WEBVTT - Check out: Drilled 0:00:02.800 --> 0:00:03.000 Hi. 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:05.680 I'm Christine, one of the producers on Zero. Today I'm 0:00:05.720 --> 0:00:08.520 sharing an episode from another climate podcast that you might like. 0:00:08.840 --> 0:00:12.360 It's called Drilled. Zero's host okshot ROTHI was a guest 0:00:12.400 --> 0:00:14.800 on Drilled earlier this year talking about his book Climate 0:00:14.840 --> 0:00:19.560 Capitalism and how climate solutions and capitalism might coexist. We're 0:00:19.600 --> 0:00:21.720 dropping that episode in the feed today. If you like 0:00:21.760 --> 0:00:23.759 what you hear, you can follow Drilled wherever you get 0:00:23.760 --> 0:00:24.480 your podcasts. 0:00:24.760 --> 0:00:34.320 Enjoy. 0:00:34.360 --> 0:00:37.880 Hello, and welcome back to Drilled. I'm Amy Westervelt. Today 0:00:37.920 --> 0:00:40.720 we have the second episode in a mini series i'm 0:00:40.760 --> 0:00:44.320 calling Messy Conversations. These are episodes where we're going to 0:00:44.440 --> 0:00:48.360 tackle some of the thornier questions around how to approach 0:00:48.440 --> 0:00:52.479 the climate crisis. This time around, my guest is a journalist. 0:00:52.520 --> 0:00:56.520 I respect a lot O shot ROTHI at Bloomberg. Akshat 0:00:56.560 --> 0:01:01.440 wrote a book recently called Climate Capitalism, title I initially 0:01:01.480 --> 0:01:04.240 found a little bit off putting. I'm not gonna lie. 0:01:04.520 --> 0:01:08.039 Unfettered capitalism has been a major fuel to the fire 0:01:08.200 --> 0:01:11.280 of global warming for years, so I tend to be 0:01:11.280 --> 0:01:15.080 a little bit skeptical about suggestions that capitalism is going 0:01:15.120 --> 0:01:17.759 to solve the climate crisis. But in both his book 0:01:17.800 --> 0:01:21.160 and in this interview, actually injected some nuance into that 0:01:21.240 --> 0:01:24.200 conversation that's kind of been missing for a while, and 0:01:24.280 --> 0:01:26.880 I felt like it was important to share. I hope 0:01:26.880 --> 0:01:30.759 you find our conversation interesting. That's coming right up after 0:01:30.840 --> 0:01:38.680 this quick break. 0:01:42.040 --> 0:01:45.240 My name is Akshatrati and I'm a senior reporter for 0:01:45.319 --> 0:01:49.640 climate at Bloomberg News. I'm also the author of Climate Capitalism, 0:01:50.120 --> 0:01:51.680 Winning the Global Race to Zero. 0:01:51.520 --> 0:01:54.480 Emissions and is the book out now. 0:01:54.600 --> 0:01:58.680 It is out everywhere except US and Canada, where it 0:01:58.720 --> 0:01:59.840 has come out in March. 0:02:00.240 --> 0:02:02.120 In March. Okay, March twenty twenty. 0:02:01.880 --> 0:02:03.680 Four, Yes, twelfth March. 0:02:03.760 --> 0:02:07.080 Yeah, okay, awesome, that's exciting. So have you been doing 0:02:07.120 --> 0:02:09.320 book tours and whatnot in the UK? 0:02:09.639 --> 0:02:12.399 Yes, yes, it's been quite nice. I've done a few 0:02:12.400 --> 0:02:14.840 book events now and there've been a nice mix. I've 0:02:14.880 --> 0:02:19.720 done one at a university, one at a consultancy, one 0:02:20.040 --> 0:02:25.480 at a conference, and every time I've been quite amazed 0:02:25.520 --> 0:02:29.240 by the sophisticated level of questions that people have about 0:02:29.280 --> 0:02:32.880 the energy transition. You know, any of these audiences are 0:02:32.960 --> 0:02:36.120 kind of a bubble, but even despite being different bubbles, 0:02:36.160 --> 0:02:39.639 there is a good level of understanding that I was 0:02:39.680 --> 0:02:44.560 a little bit surprised about. That's encouraging to hear exactly right. 