Field notes The Energy Transition for the Rest of Us

Lonely Mountain Labs · Field notes

The energy transition, for the rest of us.

Plain-language notes on the podcasts and essays where people building the energy system explain it. One note per episode or essay, accurate enough to quote in a meeting, written for someone smart who doesn’t work in energy.

192 notes3 sources~358k wordsNov 2022 – Sep 2026

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I · Episodes Catalyst with Shayle Kann Hosted by Shayle Kann A podcast about energy, climate tech and the electricity system. Usually one long interview, organized around a single question, with a host who pushes back. 125 notesNov 2022 – Sep 2026 II · Episodes Critical Capital Hosted by Alfred Johnson A podcast about the money behind energy and physical infrastructure. One long interview per episode, every other Tuesday. 11 notesApr 2026 – Sep 2026 III · Essays Steel For Fuel Written by Andy Lubershane Andy Lubershane's newsletter. The name means displacing fossil fuel with the steel in turbines, panels and reactors. Essays of very uneven length, roughly monthly. 56 notesMar 2023 – Sep 2026

Latest notes

  1. Steel For Fuel · 21 Sep 2026 For AI, energy is nothing, and energy is everything (reprise) by Andy Lubershane, Partner and Head of Research, Energy Impact Partners How much could an AI data center pay for electricity before the computing stops being worth doing?
  2. Catalyst · 17 Sep 2026 Fuel cells, geopolitics, and the solar growth curve with No outside guest; producer Max Savage Levenson interviews host Shayle Kann, early-stage investor, Energy Impact Partners Looking back at 2026 so far and forward to what comes next, what has surprised Shayle Kann, and what is he watching?
  3. Critical Capital · 15 Sep 2026 What it costs to make power cheap with Zach Dell, co-founder and CEO, Base Power If you treat home electricity as a commodity rather than a premium product, what actually sets its price, and what does a company have to do to drive that price down?
  4. Catalyst · 10 Sep 2026 Do data centers really increase electricity prices? with Andy Lubershane, partner and head of research, Energy Impact Partners Are data centers making your electricity bill go up?
  5. Catalyst · 3 Sep 2026 What comes after the data center backlash? with Brian Janous, co-founder and chief commercial officer, Cloverleaf Infrastructure Is the backlash against data centers something developers can actually fix, and if it is not, where does the buildout go instead?
  6. Critical Capital · 1 Sep 2026 What it takes to build in America again with Erin Price-Wright, general partner at Andreessen Horowitz, investing in energy, mining and heavy industry for the firm’s American Dynamism practice; previously an engineer at Palantir Now that capital has arrived for factories, mines and grid hardware, what actually decides whether they get built in the United States?
  7. Catalyst · 27 Aug 2026 The rise of metal fuels with Richard Wang, co-founder and CEO, Voya Energy Diesel generators are universally disliked and nobody has managed to replace them. Could aluminum do it?
  8. Catalyst · 20 Aug 2026 Can AI revolutionize grid operations? with Josh Wong, CEO and founder, ThinkLabs AI What actually happens inside a utility’s planning and operations functions, and where could AI change it?

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  1. The question and the answer, up front, so you know in ten seconds whether it’s the one you need.
  2. The argument in prose, because the reasoning lives in the “but” and the “which means.”
  3. Claims worth citing, each number attributed and dated.
  4. Where it’s contested, so the hedges survive.

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