Spark Club Podcast

Spark Club brings entrepreneurs in the energy field together with a common objective, to build energy businesses. We draw on each others experience to support, learn and grow energy businesses. The podcasts are hosted by Grant McDowell and are recordings of our Fireside chat with leaders in the energy transition.

Spark Club Podcast is a business podcast hosted by Grant McDowell, with 75 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80.

Grant McDowell hosts Spark Club Podcast, a business show with 75 episodes published.

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  Episode #76

  Changes to the Safeguard Mechanism - Tim Buckley -Ep76

  Sep 27, 202641 minS1

  Highlights – Minister Bowen's BYONCE for Data Centres The federal government and Energy Minister Chris Bowen have committed that data centre development approvals will be contingent on BYONCE – Bring Your Own New Clean Energy. The signs are promising –The Energy reports a consultation paper has been released by the federal government that confirmed that the Clean Energy Regulator would use the Renewable Energy Guarantee of Origin (REGO) scheme to ensure that data centres contract for renewable energy that is genuinely additional to existing sources and aligned with BYONCE. Highlights – China Generation 8MCY2026 China's total power generation growth slowed to 0.9% yoy in August 2026, while zero-emissions generation grew 8.8% yoy, more than offsetting demand growth and driving a second consecutive monthly decline in fossil fuel generation. Coal generation fell by 4.3% yoy. Solar remained the #2 generation source at 13.1% YTD, ahead of wind at 10.8%, while zero-emissions sources supplied 42.3% of total generation. 8 months into 2026, China's national emissions continue to plateau, six years ahead of 2030. Lowlights – BHP's FY2026 Annual Report confirms their shameful climate walkback In May, Angus Grigg & Maryanne at ABC 4Corners and The Guardian's Christopher Knaus and Adam Morton gave us the big reveal – BHP was locking in diesel fossil fuel use in its Pilbara operations and effectively reversing its commitments on emissions reduction while telling the public it was going green. This highlighted the shameful climate science denialism of the BHP board under Chair Ross McEwan and new CEO Brandon Craig. Four months later, last week we got the big middle finger with confirmation that BHP's emissions in 2035 will be a reported 33% higher than previously expected. The board had listened to its shareholders and the climate scientists and decided to totally ignore them. CEF continues to lobby the government to turn the $3bn annual subsidy to imported diesel for the mining sector into a TTI, a tailwind to energy security and decarbonisation. Lowlights – Sanjeev Gupta is taking the piss, still Reading veteran ABC journalist Paul Barry's insightful book "The Big Steal" reveals the massive ongoing global fraud being perpetrated by international master scammer, who literally bled Whyalla Steelworks dry. I continue to highlight this because Gupta somehow still controls InfraBuild, a firm employing 4,500 Australians and is in all likelihood according to Barry's book trading while insolvent for potentially a decade, yet ASIC is dead silent on this. ASIC asleep at the wheel, again. Main Story – CEF's Safeguard Mechanism Submission Matt Pollard led on CEF's submission to the DCCEEW consultation on the 2026 Safeguard Mechanism Review — an review required to strengthen the Federal Government's flagship policy for driving emissions reduction and fossil fuel abatement across industry. CEF's submission is grounded in enhancing the existing policy framework and improving the effectiveness of the integrated