0:02:45.040 --> 0:02:48.600 Yeah, Yeah, what's your favorite question that you've gotten that 0:02:48.639 --> 0:02:51.240 you were like, oh, smart people, thank you for coming 0:02:51.240 --> 0:02:51.840 to my talk. 0:02:52.960 --> 0:02:56.520 Well, the favorite question is essentially alrighty, you have a 0:02:56.600 --> 0:02:59.800 bunch of success stories in the book. That's great. What 0:02:59.840 --> 0:03:02.560 do you not have in the book? And it's actually 0:03:02.600 --> 0:03:05.600 favorite in the sense that it's a long laundry list 0:03:05.600 --> 0:03:08.200 of things I don't have in the book, because there's 0:03:08.240 --> 0:03:10.639 just so many things that we don't have success stories 0:03:10.680 --> 0:03:13.600 for that we need success stories for. But I try 0:03:13.639 --> 0:03:16.799 and pick one that I feel like we really need 0:03:16.840 --> 0:03:20.840 to get on very quickly, is how can we move 0:03:21.120 --> 0:03:25.040 billions and trillions of dollars into developing countries for climate 0:03:25.080 --> 0:03:29.960 solutions that we know work, are scalable, and they desperately 0:03:30.040 --> 0:03:31.000 want them. 0:03:31.520 --> 0:03:34.800 Yes, I think this is like the biggest blocker actually 0:03:34.880 --> 0:03:36.560 to transition. 0:03:36.840 --> 0:03:41.280 Absolutely, this is now completely the bottleneck that'll determine whether 0:03:41.360 --> 0:03:43.040 we meet our climate goals or not yet. 0:03:43.400 --> 0:03:45.160 So actually I wanted to talk to you a little 0:03:45.160 --> 0:03:50.840 bit about that and the other solution piece that you 0:03:50.920 --> 0:03:53.480 know I always obsess about, which is we know that 0:03:53.560 --> 0:03:55.880 these companies have done all these things, and by these 0:03:55.880 --> 0:03:59.000 companies I mean fossil fuel companies and some other actors 0:03:59.040 --> 0:04:01.000 as well. I've done all this to sort of warp 0:04:01.080 --> 0:04:05.360 the markets. What are the solutions to making sure that 0:04:05.360 --> 0:04:08.920 that doesn't continue, because you know, there are these success 0:04:08.920 --> 0:04:14.440 stories in renewables and other types of technologies, but there's 0:04:14.480 --> 0:04:20.000 also kind of continued work to try to block that success. 0:04:20.279 --> 0:04:22.400 So I'm curious what you think about that as well. 0:04:22.440 --> 0:04:25.000 But first let's talk about the development funding thing. Is 0:04:25.040 --> 0:04:28.600 there anything that you've seen that makes you think that 0:04:28.680 --> 0:04:31.680 people have a good plan in place, Like, you know, 0:04:31.720 --> 0:04:34.760 do you think what Barbados is doing is potentially the way. 0:04:34.600 --> 0:04:38.560 Forward or yeah. So if we look at the history 0:04:38.560 --> 0:04:42.520 of this a little bit, the place where climate finance 0:04:42.680 --> 0:04:45.600 as a phrase probably was first used was to try 0:04:45.640 --> 0:04:50.920 and essentially fund this movement of money from developed countries 0:04:50.920 --> 0:04:55.320 to developing countries through carbon offsets. Right the Kyoto Protocols, 0:04:55.720 --> 0:04:58.600 signed up to in nineteen ninety seven but really came 0:04:58.640 --> 0:05:02.120 into force in two thousand and five. Was predicated on 0:05:02.160 --> 0:05:05.440 the fact that rich countries will reduce their emissions and 0:05:05.520 --> 0:05:08.440 what they can't reduce, they'll buy offsets. From developing countries 0:05:08.440 --> 0:05:12.120 and that'll transfer funds that developing countries need to be 0:05:12.160 --> 0:05:16.599 able to make that transition happen themselves. Of course, we 0:05:16.760 --> 0:05:21.159 know what happened. Offsets have been a failure in both 0:05:21.360 --> 0:05:23.880 what they deliver on the common savings as they promise, 0:05:24.000 --> 0:05:26.880 but also on the amount of money that actually got 0:05:26.920 --> 0:05:29.919 transferred to developing countries. A lot of it was taken 0:05:30.000 --> 0:05:34.080 up by middlemen, and if any projects did take off, 0:05:34.440 --> 0:05:36.960 it's unclear how much of a difference they have really made. 0:05:37.720 --> 0:05:42.600 So the modern iteration of climate finance is only really 0:05:42.640 --> 0:05:46.279 starting in the last few years. The earliest example of 0:05:46.360 --> 0:05:50.880 it is this wonky term the Just Energy Transition Partnership, 0:05:50.920 --> 0:05:56.839 where G seven countries mostly are coming together and trying 0:05:56.920 --> 0:06:01.839 to make deals with countries like South Africa, Indonesia, Vietnam, 0:06:02.040 --> 