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Feb. 27, 2024

Heatspring: Online Learning for Solar and Sustainability with Brian Hayden | EP196

Heatspring: Online Learning for Solar and Sustainability with Brian Hayden | EP196

Imagine a world where anyone, from a 10-year-old child to a seasoned professional, can access top-notch training in clean energy technologies like solar, batteries, and energy efficiency – all from the comfort of their living room. That's the vision behind Heatspring, an online learning platform co-founded by Brian Hayden back in 2007. In this episode of the Clean Power Hour, Tim Montague interviews Brian Hayden, the co-founder and Managing Partner of Heatspring, an online learning platform for sustainability and the built environment.

Heatspring has become an invaluable resource for clean energy professionals, companies, and the general public interested in learning about solar, batteries, energy efficiency, and related fields. The platform offers over 260 courses, with two-thirds available for free, covering a wide range of topics taught by industry experts.

In the episode, Brian discusses the importance of partnerships and collaborations, like their recent initiative with Revision Energy to open-source apprenticeship program content. He also emphasizes the role of certifications and credentials in the industry's growth and Heatspring's focus on facilitating team-based learning for companies.

Heatspring aims to break down barriers and provide better access to the best information and training, enabling more people to join and succeed in the clean energy workforce, which is crucial for accelerating the energy transition.

Key Takeaways

  • Companies can set up free team accounts and assign courses to employees for onboarding and ongoing training.
  • Managers can track employee progress, provide accountability, and curate relevant course paths.
  • Heatspring emphasizes the importance of certifications/credentials like NABCEP for career growth.
  • Partnerships with companies like Revision Energy to open-source apprenticeship program content.
  • Approachable platform from a small company aiming to make training more sustainable and accessible.
  • Opportunity for clean energy professionals to become instructors and share knowledge.
  • Vital for upskilling workforce to meet the projected need for 1 million new electricians for the energy transition.

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Transcript
Brian Hayden:

The thing that's important about the revision partnership is that by collaborating and everybody bringing content and an audience, it's a more sustainable program for them and for others, and they can differentiate versus competitors based on other things that they do. But education and training because they're, they're partnering with us, and we can partner with other companies. And it's not like a siloed walled off thing becomes just like a, something that feeds everybody.

intro:

Are you speeding the energy transition? Here at the Clean Power Hour, our hosts, Tim Montague and John Weaver bring you the best in solar batteries and clean technologies every week, want to go deeper into decarbonisation? We do two, we're here to help you understand and command the commercial, residential and utility, solar, wind and storage industries. So let's get to it together, and we can speed the energy transition.

Tim Montague:

Today on the Clean Power Hour, a learning platform for sustainability and the built environment. My guest today is Brian Hayden, he is the co founder and Managing Partner of a platform called Heat spring, which many of you have probably heard of, but many of you have not. So please check out heat spring. Full disclosure, I am a trainer on heat spring. And it's been great getting to know Brian and his team there over the last couple of years. It is an amazing resource, though, for contractors, EPCs. Developers, anybody who wants to learn about solar batteries, HVAC, energy efficiency, you know, the things we care about. So check it out. And check out all of our content at Cleanpowerhour.com. I'm so grateful that you're here today listening. I do this for you, twice a week. So thank you. And give us a rating and review on Apple and Spotify that helps others find the show, tell a friend. There are many people that don't know the Clean Power Hour exists either. So I'm not the only well kept secret in the world. But, Brian, welcome to the show. It's great to have you here. And it's long overdue. And tell our listeners a little bit about yourself and how you had this crazy idea of creating heat spring.

Brian Hayden:

Thanks for having me, Tim, I just want to say thank you for creating clean power hour for taking the time to kind of help people learn about clean energy. And I appreciate the teaching you do through heat spraying and other places. And yeah, just appreciate all the work that you do to kind of move things forward. So thanks a lot. And thanks for having me.

Tim Montague:

You might be wondering, how do you see an AI solar PPAs get financed? For many it remains a mystery. For others, there's conductor, conductor solar helps hundreds of developers and EPCs find investors, close transactions and collaborate effectively. With competitive bids from high quality partners. Conductor make sure you and your customers get the best PPA deal every time free to use for developers and EPCs visit conductor.solar today.

