap, and Jesse Jenkins, a professor of energy systems engineering at Princeton University. Jesse is off this week.

Mentioned:

How Mikie Sherrill Won New Jersey’s Electricity Election, by Matthew

Democrats Win 2 Key Energy Races in Georgia, by Emily

Zohran Mamdani’s Muted Climate Politics, by Rob

7 New Takes From Bill Gates on Climate ‘Doomsday’ Talk and Global Health

Where Bill Gates Got It Wrong, by Zeke Haufather

Previously on Shift Key: How to Talk to Your Friendly Neighborhood Public Utility Regulator

This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by …

Hydrostor is building the future of energy with Advanced Compressed Air Energy Storage. Delivering clean, reliable power with 500-megawatt facilities sited on 100 acres, Hydrostor’s energy storage projects are transforming the grid and creating thousands of American jobs. Learn more at hydrostor.ca.

Uplight is a clean energy technology company that helps energy providers unlock grid capacity by activating energy customers and their connected devices to generate, shift, and save energy. The Uplight Demand Stack — which integrates energy efficiency, electrification, rates, and flexibility programs — improves grid resilience, reduces costs, and accelerates decarbonization for energy providers and their customers. Learn more at uplight.com/heatmap.

Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Denne episoden er hentet fra en åpen RSS-feed og er ikke publisert av Podme. Den kan derfor inneholde annonser.

Episoder(155)

The Tesla Alum Trying to Turn GM Into an American Battery Juggernaut

There are two big trends in the American battery sector at the moment. The first is that the electric vehicle market is deteriorating. GM, for instance, sold just 25,000 EVs in the third quarter of th...

7 Okt 50min

Governor Mikie Sherrill on Electricity Prices, Nuclear Power, and Building in New Jersey

Governor Mikie Sherrill is a former Navy pilot, federal prosecutor, and a member of the U.S. House of Representatives. She was elected New Jersey's governor in November 2025 in a campaign dominated by...

2 Okt 21min

Al Gore on AI, ‘An Inconvenient Truth,’ and the Biggest Surprises of the Past 20 Years

Former Vice President Al Gore needs no introduction. He is, in a way, the original climate influencer. His film An Inconvenient Truth gave rise to a new wave of climate activism in the 2000s. It was o...

30 Sep 29min

Energy Secretary Chris Wright on Trump’s Pro-Nuclear, Pro-Fossil Fuel Agenda

Since taking office last year, the Trump administration has blocked renewable energy development and attacked climate change policy, prioritized fossil fuels and encouraged nuclear energy, and started...

25 Sep 30min

What Does The Nuclear Company Do?

In the past few years, something surprising has happened in American energy policy: States and utilities have started trying to build new nuclear plants.A new kind of company — the nuclear developer —...

23 Sep 53min

Starting a Giant Online Data Platform Is the Easy Part

America has some of the world’s best data about its own internal energy, industrial economy, and carbon emissions. That’s thanks to a federal agency called the U.S. Energy Information Administration, ...

16 Sep 35min

Shift Key Classic: What Is a Watt?

As we catch up from summer vacation, we’re bringing you a favorite from the Shift Key archive. We’ll be back in your feed with more fresh episodes starting next week.What is the difference between ene...

9 Sep 47min

How to Understand America’s Gigantic Natural Gas Buildout

The United States is staring down a natural gas buildout of gigantic proportions.Amazon wants to build what would be the country’s largest power plant in Texas — and run it entirely on natural gas. No...

2 Sep 50min