0:06:04.400 and then there's a whole host of other countries in 0:06:04.400 --> 0:06:09.320 the waiting list where they want to try and provide funds, 0:06:09.440 --> 0:06:13.400 both government funds but also private funds to help these 0:06:13.440 --> 0:06:17.839 countries transition away from coal. And again it's a good 0:06:17.839 --> 0:06:20.240 bet to make to try and help these countries that 0:06:20.360 --> 0:06:23.360 do want to move away from coal, but it's messy 0:06:23.440 --> 0:06:26.360 because each of the country has very different politics. Each 0:06:26.400 --> 0:06:30.080 of the country has different reliance on coal, and we 0:06:30.160 --> 0:06:32.400 don't know whether it's going to work, but at least 0:06:32.400 --> 0:06:36.240 that's one large scale attempt right now that is in process. 0:06:36.880 --> 0:06:39.800 Then there's a third one which is more theoretical and 0:06:39.920 --> 0:06:43.320 yet has a number of people who are pushing towards it, 0:06:43.360 --> 0:06:48.040 which is the Bridge Doown initiative. And again it's a 0:06:48.120 --> 0:06:51.440 very complicated thing. They've gone through two iterations of making 0:06:51.520 --> 0:06:54.080 this much bigger than what it was in the first iteration. 0:06:54.720 --> 0:06:58.960 But it comes down to trying to reform international financial 0:06:58.960 --> 0:07:02.800 institutions so that they can actually use that money that 0:07:02.839 --> 0:07:07.479 they do have toward climate purposes and also increase the 0:07:07.560 --> 0:07:10.640 amount of money that they can give towards climate purposes. 0:07:11.240 --> 0:07:15.360 One example that I've found quite interesting is again a 0:07:15.400 --> 0:07:20.200 bit won key, but quite crucial, is to provide currency 0:07:20.400 --> 0:07:24.080 risk hedging, which is basically to say, you know, if 0:07:24.120 --> 0:07:27.240 you're investing in South Africa and you're investing in a 0:07:27.280 --> 0:07:30.440 country that is not operated on the dollar, then you're 0:07:30.480 --> 0:07:34.240 going to have some risk, especially if it's an emerging economy, 0:07:34.840 --> 0:07:38.360 that their currency might fall, it might be volatile, it 0:07:38.440 --> 0:07:42.120 might change value more frequently than the dollar. Changes value. 0:07:42.280 --> 0:07:45.280 But if you are an international investor who wants the 0:07:45.280 --> 0:07:49.120 return in dollars, you want some form of guarantee that 0:07:49.120 --> 0:07:53.560 that currency exchange will be more stable than it typically is, 0:07:54.240 --> 0:07:58.280 and international financial institutions can really enable that. But again, 0:07:58.320 --> 0:08:01.240 these are just proposals right now, so that's why it's 0:08:01.280 --> 0:08:02.000 not there in the book. 0:08:02.240 --> 0:08:04.960 I really want to have you talk through the example 0:08:05.000 --> 0:08:07.320 of solar in India because I feel like this is 0:08:07.400 --> 0:08:11.760 something that doesn't get a lot of coverage. The thing 0:08:11.800 --> 0:08:14.240 that we hear in the US all the time is, oh, 0:08:14.320 --> 0:08:16.880 Indian coal. And yes, there is still quite a strong 0:08:17.040 --> 0:08:21.040 coal industry in India, and there are some people working 0:08:21.080 --> 0:08:23.960 to obstruct progress on other things. But what you show 0:08:24.000 --> 0:08:25.960 here is how solar is breaking through. 0:08:26.200 --> 0:08:28.760 So we think about solar as this source of energy 0:08:28.800 --> 0:08:31.760 now that is cheapest form of energy that you can 0:08:31.800 --> 0:08:36.080 get almost anywhere in the world, and that's been true 0:08:36.120 --> 0:08:39.880 for now a few years. But India's solar journey began 0:08:40.480 --> 0:08:43.200 in the early to mid two thousands when the country 0:08:43.240 --> 0:08:46.839 started to recognize that there is this technology that is clean, 0:08:46.960 --> 0:08:51.440 that is distributed, that can be quite easily used in 0:08:51.440 --> 0:08:55.240 India given it its own solar resources, and so India 0:08:55.280 --> 0:08:58.400 started to copy some of the policies that had been 0:08:58.480 --> 0:09:01.560 invented in the West, where it said we'll provide a 0:09:01.559 --> 0:09:04.199 feed in tariff, which is basically, we'll provide you payment 0:09:04.240 --> 0:09:07.160 if you install solar on your roof, and that way, 0:09:07.960 --> 0:09:10.199 even though solar panels in the mid two thousand and 0:09:11.120 --> 0:09:14.000 early twenty tens are a little more expensive than they 0:09:14.080 --> 0:09:16.320 should be, you'll be able to make that money back 0:09:16.360 --> 0:09:19.800 because we'll pay you for generating that solar power. However, 0:09:20.160 --> 0:09:24.200 India as a country is quite capital restricted, which is 0:09:24.400 --> 0:09:26.640 it doesn't have that much money to be able to 0:09:26.720 --> 0:09:31.319 build huge amount of solar, and even individuals trying to 0:09:31.360 --> 0:09:34.480 build rooftop solar don't have the kind of capital needed 0:09:34.920 --> 0:09:39.960 to really make solar work. But despite that, the country 0:09:40.160 --> 0:09:43.000 was keen on trying to set a target. So what 0:09:43.040 --> 0:09:45.480 it did in twenty fourteen in the run up to 0:09:45.760 --> 0:09:49.559 the Paris Agreement is set a target for a twenty 0:09:49.679 --> 0:09:54.240 gigawatt deployment by twenty twenty two, thinking that's a good 0:09:54.320 --> 0:09:56.920 ambitious goal and we should try and meet it. In 0:09:56.960 --> 0:09:59.160 the process, it gave the signal to a lot of 0:09:59.200 --> 0:10:03.240 market players to get ready to try and grab onto 0:10:03.280 --> 0:10:06.559 the opportunity that presents itself because the government has put 0:10:06.600 --> 0:10:08.920 a mandate. And one of the companies that a profile 0:10:08.960 --> 0:10:11.880 in the book is renew Power, which is now just 0:10:11.920 --> 0:10:15.040 called renew And it started with this guy who had 0:10:15.080 --> 0:10:17.520 worked in the West, who'd worked in the financial industry 0:10:17.760 --> 0:10:21.120 in America, but his Indian by birth, and he comes 0:10:21.160 --> 0:10:24.000 back to India, has worked in the wind energy industry, 0:10:24.440 --> 0:10:28.439 looking at how renewables can work in India and recognize 0:10:28.480 --> 0:10:31.400 that solar is the opportunity I should grab onto and 0:10:31.520 --> 0:10:34.880 creates this company. And what he recognizes is that if 0:10:34.920 --> 0:10:39.440 you want to scale technologies in a country like India, 0:10:39.520 --> 0:10:42.800 you really do require capital. And he uses some of 0:10:42.840 --> 0:10:46.240 his own expertise from working in the finance industry in 0:10:46.280 --> 0:10:48.960 the US to try and raise money from the likes 0:10:49.000 --> 0:10:52.880 of Goldman Sachs eventually from the Canadian Pension Fund, and 0:10:52.920 --> 0:10:56.199 then marries it to trying to work in a country 0:10:56.240 --> 0:11:02.160 where governance's weak, corruption is high, where things don't happen 0:11:02.200 --> 0:11:06.040 as quickly as businesses would be pretty used to happening 0:11:06.120 --> 0:11:10.080 in Europe or America. And at every step he's figuring 0:11:10.080 --> 0:11:14.480 out what in Hindi would call jugaad or what we 0:11:14.559 --> 0:11:18.600 would refer to in the West as hustling. Every step 0:11:18.640 --> 0:11:21.640 where there is a blockage, they hustle. They find a 0:11:21.679 --> 0:11:24.640 solution that allows them to open it up a little 0:11:24.640 --> 0:11:28.440 bit and allows them to grow their company, and slowly 0:11:28.840 --> 0:11:31.880 but surely, through that process, Renew goes on to become 0:11:32.040 --> 0:11:36.440 the largest solar developer in the country. And even since 0:11:36.440 --> 0:11:38.959 I've written the chapter, there have been so many other 0:11:38.960 --> 0:11:41.280 players that are trying to catch up to what Renew 0:11:41.440 --> 0:11:44.880 is doing, and now some of them are even succeeding 0:11:44.920 --> 0:11:49.720 despite not having capital being raised from abroad, because the 0:11:49.760 --> 0:11:53.240 market has proven itself and solar is a solution that 0:11:53.280 --> 0:11:56.840 people can see works and actually makes money. So you 0:11:56.960 --> 0:12:01.360 do need these initial injections of that may come from abroad. 