Brian Hayden:

We started heat spring in 2007. I was a grad student at Babson College, I founded the business with Duncan Miller. And we started because we were trying to become integrators of renewable energy systems. And we were going through a whole bunch of training to learn the skills needed to do that. And as we were sitting in these classes, we won, we felt like the classes weren't very good that we were sitting in and that we could maybe find an organized better classes. And then we also realized that the people we were sitting in class with who were electricians, plumbers, engineers, architects, contractors, they were actually way better suited to do the work on the ground than we were. So we started organizing workshops. And we were kind of like the circus where we would go around the country with authors and instructors put on certification classes, a lot of the early classes were around ground source heat pumps, and that's where our name comes from in spring. But pretty quickly, it became obvious that solar was where most of the growth was happening. And so developed a solar program and went online with it in 2010. At that time, it was not really, people didn't really think you could do that kind of like teach people to do solar online. But in a 24 years, or than 14 years since then. So many pieces of technology have evolved, the markets evolved. The industry has grown tremendously, and it's like we just are like running constantly to keep up with the growth of the industry. And the reason that I love my job is because I really like the people Well that do clean energy, the contractors, the NPCs, the salespeople, everybody involved. It's a really cool industry. The people are like, just trying to do a good job. You know, like their normal, you can talk to him like normal people, like, I just love the people in this industry. So that's what kind of like, keeps us going?

Tim Montague:

Well, I didn't know that that ground source heat pumps was the origin of heat spring, but that makes perfect sense. And, yeah, you know, the Earth is an amazing source of energy in so many ways. And I think that we humans have so much more in common than differences. And I wish we would focus on our commonalities and our common mission, which is to survive. So thank you for creating heat spring, it is an amazing place. Truly go there right now, if you have not been to heatspring.com, because it is going to blow your mind. There are free courses, there are paid courses, there are certifications, if you're getting NABCEP certified, for example, you can do a huge amount of your coursework right there on heat spring with the Oh, jeez, like Shaun White. And you can all you can do it from the comfort of your living room. Right. That's one of the wonderful things about the internet. And remote learning is it's, you know, truly makes it accessible to anyone with an Internet connection. So, you, I'm curious, like, when did when did NABCEP come onto the scene for you, that's, you know, kind of the bullseye for my audience is energy professionals, clean energy professionals. And the other stuff matters, the megawatts matter, energy efficiencies is very much part and parcel here. And I always encourage my audience to understand that and learn about that stuff as well. You know, we're making the energy transition, solar, wind and batteries are now becoming the modern grid. And so organizations like NABCEP are part and parcel where they're certifying this workforce, to have certain standards of education of basic knowledge and understanding of what they're doing. I myself am NABCEP, certified, PV, technical sales. It's not easy. It's it's quite a process. But anyway, when did when did NABCEP kind of become a thing for heat spring? And I guess, I would love to hear your thoughts about the growth of the industry and how heat spring has changed and will continue to evolve with the time so to speak. Yeah.

Brian Hayden:

Well, I can think back to probably, what what spring is today, the vision of that traces back to 2010, a conversation that I had with Dan Leary who we both know, Dan is the co founder of next amp, which is a big community solar asset owner, EPC. And NEC NEC Sam started with just a couple of guys, you know, Dan, and well, Thompson, and they took training, you know, they, when they started hiring employees, they had some of those employees go through training with eastspring. And Dan, at that time, I still remember the conversation, everything about it, he described Mexico University, he said, like, I think that if, as we grow, we're going to need to bring in a lot of new people, and we're going to need to have a culture of learning. And people are going to have to develop and kind of like grow and what they can do, and then we'll hire more people underneath them. And it'll be kind of this flywheel effect. And I thought that was like a really cool Northstar for us to think about is like, how could we facilitate that for lots of companies? And so, you know, the question then to Dan is like, well, what does that look like? And, you know, one of those things is standards and maps, you know, NAB sets apart, or that and as early as 2010, we were kind of like teaching to the job task analysis. And, you know, helping people work toward NABCEP certification. Definitely over the last 14 years next amp has gone from like five people to like, 500 people. I don't know the exact number, but it's hundreds of people. And that's like a microcosm for what's happened throughout the industry is like, what was once one crew in a van is now hundreds of people. And there's there are actually a lot of next steps out there. And so, as a company goes through that type of a growth process, one it's like that That's so cool to watch. Because that's how more solar gets deployed. That's how the industry grows. That's how more jobs and careers are made like that, to me is at the epicenter of what we're trying to unlock. So I love that story. And I love all the stories like it. And part of like, what makes next st. University go is having standards and credentials to work toward, and NABCEP has established itself as being the standard in the solar industry. It's what everybody who wants to get a certification in most cases, you don't have to get NABCEP certified. It's it's a voluntary credential. But people get it because it's good. And it means something. So yeah, we've seen certifications and credentials be a big part of the growth of the industry over the last 14 years. Because if you're gonna go learn something like it's also nice to kind of like, be able to have something to show for it, beyond the knowledge and the skill set to be able to have something to communicate that to employers, to customers to whoever. So nappsa really plays an important role in the industry for sure. Yep.

Tim Montague:

And for those who don't know, NABCEP stands for North American, Board Certified Energy professional or something close to that

Brian Hayden:

North American Board of Certified Energy practitioners,

Tim Montague:

practitioner. That's it. I know I was messing up one of the words. Yeah, it's a little wonky. But But anyway, it is the gold standard, really here in North America for solar professionals anyway. And if you're, you're an aspiring solar professional, or a solar professional wanting to, you know, move up in the ranks, so to speak, I highly encourage you to pursue NABCEP it starts with the associates. And then there's all kinds of specializations, including pbicp, the installation, professional technical sales, I think there's a design associate now, there's certifications for code professionals, all kinds of NABCEP certification. So that system, that ecosystem is blossoming. I wanted to harken back to Dan Leary though that is so cool that you guys have known each other for so long, I did not know that. I knew that Dan had some courses on heat spring. So if you want to learn about Dino watch stands current company, you can go on heat spring and check out stuff about Dena watts, which is a performance monitoring and analytics platform. And a Dan has been a guest multiple times on the show. He's the co founder of three companies panel claw, the number one rooftop racking company in America for flat roof. Next app which has 520 employees, according to Sales Navigator, so big solar company now. And and now. Dena watts. So really storied solar professional. And I like to say one of my favorite solar people, but I'm curious if you could break down Brian in broad strokes for us, though, how the different segments of of what you're covering break down like half of your of your students or of your courses, you know, roughly what percentage have something to do with solar, or storage, or solar and storage. And then some of the other trades, like HVAC. You mentioned plumbing. I'm just curious, like, in broad strokes, how does that break down?

Brian Hayden:

Yeah, definitely over the last 10 years, it's been solar, leading the charge. I think, last I look, we have 105,000 people who've taken classes on the platform, and 80,000 or solar? Well, there's some overlap. You know, sometimes some companies will do have more like full service offerings and do kind of both, but for the most part, it's, it's like 8020 80%, solar 20%, HVAC building efficiency. And then storage is kind of like a sub component of the solar flux.

Tim Montague:

