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Transcript

Iberian Blackout: One-off Fiesta or Climate Warning?

Climate and energy analyst Tom Raftery tells us his first-hand experience near Seville of the blackout, its aftermath, and whether there are lessons we might learn from it.

Welcome back to Wicked Problems. We’ve been busy making mischief in various ways so it’s been a bit between episodes.

Exit Music

Today’s exit track is Fiesta by The Pogues - with Tunbridge Wells’ least-known and best-loved frontman, Shane MacGowan.

We’re finishing a long-read and when we say long we mean LONG. But it’s our attempt to get behind the day-to-day reporting of the various machinations of what’s happening in the US and try to understand it by examining the things that have shaped the worldview of the two most influential people on the planet right now. No, we don’t mean The Mad King in the Oval Office. We mean Elon Musk and Peter Thiel. And why it’s time to stop being surprised about what happens next.

Intro

Part I

But we take a break from the American shitshow to focus on something actually important, with our friend

- a transplanted Corkonian living near Seville since 2008. He and his family just lived through the most significant European blackout in decades. And because Tom is a veteran energy and climate analyst, and host of Climate Confident, he can offer a more-than-bystander account of what he was seeing, why he thinks it happened, and what might be done about it in future.

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Climate Impact Flagship Summit

And if you’re in the UK next week, and you can stretch to it, you should check out the Climate Impact summit on 7 May at the Royal Institution in London. As always, great lineup of speakers and attendees from the worlds of climate solution tech, investment, policy, and more, plus the craic is ninety.

A few tickets are still available but they are going fast. If you are going give us a shout so we can meet up when you’re there.

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