WEBVTT - The Inconvenient Truth About Reaching Net Zero

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<v Speaker 1>John, ma'am, if I were arrested, would you send me flowers?

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<v Speaker 2>I've missed this story I have for you.

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<v Speaker 1>You totally missed it. Okay, I'm going to read you

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<v Speaker 1>a little bit from The Herald, one of my favorite newspapers.

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<v Speaker 1>Speaking to reporters in Hollyrood, Keith Brown, the party's deputy editor,

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<v Speaker 1>that'll be the s MP, said it was an expression

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<v Speaker 1>of the group support for their ex leader, given what

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<v Speaker 1>she has been through over recent days. Yes, Nicholasturton's colleagues

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<v Speaker 1>are sending her flowers because she's been arrested. Anyway, we're

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<v Speaker 1>not going to talk about that that anymore. I just

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<v Speaker 1>wanted to know from you if I were arrested, I'd

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<v Speaker 1>obviously be completely innocent. But if I were arrested, would

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<v Speaker 1>you send me flowers?

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<v Speaker 2>I mean certainly we'd send you. I get out of

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<v Speaker 2>Jill soon, can't.

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<v Speaker 3>Excellent.

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<v Speaker 1>And if my morgage rate went up to six percent,

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<v Speaker 1>would you send me flowers as as you wouldn't be all.

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<v Speaker 2>I just had to refinance my mortgage earlier this year,

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<v Speaker 2>and even though my interest rate doubled, I now feel

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<v Speaker 2>relieved because it's going up an half a percentage point

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<v Speaker 2>at least since then fixed for John, fixed for five years.

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<v Speaker 1>But I'm now listen, this is really important. I mean,

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<v Speaker 1>this is really important. There was a time We've talked

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<v Speaker 1>about this several times already. There was a period when

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<v Speaker 1>everyone thought that Bank of England rates would peak at

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<v Speaker 1>four percent. That is that that ship was long, long sail.

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<v Speaker 1>There's not four percent, not four and a half, not five,

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<v Speaker 1>not five and a half.

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<v Speaker 2>It might be six, yes, and that's quite scary really

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<v Speaker 2>And also I mean I've got met it. So it's

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<v Speaker 2>higher than actually even I would have thought, and you

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<v Speaker 2>know me and you have thought inflation was going to

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<v Speaker 2>be a problem for a long time. But I mean,

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<v Speaker 2>if I'm being honest, the main reason I would have

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<v Speaker 2>thought the Bank of England it can't get to six

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<v Speaker 2>percent is because I would have thought that the economy

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<v Speaker 2>would have collapsed a long time before that, and I can.

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<v Speaker 2>And the resilience has also been so nonder how.

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<v Speaker 1>Long it takes, I mean, everyone keeps forgetting you know,

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<v Speaker 1>it takes a year to eighteen months for interest rate

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<v Speaker 1>rises to feed through. It takes longer when a lot

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<v Speaker 1>of debt is fixed, which it is so that the

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<v Speaker 1>economy has not collapsed. It should not be a surprise.

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<v Speaker 2>Yeah, I think that's a good point. A lor then

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<v Speaker 2>you sort of think, so are we just going to

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<v Speaker 2>get what usually happens where the these rates a bit

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<v Speaker 2>too far and then they kind of push off the

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<v Speaker 2>northern a cliff.

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<v Speaker 1>Yes, okay, but don't you think I mean, we have

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<v Speaker 1>a Bank of England. That is a conversation for another time,

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<v Speaker 1>but next week we might talk about whether the Bank

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<v Speaker 1>of England really should be independent or not. Has independent

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<v Speaker 1>led to a really intense outbreak of groupthink that has

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<v Speaker 1>brought us to where we are. Bank of England did

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<v Speaker 1>not raise rates fast enough at the beginning, kept them

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<v Speaker 1>low for far too long, totally failed to normalize, and

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<v Speaker 1>now is caught up in a position where they have

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<v Speaker 1>to prove that they're like super macho to get to

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<v Speaker 1>the other side of it. So it's almost inevitable that

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<v Speaker 1>they will go too far.

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<v Speaker 2>I mean, the thing that's true. I think by now

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<v Speaker 2>they're politically so embarrassed a bit having been caught and up,

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<v Speaker 2>and so they will keep pushing up breaks regardless of

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<v Speaker 2>whether it looks like things are going down or not.

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<v Speaker 2>And I mean whether or not that would be the

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<v Speaker 2>case if they weren't technically independent anymore. I still think

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<v Speaker 2>independence are sort of something that just came about because

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<v Speaker 2>of the nature of the backdrop, the economic backdrop. But

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<v Speaker 2>it would be more accountable, I suppose, if you have

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<v Speaker 2>to think harder about the elected it, then maybe you

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<v Speaker 2>would make better decisions.

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<v Speaker 1>Yeah, because a lot of people are going to suffer

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<v Speaker 1>an enormous man of financial paint as a direct result

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<v Speaker 1>of that.

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<v Speaker 2>Well, yet this is the other thing that I do.

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<v Speaker 2>I am wondering about paid rises and how much that

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<v Speaker 2>will go to offset, and because one of the things

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<v Speaker 2>is that obviously there's a slightly the portion of the

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<v Speaker 2>population that's been able to afford a house, certainly in

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<v Speaker 2>the last five years or so has been the better off,

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<v Speaker 2>and an awful lot of people now own their properties

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<v Speaker 2>outright that didn't before. And I think where the real

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<v Speaker 2>weak point in the market is just now, which is

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<v Speaker 2>not necessarily, you know, such a bad thing as the

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<v Speaker 2>buy to let market. I mean, I do actually genuinely

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<v Speaker 2>feel quite sorry for people who bought properties in good

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<v Speaker 2>faith and now say you should well, you know, I mean,

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<v Speaker 2>they can't. I do think that I can see why

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<v Speaker 2>George Osbourne changed the tax allowances. By the end of

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<v Speaker 2>the day, a mortgage interest is a business cost, and

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<v Speaker 2>it's treated as a kind of cost business cost for

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<v Speaker 2>any other type of business. And if you decide to

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<v Speaker 2>make an exception for buy to let landlords because they're

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<v Speaker 2>suddenly politically unpopular, then that's fundamentally quite unfair to help.

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<v Speaker 1>Them when they're gone, aren't we I mean, I mean.

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<v Speaker 2>You need line lots. My experience and saying and experiences

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<v Speaker 2>of the rental market is that it could do with

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<v Speaker 2>being regulated a lot more aggressively.

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<v Speaker 1>And John Tek argues for more regulation.

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<v Speaker 2>I'm going to write that down suddenly in terms of

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<v Speaker 2>the quality rather than the the you know, the sorts

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<v Speaker 2>of stuff that is allowed to be down to in

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<v Speaker 2>the round. Tenants, right, we need to talking.

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<v Speaker 1>We can't talk anymore. Why we're talking anymore, it's because

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<v Speaker 1>we've got a really excellent time quite long interview this week.

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<v Speaker 1>I just want to finish talking to you John by

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<v Speaker 1>saying I'm glad you're going to send me flower if

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<v Speaker 1>I'm arrested and Ephinam, maybe we'll just send some flowers

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<v Speaker 1>to the Bank of England.

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<v Speaker 2>Or send them a jail.

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<v Speaker 1>Got that. Welcome to Maren Talk's Money, the podcast in

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<v Speaker 1>which people who know the markets explain the markets. I'm

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<v Speaker 1>Maren sumset Web. This week our guest is Ed Conway,

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<v Speaker 1>economic editor of Sky News, and he joined me to

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<v Speaker 1>discuss his new book out this very week. Ed, thank

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<v Speaker 1>you so much for joining us today. We usually appreciate it.

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<v Speaker 3>Thank you. It's exciting.

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<v Speaker 1>Now you have written possibly one of the most interesting

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<v Speaker 1>books I have read in a really, really long time.

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<v Speaker 1>You have no idea, and listen as I'm looking for

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<v Speaker 1>sympathy here. You have no idea. How many nonfiction books

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<v Speaker 1>pass my desk. God, most of them are boring, so boring,

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<v Speaker 1>And most of them. I read the introduction, I read

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<v Speaker 1>the conclusion. I pretend I've read the whole thing. It's

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<v Speaker 1>almost never true. But on this occasion, I've had this

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<v Speaker 1>book for less than twenty four hours and I've read

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<v Speaker 1>I would say a good half of it already and

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<v Speaker 1>the rest I'll be reading the second Ed and I

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<v Speaker 1>stopped talking. It's absolutely brand So before we go any further,

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<v Speaker 1>it's called Material World, A Substantial Story of Our Past

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<v Speaker 1>and Future by Ed Conway. Go out by it right now.

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<v Speaker 1>You can't get it physically in America until November, but

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<v Speaker 1>you can get it physically in the UK and Europe now,

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<v Speaker 1>and of course you can probably get it on a

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<v Speaker 1>Kendle in the US. Go out and buy it. You

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<v Speaker 1>will learn a lot.

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<v Speaker 3>Now.

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<v Speaker 1>The first thing I want to do is talk a

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<v Speaker 1>little bit about this distinction that you make in the

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<v Speaker 1>introduction when you talk about the difference between the ethereal

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<v Speaker 1>world and the material world and how shocking it was

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<v Speaker 1>to you to find that you had been inadvertently living

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<v Speaker 1>in only one of them for the majority of your life.

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<v Speaker 3>Yeah, I mean, so it kind of started. You know,

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<v Speaker 3>I'm a journalist. I had this idea of this ethereal

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<v Speaker 3>world that many of us live in doing kind of

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<v Speaker 3>service sector jobs where we were using our brain power.

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<v Speaker 3>And we're all told, aren't we repeatedly that that is

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<v Speaker 3>the kind of apergy of human achievements. You know, to

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<v Speaker 3>use your brain and really all you need is a

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<v Speaker 3>good idea, make an app and then you can change

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<v Speaker 3>the world. And that feels like part of the story

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<v Speaker 3>that we've been told over the last kind of ten

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<v Speaker 3>twenty years or so, and you know, to a great

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<v Speaker 3>to it if you extend it further things like finance.

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<v Speaker 3>You know you and I know a lot of people

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<v Speaker 3>who work in finance. It is ultimately kind of financial intermediation.

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<v Speaker 3>It's not necessarily kind of making stuff. And I had

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<v Speaker 3>this kind of profound expert not that it's not important,

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<v Speaker 3>I should say, I mean, it's incredibly important, but this

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<v Speaker 3>is to make a distinction with this other world. I

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<v Speaker 3>went out to this gold mine in Nevada a few

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<v Speaker 3>years ago, and I was filming a piece for Sky

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<v Speaker 3>News about Brexit. But the thing that really stayed with

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<v Speaker 3>me staring at this mine was just how much of

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<v Speaker 3>this mountain. It was, this enormous mountain they were tearing

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<v Speaker 3>down in order to get a really tiny amount of gold.

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<v Speaker 3>It took about ten jumbo jets, so ten a three

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<v Speaker 3>eighties worth of AWE to get one gold bar. So

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<v Speaker 3>the scale of exploitation of what you need to do

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<v Speaker 3>to the earth to get what you need was just

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<v Speaker 3>kind of way beyond what I kind of expected. It

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<v Speaker 3>was just staggering, and so from that I kind of

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<v Speaker 3>found myself thinking, well, hang on, what do we need

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<v Speaker 3>to do. If that's what we need to do a

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<v Speaker 3>bar of gold, what do we need to do to

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<v Speaker 3>get the stuff that we really need, because obviously, you know,

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<v Speaker 3>gold we need in certain respects, but you know, we're

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<v Speaker 3>not going to literally kind of drop down dead if

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<v Speaker 3>we don't have gold, Whereas if we don't get you know, fertilizer,

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<v Speaker 3>if you don't have steel, if you don't have concrete,

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<v Speaker 3>if you don't have copper to electrify the world, then

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<v Speaker 3>that's a different story. And so that kind of set

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<v Speaker 3>me off down this this other road of trying to

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<v Speaker 3>explore what the materials are that we really really need

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<v Speaker 3>and what does it take to kind of get them

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<v Speaker 3>out of the ground convert them into the things that

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<v Speaker 3>we use. And as I kind of delve deeper into it,

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<v Speaker 3>it just, yeah, it struck me that there is this

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<v Speaker 3>entirely different world where engineering is key, where physics is key,

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<v Speaker 3>where science is genuinely not just an abstract term, but

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<v Speaker 3>it's actually being applied every day. You know, you look

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<v Speaker 3>at kind of what's happening with the manufacturer of semiconductors,

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<v Speaker 3>and this felt like, you know, I called it the

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<v Speaker 3>material world. It felt like a different universe, and it

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<v Speaker 3>felt like an inspiring and exciting place, but most of all,

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<v Speaker 3>it just felt unfamiliar. And I think that's partly because,

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<v Speaker 3>particularly in the UK, but also to some extent the US,

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<v Speaker 3>to some extent some parts of Europe, we've increasingly outsourced

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<v Speaker 3>the production of stuff. We've outsourced the getting of things

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<v Speaker 3>from the ground, and everything pretty much that we're touching

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<v Speaker 3>on a daily basis is either growing, but for the

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<v Speaker 3>most part it is mind It comes out of the ground,

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<v Speaker 3>but we just don't do as much of it in

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<v Speaker 3>this country, and as a result, we don't think about

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<v Speaker 3>it that much. We don't think about the pragmatic realities

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<v Speaker 3>of how the world around us actually came to be.