Very cool, you know, online learning, you know, it's been around for as really since the the, the dawn of the internet in the late 90s. And it's in its kind of good, bad or ugly, there's there's all flavors, some of them, some of these platforms are totally free, some are paid strictly, there's a paywall, that kind of thing. I like the hybrid approach that you've taken with heat spring, there is a ton of knowledge that you can gain just by taking the free courses on heat spring, and YouTube too. And Elon Musk is kind of famous for saying, Look, you don't need a college degree anymore. You can get a PhD and whatever you want on YouTube. And to some extent he is he's absolutely right. I'm, I'm a fan of higher education, but I think that higher education has gotten lost and there's a disconnect between the economy, the real stuff going on the built environment, and what happens in higher education and I think that, we need to fix that, and it'll or, or it will course correct and fix itself. And in other words, it will, it will implode in some manner, right and transform, that's my hope. But anyway, it's a both and getting into your degree is fine. It helps you hone certain skills, it forces you to learn how to focus and apply yourself and learn things and you know, do certain skills or apply certain skills in that. And that's, and that's all well and good. But then there's also like, the real world, the built environment that is designed, engineered, permitted, financed, constructed, project managed, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, by all these professionals, and trades people. And the trades are very, very front and center here, right? The people that turn wrenches and swing hammers, and, you know, make electricity flow through the grid are extremely important. And they're underplayed to a great extent in our educational system in our formal educational system. So, you know, I guess what I'm getting at here is that there is a very important role for platforms like heat spring, to play to introduce young people mid career and senior, the full spectrum right from, I would say, honestly, a 10 year old can probably benefit from heat spring. And there's there's material there for for teenagers definitely. And then on up. And so I just encourage our listeners to you know, shine a light on heat spring, tell your friends and colleagues, because many people don't know about heat spring, you do a great job with your partnership with NABCEP. You go to the NABCEP conference every year. And but that but you know that there's there's it's a big industry, there's a quarter million plus people now in the solar industry alone, and touching all of those people is not easy. So what should our listeners know, though, Brian, I guess about heat spring, from your perspective, these you know, the things that are front and center here are that a you our listeners have knowledge and experience that you could be sharing as an instructor on heat spring, and be you you and your colleagues could be benefiting from the courses that are there on the platform today. So there's that just the nuts and bolts of the platform. But what else should our listeners know about heat spring? You know, both current and future? Yeah,

Brian Hayden:

something that's worked really well, for the last few years is we started and it seems obvious, like every good idea always just kind of seems obvious in retrospect. But a few years ago, we started to focus on on helping teams learn together. And in retrospect, that was, you know, definitely the right move. Because the way a lot of companies use eating right now is they set up a free teams account, and they assign a bunch of free classes to people so that they can learn the basics of solar, there's, I think, two thirds of the 267 courses that we offer are free. And so companies will put together little onboarding packages, and they'll set up like a company account, assign a bunch of free classes, to all the new hires, and then maybe six months or a year down the road, they'll, you know, sign them up for some kind of an app set class, once they've kind of like got their feet under them, and some, you know, time in the field, and you feel comfortable that they're gonna stick around for a while. And so that that point, maybe you make some kind of an investment, but the fact that you can set up a team account and assign free classes to people on your team, and there's literally zero cost to that. And you can do it in 10 minutes. That's the thing I think most people don't know that they should know.

Tim Montague:

So let's drill down a little bit on that. If I'm a manager of a team of project managers, for example, at a solar development or EPC company, what is the advantage of working in a team's account versus just letting the individuals do their thing and go with their own pace, et cetera, et cetera? What is that? How is it different?

Brian Hayden:

Yeah. So as a as a manager, of a department, say, a project managers, you set up the team account, and you can assign people to the courses that you think they should take. So I think that's one initial advantage is just being able to kind of like to be a little more prescriptive and not let people kind of meander around the site. So in that case, Edie nice has a free career path course where he explains the career path or project manager, what the project manager does. And so that would be the place to start, I think there, and then. And then the manager can then see who has enrolled, like gotten into the course, what they've done, if there are like quizzes or assessments, they can see what kinds of scores they're getting. And they can kind of provide some accountability for people that that may need it, you know, we all need a little bit of accountability, you know, at the gym, you know, in school, whatever. And so, the manager can provide that accountability.

