The automotive industry is undergoing a major transformation, with electric vehicles poised to dominate the future of transport. But this transition requires more than just building great EVs; it demands a comprehensive approach to ensure our electric grid can reliably support the demand from millions of new EVs . In this episode of Climate Positive, host Guy Van Syckle speaks with Apoorv Bhargava, CEO of WeaveGrid, a company at the forefront of electric vehicle deployment and grid reliability. WeaveGrid helps utilities integrate EVs into our grid at scale, with a focus on elevating the EV driver experience and keeping charging affordable. Their platform also enables better charging alignment with renewable energy availability and broader decarbonization. Guy and Apoorv explore how WeaveGrid has built an AI software platform to transform EVs from a grid liability into a valuable grid asset, developing key partnerships with both automakers and utilities.
The automotive industry is undergoing a major transformation, with electric vehicles poised to dominate the future of transport. But this transition requires more than just building great EVs; it demands a comprehensive approach to ensure our electric grid can reliably support the demand from millions of new EVs. In this episode of Climate Positive, host Guy Van Syckle speaks with Apoorv Bhargava, CEO of WeaveGrid, a company at the forefront of electric vehicle deployment and grid reliability. WeaveGrid helps utilities integrate EVs into our grid at scale, with a focus on elevating the EV driver experience and keeping charging affordable. Their platform also enables better charging alignment with renewable energy availability and broader decarbonization. Guy and Apoorv explore how WeaveGrid has built an AI software platform to transform EVs from a grid liability into a valuable grid asset, developing key partnerships with both automakers and utilities.
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Episode recorded February 6, 2025
Chad: [00:00:00] I am Chad Reed.
Hilary: I'm Hilary Langer.
Gil: I'm Gil Jenkins.
Guy: I'm Guy Van Syckle.
Chad: And this is climate positive.
Apoorv: As you try and take 280 million cars that are on the roads today in the United States and make them go all electric, it not just requires a rethink of how do we fit all of these cars onto the grid? Electrification will literally transform grid economics as we know it today.
Guy: The automotive industry is undergoing a major transformation, with electric vehicles poised to dominate the future of transport. But this transition requires more than just building great EVs; it demands a comprehensive approach to ensure our electric grid can reliably support the demand from millions of new EVs . Today we talk with Apoorv Bhargava, CEO of WeaveGrid, a company at the forefront of electric vehicle deployment and grid reliability. WeaveGrid helps utilities integrate EVs into our grid at scale, with a focus on elevating the EV driver experience and keeping charging affordable. Their platform also enables better charging alignment with renewable energy availability and broader decarbonization. We discuss how WeaveGrid has built an AI software platform to transform EVs from a grid liability into a valuable grid asset, developing key partnerships with both automakers and utilities.
Guy: [00:00:00] Apoorv, Welcome my man. Great to have you on the pod. And, uh, excited to hear about all the good work you're doing at Weave Grid and all the, all the wonderful things. Your, uh, your team is scaling up for clients. So, at a high level, would just love to start with your core mission and how you all are supporting electrification and, and rollout of EVs across the us.
Apoorv: Well, thanks again for having me on the pod. I really appreciate it. When we started Weave Grid about seven years ago, our, our core thesis was that the world has to go from internal combustion engine vehicles to electric vehicles if we wanna decarbonize transportation. And yet the electric grid was not built to accommodate electric transportation as an end use case.
And so weave grid's core mission at the end of the day is about accelerating that decarbonization at the intersection off those two spaces. And the two spaces being the energy sector, the electricity sector as we know of today, of course, about [00:01:00] 30 odd percent of emissions as well as transportation. A larger sector vis-a-vis emissions, which about 32, 30 3% of United States', GHG emissions, you know, collectively.
These two sectors are in the midst of this once in a century transformation, right? You've got the utility sector that's going through centralized fossil fuel based generation to more and more renewable and more and more distributed generation. And at the same time, you've got the automotive industry going from ice internal combustion engine to ev and underpinning both of those transformations happening at about the same time, is this massive move towards digitization.
So what we thought about in the earliest days of WaveG Grid that has stayed true still tip of the day, seven years later, is that as you try and take 280 million cars that are on the roads today in the United States and make them go all electric, it not just requires a [00:02:00] rethink of, you know, how do we fit all of these cars onto the grid?
Electrification will literally transform grid economics as we know it today. And so building a platform, notably a digital platform that can help alleviate the pressure on the electric grid, that can help accommodate all of those vehicles that can help transform them from what is. Frankly, a very large liability for reliability and affordability of the electric grid, but turning them instead into assets.
Something that can create value for customers, for utilities, and of course automakers and charging companies. That was the core thesis behind WaveG Grid and how do you use software and AI to make that possible. That's a lot of how we've been thinking about it, and I can get more into the
Guy: weeds than that, uh, here in a second.
I appreciate you framing it up in that way and then we certainly will, will push it here into the weeds. So when you think about the liabilities as you [00:03:00] referenced there, of this large deployment of EVs, this massive wave coming online, what would you say is top of that list that utilities are facing and and how are you helping to kind of sculpt solutions around that?
Apoorv: Great question. Look, this was the sort of bottoms up, maybe a trophy word to use, but first principles thinking we had around electrification, right? Too often the conversation is, Hey, we've got enough power out there to manage EVs. What are EVs gonna really do from a gigawatt hours? A terawatt hours perspective?