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<v Speaker 3>And it's partly something about, you know, our lack of

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<v Speaker 3>awareness in the real world, and that lack of awareness

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<v Speaker 3>I think is quite important because it's partly because we

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<v Speaker 3>didn't have to think about this stuff. It's partly because

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<v Speaker 3>we outsourced a lot of it to China that I

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<v Speaker 3>think we're not as aware of both the challenges, so

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<v Speaker 3>the particular challenges of carbon emission. You know, where where

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<v Speaker 3>does that carbon frooc come from? It comes from everything,

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<v Speaker 3>It comes from pretty much every process you can care

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<v Speaker 3>to imagine, but also the challenges. You know, there is

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<v Speaker 3>no single switch we'll ever be able to flick which

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<v Speaker 3>can suddenly turn out those those carbon emissions. And the

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<v Speaker 3>book is a bit of an exploration into both of

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<v Speaker 3>those sides. You know, how we're actually making staff, you know,

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<v Speaker 3>how does a semiconductor get made? And you know plenty

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<v Speaker 3>is being written about semiconductors, by the way, but I think,

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<v Speaker 3>I am this is the first book which actually goes

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<v Speaker 3>tells the story of how you make a semiconductor from

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<v Speaker 3>the quarry all the way through to the fab Okay,

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<v Speaker 3>lots has been written about fabs, but not so much

0:11:36.640 --> 0:11:39.559
<v Speaker 3>has been written about how you make polysilicon, or how

0:11:39.559 --> 0:11:42.600
<v Speaker 3>you make silicon metal, or how you make the actual

0:11:42.679 --> 0:11:46.520
<v Speaker 3>kind of wafer itself. That stuff is that's fascinating, and

0:11:46.559 --> 0:11:48.880
<v Speaker 3>that's half of the journey of the supply chain before

0:11:48.960 --> 0:11:51.280
<v Speaker 3>it gets to TSMC or indeed any of those other

0:11:51.640 --> 0:11:54.640
<v Speaker 3>fabrication plants. So partly is a story of wonder, but

0:11:54.679 --> 0:11:57.080
<v Speaker 3>partly is also like, let's just think about the world

0:11:57.120 --> 0:11:58.520
<v Speaker 3>pragmatically for a change.

0:11:58.960 --> 0:12:02.080
<v Speaker 1>It's empesting, isn't it. You're going to tell listeners what

0:12:02.400 --> 0:12:07.720
<v Speaker 1>are the six materials that you focus on. It's sand, salt, iron, copper, oil,

0:12:08.200 --> 0:12:11.000
<v Speaker 1>and lithium. So we'll talk about a few of those

0:12:11.040 --> 0:12:12.800
<v Speaker 1>there is. There's a lot of what you just said

0:12:12.800 --> 0:12:15.360
<v Speaker 1>to unpack in it. There's a whole other podcast to

0:12:15.400 --> 0:12:19.120
<v Speaker 1>be had about how ESG itself relates to the actual

0:12:19.200 --> 0:12:22.120
<v Speaker 1>material world as opposed to the theoretical material world that

0:12:22.200 --> 0:12:24.280
<v Speaker 1>most investors live in. I mean, you just said that

0:12:24.320 --> 0:12:25.960
<v Speaker 1>the mine you went to see, the gold mine tacked

0:12:26.000 --> 0:12:28.199
<v Speaker 1>every box but was still a bloody great hole in

0:12:28.240 --> 0:12:31.360
<v Speaker 1>the ground, destroying a real environmental whatever around it, right

0:12:31.400 --> 0:12:33.640
<v Speaker 1>say nothing of the impact it might have on local communities,

0:12:33.640 --> 0:12:36.360
<v Speaker 1>et cetera. And I'm guessing I've seen pictures of minds

0:12:36.480 --> 0:12:38.720
<v Speaker 1>like that that anyone standing next to a mind like

0:12:38.720 --> 0:12:40.360
<v Speaker 1>that would be amazed to think that it took to

0:12:40.440 --> 0:12:43.839
<v Speaker 1>any ESG box at all, or certainly any e box.

0:12:43.840 --> 0:12:46.120
<v Speaker 1>Although obviously all these things are going to take s

0:12:46.200 --> 0:12:49.400
<v Speaker 1>boxes and that's very important as well. So well, if

0:12:49.400 --> 0:12:52.120
<v Speaker 1>we have time, we'll come back to ESG. Although actually

0:12:52.200 --> 0:12:54.840
<v Speaker 1>it's all about ESG, isn't it. So let's talk about

0:12:54.880 --> 0:12:56.800
<v Speaker 1>because this really is a book. It's a book about

0:12:56.920 --> 0:12:58.880
<v Speaker 1>energy in lots of ways, isn't it. Because one of

0:12:58.920 --> 0:13:01.320
<v Speaker 1>the things that you were saying, it's about turning sand

0:13:01.360 --> 0:13:03.560
<v Speaker 1>into this AsSalt, into this and iron into this, etc.

0:13:04.040 --> 0:13:08.160
<v Speaker 1>But that turning is a story of energy. So one

0:13:08.160 --> 0:13:09.520
<v Speaker 1>of the things that I think you touched on in

0:13:09.520 --> 0:13:12.120
<v Speaker 1>pretty much every chapter along the way in the book

0:13:12.480 --> 0:13:14.760
<v Speaker 1>is how we are doing something or attempting to do

0:13:14.800 --> 0:13:17.680
<v Speaker 1>something extraordinary. I suspect will fail. What we are attempting

0:13:17.880 --> 0:13:20.760
<v Speaker 1>to do something extraordinary, which is go through the first

0:13:20.880 --> 0:13:25.439
<v Speaker 1>ever energy transition that does not involve transitioning to a

0:13:25.480 --> 0:13:28.360
<v Speaker 1>better and more intense fuel for the first time, we're

0:13:28.360 --> 0:13:31.280
<v Speaker 1>trying to transition to a fuel that is effectively in

0:13:31.360 --> 0:13:34.560
<v Speaker 1>terms of intensity, worse than the one we're leaving behind.

0:13:34.840 --> 0:13:36.520
<v Speaker 1>So one of the things that you talk about is

0:13:36.559 --> 0:13:39.200
<v Speaker 1>that there are a lot of inconvenient truths in here

0:13:39.559 --> 0:13:43.960
<v Speaker 1>that our attempt to switch to net zero is much

0:13:44.000 --> 0:13:47.280
<v Speaker 1>more difficult than most people even begin to imagine it

0:13:47.280 --> 0:13:48.839
<v Speaker 1>will be, and possibly impossible.

0:13:49.440 --> 0:13:51.920
<v Speaker 3>It's a real I mean, it's an enormous challenge. And

0:13:51.960 --> 0:13:56.400
<v Speaker 3>I think that's the issue, is that no one doubts

0:13:56.559 --> 0:14:00.600
<v Speaker 3>the importance of what we are a mean to do.

0:14:00.920 --> 0:14:03.920
<v Speaker 3>You know, at the moment. What's interesting, Maren, I feel

0:14:03.960 --> 0:14:06.720
<v Speaker 3>like over the past ten years is that you know

0:14:06.760 --> 0:14:09.000
<v Speaker 3>that debate about some of the science about what's happening

0:14:09.000 --> 0:14:13.199
<v Speaker 3>with andthropogenic global warming. That seems to have been more

0:14:13.320 --> 0:14:17.000
<v Speaker 3>or less settled. What hasn't really been settled is the

0:14:17.080 --> 0:14:20.120
<v Speaker 3>solution and how we get there and how much of

0:14:20.120 --> 0:14:22.320
<v Speaker 3>a compromise there's going to be in order for us

0:14:22.400 --> 0:14:25.320
<v Speaker 3>to fulfill these goals. A lot of governments, you know,

0:14:25.360 --> 0:14:29.600
<v Speaker 3>the UK was the first, have signed into law acts

0:14:29.600 --> 0:14:31.800
<v Speaker 3>that say we must get to net zero by a

0:14:31.840 --> 0:14:35.920
<v Speaker 3>certain time, mostly twenty fifty, without really thinking about what

0:14:35.960 --> 0:14:37.640
<v Speaker 3>that actually involves.

0:14:37.720 --> 0:14:40.200
<v Speaker 1>And also about how if you get anywhere near it,

0:14:40.280 --> 0:14:42.160
<v Speaker 1>how might do those emissions you have to have to

0:14:42.200 --> 0:14:43.800
<v Speaker 1>ask other people to take on for you.

0:14:44.320 --> 0:14:46.160
<v Speaker 3>Well, I mean, that's that's what we've done in the UK.

0:14:46.440 --> 0:14:49.000
<v Speaker 3>You know, we are the global champion to some extent

0:14:49.000 --> 0:14:51.359
<v Speaker 3>in the G seven at least at reducing our carbon emissions.

0:14:51.520 --> 0:14:53.480
<v Speaker 3>And we've done that, not entirely, but we've done that

0:14:53.520 --> 0:14:56.920
<v Speaker 3>partly by de industrializing faster than any other major economy.

0:14:57.080 --> 0:15:00.000
<v Speaker 3>We just don't make stuff anymore, and that is that's

0:15:00.080 --> 0:15:01.960
<v Speaker 3>that's a good way of do industrializing, you know, look

0:15:02.000 --> 0:15:04.640
<v Speaker 3>at but not a good way of growing. It's not

0:15:04.680 --> 0:15:05.960
<v Speaker 3>a good way of growing. And I think, you know,

0:15:06.000 --> 0:15:08.280
<v Speaker 3>I think, and I kind of touched on this a

0:15:08.280 --> 0:15:10.280
<v Speaker 3>little bit towards the end of the book, because again

0:15:10.360 --> 0:15:12.200
<v Speaker 3>it's a bit of a journey for me, and you say,

0:15:12.400 --> 0:15:14.480
<v Speaker 3>you know, as you say, a lot of it's about energy.

0:15:14.520 --> 0:15:16.160
<v Speaker 3>I didn't really expect at the start of it that

0:15:16.160 --> 0:15:18.280
<v Speaker 3>there would be so much about energy. But yes, if

0:15:18.280 --> 0:15:21.280
<v Speaker 3>you're looking at the conversion of anything, any raw material

0:15:21.320 --> 0:15:23.960
<v Speaker 3>into something else, then a lot of energy is spent there.

0:15:24.000 --> 0:15:27.960
<v Speaker 3>That's straightforward thermodynamics. And as a result, then you need

0:15:28.000 --> 0:15:29.720
<v Speaker 3>to think about how you're going to do it differently,

0:15:29.840 --> 0:15:35.200
<v Speaker 3>because right now, carbon emissions are everywhere. I mean a

0:15:35.200 --> 0:15:38.320
<v Speaker 3>good example of this is to make a to make

0:15:38.360 --> 0:15:41.120
<v Speaker 3>a silicon chip or a solar panel, you need to

0:15:41.120 --> 0:15:44.120
<v Speaker 3>take silicon out of the ground, but you need to

0:15:44.120 --> 0:15:46.120
<v Speaker 3>then turn that into a form of metal. In order

0:15:46.160 --> 0:15:49.360
<v Speaker 3>to do that, you smelt it, so you're smelting it,

0:15:49.520 --> 0:15:53.560
<v Speaker 3>not unlike how you would smelt iron in an electric

0:15:53.680 --> 0:15:57.880
<v Speaker 3>arc furnace. And in order to smelt it you need coal.