structure of the Safeguard Mechanism, the ACCU Scheme, and the Nature Repair Market. This is key to building investor confidence in deploying capital into on-site abatement for industrial facilities under the Safeguard, and patient capital into nature-based solutions that deliver critical co-benefits in nature repair. CEF sees it as imperative that industry, regulators, investors, landholders and the academic community focus on enhancing the standard and integrity of this structure, and not on abandoning this model. Markets work best with a price signal, and 'polluter pays' is a longstanding core market principle Australia needs to enhance, not discard. Australia has an incredible opportunity to harness the scalability of compliance carbon markets to build a world-scale structure to sustainably generate significant positive outcomes that restore, conserve, and protect Australia's natural capital, and simultaneously create the critical investment signal of a rising price on carbon, supported by fundamentals that will drive such market conditions, catalysing large-scale capital deployment into on-site abatement in industry. Australia's opportunity, and challenge, is in forming market conditions, improving investor confidence and market participation, and ensuring system integrity and stakeholder buy-in. This is key to ensuring the integration of the ACCU Scheme with the Safeguard Mechanism to incentivise high-quality abatement and investment into nature-based solutions while simultaneously not limiting or hindering onsite emissions reductions at industrial facilities. CEF's submission was focussed upon broadening and deepening the policy settings of the Safeguard Mechanism, recommending: Establishing a progressively rising real price floor in the Safeguard Mechanism through purchasing option or reverse auction structures in the ACCU market to increase demand when secondary market prices fall below a rising floor. The Federal Government introduce a significantly greater carbon price liability for entities that exceed their Safeguard baselines by >30% through the purchasing of credits from the Government at a significant market premium over the purchase price paid through price floor auctions. The Federal Government introduce an Australian CBAM for product variables currently most associated with trade-exposed, baseline adjustment (TEBA) concessions to level the playing field for trade-exposed commodities without hindering the decarbonisation of industry and limiting new, low-emissions manufacturing and value-adding capacity to compete in the domestic market with emissions-intensive counterparts. The Safeguard Mechanism be expanded more effectively to the electricity sector to accelerate the phase out of fossil fuel-based generation and support the deployment of critical renewable energy generation, ideally aligned to ensure coal plant closure timetable certainty. The Safeguard Mechanism floor be lowered to 75,000tpa as an efficient next step extension. The Federal Government investigate the potential introduction of Carbon Contracts-for-Difference (CCfD) to accelerate investment into decarbonisation capex for captured facilities — where the current cost of compliance for Safeguard is met from ACCUs and SMCs as the lowest-cost abatement method. Our recommendations are centred upon absorbing lessons from international best practice and the development of carbon pricing mechanisms across the world, and in particular, our key trading partners in Northeast Asia. Link to CEF submission What's coming up? 13-14 October 2026 Annual Industrial Net Zero Summit in Sydney 25-29th October 2026 Bunbury in SW WA I'll be speaking at the Innovative Industries of the Future 2026 Regional Conference