0:12:01.880 --> 0:12:04.920 But once you get the engine going, the capitalist engine, 0:12:04.960 --> 0:12:08.880 so to speak, with the government direction, obviously, you can 0:12:09.000 --> 0:12:11.240 see that success can be scaled in other places. 0:12:11.320 --> 0:12:14.480 We talked about sort of availability of finance, and I 0:12:14.520 --> 0:12:17.560 feel like another thing that comes up a lot is 0:12:17.600 --> 0:12:21.480 availability of technology. And you mentioned this in the book too, 0:12:21.480 --> 0:12:24.680 that there's a pretty prevalent inaccuracy. I guess in the 0:12:24.679 --> 0:12:26.480 climate movement, this is like, oh, we have all the 0:12:26.520 --> 0:12:28.839 tech we need and it's all cheap enough to deploy now, 0:12:29.080 --> 0:12:32.200 and that's not quite true. But it's also the case 0:12:32.240 --> 0:12:36.000 that getting that technology to global south countries has tended 0:12:36.360 --> 0:12:37.920 to move a lot more slowly. 0:12:38.160 --> 0:12:40.280 A very good example of this is what happened with 0:12:40.400 --> 0:12:46.320 COVID vaccines. Right we faced a pandemic. Fortunately, by that 0:12:46.440 --> 0:12:50.720 time there was a technology called mRNA which won a 0:12:50.720 --> 0:12:53.720 Nobel Prize earlier this year, that could be used to 0:12:53.760 --> 0:12:56.679 make vaccines, but it was pretty advanced and not all 0:12:56.720 --> 0:12:59.760 countries had it. It was mostly sitting in America and 0:13:00.040 --> 0:13:04.040 in Europe, and there was a human cry about how 0:13:04.160 --> 0:13:07.359 if we're able to develop a vaccine using this technology, 0:13:07.880 --> 0:13:11.520 that technology and that vaccine should be made available worldwide, 0:13:11.559 --> 0:13:15.600 globally without patents, so that we can solve this problem quickly. 0:13:16.040 --> 0:13:18.679 And of course we didn't do that. Patterns still remained, 0:13:19.160 --> 0:13:22.040 and yes, eventually we did get the vaccine to most places, 0:13:22.120 --> 0:13:25.800 but in the process we did lose probably millions of 0:13:25.840 --> 0:13:29.040 lives that could have been saved had we not had 0:13:29.360 --> 0:13:35.400 our world where technology transfer is so complicated with green technologies, 0:13:35.480 --> 0:13:38.640 there is a risk of that happening, But I would 0:13:38.720 --> 0:13:43.080 suggest that because the climate emergency isn't at quite the 0:13:43.160 --> 0:13:48.480 concentrated scale that a pandemic is, and that it's not 0:13:48.720 --> 0:13:52.320 one technology that's going to tackle all problems. We need 0:13:52.360 --> 0:13:56.199 all sorts of technologies that we actually have more room 0:13:56.360 --> 0:14:00.480 to be able to make technology transfer work across countries. 0:14:01.000 --> 0:14:05.240 A very good example is solar panels. They were invented 0:14:05.280 --> 0:14:08.319 in America, they were really scaled up as an industry 0:14:08.840 --> 0:14:13.160 for climate purposes in Europe where Germany and then eventually 0:14:13.240 --> 0:14:17.480 Spain gave lots and lots of subsidies to deploy solar panels. 0:14:18.040 --> 0:14:22.000 It was really China that made it absolutely cheap. It's 0:14:22.120 --> 0:14:26.160 China that is now responsible for the solar boom that 0:14:26.280 --> 0:14:29.360 the rest of the world is experiencing, and of course 0:14:29.400 --> 0:14:32.280 that's come with risks of trying to raise trade barriers 0:14:32.280 --> 0:14:36.960 so that you know, countries like America or parts of 0:14:37.000 --> 0:14:39.640 India also have their own capacity to be able to 0:14:39.680 --> 0:14:42.960 make solar panels. But what we do know is, unlike 0:14:43.000 --> 0:14:45.800 fossil fuels, which have to be mined and then transported 0:14:46.000 --> 0:14:49.200 from one specific place, once you provide a solar panel, 0:14:49.560 --> 0:14:52.200 you don't also have to provide the sun that's already there. 