In this episode, we speak with David Fishman, Principal at The Lantau Group, about the energy sections of China’s draft 15th Five-Year Plan.

The conversation explores China’s evolving energy system, including the shift from energy intensity to emissions intensity, the continued role of coal as a strategic backup fuel, the growth of renewables, electrification, power market reform, green finance, grid expansion, and China’s increasingly assertive role in global climate governance.

Key Takeaways

1) China’s Five-Year Plan is less a rulebook than a signal system.

2) It identifies priorities, shapes incentives, and gives officials permission to experiment.

3) Energy security is now central to China’s clean energy strategy.

4) Renewables, electrification, grid expansion, and domestic production are all framed around resilience.

5) China is shifting from energy intensity to emissions intensity, and while coal is not disappearing its role is changing.

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In this video, I speak through how China moved from a country struggling with smog to become the “OPEC of renewable energy.”

It is a presentation that I believe highlights that progress was not the result of one subsidy, one policy, or one technology breakthrough, but the outcome of a long-term national strategy shaped by urgent, tangible problems: severe air pollution, energy security risks, industrial upgrading, and the need to build future-facing jobs and intellectual property.

Key Takeaways

1) China’s renewable energy dominance came from solving real problems, not just chasing carbon goals.

2) Smog created the urgency for policy alignment, industrial reform, and clean energy investment.

3) Solar success was built through integrated supply chains, rapid innovation, and massive domestic demand.

4) China’s renewable energy strategy also strengthened energy security, jobs, IP, and export potential.

5) Other countries can learn from China’s roadmap, but must adapt it to their own governance, resources, and local challenges.

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In this episode, we explore how climate change exacerbates living conditions in African slums, turning already fragile environments into increasingly difficult places to live. What was once seen as a distant issue—melting ice caps and rising sea levels—is now a daily reality for millions of people facing heat, flooding, food insecurity, and worsening infrastructure.

Joe Muturi, President of the Slum Dwellers International network, shares his personal journey into community organizing and offers a ground-level perspective on the realities of informal settlements. He explains how these communities are shaped by systemic failures in urban planning, political neglect, and economic exclusion—and why solutions must begin with the people who live there.

Throughout the conversation, Joe highlights the importance of community-led development, the role of data and organization in driving change, and the need for long-term coordination across governments, civil society, and local stakeholders. He also challenges common assumptions about funding, arguing that the real barriers are not financial, but structural and political.

This episode is a powerful look at the intersection of climate, poverty, and urban development—and a call to rethink how we approach one of the fastest-growing challenges in cities around the world.

Key Takeaways:

1. Climate change is amplifying existing vulnerabilities

2. Informal settlements are the result of systemic failure, not choice

3. The biggest barrier is not money—it’s coordination and political will

4. Community-led development is essential to real solutions

5. Progress is slow, but driven by small, meaningful wins

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