Re-run: Brazil’s Crucial Role in the Energy Transition

Columbia Energy Exchange

In Brazil, the energy transition is pushed and prodded by conflicting forces.

Its government is taking significant steps to cut emissions. For example, in August, it passed a much-anticipated low-carbon hydrogen framework; and in November, a law to create a regulated carbon market. And since taking office in 2023, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has spearheaded significant reductions in deforestation of the Amazon rainforest.

But Brazil is also Latin America’s biggest producer of oil, and it has been ramping up its output.

In light of Brazil’s strategic role in climate – it currently holds the presidency of the G-8, and in 2025 it will host COP30 – we’re rerunning an episode from February digging into Brazil’s energy transition.

How is the energy transition in Brazil unfolding amid these conflicting pressures? And how can the country balance environmental protection and energy security?

Bill Loveless talks with Thiago Barral about how Brazil plans to build up clean energy technologies, and how geopolitics shapes that strategy.

Thiago is the national secretary of planning and energy transition of the Ministry of Mines and Energy for Brazil. Before his role as secretary, he was the president of the Energy Research Company, a Brazilian institution responsible for energy planning studies and official state energy statistics. Thiago joined the Energy Research Company in 2007, and also served as director of energy economics and environmental studies.