{"podcast":{"title":"Solar Maverick Podcast","slug":"solar-maverick-podcast-75045","podcast_index_feed_id":75045,"rss_url":"https://solarmaverick.podbean.com/feed.xml","website_url":"https://solarmaverick.podbean.com","image_url":"https://pbcdn1.podbean.com/imglogo/image-logo/3741974/Podcast_2.jpg","author":"Benoy Thanjan","episode_count":289,"summary":"The Solar Maverick Podcast is the insiders guide to where the solar and energy markets meet entrepreneurship and trailblazing. Hosted by Benoy Thanjan - a serial entrepreneur and founder of Reneu Energy one of the industries top companies. Benoy is known for his passion, leadership and style. Always eager to truly learn from his guests, Thanjan digs deep and provides a tangible blueprint for his listeners to put what he’s learning to immediate use - making the show not only funny but entertaining, energetic and hyper -useful.","last_synced_at":"2026-07-08T20:17:03.589335+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/solar-maverick-podcast-75045"},"episode":{"title":"SMP 285:  How Battery Storage Is Powering the Future of the Grid with Russell Laplante, CFO of Convergent Energy and Power","slug":"smp-285-how-battery-storage-is-powering-the-future-of-the-grid-with-russell-laplante-cfo-of-convergent-energy-and-power","published_at":"2026-06-04T10:33:53+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/solar-maverick-podcast-75045/smp-285-how-battery-storage-is-powering-the-future-of-the-grid-with-russell-laplante-cfo-of-convergent-energy-and-power","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/solar-maverick-podcast-75045","url":"https://solarmaverick.podbean.com/e/how-battery-storage-is-powering-the-future-of-the-grid-with-russell-laplante-cfo-of-convergent-energy-and-power/","audio_url":"https://mcdn.podbean.com/mf/web/ksepd749afrjfzhy/SMP_285_-Russellayfnu.mp4","summary":"In this episode of the Solar Maverick Podcast, Benoy Thanjan speaks with Russell Laplante, Chief Financial Officer of Convergent Energy and Power, one of the leading battery storage developers and operators in the United States. Russ shares his nearly two-decade journey in renewable energy from his Goldman Sachs training program to becoming the first employee at wind startup Own Energy in 2007, through utility-scale solar at Tradewind Energy and Savion, and now leading the financial strategy at Convergent’s distributed and utility-scale battery storage platform. The conversation covers Convergent’s business model working with commercial and industrial customers on behind-the-meter battery and solar-plus-storage projects, how they save C&I customers up to 40% on their energy bills, and how batteries help utilities defer costly transmission and distribution upgrades. The episode dives deep into the financing of battery storage, including tax equity, portfolio debt financing, partnership flip structures, and why distributed generation requires a fundamentally different capital strategy than utility-scale projects. Russ also shares his perspective on the massive opportunity around data centers, AI-driven load growth, speed to grid, the Big Beautiful Bill, ITC extension for storage, and what Foreign Entity of Concern(“FEOC”) compliance means for the battery supply chain.","meta_description":"In this episode of the Solar Maverick Podcast, Benoy Thanjan speaks with Russell Laplante, Chief Financial Officer of Convergent Energy and Power, one of…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":3358,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/solar-maverick-podcast-75045/episodes/smp-285-how-battery-storage-is-powering-the-future-of-the-grid-with-russell-laplante-cfo-of-convergent-energy-and-power/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/solar-maverick-podcast-75045/smp-285-how-battery-storage-is-powering-the-future-of-the-grid-with-russell-laplante-cfo-of-convergent-energy-and-power.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}