Joe Rogan Experience #1402 - Boyan Slat

1. 0:00 – 3:41

   Ocean Cleanup System 001: early failures, redesign, and first confirmed plastic catch

   1. JRJoe Rogan0:00

      ... two. What's up, fella? How are you? Good to see you again, man.

   2. BSBoyan Slat0:06

      Likewise.

   3. JRJoe Rogan0:07

      I've been reading that you are having some great success with your machine finally. It's, uh, everything's up and running. Last time we talked, you had yet to implement it actually out in the wild, and, uh, now you, e- explain to us what happened. You had some bumps in the beginning, right?

   4. BSBoyan Slat0:22

      Yes. Yeah. So it's been quite a, quite a few years. Finally something's happening. Um, so we, uh, we launched our first ocean system from San Francisco in, uh, September of last year. And we, we took it out and roughly two months later we fi- we figured that, first of all, it wasn't catching plastic, so what we saw was that the system was moving at roughly the same speed as the plastic. So maybe just take one step back, the, the idea and how, how it works.

   5. JRJoe Rogan0:52

      Sure. Yeah.

   6. BSBoyan Slat0:53

      So, so of course, we have this, this great Pacific garbage patch between here and Hawaii, twice the size of Texas, 100 million kilos of plastic doesn't go away by itself. And the idea was to, to have this artificial coastline that is driven by the forces of the ocean. We, we put it in there, and the plastic naturally accumulates against it and kind of stays in there so we can then periodically get it out, because the, the, the, the, the big challenge is that although there's a lot of plastic, it's, it's spread out over this, this vast area. So we first have to concentrate it before we can take it out, because if you were to simply trawl the ocean for plastic with boats and nets, it would just take, um, you know, for- forever really. So, so the idea was to, to, to have those artificial coastlines. We deployed the first one, and then what we saw was that somehow the system was moving at the same speed as the plastic. So you can imagine if, if, you know, this is like a, your, your Pac-Man and this is your, your, you know, your, your catch and it's moving at the same speed, you know, it's not going in, um, and sometimes it did go in but it went out again.

   7. JRJoe Rogan1:56

      We got a video of it, what it was doing.

   8. BSBoyan Slat1:58

      Oh, that's great. Yeah. So-

   9. JRJoe Rogan1:59

      Yeah.

   10. BSBoyan Slat2:00

       So this is the basic idea. Um, but it wasn't doing that. So, so, and then, you know, we thought, okay, that's, that's all right. We'll learn from it. We'll try and adjust the systems. And then literally, you know, exactly a year ago, uh, the system broke into two and, um, so we had the structural failure forcing us to tow the whole thing back to land and, uh, go back to the drawing board. So, so we didn't have the, the best start of this year.

   11. JRJoe Rogan2:26

       How much time has been lost? Or how much time has been spent, I should say, um, in the beginning phase, the in- initial-

   12. BSBoyan Slat2:33

       Yeah.

   13. JRJoe Rogan2:33

       ... version that you launched-

   14. BSBoyan Slat2:34

       Oh.

   15. JRJoe Rogan2:34

       ... versus where you're at now?

   16. BSBoyan Slat2:36

       So we've been going on at this for since 2013.

   17. JRJoe Rogan2:40

       Oh, wow. Six years.

   18. BSBoyan Slat2:40

       So after... Yeah. So basically after five years launching it and seeing it break into two, that was... wasn't the, the, the best start of the year I could, could have imagined. Um, but then, you know, went to the drawing board, um, and, you know, the team really took it well, they... And, you know, we took those lessons into account, adjusted the design and relaunched really just a few months later, so in June. And this time we made the system a bit- a bit more modular so we could try different things to try and, uh, adjust the speed, make it go faster, make it go slower. And then what we figured was, well, the system isn't going fast enough. What if we actually turn the problem into a solution? What if we turn it around and actually slow it down so that it goes slower than the plastic? And then what we figured, um, that, that, that actually works. And, uh, in October we announced that we're actually catching plastic and really just last week the first two shipping containers full, full of plastic were, uh, were landed in port.

   19. JRJoe Rogan3:36

       Wow, so it's really recently up and running-

   20. BSBoyan Slat3:39

       Yes.

   21. JRJoe Rogan3:39

       ... the way you expected it.

   22. BSBoyan Slat3:41

       Yeah.

2. 3:41 – 8:21

   How much plastic is it collecting—and what scaling to 50–100 systems would mean

   1. JRJoe Rogan3:41

      Now how long does it take to accumulate two shipping containers full?

   2. BSBoyan Slat3:44

      Oh, so that was roughly month, month and a half.

   3. JRJoe Rogan3:47

      And how big are these shipping containers?

   4. BSBoyan Slat3:48

      Uh, 20 foot, so probably two of these rooms.

   5. JRJoe Rogan3:51

      So the only thing that's really stopping it from getting more is like the actual size of the net itself.

   6. BSBoyan Slat3:56

      Yes. So, so that's the next step. So now that we kind of went from zero to one, we have the basic principle, uh, of catching plastic confirmed, uh, we now have to make it bigger before we can s- uh, build a whole fleet of them because, you know, we, we rec- we need maybe 50 or 100 of them to really clean up half this patch in five years. That's, that's the objective.

   7. JRJoe Rogan4:16

      Half the whole patch in five years, that's the real objective?

   8. BSBoyan Slat4:19

      That's what we wanna do.

   9. JRJoe Rogan4:20

      Wow, is that really possible?

   10. BSBoyan Slat4:22

       If you have enough systems, yeah.

   11. JRJoe Rogan4:23

       That's incredible. Now where are you at in terms of like trying to get these systems made and implemented?

   12. BSBoyan Slat4:30

       Um, so, so the, um, so now we just finished this, this first step with, um, the system number one, that's how we called it. And the next step is to develop what we call system two which is indeed going to be a bigger version and, um, it, the idea is to minimize the amount of vessel use that you need for it. So that comes... Because boats are really fucking expensive. Um, you know, the, the boat that we have costs roughly 15,000 euros per day to keep running.

   13. JRJoe Rogan4:58

       Wow.

