SYNI, your hostess still going strong entering into Year 2 of the pod, presents our 2026 outlook for sustainable energy development. Consider this episode the de facto Part 2 to last week’s 2025 review, focusing on three key watch topics that sit right at the junction of policy, project delivery, and capital markets for this year. First, data centres and the way digital demand is reshaping power systems. Second, flexibility economics, meaning storage, demand response, and the evolving logic of power markets. Third, grids as the binding constraint, meaning the physical and regulatory reality of getting electrons from where they are generated to where they are needed. Yes this is an outlook episode and such occasions often tempt people into dramatic predictions that are intended to draw attention to themselves, or otherwise be forgotten in a sea of misguided forecasts. We know that energy transition has enough drama already. The interesting question for 2026 is whether the transition continues with less friction, less waste, and more system value. Data centres will test that. Flexibility will enable that. Grids will decide that. 

SYNI, your hostess with plenty of gusto, launches into our Year End 2025 episode, reflecting on the three topics that most defined sustainable energy and development trends as we move into the New Year. Before we get into the substance, a quick note of appreciation. This year marks our first full year of podcasting, which in podcast terms is roughly the same as surviving a full year of budget season, just with fewer spreadsheets and more people listening. Thank you for riding with us week after week, for sharing episodes, for challenging our takes, and for staying curious in a field that rewards stamina as much as insight. As we reflect on 2025, we can now see in hindsight that it was a year of untidy narratives. Yet it was a year of the transition becoming operationally unavoidable. Solar turned into baseline infrastructure. Carbon turned into trade compliance. Hydrogen turned into grown up finance. The EU acted like a bloc that wants its transition to be durable, competitive, and enforceable. Global politics made that posture less optional than it might have seemed a few years ago.

SYNI, your host brimming over with Christmas spirit, offers a short holiday message, plus a quick look at what we have been unpacking together this year across our first 51 episodes. And rest assured, we’ll be back with our year-end 2025 episode next week, reflecting on developments both good and bad for sustainability during this year. So Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to everyone listening in from boardrooms, trading floors, policy shops, engineering teams, academic departments, and that special corner of the world where people read consultation papers for fun. Thank you for giving us your attention in a year when attention has become the rarest commodity on Earth, narrowly ahead of grid connection capacity. 

SYNI, your hostess with real panache, addresses the European Union’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism, better known as CBAM, and why at the start of 2026 it will become the most important piece of climate policy that many exporters will only notice when an EU customer emails them with the subject line “Urgent Emissions Data Request.” Once again, the EU has followed the courage of their convictions with legislation that is certain to ruffle more than a few feathers in a world of power politics disguised as trade policy. At the end of the day, it's all about the EU's commitment to lower missions by 55% by 2030. And Brussels is about to flex on sustainable trade in an unprecedented way. 

SYNI, your hostess, turns her curiousity to the sustainability story behind big wave surfing contests, with a special focus on the World Surf League TUDOR Nazare Big Wave Challenge and what it means for the Blue Economy and for ocean conservation. The surfing community is officially on watch between now and March for “gigantes” to roll into Nazare, then the klaxon will blow for the start of the 2025-26 vintage of the breath-taking contest. SYNI looks at the history of Nazare, the sustainability efforts of the World Surfing League, the network of World Surfing Reserve designated breaks across the globe, and what the surfing community can do to better walk-the-walk of sustainability and conservation. So let's paddle out together and give us a listen just so you know that 50 is not the new 40 when it comes to SYNI or podcasts!  

SYNI, your ever-loyal pod hostess, turns her focus to AI, data centres and an impending power crunch in this new “Age of Electricity.” Can electricity grids manage to stay green amid booming AI demand for power? Forecasted data centre electricity demand will soon begin to outstrip sustainable supply. And this unbalance is forecast to grow quickly and become unmanageable in the not-so-distant future. By the end of the pod, you’ll know SNYI's view on which four pillars are needed to forge a solution. Now, let’s dig into this high-voltage elephant in the room and weigh in with our recommendations on how to cope with this crackling issue. Thanks again for joining us!

