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Shift Key with Robinson Meyer

Shift Key with Robinson Meyer

Hosted by Heatmap News

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Episodes

153

Latest episode

Sep 2026

Language

EN

About the show

Every week, Heatmap News Executive Editor Robinson Meyer and a guest make sense of the biggest shift of our time -- navigating the energy transition away from fossil fuels. Drawing on their years of experience reporting on and researching climate change and decarbonization, Meyer and his partners unpack the most important issues of the week and how the impacts of climate change and efforts to address it are transforming our economy, politics, and society at large. Music by Adam Kromelow. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Listen to episodes

60 recent
October 2, 202621 min

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 the state’s surging electricity prices. For this episode of Shift Key, Governor Sherrill joined Heatmap correspondent Matthew Zeitlin for a live conversation at our Heatmap House event, part of New York Climate Week. She reflected on electricity inflation, power markets, and what a data center developer would need to do to build in New Jersey. Shift Key is hosted by Robinson Meyer, the founding executive editor of Heatmap News. You can find a full transcript of the episode here . ​Mentioned: Matthew on Governor Sherrill’s electricity rate freeze ​ Previously on Shift Key: Energy Secretary Chris Wright on Trump’s Pro-Nuclear, Pro-Fossil Fuel Agenda Previously on Shift Key: Al Gore on AI, ‘An Inconvenient Truth,’ and the Biggest Surprises of the Past 20 Yearst 20 Years -- This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by ... Formed through a joint venture between Wärtsilä and RCT Solutions, Valo helps utilities, independent power producers, and developers navigate market and grid complexity without sacrificing system performance. Learn more at valoenergy.com . RE+ 26 is the largest clean energy event in North America, happening November 16th through 19th at the Las Vegas Convention Center. Register at re-plus.com and use code SHIFTKEY20 to save 20% off a Full Conference pass. Every year Giving Green researches the top climate nonprofits and sends 100% of every dollar donated to its Giving Green Fund straight to them. Make your first gift before the new year, and it will be matched up to $500. Go to GivingGreen.earth/Shift . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

September 30, 202629 min

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 one of the highest-grossing documentaries of all time upon its release, and it won an Oscar, a Grammy, and — for Vice President Gore — a Nobel Peace Prize. He’s remained active in climate policy since then and leads the Climate Reality Project. He is also an investor and was a longtime director at Apple. For this episode of Shift Key, Vice President Gore joined Rob for a live conversation at our Heatmap House event, part of New York Climate Week. He reflected on the 20th anniversary of An Inconvenient Truth, the existential risk of artificial intelligence, and what has surprised him most about the evolution of climate politics. Shift Key is hosted by Robinson Meyer, the founding executive editor of Heatmap News. You can find a full transcript of the episode here . Mentioned: Previously on Shift Key: Energy Secretary Chris Wright on Trump’s Pro-Nuclear, Pro-Fossil Fuel Agenda -- This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by ... RE+ 26 is the largest clean energy event in North America, happening November 16th through 19th at the Las Vegas Convention Center. Register at re-plus.com and use code SHIFTKEY20 to save 20% off a Full Conference pass. Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

September 25, 202630 min

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 a war that led to a global oil and gas supply shock. U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright has been the face of much of that policy agenda. For this episode of Shift Key, he joined Rob for a live conversation at our Heatmap House event, part of New York Climate Week. He answered questions about the Trump administration’s war on wind, a ban on diesel fuel exports, and how China has been able to buttress global oil supplies since the spring. Shift Key is hosted by Robinson Meyer, the founding executive editor of Heatmap News. You can find a full transcript of the episode here . Mentioned: Chris Wright Doesn’t Think We’ll Have a Diesel Export Ban Trump Keeps Wind Farms Waiting Despite Court Ruling Trump’s War Against Wind Energy: A Timeline Previously on Shift Key: How China Saved the World From Trump’s Energy Crisis -- This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by ... RE+ 26 is the largest clean energy event in North America, happening November 16th through 19th at the Las Vegas Convention Center. Register at re-plus.com and use code SHIFTKEY20 to save 20% off a Full Conference pass. Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