   14. BSBoyan Slat4:59

       That's just one boat. So boats, you don't want boats to, you know...

   15. JRJoe Rogan5:02

       Would you anticipate that it ever gets to a point where the amount of money that you can generate from the actual resource of physical plastic can actually pay for the exp- the whole experiment?

   16. BSBoyan Slat5:13

       I mean, I hope so. That's, uh, what we want to trial next year with, uh, by making products from the catch that we-

   17. JRJoe Rogan5:21

       Mm-hmm.

   18. BSBoyan Slat5:21

       ... that we make, and, you know, the material itself hardly has any value. It's, it's really the, the story to it and she-

   19. JRJoe Rogan5:27

       You should make straws-

   20. BSBoyan Slat5:29

       (laughs)

   21. JRJoe Rogan5:29

       ... so people don't feel guilty.

   22. BSBoyan Slat5:31

       Yeah.

   23. JRJoe Rogan5:31

       They'll go, "Oh, it's a recycled straw."

   24. BSBoyan Slat5:33

       Yeah, yeah. They'll throw them in the ocean again. Yeah.

   25. JRJoe Rogan5:36

       No, what, uh... Yeah, that's a terrible idea. But what, what-

   26. BSBoyan Slat5:38

       I mean, it would be a very sustainable business model, just keeps going.

   27. JRJoe Rogan5:41

       Yeah, it just keeps going.

   28. BSBoyan Slat5:42

       Yeah.

   29. JRJoe Rogan5:42

       What is the, um, what are the products that you're thinking about?

   30. BSBoyan Slat5:46

       ... ah, well, we have-
3. 8:21 – 9:22

   Turning recovered plastic into products to fund operations (and why boats dominate costs)

   1. JRJoe Rogan8:21

      So, um, you have these two cargo ships or these two cargo containers, uh, filled with this plastic stuff. Um, what do you do with it now?

   2. BSBoyan Slat8:32

      Yeah. So, so now it's going to Europe, but fortunately, there isn't really any useful recycling infrastructure in the US. So, um, so we set up this, this, um, infrastructure in, in, in Europe to be able to first sort it and then shred it and then recycle it and then, um, make those first products out of them. So hopefully, um, and hopefully with that, then, you know, generate the, the cash needed to, to continue, uh, running the cleanup. And of course, now it's still small scale.

   3. JRJoe Rogan9:00

      Right.

   4. BSBoyan Slat9:00

      Eventually, we should have those number of shipping containers every, you know, every day probably.

   5. JRJoe Rogan9:06

      So do you have, like, a group of people that's trying to come up with ideas of what to make out of the plastic?

   6. BSBoyan Slat9:09

      Yeah, so a little team in, uh, inside The Ocean Cleanup working on that. And, um, yeah, so they... I, I think they say that by September they should be ready to, to launch the first product, so...

4. 9:22 – 13:10

   Where the plastic goes next: sorting, recycling infrastructure, and Europe-based processing

   1. JRJoe Rogan9:22

      That's great, man. That's... The, the, the whole idea behind it is beautiful. Do... You have a river system too as well, right?

   2. BSBoyan Slat9:28

      Yes. So, so that's the other thing, right? So on one hand, we need to, we need to clean up what's, what's already in the ocean, doesn't go away by itself, and, um, yeah, basically the, the only way to, to deal with that is to just get o- go out there and, and clean it up. Um, but of course, then there's this, this other side of the equation, which is there's still huge, huge amounts of plastic flowing into the ocean every day, mostly from countries in, um, you know, Central America, um, South- Southeast Asia, where people are kind of this... the stage of development or countries are, are at a stage of development where, where the people are wealthy enough to consume a lot of things that are wrapped in plastic, yet there isn't any waste infrastructure yet to take care of it. So you literally see people on, on scooters just, uh, drive, um, on the... to a bridge to dump their municipal waste into the river, because that's simply the easiest way to get rid of it. You know-

   3. JRJoe Rogan10:26

      Wow.

   4. BSBoyan Slat10:26

      ... to your point, you know, what's easiest people will do. And, uh, so it's not really that people, you know, don't care there or that they, um, are less civilized or something, but it's really a combination. There's a lot of people, and there's no infrastructure they c- that they can make use of. So, so then back in 2015, we were like, "Okay, maybe at some point in time, this, this ocean thing will, will work out. Who knows?" But then we're stuck with this problem that there's still so much plastic flowing in that we would just have to keep going forever. And, and that would just be, you know, not, not very motivating. And we want to be this project with a beginning and an end. So, so we're like, "Okay, so where's the plastic coming from?" And then we figured, you know, probably rivers. Rivers are like these, these arteries that carry the trash from, from land to sea, because when it rains, plastic washes from street to creek to river to ocean. And, um, but then we, we found out that there is 100,000 rivers in the world. So that's kind of a, a, a big amount if you want to do something about it. So, um, so we started doing measurements in rivers, and then what we found was that just 1% of rivers are responsible for 80% of the, of the pollution. So really just a very tiny amount of rivers, if you were to, to tackle those, could really address the, the majority of, of the plastic going into the ocean. And it's, it's mostly, like, these relatively small rivers in, um, in, in capital cities like Manila, like Jakarta, like Kuala Lumpur. We have, uh, very high density of people, uh, near the coast. That's where most of the leakage, most of the emissions occurs. So-So since 2015, w- uh, we've been, kind of as a secret side project, been working on, um, seeing what ... Can we actually develop something to, to intercept the plastic in, in those rivers? And, uh, we just launched it month ago. We call it the Interceptor. And it's this, um, yeah, because it's this scalable, um, system that, that's almost like plug and play. So you bring it to a river and, um, you install it, and it, and it just works. It's fully autonomous, solar powered.

   5. JRJoe Rogan12:38

      So this is all real, the real plastic that's being pulled out of this river-

   6. BSBoyan Slat12:42

      Yeah. Th-

   7. JRJoe Rogan12:42

      ... from, from your machine?

   8. BSBoyan Slat12:43

      Yeah. So this was the-

   9. JRJoe Rogan12:44

      That's incredible.