0:15:58.880 --> 0:16:01.640
<v Speaker 3>So in order to make the silicon metal that we

0:16:01.720 --> 0:16:04.360
<v Speaker 3>make our solar panels out of and our silicon chips

0:16:04.400 --> 0:16:07.960
<v Speaker 3>out of, you need coal, coking coal right now at least,

0:16:08.440 --> 0:16:11.960
<v Speaker 3>And that is one tiny example of a way in

0:16:12.040 --> 0:16:16.080
<v Speaker 3>which carbon is kind of integral to pretty much every

0:16:16.120 --> 0:16:19.640
<v Speaker 3>product you touch on a daily basis. And while there's

0:16:19.640 --> 0:16:22.280
<v Speaker 3>been plenty of imagination and thought given into how we

0:16:22.360 --> 0:16:25.040
<v Speaker 3>are going to deal with certain processes where we're going

0:16:25.080 --> 0:16:28.120
<v Speaker 3>to change our power generation, for instance, but you know,

0:16:28.160 --> 0:16:31.280
<v Speaker 3>as you've said many times before, even that hasn't really

0:16:31.280 --> 0:16:33.800
<v Speaker 3>been thought through as deeply as it really ought to be.

0:16:34.760 --> 0:16:37.320
<v Speaker 3>That the industrial side of it, you know, how you're

0:16:37.320 --> 0:16:39.560
<v Speaker 3>going to make I mean, people talk a little bit

0:16:39.560 --> 0:16:43.560
<v Speaker 3>about cement, but cement is just absolutely enormous. How are

0:16:43.600 --> 0:16:44.880
<v Speaker 3>you going to do that? How you're going to get

0:16:44.880 --> 0:16:46.520
<v Speaker 3>your copper without creating cobbon? How are you going to

0:16:46.560 --> 0:16:49.080
<v Speaker 3>get your lithium without carbon emissions along the way?

0:16:50.120 --> 0:16:52.280
<v Speaker 1>And your steel? I mean, you can't, you can't. You

0:16:52.320 --> 0:16:55.760
<v Speaker 1>can't make steel without without coal. But it's a lot harder,

0:16:55.800 --> 0:16:57.800
<v Speaker 1>and the majority of steel is still.

0:17:00.080 --> 0:17:02.280
<v Speaker 3>Even electric. Art furnaces still use a fair bed of coal,

0:17:02.280 --> 0:17:03.840
<v Speaker 3>and they use a bit of gas as well, and

0:17:03.920 --> 0:17:06.919
<v Speaker 3>so you're still you're still kind of emitting carbon. But

0:17:06.960 --> 0:17:09.160
<v Speaker 3>the point is, you know, the point is not to

0:17:09.280 --> 0:17:12.680
<v Speaker 3>treat that as a kind of a reason for defeatism.

0:17:13.080 --> 0:17:14.879
<v Speaker 3>It's just to say that the challenge is greater than

0:17:14.880 --> 0:17:17.320
<v Speaker 3>people appreciate. I think that's the thing a lot of

0:17:17.320 --> 0:17:21.320
<v Speaker 3>people would say, oh god, it's impossible. It might not

0:17:21.359 --> 0:17:24.880
<v Speaker 3>be impossible, but it's just like, it's definitely harder than

0:17:24.880 --> 0:17:25.280
<v Speaker 3>you think.

0:17:25.560 --> 0:17:29.280
<v Speaker 1>It probably going to take us long longer than we think.

0:17:29.440 --> 0:17:31.800
<v Speaker 3>It's like it being a really good example. O is hydrogen.

0:17:32.240 --> 0:17:34.159
<v Speaker 3>This is something I think I've got leg towards the

0:17:34.240 --> 0:17:36.439
<v Speaker 3>end of the book. So green hydrogen, a lot of

0:17:36.440 --> 0:17:38.840
<v Speaker 3>people hope will be that the future because that will

0:17:38.880 --> 0:17:40.239
<v Speaker 3>solve a lot of problems. If you have a lot

0:17:40.280 --> 0:17:44.600
<v Speaker 3>of green hydrogen, you basically can run all your wind turbines.

0:17:44.840 --> 0:17:47.639
<v Speaker 3>They can take that power, turn it into hydrogen that

0:17:47.680 --> 0:17:49.200
<v Speaker 3>you can then store under the ground by the way,

0:17:49.200 --> 0:17:52.280
<v Speaker 3>in salt caverns, which comes back to salt anyway, in

0:17:52.400 --> 0:17:55.840
<v Speaker 3>order to make this hydrogen okay, which is going to

0:17:55.840 --> 0:17:57.600
<v Speaker 3>be the solution to everything, because it means you can

0:17:57.640 --> 0:17:59.920
<v Speaker 3>just burn that hydrogen when the wind's not blowing, when

0:17:59.920 --> 0:18:02.600
<v Speaker 3>the sun's not shining. It is your backup. It solves everything.

0:18:02.640 --> 0:18:05.920
<v Speaker 3>You can put it into trucks theoretically and run them

0:18:05.920 --> 0:18:09.159
<v Speaker 3>around instead of using diesel. In order to create that

0:18:09.320 --> 0:18:14.359
<v Speaker 3>hydrogen okay, the amount of energy you need is stupendous

0:18:14.520 --> 0:18:17.680
<v Speaker 3>to run through those electrolyzers. And I'll give you an example.

0:18:18.520 --> 0:18:20.159
<v Speaker 3>We at the moment in the UK, we've got a

0:18:20.160 --> 0:18:22.240
<v Speaker 3>couple of fertilizer plants. Actually neither of them are running

0:18:22.320 --> 0:18:26.160
<v Speaker 3>right now because gas is so expensive to run one

0:18:26.200 --> 0:18:28.600
<v Speaker 3>of those fertilizer plants. It's a kind of a medium

0:18:28.640 --> 0:18:32.280
<v Speaker 3>sized plant doesn't create enough ammonia for the UK at

0:18:32.280 --> 0:18:36.880
<v Speaker 3>the moment. It takes natural gas in and fertilizer comes out,

0:18:36.920 --> 0:18:38.959
<v Speaker 3>So it uses the natural gas as the process that

0:18:39.000 --> 0:18:42.760
<v Speaker 3>creates that ammonia fertilizer. It's one of the most important

0:18:42.800 --> 0:18:46.480
<v Speaker 3>processes in the modern world. Without these plants, we are

0:18:46.560 --> 0:18:49.120
<v Speaker 3>all dead, or at least fifty percent of us are dead,

0:18:49.119 --> 0:18:52.800
<v Speaker 3>because fifty percent of the world is alive today thanks

0:18:52.840 --> 0:18:56.840
<v Speaker 3>to nitrogen fertilizer we get from natural gas. Almost entirely

0:18:56.840 --> 0:18:59.320
<v Speaker 3>from natural gas, although in China they use coal. Still,

0:19:00.760 --> 0:19:04.120
<v Speaker 3>if you wanted to replace that fertilizer plant, as I say,

0:19:04.200 --> 0:19:09.880
<v Speaker 3>pretty medium sized fertilizer plant with green hydrogen, which which

0:19:10.560 --> 0:19:12.320
<v Speaker 3>you could then turn into ammonia. Because you can take

0:19:12.320 --> 0:19:15.320
<v Speaker 3>that green hydrogen turn it into ammonia, you would need

0:19:15.960 --> 0:19:20.520
<v Speaker 3>the entire output of the biggest offshore wind farm in

0:19:20.560 --> 0:19:23.400
<v Speaker 3>the world. So there's one off the UK called Dogger Bank.

0:19:23.440 --> 0:19:27.600
<v Speaker 3>There's another called Hornsey too. You would need their entire output,

0:19:27.920 --> 0:19:31.679
<v Speaker 3>which was enough for about a million homes, just to

0:19:31.800 --> 0:19:36.480
<v Speaker 3>power that plant and get green hydrogen and thense green ammonia.

0:19:37.000 --> 0:19:39.520
<v Speaker 1>So yeah, then you'd also need a cool backup plant

0:19:40.040 --> 0:19:41.240
<v Speaker 1>when the wind wasn't blowing.

0:19:41.640 --> 0:19:44.120
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, I mean, you know, you see the thing, it's

0:19:43.920 --> 0:19:46.440
<v Speaker 3>the scale it is that's one tiny that is one

0:19:46.520 --> 0:19:48.919
<v Speaker 3>tiny part of the picture that very few people have

0:19:49.000 --> 0:19:51.720
<v Speaker 3>considered and never enters that the dialogue when we're talking

0:19:51.720 --> 0:19:55.439
<v Speaker 3>about net zero and just underlines that the scale of

0:19:55.440 --> 0:19:57.680
<v Speaker 3>what we need to achieve is far greater. And also

0:19:57.720 --> 0:19:59.879
<v Speaker 3>what that underlines as well, Marin, isn't it is that

0:20:00.040 --> 0:20:03.960
<v Speaker 3>energy density thing. You know, natural gas is incredibly energy

0:20:04.040 --> 0:20:06.560
<v Speaker 3>dence compared with you know, trying to get the energy

0:20:06.560 --> 0:20:08.920
<v Speaker 3>out of a wind turbine and electeralize it and waste

0:20:08.920 --> 0:20:10.800
<v Speaker 3>a lot of energy along the way and turn that

0:20:10.840 --> 0:20:13.800
<v Speaker 3>into hydrogen. It is a very different world. It's a

0:20:13.880 --> 0:20:15.960
<v Speaker 3>very different challenge we're facing. It's far greater than you

0:20:16.080 --> 0:20:19.440
<v Speaker 3>possibly could have imagined. But by the same token, there

0:20:19.480 --> 0:20:22.480
<v Speaker 3>is hope here because there's opportunities. You know, we need

0:20:22.640 --> 0:20:26.000
<v Speaker 3>so many more innovations. It's not just innovations, you know,

0:20:26.160 --> 0:20:28.520
<v Speaker 3>to try and crack all of those different little kind

0:20:28.520 --> 0:20:31.320
<v Speaker 3>of things that we've heard about, whether it's kind of

0:20:31.320 --> 0:20:35.040
<v Speaker 3>improving lithiumon batteries. It's all along the industrial chain, all

0:20:35.080 --> 0:20:36.720
<v Speaker 3>the way from the mind through to the products that

0:20:36.720 --> 0:20:40.760
<v Speaker 3>we're using today. It's through to petrochemicals, it's through to ammonia.

0:20:40.840 --> 0:20:44.720
<v Speaker 3>Like I say, there are so many different opportunities here,

0:20:44.800 --> 0:20:48.399
<v Speaker 3>all of them pretty damn difficult. But that to me

0:20:48.480 --> 0:20:52.440
<v Speaker 3>spells an interesting, exciting time.

0:20:53.280 --> 0:20:55.439
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, that definitely exists. And one of the things that

0:20:55.680 --> 0:20:58.120
<v Speaker 1>I got, the slight sense surprised you but a little

0:20:58.160 --> 0:21:00.199
<v Speaker 1>when I was reading the chapter on oil is the

0:21:00.440 --> 0:21:03.320
<v Speaker 1>extent to which fossil fuel still do fuel the world,

0:21:03.320 --> 0:21:06.120
<v Speaker 1>and that number of eighty percent of global energy coming

0:21:06.119 --> 0:21:08.720
<v Speaker 1>from fossil fuels just doesn't go down. I mean a

0:21:08.760 --> 0:21:11.080
<v Speaker 1>reflects the fact that we're becoming more efficient at using

0:21:11.119 --> 0:21:13.119
<v Speaker 1>all the fossil fuels that we do, but also that

0:21:13.240 --> 0:21:17.399
<v Speaker 1>demand is constantly rising, so getting it below eighty eighty percent,

0:21:17.440 --> 0:21:20.119
<v Speaker 1>so it fields like whatever we do, we're not really

0:21:20.160 --> 0:21:23.520
<v Speaker 1>moving very fast in the end, and possibly if policy

0:21:23.520 --> 0:21:25.720
<v Speaker 1>makers made more effort come to terms with that, they'd

0:21:25.720 --> 0:21:27.560
<v Speaker 1>find it easier to make policy going forward.

