David Reiner

UK-EU Summit - Common Understanding (HTML)

It is interesting to compare our nine energy priorities and five climate priorities to the current text from the UK government. It is promising to see most of the priorities we list either agreed or being taken forward. www.gov.uk/government/p...

It was great fun to write this short piece with my colleague Michael Pollitt a few days ago in advance of the UK-EU summit. We tried to highlight areas of energy and climate policy where we thought there were the greatest opportunities for increased cooperation. www.jbs.cam.ac.uk/wp-content/u...

EU-UK reset is in the news - motivating me to share this great paper by David Reiner and Michael Pollitt from @cambridgeuni.bsky.social - neatly setting out the case for greater collaboration in UK-EU #energy and #carbon markets

#energysky #greensky

www.jbs.cam.ac.uk/wp-content/u...

The Politics of Carbon Capture Are Getting Weirder The culture wars are threatening one of the few bipartisan areas of climate policy.

How carbon capture became the latest victim of conservatives' climate culture war, from @emilypont.bsky.social with insights from @dmreiner.bsky.social ⬇️

US competition can teach Cambridge a thing or two about growth Fine words about the Oxford-Cambridge Arc must be translated into action

on.ft.com/42dDCse

“Boston’s transformation was made possible with more than $1.6bn in state government investment over 15 years […] While we might not be able to match investment at that scale, the UK must make a clear, sustained commitment…” — so the UK can’t afford $100m/yr?!

2) Deng et al, Co-deploying Biochar and Bioenergy with Carbon Capture and Storage can improve cost-effectiveness and sustainability of China’s carbon neutrality in One Earth

authors.elsevier.com/c/1kOXZ_wvRV...

Two new articles have just come out in the past week and coincidentally both are led by wonderful collaborators at Tsinghua:

1) Bai et al, Assessing the Viability of Renewable Hydrogen, Ammonia, and Methanol in Decarbonizing Heavy-duty Trucks in Applied Energy

authors.elsevier.com/sd/article/S...

Methane makeover: how tech is transforming the greenhouse gas Cambridge tech company is turning waste methane into

Turning methane into the world's strongest material: Professor David Reiner of #CambridgeJudge comments in this article: www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
#methane #emissions #climate
@dmreiner.bsky.social

Only a German article would string together these two sentences: “At the same time, the share of coal in the electricity mix fell to 23 percent in 2024. One thing is certain: German nuclear power is not missed”. Nowhere is it acknowledged that if nuclear was retained, coal could be ramped down.

The article starts with a strawman claim that “everything is going wrong” and so pointing to frankly trivial achievements like record renewables is meant to refute that claim (commendable yes, but renewables are setting records year on year almost everywhere!)

A useful update but the tone reflects a steadfast denial of the history of German underachievement on grid decarbonisation relative to, say, the UK or Denmark, both of which had substantial coal share in generation a quarter century ago. See Brauer et al (2020)

www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Actually, those figures indicate that international aviation still had not recovered by 2022 (and in any case will be one of the last sectors to decarbonise) But it is disturbing how the entire rail network is completely shut on the 25th and we then have rail replacement buses until well
Into 2025!

Sweden open to power cable project if Germany reforms, minister says [FREE TO READ] Swedish energy minister Ebba Busch prepared to move on Hansa PowerBridge project if Berlin overhauls electricity market

NEW: Sweden open to going ahead with the Hansa PowerBridge cable project if Germany reforms its electricity market, ⁦‪energy minister Ebba Busch‬⁩ tells @financialtimes.com

on.ft.com/3VHkSi8

Paul McClean graduate trainee programme Applications will open in December for our 2025 intake

The grad trainee programme at the FT is extraordinary. We train you for THREE years you get decent money and an overseas placement. I've seen other news trainee schemes and this one is exceptional.
It's open now. Pls share with anyone you know who would benefit d/l 14/1/25 www.ft.com/content/314f...

UK uncovers vast crypto laundering scheme for gangsters and Russian spies Multibillion-dollar ring across London, Moscow and Dubai connected cash-rich criminals with sanctions evaders

Bitcoin 100K — but still, after 15 years, no legitimate use cases www.ft.com/content/31b9...

In news conference discussing border sheriffs idea, Justice Minister Mickey Amery highlights the problem with guns and drugs coming north from U.S. — which isn't exaaaaactly what Trump was on about.

If dunkelflaute means ‘dark doldrums’ then yesterday’s Storm Bert felt like whatever the opposite of that is — maybe ‘bright exuberance’? (‘Hellesuberschwang’?! Pardon the mangled German!)

A reminder that ‘winter fuel payments’ has nothing to do with energy policy it is simply ‘payments to retirees’ that they can spend on whatever they want. It is a shame that addressing the genuine problem of excess winter deaths and the dreadful UK housing stock is not actually being debated.

When folks like @climatebrad.hillheat.com create climate moderation lists blocking veteran climate scholars like @thehonestbroker.bsky.social they are shrinking the climate tent just when it needs to be broadened. (an excerpt from this #sustainwhat chat: revkin.substack.com/p/exploring-...) 1/

Glad to see that Bluesky is not some sort of panacea and that there are still lots of bad takes to be found!

Pleasure to contribute to this collection with an expert elicitation on DACCS and BECCS co-authored with my wonderful colleagues Manon Abegg, Lucrezia Nava and Zeynep Clulow. Lots of other excellent contributions that are worth digging into as well!

Cool job alert. Stripe/Frontier is hiring in-house climate counsel.
www.linkedin.com/jobs/view/40...

Cambridge spends £50m to attract the brightest minds in the world The university is expected to fully fund around 30 PhDs each year for ten years

Cambridge launches £50 million bid to attract the brightest & best - partly because of Brexit.

Decline in potential PhD students from Europe of particular concern as fees trebled for them post-Brexit, and "quite often the UK is not seen as an attractive place to do a PhD".

It is a part-time role, which can be combined with other pursuits and would suit anyone interested in working at the intersection of business and academia in energy, to support and build our extensive stakeholder relations. Please do pass along to anyone you think might be a good fit.

This exciting new role will involve working closely with me and other wonderful colleagues at EPRG (soon to join Bluesky!), Cambridge Judge Business School, and the rest of the University of Cambridge. Please do get in touch with me directly if you want to have a quick chat about the position.

It seems the energy community is regrouping so I wanted to advertise that our Energy Policy Research Group (EPRG) at Cambridge is looking for a new Head of its Energy Policy Forum and Business Development Manager. Deadline is 17 Nov (sorry for the short notice!) www.jobs.cam.ac.uk/job/48771/

For 15 eurocents per kWh one might expect (literally) goldplated grid connections!