Behind the Balance Sheet · Stephen Clapham's Podcast on Value Investing | Stockmarket Analysis | Equities

E1 Emmanuel Lagarrigue explains the opportunity for KKR and private equity in the energy transition

·53 min·3 clips

Emmanuel says the net-zero transition needs about $200 trillion in additional capital.

Steve Claffin opens a new climate-change and energy-transition series tied to Behind the Balance Sheet, with Hugh Van Steenis joining as co-host. The guest is Emmanuel, KKR's co-head of climate, and the conversation quickly gets practical. His Schneider Electric background is part of the setup: 27 years there, including strategy, sustainability, and innovation at executive level. The episode keeps asking which technologies are investable now, rather than simply plausible. Emmanuel draws a line between ideas that can take serious capital and those still living in climate-tech incubation. Renewables, especially solar, are already in the money. Batteries are there too. Transportation storage looks like one of the few areas ready to move from growth equity into classical infrastructure. Other areas are messier. Green steel, sustainable aviation fuel, shipping fuel, and regenerative agriculture are active, but not all are ready for prime time. Direct capture is treated as necessary someday, just not in the money now. Data-center cooling gets the same cautious treatment: important for hyperscalers and AI data centers, but early for big infrastructure scaling. KKR's opening is the bridge between those stages. The fund case is to help maturing technologies cross from growth equity into infrastructure over a five-to-seven-year hold. That naturally pulls policy into the conversation, because public support and regulation shape climate investments held for that long.

Listen to the show on

Apple Podcasts Spotify

Play clips from this episode More from Behind the Balance Sheet