Not a ton. And that's exactly right. Actually, the irony of it is that EVs are so efficient that from a primary energy perspective, they're actually exceptional. The challenge is about power. The challenge is about capacity even charging at home, which is where 80 plus percent of charging of electric vehicles happens.
An average EV charges anywhere between seven to 15 kilowatts. That's a lot of [00:04:00] power. That is frankly, double the amount of peak power utilization of any home on the hottest day in the summer. And so now if you're putting two household equivalent of extra power. Onto every household. And remember, Americans, we like our cars two to one ratio of vehicles to homes.
There's about 120 million homes in the country, 280 million cars. You start to do the mass very quickly, bottoms up, and you realize actually the part of the system that's most vulnerable, the most under talked about part of the electric grid is the distribution system and something that was very early.
Insight at Weave Grid that I think, of course, like our systems folks understood, but they just didn't think about necessarily exponential growth curves was if EVs come at the pace that we think they're gonna come, if learning curves on batteries drive rapid electrification, you were talking about a bottoms up load growth.
On the distribution system, unlike anything it has ever [00:05:00] seen before. The average transformer in the United States is about 25 years old. Take a 25 KVA transformer and now pound it with six EVs in a neighborhood, each charging in anywhere between seven to 15. I mean, that thing's gonna blow up and so. What this does, and especially when you look at where the economics of the power sector are going today, especially in this moment of AI load growth and so forth, the economics are shifting from the 1973 energy crisis era to today where generation is becoming a smaller and smaller component of our total bill.
Transmission remains somewhat the same. There's a little bit of up and down here and there. The distribution is rapidly increasing in cost and in some places, like California is already 30, 40, 50% of your bill. And so electrification doesn't just add to that cost, it's supercharges it. And I think the question is how do you take what is an [00:06:00] incredibly flexible battery on wheels?
Where on average somebody only needs to charge anywhere between two to three hours. But instead of everyone charging in, what is actually a pretty dumb way, in my view, everyone charges at 10:00 PM because it's off peak. That's not the most. Maximal utilization of the grid. We could be doing, you could be doing a much more intelligent management off those vehicles charging such that the consumer's needs are met, Hey, I need to be fully charged by 7:00 AM But also that you're maximally utilizing the distribution system and also minimizing the costs on the bulk system.
And that's really the, the heart of Weg grid, which is. Personalized AI powered charging management that solves for all stakeholders in this equation, which are of course, the EV owner, but also the grid operators whose job it is
Guy: to maintain a reliable and affordable grid. Right. And, and I think it's so important how you highlight, you know, the reliability benefits that [00:07:00] grid is.
Enabling for utilities. Um, and also, you know, certainly the benefits then that flows back to rate payers. What would be helpful is if you can maybe give us a better sense of how. The software and the AI tools that y'all have developed and shout out for having AI in your various decks. Well, before everyone was just adding it in, but give us a better sense of, you know, how does the software work?
What kind of data are you pulling in? What goes into kind of the buildup of the assessment, and then what does that output look like when you are interfacing with utilities and trying to support them?
Apoorv: Great question and yes, like it's nice to be a little bit ahead of the curve in multiple ways, right ahead of the curve on UV adoption, ahead of the curve on using, using ai.
I mean, look, maybe, maybe just to quickly talk about the AI thing before anything else, it's that when you think about the fact that traditional distribution operations and [00:08:00] distribution planning has been all about, Hey, I gotta add a new cul-de-sac. In a city or in a neighborhood, I can do the planning process.
I can do that in a thoughtful, you know, six month, nine month process. If I'm adding five, 1,000, suddenly a megawatt worth of load in the span of a couple months in an area that you never expected or anticipated that load being in, that's where human intelligence needs to be Augmented. And that's where you need ai because it isn't anymore about just saying, Hey, I, as the human who've run this grid really darn well with heuristics.
Can now have a full understanding off what's going on, and then more importantly, have full control over what's going on. And so that's really the way we think about the, the layer caking of our value. First is about visibility and monitoring, right? So just understanding what's happening as well. These EVs are coming online, and the next is about then automation.
[00:09:00] Actually automating and managing people's charging in a much better way. And the third is about autonomous control, which is really letting those vehicles be managed for the most valuable use case subject to the constraints of the vehicle type and the consumer's needs. Because the thing that I sort of fight back with, and I had a lot of spicy comments, so maybe this is mono mine, it's like an EV isn't a DER, right?
I never bought an ed. Right. To be an energy resource. I bought it as a mobility resource. I like my car, I want a car. It drives fast. It does, you know, it's quiet, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And yet, ironically, today, there are more EVs than residential solar panels in the United States. And so when you think about the DER landscape, here's a whole new asset type that for all intents and purposes, most people don't think about.
Like you don't get an interconnection permit to drive an ev, but you do for your solar. By the way, there are now more plug in vehicles than there are solar panels, and so from a grid operations standpoint, there's [00:10:00] actually very little understanding in quasi real time. What's going on with electrification?
How are these charging patterns affecting the loading behaviors on my assets? Can I predict that? And I then more than just predicting it? 'cause predictions are cool, but at the end of the day, that's not super valuable. If I don't have control over that, if I can't bring it back to my operating parameters that I need my grid to operate within.
