2026 trends: Gas turbines, Texas’ load queue and China electrifies

January 15, 2026

AI Summary

5 min read

🎙️ The Voices & The Context

The Format: Casual interview with data-driven banter, walking through Nat Bullard's 200-slide deck on energy trends and decarbonization—part 1 of 2.
The Key Players:
- Guest: Nat Bullard, longtime energy/climate analyst, co-founder of Halcyon (AI research platform); famous for his annual massive slide decks packed with unique data visuals.
- Host: Shale Khan, early-stage venture lead at Energy Impact Partners; longtime friend/colleague, picks favorite slides for geeky deep dives.
The Vibe: Educational yet fun—nerdy excitement over charts, light-hearted ribbing on slide counts, optimistic on energy shifts amid AI/data center hype.

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What you'll learn

1 (00:00) **🎙️ Introduction: Nat Bullard**
2 (05:07) **China's Electrification Lead Over US (Slide 15)**
3 (10:20) **GDP Spending: Electricity vs Oil (Slide 17)**
4 (16:43) **Gas Turbine Order Book Shortage (Slide 28)**
5 (22:42) **Rising Gas Plant Capital Costs**
6 (27:44) **Tech Capex Boom vs Historic Projects (Slide 32)**
7 (31:37) **ERCOT Large Load Interconnection Queue Surge (Slide 91)**

+ Full timestamped outline available in the app

Show Notes

It’s a new year, which means the veteran energy analyst Nat Bullard has dropped another annual, data-rich presentation on the state of energy and decarbonization.

And per what has become tradition, Nat is back on Catalyst – for the fourth time – to discuss some of Shayle’s favorite slides, cherry-picked from the 200-page deck.

In part one of their two-part conversation, they cover topics like:

The significance of China’s rapid electrification
Why the proportion of GDP spent on electricity has remained flat while oil has proven volatile
The massive backlog and rising capital costs for gas turbines
How current tech CapEx compares to past large-scale endeavors like the Manhattan Project and broadband build-out
The extraordinary explosion of large load interconnection requests in Texas
The divergence in load forecasting between grid operators and transmission providers
Global drivers of electricity demand growth beyond data centers

Resources

Nat Bullard’s 2026 Presentation
Catalyst: 2025 trends: aerosols, oil demand, and carbon removal
Catalyst: 2024 trends: batteries, transferable tax credits, and the cost of capital

Credits: Hosted by Shayle Kann. Produced and edited by Max Savage Levenson. Original music and engineering by Sean Marquand. Stephen Lacey is our executive editor.

Catalyst is brought to you by Uplight. Uplight activates energy customers and their connected devices to generate, shift, and save energy—improving grid resilience and energy affordability while accelerating decarbonization. Learn how Uplight is helping utilities unlock flexible load at scale at uplight.com.
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