SYNI, your hostess that defines podcasting elegance and focus, addresses the events of this week all pointing to being confidently wrong in a wetter world. No prizes for all of us that knew COP30 was always likely to be a bust. SYNI provides a brief discussion of this latest edition of a COP flop, the briefer the better. Yet the political clownshow in Belém dovetails with some extraordinary news about super-computer enhanced climate forecasting a wetter and more volatile world. This very bad COP also demonstrated how the psychology of ignorant over-confidence is framing the current climate debate. Over to SYNI and "bora là" as they say in Brazil!

SYNI, your hostess that consistently exceeds expectations, asks if adaptation and resilience are now the fallback positions due to an expected failure to deliver on Net Zero? Are we quietly shifting from a world where mitigation reducing emissions is the main story to a world where we accept higher levels of warming and simply try to toughen up our societies and our infrastructure? This is not just some theoretical question. Last year, the total costs associated with climate change related disasters globally spiked to ~$1.5 trillion. The US share of this disaster bill approached $1 trillion, close to the amount it spent on providing Social Security income support for poor and older Americans. Given this tremendous price tag, SYNI helps us understand the scale of adaptation that is being discussed and the expectations about future warming that sit behind it. By the end of this episode, you’ll know our take on these key issues. We invite you to join us!

Instead of yet another COP30 preview, your hostess SYNI heads right into the heart of the real sustainable energy debate that is sadly missing in Brazil, starting with an explanation of the one chart you need during COP30 week, the classic Sankey energy use diagram. If you’re not familiar with the Sankey, never fear, you will be by the end of this pod. And you’ll know how it reveals that clean energy answers a far larger share of our real energy needs than realised by the pessimists responsible for COP30's negative vibe shift. Think interns of energy services and suddenly you can see the light at the end of the NetZero tunnel. So join SYNI as she paints this Sankey picture in your sustainable imagination. 

SYNI, your hostess with virtual swag, challenges us to become time travellers to ameliorate our view on climate change. She addresses the recent, growing clamour in the climate change debate and why the science leaves very little room for doubt. The clock we should be watching is measured in geological time rather than in financial quarters or electoral cycles. Claims that urgent action is alarmism fail this basic time test. The science shows that each additional increment of warming increases damages and raises the risk of crossing thresholds with long lasting outcomes. The pathways that keep those risks in a manageable range demand deep emission cuts this decade and the next. They require structural investment decisions that align with a world that works at low emissions. So let's go Back to the Future, jump into the DeLorean with Doc and Marty, set the clock to the 22nd century and listen to SYNI tell it like it is.  

SYNI, your host with the most subtle-swag in the sustainable community, is focused on the United Nations endorsing the first Article 6.4 carbon credit methodology, a breakthrough that may unlock hundreds of billions $$ in climate finance and reframe how global carbon markets operate. SNYI introduces you to the A6.4ER (catchy we know!) and unravels why this huge step forward that has taken a decade will soon take centre stage at the COP30 conference in Belem, Brazil. And yes, this is one of those rare times when bureaucracy might save the planet. One thing is certain: the global carbon market is no longer a theoretical construct. It has a name, a rulebook, and a supervisor. 

SYNI, your host, gives a review of the International Maritime Organisation meeting in London last week to promote a Net Zero agenda. Spoiler Alert: Delegates arrived with dense documents and finely tuned talking points and left with a familiar souvenir from multilateral life. The headline is simple. The can has been kicked into 2026. The decision on a global fuel standard and a pricing instrument still awaits while the working group on greenhouse gas reduction refines drafts and guidance while capitals weigh their red lines and their comfort zones. As always, SYNI is full of tough questions and she offers up honest answers. Thanks for joining us!