   10. BSBoyan Slat12:44

       This was the prototype. Um, so this was in-

   11. JRJoe Rogan12:46

       Dude, that's amazing.

   12. BSBoyan Slat12:47

       This was in, uh, Jakarta.

   13. JRJoe Rogan12:49

       For people that are just listening, we're looking at this thing pull enormous amounts of plastic out of this river, and it's also doing so and, and they're, they're stacking it into these bags. It's, it's a large physical quantity of stuff.

   14. BSBoyan Slat13:02

       Oh, yeah. And then maybe you can actually pull up the video of Interceptor 2 in, in Malaysia. So we already have two of them in, uh, in real life as we speak. And-

5. 13:10 – 15:59

   Stopping the source: why rivers matter and how the Interceptor works

   1. JRJoe Rogan13:10

      How does it avoid doing anything with fish? How do you avoid, um, capture? Acc- accidentally... Oh my God. Is that real? That, that-

   2. BSBoyan Slat13:18

      Yeah. So this is, this is the Klang River in Kuala Lumpur, and it's-

   3. JRJoe Rogan13:22

      Oh my God.

   4. BSBoyan Slat13:22

      ... according to our model, it's like the fifth most polluting river in the world. So 1% of all plastic, uh, going into the world's oceans is coming from that one river. And, uh-

   5. JRJoe Rogan13:30

      This is unbelievable how polluted this is.

   6. BSBoyan Slat13:33

      It's-

   7. JRJoe Rogan13:33

      This is crazy.

   8. BSBoyan Slat13:34

      It's 10 million kilos per year, roughly. So ...

   9. JRJoe Rogan13:37

      Just, just looking at it, it looks like a wasteland. That's so sad.

   10. BSBoyan Slat13:41

       Yeah. So, um, so then we, um, so, so we now have four Interceptors. Two of them have already been deployed. So here, here's the one, uh, going to, um, to the, to this Klang River. And kind of wanted to make it look like a, like a spaceship, um, just so people would like it. And so it has this barrier that, that concentrates the plastic to the mouth of the Interceptor, where you have a conveyor belt that then scoops it out of the water. Uh, again, fully solar and battery powered, and then deposits it onto this moving shuttle, um, conveyor, which then distributes it across these, uh, big dumpsters. Can hold roughly 50 cubic meters of trash. And, um, yeah, it, it just works by itself. So it's, um ... That's what it does.

   11. JRJoe Rogan14:28

       How much... This, that's an insane amount of garbage that you're pulling out of there. You, when you look at it visi- visually, folks, you can watch the video. What is the name of this video, Jamie? So people can find it. Rivers Interceptor 002 Cleaning in Malaysia is the title of the YouTube video. It's crazy. Now ... And you're not catching any fish in this?

   12. BSBoyan Slat14:48

       Oh, yeah. So, uh, so because this, this barrier is non-permeable, the current just flows underneath it. Um, basically the, the sea life can just pass it, actually. (laughs) At one point, we had this giant lizard, which was probably two meters. We should probably post that photo. It was kind of climbing onto the barrier and then it just swam around it. So, um, yeah.

   13. JRJoe Rogan15:09

       Two meters? Really?

   14. BSBoyan Slat15:11

       Yeah. Or one and a half. Like, it was-

   15. JRJoe Rogan15:13

       What kind of lizard is that?

   16. BSBoyan Slat15:14

       Uh, I don't th- I don't know the name. But it, it was-

   17. JRJoe Rogan15:18

       Some kind of monitor or something?

   18. BSBoyan Slat15:19

       Monitor. That's-

   19. JRJoe Rogan15:20

       Yeah.

   20. BSBoyan Slat15:20

       You're right. Yeah.

   21. JRJoe Rogan15:21

       Yeah. Do you have a image? Where is that? Do you see a f- an image of that? No?

   22. BSBoyan Slat15:26

       I'll post it next week.

   23. JRJoe Rogan15:27

       Oh, you haven't posted it before?

   24. BSBoyan Slat15:28

       No, no.

   25. JRJoe Rogan15:29

       Oh, okay. He was looking for it.

   26. BSBoyan Slat15:30

       Yeah.

   27. JRJoe Rogan15:30

       I thought you were saying it was out there. Um, so it's safe for fish. Um, what about the, the stuff that doesn't float on the very surface?

   28. BSBoyan Slat15:38

       Right. So the, the system goes down one meter, and what we measured is that really almost all the plastic is in that top layer.

   29. JRJoe Rogan15:46

       Okay.

   30. BSBoyan Slat15:46

       So sure, you know, it won't be 100% efficient, but I think it's, it's really about having this pragmatic thing that catches most of it.
6. 15:59 – 25:24

   Wildlife safety and capture depth: engineering around fish and submerged debris

   1. JRJoe Rogan15:59

      That's great. Um, and so this plan that you had, uh, when, you know, it's been six years running.

   2. BSBoyan Slat16:07

      Mm-hmm.

   3. JRJoe Rogan16:08

      Uh, how much of your daily time is devoted to this?

   4. BSBoyan Slat16:13

      Oh, I don't think there's much, much free time at all. (laughs) So I guess for the past year, I've na- I've not had a single free day. Uh, so-

   5. JRJoe Rogan16:24

      Not a single?

   6. BSBoyan Slat16:25

      Yeah. Just 9:00 AM to usually, you know, 9:00 PM in the office. Just it's been, uh, busy. But I think it was, uh, it was worth it, uh, looking where we were beginning of the year to where we're now. Yeah.

   7. JRJoe Rogan16:40

      Well, now that you've actually pulled these cargo containers filled with plastic out of the ocean, that must give you an extreme feeling of satisfaction, right? That you've, you've actually made it work. Like you-

   8. BSBoyan Slat16:51

      So-

   9. JRJoe Rogan16:51

      It's, it's moving now.

   10. BSBoyan Slat16:53

       So I was, I was kind of hoping for that feeling, but then when you get to that point, you're like, "Okay," but there's still, you can really only see the amount of work that's still ahead of you. So, so it's actually really hard to kind of enjoy successes in, in a way.

