Feb 19, 2026 · 51m · catalyst
The rise of grid power electronics with Drew Baglino
Drew Baglino · 33m spoken Shayle Kann · 10m spoken Commercial Narrator (Bloom Energy / Engie) · 2m spoken
0:00 / 0:00
gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions
In this episode of Catalyst, host Shayle Kann interviews Heron Power founder Drew Baglino to examine how solid-state transformers and advanced power electronics can overcome legacy supply chain bottlenecks, optimize renewable generation, and modernize grid and data center power architectures.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. Shayle holds 21.4% of the talking time here. How this is scored →
Shayle as informed peer 5.2 Guest teaching 6.2 Guest disagreement 0.5 Shayle pushing back 0.7
speaking balance: gold is Shayle, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 47:42 Drew corrects Shayle's water dam metaphor
Drew politely rejects Shayle's dam analogy by explaining that dams only divert fixed ratios, substituting his own canal lock and potential analogy instead.
Hardest push from Shayle ▶ 26:23 Shayle challenges the simple demand-driven shortage narrativeShayle adds nuance to Drew's bottleneck explanation by highlighting that legacy manufacturers deliberately constrain expansion to protect margin and pricing power.
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 33:42 Drew maps out single-line diagram simplificationDrew methodically walks through the electrical topology of a solar plant, detailing every legacy component eliminated by solid-state modular design.
Shayle holds their own ▶ 26:23 Shayle explains transformer manufacturer economicsShayle articulates the supplier psychology and tragedy of the commons governing incumbent transformer factories facing boom-bust cycles.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | Shayle as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | Shayle pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Host Welcome and Overview of Heron Power | 5 | 5 | 0 | 0 | Shayle introduces his personal investment in Heron Power and Drew's background at Tesla before framing the overarching topic. Drew responds with an extensive foundational overview of power semiconductor development compared to digital computing transistors. | |
| Historical Applications: From Industrial Drives to Silicon Inverters | 5 | 6 | 1 | 1 | Shayle prompts Drew to trace the specific historical adoption of power electronics. Drew details the evolution from industrial variable frequency drives and HVDC interconnects to consumer silicon and silicon carbide. | |
| Silicon Carbide Innovation and Automotive Scaling | 5 | 6 | 0 | 0 | Shayle asks whether automotive electric vehicles drove the scale and maturity of silicon carbide manufacturing. Drew details how Tesla implemented silicon carbide in the Model 3 onboard charger and drivetrain inverter to cut battery sizing costs. | |
| Traditional Grid Infrastructure Versus Solid-State Devices | 4 | 7 | 0 | 0 | Shayle asks how modern fast power electronics contrast with legacy grid distribution. Drew explains that grid infrastructure remains reliant on century-old passive magnetic transformers and slow mechanical armatures. | |
| Drivers Behind the Global Transformer Supply Bottleneck | 7 | 5 | 1 | 2 | Drew lists macro demand and regulatory headwinds behind transformer backlogs. Shayle adds high-level industry expertise regarding legacy manufacturers' rational reluctance to over-invest after historical boom-and-bust cycles. | |
| Mid-Roll Sponsor Break: Clean Energy and VPP Solutions | 5 | 7 | 0 | 0 | Following mid-roll advertisements, Shayle asks Drew to walk through a solar site single-line diagram. Drew provides an in-depth breakdown of how solid-state transformers replace multiple discrete components, low-voltage switchgear, and bulk iron transformers. | |
| Economic Uplift: Reliability, Efficiency, and O&M Savings | 6 | 6 | 1 | 2 | Shayle presses Drew to rank-order the genuine commercial drivers that convince renewable developers to adopt new hardware over status-quo gear. Drew details empirical failure rates of conventional inverters and transformers and quantifies project NPV uplift. | |
| Modernizing Data Center Power Architecture with SSTs | 6 | 6 | 0 | 1 | Shayle highlights how data center topologies benefit uniquely from equipment elimination. Drew explains the transition from legacy 48V AC multi-stage distribution to medium-voltage DC backplanes powered by solid-state transformers. | |
| System-Level Grid Transformation and Utilization Economics | 5 | 7 | 0 | 0 | Shayle asks about the macro grid management implications of replacing utility transformers over time. Drew outlines how solid-state transformers natively replace ancillary hardware like synchronous condensers and capacitor banks to increase pole-and-wire asset utilization. | |
| Hydrology Analogies: River Flow, Locks, and Water Hammer | 4 | 7 | 2 | 1 | Shayle proposes a river and dam metaphor to conceptualize power routing. Drew reframes the analogy to canal locks and water hammer effects to illustrate voltage potentials and oscillatory transients on electrical grids. |
Statements from this episode (17)
Kann: Heron Power Raised $140M Series B Led by a16z
“For disclosure, I'm an investor in Heron, and I have been since their first external round. And actually, just this week, Heron announced a hundred forty million dollar Series B, led by Andreessen Horowitz, where we at EIP also doubled down.”
