How youth can reignite climate hope
[Music]
let me paint you a picture of what
january 2020 looked like for me
the east coast of australia had been
burning for weeks
and there was a lingering sense of dread
as fire threatened to enter my city
we had suffered through weeks of smoke
actually
and we’d recorded the worst air quality
in the world
worse than new delhi worse than beijing
and that smoke it was thick
and almost sweet and it reminded us
that we were breathing in the vapors of
burning nearby towns
one day in early january i got a call
from my brother
to say that our family’s property was
under
ember attack and because our rural
firefighting service was stretched i
went to help him defend the property
now we were safe
but many weren’t our property survived
and we
survived but many others in australia
lost their lives that day
many lost their homes as well and these
fires continued to burn for many weeks
i returned home to pack my bags to head
to the world economic forum in davos
i was there to tell world leaders and
the business community
that there is climate hope
and one of the solutions was coming from
the embers of a burning australia
each year in recognition that dialogues
with world leaders
would benefit from having youth voices
in the room
50 young people or global shapers from
all over the world
are selected to attend the world
economic forum
i was there to show the world the
technology that my team is working on
this cement brick is made from
industrial co2 emissions
turning waste greenhouse gases into
building materials
this cement brick can be sold it’s part
of a circular economy
and it was a piece of hope in my pocket
basically since the start of the
industrial revolution we’ve been spewing
too much
co2 and greenhouse gases into our
atmosphere
it’s been pretty much free to pollute
and al gore describes it as treating our
atmosphere
like an open sewer now the world
economic forum itself
is filled with many of the world’s most
powerful people
many of them run the companies and the
countries that emit the most
these people have the ability to enact
great change
and globally though we’ve seen
stagnation and stalling from governments
when it comes to climate change policy
repealing emissions trading schemes
withdrawing from the paris climate
accord
and calling into question the loss of
competitive advantage from climate
action
are some examples that come to mind
there are oil gas and fossil fuel
companies that are determined to
continue with business as usual
or profits as usual
and i spoke to one large oil and gas
executive
who said that his company really wanted
to
curb their emissions but they were
waiting for governments to legislate
so that there would be a minimum
standard
they didn’t want to be at a disadvantage
over their competitors
they only wanted to do it if their
competitors were doing it too
now imagine if there was a way to make
profits directly from climate action
that’s a way to gain a competitive
advantage over your competitors
so what is interesting is that
sophisticated businesses are starting to
take the lead in this space
bhp and rio tinto have made net zero
pledges before our government has
microsoft have committed to net zero by
2030
with further negative emissions pledges
amazon apple and mckinsey have all set
forward ambitious emissions targets
for their operations they have assessed
that their customers
and employees and shareholders want this
action
they’ve assessed that they can make
money and lower emissions
but how exactly do you lower emissions
let me tell you about some of the
realities we are facing here
a lot of the carbon dioxide in the
atmosphere has been dug
out of australian soil in the form of
oil and gas
of coal and gas that co2 has allowed us
to develop
our economies it’s allowed us to lift
nations out of poverty
it’s allowed us to innovate we have
created
vibrant industries and jobs from the
processing
bulk handling and export of these
materials to the rest of the world
and we’re really good at it
however that carbon dioxide is now
making us sick
it’s making us unstable and fragile to
weather events
and it’s destroying progress
weather events like australia’s horrific
summer
are predicted to become more frequent
and overlapping
we have to change the way we do things
in order to clean up our act we have to
decarbonize
our entire economy if you look at energy
there is a clear path to decarbonization
with wind solar hydrogen
and other renewables providing viable
options
the past decade has seen remarkable
growth in this sector actually
and we need to further support the
transition to 100
renewables there are other parts of the
economy however
that have less clear low emissions
options
in order to make steel you need to use
metallurgical coal did you know that
there are no other viable renewable
options right now
cement and chemicals also rely on
thermal
similar thermal processes
so economies don’t just start and stop
and
transition is important coal-fired power
stations running in australia right now
will run until the end of their lives
that’s around 20 or so more years
so as we start to wind down heavy
industries
we need a plan for jobs and the just
transition
and we need a plan for the emissions too
the steel cement and chemical industries
are required that
are required to build our future
infrastructure
and these technologies need
decarbonization options
this is the kicker right now if all of
our industries that were emitting co2
were capturing their emissions
we actually wouldn’t have enough places
to put it
when it comes to co2 you can either emit
it
you can store it away or you can use it
now many of you might have heard of
carbon capture and storage
or ccs before that’s the underground
injection
storage and monitoring of co2
there has been a lot of r d spent around
the world developing this tech
and it has a large potential to scale
but it needs a lot more support and
breakthroughs
to mature carbon storage
has enjoyed the lion’s share of
attention
and government funding compared to
carbon capture and utilization
or carbon transformation tech which is
what i’m working on
so a crucial thing to understand about
this is the key difference is that
carbon storage stores co2 underground
like throwing it in the bin with a
lifetime of storage costs
whereas carbon utilization transforms
co2
and recycles it as a new raw material
this creates valuable products and
generates profit
turning waste into value just makes
sense don’t you think
but this is the important thing there is
no one technology
or silver bullet for climate change
there will be a portfolio of solutions
that will work
in different places and different times
so my team and i at mineral carbonation
mci
are turning carbon dioxide into valuable
materials like this cement brick
we use the earth’s natural process of