   11. JRJoe Rogan17:09

       Mm-hmm.

   12. BSBoyan Slat17:10

       Um, I should probably get better at that.

   13. JRJoe Rogan17:12

       It's hard ... Well, particularly what you're doing, you have a monumental task in front of you. And what you're doing is rightly being applauded by so many people, but I don't know how many people are actually helping you.

   14. BSBoyan Slat17:22

       Hmm.

   15. JRJoe Rogan17:22

       You, you have a crazy thing that you're doing. You're trying to pull the plastic out of the ocean. When people find out about the Great Pacific garbage patch, they, they, they get panicky. They're like, "What? How long has this been going on? How do I, how do I not know about this?"

   16. BSBoyan Slat17:34

       Right.

   17. JRJoe Rogan17:34

       'Cause so few people ... I mean, I would think like maybe 40% of the population understands there's a gigantic patch-

   18. BSBoyan Slat17:40

       Yeah. (laughs)

   19. JRJoe Rogan17:40

       ... of garbage in the middle of the ocean.

   20. BSBoyan Slat17:41

       And it was discovered 20 years ago.

   21. JRJoe Rogan17:43

       Yeah.

   22. BSBoyan Slat17:43

       Exactly 20 years ago, and still-

   23. JRJoe Rogan17:45

       That's crazy.

   24. BSBoyan Slat17:45

       Still it's there, just been growing.

   25. JRJoe Rogan17:47

       So 1998, no one had a goddamn clue.

   26. BSBoyan Slat17:49

       Nope.

   27. JRJoe Rogan17:50

       And then they went, "Wait, hey, what? What's going on here?"

   28. BSBoyan Slat17:53

       Yeah.

   29. JRJoe Rogan17:53

       "What is all this garbage?" And it keeps getting bigger and bigger, right?

   30. BSBoyan Slat17:56

       Yeah. It's actually a g- quite a good story. There's this, um, this sailor called Charles Moore, who was, um, participating in a sail race between Hawaii and California. And, um, while others would go further north, he thought, "Well, let's try and, uh, cut off this, this piece." And then he was a-... looking at the water and he just, just saw all that, all that trash. And, um, then he went back, he was shocked about it and then, um, he decided to, to put, uh, take some measurements, publish the results, and that kind of popularized that whole concept of, of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.
7. 25:24 – 31:27

   Founder reality check: workload, satisfaction gap, and building a 100-person organization

   1. JRJoe Rogan25:24

      It's a good thing to say. It's, it's accurate. What do you, what do you think though about... What I was gonna get at was, do you, uh, ever conceive a possibility of coming up with something that removes carbon from the atmosphere? That's a giant issue with us, right?

   2. BSBoyan Slat25:36

      Right. Um-

   3. JRJoe Rogan25:37

      Carbon emissions.

   4. BSBoyan Slat25:38

      So, definitely, I, I believe negative emissions, what, what I think you, you, you refer to them, um, will be required to make the, the goals to kind of keep the, you know, warming in, in, in check. Um, it's... However, it's a much more difficult problem, because if you think of the ocean, it's, it's basically a, a two-dimensional problem. It's plastic on the surface and fortunately it's not even the whole ocean. It's, it's kind of concentrating in these accumulation zones. So the garbage patch, although it's twice the size of Texas, it's still, you know, 1.6 million square kilometers, while the ocean is something like 300 million square kilometers off the top of my head. So it's really just, maybe less than a percent of the ocean which needs to be cleaned and it's a... Again, it's a two-dimensional problem. While the atmosphere is, is three-dimensional, so it's just this, this one-dimensional increase is just... Yeah, it's just a, a huge, huge challenge. So I, I do think it needs to be tackled and it's definitely an exciting problem to think about. Um, I, I, I do think that's definitely... That's not a good starter problem to, to work on.

   5. JRJoe Rogan26:53

      No. Um, wasn't there something, Jamie, that we had talked about where they had figured out a way to make these building-sized, essentially, vacuum cleaners they were gonna put in the center of, uh, certain cities? I believe it was in Asia. Maybe... Perhaps China-

   6. BSBoyan Slat27:06

      Mm-hmm.

   7. JRJoe Rogan27:06

      ... they'd come up with this. And, and they... I don't know if they implemented it yet, but the idea was to have these enormous things in place that look like a skyscraper.

   8. BSBoyan Slat27:13

      Mm-hmm.

   9. JRJoe Rogan27:14

      And really, it was just a, a huge vacuum cleaner for carbon.

   10. BSBoyan Slat27:17

       Sure. I, I know there are a few companies that are working on it. I believe Carbon Engineering is one. There is also, um, there's also one out of Switzerland. Forgot the name. But, uh, so, so definitely good, smart people are, are working on that problem. Um, I'm not sure where they are in terms of, you know, the economics and ............................

   11. JRJoe Rogan27:36

       Can this sit right here?

   12. BSBoyan Slat27:36

       When he mentions Carbon Eng-Engineering is this one.

   13. JRJoe Rogan27:39

       Okay, so that looks like-

   14. BSBoyan Slat27:41

       Bill Gates Funded Fit.

   15. JRJoe Rogan27:42

       ... giant fans. Like, a huge building filled with fans (laughs) .

   16. BSBoyan Slat27:46

       Yeah.

   17. JRJoe Rogan27:46

       "We believe humanity can solve climate change." Yikes. Imagine, like, we have filters for air the same way we have filters for water. Direct air capture technology. Carbon Engineering. Um, more than 10 years in the making that can capture carbon dioxide directly from the atmosphere. And look at that machine. Try to get a close-up on what that thing looks like. It looks like giant fucking washing machines.

   18. BSBoyan Slat28:09

       (laughs)

   19. JRJoe Rogan28:09

       Right? Like, it's washing the air. Doesn't it look like giant washing machines?

   20. BSBoyan Slat28:14

       Yeah. It does.

   21. JRJoe Rogan28:14

       Wow.

   22. BSBoyan Slat28:14

       Def.

   23. JRJoe Rogan28:14

       I mean, uh, it seems like it's feasible. It doesn't seem like it's something that's impossible.