That's really the end-to-end value that WaveG Grid provides because what we do is we integrate in a really time consuming, but very valuable way with each and every automaker and charging partner that we have. So we build integrations down to the telemetry layer within the vehicle or the charging hardware, and then we.
Aggregate that data by enrolling customers into programs that utilities run. Whereas a consumer, as a Tesla driver, as a Toyota driver, you can get anywhere between a hundred to 200 to $300 off [00:11:00] your bill a year by letting your utility manage your charging. But what's radically different than any of the thermostat load management programs that Nest Ando and other folks have run historically is that this isn't about five events a year.
When I need to turn on a peaking power plug, this is about continuous load orchestration. This is about autonomous control where we're constantly reevaluating the portfolio and constantly thinking to ourselves, not just add a oh, like what's going on in the iso, what's going on with those power plugs, but down to that transformer level, we are having a continuous assessment of are an easy EVs causing more harm.
On the grid, then they should. And if there is flexibility, can we actually move that charging around and eventually discharge some of that charging as the vehicles become capable? And if they cannot, if there is no flexibility, can we actually alert the grid operator that guys, it's gonna be time for you to go upgrade the system now proactively [00:12:00] versus waiting for something to go explode.
That's really what weave grid's value prop is, and it has tremendous affordability benefits as you are maximizing the utilization off the part of the grid that's often most underutilized, and that puts downward pressure on rates, which is extremely attractive to regulators and extremely compelling for rate payers as well.
Guy: What you all can do in terms of maximizing that infrastructure. And I think really important how you highlighted the percentage of an energy bill these days. That is distribution infrastructure. So key to recall, as we create all these new solutions, can we zoom in a little bit more on. How you all are saving utilities money, maybe kind of high level examples of how your software avoids necessary system upgrades and then how that flows to repairs.
Apoorv: I'll give you examples, uh, to a few different places. So at Xcel Energy [00:13:00] in Colorado, there is a lot of wind in the middle of the night, and so there's so much wind that that wind could be curtailed because the supply literally exceeds the demand. So what we've written has built is a system in partnership with Excel, where in the middle of the night we get signals.
We get this sort of proxy signal, which is a proxy supply signal from Excel that essentially says, y'all at this time, there's too much supply. And what we do is we tell thousands of cars around the state of Colorado to automate their charging, to maximize the charging at that moment. We're not telling them to charge at 9:00 PM or 10:00 PM you know, time of use freights are sort of imperfect.
They're, they're really a proxy of a proxy, right? They're kind of telling you, oh, it might be cheapest to charge at this time. It might be cheapest for the grid to operate at this time. What we're doing is we're taking that real time condition data, and we're saying, okay, at this moment it is best. Again, subject to the constraints, because Guy might want his charging done by 7:00 [00:14:00] AM and Mary might want hers done by 6:00 AM.
So we're taking in shuffling each of those vehicles around such that they're maximally charging during those lowest cost hours where there's so much wind production. So not only are we increasing the penetration of renewables on the grid, we're also bringing down the cost of charging. As a consumer, you're getting an added benefit of an extra 150 or maybe even $200 off your bill every year.
By the way, it's bringing down the cost for all rate payers, because we're deploying, some people call this a virtual power plant, but the point is, we're deploying this resource and at maximizing that utilization at Pacific Gas and Electric and pg e, we're literally doing that load orchestration down to the transformer level.
So we're not just maximizing, you know, you're charging at lowest cost times according to your rate. We're also then doing that really, really fine level orchestration where we're saying, okay, transformer, right transformer, how many EVs are there? How much can we make sure that [00:15:00] we are, you know, bringing down that load on every single asset?
At Exelon, we have that deployed at the largest scale in the country. There's no larger managed charging active managed charging program with a distribution focus. Part of that project was initially funded by the DOE, and now it's actually become a full commission approved program that is scaling to a massive size.
And just to give you an example there, we saw feeders that had anywhere between 40 to 50% reduction in load on a daily basis due to, wow. Wow. So you were essentially able to add two x the number of EVs now onto that same asset. So now if you're distribution operations, you're saying to yourself, oh my God, I now have so much more capacity to operate, so I do need to interconnect by the way, a new data center or something.
Now I can look at that portfolio and that system and say, where do I have this continuous value that can help me? I. As I'm bringing on more load, I can also offset the load somewhere else. Mm-hmm. And that's the [00:16:00] kind of value that we're able to deliver back to all rate payers.
Guy: I think it's really interesting that you highlight there.
Importantly, you highlight that it's not only distribution assets that you're helping to optimize and avoid necessary upgrades and all this, but you know, we're making the most out of. Clean electrons generated from, you know, the wind projects across Colorado and being able to utilize that otherwise curtailed electricity to charge vehicles.
So I think that's a really important, uh, example there as well.
Apoorv: That's exactly right. I mean, the reason we often highlight our distribution value more is not because the bulk system value, the, the renewable electrons is something we see as not important. We actually almost see it as table stakes. It's like so necessary that you're always optimizing for wholesale value.
I think the thing that we've historically forgotten as an industry is the distribution system, and I think unlike a lot of other DERs, the [00:17:00] value of EVs is so concentrated on the distribution system that that's why you had to re-architect and rethink how you built. An orchestration and optimization platform that started bottoms up versus top down.