Tim Montague:

Yep, indeed. And there's a full spectrum some, some employees need that kind of oversight and encouragement and some don't, some are just going to go to town and tear it up and move forward and, you know, be consumers of of education. The Clean Power Hour is brought to you by CPS America. The maker of North America's number one three phase string inverter with over six gigawatts shipped in the US. The CPS America product lineup includes three phase string inverters ranging from 25 to 275 kW, their flagship inverter, the CPS, 250 to 75 is designed to work with solar plants ranging from two megawatts to two gigawatts, the 250 to 75. pairs well, with CPS, America's exceptional data, communication controls and energy storage solutions, go to chintpowersystems.com To find out more. So I'm always a little surprised how hard it can be to get people to pursue additional training. I come from a family where my dad was an educator, he was a professor in university. And so it's just kind of in my blood, I think that education is very important. And I am a lifelong learner, I read a lot, mostly audiobooks. Now. Thank God, for audiobooks, it allows me to access a lot more material than I would otherwise. And of course, podcasts, and YouTube videos, and heat spring courses. But it's always surprising to me that there is a barrier to entry. And not everyone, when you just tell them about it is going to go Oh, and they dive in so to speak. What have you learned over the years about how do we get more people to avail themselves of these? Many times, as you pointed out free resources, like a third of the coursework on heat spring is available to the public free, which is completely amazing. How do we get more people on the platform? Yeah,

Brian Hayden:

well, one challenge with being an educator is that there is a low barrier to entry business, like there's a lot of information out in the world. So that is, you know, the cards are stacked against you from the start from that regard. And I think that the to me, what can kind of like help cut through the noise. One is like, consistency. You know, just like you putting out your podcast two times a week, you know, the fact that the people who like it, for them to know that you're there, and that they can come back and get something from you on a regular basis. I think I've seen that, that's sort of like a crew over time. For us being doing this for 16 years, it's a lot easier for us to reach people, more people today than it was 16 years ago. And, you know, we have to like continue to, like earn that trust and, and keep putting out good stuff in order to kind of like grow that audience. So that's just like the grind of producing, of being consistent of developing trust with people who who learn from you. And then how do you go find new audiences? I think that's like, definitely, like a full time job. For me, trying to figure out where are the people who need this information and like, How can I help them pay attention to the fact that it exists? And also, timing plays a big factor in it, you know, like, it could be like the greatest thing that someone exactly needs, but if they're just not thinking along those lines at that moment, you know, there's nothing you could say. And so like, being very very clear with our message when somebody is in a mode of paying attention and is like, open to, like, developing a new way of learning. I think that's really important too. I think, you know, the nice thing is there are more options today. Like, I think that a lot of people learn through YouTube and a lot of people learn through social media. And I think that that's, like, additive, and, and like super cool. The, we've always kind of had to decide like, well, what are we going to hold on to tight, you know, like, what, what is our core. And I think it's two things that kind of differentiate us versus like YouTube or anywhere else that you could go learn something. One is having a person like an actual person to learn from, not everybody cares about that. But from I know, for me and my like, most important learning experiences, like having an actual instructor that I think is good, and I enjoy and I can actually talk to, really matters to me a lot. When I think back on all the best classes I've ever had, I don't remember a whole lot of the actual content, necessarily, what I remember is the relationship I had with the instructor. So that's always been important to us. And then the other thing, too, is certification credentials, I see that that's a very important differentiator. And, you know, there's room for like learning a new tip or trick in 60 seconds on tick tock. But that's a very different experience from like, an apprenticeship, a plumbing apprenticeship, or an electrical apprenticeship or, you know, learning how to really become a solar designer and pass an AP certification. So, you know, just understanding the lane that we're in, and doing a really good job in that lane has been the best we can do. You

Tim Montague:

know, it's a big world. There are many opportunities. And, you know, but kind of the bottom line here is that we need, for example, a million new electricians in the United States to make the clean energy transition. That's a huge number. When you think of workforce development, writ large, and industries, like solar, wind and batteries that are just on fire, where's this going? What is the evolution of of learning and education in the US? And what is your, you know, your dream of the role that heat spring can play in that?