In this episode, SYNI, your host who provides the most, is mulling the politicisation of sustainability, especially sustainable finance at the supranational institutional level. The World Bank sits at this crossroads, and there are political opponents howling in the not-so far distance. This brings us to a core principle we have stated since the start: sustainability should stand on its own, not be wrapped in other causes, so it stays clear of political fights unrelated to protecting the climate. So let's tip our hat to SYNI and cozy up to another 20 minutes of her podcast magic.

Join SYNI, your host, for an examination of Germany’s role in Europe’s green hydrogen industry and the politics now shaping support for production and infrastructure across the Union. Germany likes to think of itself as Europe’s industrial metronome. When the beat is steady, factories hum and policy lines up with engineering. When the beat stutters, everyone hears it. Nowhere is that more evident than in green hydrogen, where Berlin’s choices ripple through investment committees from the Ruhr to Rotterdam, and through ministries from Brussels to Madrid. 

SYNI, your host, explores the Douro Valley as a living landscape, a place that invites careful stewardship because it is both a working valley and a world treasure. We are going to explore how UNESCO helps set a sustainable framework for this remarkable region in northern Portugal, how local institutions and producers have translated that framework into practical choices, and why the Douro remains a case study for aligning heritage with climate action. So join SYNI's pod and search into your cabinet for that long-savoured bottle 40 Tawny, both yours to enjoy! 

SYNI, your host, delves into New York City Climate Week, one of the high-profile gatherings on the sustainable calendar. As the conference moves into full-swing, we want to answer two important questions that you may share. Is this spectacle or substance? Are we meeting to admire the problem or to move capital and policy and technology at the speed required? SYNI works through these animating questions in five pieces of thinking. History and origins. Who is on the mic this week. What impact to expect in real terms. What the record says about outcomes from prior years. And what future trends and complementary events like Harvard Climate Action Week can add to the signal. So sit back and let SYNI sort it out on your behalf!

SYNI, your hostess, address today’s topic of a slightly specialist nature within the world of sustainable politics, Nationally Determined Contributions, otherwise known as NDCs, and whether they are a credible foundation of climate action or a theatrical flourish of sustainable politics that promises the earth on the grand political stage but then forgets its lines once the global attention and auditorium empties. But don't expect a one-line verdict from SYNI. That would be neat and misleading. Evidence points to both momentum and inertia. Listen for the next 22 minutes and join the debate!

In our 37th Episode, SYNI, your host, tackles the next wave of sustainable energy storage and why it will define the pace and reach of the clean power transition. Storage is the hinge on which an electrified future swings. Solar and wind now form a meaningful and growing share of generation in many markets. Yet scale brings new questions. SYNI asks you, our loyal listeners, to picture the grid as an outdoor orchestra. Renewables are the brass and strings with surges of splendour and the odd squeak of timing. Storage is the percussion section keeping time. The conductor is price. And the audience is you, a public that now expects reliability, low emissions, and sensible cost. Happy listening!! 

SYNI, your indefatigable hostess, focuses on the Science Based Targets initiative and its draft revision to the Corporate Net Zero Standard, which were recently updated. We hope you didn’t think we would go for a light and cheerful topic to close out the summer? No, no! Instead SYNI plunges into the deep end of sustainable governance and corporate regulation, taking a close look at STBi Version 2.0 and the fine line between pragmatic target setting and protecting long-term reductions that the net zero carbon emissions goal requires. So grab your notebook and sit at your desk for this one as we're working through complex policy and making recommendations how to best navigate the changes.   

SYNI, your host, tears into today's topic, the European Union Hydrogen Bank. Specifically, what is wrong with the Bank and why are winners of the biggest subsidies walking away from completing their green hydrogen projects? We’re talking about three of the largest green hydrogen projects in the EU turning an icy shoulder €589 million of future EU support during this blazing hot summer. We’ll need more than sun cream and a beach umbrella to unravel this one. Thankfully we have SYNI's take on both problems and solutions, so sit back for the next 23 minutes and enjoy the cool breeze of our pod.