0:21:28.160 --> 0:21:31.760
<v Speaker 3>It's very easy to just try and look for enemies

0:21:31.800 --> 0:21:35.199
<v Speaker 3>and to look for villains, and to some extent, you know,

0:21:35.480 --> 0:21:38.359
<v Speaker 3>fossil fuels in particular, oil has been cast as one

0:21:38.359 --> 0:21:42.119
<v Speaker 3>of the villains. I mean coal obviously as well. But

0:21:42.359 --> 0:21:46.800
<v Speaker 3>even so, when you listen to protesters like just stop Oil,

0:21:46.840 --> 0:21:50.040
<v Speaker 3>for instance in the UK, and similar protesters around the world,

0:21:50.520 --> 0:21:52.800
<v Speaker 3>one of the things they frequently point to is that

0:21:52.840 --> 0:21:55.360
<v Speaker 3>the International Energy Agency has said that we don't necessarily

0:21:55.440 --> 0:21:59.560
<v Speaker 3>need any new licenses for oil exploration in the future.

0:22:00.440 --> 0:22:05.639
<v Speaker 3>Even that same i EA framework, even that same forecast,

0:22:06.040 --> 0:22:08.840
<v Speaker 3>still presumes that we're going to be consuming a lot

0:22:08.880 --> 0:22:12.040
<v Speaker 3>of oil come twenty twenty fifty. We're still going to

0:22:12.040 --> 0:22:14.359
<v Speaker 3>be consuming a lot of oil come twenty sixty as well.

0:22:14.800 --> 0:22:17.679
<v Speaker 3>We still rely on a lot of oil and a

0:22:17.720 --> 0:22:21.200
<v Speaker 3>lot of gas because right now there are still things

0:22:21.240 --> 0:22:24.199
<v Speaker 3>that we can't really do very well without them, you know,

0:22:24.400 --> 0:22:26.760
<v Speaker 3>fertilizers being another being a pretty good example.

0:22:26.880 --> 0:22:29.439
<v Speaker 1>Well, fertilizer seems that an example that you know, so

0:22:29.480 --> 0:22:31.920
<v Speaker 1>many people don't quite grasp. One of the I was

0:22:31.920 --> 0:22:33.960
<v Speaker 1>looking a photo of just stop oil holding up something

0:22:34.000 --> 0:22:35.400
<v Speaker 1>on the other the other day, and one of them

0:22:35.480 --> 0:22:38.760
<v Speaker 1>was holding a big banner saying you can't eat oil.

0:22:39.520 --> 0:22:41.639
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, that's we literally, well yeah, kind of do.

0:22:42.000 --> 0:22:42.840
<v Speaker 1>That's what we eat?

0:22:43.520 --> 0:22:46.600
<v Speaker 3>Well gas, yeah, we'll not that is eating oil.

0:22:46.640 --> 0:22:49.440
<v Speaker 1>But we are eating photol fules all the time, every day.

0:22:49.560 --> 0:22:49.840
<v Speaker 1>All of this.

0:22:50.040 --> 0:22:52.600
<v Speaker 3>I mean, I think them down, we're munching them down.

0:22:52.640 --> 0:22:55.600
<v Speaker 3>And it's partly because it's the fertilized, the most important bit,

0:22:55.680 --> 0:22:57.560
<v Speaker 3>but also actually random things like I don't know if

0:22:57.600 --> 0:23:00.280
<v Speaker 3>you've recently eaten salt and vinegar crisps. A lot of

0:23:00.280 --> 0:23:04.040
<v Speaker 3>the time the vinegar tasting crisps actually comes from from

0:23:04.200 --> 0:23:08.960
<v Speaker 3>from petrochemicals. Did you know that it's the vinegar?

0:23:09.000 --> 0:23:16.520
<v Speaker 1>And I mean it depends umber, chicken, fass are.

0:23:16.600 --> 0:23:23.320
<v Speaker 3>Vegan, it's everywhere, it's everywhere, and and and I think

0:23:23.320 --> 0:23:26.480
<v Speaker 3>that we won't we won't do ourselves any favors by

0:23:26.800 --> 0:23:31.840
<v Speaker 3>just demonizing kind of processes that we depend on to survive.

0:23:32.640 --> 0:23:34.800
<v Speaker 3>I mean, that's that's not to say we shouldn't be

0:23:34.840 --> 0:23:38.360
<v Speaker 3>finding ways of diminishing our reliance on that which we're

0:23:38.400 --> 0:23:41.760
<v Speaker 3>doing and which we have plans to do. But everyone

0:23:41.880 --> 0:23:46.240
<v Speaker 3>is after just easy answers. Everyone is after villains and heroes.

0:23:46.320 --> 0:23:49.280
<v Speaker 3>Everyone is after silver bullets and the way. One of

0:23:49.320 --> 0:23:51.680
<v Speaker 3>the reasons that I've been, you know, kind of focused

0:23:51.720 --> 0:23:53.760
<v Speaker 3>on this, and my background is slightly more in economics

0:23:53.800 --> 0:23:55.840
<v Speaker 3>and you know, other kind of reporting, but one of

0:23:55.880 --> 0:23:58.840
<v Speaker 3>the reasons I've been drawn into this is that it

0:23:58.960 --> 0:24:03.520
<v Speaker 3>felt like an area where too few people talking about

0:24:03.560 --> 0:24:07.400
<v Speaker 3>the nuance of complexity and the gray areas. It's too

0:24:07.440 --> 0:24:10.560
<v Speaker 3>easy to just do kind of coverage of the green

0:24:10.640 --> 0:24:13.000
<v Speaker 3>you know, the energy transition and climate just in terms

0:24:13.000 --> 0:24:16.560
<v Speaker 3>of villains and in terms of you know, heroes. But

0:24:16.640 --> 0:24:19.280
<v Speaker 3>that's not the way the world works. And you know,

0:24:19.320 --> 0:24:21.600
<v Speaker 3>I wanted to try to explain a little bit more

0:24:21.640 --> 0:24:24.000
<v Speaker 3>about the basics of how the world works. I should

0:24:24.000 --> 0:24:25.720
<v Speaker 3>say it wasn't the reason I started writing book. The

0:24:25.760 --> 0:24:27.320
<v Speaker 3>reason I started writing book was I just wanted I

0:24:27.320 --> 0:24:30.240
<v Speaker 3>wanted to get I wanted to understand how the products

0:24:30.280 --> 0:24:32.120
<v Speaker 3>that I was using every day actually got into my hand.

0:24:32.160 --> 0:24:34.960
<v Speaker 3>I wanted to understand the journey that a semiconductor or

0:24:35.000 --> 0:24:36.880
<v Speaker 3>the steel frame of my phone had been in before

0:24:36.920 --> 0:24:39.840
<v Speaker 3>it arrived in my hands. But then along that way,

0:24:39.880 --> 0:24:43.400
<v Speaker 3>You're like, well, there is this whole world and populated

0:24:43.440 --> 0:24:49.399
<v Speaker 3>by amazing people, you know, engineers, scientists, physicists, manufacturers making

0:24:49.480 --> 0:24:53.159
<v Speaker 3>this stuff that we rely on every day, whereas this

0:24:53.480 --> 0:24:58.720
<v Speaker 3>you know, commentorati are living in this entirely separate universe

0:24:59.160 --> 0:24:59.680
<v Speaker 3>and they're.

0:24:59.520 --> 0:25:00.159
<v Speaker 2>Just going to Now.

0:25:00.240 --> 0:25:04.120
<v Speaker 1>I was looking for work experience for my daughter, and

0:25:04.240 --> 0:25:06.320
<v Speaker 1>everything that I could find that I looked at for

0:25:06.400 --> 0:25:10.439
<v Speaker 1>her involved watching other people typing on computer. And you know,

0:25:10.480 --> 0:25:12.960
<v Speaker 1>we had this exact conversation at home, how can we

0:25:13.080 --> 0:25:16.200
<v Speaker 1>find you work experience that allows you to actually see

0:25:16.359 --> 0:25:19.560
<v Speaker 1>stuff being made, stuff being done, stuff being dug out

0:25:19.600 --> 0:25:22.080
<v Speaker 1>of the ground, that allows you to see something other

0:25:22.160 --> 0:25:26.199
<v Speaker 1>than people making spreadsheets and typing blogs. It's, you know,

0:25:26.480 --> 0:25:28.600
<v Speaker 1>entry into that world if you're not in it, not

0:25:28.640 --> 0:25:30.240
<v Speaker 1>necessarily the easiest thing.

0:25:30.600 --> 0:25:32.720
<v Speaker 3>Well that's I mean, actually, that's another kind of interesting point,

0:25:32.720 --> 0:25:36.360
<v Speaker 3>which is that one of the wonders of the modern world,

0:25:36.440 --> 0:25:40.600
<v Speaker 3>I suppose, is that we have managed to and this

0:25:41.280 --> 0:25:43.760
<v Speaker 3>is why we've managed to reduce the number of people

0:25:43.800 --> 0:25:47.840
<v Speaker 3>it takes to get a lump of iron or copper

0:25:47.920 --> 0:25:49.399
<v Speaker 3>or whatever it is out of the ground. You know,

0:25:49.520 --> 0:25:52.920
<v Speaker 3>back back in the day, you needed thousands of people

0:25:52.960 --> 0:25:55.480
<v Speaker 3>working at these mines these days, so much of the

0:25:55.520 --> 0:25:58.840
<v Speaker 3>process is automated that there's so few people are needed

0:25:58.880 --> 0:26:00.720
<v Speaker 3>to get the stuff out of the ground. And this

0:26:00.760 --> 0:26:02.440
<v Speaker 3>is part of the explanation. I kind of think of

0:26:02.480 --> 0:26:06.240
<v Speaker 3>it as people are really sniffy about things like resource exploitation.

0:26:06.760 --> 0:26:09.879
<v Speaker 3>They're sniffy about it because it's not like semiconductors. You

0:26:09.880 --> 0:26:13.520
<v Speaker 3>don't have Moore's law when it comes to copper or iron,

0:26:13.600 --> 0:26:17.760
<v Speaker 3>do you? But actually you do. You do because if

0:26:17.800 --> 0:26:19.840
<v Speaker 3>you look at the price of copper, not just in

0:26:19.920 --> 0:26:24.119
<v Speaker 3>terms of it's kind of real value of inflation adjusted value,

0:26:24.119 --> 0:26:25.200
<v Speaker 3>but if you look at it in terms of the

0:26:25.280 --> 0:26:28.600
<v Speaker 3>labor hours that are needed to go into it, you've

0:26:28.640 --> 0:26:33.240
<v Speaker 3>had an extraordinary rise in productivity in the mining sector.

0:26:33.280 --> 0:26:35.679
<v Speaker 3>We've got so much better at getting stuff out of

0:26:35.680 --> 0:26:39.359
<v Speaker 3>the ground thanks to you know, big trucks. Those they've

0:26:39.359 --> 0:26:41.120
<v Speaker 3>allowed us to get so much of this stuff out

0:26:41.160 --> 0:26:44.119
<v Speaker 3>of the ground and keep the price low to allow

0:26:44.200 --> 0:26:48.600
<v Speaker 3>countries like China and India to start to industrialize. If

0:26:48.600 --> 0:26:53.240
<v Speaker 3>it wasn't for this amazing productivity miracle, this undertold miracle,

0:26:54.080 --> 0:26:56.520
<v Speaker 3>then you wouldn't have had the kind of progress we've had.

