Cleaning Up: Leadership in an Age of Climate Change

Bryony Worthington and Michael Liebreich give their analysis of the impact of the conflict in Iran on global energy markets. How will it impact the Middle East, Europe, Asia, the US, and will it force countries back to coal, or accelerate the clean energy transition? 

This episode was recorded Thursday March 5. 

Leadership Circle: 

Cleaning Up is supported by the Leadership Circle, and its founding members: Actis, Alcazar Energy, Davidson Kempner, EcoPragma Capital, EDP, Eurelectric, the Gilardini Foundation, KKR, National Grid, Octopus Energy, Quadrature Climate Foundation, Schneider Electric, SDCL and Wärtsilä. For more information on the Leadership Circle, please visit https://www.cleaningup.live.

How can we build out clean energy and infrastructure faster? Is Europe engineering its way to resilience, or pricing itself out of competitiveness? And can we redesign the entire system fast enough to keep up with AI, electrification and rising demand? 

This week on Cleaning Up, Michael Liebreich sits down with Hilde Tonne, Chair of Arup and former CEO of Statnett, to explore the hard realities behind the energy transition. From offshore wind and nuclear to grid bottlenecks and data centre demand, Hilde brings a uniquely systems-level perspective shaped by decades leading infrastructure transformation across telecoms, energy and engineering. 

They dive into: 

Why grid investment, not generation, may be Europe’s biggest constraint 

Whether hyperscaler AI companies should foot the bill for massive grid upgrades 

The hidden bottlenecks in regulation, permitting and procurement • How ‘total design’ thinking can cut carbon by 40% before construction even begins 

Whether electrification makes Europe more resilient, or more exposed 

Hilde argues that this transition is no longer just about climate. It’s about security, competitiveness, affordability and economic growth. But achieving it will require rethinking regulation, redesigning infrastructure and the bureaucracy around it, and aligning public and private capital at unprecedented scale. 

Leadership Circle: 

Cleaning Up is supported by the Leadership Circle, and its founding members: Actis, Alcazar Energy, Davidson Kempner, EcoPragma Capital, EDP, Eurelectric, the Gilardini Foundation, KKR, National Grid, Octopus Energy, Quadrature Climate Foundation, Schneider Electric, SDCL and Wärtsilä. For more information on the Leadership Circle, please visit https://www.cleaningup.live. 

Links and more:

 Arup’s website: https://www.arup.com/ 

Inside Europe’s Largest Data Centre: https://youtu.be/juAyLAUmU3w

This week on Cleaning Up, host Bryony Worthington sits down with investor and energy strategist Laurent Segalen, co-host of the Redefining Energy podcast, for a sweeping conversation that spans carbon markets, uranium trading, battery innovation, and Laurent’s bold plan to connect Canada and Europe with a 5,000km subsea electricity cable.

Laurent shares the personal moments that shaped his obsession with energy security, from witnessing Cold War division in Germany to cleaning an oil spill off the beaches of Brittany, and how those experiences led him to the heart of Europe’s carbon trading system and into high-stakes commodity markets.

Along the way, Laurent recounts:

How he became becoming one of the most profitable uranium traders on the market

The financial mechanics behind interconnectors, and why east-west cables make money

Why sodium batteries could reshape grid storage

His experience designing carbon markets, and whether they are working or not.

At the centre of the discussion is NATO-L (North Atlantic Transmission One Link): an audacious proposal to link Canadian hydro and wind to European markets through ultra-high-voltage subsea cables.

Leadership Circle:

Cleaning Up is supported by the Leadership Circle, and its founding members: Actis, Alcazar Energy, Davidson Kempner, EcoPragma Capital, EDP, Eurelectric, the Gilardini Foundation, KKR, National Grid, Octopus Energy, Quadrature Climate Foundation, Schneider Electric, SDCL and Wärtsilä. For more information on the Leadership Circle, please visit https://www.cleaningup.live.

Links and more:

NATO-L website: https://nato-l.com/

Redefining Energy Podcast: https://www.redefining-energy.com/

Ep92: Simon Morrish "650 Leagues of HVDC Under the Sea": https://youtu.be/m6KIMswZkWA

This week on Cleaning Up, Michael Liebreich sits down with Miguel Stilwell d’Andrade, CEO of EDP, one of the world’s leading clean energy companies.
From the front lines of the energy transition, Miguel explains why electricity demand in the United States is exploding, driven by AI, data centres, and re-industrialisation, and why this could make renewables one of the most attractive investments of the decade. He also shares how EDP transformed itself from an 80% coal-based utility into a company generating over 90% of its electricity from renewables.
But the transition hasn’t been entirely smooth. Miguel recounts the dramatic moment when Spain’s grid collapsed, taking Portugal down with it, and what it taught him about resilience, grid stability, and the hidden challenges of running a modern clean power system.
They also dive into:
Why soaring power demand is changing energy economics
The real story behind renewable costs and rising electricity prices
The link between European competitiveness and energy independence
The political and economic reality of investing in US clean energy
Why resilience may define the next phase of the transition
This episode was recorded prior to the recent storms in Portugal. For more information on how EDP is responding to the storms, and what to do if you are affected by them, please visit: www.edp.com
Leadership Circle:
Cleaning Up is supported by the Leadership Circle, and its founding members: Actis, Alcazar Energy, Davidson Kempner, EcoPragma Capital, EDP, Eurelectric, the Gilardini Foundation, KKR, National Grid, Octopus Energy, Quadrature Climate Foundation, Schneider Electric, SDCL and Wärtsilä. For more information on the Leadership Circle, please visit https://www.cleaningup.live.
Links and more:
EDP website: https://edp.com/en
The £60 Billion Plan To Rewire Britain | Ep227: John Pettigrew https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7Lg1A958aA
The Enormous Ambition Of Germany’s New Grid Build Out | Ep233: Tim Meyerjürgens: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQgUuJ-dx78
The $60 Billion Plan For Europe’s Largest AI Data Centre | Ep235: Robert Dunn https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juAyLAUmU3w
The Price of Resilience - Ep8: Roger Dennis https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CELQT31riDE

This week on Cleaning Up, Michael Liebreich sits down with carbon removal insider Robert Höglund, CEO of Marginal Carbon, co-founder of CDR.fyi and architect of MilkyWire’s Climate Transformation Fund, for a deep dive into what’s working and what’s not in carbon dioxide removal and corporate climate action.
Drawing on five years of hands-on experimentation funding everything from biochar to direct air capture and policy advocacy, Höglund challenges the dominant “speed and scale” narrative. Instead, he makes the case for a new phase: prove and learn. 
Together, Michael and Robert unpack why the highest-impact climate interventions are often the least measurable, why corporate net-zero targets are more conditional than we admit, and what it will actually take to make carbon removal credible, scalable, and worth paying for.
Leadership Circle:
Cleaning Up is supported by the Leadership Circle, and its founding members: Actis, Alcazar Energy, Davidson Kempner, EcoPragma Capital, EDP, Eurelectric, the Gilardini Foundation, KKR, National Grid, Octopus Energy, Quadrature Climate Foundation, Schneider Electric, SDCL and Wärtsilä. For more information on the Leadership Circle, please visit https://www.cleaningup.live.
Links and more: 
Marginal Carbon: Marginal Carbon
CDR.fyi: https://www.cdr.fyi/
MilkyWire Climate Transformation Fund: https://milkywire.com/
Carbon Gap: https://carbongap.org/
Julio Friedmann on Cleaning Up: https://youtu.be/DX7k6qnTxE8