storing carbon
called mineral carbonation you can see
here
the white cliffs of dover this is an
example of where the earth has stored
co2
over millions of years through a process
called weathering
we have simply taken that process from
millions of years
to a matter of hours in an industrial
setting
and the process is extremely scalable
with enough mineral deposits in the
world
we have enough mineral deposits in the
world to lock away
all of the co2 that has ever and will
ever be emitted
by fossil fuels
and it’s on the kind of time frame we
need to as
carbonate is thermodynamically favorable
it is the most stable way to store
carbon dioxide
and that means we’re storing something
like this for 10
000 years preventing the co2 from being
emitted into the atmosphere again
so check it out this cement brick
represents a way
that we can turn waste emissions and
industrial wastes into profits
this plasterboard it represents a way
that we can create new industries and
jobs in green construction
and sustainable manufacturing in fact
this plasterboard has stored away
more co2 than was used to create it
so it’s a negative emissions building
material and this is the way of the
future
let me talk to you a little bit more
about negative emissions
even as we reach 100 renewables
and we have significant behavior change
the projections of the ipcc
still indicate that we are likely to
need to use technologies
to draw co2 down out of the atmosphere
in order to not overshoot our 1.5 degree
targets
and these technologies are called direct
air capture tech
here’s an example of a direct air
capture facility in zurich
these guys are sucking co2 out of the
air with these big filters
and pumping them into greenhouses to
grow tomatoes and lettuce
and then they’re selling those products
in the local market at a premium
now this is a really neat illustration
of the circular economy at play
the carbon dioxide is drawn down from
the air
then it’s embedded into a tomato the
tomato is then eaten by a human
and then it’s excreted back into the
atmosphere
but what’s really compelling is when
direct air capture is partnered
with mineral carbonation technology or
carbon utilization
that’s when we can draw co2 down from
the air
and embed it straight back into building
materials that create the cities of the
future
technologies many of them partnered with
ambitious targets
leadership market certainty and consumer
will
will get us to where we want to go we as
technologists need to be better at
communicating the potential of our
technology
now it would be remiss of me to
um to not mention that there is a
technology that already exists that
sucks co2 out of the atmosphere and
locks it straight back into building
materials that can be used in advanced
manufacturing and construction
and that’s wood so we think wood is
fantastic we should be planting as many
trees as possible
it’s a wonderful way to store co2 but a
tree however
requires land water and
it will store co2 from around 20 to 100
years
and if that tree rots or burns then it
will release all of the co2 that it has
ever stored away
so this is my point is that different
technologies work in different areas and
at different times
now when i first started working in this
field seven years ago
i met a lot of technologists and
scientists complaining that their
technology
didn’t get grant funding and support
from governments
they complained that policy wasn’t
supporting the potential growth of their
innovations
but i realized that when you’re stuck in
a lab all day
you’re not really focusing on
communicating the potential of your
technology
and that’s crucially important
how are policy makers and legislators
meant to know about the potential of
your tech
if you’re not talking about it so i
realized that policy doesn’t only
influence technology
but technologies can also influence
policy development
and in recognition of that i set up an
advocacy group with some colleagues
called co2 value australia so this
advocates for all technologies that use
co2 as an ingredient
you know there are technologies that
transform co2 into synthetic fuels
into chemical feedstocks for everyday
items like mattresses
and advanced manufacturing materials
many of these companies just like mci
are at pilot phase or so
but the industry has been estimated to
be worth more than one trillion dollars
by 2030.
so how do we get to a decarbonized
future
we need governments to set ambitious
targets that will signal industry
creation
when john f kennedy declared that
america would put a man on the moon by
the end of the decade
the technology didn’t yet exist by
making the ambitious statement
private and public investment aligned
and they reached their goal which was
achieving a first for humanity
closer to home too the act government
declared in 2015
that we would be at 100 renewable
electricity by 2020.
that ambitious target allowed us to
attract the best new innovators
and renewable energy businesses and this
created a vibrant renewable ecosystem
and that’s another thing that happened
on the 1st of january 2020.
we achieved our target governments can
set
forth visions show leadership and create
and achieve ambitious climate targets
we are capable of so much
now i ask you what part will you play in
helping us to create a sustainable
future
here are a couple of ideas spread the
word
remember what i’ve told you today carbon
dioxide can be turned into useful
products
now we can turn waste into opportunity
and into profit
now you know please tell everyone tell
your mum
tell your dad your dog and tell your
local politicians
demand ambition from governments at all
levels
in this constantly changing world we
should be better at communicating our
priorities to our representatives
so they remember if you’re unsure of
whether your representatives have the
same stance on climate change as you
it’s worth writing to them
use your money wisely your
superannuation and bank of choice
has ultimate power to invest in
initiatives that care more about
that care about more and environmental
and social impact
you can achieve more than just profits
with your money
in fact every time you spend a dollar
you are making a political statement if
there’s an option
to purchase circular carbon embedded
sustainable everyday goods then do it
it’s critically important that we make
these changes if we
and if we don’t we’re going to be living
through more horrific summers like the
one we just experienced
while we’re painfully aware of the risks
of climate change
there are also opportunities for
creating new sustainable industries and
jobs
this brick is proof that we’re already
on our way
we can be supporting many different
technologies and creating
profitable pathways to decarbonization
we all have a part to play and what role
are you going to play
in creating a greener cleaner future
[Music]
you