   24. BSBoyan Slat28:19

       Yeah. Uh, it's... It's... I think just it's the, it's the scalability that, that's the main challenge.

   25. JRJoe Rogan28:23

       Right. Well, it's also funding. Like, if you drive over, uh, or fly over Manhattan, rather, and see the density of the structures and how many buildings are in there, you know that people can make some pretty insane shit.

   26. BSBoyan Slat28:33

       Right.

   27. JRJoe Rogan28:33

       Why couldn't they make some giant, insane vacuum cleaner for the air that's-

   28. BSBoyan Slat28:37

       Yeah.

   29. JRJoe Rogan28:37

       ... you know, as big as a city block?

   30. BSBoyan Slat28:38

       Of course, a lot of it comes down to economics.
8. 31:27 – 32:35

   Plastic breakdown and microplastics: why time makes pollution worse (and a surprise win)

   1. BSBoyan Slat31:27

      And actually, plastic, again, is carbon chains.

   2. JRJoe Rogan31:31

      Makes diamonds? Oh, that's right. You could ... (gasps)

   3. BSBoyan Slat31:32

      So we could even make diamonds out of ocean plastic.

   4. JRJoe Rogan31:33

      Whoa, that would be the ultimate green diamond. Imagine like, if you were like a really, um, ecologically-minded rapper. You could wear, all, all your ice could come from the ocean.

   5. BSBoyan Slat31:45

      (laughs)

   6. JRJoe Rogan31:45

      Let everybody know.

   7. BSBoyan Slat31:46

      From trash to treasure.

   8. JRJoe Rogan31:47

      Yes. There you go. Dude, that's the fucking, that's, that's the signature of the company. In quotes, "From trash to treasure."

   9. BSBoyan Slat31:54

      You down to write these things down?

   10. JRJoe Rogan31:56

       Bullion diamonds, how about that? I like it.

   11. BSBoyan Slat31:59

       Yeah.

   12. JRJoe Rogan31:59

       Dude, you could be the first, uh, guy to do this. Here we go.

   13. BSBoyan Slat32:03

       ... plastic, this is an ocean diamond.

   14. JRJoe Rogan32:06

       Whoa. Earth is crushing the ocean into salty diamonds. That's a dope-looking diamond too.

   15. BSBoyan Slat32:13

       Hmm. What is that?

   16. It's salt, I guess.

   17. JRJoe Rogan32:16

       Uh, recreated salty diamond deposits in a high-pressure, high-temperature experiment suggesting that many of Earth's diamonds form when the m- mantle crushes ancient seabed minerals.

   18. BSBoyan Slat32:28

       Mm-hmm.

   19. JRJoe Rogan32:29

       Oh. Isn't science and the Earth cool?

   20. BSBoyan Slat32:33

       (laughs)

9. 32:35 – 56:29

   Beyond plastic: carbon capture, ‘green diamonds,’ and monetizing environmental fixes

   1. JRJoe Rogan32:35

      I mean, if you do get to do this ... Here's another problem, okay? Here's a, is a big one for the ocean. We are depleting it of seafood, of life.

   2. BSBoyan Slat32:42

      Sure.

   3. JRJoe Rogan32:43

      I mean, we, you know, I had, um ... How do you say his name again? Psajoyas, right? Louis Psajoyas, who, uh, directed The Cove on.

   4. BSBoyan Slat32:51

      Yep.

   5. JRJoe Rogan32:51

      And we were talking about, um, the deplenishing, deplenishing of the wildlife in the, in the ocean. And when you start looking at it on a grand scale, like how much fish they're pulling out of the oceans-

   6. BSBoyan Slat33:01

      Hmm.

   7. JRJoe Rogan33:01

      ... it's very sobering, you know?

   8. BSBoyan Slat33:03

      Sure.

   9. JRJoe Rogan33:04

      Maybe you can come up with a way to replenish-

   10. BSBoyan Slat33:07

       Wow.

   11. JRJoe Rogan33:07

       ... fish in the ocean, so we can continue eating sushi. What do you think?

   12. BSBoyan Slat33:10

       (laughs)

   13. JRJoe Rogan33:11

       (laughs)

   14. BSBoyan Slat33:13

       So, so maybe could just zoom out a bit and, and, you know, so what is ... So because, of course, plastic pollution, you know, climate change, overfishing, I think is all part of one big problem to make civilization sustainable. And, um, the, the way I look at it is that, of course, over the past 200 years, humanity has made tremendous progress. So, of course, since agriculture re- revolution 10,000 years ago, um, humanity has been kind of stagnant, no progress, or just very, very slow progress, number of people, um, lifespan. It was all kind of flat, nothing really happened. And then since the, the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, and when we learnt t- how to utilize science and, and our knowledge, uh, collective knowledge, to, um, to turn that into progress. Um, basically, every possible metric for humanity has im- i- improved tremendously. And if you think of wealth, health, violence, education, uh, rights, all these things, and, and know you've had Steven Pinker on. He's, he's much more knowledgeable on that topic than, than I am. Um, yet, um, so, so truly at this point in time, uh, it has never been a, a better time to be alive for humans than, than today. Not saying that it can't get better, but we have made tremendous progress, uh, by, on one hand, um, im- imagining things that don't exist yet, so inventing technologies, and also inventing, uh, institutions. And on the other hand, uh, our human ability to, to collaborate effectively in large numbers, uh, which includes, you know, the, the corporation, which is a, a very effective way for, for people to, to work together. Now, all that progress has always ... has also had its negative side effects, which are most pronounced, of course, in the area of the environment, where, um, I think we, we put things into an environment that, that shouldn't belong there, and we take too much out of it than nature can replenish, which includes, you know, the fish, and on the other hand, you have the plastic going into the environment, et cetera. So, uh, so then the question is, well, how do we solve that? And of course, one hand is to say, okay, it's kind of the, the, um, yeah, the maybe Luddite is maybe a bit of a negative way to, to phrase it, but the sort of reactionary approach of saying, okay, we should consume less. Um, you know, corporations are bad, technology's bad, we should all get rid of all those things. Mm-hmm.