0:26:56.520 --> 0:26:58.800
<v Speaker 3>You wouldn't have had the sheer number of people rising

0:26:58.800 --> 0:27:00.600
<v Speaker 3>out of the poverty numbers that we had. So there

0:27:00.640 --> 0:27:03.240
<v Speaker 3>was an amazing story here, But the corollary of that

0:27:03.359 --> 0:27:06.640
<v Speaker 3>story is that there are fewer people than ever before

0:27:07.040 --> 0:27:11.399
<v Speaker 3>working in the material world. It's not just economics, obviously,

0:27:11.480 --> 0:27:13.000
<v Speaker 3>is it. It's also then they've got the kind of

0:27:13.040 --> 0:27:15.840
<v Speaker 3>national security question. You've got do we want to be

0:27:15.880 --> 0:27:18.320
<v Speaker 3>so reliant on China? Because in a sense that kind

0:27:18.359 --> 0:27:22.560
<v Speaker 3>of the shadow hero protagonist of this book is also China,

0:27:22.560 --> 0:27:25.000
<v Speaker 3>because in every single one of these materials, it's basically

0:27:25.080 --> 0:27:28.320
<v Speaker 3>pretty dominant. And so do you still want to be

0:27:28.440 --> 0:27:29.879
<v Speaker 3>kind of so reliant? What do you want to do

0:27:29.920 --> 0:27:32.960
<v Speaker 3>about that? We're all kind of aware of how reliant

0:27:33.000 --> 0:27:37.240
<v Speaker 3>we are on China for stuff, perhaps we're not even

0:27:37.280 --> 0:27:41.520
<v Speaker 3>aware of just how great that is. And so again,

0:27:41.560 --> 0:27:47.360
<v Speaker 3>whether it's green tech, whether it's plastics, whether it's copper.

0:27:47.400 --> 0:27:49.919
<v Speaker 3>You know, almost half of all of the world's copper

0:27:50.000 --> 0:27:51.880
<v Speaker 3>is refined in China. You're a lot of people talk

0:27:51.880 --> 0:27:55.080
<v Speaker 3>about rare earth materials and how look, it's terrible. China

0:27:55.119 --> 0:27:58.680
<v Speaker 3>has a massive stranglehold, which they do copper. You know,

0:27:59.240 --> 0:28:01.959
<v Speaker 3>the majority of the world's copper concentrate, which comes out

0:28:02.000 --> 0:28:03.359
<v Speaker 3>of the mind. So there's two types of that. You

0:28:03.359 --> 0:28:05.360
<v Speaker 3>get the kind of some refined copper, but you also

0:28:05.400 --> 0:28:08.199
<v Speaker 3>get copper concentrate, which is less refined. The majority of

0:28:08.240 --> 0:28:10.560
<v Speaker 3>that gets shipped over to China from all over the world.

0:28:10.600 --> 0:28:13.679
<v Speaker 3>So it's you know, in and Easier, It's it's Chili,

0:28:13.800 --> 0:28:15.719
<v Speaker 3>it's it's pappened in the Guinea, it's all of these places,

0:28:16.000 --> 0:28:18.800
<v Speaker 3>and then it gets sent to China, and China is

0:28:19.000 --> 0:28:22.439
<v Speaker 3>right at the heart of that supply chain now and

0:28:22.520 --> 0:28:25.840
<v Speaker 3>without an incredible increase in the amount of copper that

0:28:25.880 --> 0:28:28.760
<v Speaker 3>we have, we are not going to fulfill anything. We're

0:28:28.760 --> 0:28:30.760
<v Speaker 3>not going to be able to build enough wind turbines,

0:28:30.760 --> 0:28:32.320
<v Speaker 3>we're not gonna be able to make enough solar panels,

0:28:32.320 --> 0:28:34.679
<v Speaker 3>we're not gonna be able to make enough electric cars

0:28:35.240 --> 0:28:36.040
<v Speaker 3>and so, and.

0:28:36.000 --> 0:28:38.600
<v Speaker 1>We're not also going to be able to upgrade our

0:28:38.680 --> 0:28:42.840
<v Speaker 1>grids to even begin to cope with the many intermittent

0:28:42.920 --> 0:28:46.160
<v Speaker 1>sources of energy that come in. Right, that's also a

0:28:46.280 --> 0:28:47.200
<v Speaker 1>major part of it.

0:28:47.400 --> 0:28:49.000
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, you need copper. You need a lot of aluminium

0:28:49.000 --> 0:28:52.560
<v Speaker 3>for that as well, but particularly copper and copper and iron.

0:28:53.000 --> 0:28:57.920
<v Speaker 3>You need electrical steel and copper for transformers. Transformers are

0:28:57.960 --> 0:28:59.880
<v Speaker 3>one of the most exciting things in the world. No

0:29:00.120 --> 0:29:04.200
<v Speaker 3>one talks about transformers, but these, you know, these boxes

0:29:04.880 --> 0:29:07.960
<v Speaker 3>of copper and iron that sit somewhere and no one

0:29:08.000 --> 0:29:10.480
<v Speaker 3>pays any attention to them and allow us to modulate

0:29:10.520 --> 0:29:14.120
<v Speaker 3>between AC and DC and change the frequency are one

0:29:14.160 --> 0:29:17.240
<v Speaker 3>of the most important things in the world. And for them,

0:29:17.320 --> 0:29:19.520
<v Speaker 3>like you say, we need we need a lot of copper.

0:29:19.560 --> 0:29:21.560
<v Speaker 3>We need a lot of copper for that. And we

0:29:21.680 --> 0:29:24.320
<v Speaker 3>need to upgrade all our grids in the UK massively,

0:29:24.880 --> 0:29:27.160
<v Speaker 3>in the US as well across much of Europe. And

0:29:27.600 --> 0:29:30.040
<v Speaker 3>there you run into another issue, okay, which is that

0:29:30.800 --> 0:29:32.560
<v Speaker 3>the UK is a really good example of that. We

0:29:32.640 --> 0:29:34.560
<v Speaker 3>need to we need to build a lot more pylons

0:29:35.600 --> 0:29:37.680
<v Speaker 3>to get us the power that we need for all

0:29:37.720 --> 0:29:39.920
<v Speaker 3>these electric cars and stuff, but also to get it

0:29:39.960 --> 0:29:43.600
<v Speaker 3>from the places where we're generating that power right now. Yeah,

0:29:43.680 --> 0:29:47.840
<v Speaker 3>what's fascinating about this material world filled with companies you've

0:29:47.920 --> 0:29:52.920
<v Speaker 3>never heard of, you know, companies making polysilicon, and companies

0:29:52.920 --> 0:29:55.360
<v Speaker 3>making kind of random products that turn out to be

0:29:55.440 --> 0:29:59.160
<v Speaker 3>the basis for Apple's entire business, and you know Tela's

0:29:59.280 --> 0:30:02.560
<v Speaker 3>entire business. Anyway, one company that's kind of interesting to me.

0:30:03.080 --> 0:30:06.440
<v Speaker 3>It's called prismium and they make I'm not this this

0:30:06.560 --> 0:30:08.320
<v Speaker 3>is I have no idea about what's going on the core.

0:30:08.440 --> 0:30:10.719
<v Speaker 1>This is not an investment. This is not investment advice,

0:30:10.880 --> 0:30:11.480
<v Speaker 1>just to be clear.

0:30:11.600 --> 0:30:15.080
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, just fascinating because they make the cables that go

0:30:15.200 --> 0:30:17.360
<v Speaker 3>under the sea. Okay, you know you've probably seen some

0:30:17.400 --> 0:30:20.920
<v Speaker 3>of the diagrams of these cables. Copper in the middle,

0:30:21.360 --> 0:30:24.560
<v Speaker 3>shielded with various different kind of bits of steel on

0:30:24.600 --> 0:30:25.640
<v Speaker 3>the outside.

0:30:25.440 --> 0:30:28.040
<v Speaker 1>And huge, right, the diameter these things is whopping.

0:30:29.560 --> 0:30:32.360
<v Speaker 3>Fiber roptics are smaller, but yeah, copper is coppera is

0:30:32.400 --> 0:30:34.440
<v Speaker 3>is thick, particularly for an under sea for a high

0:30:34.480 --> 0:30:37.320
<v Speaker 3>voltage under sea cable, and we're going to have to

0:30:37.360 --> 0:30:38.760
<v Speaker 3>make so many more of them. Were don't have to

0:30:38.840 --> 0:30:42.000
<v Speaker 3>lay so much cable in the coming years. And it's

0:30:42.280 --> 0:30:44.640
<v Speaker 3>interesting there is this company that basically dominate both the

0:30:44.640 --> 0:30:47.800
<v Speaker 3>manufacturer of those cables and the laying of them, which

0:30:48.560 --> 0:30:51.800
<v Speaker 3>again you find quite a few of these, these companies

0:30:51.840 --> 0:30:55.040
<v Speaker 3>which dominate this world. Back to what I think it's

0:30:55.200 --> 0:30:58.800
<v Speaker 3>inspiring about this. There was that that was it Peter

0:30:58.880 --> 0:31:02.120
<v Speaker 3>Teel who said, you know where's my flying car? You know,

0:31:02.160 --> 0:31:03.800
<v Speaker 3>you gave me one hundred and sixty character or two

0:31:03.880 --> 0:31:05.760
<v Speaker 3>hundred and forty characters. But where's my flying car?

0:31:06.080 --> 0:31:06.280
<v Speaker 1>Yep?

0:31:06.560 --> 0:31:10.160
<v Speaker 3>Totally fair, Yeah, well it is. But here we are again.

0:31:10.200 --> 0:31:13.120
<v Speaker 3>We're starting with we are. We are building stuff. It's

0:31:13.160 --> 0:31:15.920
<v Speaker 3>beginning to happen. And in order to fulfill that zero,

0:31:15.960 --> 0:31:18.040
<v Speaker 3>one of the inspiring and exciting things about it is

0:31:18.040 --> 0:31:22.840
<v Speaker 3>it involves one of the biggest infrastructure opportunities challenges that

0:31:22.280 --> 0:31:25.920
<v Speaker 3>we have that we've had for many, many decades, both

0:31:25.920 --> 0:31:27.520
<v Speaker 3>in this country and elsewhere. We need to do it

0:31:27.560 --> 0:31:29.760
<v Speaker 3>all over again again. You know, imagine if we did

0:31:29.800 --> 0:31:33.880
<v Speaker 3>have a global electricity grid, so you could have power

0:31:33.920 --> 0:31:38.320
<v Speaker 3>from Morocco sent through to Europe, solar power from there,

0:31:38.320 --> 0:31:41.360
<v Speaker 3>you kind of win power from elsewhere. That's quite an

0:31:41.360 --> 0:31:43.680
<v Speaker 3>exciting story. But in order for it to happen, you

0:31:43.760 --> 0:31:45.800
<v Speaker 3>need a lot more infrastructure, You need a lot more copper,

0:31:45.800 --> 0:31:47.160
<v Speaker 3>you need a lot more of these cables to go

0:31:47.200 --> 0:31:51.320
<v Speaker 3>down under sea. And again, right now, it's quite hard

0:31:51.360 --> 0:31:54.800
<v Speaker 3>to persuade anyone to open new mine and new copper mine,

0:31:54.840 --> 0:31:57.680
<v Speaker 3>and so the question is whether whether people are going

0:31:57.720 --> 0:32:00.240
<v Speaker 3>to be willing enough to actually do the mine that

0:32:00.280 --> 0:32:03.320
<v Speaker 3>we need to do in order to get to net zero.

0:32:03.960 --> 0:32:05.680
<v Speaker 1>Well, this is one of the big conversations in the

0:32:05.720 --> 0:32:09.000
<v Speaker 1>investment markets in that historically everyone always says that the

0:32:09.320 --> 0:32:11.640
<v Speaker 1>cure for high prices in the commodity market is high

0:32:11.640 --> 0:32:13.400
<v Speaker 1>prices because it has to go up and then you

0:32:13.400 --> 0:32:16.720
<v Speaker 1>have more exploration, more minds opening, and that brings prices down.

0:32:17.200 --> 0:32:19.040
<v Speaker 1>But of course, at the moment you look around the

0:32:19.080 --> 0:32:21.520
<v Speaker 1>world and prices go up, and who's going to open

0:32:21.560 --> 0:32:23.360
<v Speaker 1>a new mind in this environment? As you say, it's

0:32:23.400 --> 0:32:26.960
<v Speaker 1>incredibly difficult. Across the developed world, it's difficult in Chile.

