Decarbonisation in Practice

In the episode, Akshara Durugkar breaks decarbonisation into a simple sequence. First, switch as much as possible to electricity: cars to electric vehicles, gas boilers to heat pumps, fossil-fired industrial heat to electric alternatives where the technology allows.

Electrification matters because it turns many separate problems into one. Instead of cleaning up millions of engines and furnaces individually, you only have to clean up the power stations that feed them.

Once demand runs on electricity, the next job is to generate that electricity without burning fossil fuels. The main options are solar, wind, hydro, and nuclear, and each has a different character. Solar and wind are now cheap but vary with the weather. Hydro is flexible but depends on geography. Nuclear runs steadily around the clock but is expensive and slow to build.

No single technology wins everywhere. A real grid mixes them, then adds storage, transmission lines, and flexible demand to balance supply against need.

Akshara's central point is that financial capital ultimately decides which technologies scale. An idea can work in a lab, and even in a pilot plant, but it only changes the world when investors are willing to fund it at enormous scale. That depends on cost, risk, and how quickly the investment pays back.

This is where she ties the session to Cary Krosinsky's book Transition Momentum, which looks at how the shift to a low-carbon economy is being driven by where capital flows. It sets up part two of the event, where Cary himself asks whether the financial system can steer that shift fast enough.