   15. JRJoe Rogan35:47

       And, um, I, I think, you know, the en- environment, the m- modern environmental movement, which is very kind of this romantic movement, has this image of back in the day, everything was great and we lived in harmony with nature, so let's get rid of all this modernity and try and return to that pure original state. What I, however, believe is that, first of all, that's, I don't think it's a very realistic thing. You know, people want to keep their iPhones and their cars, and you know, people want to move forward. Um, and at the same time, I don't think it's really the most effective way to, to solve these problems, because, you know, it would be like fighting a, a Leopard tank with, with bow and arrow. Um, you know, technology is nothing more than an, an, an enabler of human capabilities. It, it enhances our power. So why not use that power to also try and solve these, these, these, these problems as well? So rather than try and reject business, reject technology, I truly believe that we should embrace those-

   16. BSBoyan Slat36:46

       ... those forces that make us human and, and has created this amazing world, to also try and solve these, these negative side effects as well. And that's why I believe, you know, the overconsump- overconsumption of fish is not going to end by people all becoming vegan, but rather through, um, you know, fake meat. Uh, I think that the, uh, transport emissions are not going to be solved by people not flying anymore or not going anywhere anymore. Realistically, people are going to fly more, so we better invent technologies that allow people to do that without harming the environment. And, um, you know, the same thing I think would be the case for, for, for plastic and, and really other energy uses as well.

   17. JRJoe Rogan37:31

       No, I think that's a very wise way of looking at it, and it's a, it's a hopeful way of looking at it. And it's funny that today you kinda ha- even though you're, you're, you're dealing with, uh, statistics and factual information, like the fact that it is, uh, safer to live today.

   18. BSBoyan Slat37:48

       Mm-hmm.

   19. JRJoe Rogan37:48

       There's less violent crime. It's easier to get by. There's more technology, more innovation. Medical technology's improved radically. All these things are true. But you still have to say, "It's not where we want it to be."

   20. BSBoyan Slat37:59

       Right. Right. (laughs)

   21. JRJoe Rogan38:00

       It's not w- I'm not saying that the world's p- we- you have to say that, even you.

   22. BSBoyan Slat38:03

       Yep.

   23. JRJoe Rogan38:03

       Like, even though you're ... I mean, look, it's, it's the worry about people barking at you. So worry about people, "It's still terrible in parts of the world."

   24. BSBoyan Slat38:11

       Yeah. (laughs)

   25. JRJoe Rogan38:11

       "It's still terrible for people of, of color. It's still terrible for trans. It's still d-" I get it, I get it, I get it. No one's saying that there's not room for improvement. But you have to say that.

   26. BSBoyan Slat38:21

       Yeah.

   27. JRJoe Rogan38:21

       Like, you, even though you felt compelled, you're like, "It's still not perfect."

   28. BSBoyan Slat38:24

       Yeah. And, uh, I, I wonder why it's so, so controversial. I, I think it's important to, um, learn from the things that we do well and then apply that to-

   29. JRJoe Rogan38:35

       I don't think it is that controversial. I think it's a trick.

   30. BSBoyan Slat38:38

       Yeah.
10. 56:29 – 1:02:36

    A pro-innovation environmental philosophy: decoupling progress from damage

    1. JRJoe Rogan56:29

       Have you faced any opposition to this? Is there anybody that thinks this is a fruitless idea?

    2. BSBoyan Slat56:33

       Yeah. Yes.

    3. JRJoe Rogan56:33

       'Cause I know there were people that were actually ... I was very shocked. I read people that were actually happy that your project didn't work the first time.

    4. BSBoyan Slat56:40

       (laughs)

    5. JRJoe Rogan56:40

       I'm like, "What the fuck, man?"

    6. BSBoyan Slat56:41

       Yeah.

    7. JRJoe Rogan56:42

       There's people that ... I think it's a, a young thing. Like, 'cause you're this, uh, really hopeful, young, intelligent guy who comes up with this solution, and I think they're probably, "Oh, he thinks he's so fucking smart. Oh, fuck him, I hope it fails." And when it failed, people actually enjoyed it.

    8. BSBoyan Slat56:58

       Yeah. Oh, yeah. It was-

    9. JRJoe Rogan57:00

       Was that sh- did that hurt?

    10. BSBoyan Slat57:02

        No. Um, so for me, uh, of c- so, yes, of course since the, uh, really since the beginning 2013 there have been people, um, you know, like, relatively small group of people, but there have been people that have been opposing it, and, um, most of them, ironically enough, are people that care about the ocean, because they don't feel it's the right way to, um, to, to tackle the issue. And, um ... but, so th- the way I deal with it is y- at least what I used to do in the beginning, now there're ... fortunately there aren't many new arguments anymore, but, um, just basically write them out, every single argument, rationally analyze them, you know. No emotions. Emotions only muddle your, your thinking i- in that way. And make a distinction, okay, is this something where this person has a point? If so, great, because, you know, rather have somebody else pointing it out to me than us having to learn it in the field and, you know, having a, having a unnecessary failure. Um, and if the person doesn't have a point and if it's just, uh, you know, assumption, or unfounded or whatever, um, you know, then it's very easy for me to just ignore it. And so ... And then the question is, well, what motivates people to be negative? And I, I think there's probably four reasons. First of all it's, it's, uh, you know, genuine skepticism whether it can be done, and I think that's, you know, that's healthy and I think we've proved most of those arguments wrong now, uh, but of course there's still, you know, the whole scale-up thing which we still have to do, so there's still a bit of that, but it's kind of morphing now to few other things. Um, I think one thing is, um, human, uh, risk perception, which i- is sometimes y- I think is a, it's a cause of, um, o- of, of some, uh, opposition, where, um, it, it, it's very, uh, easy for people to ignore the, the, the baseline when they look at risks. So, um, you know, you can, for example, say, "Okay, nuclear power, super risky. We, we shouldn't do that." But then if you compare it to the baseline of other sources of energy, that's actually probably the, the least risky, um, source of energy there is. Like, even solar energy is, causes more deaths per megawatt hour than, um, than, than nuclear power, because people fall off roofs. So, so it's, it's really ... So if you ignore the baseline, and if you say, "Okay, um, doing this cleanup, we shouldn't do it because there's all these potential risks, right? Of, um, you know, potentially there is some sea life that may be caught, potentially there are, uh, these moral hazards, uh, there's all these risks and, you know, basically best thing to do is not do it." What people then are ignoring is sort of the, the certain hazard of just hundreds of millions of kilos that, that ... of plastic that's already in the ocean, and if you were to kind of pose the opposite question and say, "Okay, um, so if I were to go to the ocean right now and just dump the s- equivalent amount of plastic that we were to take out, would dump it into the ocean, uh, would you, would you think that's a good plan?" And then, well, probably the answer is, is, is, "No." So, so I think there's, there's a bit of this, um, you know ... of course, of course what we're doing, it's new. There are risks involved, but as long as we, um, you know, map them well, we take things step by step, I think they're manageable, and they're definitely not risks, uh, or reasons to, to not do it, because of course the baseline is that there is already doing, uh, uh, a lot of harm being done by, uh, the status quo. So, so I think that's one argument behind people's opposition. Um, there's also a bit of, um, zero ... what, what do you call? Zero-sum game bias, where people are saying, "Well, we shouldn't do this because the resources would be better spent elsewhere." Saw a, um, an, an op-ed in, uh, Wired few weeks ago where people were saying, well ... or, uh, just one person actually, was, was writing where this person said, you know, "You shouldn't, um, worry about the plastic pollution issue. You shouldn't do anything about it, because climate change is the biggest issue, and all our attention should go there. Plastic pollution's just a distraction." And-

