Freeing energy from the grid Justin HallTipping

why can’t we solve these problems we

know what they are something always

seems to stop us why I remember March

the 15th 2000 the b15 iceberg broke off

the Ross Ice Shelf in the newspaper it

said it was all part of a normal process

a little bit further on in the article

it said a loss that would normally take

the ice shelf fifty to a hundred years

to replace that same word normal had two

different almost opposite meanings if we

walk into the b15 iceberg when we leave

here today we’re gonna bump into

something a thousand feet tall 76 miles

long 17 miles wide and it’s gonna weigh

two Giga tons I’m sorry there’s nothing

normal about this and yet I think it’s

this perspective of us as humans to look

at our world through the lens of normal

is one of the forces that stops us

developing real solutions only ninety

days after this arguably the greatest

discovery of the last century occurred

there was the sequencing for the first

time of the human genome this is the

code that’s in every single one of our

50 trillion cells that makes us who we

are and what we are and if we just take

one cells worth of this code and unwind

it it’s a meter long two nanometers

thick two nanometers is twenty atoms

in thickness and I wondered what if the

answer to some of our biggest problems

could be found in the smallest of places

where the difference between what is

valuable and what is worthless is merely

the addition or subtraction of a few

atoms and what if we could get exquisite

control over the essence of energy the

electron so I started to go around the

world finding the best and brightest

scientists I could at universities whose

collective discoveries have the chance

to take us there and we formed a company

to build on their extraordinary ideas

six and a half years later a hundred and

eighty researchers they have some

amazing developments in the lab I will

show you three of those today such that

we can stop burning up our planet and

instead we can generate all the energy

we need right where we are

cleanly safely and cheaply think of the

space that we spend most of our time

tremendous amount of energy is coming at

us from the Sun we like the light that

comes into the room but in the middle of

summer all that heat is coming into the

room that we’re trying to keep cool in

winter exactly the opposite is happening

we’re trying to heat up the space that

we’re in and all that is trying to get

out through the window would it be

really great if the window could flick

back the heat into the room if we needed

it will flick it away before it came in

one of the materials that can do this is

a remarkable material carbon that has

changed its form in this incredibly

beautiful reaction where graphite is

blasted by a vapor and when the

vaporized carbon condenses it condenses

back into a different form chicken-wire

rolled up but this chicken-wire carbon

called the carbon nanotube is a hundred

thousand times smaller than the widths

of one of your hairs

it’s a thousand times more conductive

than copper how is that possible one of

the things about working at the nano

scale is things look and act very

differently

you think of carbon as black carbon at

the nano scale is actually transparent

and flexible and when it’s in this form

if I combine it with a polymer and a fix

it to your window when it’s in its

coloured state it will reflect away all

heat and light and when it’s in its

bleach State it will let all the light

and heat through and any combination in

between to change its state by the way

takes two volts from millisecond pulse

once you’ve changed its state it stays

there until you change its state again

as we were working on this incredible

discovery University of Florida we were

told to go down the corridor to visit

another scientist and he was working on

a pretty incredible thing imagine if we

didn’t have to rely on artificial

lighting to get round at night we’d have

to see at night right

this lets you do it it’s a nanomaterial

to nanomaterials a detector and an

imager the total width of it is 600

times and it takes all the infrared

available at night the space of two

small films and is enabling you to play

an image which you can see through I’m

going to show to tedsters the first time

this operating firstly I’m going to show

you the transparency transparency is key

it’s a film that you can look through

and then I’m going to turn the lights

out and you can see off a tiny film

incredible clarity as we were working on

this it dawned on us this is taking

infrared radiation wavelength converting

it into electron what if we combined it

with this suddenly you’ve converted

energy into an electron on a plastic

surface that you can stick on your

window but because it’s flexible it can

be on any surface whatsoever the power

plant of tomorrow is no power plant

we talked about generating and using we

want to talk about storing energy and

unfortunately the best thing we’ve got

going is something that was developed in

France 150 years ago the lead acid

battery in terms of dollars per watt

stored it’s simply the best knowing that

we’re not going to put 50 of these in

our basements to store our power we went

to a group at University of Texas at

Dallas and we gave them this diagram it

was in actually a diner outside Dallas

Fort Worth Airport we said could you

build this and these scientists instead

of laughing at us said yeah and what

they built was e box he boxes testing

new nanomaterials to park an electron on

the outside hold it until you need it

and then be able to release it and pass

it off being able to do that means that

I can generate energy cleanly

efficiently and cheaply right where I am

it’s my energy and if I don’t need it I

can convert it back up on the window to

energy light and beam it line-of-sight

to your place and for that I do not need

an electric grid between us the grid of

tomorrow is no grid an energy clean

efficient energy will one day be free if

you do this you get the last puzzle

piece which is water

each of us everyday need just eight

glasses of this because we’re human when

we run out of water as we are in some

parts of the world and soon to be in

other parts of the world we’re going to

have to get this from the sea and that’s

going to require us to build these

salination plants 19 trillion dollars is

what we’re gonna have to spend these

also require tremendous amounts of

energy in fact it’s going to require

twice the world’s supply of oil to run

the pumps to generate the water we’re

simply not going to do that but in a

world where energy is freed and

transmittable easily and cheaply we can

take any water wherever we are and turn

it into whatever we need I’m glad to be

working with incredibly brilliant and

kind scientists no kind of than many of

the people in the world but they have a

magic look at the world and I’m glad to

see their discoveries coming out of the

lab and into the world it’s been a long

time in coming for me eighteen years ago

I saw a photograph in the paper it was

taken by Kevin Carter who went to the

Sudan to document their famine there

I’ve carried this photograph with me

every day since then it’s a picture of a

little girl dying of thirst

by any standard this is wrong it’s just

wrong

we can do better than this we should do

better than this

and whenever I go round to somebody who

says you know what you’re working on

something that’s too difficult it’ll

never happen you don’t have enough money

ya don’t have enough time there’s

something much more interesting around

the corner I say try saying that to her

that’s what I say in my mind and I just

say thank you and I go on to the next

one this is why we have to solve our

problems and I know the answer as to how

is to be able to get exquisite control

over a building block of nature stuff of

life the simple electron thank you

you