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Transcript

Friendly Fire at Chatham House

Climate tech heroes led the final session of the Climate and Energy Summit 2025 and for some reason I was allowed to chair the event.

If the global Establishment has a heart, it’s not Klosters with those nouveau riche types. It’s really Chatham House on St. James’s Square in London. You might know it best from “the rule” - the Fight Club type edict that while you can quote things said in session, you can’t mention where it was, what the topic was, or who said it. That rule allowed the world’s great and good to engage in real talk within its friendly confines for more than 100 years, why topics like climate and energy have featured prominently in the discussions they host, and partly why it’s become even more relevant as an alternative to a 21st century public culture dominated by kayfabe, kabuki, and kakistocracy.

Outro of the Day

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We’re glad they do keep providing that essential global public good. But I’m still scratching my head about how I managed to sneak in and chair the final session of their Climate and Energy Summit 2025. The Chatham House team assembled an outstanding set of climate tech innovators to present their solution, ranging from AI-enabled adaptation data platforms to enhanced grid resilience to graphene from captured carbon to the deepest geothermal project in the UK:

Julia Kumari Drapkin, CEO & founder, ISEECHANGE

Taco Engelaar, SVP & Managing Director UK & Europe, Neara

John Hartley, CEO, Levidian

Gus Grand, Chief Executive Officer, and Lucy Cotton, Principal Geologist, Eden Geothermal

And asking them properly smart questions:

Marisa Drew, Chief Sustainability Officer, Standard Chartered Bank

Fiona Harvey, Environment Editor, Guardian

Peter Hirsch, Head of Sustainability and Policy, 2150

And the best part is that this year the Rule was lifted - which means we get to bring you inside Chatham House for the discussion.

Enjoy!

All the Outro Tracks

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