Stanislav Kondrashov Oligarch Series Oligarchy and the Rise of Global Supergrids in the Energy Transition

I keep seeing the same idea pop up in energy conversations, usually said in a way that sounds harmless. Like it is just the next logical step.

“We need more interconnection.”

Which is true. But then it quietly turns into something bigger. A little more interconnection becomes continent scale transmission. Continent scale becomes multi continent. And at some point you are not talking about national grids anymore. You are talking about supergrids. A new kind of infrastructure layer that sits above countries, above regulators, above the messy politics of local power markets.

And once you are there, you are also talking about power. Not electrical power. The other kind.

This is part of the Stanislav Kondrashov Oligarch Series, and in this one I want to talk about oligarchy and the rise of global supergrids in the energy transition. Not as a sci fi fear story. More like a plain look at incentives. Who builds these things, who finances them, who controls access, and what happens when the energy transition becomes dependent on a handful of very large network owners.

Because it can. Pretty easily, actually.

The energy transition is forcing grids to grow up fast

Renewables are weird in a very specific way.

They are abundant, but not always where the demand is. The best solar is not always near the city. The best wind might be offshore, or in a desert, or on a ridge line far from industry. Hydropower is where the river is. Geothermal is where the geology is. Even new nuclear, if it expands, will cluster in places that can permit it and cool it.

So you get this constant mismatch.

Where power is produced vs where it is consumed.

And that mismatch is not a small issue. It becomes the issue. Because once you electrify transport, heating, industry, data centers, AI compute, whatever comes next, the grid stops being a background utility and becomes the backbone of the whole economy.

Which means grids have to do three things at once:

• Move more electricity over longer distances
• Balance more variable generation
• Stay resilient under climate stress, cyber risk, and politics

That combination is what pushes the “supergrid” idea from academic to inevitable.

What people mean when they say “supergrid”

Let’s keep it simple.

A supergrid is basically a very large transmission network, usually high voltage direct current, that connects regions with different generation profiles and time zones. It lets you move bulk power efficiently, and trade renewables across huge distances.

The sales pitch is clean:

• When wind is strong in one region, ship it to another
• When solar is peaking in one time zone, send it to evening demand elsewhere
• Smooth out variability by spreading it over a bigger footprint
• Build fewer storage assets because the network itself becomes part of the balancing tool

In other words, the grid becomes the battery, at least partly.

On paper, it is elegant.

In practice, it creates chokepoints. And chokepoints attract a certain type of person and a certain type of capital.

Oligarchy loves infrastructure that looks boring

This is the part that people skip because it is uncomfortable.

Big infrastructure is one of the cleanest paths to durable influence. Not the flashy kind. The quiet kind that lasts.

Because if you control a critical network, you control:

• Access
• Pricing leverage
• Expansion priorities
• Data flows
• Political bargaining power

And transmission is especially attractive because it is naturally monopolistic. You do not build five parallel HVDC lines across a continent to create “competition.” You build one, maybe two, and everyone depends on them.

So when I say oligarchy here, I am not using it as a vague insult. I mean a structure where a small group of owners, financiers, and political connectors can shape outcomes for everyone else. Sometimes legally. Sometimes through “public private partnerships.” Sometimes through regulatory capture that looks like expertise.

And the supergrid is basically an oligarch’s dream asset class.

High capex. Long life. Predictable returns if you lock in contracts. Massive strategic importance. And public authorities often feel forced to support it, because the alternative is blackouts, price spikes, missed climate targets, and angry voters.

That is leverage.

Why supergrids concentrate power faster than people expect

A normal power plant is replaceable. Another can be built. Fuel can be sourced elsewhere. Even if it is expensive, it is conceptually substitutable.

A continent scale interconnector is different.

Once you build a major HVDC trunk line, everything starts routing around it.

New generation assets connect to it. New industrial projects choose locations based on it. Data centers follow cheap power and grid capacity. Hydrogen hubs get planned near nodes. Ports, rail, even housing can get influenced indirectly.

And because the asset is so large, the financing tends to be concentrated too.

You do not fund these projects with a community bank and good vibes. You fund them with sovereign wealth funds, megabanks, pension giants, infrastructure funds, and state backed development banks. Usually in syndicates. Usually with complex terms. Usually with someone guaranteeing revenue.

