Energypreneurs

Hosted by Sohail Hasnie

Business Entrepreneurship Technology

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Episodes

349

Latest episode

Aug 2026

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About the show

Energypreneurs is a podcast that brings solar power, electric vehicles and battery technologies to young entrepreneurs. Sohail Hasnie, our host, is a firm believer that the solution to climate change lies in these technologies, which will also fundamentally change the way we think about electricity and transportation—on road, on water and even on air. Over the last 35 years, Sohail has applied technology and innovation in many large infrastructure projects across Australasia. As a staff of the Asian Development Bank since 2001, he has developed large investment projects with solar power, battery, and electric vehicles across Asia.

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60 recent

August 12, 2026Episode 34753 min

E347: Green Hushing: Why Companies Hide Their Climate Wins

Everyone knows greenwashing. Helen Neal is more worried about its opposite — green hushing, where companies making real climate progress stay silent because the risk of getting a claim wrong now outweighs the benefit of talking at all. A 20-year communications specialist who once brought the first EVs into Europe, she's sharp on why "business sense" beats "moral duty," where greenwashing actually comes from inside a company, and why you should never test a sustainability claim on a general AI — including what her team built instead. Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

August 9, 2026Episode 34657 min

E346: The Grid Ends at the Meter

Bruce Nordman spent decades at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory working on demand flexibility. He returns with an argument that cuts against most of what the industry is building: the grid should stop at the meter. Everything behind it — solar, batteries, water heaters, EVs — belongs to the customer, coordinated by one mechanism: price. Not aggregators. Not cloud platforms. Not utilities micromanaging your devices. — Standards vs. platforms: what VPPs make you pay for — The case for low-voltage DC — solar is DC, batteries are DC, so why convert twice? — Why under 5% of Californian EV owners let the utility touch their charger — The Bell Labs story: how the smartest engineers alive dismissed the internet Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

August 7, 2026Episode 34521 min

E345: The Cheapest Electricity in History | Energypreneurs Briefing

One in three Australian homes now has solar on the roof. Nobody built a power station to make it happen — millions of households just did it themselves. That's the largest distributed energy build in history, and it started as a rounding error. In Brief 03, we distill hundreds of expert conversations into one argument: solar didn't win on policy or ideology. It won because it got cheap, then kept getting cheaper. We cover: — How solar became the cheapest electricity humanity has ever generated — Why Australia's rooftops are the template for everywhere else — What breaks when the sun does the work — and why storage is the answer 340+ conversations. 1 brief. Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

August 5, 2026Episode 34448 min

E344: Why Development Banking Is About to Be Disrupted Like Consumer Banking Was

Back in 2018, Ozzeir Khan ran an experiment at the Asian Development Bank: could AI predict GDP better than the bank's PhD economists? It came remarkably close. The economists' verdict — if you can't explain it, it's no good, even if it's right. Eight years on, that argument is over. We talk about what generative AI is doing to document-centric institutions — development banks, law firms, investment banks — and who it displaces first. Ozzeir's answer is uncomfortable: not just the entry-level roles, but the middle management layer, and it's already showing up in the Amazon and Microsoft layoffs. Also: why the skill that matters now is asking better questions rather than finding answers, and why the biggest disruption he sees is to his own profession — software engineering. Ozzeir Khan is Director and CIO | Operations and Country Engagement at the World Bank, previously Director of Digital Innovation at the Asian Development Bank. Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

August 2, 2026Episode 34331 min

E343: How a Text Message Replaces a Power Plant: Octopus Energy

Most energy retailers earn more the more you use. Octopus Energy built its business on the opposite idea — that a utility should help you spend less. Eric Davids, who leads US strategy, explains how: "plunge pricing" alerts at 50–70% off when renewables are abundant, EV tariffs that cut peak demand 42% and save around £650 a year, and the striking claim that a simple behavioural nudge, at scale, can replace a gas peaker plant. Figures are from Octopus's UK operations. Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

July 30, 2026Episode 34226 min

E342: Your Car is the Next Power Plant | Energypreneurs Briefing

There are 200 cars parked outside right now. Each carries a 60–80 kWh battery. Together, that's a small power station sitting idle. That's Vehicle-to-Grid — and it's closer than most people think. In Brief 02, we distill hundreds of expert conversations into one argument: your EV isn't just transport. It's a battery on wheels that can power your home, stabilise the grid, and earn you money while it sits in the driveway. We cover: Why V2G will spread like SMS did — slowly, then all at once What happens when millions of EVs start feeding electricity back The economics that make it inevitable 340+ conversations. 1 brief. Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

July 29, 2026Episode 34145 min

E341: A $22,000 Battery That Pays for Itself in Four Years

Australia's home battery market is booming — but the gap between the sales pitch and the lived reality is wider than most people think. Christina Li works at the frontline of battery adoption, with visibility across customers, retailers, installers, DNSPs and VPPs that very few people have. We dig into what's really driving uptake, what's stalling it, why some households see payback in under four years while others can't make the numbers stack, and what the rise of VPPs means for the value of a battery sitting in your garage. If you've ever wondered whether a home battery actually makes financial sense — this is the conversation to have. Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

July 27, 2026Episode 34043 min

E340: Your Dung Is Our Dough: The Fuel Cell Anyone Can Make

Nick Abson made pop videos for Queen, then children's puppets, then built Europe's largest fuel cell company, which was later killed off. At 79, his argument is that a community could build its own fuel cell and run on nothing but its own waste. His figures are unverified, and the units aren't built yet, but it is one of the more unusual conversations I've had on the show. Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

July 22, 2026Episode 33845 min

E339: The Zero Marginal Cost Drive: Arguing with Tesla's AI

For almost a decade I've been convinced electricity will end up free — free the way the internet is free. Last week I charged the car for nothing at a shopping mall, same as I would from my own solar, and drove north out of Manila. The trip cost nothing at all. Fifty minutes on where that leads, and an argument with Tesla's AI about a future where knowledge is free too. Only I have finite energy. The AI can go forever. Come find out how far. Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs

July 19, 2026Episode 33846 min

E338: Bigger Than Snowy Hydro 2.0 — If We Can Unlock It

Australia's aggregated EV fleet capacity is expected to exceed Snowy Hydro 2.0 by the early 2030s. The government spent $12 billion on Snowy Hydro. The EV battery potential is sitting in driveways across the country — for free. But only if we can enable bidirectional charging. Portia Rooney spent three years working on exactly that — and took a Churchill Fellowship to Europe and China to study how the world's most advanced V2G programs actually work. Her verdict: the technology is ready. The OEM approval, interoperability and harmonisation of standards and regulations are the missing pieces. In this conversation: AC vs DC bidirectional charging, why a Nissan LEAF got bricked trying to do V2G, why power companies are going to have to adapt their business model and why the distributed Lego-block model has no single point of failure. "It doesn't have a central point. If you've got a transmission line transporting energy, there's a single point of failure. This doesn't." Connect with Sohail Hasnie: Facebook @sohailhasnie X (Twitter) @shasnie LinkedIn @shasnie ADB Blog Sohail Hasnie YouTube @energypreneurs