Yeah. From a grid topology standpoint. And that's sort of a lot of the secret sauce behind WaveG grid's value, I think.
Guy: And you know, I think the other thing that's been really impressed about what y'all have been doing, I'd love to hear more about it, is you're selling to the often, uh, much maligned utility sector.
Right. And would love to get your perspectives and. Learnings, any advice for kind of the other solutions providers out there on, how you, how you've worked with utilities and it seems, quite productively over the years,
Apoorv: well, selling new utilities. I don't know what you guys are talking about.
Guy: We have many utility friends here as well, so, but no, I, there is kind of that, that buzz about him.
Apoorv: Yeah. You know, look, it's um. [00:18:00] The way I think about utilities, and it shocks people whenever I say this, but I, I think about the job they have with a lot of empathy for them, and I think the empathy is in the fact that maintaining clean, reliable, affordable electricity for all, not for the few, but for the all is a really complex task, especially when you've been in the last 40 years of minimal to declining load growth, and now here's this whole new challenge of massive load uptick, and at the same time, you've got to transform through much more variable renewable energy. You've gotta add energy storage, you've gotta do all this new technology addition at the same time, is not letting the core responsibility of keeping the lights on and affordable go out.
That's really tough. That is really, really tough. And I, I think the way we've designed our products, the way we do a lot of our selling starts with that [00:19:00] empathy, which is that you've got a tough job. I get it. Mm-hmm. By the way, this is happening. Electrification is a habit. People are gonna keep buying cars.
You know, they're getting better and better. They're getting cheaper and cheaper. How do we help you solve the problem that you've gotta solve? Not the problem that some of us who come from the clean energy sector want to solve, right? Some of us want to see something like a virtual power plant because we think that's the better way to go.
Some of us want to see this. We wanna manifest that future on the world, and I wanna manifest helping them do their job better and in the process utilize our technology so that we can then go together, build the next thing, and the next thing and the next thing. But I think too often, I think we try to solve for our problems and our desires.
Mm-hmm. Not the customer's problems. And so I think the other thing very important thing is like, utilities don't make decisions in a vacuum. They are a regulated entity. And so if you're not talking to regulators and regulatory staff constantly, if you're viewing the utility as making the decision without that [00:20:00] stakeholder in the room essentially, or without that stakeholder being a primary driver, then I think you're solving the problem in the wrong way.
And so I think we've just engaged well with both the regulatory kind of apparatus. State by state, but also with the utilities and, and learn to break through what I call the pilot hellhole, because I think every utility wants to pilot things, but I break it down into a very simple framework. It's like sometimes you need to pilot something because you want to prove out a technology.
I. I think a lot of utilities often start with that, but I try to remind utilities that there's no need to repilot my technology. My technology works across nine of the 10 largest utilities in the country. The thing they want to pilot with us is the value that we will generate differentiated for them in their service territory.
That's the thing we should be piloting together. And that actually changes the frame of reference. 'cause now you're talking more about value and ROI versus Oh, like I just got a toy with your thing. 'cause I like to try a new toy. That's not valuable for any of us.
Guy: [00:21:00] That makes a ton of sense and I think how you frame it up in terms of leading with that empathy and understanding of what our utilities, I.
Are asked, you know, in terms of this quite the service to our economy and our society, right? And keeping the lights on and keeping us safe from a power perspective, and how that you can lead with that and really think about how are you helping them. With their end goals and the issues that they're facing.
So grateful you're up there championing these solutions and advancing these wonderful technologies. I would love to spend a little time on your other client base. I mean, you have the, uh, the good fortune of marketing and selling to two of the largest incumbents out there. And, uh, would love to hear about what you're doing, uh, with automakers these days.
Helping them through their, uh, similarly complex transition.
Apoorv: Yeah, I think someone [00:22:00] never taught me and John, my co-founder, to let your ambition be like a little, a little more like bounded in some way. Yeah. Yeah. We, we, we might've, we might've, uh, we might've never been taught to do that. And yeah, look, we set off on like a ridiculous task, right?
We said to ourselves, not only are we gonna go sell to utilities, we're gonna go effectively sell to automakers as well, because while we don't. Necessarily today, monetize automakers. We help them monetize their vehicles. We help them transform their vehicles from being cars that perform really well in asphalt to cars that could one day perform really well with the electrical grid.
And we call that process turning their vehicles into grid interactive vehicles. There's this idea that all DERs, and this is again why I tend to hate the term DERs, but like there's this idea that anything that isn't a centralized power plant can just plug into the grid and deliver grid services. And I think especially some of the folks, you know, well-intentioned folks out of Europe make it seem [00:23:00] like, oh, it's just so easy.
Look at me, I can do anything. This is not true.
Guy: Sure. Sensors and software and ai, they'll do it all. Yeah.
Apoorv: And retail energy. Yeah. Plushies that look like octopuses. I mean like we figured it all out. Like that's not true. Most cars do not have the functionality within them to be interactive with the grid.
And what I mean by that is it's totally fine to. Brian used very shaky APIs to gather some data to maybe tell the car to charge at 9:00 PM but if you really want the car to provide high quality data that a grid operator can trust, high quality controls around charging management, where you can do that transformer level optimization, and then high quality dispatch that is in line with the same smart inverter technologies that solar is already using.