0:14:52.600 --> 0:14:56.720 So there is a distributive nature in green technologies that 0:14:56.760 --> 0:15:01.600 we can use to acceleate the energy transition, and so far, 0:15:02.400 --> 0:15:06.600 fortunately technology transfer hasn't been a barrier for progress. But 0:15:06.720 --> 0:15:08.680 in a world where we are starting to put up 0:15:08.720 --> 0:15:13.160 more trade barriers and where future technologies like hydrogen or 0:15:13.240 --> 0:15:16.720 carbon capture or carbon removal, which is a growing technology 0:15:16.760 --> 0:15:19.960 that we eventually will need a lot of, it is 0:15:20.000 --> 0:15:22.840 a risk that we will slow down the energy transition, 0:15:22.920 --> 0:15:25.360 that we will slow down our ability to be able 0:15:25.400 --> 0:15:29.360 to reach net zero to stop warming, and it's a 0:15:29.480 --> 0:15:32.000 risk that we all should be aware of and working 0:15:32.000 --> 0:15:32.400 to avoid. 0:15:32.520 --> 0:15:35.280 I'd love to have you talk about this streaming that 0:15:35.320 --> 0:15:37.160 you have in the book, which I think is really 0:15:37.200 --> 0:15:41.480 helpful that there's been a lot of discussion about. Hey, look, 0:15:41.720 --> 0:15:46.040 Evennom Chomsky himself is like, there's not enough time to 0:15:46.240 --> 0:15:51.120 replace the entire economic system and deal with climate change 0:15:51.120 --> 0:15:53.520 in time. So what do we do? And you sort 0:15:53.520 --> 0:15:56.640 of suggest we can reform capitalism and we can use 0:15:56.680 --> 0:15:59.680 it in better ways. So yeah, i'd love to hear 0:15:59.680 --> 0:16:02.640 you talk about that a little bit, and also about 0:16:03.080 --> 0:16:05.920 the governance that's needed to enable that to happen. 0:16:06.120 --> 0:16:08.600 Yeah. When I started writing this book, what I was 0:16:08.640 --> 0:16:11.560 seeing was that there were all these solutions that were 0:16:11.560 --> 0:16:16.680 scaling in different contexts globally. But there's this large narrative 0:16:16.880 --> 0:16:20.720 that there are blockers in the system, whether it's business, 0:16:20.840 --> 0:16:25.720 whether it's politics, whether it's global diplomacy, that are stopping 0:16:26.080 --> 0:16:29.960 any progress from happening. And so one reason I wanted 0:16:30.000 --> 0:16:31.920 to write the book was to try and see if 0:16:31.960 --> 0:16:35.040 that is true, if progress is not happening at all, 0:16:35.400 --> 0:16:37.480 And very quickly I found out that's not the case. 0:16:37.640 --> 0:16:40.040 So through the book, I have these examples of how 0:16:40.080 --> 0:16:44.120 solar scaled in India, how windscale scaled in Denmark, how 0:16:44.200 --> 0:16:48.560 batteries and electric cars scaled up in China. But alongside it, 0:16:48.600 --> 0:16:53.680 I also recognized very quickly that there are very crucial 0:16:53.920 --> 0:16:57.680 enabling factors that allowed these technologies to get to scale, 0:16:58.240 --> 0:17:05.160 and those are policy, finance, global diplomacy, shareholder activism. All 0:17:05.200 --> 0:17:07.560 of these things are also starting to play out in 0:17:07.640 --> 0:17:11.520 their own way at scale in different countries. And so 0:17:12.119 --> 0:17:15.679 it is possible, even in the economic system that we 0:17:15.760 --> 0:17:19.360 sit and that we must recognize has contributed to worsening 0:17:19.359 --> 0:17:22.679 climate change, that it's possible to tweak it to work 0:17:22.840 --> 0:17:27.639 for tackling climate change. And we have many examples of it. 0:17:27.680 --> 0:17:31.240 We don't have to look at one. The American capitalistic system, 0:17:31.440 --> 0:17:34.480 with what's happening with the Inflation Reduction Act, is trying 0:17:34.520 --> 0:17:39.240 to use whatever political agreement there can be in one 0:17:39.320 --> 0:17:44.040 party to try and push for subsidies for green technologies. 0:17:44.560 --> 0:17:48.280 The European capitalism is quite different. There is actually broad 0:17:48.400 --> 0:17:52.040 political agreement in Europe to do something about climate change, 0:17:52.440 --> 0:17:56.439 but they do not have quite the capital capacity of America, 0:17:56.520 --> 0:17:59.880 so they are not going down the huge subsidies route. 