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The Gist
The Gist is the monthly newsletter of The Ad Hoc Group that covers everything at the intersection of climate tech and policy. Subscribe at the link here to have The Gist mailed to your inbox each month.
The Ad Hoc Gist: Can States Defend and Advance Climate Progress?
Now that Congress has gutted much of the Inflation Reduction Act, attention turns back to the states that have historically provided a “climate firewall” when the federal government backslides.
In 2016 when Trump was first elected, climate-forward states united in common cause to flex the power that the federalist system gave them to continue to drive the energy transition forward.
In this month’s Gist, we interview Will Toor, who leads Colorado Governor Polis’ energy office, to find out if states will step up again and what’s different about 2025.
The Ad Hoc Gist: Can Utilities Learn to Innovate Faster?
Utilities have struggled to adopt new technologies quickly and are known to pilot tech startups out of business. As a result, investors often avoid investing in startups that sell to utilities.
But utilities need to innovate now more than ever. There is no way to achieve the goals of the energy transition, meet rising electricity demand from AI, and address the threats posed by climate change without significant innovation in the utility sector.
In this month’s Gist, we interviewed Larry Bekkedahl, senior vice president of advanced energy delivery at Portland General Electric (PGE), Oregon’s largest utility, which has gone from last to first in utility innovation. We discussed how PGE did it, and why it has been an imperative for the company.
The Ad Hoc Gist: Is the US Sabotaging the $250B Carbon Removal Opportunity?
Carbon removal is in temporary panic mode as the Trump administration injects uncertainty into this nascent market. It doesn’t need to be this way.
In this month’s Gist, my colleagues Annie Gilleo and Myron Lam argue why America should continue to “dominate” this market and not cede its jobs and technological advancements to Asia and Europe, and how states can step up to fill the temporary gap.
White Papers
The Ad Hoc Group, in partnership with other industry thought leaders, publishes white papers that take a deep dive into the complex issues facing the energy industry and our clients.
Bridging the Load Gap: A Collaborative Path for Utilities, Hyperscalers and Customers
In this white paper, published in January 2026, the Alliance to Save Energy and the Ad Hoc Group explore whether a collaborative model – one in which a large load funds incremental, utility-directed demand-side management (DSM) investments that include both demand response (DR) and energy efficiency (EE) programs – could unlock new capacity, reduce pressure on infrastructure timelines, and support improved affordability and resilience for customers.
Blog
Follow our blog for updates from The Ad Hoc Group.
People as Moat – Ad Hoc Expands into Search
In climate tech, we talk a lot about, well, technology. But talk with most CEOs and they’ll share that the hardest part of their job is figuring out how to hire and retain the right people. In my experience, a company’s ability to hire and effectively onboard the right people is what differentiates successful businesses from those that falter. Because, as a CEO, you can have a great vision, but if you don’t have the right people, you can’t execute it.
Press
What Utilities Learned from Winter Storm Fern
When Winter Storm Fern swept across the United States last month, it served as a stress test for the grid hardening measures that utilities have employed in the last few years. As a large swath of the U.S. froze, there was intense scrutiny of how the grid would hold up.
In Texas, a combination of infrastructure winterization and a diversified grid — including new batteries — allowed ERCOT to hold the line. It was the Southeast that ultimately saw the most outages, due to frozen equipment and iced-over lines.
But the debate over why the grid mostly held continues, with stakeholders tending to view the conversation through the lens of their own resource of choice. Even the U.S. Department of Energy has entered the fray, emphasizing the minimal role of coal in keeping the lights on.
Ad Hoc Group founder and CEO Jim Kapsis joined Latitude Media editor Lisa Martine Jenkins on Latitude Dispatch to dissect the impact of the storm.
Where the Smart Climate Tech Venture Money Is Going in 2025
This year is shaping up to be a dramatic one for climate tech investors.
Donald Trump’s return to the White House is set to shift the US landscape, with the possible rollback of key provisions in the Inflation Reduction Act, Energy Department loans drying up and weaker regulations. Beyond the US, the prospect of more trade wars is scrambling the economy in ways that will determine which climate tech sectors to bet on.
Meanwhile, headwinds for hydrogen are throwing doubt on its viability, and artificial intelligence is now fully on investors’ radars.
The Regulator’s Dilemma, Part 3
Virtual power plants (VPPs) are poised to revolutionize the power sector by orchestrating distributed energy resources (DERs) — like smart thermostats, household appliances, solar panels, batteries, and electric vehicles — into real-time networks of dispatchable capacity. The opportunity is especially significant for advanced VPPs, which aggregate multiple device types, are fully automated and optimized by price signals, provide multiple reliable grid services, are compensated on a pay-for-performance basis, and serve as a true supply-side resource.
Advanced VPPs can offer grid operators significant value by reducing stress on generation, transmission and distribution infrastructure at lower cost than conventional solutions like large-scale batteries, peaker plants, or additional poles and wires.
Podcast
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