Such that you can do bidirectionality like Vita G or Vita H. It's a lot of work. That's a lot of work that most auto makers have [00:24:00] not been conceptualizing as they're building an all electric drive train or even a plugin, hybrid drive train. And so we realized very quickly as we started doing this work that like John, my co-founder who came from Tesla, you know, even working with Tesla, it was very clear that like, oh gosh, there's so much we're gonna have to do with all the other automakers to help them get to.
Just the same gold standard as Tesla, and then frankly, even more beyond that to make EVs a highly reliable functioning part of an electric grid. Because you see, first of all, thermostats and so forth, they're not on any kind of standard today, right? There's no such thing of like an operating standard for all iot out there for the grid.
Part of the reason that they aren't is no distribution system team has ever trusted those assets to be a part of their operating motion in distribution ops. I think bulk system operators have, 'cause they've said look like whether you show up with 1.8 megawatts or whether [00:25:00] you show up with 1.75 megawatts because half your thermostats don't work it, it doesn't matter to me.
All that matters is that I get my load shed when I ask for my load shed. It's very different when you're talking about a much more. Brittle and a much more, frankly, just a much less robust part of the grid, like the distribution system. And so in order to make EVs a reliable part of grid Ops, we needed to do a lot of work with the OEMs.
And I think as we started doing that work, we realized, wait a second, not only are OEMs developing, frankly, what is gonna be the biggest distributed resource customer side energy resource, uh, relative to anything else. The other thing we realized was they understand their customer far better than. Any other player in this ecosystem.
And what I mean by that, right, is like, I don't know about you, but I'm sure you know your car is brand intimately. Well, I couldn't tell you what my first thermostat was or where my first microwave was. Right, right. I can tell you my first car, I can tell you her name. I can tell you the color, I can [00:26:00] tell you everything.
Hell, it might even be the secret question on one of my passwords. And so that's my point, right? Is like we have this cultural affiliation with cars because car companies are exceptional at building a deep customer relationship. I think as we think about the ability to leverage customer side resources like EVs and turn them into virtual power plants or whatever else, the ability to use that channel that automakers have is critical.
I. Not only do we wanna leverage the telemetry in the cars, not only do we want to use the controls in the cars, we also want to use that customer acquisition channel. And so that's been a huge driving force behind our partnership. Now you partner enough with some automakers and they start liking you.
And when they like you enough, then they ask the question, Hey, you want to get more serious together? And in our case, what that meant was we've had the privilege recently of announcing that Kia, Toyota and Hyundai all invested in us as as an entity because, you know, they [00:27:00] just saw a lot of joint road mapping we were doing.
They saw a lot of the work we were doing and they said, wait a second, if you guys are building so much of this functionality with us. Why wouldn't we wanna also like invest and of course maintain you as a neutral platform. You've got partnerships with other OEMs as well, but at the same time, like make sure that you're capitalized to be essentially a supplier for the whole industry.
And I think that's, that's a big part of the thesis. And I mean, look, we're gonna do some really cool things uniquely with each of them. We, we did a V two V two G project, a pilot with Kia recently. We've got some exciting things that we're gonna be announcing with Hyundai and Toyota in the next few months.
Guy: Lots of good stuff to come. A absolute, uh, huge congrats to you and the team on building out that partnership, uh, incredibly exciting times ahead. Now, to get to the important question, what was the name of that, uh, that first car?
Apoorv: Yeah, it was a 2009 Toyota Corolla actually, believe it or not. And, uh, her name was Arminius Aus was a [00:28:00] Swedish, Monte Aus, the Swedish scientist who actually discovered climate change.
So Amazing.
Guy: Mine is slightly less creative. I've had the Guy Lander and the guy bread, so, uh, so good.
Apoorv: So you all also have a Toyota. Good to know.
Guy: Yeah. Oh, of course. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Supporting, supporting y'all's partnership. Absolutely. You know. I think we talked through in depth kind of your sales proposition to utilities.
When you think about these automakers and right there in the business of selling cars and keeping customers happy, where do you see it resonating most? For them in terms of your solution and the benefit that you're providing, right? Is it reliability for their customers? Is it the ability to sell more vehicles?
Kinda what? What really resonated with that Toyota and Kia and Hyundai team? I.
Apoorv: I mean, look, I automakers, and then as I mentioned, right, are in the midst of their own once in a century transition, and I think that they're [00:29:00] facing forces in a much more competitive way, frankly, than utilities are. They're facing forces like never seen before.
Now, one of the forces around electrification is that not only do they have to change the drive drivetrain, they also now have exposure to a part of a supply chain that they've never thought about. Notably, an electric grid. By the way, that electric grid looks radically different across the 50 states that they sell cars in, in the United States and the 198 countries that they sell cars in around the world.
And so how do you think about the supply chain risk that when my car goes out into the field and has to plug in somewhere, how does it operate? Also, how do I maintain a strong connection with my customer, that trust with my customer that this car is going to deliver, not just the comfort and the leather seats and the high performance and the the speed and the perform, all of that, but also that it operates the way that I want it to because the fueling is being done really well, right?
They haven't had to worry again about fueling [00:30:00] infrastructure over the last century. After basically Rockefeller and Shell figured out how to
Guy: mm-hmm.
Apoorv: Take canisters of gasoline and put them in pumps and you know, here we are. Mm-hmm. I think that is a driving force behind how automakers are thinking about charging.
