Professor Mairi Spowage, Director of the FAI, is joined by Angela Mitchell, Deloitte’s Senior Partner for Scotland & Northern Ireland, and Lesley McEwan, Director in Deloitte’s Infrastructure and Capital Programmes Team, to discuss the opportunities that the energy transition and digital adoption and diffusion present to drive growth in Scotland.
Episode notes
Participants
Professor Mairi Spowage, Director, Fraser of Allander Institute
Angela Mitchell, Senior Partner for Scotland & Northern Ireland, Deloitte
Lesley McEwan, Director in Deloitte’s Infrastructure and Capital Programme Team, Deloitte
Time stamps
(10:50 ) What purposes could public land be put to?
(14:10) Taking the demand to the supply – data centres
(15:40) Grid infrastructure issues must still be tackled
(16:40) Digital opportunities
(19:23) Threats and opportunities from AI, including smart cities
(22:28) What can Scotland learn from other cities around the world
(24:30) A key role for research and academia
(25:23) Power hungry AI
(26:50) Use of digital and AI for public service reform
(29:57) Civil service efficiency
(31:50) Economic impact of these opportunities, including employment
Authors
Mairi is the Director of the Fraser of Allander Institute. Previously, she was the Deputy Chief Executive of the Scottish Fiscal Commission and the Head of National Accounts at the Scottish Government and has over a decade of experience working in different areas of statistics and analysis.
Angela Mitchell
Angela Mitchell is Deloitte’s Senior Partner for Scotland & Northern Ireland, overseeing Deloitte's business and teams across our offices in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Aberdeen, and Belfast. We work with clients across Financial Services, Energy and Public Sector in Scotland. My day job is Government and Public Sector, and I have worked across the public sector in Scotland for the last 28 years. My background is in digital, I moved into IT when it was a very new field and have loved witnessing and being part of the fascinating journey over 3 decades as technology has evolved and had an ever-increasing impact on our lives.
Lesley McEwan
Lesley McEwan,Director in Deloitte’s Infrastructure and Capital Programmes team. I’m based here in Scotland but I work with clients across the UK and beyond. I’ve been with the team for over 12 years. I have been working across both public and private sector clients in the energy transition space – from a private perspective in M&A and PPA advisory and from a public sector space in policy design, implementation and other associated work.