The transformative potential of solid-state transformers

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.volts.wtf/subscribe Power electronics have taken over almost everything in our lives, with the exception, oddly, of the power grid itself — it is still held together by tens of millions of analog, iron-and-copper transformers, the design of which has barely changed in a century. Solid-state transformers replace the dumb gray box with something that can monitor and steer power or convert it from AC to DC and vice versa. In this episode, Enphase co-founder Raghu Belur, who built his company by dividing big solar inverters into thousands of small ones, explains how he’s trying the same thing with transformers, why AI data centers and big solar and battery projects are the first markets, and what it would take to put a smarter transformer on every pole. Chapters: 00:00 – Introduction 03:02 – What a transformer does 07:53 – What conventional transformers can’t do 11:43 – What makes a transformer solid state 15:27 – How much is software, how much is hardware 19:40 – Why power electronics hasn’t reached the grid 23:54 – Enphase’s distributed approach 31:23 – Building transformers from 5-kilowatt modules 34:58 – Copper, gallium nitride, and supply chains 43:44 – Cybersecurity 47:23 – Data centers and 800 volts DC 59:29 – Solar and battery storage 1:05:18 – The cost question 1:07:02 – Neighborhood transformers and the utilities 1:15:37 – Efficiency, lifespan, and heat 1:22:24 – Handling grid faults 1:25:27 – Standards, policy, and the next few years