From heating our homes to powering our cars, power utilities are moving away from coal

and natural gas power plants and embracing renewable energy sources like hydro, wind and

solar, but it's a slow turnaround.

And in the meantime, the nation's aging electric infrastructure isn't equipped to meet this

new demand or withstand the effects of severe weather.

As floods, droughts, freezes and heat waves become more prevalent in the face of climate

change, they're adding further stress to an already fragile power grid.

What does the power grid of the future look like?

Every January 1A dedicates a week to topics suggested by you, our listeners, and this was

one of the questions you asked.

We convene a panel of experts to talk about it after the break.

I'm Celeste Headley in for Jan White and you're listening to the 1A podcast where we get

to the heart of the story.

Let's get right into it with our panel.

Gretchen Bachy is a cultural anthropologist and senior fellow at the Institute for Advanced

Sustainability Studies in Potsdam, Germany.

She's also the author of The Grid, which examines the flaws in our nation's power grid.

Gretchen, it's so great to have you.

Yeah, thank you very much for having me.

Also with us is Amy Harder.

She's the executive editor of Cypher.

That's a media outlet supported by Breakthrough Energy, a network of clean energy initiatives

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