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  Episode #75

  China is Electrifying Everything - Tim Buckley - Ep75

  Sep 5, 202647 minS1

  Spark Club Podcast - Ep75 - 3rd September 2026 Highlights – CEF's field trip to China CATL, XCMG and China Hongqiao Group Tim Buckley and Matt Pollard's three highlights from their China trip in August: CATL : RD&D: CATL invested an annualised RMB22.7bn (A$2.3bn) in R&D in 1HCY2026, up 13% y-o-y, with 22,000 staff deployed in RD&D, including 700 professors, with >60,000 patent applications and 17 new patents being borne daily! Extensive use of data, robots & analysis means CATL targets an error rate of 1 part per billion! China Hongqiao Group is China's #2 integrated aluminium producer, and they toured the largest single-site aluminium smelter in the world, 4x the capacity of Tomago in Newcastle. This smelter has reduced its annual emissions by 32Mtpa since 2020, with a lot more reductions underway. XCMG : CEF joined Fortescue & XCMG at the largest commercial deployment of autonomous EV mining vehicles at China Huaneng Group's 35Mtpa open cut opencut coal mine in Inner Mongolia. The highlight was the confirmation that having successfully deployed 100 autonomous EV mining trucks in May 2025, by Sept'2026 this will double to 200 and then treble to 300 trucks by Nov'2026, 18 months ahead of the original 3 year rollout. Follow the money – one of the largest coal mining utilities in the world sees this technology as commercial, even as BHP and Rio Tinto continue with their climate walk back. Highlights – Asian Carbon markets progress Matt and Tim attended a full day session in Beijing with 30 people from the greater Asian region to discuss China's carbon market expansion, and the progress on carbon market developments from India to Thailand, Korea and Philippines. A key point was made by China's Assistant Director General of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment that climate markets are an integral part of China's sustainable economic development. The focus is on building momentum towards greater Asian regional cooperation in carbon market development, particularly in regional trade so as to extend and leverage the EU ETS and CBAM. It was great to hear Minister Bowen last month talk about his push for a path to an Australian CBAM, particularly as it was followed by his Australian meeting late August 2026 with China's Minister of Ecology and Environment, Huang Runqiu , for the 10th Australia-China Ministerial Dialogue on Climate Change. Lowlights – The WA by-election last week Not only did ONP win a strong 57% two-party share of the total vote and take the seat of Secret Harbour, but the WA ALP fielded Woodside's ex lobbyist as their candidate, and Woodside was one of the largest donors to her election campaign. Yet more evidence of the state capture of the WA government by the fossil gas industry. Main Story – My keynote presentation this week to the RE Construction Summit This week Tim is presenting in Sydney at the Renewable Energy Construction Summit, see presentation is available via CEF's website. Main themes are: #1 We are making strong progress on the journey to 82% RE and beyond, even if we are tracking 1-2 years behind Minister Chris Bowen's ambitious 2030 target. The 12 month moving average for RE share hit a record high of 46.9% in August 2026. Rooftop solar installs are on track for an all time record high of 4GW in CY2026, up a third on the last 5 years' average. This is supported by the 2,000 home battery installs per day being delivered thanks to Minister Bowen's massively successful program. And rooftop C&I is finally set to surge with Bowen's latest incentive program, all leveraging the existing grid and thereby lowering average retail electricity prices for all. And while AEMO's new ESOO flags a record 9.1GW of net new generation and storage capacity (utility and CER) was added in FYU2026, almost 3x that of the last five years, the reality is we need to see progress rise another 50% and then sustain that for the next decade. The CER's August 2026 report highlights that another cumulative 7.5GW of utility scale renewables capacity has reached FID but yet to be commissioned, with a record 32.2GW in the CER's probable category. Progress is being made, but we must see this accelerate, and for this to happen, we must see project proposals that have won CIS leverage this and get to FID and into construction. The only way we get coal plant closures is by building replacement renewable generation capacity beyond what is needed to cover the ongoing growth in electrification, including EVs and data centres. What's coming up? Later this week Tim is off to Adelaide for a German-Australia green iron and steel roundtable, followed by attending the Asia Hydrogen Summit, where Tim is moderating a panel on path to commercialisation and deployments Next week TIm is off to Canberra with Prof. Liz Thurbon and Oliver Yates to meet with the Chinese Embassy to suggest ways for greater bilateral China-Australia collaboration, and meeting with Treasury again re the FTC reform Then Tim will be going to the Gold Coast to see a potential battery assembly factory with eLumina, then talking at a community event on China's energy transition hosted by Mara Bun with Annastacia Palaszczuk, Chair of the Advanced Materials & Battery Council, and like me, a massive fan of seeing first hand China's energy system transformation and the opportunities for greater Australia-China collaboration. The following week Tim will join a Canberra Parliament delegation (including Mick Liubinskas' VC event on the 16th), then he's speaking at an Ethinvest event in Melbourne on the evening of the 16th, then a Sydney Freight Electrification event on the 17th then talking at the Everything Electric Sydney event on 18th Sept. End