0:18:00.160 --> 0:18:03.880 They are providing some subsidies, but mostly they're providing direction. 0:18:04.119 --> 0:18:06.600 They're laying out a clear plan for when we need 0:18:06.640 --> 0:18:08.919 to get to net zero, what each sector in the 0:18:08.960 --> 0:18:14.240 economy must do. They are taxing emissions, which incentivizes people 0:18:14.280 --> 0:18:18.240 to pollute less, and they're laying down very strict rules 0:18:18.280 --> 0:18:22.760 around what a green investment would be, and that's allowing 0:18:22.800 --> 0:18:26.480 for people to put money in the right places. Chinese 0:18:26.480 --> 0:18:30.160 capitalism is very different. It doesn't start with the place 0:18:30.200 --> 0:18:33.120 of we want to tackle climate change, although they do 0:18:33.200 --> 0:18:36.199 because they recognize China is going to be affected. It 0:18:36.280 --> 0:18:40.200 starts with we want to provide our people the kind 0:18:40.240 --> 0:18:43.199 of lifestyle that people in the West have, but we 0:18:43.280 --> 0:18:47.720 recognize fossil fuels are limited, energy resources are limited, and 0:18:48.480 --> 0:18:51.240 we as an economy need to grow while we do that. 0:18:51.680 --> 0:18:55.280 So their solution has been to try and basically build 0:18:55.600 --> 0:18:59.680 huge industries that do green technology probably better than anybody 0:18:59.680 --> 0:19:02.240 else does in the world right now, and then just 0:19:02.320 --> 0:19:05.920 export all that green technology while earning money. And it's 0:19:05.920 --> 0:19:09.520 a little bit jingoistic. It's driven by a lot of subsidies, 0:19:10.040 --> 0:19:13.760 but there is clearly a market for these companies because 0:19:14.280 --> 0:19:18.720 even as they start off heavily subsidized by state, eventually 0:19:18.720 --> 0:19:22.800 they become private enterprises, they consolidate, and there are some 0:19:23.000 --> 0:19:26.680 champions that remain that then go on to build factories 0:19:26.760 --> 0:19:29.560 outside China. A very good example is what's happening with 0:19:29.600 --> 0:19:33.320 batteries and how China is using its lead in batteries 0:19:33.440 --> 0:19:36.720 to go out and build factories in Germany, in Hungary, 0:19:37.320 --> 0:19:39.760 eventually in the US and in Mexico. So you get 0:19:39.760 --> 0:19:44.119 these different forms of capitalism that are showing you that 0:19:44.720 --> 0:19:48.800 within the political context that is available, you can start 0:19:48.840 --> 0:19:52.919 to tweak the rules such that they will help reduce 0:19:52.920 --> 0:19:59.480 emissions while addressing global competitiveness, economic growth, all things that 0:20:00.200 --> 0:20:03.840 the capitalist system requires for you to be able to 0:20:03.840 --> 0:20:05.520 push these solutions forward. 0:20:05.280 --> 0:20:09.160 Do you get a sense that in places like the US, 0:20:09.200 --> 0:20:13.880 for example, where there really hasn't been sort of guardrails 0:20:13.960 --> 0:20:18.399 put in place, that it's possible to grain in the 0:20:18.440 --> 0:20:26.719 more out of control aspects of capitalism that example, So 0:20:27.000 --> 0:20:29.440 with the fossil fuel industry, for example, in the US, 0:20:29.760 --> 0:20:33.040 what you see when regulation is put in place, or 0:20:33.080 --> 0:20:37.320 even when demand goes down for fossil fuels is a 0:20:37.440 --> 0:20:41.960 really really well funded effort to get around regulation and 0:20:42.000 --> 0:20:45.879 to sort of artificially increase demand. You see in the 0:20:46.520 --> 0:20:49.199 tracking context is like the most obvious right where you 0:20:49.320 --> 0:20:56.360 had kind of unfettered development of that resource, then a glut. 0:20:56.680 --> 0:20:59.520 They pushed for a lift on the export band to 0:20:59.520 --> 0:21:02.120 deal with that glut, and they got it. Then they 0:21:02.160 --> 0:21:06.840 pushed to basically use one of the byproducts of tracking 0:21:07.160 --> 0:21:10.880 for plastic that nobody wanted. That didn't stop them from 0:21:11.040 --> 0:21:14.800 building out a massive number of petrochemical plants that are 0:21:14.800 --> 0:21:18.440 just dumping simply use plastics on the market, and everyone 0:21:18.520 --> 0:21:22.080 is saying they're projections for demand for that are off, 0:21:22.600 --> 0:21:26.800 but that hasn't actually impacted the supply side yet. And 0:21:26.920 --> 0:21:29.720 you know, you see it with sympeic fabrics and stuff too, right, 0:21:29.840 --> 0:21:35.240 So this thing that's happened where certain industries, for sure 0:21:35.240 --> 0:21:38.760 in the US are sort of allowed to just tinker 0:21:38.880 --> 0:21:41.840 with the market to suit their needs. 