Just spent 7 months with @freeelectronspr. It's 10 utilities engaging with 15 startups. It's been a real honour to be part of it. What I've learned...

1. The future is all about consumers. They'll be the ones in control in future. Utilities need to give them what they want.

2. Tech will/is delivering completely new solutuons. Not just evolutions of what's gone already. Like PAYG rooftop solar for off-grid communities just like PAYG mobile phones. Skip the whole nationalised grid infrastrucutre bit. Go straight to decentralised solutions.

3. There are so many brilliant solutions ready to roll. So many energetic, agile and ready startups eager to deliver. It's difficult to explain why there's still a climate problem TBH. We've got the solutions, we need to use them.

4. Utilities want to act. They're actively reaching out to the startup community, even in covid times. As one startup said, they could easily have cancelled - that they didn't shows how much importance they place on innovation. I also hadn't expected them to be so open TBH.

5. OMG are there some brilliant ideas.
Shared behind the meter rooftop solar for low rise apartment blocks.
Video post-it notes.
AI to avoid wildfires from vegetation overhanging grid lines.
Micro monitoring of grid infrastructure
Better EV route planners

6. Everyone knows that everything is going to change. Utilities are rolling with it. They're embracing innovators to help them adapt, and ultimately win, in the new energy sector.

7. I know I work everyday in a startup but when startups get together (even virtually) something really special happens. People are so open, supportive, honest and driven. Everyone's looking for collaboration, not competition.

8. So anyway. It's been a ball. Being surrounded by people who want to get stuff done, whether a startup or a utility is great. It doesn't stop here tho. We've got to test whether we can take @RippleEnergy to other markets. And do it.

9. Also the last 7 months have flown by. Free Electrons has enabled me to meet new people, in the middle of lockdown. To speak to people on the other side of the world, even as the parameters of my physical world had shrunk. It's hard to express how much I've appreciated this.