    11. JRJoe Rogan1:01:21

        That's foolish.

    12. BSBoyan Slat1:01:22

        Well, yeah, I think, you know, there's seven and a half billion peoples in the world, and, um, we can do more than one thing at the same time, I think, so-

    13. JRJoe Rogan1:01:29

        Yeah, I mean, w- should you not wash your dishes because your carpet is dirty? I mean, it doesn't make any sense. Both of them are a problem.

    14. BSBoyan Slat1:01:35

        Oh.

    15. JRJoe Rogan1:01:35

        Do ... Clean both of them. This, this idea that you should only think about climate change, it's like, oh, don't think about the giant Pacific garbage patch that's twice as big as Texas.

    16. BSBoyan Slat1:01:43

        Right.

    17. JRJoe Rogan1:01:43

        Are you fucking serious?

    18. BSBoyan Slat1:01:45

        Yeah.

    19. JRJoe Rogan1:01:45

        It's a dumb argument. Both of them are important. To think about both of them are important. But ...... a part of writing an article today is writing something that people will get upset about. That's part of it, is, like, generating outrage.

    20. BSBoyan Slat1:01:55

        Yeah.

    21. JRJoe Rogan1:01:56

        Get, j- clickbait stuff. Having controversial opinions. Being a contrarian. All those things are profitable today.

    22. BSBoyan Slat1:02:01

        Sure.

    23. JRJoe Rogan1:02:01

        I mean, there's a giant part of why people write articles. They don't write articles-

    24. BSBoyan Slat1:02:05

        It's all about the clicks.

    25. JRJoe Rogan1:02:05

        They don't write articles to state an objective, well-thought-out perspective, always. Sometimes people do. But a lot of times people make some clickbait-y bullshit, and they kind of twist a story and qu- twist an idea of who you are-

    26. BSBoyan Slat1:02:19

        Hmm.

    27. JRJoe Rogan1:02:19

        ... twist it to sort of make their narrative make ... more compelling, be more compelling, and-

    28. BSBoyan Slat1:02:24

        Right.

    29. JRJoe Rogan1:02:24

        ... sell more, or click more and-

    30. BSBoyan Slat1:02:26

        Yeah.
11. 1:02:36 – 1:07:44

    Criticism, moral hazard, and why cleanup can improve behavior (broken-window effect)

    1. JRJoe Rogan1:02:36

       Social media.

    2. BSBoyan Slat1:02:37

       In politics, right?

    3. JRJoe Rogan1:02:37

       I mean, the, the, the fact that Facebook's algorithms in, in a sense support outrage. Right?

    4. BSBoyan Slat1:02:43

       Right.

    5. JRJoe Rogan1:02:43

       Like these, these things are designed to support ... My friend, Ari Shaffir, tested this, and it's really interesting because he tested it to find out what did it, what does it actually support. What it actually supports is what you're interested in. If you're interested in being outraged, it'll show you the, things that outrage you.

    6. BSBoyan Slat1:02:56

       Mm.

    7. JRJoe Rogan1:02:57

       So he decided to just only YouTube-

    8. BSBoyan Slat1:02:59

       (laughs)

    9. JRJoe Rogan1:02:59

       ... puppies.

    10. BSBoyan Slat1:03:00

        Yeah.

    11. JRJoe Rogan1:03:01

        And that's all YouTube would show him was puppies. He's like, "No, you assholes. This is what you're into. If you're into fucking getting mad about, uh, the border, and getting mad about the climate-"

    12. BSBoyan Slat1:03:11

        Right.

    13. JRJoe Rogan1:03:11

        "... and getting mad about abortion, and getting mad about whatever the fuck it is, that's what it'll show you, because that's what you're interested in."

    14. BSBoyan Slat1:03:16

        Right.

    15. JRJoe Rogan1:03:17

        You know, my YouTube f- feed is mostly muscle cars and fights.

    16. BSBoyan Slat1:03:21

        (laughs)

    17. JRJoe Rogan1:03:22

        Why? Because that's what I'm interested in.

    18. BSBoyan Slat1:03:23

        Yeah.

    19. JRJoe Rogan1:03:23

        You know, I'm i- j- that's, I, I ... You know, and occasionally science things.

    20. BSBoyan Slat1:03:26

        Yeah.

    21. JRJoe Rogan1:03:27

        But that's just because that's what you search for. That's ... It'll show you what you search for.

    22. BSBoyan Slat1:03:31

        I'm sure you're somewhat happy that it shows you those things rather than-

    23. JRJoe Rogan1:03:35

        Yes.