September 23, 202653 min

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 — is now trying to handle those projects. The most prominent by far is The Nuclear Company , a startup that has hired many of the same people who built the new Vogtle plant in Georgia. On this episode of Shift Key, Rob is joined by Jonathan Webb, the CEO of the Nuclear Company. They discuss the company’s goal of building “fleet-scale” nuclear, why Jonathan believes nuclear is poised for a revival, and what has changed since the company began. Shift Key is hosted by Robinson Meyer, the founding executive editor of Heatmap News. You can find a full transcript of the episode here . Mentioned: Previously on Shift Key: The Lesson Nuclear Companies Should Take From the Dot-Com Boom -- This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by ... RE+ 26 is the largest clean energy event in North America, happening November 16th through 19th at the Las Vegas Convention Center. Register at re-plus.com and use code SHIFTKEY20 to save 20% off a Full Conference pass. Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

September 16, 202635 min

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, which painstakingly collects and updates the data every week. But EIA data can be hard to access — and even harder to share and understand. A new project aims to change that. U.S. Energy Data takes federal energy data and repackages it, helping amateurs and experts understand the power grid, liquid fuels, and more. It is now the easiest way to make and share charts with federal energy data. On this episode of Shift Key, Rob is joined by Hannah Ritchie, a data scientist and writer who advised and prototyped US Energy Data. She is also the author of Not the End of the World and Clearing the Air, as well as a senior researcher at the University of Oxford and the deputy editor at Our World in Data . Rob and Hannah discuss how the platform came together, what makes it such a valuable resource, and what we can learn from it about the state of the energy transition. Shift Key is hosted by Robinson Meyer, the founding executive editor of Heatmap News. You can find a full transcript of the episode here . Mentioned: U.S. Energy Data Previously on Shift Key: Daniel Palken of Arnold Ventures joined us to discuss permitting reform -- This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by … RE+ 26 is the largest clean energy event in North America, happening November 16th through 19th at the Las Vegas Convention Center. Register at re-plus.com and use code SHIFTKEY20 to save 20% off a Full Conference pass. Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

September 9, 202647 min

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 energy and power? How does the power grid work? And what’s the difference between a megawatt and a megawatt-hour? On this week’s episode, we answer those questions and many, many more. This was the start of Shift Key Summer School, a series of introductory “lecture conversations” meant to cover the basics of energy and the power grid for listeners of every experience level and background. In less than an hour, Rob and former Shift Key co-host Jesse Jenkins, a professor of energy systems engineering at Princeton University, try to get you up to speed on how to think about energy, power, horsepower, volts, amps, and what uses (approximately) 1 watt-hour, 1 kilowatt-hour, 1 megawatt-hour, and 1 gigawatt-hour. Shift Key is hosted by Robinson Meyer, the founding executive editor of Heatmap News. You can find a full transcript of the episode here . Mentioned: Decarbonize Your Life -- This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by … Verse’s software platform Aria helps data centers connect to the grid faster and optimize power operations in real time. Learn more at verse.inc . RE+ 26 is the largest clean energy event in North America, happening November 16th through 19th at the Las Vegas Convention Center. Register at re-plus.com and use code SHIFTKEY20 to save 20% off a Full Conference pass. Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

September 2, 202650 min

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. Not to be outdone, OpenAI is plotting an even larger power plant in Ohio that, if built, would become the world’s largest gas power facility. How should we think about this boom — and about the AI and technology companies behind it, who remain some of the world’s biggest buyers of clean energy? On this episode of Shift Key, Rob is joined by Emily Pontecorvo, a Heatmap founding staff writer. They discuss what Emily learned identifying the country’s 10 biggest gas projects, what surprised her most, and what this means for the country’s climate trajectory — and Big Tech’s corporate net-zero goals. Shift Key is hosted by Robinson Meyer, the founding executive editor of Heatmap News. You can find a full transcript of the episode here . Mentioned: The U.S. Is Building Natural Gas Power Twice as Fast as China Emily on Amazon’s Gigawatt Ranch Rob on OpenAI and the PORTS-Pike Technology Campus -- This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by ... Verse's software platform Aria helps data centers connect to the grid faster and optimize power operations in real time. Learn more at verse.inc . RE+ 26 is the largest clean energy event in North America, happening November 16th through 19th at the Las Vegas Convention Center. Register at re-plus.com and use code SHIFTKEY20 to save 20% off a Full Conference pass. Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

