Economics
FLIP THE SCRIPT: RESTORATIVE ENERGY POWER
The energy system most of us rely on?
It’s dirty.
It’s centralized.
It’s owned by corporations who profit while we pay —
financially and environmentally.
Fossil fuels fuel climate collapse.
Utility giants keep raising prices.
Blackouts and breakdowns hit the most vulnerable first.
⚡ And “green” energy?
Too often, it’s just the same system with solar panels slapped on top.
So what do we do?
We flip it.
We build local, community-owned, renewable energy systems that serve the people — not shareholders.
Here’s how we start:
1. Shift from centralized to distributed power.
Instead of one giant grid, imagine thousands of neighborhood-based microgrids — solar-powered, battery-backed, resilient in storms, and locally maintained.
⚡ 2. Make energy a commons, not a commodity.
Energy is a basic human right.
Communities should own and govern their own power — through energy co-ops, public utilities, or hybrid models designed for justice, not profit.
3. Invest in regenerative energy — not just renewable.
Solar and wind are good — but let’s think bigger:
Can your energy system regenerate ecosystems?
Can it be built with recycled materials?
Can it reduce inequality?
That’s the next level.
4. Decolonize and localize your grid.
Corporate energy giants often exploit Indigenous land and push poor communities to the margins.
Energy justice means shifting decision-making to the people who are most impacted.
Decentralize. Democratize. Reclaim control.
5. Shrink demand. Redesign systems.
This isn’t just about switching fuels.
It’s about reimagining how much energy we actually need.
Smart, efficient homes. Community transit. Shared infrastructure.
Less extraction, more intention.
Here’s your action step for today:
✅ Research whether your city or town has a local energy co-op or public utility.
✅ If not — organize.
Host a teach-in. Start a solar bulk-buy program.
Link up with groups already flipping the script in energy — because they’re everywhere.
You don’t have to be an engineer to be part of the solution.
You just have to believe this truth:
We already have the tools to power our world differently.
Now we need the will — and the community — to do it.
[soft swell in outro music — slow, powerful, grounded rhythm returns]
This is FLIP THE SCRIPT.
The future of energy is regenerative.
And the power?
It belongs to the people.
Highlights of this episode:
- Connects energy with justice, localization, and regeneration.
- Offers visionary and grounded examples.
- Empowers people to take first steps without needing tech expertise.
Richard Allen comes across a massive tax fraud that makes the Channel Islands loophole look like a tea party. He teams up with two more retailers whose businesses are being destroyed by it and they start to apply pressure to the tax authorities, HMRC, who seem reluctant to take on big online market players Amazon and eBay.
Music (in order of use) is courtesy of Cherry Red Records: Steal No Egg by Electric Orange and Movement by Praise Space Electric.
This is a Tax Justice Network podcast with Naomi Fowler of the Taxcast podcast. Produced by Naomi Fowler and Leo Schick and sound designed by Leo Schick.
Tax evasion is an illegal – usually criminal – activity, by which a taxpayer escapes tax through deception. Tax avoidance, on the other hand, means getting around (or avoiding) the spirit of the law without actually breaking the law. There is a large grey area between the two poles of avoidance and evasion.
Tax evasion is an illegal – usually criminal – activity, by which a taxpayer escapes tax through deception. Tax avoidance, on the other hand, means getting around (or avoiding) the spirit of the law without actually breaking the law. There is a large grey area between the two poles of avoidance and evasion.
A tax haven or secrecy jurisdiction is a place that deliberately provides an escape route for people or entities who live or operate elsewhere. They shield them from whatever taxes, criminal laws, financial regulations, transparency or other constraints they don’t like. Ordinary people whose lives are affected by tax haven laws are not consulted on these laws because they live in other countries: they have no say in how those laws are made, thus undermining their democratic rights.
“Tax is one of the smartest investments you can make.” That’s Professor Chris Harrop’s promise to companies, and his new tax funded impact model proves it by helping quantify how paying tax is not only good for their businesses, but for the economies they’re operating in, and of course for people and society.
Plus: Why have OECD countries just bent the knee to Donald Trump and given up their sovereign rights to tax US businesses operating within their own borders? Naomi Fowler speaks with Zorka Millin of the FACT Coalition about how US companies now have an exemption from the global minimum corporate tax. Also, Zorka discusses some progress on the Corporate Transparency Act’s rollercoaster journey in the US towards setting up a beneficial ownership register – a court ruling has pushed things a little further forward, which is good news since the United States is the world’s biggest financial secrecy offender. Now some of the watering down of the act needs to be reversed…
And finally, the UK has strengthened its whistleblower reward scheme, lawyer Mary Inman of Whistleblower Partners tells us more.
Produced by Tax Justice Network
