World Changing Ideas

How does one become an organic dairy farmer? Well, sometimes you just happen to stumble into it. Donald De Jong is the CEO of Natural Prairie Dairy and he was more surprised than anyone else when he delved into the world of organic dairy farming.

It’s World Oceans Day! And we’re celebrating our blue planet by talking about coral reefs. Coral bleaching events are like 100-year flood events: ideally they're only supposed to happen once every 100 years but that's not the reality. In 2005, the U.S. lost half of its Caribbean coral reefs in one year due to a major bleaching event and this past March the Great Barrier Reef experienced its sixth mass bleaching event on record. But there is some good news!We talked with James Robinson, a research fellow at Lancaster University in the U.K, who recently found that bleached corals could actually provide sustenance to local coastal communities. Sam Teicher is the co-founder of Coral Vita, a company that grows corals to restore our world's dying reefs. They are not only restoring coral that's been lost but also helping support local economies that rely on coral reefs.

Renewable energy comes in many forms: solar, wind, hydroelectric, biomass, geothermal, and wave energy.On this episode, we're focusing on solar energy and how more communities can gain access to and benefit from it. Clearloop Co-founder and CEO Laura Zapata talks about how she got involved in cleaning up the electricity grid in the U.S.Then we learn how solar can help generate a green form of hydrogen. Bill Gross is the founder and CEO of Heliogen, a company that uses computer science and engineering to make renewable energies more of a reality.

As a follow-up to our episode on transportation, we're revisiting a conversation with Jennifer Wong, the head of sustainability at Convoy. The company is working on improving efficiency in the trucking business by saving money for shippers and increasing earnings for truck drivers, while also helping eliminate carbon waste.  

Global transportation is responsible for 24 percent of direct CO2 emissions from fuel combustion. The transportation sector in the U.S is responsible for roughly 29 percent of greenhouse gas emissions.First, we look at how Ford is remodeling its most popular vehicle and then learn about a unique way to solve climate change in the transportation industry. Haakon Brunell is the co-founder of Carbon Crusher, a road tech company that builds carbon negative roads.

A new study shows how quickly reducing animal farming could unlock ‘negative emissions’ by lowering the amount of methane and nitrous oxide from the air and allowing forests to regenerate. Talib and Avery discuss this development through the lens of their own dietary choices.

Deforestation is partially a result of traditional agriculture practices so we’re looking into alternative agriculture to find out how it can actually benefit the environment. We're focusing on two farming innovations, one of which doesn’t involve soil to grow plants and another that uses a machine to clean up cow manure.Stanley Janicki is the vice president of Sedron Technologies and Donald De Jong is the co-owner and CEO of Natural Prairie Dairy. They partnered to roll out the Varcor system, which upcycles cow manure into a better fertilizer while helping to sequester more carbon in the soil. Plus, it produces clean drinking water!Gotham Greens Co-founder and CEO Viraj Puri developed an urban greenhouse farm that's completely devoid of soil. With the goal to localize supply chains, Puri is opening up more hydroponic farms located in urban settings to cut back on distribution distances.Resources on regenerative farming and permaculture: https://www.nrdc.org/stories/regenerative-agriculture-101#whatishttps://www.thespruce.com/permaculture-garden-principles-steps-5199140

Last year Talib talked with Maisie Hughes from American Forests about tree equity and since it seemed like a good follow-up to our episode on reforestation last week, we’re going to share some highlights from that interview.

Because it’s Earth Day in two days, we thought, what better way to celebrate than by talking about the most iconic symbol of the Earth? Trees are nature’s first line of defense when it comes to fighting climate change, because of their capacity to remove carbon from the atmosphere and store it. In this episode we’ll learn about two ways that will help forests keep doing the work they need to do.Yee Lee is the VP of Growth at Terraformation, a forest restoration startup that aims to speed up the reforesting process.Zack Parisa is NCX CEO and co-founder and Dr. Jennifer Jenkins is its Chief Sustainability Officer. NCX is connecting American landowners with carbon buyers using AI data mapping to open up access to the carbon offsets market.

We know that corporations have known about their own role in climate change for some time but while they might be accountable, individuals are also responsible for managing their own carbon-producing behavior.On today's episode, we’re looking at a decades-long blame game and then we'll find out about the recent SEC ruling that could change the way companies operate when it comes to climate change.