Energy policy, technology, and utility challenges: How industry leaders are overcoming barriers
Interchange Recharged
Wood Mackenzie
4.8 • 535 Ratings
🗓️ 18 November 2025
⏱️ 38 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Utility-scale clean energy projects in development are still facing connection queues and regulatory barriers. RE+ may be done for 2025, but the debate is still going. Host Sylvia Leyva Martinez, Research Director at Wood Mackenzie, sits down with three leaders who are driving progress from different corners of the energy transition, from utility-scale project development to digital grid optimisation and solar system reliability.
Sylvia Leyva Martinez and her guests discuss how federal and state regulations shape project timelines and financing, the latest innovations in the grid and the future of interconnection studies, the supply chain outlook for developers and technology providers, and how policy and software are converging to accelerate the energy transition.
In this episode you’ll hear from:
Angela Amos from AES Clean Energy - As Director of Commercial Strategy & Innovation, Angela brings a unique vantage point that bridges policy, finance, and market execution. Drawing on her experience at AES, Uplight, and FERC, Angela shares how developers are navigating an evolving regulatory landscape, adapting to federal and state policy shifts, and rethinking how technology integration shapes long-term strategy. She also discusses how AES is approaching supply chain partnerships and what “innovation” really looks like at a global energy developer.
Lindsey Williams from Shoals Technologies Group - Lindsey is VP of Marketing & Communications at Shoals, and she joins Sylvia to unpack the latest in solar and storage performance. Building on Shoals’ recent focus on EBOS (Electrical Balance of System), Lindsey reflects on how component design, reliability, and digital monitoring are redefining project outcomes. She also shares what she heard from the floor at RE+, including the big industry talking points shaping developer confidence and long-term investment certainty in clean energy infrastructure.
Inalvis Alvarez Fernandez from Simple Thread - Inalvis is a Senior Energy Technology Engineer at Simple Thread, and she explains how digital tools like Minerva are helping reduce project backlogs, streamline utility processes, and unlock grid capacity faster. Inalvis also discusses the challenges clean energy companies face scaling renewables and how regulatory clarity can enable more efficient technology deployment.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Angela, welcome to the interchange recharge podcast. I'm so happy to have you here. |
| 0:09.5 | Thank you so much for inviting me. I'm excited to be here. |
| 0:12.5 | So you lead the commercial strategy and innovation at AES, Clean Energy, right? |
| 0:17.9 | My focus these days is on regulatory strategy within the commercial team. |
| 0:23.4 | We recognize that our industry is highly regulated. Yes. And it's important to take those issues |
| 0:28.9 | into account. Yeah. And I think particularly now with the ever-changing policy, regulatory |
| 0:35.0 | landscape, I bet you and your team have been very busy. So how is AES thinking |
| 0:39.9 | about all these changes like for yourselves, for your customers and other stakeholders you interact with? |
| 0:45.3 | Great question. It's helpful to remember that AES as a company has been around for over 40 years. |
| 0:52.8 | And so our entire business model relies on using the technology |
| 0:57.4 | and developing the technology needed to meet the moment. |
| 1:00.4 | We prioritize our customers, whether those customers are retail customers for our utilities, |
| 1:06.7 | people's homes or businesses, or large industrials or others. So we recognize that no matter what |
| 1:14.5 | context we're operating in, people want the same thing. They want light. They want fuel to power |
| 1:20.5 | the rest of their lives. So for us, regulatory change is just part of doing business. |
| 1:25.3 | Yeah. And has anything like particularly changed over the past few months? |
| 1:30.8 | I know that there has been a lot of change since the Trump administration started, a lot of |
| 1:35.1 | policy uncertainty. |
| 1:36.4 | So the reaction from the market is very different for, let's say, utilities versus |
| 1:41.1 | developers versus homeowners, right? |
| 1:43.6 | How is AES thinking about how to address all the |
| 1:47.1 | different customer types that you have? We always prioritize, as I said, safety, affordability, |
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