About this episode
Tisha Schuller discusses the complexities of U.S. energy strategy with Josh Freed, emphasizing the need for a balanced approach to community voices and energy infrastructure.
What you’ll get in this episode of Energy Thinks The most important conversations often must reckon with a profound tension: two opposing ideas that are both true. Example: * Communities deserve voice and process. * Communities can’t keep using their voices to “ban” the stuff that keeps the lights on—pipelines, transmission, firm generation—without consequences: spiking bills, stalling projects, and disappearing reliability. I look for conversations with people with whom I don’t always agree—in order to explore the tensions that we must confront to make progress. In this episode, I sit down with Josh Freed, senior vice president for climate and energy at the centrist think tank Third Way, to explore what a U.S. energy strategy rooted in the national interest could look like. That’s the connective tissue between today’s theme and the bigger question behind it: We can’t ban our way to the national interest. We have to define what we’re optimizing for—reliability, affordability, security, competitiveness, and yes, lower emissions—and then build the infrastructure that makes those goals real. Josh brings an important, and still too rare, perspective to our industry’s work: What is…
People in this episode
Host: Tisha Schuller
Guest: Josh Freed
Topics covered
- energy strategy
- community voice
- infrastructure
- affordability
- political viability
- climate and energy
Keywords
- energy strategy
- community voice
- infrastructure
- affordability
- political viability
- climate
- natural gas
- nuclear power
- coal
- innovation
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: Third Way
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- Energy Abundance Is Non-Negotiable. Responsibility Is, Too. · April 23, 2026 · 33 min
- Climate Plans Get Punched in the Face · April 9, 2026 · 46 min
- Your Antidote to the Politics of Fear · April 2, 2026 · 29 min
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