How Do We Get to Cleaner Energy?

0:00 so I think when we look at the different 0:02 scales that we want to deploy energy 0:04 right and we talked about Google needing 0:06 their own server farm or a Central 0:08 Station power plant that's producing 0:10 power for a big city or just solar 0:13 powers on panels on your own home in 0:16 those scenarios I think the critical 0:17 things to remember are people always 0:19 want cleaner power this is a big 0:21 discussion now around climate change but 0:23 it's always been true as we've gone from 0:24 animal fats to biomass to coal to 0:28 natural gas to nuclear to renewables 0:31 we're always asking for more power but 0:34 less impact on us 0:36 so the first thing is to remember people 0:37 want cleaner how do you get there second 0:40 I think is to be a little humble in your 0:41 approach some people are real 0:44 evangelists for technologies they really 0:46 want to do 100% X whatever X is because 0:48 that's their thing but I really think if 0:50 you look at all the different scenarios 0:51 in which we want to deploy energy some 0:53 things make sense in a certain context 0:55 right if you're in Southwest Arizona and 0:57 you've got a ton of Sun the public 0:59 deploying solar makes a lot of sense and 1:00 it's easier but it may be different in a 1:03 deployment scenario where you're up in 1:05 northern Alaska and it's dark large 1:07 portions of the year and you don't have 1:09 a grid and you don't even have 1:10 electrical or natural gas pipelines so 1:12 to me the critical things are recognize 1:15 people want clean they want affordable 1:16 and be a little humble in your approach 1:19 and try to understand what are the 1:21 specific needs of the community that 1:23 wants the energy and I think that social 1:25 science element is is lacking in a lot 1:27 of the things that we've done 1:28 traditionally and will make us better if 1:30 we're thoughtful about it and I'll give 1:31 you an example of a difficult problem 1:33 that was solved so Finland as a country 1:36 deploys nuclear power and they have for 1:39 a number of years and if you listen to 1:41 the public narratives around nuclear the 1:43 idea that you can dispose of the nuclear 1:44 waste seems impossible everyone throws 1:46 up their hands and says it's impossible 1:47 but the Finns actually have a plan and a 1:50 working underground repository where 1:52 they're going to put the waste and they 1:53 did that through a site a long-term 1:55 planning process that involved 1:57 communicating with the communities and 2:00 having a discussion about how they would 2:02 take care of the waste that they 2:03 produced from the energy that they used 2:05 so people who use this sort of 2:07 thoughtful approach where they look at 2:09 what's the energy need what's the 2:11 technology we're going to use all the 2:12 way to the very end of 2:13 how are we going to dispose of it and 2:15 have minimal impact on the environment 2:16 and future future generations I think 2:19 can be done and I think this example in 2:21 Finland is a good example where people 2:22 have solved what seemed to be an 2:24 insoluble problem and I think for all 2:26 this to work you need to incentivize 2:28 people to collaborate all the way from 2:30 the utilities to the people who want the 2:32 power right the stakeholders and I think 2:35 this is gonna sound silly but the simple 2:38 way is to get them in the same room and 2:39 having the discussions right people tend 2:42 to work in certain areas right so I have 2:45 a technical background so I tend to hang 2:46 out with people that do technical work 2:48 and finding a way to start those 2:50 conversations at the level of complexity 2:53 of the actual energy deployment problem 2:56 is important so we started this segment 2:58 talking about why is energy and 3:00 interdisciplinary problem because life 3:02 is interdisciplinary I think having 3:03 those same conversations at that level 3:05 matters back to this fastest path to 3:07 zero initiative one of our big goals was 3:09 to make sure we were having 3:11 interdisciplinary conversations so with 3:13 within one of our summits we may be 3:15 talking about technology for a half hour 3:16 but then we'll switch over to the role 3:18 of the media or the role of Labor 3:20 because that's really what deploying 3:22 clean energy looks like and I think if 3:23 we're going to do it well then we need 3:24 to have conversations at that level of 3:26 complexity