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  Episode #74

  Governments step up for Tomago with $2.5B - Tim Buckley Ep74

  Aug 20, 202655 minS1

  Spark Club Podcast 14 August 2026 Highlights – The new SRES support for the missing middle C&I rooftop solar Businesses, farmers to save on solar installations under renewable energy scheme expansion Minister for Climate Change and Energy Chris Bowen today addresses the National Press Club of Australia to announce that the Australian Anthony Albanese government is expanding the solar discount to include installations up to 1MW in size. This will slash the installation costs for commercial & industrial (C&I) + agricultural buildings by ~20%. Estimates vary, but the technical rooftop potential for solar on C&I and agricultural rooftops could exceed 80GW. The Small-scale Renewable Energy Scheme (SRES) limit will be lifted from 100kW to 1,000kW. Minister Bowen is also requesting the Australian Energy Market Commission (AEMC) to consider a rule change to require the network providers to approve C&I solar much more expeditiously and efficiently than they have been doing. Another strong step forward for Australia's energy system transformation to embrace electrification, decarbonisation and energy independence. The Smart Energy Council's Robert Potter earlier this month released a major report on the unrealised potential of the commercial and industrial solar market, and how it could be fulfilled, says the expanded SRES will be "a permanent bill slasher" for farms, factories and warehouses - refer below. Well done SEC Highlights – Oriign Energy FY2026 results highlight electricity price deflation ahead Simply amazing to see electricity and gas price deflation in the middle of the latest fossil fuel war in the Middle East. Surging global LNG and oil prices, and yet Australia's wholesale electricity prices are coming down in 2026! Congrats Climate & Energy Minister Chris Bowen - deflation in a world of hyper fossil fuel price inflation. Such a contrast to 2022 when Australian energy prices - oil, gas and electricity - went through the roof. The Default Market Offer (DMO) is down from 1 July 2026. Such a contrast to energy bills under the previous mob when Putin invaded Ukraine and we all suffered hyper fossil fuel price inflation, and the resulting cost of living crisis and higher mortgage costs! More #Renewable Energy generation firmed by a massive buildout of batteries- utility scale BESS and behind the meter batteries - is putting some downward pressure on energy prices. The record 2,000 home battery installs per day is helping drive permanently lower electricity prices, and preventing electricity prices going up as per what happened in 2022. 500k BTM battery installs now achieved. Time to embrace electrification of our transport sector, EVs, freight and mining. Time for the $11bn annual imported diesel fuel subsidy to be pivoted into a tailwind for decarbonisation. Lets remove the obstacle to BHP and Rio Tinto embracing electrification and decarbonisation in the Pilbara. Australia is the largest importer of diesel in the world - and our mining sector is the biggest user of imported diesel. We have the solutions, time to cut our $50bn annual imported diesel and oil bill, permanently! Highlights – GANE and carbon / nature market pricing Great to spend some time at the Growing Australia's Nature Economy (GANE) Yass gathering GANE's mission is to be a positive and active advocate for market-based opportunities that benefit nature, the economy and people. Strengthening Australia's nature-based economy by advocating for environmental markets that deliver real outcomes. A very informative deep dive into the intersection of the need for climate markets, the price on carbon pollution and the integrity of the system to be enhanced to concurrently protect our natural environment while incentivising the repair of our land sector - with the massive opportunities to better serve our nature, farming and indigenous mobs. Climate & Energy Minister Chris Bowen joined us for a lengthy discussion on the Safeguard Mechanism as well as the opportunities for stronger systems for valuing and protecting biodiversity, endangered species, nature and enhancing First Nations self-determination. Australia's land, water and wildlife are under immense strain. Forests are being cleared faster than they can regrow, soils are