0:32:27.040 --> 0:32:29.200
<v Speaker 1>I've been reading a lot about that. There's a lot

0:32:29.200 --> 0:32:32.840
<v Speaker 1>of concern there about the lithium in particular in Chili

0:32:32.880 --> 0:32:35.920
<v Speaker 1>red So you know, as prices go up, who's going

0:32:35.960 --> 0:32:39.360
<v Speaker 1>to be the one who approves the new minds. It's

0:32:39.400 --> 0:32:42.200
<v Speaker 1>a very difficult argument to make, as you say, because

0:32:42.200 --> 0:32:45.360
<v Speaker 1>there isn't enough nuance in the debate, Whereas the argument

0:32:45.440 --> 0:32:47.400
<v Speaker 1>really should be, if you want to move to an

0:32:47.480 --> 0:32:50.520
<v Speaker 1>environmentally superior world, you've got to dig the minds first.

0:32:50.880 --> 0:32:52.520
<v Speaker 3>I think that's it, and I think I think the

0:32:52.600 --> 0:32:55.880
<v Speaker 3>difficulty that the frustration I sometimes feel is when you

0:32:55.880 --> 0:32:58.200
<v Speaker 3>talk to people who can very earnestly want us to

0:32:59.600 --> 0:33:02.640
<v Speaker 3>reduce carbon emissions and to fulfill all of these objectives.

0:33:02.920 --> 0:33:05.120
<v Speaker 3>One of the things they also don't like is new mines.

0:33:05.200 --> 0:33:07.520
<v Speaker 3>They don't they don't like the mines and they don't

0:33:07.520 --> 0:33:11.600
<v Speaker 3>want the extra mining. But there is is just implausible

0:33:11.640 --> 0:33:14.239
<v Speaker 3>to see. And then the argument is, then, oh, well,

0:33:14.280 --> 0:33:16.280
<v Speaker 3>we should just consume less. And of course that's true.

0:33:16.360 --> 0:33:20.600
<v Speaker 3>You know, we in this country and elsewhere could certainly

0:33:20.640 --> 0:33:22.920
<v Speaker 3>consume a bit less. You know, we could seem a

0:33:22.920 --> 0:33:26.280
<v Speaker 3>lot could maybe consume a lot less. But even if

0:33:26.280 --> 0:33:31.000
<v Speaker 3>we did that, it still wouldn't kind of make the difference.

0:33:31.160 --> 0:33:33.680
<v Speaker 1>It's still well, it wouldn't begin to move the dial globally.

0:33:34.000 --> 0:33:36.400
<v Speaker 1>That's the key thing. What we do here makes no

0:33:36.480 --> 0:33:39.040
<v Speaker 1>difference globally. No, And maybe we should just dig up

0:33:39.040 --> 0:33:40.360
<v Speaker 1>all of Cornwall. I mean, there's been a lot of

0:33:40.360 --> 0:33:43.160
<v Speaker 1>copper and lithium in Cornwall, right and there are talks

0:33:43.200 --> 0:33:45.840
<v Speaker 1>about reopening minds. We could just dig the whole thing up, yes,

0:33:45.880 --> 0:33:47.959
<v Speaker 1>and that would be the environmentally friendly thing to do

0:33:48.080 --> 0:33:48.480
<v Speaker 1>right now.

0:33:48.760 --> 0:33:51.760
<v Speaker 3>Ye'll to dig up Cornwall, yeah, totally, because the grades

0:33:51.800 --> 0:33:53.360
<v Speaker 3>that some of the grades there are better than some

0:33:53.440 --> 0:33:55.680
<v Speaker 3>of the grades you get in Chili, no joke, No, joke.

0:33:55.720 --> 0:33:57.959
<v Speaker 3>I mean, there's you know, but I don't know if

0:33:57.960 --> 0:34:01.040
<v Speaker 3>anyone really wants to dig up all those holiday homes.

0:34:01.080 --> 0:34:03.360
<v Speaker 3>But having been to a copper mine, actually a few

0:34:03.360 --> 0:34:07.120
<v Speaker 3>copper mines, you need to create some pretty enormous holes

0:34:07.120 --> 0:34:09.200
<v Speaker 3>in the ground in order to do it, and so

0:34:09.280 --> 0:34:12.520
<v Speaker 3>our you know, willingness to do that does start to

0:34:12.520 --> 0:34:14.360
<v Speaker 3>diminish when it's in nice, pretty places.

0:34:15.040 --> 0:34:15.520
<v Speaker 2>But that's right.

0:34:15.560 --> 0:34:18.200
<v Speaker 1>We'd rather dig up somebody else's country, wouldn't we totally?

0:34:18.280 --> 0:34:19.600
<v Speaker 3>And on the other side of the world, in a

0:34:19.600 --> 0:34:21.640
<v Speaker 3>place like the Attakama Desert where no one comes there

0:34:21.640 --> 0:34:23.840
<v Speaker 3>and no one looks at it. But god, those holds

0:34:24.200 --> 0:34:27.239
<v Speaker 3>a massive They're canyons. They are man made canyons. So

0:34:27.680 --> 0:34:30.040
<v Speaker 3>one of the great productivity achievements of the past few

0:34:30.239 --> 0:34:32.719
<v Speaker 3>decades has been that we have managed to be even

0:34:32.760 --> 0:34:34.719
<v Speaker 3>better at getting copper out of the ground. And as

0:34:34.760 --> 0:34:38.759
<v Speaker 3>a result of that, all those those doom laden predictions

0:34:38.800 --> 0:34:41.000
<v Speaker 3>about how we were going to run out of materials. Remember,

0:34:41.080 --> 0:34:42.560
<v Speaker 3>you know, this is not the first time that there's

0:34:42.600 --> 0:34:45.560
<v Speaker 3>been this dialogue. The Club of Rome Limits to Growth

0:34:45.560 --> 0:34:48.040
<v Speaker 3>the nineteen seventies was all about how we were going

0:34:48.080 --> 0:34:49.400
<v Speaker 3>to run out of stuff, and we were going to

0:34:49.480 --> 0:34:52.640
<v Speaker 3>destroy the world. That didn't happen. It didn't happen because

0:34:52.640 --> 0:34:57.040
<v Speaker 3>we became so much better at getting ever more copper

0:34:57.520 --> 0:35:01.680
<v Speaker 3>out of ever less promising all so the grades of

0:35:01.719 --> 0:35:03.799
<v Speaker 3>the rock that we get out of the ground have

0:35:03.920 --> 0:35:06.520
<v Speaker 3>become less promising, and the stuff that we previously would

0:35:06.520 --> 0:35:08.840
<v Speaker 3>have said as junk now turns out to be legitimate

0:35:08.880 --> 0:35:11.200
<v Speaker 3>copper or And the upshot is these holes have got

0:35:11.239 --> 0:35:14.280
<v Speaker 3>even deeper. The question is whether we can have another

0:35:14.280 --> 0:35:16.680
<v Speaker 3>one of those leaps again. If we can, then maybe

0:35:16.680 --> 0:35:18.840
<v Speaker 3>we can do kind of get a bit squeeze a

0:35:18.840 --> 0:35:20.719
<v Speaker 3>bit more out of the existing minds. But I think

0:35:20.800 --> 0:35:24.560
<v Speaker 3>even if you make all the most optimistic assumptions about that,

0:35:25.320 --> 0:35:28.320
<v Speaker 3>you still need a shed load nor more copper minds.

0:35:28.560 --> 0:35:31.960
<v Speaker 3>And right now the pipeline isn't promising enough on copper.

0:35:33.120 --> 0:35:35.560
<v Speaker 1>Okay, well that's optimistic realism as well. I'm going to

0:35:35.600 --> 0:35:37.440
<v Speaker 1>put you down as an optimistic realist.

0:35:38.280 --> 0:35:42.160
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, it's exciting, but it's exciting, it's exciting, and it's

0:35:42.239 --> 0:35:44.879
<v Speaker 3>energizing because we can make stuff we.

0:35:44.800 --> 0:35:47.040
<v Speaker 1>Haven't talked, and we want to talk briefly about lithium.

0:35:47.080 --> 0:35:49.680
<v Speaker 1>It's the last chapter in your book and it's the

0:35:49.719 --> 0:35:52.040
<v Speaker 1>metal I think of what all the substance material that

0:35:52.080 --> 0:35:54.720
<v Speaker 1>when people run down the contents, when they get to lithium,

0:35:54.920 --> 0:35:57.120
<v Speaker 1>it'll be the first one they'll think to themselves, lithium

0:35:57.239 --> 0:35:59.880
<v Speaker 1>is that really as important as oil and salt and sand?

0:36:01.280 --> 0:36:05.920
<v Speaker 1>But it is for the future as opposed to historically, Yeah.

0:36:05.719 --> 0:36:10.520
<v Speaker 3>It is. Lithium is still incredibly, incredibly important. It is

0:36:10.520 --> 0:36:12.760
<v Speaker 3>there at the heart of pretty much every battery chemistry

0:36:12.880 --> 0:36:16.080
<v Speaker 3>you're talking about. It's not the only thing. We need nickel,

0:36:16.120 --> 0:36:20.440
<v Speaker 3>we need manganese cobos in some places. But our ability

0:36:20.520 --> 0:36:22.439
<v Speaker 3>to get enough lithium out of the ground is going

0:36:22.480 --> 0:36:26.160
<v Speaker 3>to be one of the most telling questions in whether

0:36:26.200 --> 0:36:28.560
<v Speaker 3>we can achieve the other part of net zero, which

0:36:28.600 --> 0:36:32.160
<v Speaker 3>is electrifying road transport and also you know, providing the

0:36:32.160 --> 0:36:35.040
<v Speaker 3>lithium that we're using for talking on devices like this,

0:36:35.680 --> 0:36:39.400
<v Speaker 3>and the process of getting that lithium out of the ground, well,

0:36:39.440 --> 0:36:41.239
<v Speaker 3>it's kind of fascinating. So I went out to Chile

0:36:41.320 --> 0:36:46.239
<v Speaker 3>to go to the lithium ponds where it is where

0:36:46.239 --> 0:36:48.640
<v Speaker 3>it has got from under the ground, so that the

0:36:48.680 --> 0:36:51.440
<v Speaker 3>Saladieta camera is this kind of crazy place in the

0:36:51.520 --> 0:36:53.160
<v Speaker 3>dry one of the dryest does it's where's the dryest

0:36:53.160 --> 0:36:56.719
<v Speaker 3>desert in the world where you can stand on this

0:36:56.840 --> 0:37:00.560
<v Speaker 3>salt flat? And I did, and a few meat beneath

0:37:00.600 --> 0:37:03.319
<v Speaker 3>your feet. It's slightly terrifying because I was told later

0:37:03.400 --> 0:37:05.759
<v Speaker 3>I shouldn't have said on the salt flat, because a

0:37:05.760 --> 0:37:10.000
<v Speaker 3>few meters beneath your feet there is this gigantic underground

0:37:10.080 --> 0:37:13.000
<v Speaker 3>reservoir of brine and it's just been sitting there. It's

0:37:13.040 --> 0:37:15.839
<v Speaker 3>this strange kind of spooky thing. You think about water

0:37:16.320 --> 0:37:20.120
<v Speaker 3>have been constantly in motion, but there's this underground well

0:37:20.360 --> 0:37:23.759
<v Speaker 3>where lithium has been there for millions of years, and

0:37:23.760 --> 0:37:27.520
<v Speaker 3>then we pump up the brine and then gradually precipitate

0:37:27.560 --> 0:37:29.920
<v Speaker 3>away the other different salts in it. It's funny thing

0:37:30.000 --> 0:37:32.480
<v Speaker 3>is when you know, if you read the book in sequence,

0:37:33.000 --> 0:37:35.439
<v Speaker 3>there's there's a large section on salt, and it turns

0:37:35.480 --> 0:37:37.719
<v Speaker 3>out that the way the way we make lithium, at

0:37:37.800 --> 0:37:40.880
<v Speaker 3>least from these from these brine deposits, is basically the

0:37:40.920 --> 0:37:43.160
<v Speaker 3>same as the way that we make salt. So you're

0:37:43.160 --> 0:37:47.560
<v Speaker 3>evaporating away in those large ponds over a long period.