August 27, 20261 hr 3 min

Trump’s Clean Energy Repeal Was Even More Costly Than We Thought

Two years ago, Donald Trump made an outlandish campaign promise: He would cut Americans’ power bills in half. It was a ridiculous, impossible pledge — but even so, the affordability problem didn’t need to get this bad. A new report, out this week from the Natural Resources Defense Council, looks at the economic, environmental, and public health costs of Trump’s regulatory and legislative clean energy policies, including his rollback of the wind and solar tax credits. The report’s author, Amanda Levin, joins Rob on this episode of Shift Key. Levin is a Director of Policy Analysis at the NRDC’s Science Office. They discuss why Trump’s repeal will have long-term effects, the underrated public health impacts of the rollback, and why Levin believes the credits should be restored. Shift Key is hosted by Robinson Meyer, the founding executive editor of Heatmap News. You can find a full transcript of the episode here . Mentioned: Amanda Levin’s new report: An Affordability Crisis of Trump’s Own Making A ‘Glass Half Full’ Isn’t Enough to Fight Climate Change Previously on Shift Key: The New Paper Arguing Biden’s Power Sector Emissions Cuts Are Largely Intact — Even Under Trump -- This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by ... Discover the Yale Clean and Equitable Energy Development online certificate program at the Yale Center for Business and the Environment. In this fully online, 5-month program, you’ll learn from leading experts, develop practical skills, and grow a powerful network. Visit cbey.yale.edu to learn more and apply. Verse 's software platform Aria helps data centers connect to the grid faster and optimize power operations in real time. Learn more at verse.inc . Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

August 20, 202641 min

Who Pays for Wildfire Prevention? If You’re in California, You Do — in Your Power Bill.

California now has the most expensive electricity in the continental United States. It also has expensive housing … and an increasingly broken home insurance market. Are the three phenomena linked? They might be. Due to a peculiarity in the state’s constitution, electricity utilities are incentivized to pay for a huge amount of wildfire prevention, above and beyond what would be seen as economically reasonable in another state. Fixing that constitutional peculiarity could help bring down energy costs and heal the home insurance market, but it will be complicated — and a number of policies will need to get passed at the same time. That’s what Lauren Teixeira argues in her new report, “ Rewiring Risk .” Teixeira, a senior climate and energy analyst at the Breakthrough Institute, joins Rob for today’s episode of Shift Key. They discuss how California found itself in this situation, how it might be fixed, and why the state treats utilities as a sin-eater for wildfire risk. Shift Key is hosted by Robinson Meyer, the founding executive editor of Heatmap News. You can find a full transcript of the episode here . Mentioned: Lauren’s report: Rewiring Risk Rethinking Utility Wildfire Risk in California Previously on Shift Key: How California Broke Its Electricity Bills Previously on Shift Key: How Wildfires Destroyed California’s Insurance Market -- This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by ... Discover the Yale Clean and Equitable Energy Development online certificate program at the Yale Center for Business and the Environment. In this fully online, 5-month program, you’ll learn from leading experts, develop practical skills, and grow a powerful network. Visit cbey.yale.edu to learn more and apply. Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

August 12, 202647 min

Why This El Niño Looks Like a Monster

Every few years, the Pacific Ocean’s surface waters become especially warm near the equator, a climatic phenomenon known as El Niño. El Niño is a normal part of the climate system, but even in a normal year, it can trigger extreme weather around the world. Forecasters are worried that the current El Niño — which just began a few weeks ago — is going to be anything but normal. Models suggest that we could soon see the hottest El Niño ever measured, with unpredictable and catastrophic effects for ecosystems and societies around the world. What does that mean? And why does this El Niño look so bad? On this episode of Shift Key, Rob is joined by Zeke Hausfather, a climate research lead at Stripe and a research scientist at Berkeley Earth. They discuss what forecast models are saying about this El Niño, why it gives us a glance at the future, and whether climate change itself is accelerating. Shift Key is hosted by Robinson Meyer, the founding executive editor of Heatmap News. You can find a full transcript of the episode here . Mentioned: NOAA’s El Niño page and the relative El Niño index An Assessment of Earth's Climate Sensitivity Using Multiple Lines of Evidence , the 2020 paper where Zeke was a coauthor Zeke’s blog post on AI emissions: The real energy use of agentic AI John Bistline’s post on AI emissions at Watershed Heatmap’s coverage of AI emissions: A New Guesstimate for Corporate AI Emissions -- This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by ... Discover the Yale Clean and Equitable Energy Development online certificate program at the Yale Center for Business and the Environment. In this fully online, 5-month program, you’ll learn from leading experts, develop practical skills, and grow a powerful network. Visit cbey.yale.edu to learn more and apply. Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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