Episode 155 · 2022-10-03 · 32:08 · Original in Finnish
Geopolitical Risk in Renewables | Mikko Kantero and Petri Haataja | Negotiator 155
Originally published as “Geopoliittinen riski uusiutuvissa | Mikko Kantero Petri Haataja | Neuvottelija 155”
The bubbles rising over Nord Stream in the Baltic are a reminder that energy is always also geopolitics. Mikko Kantero and Petri Haataja of Korkia explain why country risk is pushing much of the world to build its own energy infrastructure, and why industrial-scale solar now works very nearly anywhere. Their unexpected favourite market is Alberta, the Texas of Canada, where oil money flows into wind and solar on market terms and without subsidy. The conversation covers dependence on China in component manufacturing, the unusually good work done by the Finnish grid operator Fingrid, the battery breakthrough in the British market, and what plant maintenance actually amounts to in jobs. It closes on why the best place for solar is not the Sahara.
Core theses
- Country risk, not carbon policy, is what is currently driving the build-out — the security argument and the climate argument happen to point the same way.
- Alberta is the interesting case precisely because the projects there stand up without subsidy, which removes the usual objection to renewables economics.
- Component manufacturing is where the dependence on China actually sits, so replacing imported fuel with imported hardware moves the exposure rather than removing it.
- The best solar site is not the sunniest one: grid connection, land and demand decide it, which is why the Sahara is the wrong intuition.
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Summary
The bubbles rising over Nord Stream in the Baltic are a reminder that energy is always also geopolitics. Mikko Kantero and Petri Haataja of Korkia explain why country risk is pushing much of the world to build its own energy infrastructure, and why industrial-scale solar now works very nearly anywhere. Their unexpected favourite market is Alberta, the Texas of Canada, where oil money flows into wind and solar on market terms and without subsidy. The conversation covers dependence on China in component manufacturing, the unusually good work done by the Finnish grid operator Fingrid, the battery breakthrough in the British market, and what plant maintenance actually amounts to in jobs. It closes on why the best place for solar is not the Sahara.
Security is doing the work
The build-out described here is not primarily a climate story. Countries are buying their way out of dependence on someone else’s fuel, and renewables happen to be the available instrument. That reframing explains why the pace picked up in 2022 specifically, and it is the episode’s main analytical contribution.
Why Alberta
An oil province is a strange favourite market until one notices what it implies: the projects clear on their own economics, without a subsidy regime to argue about. That is why Kantero and Haataja reach for it as evidence rather than as an anecdote.
Where the dependence actually is
Solar panels, turbines and cells are manufactured largely in China. Swapping imported gas for imported hardware changes the shape of the exposure and does not eliminate it — a point the guests make against their own book, which is why it is worth keeping.
Watch
The recording lives on the Neuvottelija channel: Geopoliittinen riski uusiutuvissa | Mikko Kantero Petri Haataja | Neuvottelija 155. A Finnish edition of this episode is published at www.neuvottelija.fi.
In depth
The Neuvottelija AI editions carry a long-form write-up of this episode: English · suomeksi.
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People and topics
Guests: Mikko Kantero, Petri Haataja
Topics: Geopolitics Investing & Markets