0:37:48.200 --> 0:37:52.120
<v Speaker 3>And again, the interesting thing in future is going to

0:37:52.120 --> 0:37:55.439
<v Speaker 3>be whether we can get enough of it right now

0:37:56.000 --> 0:37:57.719
<v Speaker 3>there's far more lithium coming out of the ground in

0:37:57.719 --> 0:38:01.680
<v Speaker 3>Australia because you can mine as a hard rock and

0:38:01.719 --> 0:38:04.200
<v Speaker 3>then ship it off to China to get refined and

0:38:04.200 --> 0:38:05.520
<v Speaker 3>then you can just get more out of the ground

0:38:05.560 --> 0:38:07.839
<v Speaker 3>that way, whereas in Chile you're basically having to wait

0:38:07.880 --> 0:38:09.799
<v Speaker 3>for the sun to do its work so evaporate it

0:38:09.800 --> 0:38:12.600
<v Speaker 3>over the course of a year or so, and so

0:38:12.840 --> 0:38:15.800
<v Speaker 3>again we fall back on our reliance on on China.

0:38:16.160 --> 0:38:19.440
<v Speaker 3>And you know it is there's there's all of the

0:38:19.440 --> 0:38:23.400
<v Speaker 3>same issues here, the environmental question. You know, we're using

0:38:23.800 --> 0:38:26.799
<v Speaker 3>the deploying water in one of the driest regions of

0:38:26.800 --> 0:38:31.319
<v Speaker 3>the world, getting it's a totally pristine ecosystem. We have

0:38:31.400 --> 0:38:34.120
<v Speaker 3>no idea what we're doing to it, yet we're doing it.

0:38:35.160 --> 0:38:37.400
<v Speaker 3>And then the locals, the locals really don't like it

0:38:37.480 --> 0:38:40.359
<v Speaker 3>at all. But they don't and that's happened. And that's

0:38:40.400 --> 0:38:42.560
<v Speaker 3>that's We're only at the start of this for lithium.

0:38:42.719 --> 0:38:46.360
<v Speaker 3>So you know, that's that's that's pretty kind of profound.

0:38:46.400 --> 0:38:48.560
<v Speaker 3>I think I don't think we're going to have it.

0:38:48.600 --> 0:38:49.879
<v Speaker 3>I think we're going to be able to get enough

0:38:49.880 --> 0:38:52.480
<v Speaker 3>of this stuff. But what's interesting with lithium as opposed

0:38:52.480 --> 0:38:54.200
<v Speaker 3>to the other kind of materials. I look at the book.

0:38:54.360 --> 0:38:56.399
<v Speaker 3>Is it's just that it's new. You know, we've got

0:38:56.480 --> 0:38:59.360
<v Speaker 3>hundreds of years of about thousands of years of experience

0:38:59.360 --> 0:39:03.120
<v Speaker 3>of mining copper. We only, you know, very recently decided

0:39:03.120 --> 0:39:05.239
<v Speaker 3>that we like lithium for good reason. It's it's about

0:39:05.239 --> 0:39:07.520
<v Speaker 3>the best thing you can put in a battery. But

0:39:07.560 --> 0:39:09.960
<v Speaker 3>we don't have much experience of mining it and how

0:39:10.000 --> 0:39:12.280
<v Speaker 3>we do that, and how we deal with the world

0:39:12.280 --> 0:39:15.080
<v Speaker 3>which is less into mining. Now for this grand new

0:39:15.440 --> 0:39:19.560
<v Speaker 3>beginning of exploitation is going to be a kind of

0:39:19.719 --> 0:39:21.719
<v Speaker 3>an interesting one. I'm not sure where that's going to

0:39:21.800 --> 0:39:22.359
<v Speaker 3>kind of end up.

0:39:23.560 --> 0:39:27.080
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, okay, well, hopefully not digging up all of cornwall,

0:39:27.120 --> 0:39:29.320
<v Speaker 1>but we'll see me.

0:39:29.480 --> 0:39:32.759
<v Speaker 3>You know, I'm up for digging parts of cornwall because

0:39:32.920 --> 0:39:34.719
<v Speaker 3>there's there's loads of copper. And wouldn't it be great

0:39:34.760 --> 0:39:36.520
<v Speaker 3>if we could make cop We've got lots of titanium.

0:39:36.520 --> 0:39:39.680
<v Speaker 3>I think there's titan or tungs in the UK.

0:39:40.400 --> 0:39:45.279
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, we could live with that bottoming more really goodn't we? Hey?

0:39:45.280 --> 0:39:45.520
<v Speaker 3>Mas?

0:39:45.560 --> 0:39:49.360
<v Speaker 1>The usual exer, thank you carry on it.

0:39:49.920 --> 0:39:52.000
<v Speaker 3>We we do, we do. We've got lithium in cornwall,

0:39:52.120 --> 0:39:55.400
<v Speaker 3>so there's there's. But the thing is the UK is always,

0:39:55.920 --> 0:39:58.799
<v Speaker 3>you know, relied on other people to get to get

0:39:58.840 --> 0:40:02.799
<v Speaker 3>its kind of metals. I think the interesting one interesting thing. Okay,

0:40:02.600 --> 0:40:06.880
<v Speaker 3>so when when we were in those early days of

0:40:07.080 --> 0:40:11.840
<v Speaker 3>crossing the world with those cables, so the copper cables

0:40:11.520 --> 0:40:16.440
<v Speaker 3>that were our first telecommunications network, the boats that the

0:40:16.480 --> 0:40:19.840
<v Speaker 3>ships that were doing that discovered when they were dragging

0:40:19.880 --> 0:40:23.280
<v Speaker 3>their kind of their sounders across the across the bottom

0:40:23.280 --> 0:40:27.520
<v Speaker 3>of the Atlantic, they discovered these things called polymetallic nodules.

0:40:28.120 --> 0:40:30.360
<v Speaker 1>Very I was reading about those the other day.

0:40:30.360 --> 0:40:35.799
<v Speaker 3>Well, the other frontier. So polymetallic nodules. Actually, I think

0:40:35.800 --> 0:40:37.520
<v Speaker 3>they found them in the Pacific, because that's where most

0:40:37.560 --> 0:40:39.799
<v Speaker 3>of them are. Are these little rocks that you find

0:40:39.840 --> 0:40:42.839
<v Speaker 3>on the seabed which are very dense, very very high

0:40:42.920 --> 0:40:45.680
<v Speaker 3>grades of a lot of the metals that people quite

0:40:45.719 --> 0:40:47.680
<v Speaker 3>want these days, so cobalt and copper and a few

0:40:47.719 --> 0:40:51.319
<v Speaker 3>other things besides nicol. I think, and one of the

0:40:51.360 --> 0:40:55.480
<v Speaker 3>big questions in the coming years again is whether we

0:40:55.520 --> 0:40:57.759
<v Speaker 3>are going to start mining under the sea. And so

0:40:57.840 --> 0:40:59.360
<v Speaker 3>I have a whole chapter on this because actually it

0:40:59.400 --> 0:41:02.200
<v Speaker 3>turns out there might be a whole lot more copper

0:41:02.880 --> 0:41:05.560
<v Speaker 3>in those deposits under the sea than anyone who has

0:41:05.560 --> 0:41:08.440
<v Speaker 3>accounted for at the moment, even in the official numbers.

0:41:08.760 --> 0:41:13.440
<v Speaker 3>And if we don't want to mine on land, are

0:41:13.440 --> 0:41:15.359
<v Speaker 3>we going to be any more likely to want to

0:41:15.400 --> 0:41:17.640
<v Speaker 3>mine under the sea. Probably not, because that's another that's

0:41:17.640 --> 0:41:19.440
<v Speaker 3>an even more pristine ecosystem.

0:41:19.600 --> 0:41:21.799
<v Speaker 1>But not only that, that's an ecosystem that we don't

0:41:21.840 --> 0:41:24.920
<v Speaker 1>know nearly as much about yet. And at least, if

0:41:24.920 --> 0:41:27.400
<v Speaker 1>we're mining on land, we know what we're doing, we

0:41:27.480 --> 0:41:29.480
<v Speaker 1>know what we're destroying as we go. We understand these

0:41:29.520 --> 0:41:33.839
<v Speaker 1>ecosystems relatively well, whereas on the ocean bottom we don't

0:41:33.880 --> 0:41:37.480
<v Speaker 1>understand really anything about those ecosystems. We only just discovered

0:41:37.520 --> 0:41:39.719
<v Speaker 1>these nodules. We have no idea what would happen if

0:41:39.719 --> 0:41:41.640
<v Speaker 1>we had to scrape them off off the seabird.

0:41:42.080 --> 0:41:44.839
<v Speaker 3>Totally totally and I mean like we I'd say the

0:41:44.840 --> 0:41:47.120
<v Speaker 3>mainly one exception to that is just that things like

0:41:47.120 --> 0:41:49.440
<v Speaker 3>the salt the salad data camera in Chili, where we

0:41:49.480 --> 0:41:51.520
<v Speaker 3>really don't know much about how that, how that really functions.

0:41:51.640 --> 0:41:57.000
<v Speaker 3>But under the sea, under the sea totally pristine, we

0:41:57.080 --> 0:41:59.040
<v Speaker 3>know so little about it. What we do know is

0:41:59.040 --> 0:42:03.600
<v Speaker 3>that whenever we go into a new habitat and plunder it.

0:42:02.719 --> 0:42:07.799
<v Speaker 3>There are consequences, and yet that is where a lot

0:42:07.800 --> 0:42:10.480
<v Speaker 3>of people are racing towards right now. I mean, I

0:42:10.520 --> 0:42:12.719
<v Speaker 3>think it's probably less likely. I think what's much more

0:42:12.760 --> 0:42:14.680
<v Speaker 3>likely is that we just get better at mining the

0:42:14.719 --> 0:42:19.719
<v Speaker 3>stuff from terrestrial minds. But even so, the hunger for

0:42:19.800 --> 0:42:24.600
<v Speaker 3>minerals is so great now that people are looking in

0:42:24.640 --> 0:42:27.720
<v Speaker 3>all sorts of places to find this stuff. And the

0:42:27.760 --> 0:42:32.160
<v Speaker 3>reluctance amongst many people on land to have mining near

0:42:32.200 --> 0:42:35.880
<v Speaker 3>them is such that you know, if you're not going

0:42:35.960 --> 0:42:38.279
<v Speaker 3>to let them mine on land, then maybe you're going

0:42:38.320 --> 0:42:40.200
<v Speaker 3>to find the path of lease resistance. And right now

0:42:40.880 --> 0:42:43.800
<v Speaker 3>that is actually a part of least resistance, because you know,

0:42:43.840 --> 0:42:47.799
<v Speaker 3>you've got places like the International Seabird Authority which are

0:42:47.840 --> 0:42:52.360
<v Speaker 3>in the process of laying down the rules to allow

0:42:52.440 --> 0:42:55.600
<v Speaker 3>deep sea mining. We don't know. That's an ongoing conversation

0:42:55.840 --> 0:42:58.319
<v Speaker 3>right now, but it's within a kind of regulatory body

0:42:58.360 --> 0:43:01.480
<v Speaker 3>which no one's ever heard of, Frank, and there's very

0:43:01.480 --> 0:43:04.120
<v Speaker 3>little oversight. I went there. I went to Jamaica where

0:43:04.120 --> 0:43:06.600
<v Speaker 3>the International Seabed Authority is based. They're the guys, you know,

0:43:06.640 --> 0:43:09.120
<v Speaker 3>who decide who is allowed to mine on the seabed,

0:43:09.560 --> 0:43:13.640
<v Speaker 3>and it's this sleepy place on the on the seafront

0:43:13.680 --> 0:43:16.319
<v Speaker 3>in Kingston. It's rather delightful, but it feels like a

0:43:16.400 --> 0:43:18.360
<v Speaker 3>kind of you're going into a time capsule. It's an

0:43:18.360 --> 0:43:22.680
<v Speaker 3>old nineteen seventies bond set for like the Roger Moore era.