    24. BSBoyan Slat1:03:35

        Yeah.

    25. JRJoe Rogan1:03:35

        Sure. I don't think, I don't think it's as sinister as people want to say it is. I think the, the issue is human nature. We are, we are compelled to, uh, get upset about things, and I think a lot of it is people that feel disempowered in their own existence.

    26. BSBoyan Slat1:03:50

        Mm.

    27. JRJoe Rogan1:03:50

        The people that you were talking about that are stuck in cubicles and that are staring at that clock waiting for the buzzer to ring so they can go home.

    28. BSBoyan Slat1:03:56

        Right.

    29. JRJoe Rogan1:03:56

        Those people are online. They're tweeting. They're taking a shit and tweeting, "Fuck this guy. This little kid thinks he's gonna fix this. Fucking eh, he ain't fixing shit." There's a lot of what's going on.

    30. BSBoyan Slat1:04:04

        Yeah.
12. 1:07:44 – 1:35:28

    Clickbait incentives and social media algorithms: outrage as a business model

    1. JRJoe Rogan1:07:44

       Again, again, I think we're in this transitionary phase, and I also think technology is going to make a lot of what we're concentrating on-... obsolete. I think, um, w, we are really, really close to some crazy breakthroughs in terms of the distribution of information that's gonna make it obsolete.

    2. BSBoyan Slat1:08:04

       Mm-hmm.

    3. JRJoe Rogan1:08:04

       And people aren't gonna care as much about clickbait-y things because, you know, you're gonna be able to feel things from, uh, digitally created media.

    4. BSBoyan Slat1:08:13

       Hmm.

    5. JRJoe Rogan1:08:13

       And we think we're very, very close to augmented reality becoming an, uh, an essential part of people's lives, you know, the same way your phone has become an essential part of your life. 20 years ago, no one carried a phone around. It was very rare and you wouldn-

    6. BSBoyan Slat1:08:26

       Right.

    7. JRJoe Rogan1:08:26

       ... n- y- you know, 1999, I mean, m- a small percentage of people had phones on them. Now it's 100%. Right? D- All this stuff is happening at this exponentially increasing rate. When they implement augmented reality, and who was telling us that Apple's, like, somewhere around 2021?

    8. BSBoyan Slat1:08:44

       Man, I might have been ... I've been looking that up.

    9. JRJoe Rogan1:08:46

       Yeah.

    10. BSBoyan Slat1:08:46

        I mentioned it once or twice.

    11. JRJoe Rogan1:08:47

        You definitely did.

    12. BSBoyan Slat1:08:48

        Yeah.

    13. JRJoe Rogan1:08:48

        Um, might have been you. Um, but some other folks had brought it up too, that Apple's really close and they're, they're in the process right now of developing some sort of augmented reality goggles.

    14. BSBoyan Slat1:08:59

        Hmm.

    15. JRJoe Rogan1:09:00

        And they'll be like glasses, like, you know, you put on a pair of, uh, you know, just like this. But you'll be seeing all these things in front of you. You'll be able to move them around.

    16. BSBoyan Slat1:09:10

        Right.

    17. JRJoe Rogan1:09:10

        You'll be able to see navigation.

    18. BSBoyan Slat1:09:12

        Yep.

    19. JRJoe Rogan1:09:12

        You'll b- you'll turn it on and off, it'll probably work on Siri, you'll be able to talk to it. And you're gonna be able to get video and information written, w- as podcasts, all these things, music.

    20. BSBoyan Slat1:09:22

        Sure.

    21. JRJoe Rogan1:09:22

        The- It's gonna come through this. And w- probably this is one step in this ever-increasing trend of us getting further and further immersed in technology. And, uh, augmented reality will lead to some sort of, uh, impossible to determine virtual reality-

    22. BSBoyan Slat1:09:41

        Yep.

    23. JRJoe Rogan1:09:41

        ... where it's indistinguishable from regular reality. We're, we're like, we're like 50 years away from literally being in The Matrix.

    24. BSBoyan Slat1:09:48

        Yeah. Yeah, so, so I, I think it's underappreciated how much our behavior is also guided by technology. I mean, of course, we have our genes, our genotype, which kinda lies at the most fundamental level of how our, our behaviors are formed. Um, that's why, you know, there is such a thing as, as, as human nature. But then there is this whole sort of cultural layer bu- that w- we humans created around us, which, um, I call the technosphere, maybe other people have different names for it. But it's indeed, uh, everything we read, we, we interact with something like 30,000 inventions or 30,000 technologies through our entire lives. That's a huge amount and I think, um, you know, that environment that shapes your behavior, it, um, decides what kind of b- um, yeah, genes are, are expressed. And the interesting thing is, is it's not just a natural environment, but it's an environment we create. So, so probably, um, you know, when you think about people being born thousands of years ago, their genes were very, very similar to the people today, yet, um, how they behave is completely different. You know, look again at violence. And why is that the case? Well, it's thanks to, uh, these inventions, not just, you know, physical inventions, but also cultural inventions and institutions that we created that, um, you know, shapes our behavior. And, um, you know, probably, you know, y- uh, human nature is, is, the human behavior is very hard to change unless it actually, um, you know, benefits what, what we do. Look at, you know, smartphones, how fast that happened versus, uh, how long it takes for smoking to, to go away. You know, one is, um, you know, one is kind of incentivizing the continued use of it, um, you know, through addictive products, while, um, with, um, with, uh, smartphones, it's again, it's, it's something that you, you want to use. Mm-hmm. So, um, so I just wonder whether, you know, that interaction between humans and the technology that we create kind of invent- uh, incentivizes inventors to become morally better and better, because they ... Uh, did you lose me already or ... You sure?

    25. JRJoe Rogan1:12:17

        No, no, no, no.

    26. BSBoyan Slat1:12:17

        Okay. (laughs)

    27. JRJoe Rogan1:12:18

        No.

    28. BSBoyan Slat1:12:19

        So-

    29. JRJoe Rogan1:12:20

        (laughs)

    30. BSBoyan Slat1:12:20

        ... so the, you know, the, the question is, um-

Episode duration: 1:44:41