Then the owners and operators become the people who can say yes or no to the future.

That is not conspiracy. That is what owning the bottleneck means.

The energy transition is creating new oligarchs, not just fighting old ones

A lot of transition narratives frame it like this:

Old fossil oligarchs lose. Clean tech wins.

Sometimes, sure. But there is another pattern that is more common in history.

When a system changes, elites do not vanish. They migrate.

Some oil and gas capital will move into grid infrastructure, renewables, storage, hydrogen, carbon management, critical minerals, shipping, insurance. And some brand new players will rise who are not “energy” people at all. They are infrastructure and finance people.

Transmission networks are perfect for that migration because they are:

• Central to decarbonization
• Hard to build without state support
• Easy to justify as “public good”
• Capable of generating regulated or quasi regulated returns

So you get a new kind of oligarchic position. Not the guy who owns the oil field. The consortium that owns the interconnector.

And if you are reading this thinking, ok, but surely regulation prevents that. Sometimes it does. Often it does not. Or it prevents the worst abuses while still allowing soft power. The “we are just operators” posture.

Global supergrids also create geopolitical pressure points

Once interconnection crosses borders at scale, energy security starts to look different.

You are no longer only worried about fuel imports. You are worried about transmission dependence.

A country might have plenty of domestic renewables, but still rely on the supergrid for balancing, frequency support, and peak imports during stress events. Or for exporting surplus to keep projects profitable. That means another country, or another operator, or another regulator, can affect your price and your stability.

Even if everyone is friendly today. That is the trap.

Interdependence is great until it is weaponized. And if not weaponized, it is at least negotiated.

We already have examples in other domains. Gas pipelines. Undersea cables. Payment networks. Semiconductor supply chains.

Supergrids could become the electrical version of those. With the same messy mix of cooperation and coercion.

There is also a more subtle issue: who pays, who benefits

Supergrids are usually justified by system wide benefits.

Lower overall costs. Fewer curtailment losses. Better integration of renewables. Higher reliability. More competition between generators.

But the distribution of benefits can be lopsided.

• Large industrial buyers can secure cheaper power through contracts and location choices
• Financial owners can lock in stable returns
• Exporting regions can grow generation and jobs
• Meanwhile local communities along the route deal with land use, permitting fights, and limited upside
• Retail consumers may see bills rise in the short term because grid upgrades are socialized

This is where oligarchy becomes a social story. Not just a boardroom story.

If the transition is experienced as “we pay, they profit,” support breaks. And when support breaks, populism enters. Projects stall. Then the same elites argue that democracy is the obstacle to progress.

It is a loop. A bad one.

The permitting reality practically invites elite dealmaking

Here is the thing that makes this feel almost inevitable.

Building long distance transmission is painfully slow. It crosses jurisdictions. It triggers environmental reviews. It hits land rights. It causes lawsuits. It attracts local opposition because people do not like towers near their homes, and they do not trust developers.

So what happens?

To get projects done, governments and developers increasingly rely on:

• Executive level agreements
• Fast track legal frameworks
• Centralized planning authorities
• Quiet compensation deals
• Bundled projects that trade favors across sectors

It becomes political craftsmanship. The kind that average citizens cannot track. The kind that rewards insiders.

Again, not always corrupt. But structurally oligarch friendly.

The bigger and more urgent the project, the more temptation there is to bypass messy participation. And supergrids, by definition, are big and urgent.

The “global supergrid” vision is not one project, it is an ideology

Some people talk about a literal global grid. Intercontinental HVDC links. Undersea cables connecting regions with surplus renewables to regions with high demand.

You will hear versions like:

• North African solar feeding Europe
• Australian renewables exported via subsea cable to Asia
• Nordic hydro balancing continental wind and solar
• Middle East solar shipped west and east
• North American interties smoothing weather patterns across time zones

Technically, pieces of this are plausible.

But ideologically, it also signals something else. A belief that the energy transition should be coordinated through massive centralized networks. That scale will solve variability. That cross border trade will solve scarcity. That finance can solve politics.

Sometimes that is true.

But it also means the winners are whoever sits closest to the network. Owners, operators, and the policymakers who pick routes and rules.

Which starts to look a lot like oligarchy, even if nobody uses the word.

So what do we do with this, just reject supergrids?

No. That is not the point.