eroding, and native species are vanishing. At the same time, our climate is changing, with hotter, drier seasons hitting farmers, First Nations communities and regional towns the hardest. Repairing nature at this scale will require investments in the hundreds of billions of dollars, far beyond what governments or charities can afford alone. ACCUs bring in a long term revenue stream to support communities: Savanna burning by our First Nations provides self-determination for our mobs, on-country employment for rangers, with a career path and connection to country that is empowering their communities. for farmers to rebuild farm resilience by restoring soil carbon and water retention, boosting farm productivity whilst providing a second income stream. for conservation groups from reforestation to protect endangered species. Lowlights Plutocracy Rising Sunrise Energy Metals The rise and rise of the war-profiteering US led plutocracy Near Dubbo, six hours west of Sydney, former Rio Tinto executive Sam Riggall and his team at Sunrise Energy Metals have grabbed control of one of the world's largest and highest quality scandium deposits, in a rich mineral ring around a nickel and cobalt resource. But the global scandium market was tiny and the team could not make the economics work. Now in cahoots with Trump and his administration, plus a couple of billionaires Robert Friedland, Chinese real estate, agriculture and property billionaire Jiang Zhaobai and some other insiders in the US, plus Sam Riggall add a few more billion $$$$$$ to their personal wealth by securing a US Department of Defence $US400m loan. In a related announcement ExxonMobil last week announced record high 2QCY2026 earnings of US$14.5 billion, double that reported last year thanks to Trump's ongoing open-ended war against Iran. The war profits continue to roll-in to the business 'elites' as the rest of the world pays the massive open-ended cost. https://lnkd.in/gaHEbn4g Main Story – Highlights – The $2.5bn NSW and Fed funding for Tomago The NSW & federal governments have agreed to invest $2.5bn over 10 years to secure the future of Australia's largest aluminium smelter, Tomago Aluminium. Smelter owner Rio Tinto has long threatened closure amid with the end of its long term subsidised coal-fired power supply contract. Now Rio Tinto and partners have agreed to invest another $1.1bn in modernisation & decarbonisation on top of the $2.5bn state and Federal investment package to secure 3GW of new Renewable Energy. Rio Tinto has long threatened Tomago closure when the subsidised coal power contract expired end 2028. The world is embracing decarbonisation and Tomago is >95% export focussed, so Rio has long made it clear green aluminium exports was the only international path forward. Renewable Energy firmed by BESS + DRM (demand response management, flexing down production when the grid is stressed and power prices are too high) supported by gas peakers is the internationally cost competitive solution. Gas will play an important, but small & declining role in grid resilience. Gas is Well done NSW Premier Chris Minns, Treasurer Daniel Mookhey and Climate & Energy Minister Penny Sharpe, plus your Federal counterparts PM Anthony Albanese Treasurer Jim Chalmers, Climate & Energy Minister Chris Bowen & Industry Minister Tim Ayres. Australian value-added facilities are strategically challenged in the absence of a clear price signal for embodied decarbonisation in international trade (outside of the EU CBAM). Green aluminium is the only path forward for investment says Rio Tinto. But Tomago Aluminium cant wait till "A Price on Carbon: Building Towards an Asian CBAM", as Matt Pollard at Climate Energy Finance wrote . Well done to Oliver Yates Manik Mahajan Lauren Farrow Lindsay Soutar The Sunrise Project for coming up with the SPV concept and the team pile-on to give our governments the confidence to invest in retaining and building strategic industries of national significance under #FMIA. What's coming up? Matt Pollard and Tim are heading off to China for the last two weeks of August 2026 for a field trip with FMG to XCMG autonomous EV mining trucks deployed commercially at a massive open cut coal mine in Inner Mongolia. Also visiting China Hongqiao Group's green aluminium smelter and CATLs head office, plus spending a day on carbon pricing with GGCI (Global Green Growth Institute) in Beijing.