And I think maybe something that has been a misnomer in our industry is that so much of the conversation around charging has been focused on public charging infrastructure. I would say a lot of public dollars have gone towards public charging infrastructure, but the reality of charging. Is that anywhere there's a plug you could charge.
Now, of course, that's a slow charge, but another, if you have a level two charger, that's a much faster charge. And of course you need DFCS to give you a much, much faster charge. But the truth is, so percent of Americans live in single family homes. 80 plus percent of charging happens at home today. In the long run, you will still see upwards of 60 to 70% happening at home.
And if you add in workplace. Home, including [00:31:00] single and multifamily, single family, multifamily and workplace. You're gonna be talking about anywhere between 75 to 80% of charging happening still outside of the public charging. What that means is now you're talking about a much lower volume of electrons or a much lower volume of fuel existing at this public charging infrastructure. So the misnomer around where do we need to invest, where do we need to shore up charging or not? The misnomer, the the sort of misdirection perhaps, is that I think we expended so much time thinking about public charging, which is needed to get people over sort of this mental hurdle that we've forgotten that actually the grid infrastructure. That needs to support all of the charging is actually another core area of focus that people are need to think about. Right?
Guy: I think that's so important how you highlight that there in terms of where Charging's happening today and, and interesting to hear that, you know, projections on, on that likely being a similar percentage going forward, right around 70, 80% of that happening at the home and maybe a little bit more than that with Larry in workplace.
So [00:32:00] really important highlight.
Apoorv: I think that's a big part of why automakers, as we've introduced that concept to them, as we've tried to help them understand their own struggles and challenges. I think that's where they've said, oh wow, here is, and I think, again, it goes from the liability to the asset mindset, but it's that they sort of were like, oh my God, I didn't even think about the electric grid as a risk factor.
That was the liability side. Then it's become more of an asset, which is saying, well, if I can actually engage with my customer more, if I can actually transform my vehicle into being an intelligent grid asset, maybe I can monetize this. Maybe I can get more value out of this, and if you weave grid can help me go do that.
This is actually a really interesting value proposition for me and my customer. And so that's a lot of the transformation we've been able to go through with the automakers where we said, look, this is a risk. But instead of viewing it as solely as a risk, how about we turn this into opportunity for you?
And I think that we've been really successful one by one. We have a whole team [00:33:00] dedicated to just working with automotive companies and you know, it's a, again, crazy bet, right? We can sell the utilities. Yeah. And automotives at the same time, but. But it's, uh, but it seems to be working,
knock wood. I love it.
I love it. The ambition there is, is certainly applaudable and you mentioned your team. I've had the good pleasure of interacting with a, a number of 'em and always impressed. We'd love to hear, you know, how you think about instilling this customer focus solutions oriented. Kind of put yourself in the shoes of automakers, utilities approach as y'all deploy your solutions and help out both utilities and automakers and repairs and all the good folks involved.
Somehow my team seems to like me, so I think I'm doing an okay job. I don't know how, how, I dunno. You can ask that may, maybe they'll tell you differently. But look, I, I, I think it starts first and foremost with mission orientation, right? I think no one doubts that John and I are extremely mission oriented and we often joke, it's like there's no other job we'd rather be doing.
And so it's just like everyone feels it authentically. I know, I know. People know that about [00:34:00] us. I think the next thing is like. Saying, okay, where is there a moment where we feel like we have to build trust with our partners versus when is a moment where we have built trust and now it's, it's helping them help themselves and saying, okay, now that we're here, let's go do more together.
Because with a lot of these larger entities. Once they start trusting you, it's less that they go on and do things. It's just that they get in their own way. It's like, how do we scale this thing? How do we move faster? How do we do that? There's just so many layers of bureaucracy and, and sort of internal challenges that even if you have a driving force inside of a company, a large automotive company or a large utility, they say, oh, well I don't know if I can get it done this quarter or this year.
Mm-hmm. And it's like, no, no. Mm-hmm. We're gonna get it done this month. And so you have to like help them and coach them and work through it with them. I think internally, you know, I keep reminding the team that like what we're building here, if we are right is a systems solution. And it's hard sometimes, right?
It's hard sometimes to feel as excited about a systems solution [00:35:00] because I'm not removing. Of carbon from the air. I'm not deploying X hundred megawatts of solar in the field. It doesn't feel as tangible, but every, every new driver we bring onto our platform, every megawatt. Shift or every megawatt hour we bring in of clean energy, that scalability and that sort of almost infinite scalability you can have using software is so powerful.
But the thing that I always try to remind our team is like apathy is our biggest enemy. I. It's not this competitor, that competitor, it's that we just don't have time, so we have to move faster. Mm-hmm. And, and that sort of encompassed in our values, like we didn't intend on this, but our values ended up spelling out, believe it or not, AC Fuel our values are, are very simple.
It's accountability, collaboration, focus, urgency. Empathy and learning, and we want to, we wanna have all of those things, but like, you know, there's a reason we use the word urgency. It's 'cause we really feel it. We, [00:36:00] we know that if we're serious about climate change and climate solutions, you gotta move really fast.
And at the same time you're working with entities that don't wanna move fast all the time. So you have to hold that, that duality in your mind and still move. I know seems to be working.
Guy: No, that's wonderful. I, I, you know, I think those are lessons and values that, uh, so many airspace can benefit from and just that approach with.