Brian Hayden:

Yeah, you said it a million electricians. And that reminds me of revision energy did a really fun, cool. Electricians will save the world marketing campaign, it was kind of built around that statistic, like we need a million new electricians. And revision is a great example of a company that is is very close to like, what I think is the future is like, they embraced apprenticeships in a very serious and big way, even before, like the IRA mandated it for utility scale projects. And so they have like all these apprenticeship programs, and they've been delivering these apprenticeship programs for years now. And we recently started to partner with them, because they're a B Corp, and they're like, they have a mission to kind of have an impact bigger than outside their walls. And one of the ways that they identified is they can take these apprenticeship programs that they developed and have been delivering for years. And that's the structure of those apprenticeship programs, any education that goes with it in. So we're partnering with them to start to open source a lot of that content so that other companies that are having to implement apprenticeships, for the IRA, and because they want to, they can have more guidance and structure around what that should look like. And get like a little bit of a head start because revision, and others have kind of shared what, what they've learned and share these best practices. So to me, the future is about like, bringing down those walls and taking all the best information from wherever it resides, whether it's inside of a revision energy or inside the brain of Tim Montague, or Shawn white, and breaking down those walls and providing better access so that people can find it and and learn it in a way that's useful to them. So I think collaboration and like and sort of partnerships like that, and, you know, on the content side, and then on the learner side, more teams and organizations and building incentives into those organizations so that they can help their people grow faster. Those are the two kind of flywheels that we're trying to get going. You've

Tim Montague:

had conversations with some of my clients like greenlink The CEO, Austin Carr is going to be on the show here in the next couple of weeks. You You my listener can look for that very interesting company in Northern Illinois that's doing all kinds of retrofitting electrification, and solar and batteries.

Brian Hayden:

But greenlink has a big vision. I think they're a very cool company. Yeah.

Tim Montague:

And Austin is talking about building a greenlink. University for his staff, and trainees, you know, you there. I just trainee is the word that rolls off my tongue here. But we're talking about apprenticeships, basically. Right, bringing people from A to Z, where they're a noob in some fashion to being a qualified installer, for example. But what is it about your partnership with revision that other companies should be aware of? And and how does this play out? For your audience, so to speak for users of heat spring?

Brian Hayden:

Yeah, I think the thing that's so important about the revision partnership is that over, I've noticed over the last 16 years that every company understands that training is important in some way. And what happens is that there, how important it is to the organization kind of like goes through cycles. So frequently, we'll get a call and somebody will have just come to come out of a meeting. And their boss said, like, we got to have a, you know, an education program where we got to have an apprenticeship program. And so then there's a whole bunch of energy around it. And then, over time, like just running the business and delivering on projects and stuff like that starts to kind of like pull the energy away from training and education. So it's like this thing that never it's like the tail on the dog, like training and education, very rarely is like leading for the organization. But it's always there. And it's always important. So the thing that's important about the revision partnership is that it makes by collaborating and everybody bringing content and an audience, it's a more sustainable program, for them and for others, and they can differentiate versus competitors based on other things that they do, you know, like, the way the quality of their craftsmanship, you know, the way that they treat customers, you know, financing products, or whatever they decide is their differentiator, but education and training because they're they're partnering with us, and we can partner with other companies. And it's not like a siloed walled off thing becomes just like a, something that feeds everybody. So that that would be great. If we could play that role for more companies. You know, that's, that's what we're trying to do.

Tim Montague:

Yeah. So my 80 20 Rule question, you know, in business, there's this rule that you'll get 80% of your revenue from 20% of your customers. And it's an incredibly robust rule of thumb. Sometimes it's 9010. Sometimes it's 7030. But the way it plays out in society, and in business, generally, on average is at 20. And one of the take homes for that is that you have to really do a great job serving that 20%, even though a majority of the contacts you're having in the world, that 80% are a a source of income, but they're largely a distraction, unless they have the potential to become part of the 20. But how does this play out for heat spring? Is there? Is there an analogy there that resonates around? 8020? Yeah, totally.

Brian Hayden:

Our 20% is solar companies, with 50 to 300 employees, mid size solar companies that are in growth mode. They're, they're in the bullseye of like, where we're the best partner. And our platform is built for them. And we've been really successful with that cohort. I think that one of my goals for this year is we just rolled out a new piece of software for larger organizations to better reflect their needs, which are different from, you know, a midsize solar company. So it's my goal that we would kind of see that. See that number of employees kind of like pick up in terms of like, who we serve really well. And then we're always going to be excited for the scrappy or smaller companies too. And but but for them, they're essentially like taking a course as opposed to like setting up an account and looking like globally at the team's program.

