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The Grid: The Largest Machine Ever Built - now live in all podcast apps! stepchange.show/grid
The grid powers everything around you. And it is in crisis. We cannot build AI, decarbonize our economy, or deliver affordable electricity if we don’t rebuild. And yet, the largest machine humankind has ever made is a miracle.
For nearly a century, electricity got cheaper every decade and the grid became so reliable that we stopped thinking about it altogether. This machine was not designed; it accumulated through a century and a half of decisions with unforeseen consequences. And now we are demanding that this aging, fragmented system grow faster than it has in generations.
To understand the struggle and opportunity of this moment, we have to understand how the grid came to be. It is an epic story of inventors and electrocutions, of a man who brought power to the masses and then lost everything, of an America that built massive new industries to win wars, of regulatory ambition and regulatory failure, of catastrophic blackouts, and of a trillion-dollar energy transition we are living through right now.
Thank you to @CrusoeAI, our presenting sponsor.
This is the fourth episode of @stepchange_vc where we explore the technologies and systems that have transformed human civilization. Hosted by me and @anayshah.
The grid powers everything around you. And it is in crisis. We cannot build AI, decarbonize our economy, or deliver affordable electricity if we don’t rebuild. And yet, the largest machine humankind has ever made is a miracle.
For nearly a century, electricity got cheaper every decade and the grid became so reliable that we stopped thinking about it altogether. This machine was not designed; it accumulated through a century and a half of decisions with unforeseen consequences. And now we are demanding that this aging, fragmented system grow faster than it has in generations.
To understand the struggle and opportunity of this moment, we have to understand how the grid came to be. It is an epic story of inventors and electrocutions, of a man who brought power to the masses and then lost everything, of an America that built massive new industries to win wars, of regulatory ambition and regulatory failure, of catastrophic blackouts, and of a trillion-dollar energy transition we are living through right now.
Thank you to @CrusoeAI, our presenting sponsor.
This is the fourth episode of @stepchange_vc where we explore the technologies and systems that have transformed human civilization. Hosted by me and @anayshah.
www.stepchange.show The Grid | The Stepchange Show The story of how America was electrified — a century and a half of inventors, monopolists, blackouts, and bargains, and the trillion-dollar question of what we do next. 