Urgency, empathy and learning and constantly growing through there. Uh, incredibly applaudable. You know, one thing I do see in your team is, uh, shout out to the Clean Energy Leadership Institute. I think you might have one of the highest percentages of folks from LY out there, so maybe just a quick shout out or in terms of, you know, kind of what you.
What you've seen, uh, from sea lions over the years,
Apoorv: sea Lion, the turt that yours truly may have helped co-create back in the day, uh, when I was a sea lion. Uh, yeah. Look, I mean, I think one of the huge, huge benefits of bringing, bringing that kind of talent base into the team is [00:37:00] that they're already strong leaders and, uh, they're also incredibly well educated about the industry, right?
So it's like, it's two birds with one stone. It's like I know that they have in them the desire to run and. Operate with this urgency that we were just talking about while also being great people. And at the same time, like they've already got so much of the industry context and, and then it's about just educating around the edges.
It's like, okay, I know you learned all these things. Now here's how we go do it in the real world. But most of them are coming from wonderful backgrounds and companies and so forth. So, I don't know, it's just been an incredible place for me to go, uh, still find more talent.
Guy: Good. Good, good, good.
And Apoorv of, as we think about what's next up for y'all, what's exciting, what's firing you up? What's, what's coming down the pike?
Apoorv: This is a funny year for us. We talk about this being a year of focus, and what I mean by that is with a lot of the noise from administration change to Yeah. All of this stuff happening. I think one of the things that has been really nice for us is that we have delivered [00:38:00] value to our customers, right?
Our customers. When they go pencil us in a, in a regulatory hearing, they're seeing cost benefit analyses that are way higher than anything they've ever seen before. Right. We're doing, you know, relative to a thermostat management program or something else, like we're two x three x that. Mm-hmm. So we're literally returning dollar off to our, to our two customers.
And when I think about like what we need to do today, it is about scaling, scaling, scaling. We need to help regulators feel like this is a tool that they have in their toolkit to push utilities, to help utilities like bring down rates for all customers. This is an affordability tool first and foremost right now.
'cause you got basically gigawatts of EV potential sitting around today. And by the way, it's growing. Faster than any other EER, quote unquote. And so how would we tap into that untapped potential? And so that's why I say this is a year of focus because with all the AI load growth, with power prices going [00:39:00] the way they are, with frankly residential rates going where they are.
It's just so critical that we use what we've already got to bring down cost for customers, because otherwise you're not gonna trust the energy transition. And I want people to trust in electrification. I want people to trust in clean energy, and I think that the best thing you can do is utilize what you've already got.
And so that's a lot of what this year is about
Guy: for us. Mm-hmm. Yeah. The focus that y'all bring to the space and helping so much in terms of this broader deployment. Certainly grateful for that. Alright. I do have to pick your brain because I know you have been quite this successful seed investor over the years.
And of course, HASI is, an investment fund focused on sustainable infrastructure and cool opportunities ahead. Would love your thoughts on places, where you think we'll see biggest investment over the next few years as it relates to EVs or grid infrastructure.
What you're seeing out there in terms of solutions and opportunities.
Apoorv: Look, I mean, one area that I think it's [00:40:00] clear that we're gonna have to continue investing in, and again, changing hearts and minds within utilities to trust these tools is around resilience, right? It's clear that resilience is becoming such a huge issue and with the massive tragedy down in LA and you know, at the same time happening across the country, like there's gonna be a real need for more and more tools around just keeping grid more reliable.
Now, of course, you know, I think the automatic. Jump that some folks make is like, okay, it's all about microgrids and this and that. And there is, there is absolutely a role for all of that, but it's also about quantifying that risk. And I think we need to get better at quantifying where the challenges are going to be and what the cost is gonna be.
And if, if the microgrid solution is the most cost-effective way or not, or is there something else? Is it, you know, just a bunch more hardening or undergrounding or whatever else. So I think that's one place I'm particularly interested in. I do think that. AI tools, modern ai, the LLM based ai, as it were, are gonna completely change workflow.
[00:41:00] And I think that workflows and workflow management as we know it today is, you know, when we think about interconnections, when we think about all these places where we feel very rate limited, a lot of it comes back to the fact that we just don't have the people to do the work. I am seeing AI do things that 10 people couldn't do in a month.
It can do in a minute. It's just unbelievable. And I think the opportunity for workflow management improvement is tremendous there. And so I'm very excited about that. And I do think that, and this is maybe one, one place where I'm very bullish, is that, you know, I think there's a very robust and important conversation happening about is the AI load growth.
Creating harm in terms of emissions or not. And I think there, there's both sides to the argument. I'm not sure I'm an expert enough to talk about it. What I do know is that the load growth is just like in any sector undergoing change, right? It's exchange creates space for new opportunities, new solutions.
And [00:42:00] static industries, it is much harder bringing in a new idea. Whereas when everyone feels like the rule book that they're operating with has been kind of torn up, then they're much more willing to have a serious conversation. Hey, let's talk about like what new idea you've got. Is that reliable? Is it serious?
Can you deploy it? Can we test it quickly and can we get going? I've never heard utilities say. Throw the pilot idea out of the window. Let's just go like I've heard today. And so I do think that this moment is really interesting. You know, it's a tragedy that we don't have as robust probably federal regulations and federal support.