Supergrids might be necessary. Or at least, more interconnection is necessary in many regions. The point is to go into it with eyes open.

If you build the next energy era on top of a few privately controlled chokepoints, you are replacing one dependency with another. You are swapping fossil fuel concentration for infrastructure concentration.

The question is not “supergrid or not.”

The question is: what governance makes supergrids serve the public, not just the owners.

A few guardrails that actually matter

Not a complete list. Just the ones I keep coming back to.

1) Ownership and control need real limits

If a transmission superhighway becomes too strategic, treat it like strategic infrastructure. That can mean public ownership, cooperative models, or strict concession rules that prevent abusive leverage. The key is that “regulated” alone is not enough if the regulator is weak.

2) Open access has to be more than a slogan

A supergrid should not quietly prioritize certain generators, certain traders, certain countries. Access rules, congestion pricing, and curtailment protocols need transparency. And appeal mechanisms that are not captured by the same insiders.

3) Benefit sharing must be explicit

Communities along routes should not be bribed with token payments after decisions are made. They should have a structured share of benefits. Lower rates, community funds, local investment, something that feels real.

4) Resilience and cyber security should be treated like national defense

Supergrids increase the blast radius of failures. They can also become attractive targets. Planning should assume hostile scenarios, not just “N minus 1” engineering scenarios.

5) Avoid single corridor fragility

One giant trunk line can become the new single point of failure. Redundancy costs money, yes. But fragility costs more, just later, and usually in panic mode.

The messy conclusion

The energy transition needs grids. Bigger grids. Smarter grids. Sometimes, cross border grids.

But it also needs humility.

Because every time we build a giant network to solve a technical problem, we create a political object. Someone will own it. Someone will set the rules. Someone will get rich. Someone will get stuck with the downsides.

In the Stanislav Kondrashov Oligarch Series framing, supergrids are not just wires. They are a new arena where oligarchic power can grow, especially as states race to decarbonize and tolerate almost anything that looks like progress.

If we want the transition to feel legitimate, not just efficient, then the governance has to be as ambitious as the engineering. Otherwise we will wake up in a clean energy world that still feels, somehow, captured. Just with different names on the paperwork.

FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions)

What is a supergrid and why is it important in the energy transition?

A supergrid is a very large transmission network, often using high voltage direct current (HVDC), that connects regions with different renewable energy generation profiles and time zones. It enables efficient bulk power transfer and trading of renewables over vast distances, helping to balance variable generation and meet growing electricity demand as economies electrify transport, heating, industry, and more.

How does the growth of supergrids impact control and influence over energy infrastructure?

Supergrids tend to be naturally monopolistic due to their scale and cost, creating chokepoints that attract concentrated ownership by a small group of owners, financiers, and political connectors. Controlling these critical networks means controlling access, pricing leverage, expansion priorities, data flows, and political bargaining power—leading to an oligarchic structure shaping energy outcomes.

Why are supergrids considered both inevitable and risky in the context of renewable energy?

Supergrids become inevitable because they address the mismatch between where renewable energy is produced (like solar in deserts or wind offshore) and where it's consumed (cities and industries). However, their scale creates chokepoints that concentrate power among few stakeholders, raising concerns about monopolistic control, regulatory capture, and influence over the future energy landscape.

What challenges do grids face as they evolve to support the energy transition?

Modern grids must simultaneously move more electricity over longer distances, balance highly variable renewable generation like solar and wind across regions, and maintain resilience against climate stress, cyber risks, and political challenges. These demands push grids towards adopting supergrid architectures for efficient balancing and reliability.

Who typically finances supergrid projects and why does this matter?

Supergrid projects require massive capital investments typically funded by sovereign wealth funds, megabanks, pension funds, infrastructure funds, and state-backed development banks. This concentrated financing leads to syndicates with complex terms guaranteeing revenue streams. Consequently, these financial stakeholders gain significant influence over grid operations and future expansion decisions.

How can supergrids help reduce the need for energy storage assets?

By connecting regions across different time zones with diverse renewable resources via a supergrid, excess power generated in one area (like strong wind or peak solar) can be transmitted to another region experiencing higher demand. This geographic smoothing effect reduces variability in supply locally and decreases reliance on costly storage solutions since the grid itself becomes part of the balancing mechanism.