Tim Montague:

So how is what are what are the needs of a larger company compared to a medium sized company, the

Brian Hayden:

larger company has more infrastructure that we need to kind of play with. So they have an HR system. Many times they have an internal learning management system. They've got, you know, multiple departments with different reporting structures that need to approve training, instead of like one HR manager who's signing up, you know, everybody in the company for classes, it's going to be the functional leader within all those departments, though. It's just like mn frequently it's like data integration. And like software integration.

Tim Montague:

Yeah. Makes sense. You might be wondering, how do you see an eye solar PPAs get financed? For many, it remains a mystery. For others, there's conductor, conductor, solar helps hundreds of developers and EPCs find investors, close transactions, and collaborate effectively. With competitive bids from high quality partners. Conductor, make sure you and your customers get the best PPA deal every time free to use for developers and EBCs. Visit conductor.solar today. Cool. Well, I don't really have any other questions for you. I'm super grateful for you making time for the show. Check out all of our content, please cleanpowerhour.com Give us a rating and review. And cleanpowerhour.com You can go to the training tab and see the courses that I offer on solar sails and CNI solar cells and development is the focus of my work on heat spring. But, Brian, what else should our listeners know? And where can they find you? You're going to the NABCEP conference, for example, in March in I believe Durham, North Carolina set right?

Brian Hayden:

Yeah, Raleigh, Raleigh, North Carolina, the conference will be there. We're doing a PPD associate class there with Saun White, and then West Kennedy is going to be doing a solar plus storage essentials workshop, a three hour workshop, I think the thing to know, is, we're just a small company with really normal people working there. And that you can call us, email us or do whatever, like whenever you want were really accessible. Yeah, I think just it there can be like this kind of like distance. And this sort of like, feeling like you don't know who's behind the wall. But just know that we are and always will be a small company with normal people who want to do cool stuff. So if there's something that you have in mind, and would like to kind of pitch a partnership or a class or something like that, I'd like genuinely like to hear from you.

Tim Montague:

Excellent. We'll check out heatspring.com just like it sounds heatspring.com. And reach out to Brian and his team there. I can also connect you if for whatever reason, you can't connect through the website or through LinkedIn, which I would be very surprised if you weren't. But reach out to me on LinkedIn. I love connecting with my listeners. Thank you for being here. And let's grow solar and storage. I'm Tim Montague. Thank you so much, Brian.

Brian Hayden:

Thanks, Tim. Yeah, I really appreciate it.

Tim Montague:

Hey, listeners. This is Tim, I want to give a shout out to all of you. I do this for you twice a week. Thank you for being here. Thank you for giving us your time. I really appreciate you and what you're all about. You are part and parcel of the energy transition, whether you're an energy professional today, or an aspiring energy professional. So thank you, I want to let you know that the Clean Power Hour has launched a listener survey. And it would mean so much to me. If you would go to cleanpowerhour.com click on the About Us link right there on the main navigation that takes you to the about page and you'll see a big graphic listener survey, just click on that graphic and it takes just a couple of minutes. If you fill out the survey, I will send you a lovely baseball cap with our logo on it. The other thing I want our listeners to know is that this podcast is made possible by corporate sponsors. We have chin power systems, the leading three phase string inverter manufacturer in North America. So check out CPS America. But we are very actively looking for additional support to make this show work. And you see here our media kit with all the sponsor benefits and statistics about the show you know we're dropping to episodes a week. We have now over 320,000 downloads on YouTube. And we're getting about 45,000 downloads per month. So this is a great way to bring your brand to our listeners and our listeners are decision makers in clean energy. This includes projects executives, engineers, finance, project management, and many other professionals who are making decisions about and developing, designing, installing and making possible clean energy projects. So check out cleanpowerhour.com both our listener survey on the about us and our media kit and become a sponsor today. Thank you so much. Let's go solar and storage