But at the same time, like I do think the economics are getting to a place where there's gonna be so much innovation that comes out just due to this changing landscape in some sense. Mm-hmm. That's what excites me a lot.
Guy: Yeah. You know, coming back to urgency, right? The urgency of deploying solutions and, uh, opportunity for all these exciting, uh, new tech and AI tools and all the other [00:43:00] wonderful, uh, solutions that are gonna be deployed to, to roll up certain faster.
Alright. I do have to also ask here . You've somehow managed to avoid the dark side of the Forbes 30 under 30 list, you know, Dodge, the Elizabeth Holmes, SBF Martin Skelli Vape. What's keeping you grounded, man?
Apoorv: Oh, no. Well, you know what? Don't worry. Tim Latimore wrote fur. Him and I we're on the list as well, so I I'll let him be the first one.
He, he's a good dude too. Yeah, yeah. No, no, we go off tip. Well, it keeps me grounded. I mean, honestly, like maybe it's just the fact that like pushing a rock uphill in this sector still feels like we're so far away from getting even anywhere close to really making a huge dent in emissions. Right? It's like you want to keep doing the work every day because you're just like, no matter how much you think, like, oh yeah, like.
Successful partnerships, successful investment, this, that at the end of the day, like I wish I could say that I've made a dent in emissions. I have 'em. I feel like we're scratching the surface of the surface of the surface of making a dent in emissions. [00:44:00] And so I think what keeps me grounded is that sense of mission, right?
Which is like, I just feel like we have so much potential and. I would get really frustrated if in some form of, you know, hubris we got carried away and thought, oh, we're the, the hottest, you know, I won't say the expletive, but the hottest thing possible out there and we, we lose, which lose track of the fact that we still have much work to do.
So, yeah, I don't know. I think that could be very grounded. Maybe when I did Forbes also, when I was on Forbes, I'm not that old, but still, when I was on four, three under 30, it wasn't, it wasn't as sexy a thing or it was very sexy, but it wasn't as like, uh, you. Yeah. Pipeline to, to jail thing.
Guy: Well, I think, uh, yeah, your mission oriented approach and, uh, commitment to bending that curve.
I'm certainly excited about the good work that y'all are doing. Grateful for it, and grateful I. For the, uh, humility of you and your team as you, uh, approach these really complex and still really promising and really exciting solutions ahead. [00:45:00] So thank you for that. And one thing that we always do on, uh, climate positive is we wrap it up with a hot seat here.
So I've got a few quick questions for you to round us home. First one, an easy one for you. I know you're a bit of a, uh, foodie. And certainly well traveled and have lived all over the planet. Would love to start with what's a favorite food, um, from your hometown.
Apoorv: Well, the complicated question there is hometown, but I'll give you two favorite foods because I kind of grew up.
I'm a bit of a mutt and I grew up in different places, but I grew up in the island of Cyprus. One of my favorite foods from there is Lummi cheese. If you eat Lummi, and it's not from Cyprus, it's a lie. It's only allowed to be from. Uh, so halmi cheese, and then my family's from India, so, uh, there is a specific butter shake in the, like, depths of old deli that is just unbelievable.
Never had anything as good. That's the other favorite
Guy: thing. Okay. I look forward to a, uh, a pilgrimage, uh, to both with you in our near future. All right, next up, what's something you thought was true that you no [00:46:00] longer believe? Oh man,
Apoorv: I, I'm gonna flip that a little bit, if that's okay, which is that I used to believe.
That we weren't gonna crack fusion and I believe we will.
Guy: Oh wow. Okay. On for our next Fusion podcast, I look forward. Alright. What is something you're particularly proud of?
Apoorv: I'm particularly proud of the fact that we've gotten a lot of. Massive companies that historically have been viewed as naysayers or sort of like recalcitrant in their views towards electrification and towards accelerating that transition.
I am really proud of the fact that they're willing to not just put their, not just their logo behind us, but also their might behind us. Like
Guy: I feel allyship a deep, a deep commitment there. Yeah.
Apoorv: Deep commitment and an allyship in a way that I like would not have believed even a few years ago. I
Guy: love it.
I love it. And then what's something you're particularly grateful for?
Apoorv: Oh, my [00:47:00] team. I'm so grateful to the team that I have. I'm so grateful to the work we do together every day. I know it's a cop out. I'm also grateful to, to see my community. I love, love my peeps.
Guy: I love it. Community team, certainly. Uh, you, you have a, a wonderful one there in both accounts.
Um, and then finally, uh, to you, what does climate positive mean? I think climate
Apoorv: positive means doing work that is meaningful for, of course the climate, but is also meaningful for the bottom line, is also meaningful for the systems transformations that we wanna see. It's work that actually like, makes you feel better, makes society feel better, and also makes the climate better.
Guy: Amazing. I think that is a, a beautiful place to round it out. A pour of. Always a pleasure chatting with you, my friend, and uh, I thank you so, so much.
Apoorv: Likewise. Thanks for having me on Guy.
Guy: If you enjoyed this week's podcast, please leave us a rating and review on Apple and Spotify. It really helps us reach more listeners. You can also let us know what [00:37:00] you thought via Twitter at Climate pai pod, or email us at climate positive@hasi.com. I'm Guy Van Syckle and this is Climate Positive.