Baglino: Silicon carbide inverters saved Tesla $400 to $500 in battery costs
“You know, while I was at Tesla, we started using silicon carbide to make drive inverters in cars because the incremental cost of the more expensive transistor was more than outweighed by the savings in battery because the drive inverter could be so much more e…”
Baglino: Higher frequency linearly reduces transformer size and power electronics costs
“The best way to make power electronics Systems that involve isolation more affordable is go up in frequency, because to get isolation, you basically need to use a transformer of some type, and transformers become smaller as you go up in frequency. It's just a,…”
Baglino: Silicon carbide doubled the power density of Tesla onboard chargers
“And so we really wanted to make the onboard charger smaller, so we used these early silicon carbide devices to make the onboard charger. Yeah, I think we reduced, increased its power density by, like, a factor of two. We dramatically reduced its cost.”
Baglino: Silicon carbide in Tesla inverters saved three miles of battery
“So silicon carbide went there, and then silicon carbide went into the drive inverter to make the drive inverter about one percent more efficient, which you're like, oh, that doesn't seem like a lot, but when you think about, you size the battery to give you, l…”
Baglino: Mechanical grid switches only last a few thousand actuations
“It actuates in hundreds of milliseconds and can actuate, you know, once every couple of minutes, and it's really not meant to actuate more than, like, a couple thousand times in its total lifetime.”
Baglino: Silicon carbide devices now operate up to 4.6 kV
“Silicon carbide 10 years ago was 600 volts or 1.2 kilovolts. You know, nowadays they're silicon carbide devices that are 2.3 KV capable or 4.6 KV capable.”
Baglino: Step-up transformer demand has surged over 250% since 2019
“In fact, I have some statistics here. You know, power transformers, these are generator transformers. Demand is up is over double since 2019. For generation step-up transformers it's up over 250%. Distribution transformers up over a hundred percent.”
Baglino: Solid-State Transformers Will Replace Passive Ones
“I believe that solid-stage transformers are going to replace passive ones.”
Baglino: Very few utility-scale transformers are manufactured in the US
“The transformers are generally made these days in, like, China, India, and Mexico. Very few of them are actually made in the US.”
Baglino: Solid-state transformers are 50 to 100x more power dense
“So when we do this with a solid state transformer, we basically move the 60 hertz transformer to a hundred kilohertz transformer, And that makes it much smaller, like, 50 to a hundred times more power dense”
Baglino: Heron Link eliminates transformers and capacitors from solar diagrams
“What we remove from the single line diagram is we remove the legacy transformer. We remove that six, 90 volt, you know, breaker or fuses protection there. And we also, because we don't have that medium voltage transformer anymore with the inductance of that me…”
Baglino: Central inverters average 97.5% to 98% availability, leading solar plant underperformance
“Solar inverters are the largest source of underperformance on utility-scale solar plants. It's not the modules. You'd think it would be the modules, because there's so many of them, and they're out in the field, and you worry about hail, and you worry about wh…”
Baglino: Utility-scale solar plant transformers fail at about 1.4% per year
“Transformers are not really designed to run at their rated power, you know, as long as they do in these Desert power plants, you know, where they're, first of all, very hot, because they're sitting in the sun, and second of all, because they're running at name…”
Baglino: Data center rack voltages will reach 800V+ with SST architecture
“Now the backplane voltage of the racks will be 800 volts or even higher. And then you can use a SST based solution to go from medium voltage, 34 KV all the way to 800 volts with no gray space rooms with UPSs and power distribution panels and anything like that…”
Baglino: SSTs eliminate 70% of data center electrical components and footprint
“And you can remove 70% of the stuff in the in the electrical diagram and a similar amount of footprint”
Baglino: Solid-state transformers can match traditional transformer costs while adding grid functions
“An SST can have a cost similar to a traditional oil-filled transformer but at the same time provide functions that would be That would be provided by popcorn components around the transformer. Functions like overcurrent protection, fault isolation, what an aut…”