0:43:23.120 --> 0:43:24.840
<v Speaker 3>But they've still got the kind of phone booths with

0:43:24.920 --> 0:43:27.520
<v Speaker 3>the nineteen seventies era of phones that you could kind

0:43:27.560 --> 0:43:30.400
<v Speaker 3>of pick up and still work functioning. That is the

0:43:30.400 --> 0:43:34.000
<v Speaker 3>front line for deep sea mining right now, and no

0:43:34.040 --> 0:43:36.120
<v Speaker 3>one is quite sure what they're going to come up

0:43:36.120 --> 0:43:39.520
<v Speaker 3>with right now. So we are in a really interesting

0:43:39.520 --> 0:43:45.200
<v Speaker 3>moment where we're testing our kind of limits of reluctance

0:43:45.320 --> 0:43:48.520
<v Speaker 3>or willingness as to how much exploitation we're going to

0:43:48.520 --> 0:43:48.879
<v Speaker 3>be doing.

0:43:50.280 --> 0:43:52.680
<v Speaker 1>Ed last question, because I've had you for too long,

0:43:52.760 --> 0:43:55.520
<v Speaker 1>I must let you go. But how long before we

0:43:55.600 --> 0:43:57.839
<v Speaker 1>can mine all these minerals in space and we can

0:43:57.840 --> 0:43:59.600
<v Speaker 1>start worrying about all these conversations.

0:43:59.680 --> 0:44:03.560
<v Speaker 3>Well, I mean even less likely than under the sea.

0:44:03.600 --> 0:44:06.279
<v Speaker 3>I think even less likely. Although I suppose you don't

0:44:06.320 --> 0:44:07.839
<v Speaker 3>have to worry about the kind of ecosystem thing.

0:44:07.880 --> 0:44:10.600
<v Speaker 1>But the well we think we don't We have no

0:44:10.680 --> 0:44:11.560
<v Speaker 1>idea either.

0:44:11.360 --> 0:44:14.480
<v Speaker 3>Do we actually maybe that's yeah, I know, blithely go

0:44:14.600 --> 0:44:17.759
<v Speaker 3>out there and accidentally discover life and then destroy it.

0:44:18.160 --> 0:44:21.160
<v Speaker 3>The thing I definitely kind of learned in the process

0:44:21.200 --> 0:44:24.120
<v Speaker 3>of kind of under you know, exploring more about mining

0:44:24.160 --> 0:44:27.080
<v Speaker 3>and not just mining, but the transformations we do to

0:44:27.360 --> 0:44:30.600
<v Speaker 3>turn one thing into another is that you know, in

0:44:30.640 --> 0:44:32.520
<v Speaker 3>the end, you do need to be able to do

0:44:32.600 --> 0:44:34.520
<v Speaker 3>it in a way that isn't going to bankrupt everyone,

0:44:35.120 --> 0:44:38.400
<v Speaker 3>because part of human progress is about making these things cheaper,

0:44:38.760 --> 0:44:42.440
<v Speaker 3>you know, making copper cheaper, making concrete cheaper so that

0:44:42.480 --> 0:44:45.560
<v Speaker 3>you can concrete in places, and you know, lives are

0:44:45.560 --> 0:44:49.879
<v Speaker 3>saved thanks to concrete because concrete floors in a house

0:44:49.960 --> 0:44:54.600
<v Speaker 3>rather than mud floors are just far better for the inhabitants.

0:44:55.320 --> 0:44:59.120
<v Speaker 3>So our ability to get this stuff at scale and

0:44:59.160 --> 0:45:05.000
<v Speaker 3>at reasonable is everything. Right now, we in the developed

0:45:05.040 --> 0:45:07.480
<v Speaker 3>world have about a lot of people kind of look

0:45:07.520 --> 0:45:10.360
<v Speaker 3>at development statistics and they focus on GDP per capita.

0:45:10.440 --> 0:45:13.120
<v Speaker 3>My favorite is steel per capita. So if you look

0:45:13.160 --> 0:45:15.840
<v Speaker 3>at the amount of steel that we have per head

0:45:17.040 --> 0:45:19.680
<v Speaker 3>in most developed economies like the UK and the US,

0:45:19.760 --> 0:45:23.319
<v Speaker 3>it's kind of about fifteen tons per capita. In China

0:45:23.680 --> 0:45:28.239
<v Speaker 3>it's about seven eight tons per capita. And bear in

0:45:28.280 --> 0:45:30.800
<v Speaker 3>mind that when we're talking about the steel per capita,

0:45:30.880 --> 0:45:33.239
<v Speaker 3>what does that mean. That means the steel around you

0:45:33.280 --> 0:45:35.440
<v Speaker 3>in your life. It means your car, most of your

0:45:35.440 --> 0:45:36.960
<v Speaker 3>car is still made from stel, even though bits and

0:45:36.960 --> 0:45:40.320
<v Speaker 3>pieces are made from aluminium. Still steel. It's the building

0:45:40.320 --> 0:45:42.759
<v Speaker 3>that you're you know, you're probably in right now. It's

0:45:42.800 --> 0:45:46.680
<v Speaker 3>the infrastructure, the high speed rail, the rails themselves, the trains,

0:45:46.920 --> 0:45:49.279
<v Speaker 3>it's the machines that make the things that you use.

0:45:49.320 --> 0:45:52.200
<v Speaker 3>Because everything, if it's not made of steel, it's made

0:45:52.280 --> 0:45:54.440
<v Speaker 3>with steel. So you need a hell of a lot

0:45:54.480 --> 0:45:58.520
<v Speaker 3>of steel to have a developed economy, to have hospitals,

0:45:58.520 --> 0:46:01.280
<v Speaker 3>to have infrastructure, to have the trappings that we all

0:46:01.520 --> 0:46:04.800
<v Speaker 3>feel we deserve. You need those fifteen tons of steel

0:46:04.800 --> 0:46:06.920
<v Speaker 3>per capita, okay, And we're more or less flat at

0:46:06.960 --> 0:46:09.000
<v Speaker 3>fifteen tons. It's not going up, so that's kind of

0:46:09.000 --> 0:46:11.080
<v Speaker 3>something we're not increasing our consumption per capita of still.

0:46:11.960 --> 0:46:14.839
<v Speaker 3>But in the developing world and in the emerging economies,

0:46:15.480 --> 0:46:17.440
<v Speaker 3>you know, that amount of steel per capita is more like,

0:46:17.480 --> 0:46:19.719
<v Speaker 3>well I said, in middle income it's more like kind

0:46:19.760 --> 0:46:23.759
<v Speaker 3>of seven six six tons. In parts of Africa, sub

0:46:23.800 --> 0:46:28.319
<v Speaker 3>Saharan Africa, it's one ton or less. And if those

0:46:28.400 --> 0:46:31.319
<v Speaker 3>economies are going to develop and become middle and then

0:46:31.560 --> 0:46:34.960
<v Speaker 3>developing develops economies mid income and then high income economies,

0:46:35.680 --> 0:46:38.680
<v Speaker 3>they will need more steel. Yeah, and infrastrate. If you're

0:46:38.680 --> 0:46:40.799
<v Speaker 3>gonna build out kind of highways you need stell, you

0:46:40.840 --> 0:46:43.399
<v Speaker 3>need still reinforcement for them. If you're gonna build out

0:46:43.600 --> 0:46:46.120
<v Speaker 3>kind of rail, if you're gonna build hospitals, you need still.

0:46:46.120 --> 0:46:49.720
<v Speaker 3>If you're gonna build schools, you need steel. And making

0:46:49.760 --> 0:46:52.400
<v Speaker 3>steel is massively carbon intensive, but it's also something we

0:46:52.440 --> 0:46:56.479
<v Speaker 3>do at scale, so you know that's your question. Yeah,

0:46:56.520 --> 0:46:58.279
<v Speaker 3>maybe at the margin, there might be some mining of

0:46:58.640 --> 0:47:03.760
<v Speaker 3>asteroids for certain rare materials, but what really matters fundamentally

0:47:03.960 --> 0:47:08.279
<v Speaker 3>is being able to get this supposedly basic stuff and

0:47:08.400 --> 0:47:12.760
<v Speaker 3>turn it into the life saving and life sustaining apparatus

0:47:13.120 --> 0:47:15.560
<v Speaker 3>that has around all of us all the time. And

0:47:16.239 --> 0:47:17.560
<v Speaker 3>we need to do more of it. And right now

0:47:17.600 --> 0:47:20.680
<v Speaker 3>that's massively carbon intensive. But who, you know, who are

0:47:20.719 --> 0:47:24.160
<v Speaker 3>we to say to people in sub Saharan Africa that

0:47:24.480 --> 0:47:30.680
<v Speaker 3>you need to be constraining your natural demand for extra things,

0:47:30.760 --> 0:47:31.319
<v Speaker 3>you know, for.

0:47:31.400 --> 0:47:34.320
<v Speaker 1>A natural demand for your natural demand for higher living standards,

0:47:35.000 --> 0:47:36.920
<v Speaker 1>say that they shouldn't have them.

0:47:36.760 --> 0:47:39.120
<v Speaker 3>Exactly, and that's reflected in the amount of steel that

0:47:39.160 --> 0:47:42.120
<v Speaker 3>we're all consuming. It's not you know so, and to

0:47:42.680 --> 0:47:46.080
<v Speaker 3>make steel is really carbon intensive right now, and if

0:47:46.120 --> 0:47:47.200
<v Speaker 3>you're going to try and do it in a less

0:47:47.200 --> 0:47:50.799
<v Speaker 3>carbon intensive way, it is far more expensive. And so

0:47:50.920 --> 0:47:52.400
<v Speaker 3>who are we again to say you're going to have

0:47:52.400 --> 0:47:54.799
<v Speaker 3>to spend more for your steel than we would have

0:47:54.840 --> 0:47:56.480
<v Speaker 3>to spend or that we had to spend when we

0:47:56.480 --> 0:48:00.960
<v Speaker 3>were developing. Those are knotty issues. They're notty trick issues

0:48:01.000 --> 0:48:05.239
<v Speaker 3>with no straightforward answer, which is why it's interesting. But unfortunately,

0:48:05.280 --> 0:48:07.120
<v Speaker 3>you know a lot of people would much rather think

0:48:07.160 --> 0:48:10.719
<v Speaker 3>in just terms of easy questions, easy answers, black and white,

0:48:10.760 --> 0:48:13.239
<v Speaker 3>heroes and villains. It's not the way the world works,

0:48:13.239 --> 0:48:16.799
<v Speaker 3>certainly not the kind of pragmatic material world that I'm

0:48:16.840 --> 0:48:18.920
<v Speaker 3>trying to describe that.

0:48:18.920 --> 0:48:21.040
<v Speaker 1>You have described very well, Ed, I think we have

0:48:21.120 --> 0:48:22.960
<v Speaker 1>to leave it there. Thank you so much for your

0:48:23.040 --> 0:48:26.520
<v Speaker 1>nu ancewer to optimism, and as I say, everybody, please

0:48:26.560 --> 0:48:28.640
<v Speaker 1>go ad and by edsbook. It will change the way

0:48:28.640 --> 0:48:31.759
<v Speaker 1>you look at so many things, and you probably need

0:48:31.800 --> 0:48:33.520
<v Speaker 1>the way you look at so many things change just

0:48:33.560 --> 0:48:34.040
<v Speaker 1>a little bit.

0:48:34.400 --> 0:48:36.000
<v Speaker 3>Ed. Thank you Thank you.

0:48:39.360 --> 0:48:41.360
<v Speaker 1>Thanks for listening to this week's Marin Talks Money. We

0:48:41.400 --> 0:48:43.400
<v Speaker 1>will be back next week in the meantime. If you

0:48:43.560 --> 0:48:46.479
<v Speaker 1>like our show, rate review, and subscribe wherever you listen

0:48:46.480 --> 0:48:49.879
<v Speaker 1>to podcasts. This episode was hosted by me Maren Sumset Web.

0:48:50.160 --> 0:48:53.520
<v Speaker 1>It was produced by Samasadi and Muhammad Faruk. Additional editing

0:48:53.560 --> 0:48:56.400
<v Speaker 1>by Blake Maple's Bettel. Thanks to Ed Conway and to

0:48:56.600 --> 0:48:59.839
<v Speaker 1>John Steppek, and of course our weekly reminder do sign

0:48:59.920 --> 0:49:02.680
<v Speaker 1>up John Sale newsletter Money distilled the linkers in the

0:49:02.680 --> 0:49:05.359
<v Speaker 1>show notes, and do not forget my Ed's book. It's

0:49:05.400 --> 0:49:06.040
<v Speaker 1>really very good.