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  Episode #73

  The Grid Network Story - Ep72 - Stephanie Bashir

  Aug 16, 20261h 9mS1

  Announcing the Spark Club podcast series on the grid networks. High time for this important conversation about our Poles and Wires in Australia. And nobody better to discuss this topic than Stephanie Bashir . In this first episode in the series, the saga begins with laying out the landscape and asking the obvious question. In a regulated monopoly, where is the regulator? Thank you Stephanie Bashir for shining a light on another 'missing middle', or 'missing regulator' in the energy transition, Poles and Wires. The grid is a sleepy hollow that used to cost electricity consumers just 25% of the kWh stack in Australia. Its around 55% of the stack today. Which is why this is such an important conversation. We welcome input from our Spark Club community on topics we should be convering in this series on Poles & Wires. Send us an email. Looking forward to our next conversation.

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  Episode #72

  Green Steel - Now's the time for Australia - Tim Buckley Ep72

  Jul 29, 202644 minS3

  Spark Club Podcast Ep72 24th July 2026 Highlights – 'Message to the haters' AFR Headline Beyond Tim's inspirational trip to China last month to be reminded about 'China Speed, China Scale' + 'China Going Global', his favourite thing this year was seeing the AFFR headline: "'Message to the haters': Chalmers gets cover to cut diesel tax rebate" Following a campaign in the lead-up to Labor's 50th national conference by the highly influential Labor Environment Action Network (LEAN), convenor Louise Crawford moved an amendment that paved the way for future action: "Labor will ensure that all policies, including taxation, work together to provide appropriate incentives and remove disincentives for orderly decarbonisation," the amendment, passed unopposed by delegates. Recently elected ALP MP for Bennelong, Jerome Laxale said the amendment sent "a message to the haters that Labor can and will double down on decarbonisation. Our new platform should scream that Labor is serious about climate action and no one who reads it should be surprised when we use our time in government to deliver it." And the AFR acknowledged a key plank of Climate Capital Forum's strategy: "Farmers and tourism operators would not be affected by the proposal." A long way to go yet, but such a big team effort, with LEAN working with the ACTU, Fortescue, CANA, ACOSS and IGCC plus a range of additional groups leaning in to build collective social, union, cleantech and eNGO power – the power of a coalition. Highlights – China CleanTech exports record high in June China's cleantech exports are truly booming. EMBER reports June 2026 was a record high US$26.7bn Lowlights - China solar capacity installs in 1HCY2026 down 1HCY2026 capacity adds data is pretty bleak relative to the massive outperformance by China in previous years. They have added 38GW of thermal in 6 months, up vs 26GW add pcp. They have added 72GW of solar in 6 months, down vs 212GW add pcp. -2/3 They have added 39GW of wind in 6 months, down vs 51GW add pcp. -22% BESS installs are booming – but clearly they are holding firepower on the domestic economic stimulus to have firepower vs Trump, but after GDP growth of +4.3% yoy in 2QCY2026, they are likely to do something stimulus wise near term, I would think Main Story – Our new CEF Report: Arc of Ambition: Decarbonising and Safeguarding Australia's Steel Industry An effective Green Energy Statecraft policy architecture starting domestically can create government initiatives and channels of strategic public capital deployment that de-risk key aspects of project development through coordinated planning; enabling infrastructure; and efficient allocation and alleviation of project development risks, addressing structural challenges to the economic viability of decarbonised value-add. Link to the full report here: https://climateenergyfinance.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/CEF_Arc-of-Ambition_-Decarbonising-and-Safeguarding-Australian-Steel_FINAL.pdf What's coming up? Boao Forum Perth This week Tim had the privilege of joining Oliver Yates of @Green Energy Statecraft, Rachel Howard @MPP & Tom Parker @ACBC Beathan @TSP, Tom Quinn @Springmout and others to attend a full day conference – the Boao Forum in Perth The Boao Forum for Asia (BFA), hosted by Fortescue, brings together senior leaders from government, industry and academia from across Australia & China, and a smattering of representatives from ASEAN and Gabon.The Perth Forum explored the theme The Next Phase of Green Industry Cooperation. The Forum examines how governments and industry can strengthen regional cooperation, improve energy security and accelerate the deployment pathways for large scale green technologies and industries. CEF is honoured to be speaking in Session 4: Future green energy enabled industries and market creation It is a who's who from China – both cleantech, government, steel, construction and finance – so a lot broader than just the narrow definition of the steel supply chain of old – it is all about the massive infrastructure buildout needs of the bilateral integrated green iron and steel profile from mining, railways, grid, renewable generation and bess firming to green iron and then green steel, with the massive associated cooperation required at the political arena, plus the financing needs – interesting to see ANZ and Macquarie Group speaking alongside CDB, Bank of China, China Construction Bank and China EXIM Bank. Given the seniority and number of Chinese executives attending – It is embarrassing the Australian delegation that pales by comparison. At least the WA Premier and Energy Ministers attended in part. End.

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