0:21:42.160 --> 0:21:44.520 Before we get to the US context, I think it's 0:21:44.600 --> 0:21:48.080 worth taking a step back and just recognizing, and I 0:21:48.119 --> 0:21:51.800 think we don't do that enough, is the fact that 0:21:52.480 --> 0:21:55.800 almost all the progress that has happened so far on 0:21:55.920 --> 0:22:01.119 trying to reduce emissions has happened despite the social industries 0:22:01.800 --> 0:22:06.760 heavy attempts to try in derail progress. And so I 0:22:06.760 --> 0:22:09.680 think we should take hope is probably not the right word, 0:22:09.720 --> 0:22:13.600 but we should take some hope that despite the level 0:22:13.760 --> 0:22:16.040 of barriers that are in front of us to try 0:22:16.119 --> 0:22:19.480 and deal with this problem, progress can be made. Now 0:22:19.520 --> 0:22:23.280 coming to the specific problem of American capitalism and how 0:22:23.359 --> 0:22:27.720 much of it is tied to essentially corporate greed, because 0:22:27.960 --> 0:22:33.359 your ability as a company to lobby politicians to just 0:22:33.440 --> 0:22:36.600 do your bidding very strong in America, not to say 0:22:36.640 --> 0:22:40.200 it's not there in other countries. That exists in almost 0:22:40.280 --> 0:22:44.639 all resource intensive countries. Canada has it, Norway has it, 0:22:44.800 --> 0:22:48.679 Australia has it, and to some extent countries like India 0:22:48.720 --> 0:22:52.240 where there's a big base of coal jobs, even as 0:22:52.480 --> 0:22:54.800 most of the coal industry is state owned, has that 0:22:54.880 --> 0:22:57.480 lobbying power because those are state owned industries that are 0:22:58.000 --> 0:23:00.639 talking into the years of the very politics who are 0:23:00.640 --> 0:23:05.120 making these decisions. But one thing to recognize is that 0:23:05.200 --> 0:23:08.240 climate progress is sort of two steps forward, one step back. 0:23:08.480 --> 0:23:11.280 You know, all the curves that we see on climate 0:23:11.320 --> 0:23:14.160 models that say to reach one point five degrees celsius, 0:23:14.640 --> 0:23:17.840 here's a smooth path that you must take to reach zero, 0:23:18.480 --> 0:23:21.080 is likely to be pretty jagged because we are going 0:23:21.119 --> 0:23:24.959 to get these swings between politicians who care about climate 0:23:25.000 --> 0:23:27.560 and politicians who don't. And it's again not just an 0:23:27.600 --> 0:23:31.000 America problem. We're starting to see that here in the 0:23:31.080 --> 0:23:34.679 UK with the Conservative government that was responsible for a 0:23:34.720 --> 0:23:37.520 net zero target now sort of turning its back on 0:23:38.000 --> 0:23:41.680 green policies. But what happens here is that now we' 0:23:41.720 --> 0:23:46.399 vented this period where there is recognition that climate change 0:23:46.400 --> 0:23:50.919 and climate impacts are very real, very intense, and they 0:23:50.920 --> 0:23:54.040 are going to hurt not just people but economies. Right 0:23:54.080 --> 0:23:57.879 from a capitalistic perspective, is it going to hurt growth, yes? 0:23:58.280 --> 0:24:00.879 Is it going to hurt companies yes. Even if you 0:24:00.920 --> 0:24:03.440 don't care about people, you're going to have to care 0:24:03.480 --> 0:24:08.159 about these other forces that capitalism forces you to think about. 0:24:08.280 --> 0:24:11.120 If you have any amount of long term thinking in 0:24:11.160 --> 0:24:16.679 your political mindset, in your company mindset, you recognize that 0:24:16.720 --> 0:24:23.080