236 Alpha Lo - What if water is more important than carbon - Investing in Regenerative Agriculture and Food

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Okay, repeat after me .
Slow water down and drought,fire, floods Those two concepts
we're going to repeat a milliontimes.
Trees create rain and not theother way around.
There's just so much to learnabout water in all its forms
what it does when it's part of ahealthy water cycle, either big
or small, and what it does whenit isn't.

(00:20):
Massive floods we see aroundthe world at the moment.
In this interview, we tried tostart to unpack the massive role
water plays in heating andcooling our planet and argue why
we should absolutely pay moreattention to water and the water
cycles.
Potentially, it's moreimportant and relevant in the
climate discussion than carbon.
Did I just say that?
Yes, i did So enjoy.

(00:40):
If it's true that water vaporaccounts for 60 to 70% of the
greenhouse effect, well, co2only accounts for 25.
Why do we rarely discuss it?

(01:01):
Maybe we choose to ignore itbecause it means we literally
need to re-vegetate the entireEarth.
Bring back the marshes, themangroves, superannual pastures
with trees and re-grow realforests that can bring back rain
in strategic places.
In short, bring back life, lotsof plants, trees, animals back
to many places on this Earth,not your climate engineering.
It is time we take our role askeystone species super seriously

(01:26):
.
In this special water cycleseries, we interview the
dreamers and the doers who areusing the latest technology to
figure out where to intervenefirst.
They're making, or trying tomake, the investment and return
calculations and plans.
So what's missing?
What's holding us back?
Maybe we lack the imaginationto back them and try
regeneration at scale?
We're thankful for the supportof the Nest Family Office in

(01:49):
order to make this series.
The Nest is a family officededicated to building a more
resilient food system throughsupporting natural solutions and
innovative technologies thatchange the way we produce food.
You can find out more ondenestfocom.

(02:19):
Welcome to another episode Todaywith physicist and writer of
the Climate Water Project thatyou definitely can find on
Substack.
I will link it below Welcome,alpha.
Hi.
Glad to be here And I'm verymuch looking forward to this
conversation and the wholeseries.
Honestly, were in the middle ofaround water cycles.
But I would love to start witha personal question.

(02:41):
How did you end up because Ialready mentioned physicist not
necessarily focus on watercycles, i think to begin with
when you're in university Howdid you end up?
going very deep?
because if you follow yourSubstack super accessible, by
the way, but it still goes verydeep into the water cycle space.

Speaker 2 (03:01):
Yeah, i've been kind of working in permaculture and
doing some regeneration on land,and when the wildfires hit
California, which is where I'mfrom, i thought there must be
some permaculture solution.
And I saw Zach Weis's work abouthydration And he was reporting,
i think, anastasia's work,macareva's work.

(03:23):
But he was saying that there'sa small water cycle and that we
can actually increase the rain,and so I thought there should be
ways of possibly utilizingthese land management methods
that might be able to increaserain or create ways of holding
water in the soil longer tofight the fires.
And then, the more I delvedinto it, i was like, wow,

(03:43):
there's a lot of thingshappening with the climate and
with the environment that haveto do with the water cycle, and
previously, as a physicist, i'dstudied water, but not on the
macroscopic.
But so I had some interest inwater And so I got curious, and
the more and more I delved intoit, the more I was like my
goodness, water is a huge partof the climate, and so carbon is

(04:04):
an important part of the wholeclimate equation too, but water
is actually this huge part thatnot enough people are talking
about.
So I then applied mypermaculture background and my
physics background to delve moreinto this.

Speaker 1 (04:17):
Perfect.
Yeah, you mentioned already alot of interesting concepts we
have to unpack, and Zach Wise,which we had on the podcast
before, which I will link below,in Anastasia, which we'll have
hopefully in a month or so orwhenever you're listening to
this.
It should be online already.
You just interviewed her.
I haven't been able to listento that yet, but I read the sub

(04:37):
site, which is very detailed,very graphic, a lot of
interesting pictures andconcepts, so I will link that
below as well.
But let's start with a fewthings.
You mentioned Small water cycle, which suggests that there's a
big one as well.
We've talked about it, but thatwas a long time ago with Zach,
so let's repeat and emphasize ita bit more What is a water
cycle to begin with, and whythere are two different ones?

Speaker 2 (05:00):
Yeah, so water on Earth is very interesting.
It actually is in thisnon-equilibrium state.
It's always constantly going upinto the air, where it forms
rain, and then it comes backdown, which it doesn't do on
other planets, and so there's alarge water cycle where it's
coming in from the ocean, themoisture blows into the ocean,

(05:20):
but then there's also, and thenwhen it falls to the land, the
land can absorb some of thatrain and then evapotranspire.
Evapotranspire means thewater's either being released by
the plants or the soil up intothe air or by lakes, and that
combines with the water blowingin from the ocean.
And so you know.

Speaker 1 (05:39):
So the big one is basically what we learn in
school it rains somehow, we'llget into that why but water
flows down, either through ariver system or elsewhere.
It gets into the ocean, gets upagain and repeats.
That's the big one, but there'sa much more important, smaller
one, actually, that we don'treally talk about, or at least
not outside the water cyclegeeks, let's say.

(06:01):
Or the water cycle bubble,which is doesn't include the
oceans or big water bodies.
It includes mostly vegetationthat basically sweat and
evaporate a lot of water and itstarts looping as well, which is
a shorter one.
That's why it's called thesmall water cycle.

Speaker 2 (06:19):
Yeah, and it can be anywhere from 10% to 80% of the
cause of the rain Massive.
Yeah.
So places where, likeCalifornia, it's a little bit
less, because a lot of that'scoming from the ocean, but
places like China, a lot more ofit is coming from the grounds.
So the small water cycle, youknow, maybe on average it's
about 40 to 50% around the world, the small water cycle And in

(06:42):
the climate.
The climatologists have alsobeen studying this.
They call it precipitationrecycling And actually, because
it's been independentlydiscovered various times in
atmospheric science and climatescience, it's also called
moisture recycling or moisturefeedback or precipitation
feedback.
So multiple people have come upwith different terms And it's
interesting.
In the permaculture and thekind of regenerative agriculture

(07:02):
, people talk about the smallwater cycle.
The climate scientists talkabout precipitation recycling
and they don't know thatsometimes they don't know this
other demographic is actuallystudying the same thing or
talking about the same thing,and why do the climate
scientists talk about this?

Speaker 1 (07:17):
Because we mostly talk about carbon and other
emissions, like the carbonequivalent of the famous little
E at the end of a lot of CO2statements.

Speaker 2 (07:27):
The climate scientists are studying water a
lot.
I mean, it is a big part ofatmospheric science because,
well, for one, the whole heatingup, the carbon heats up, but
then it draws in the water vaporinto the air and that affects
the temperature too.
So even to do the basictemperature calculations you
have to take into account thewater cycle.
And then you know atmosphericscientists are very interested
about rain.

(07:47):
You know droughts and floodsand all this, and so they're
studying the water cycle a lottoo.
And there's some Dutchscientists in particular that
have been really pushing thisprecipitation recycling Van der
Eint and Hubert Savanege Andthey actually mapped out how

(08:07):
much each country and where itis, how much the small water
cycle, the precipitationrecycling, is playing a part in
the rain.
And they're like we really needto get the climate scientists
focused a lot more than this.
And then climate science isreally saying, hey, how come our
field is not focusing enough onthe hydrological cycle?

Speaker 1 (08:27):
And then within your writing and publishing because
you're not just writing, i meanyour recording podcast as well
and doing a lot of drawing aswell.
And what do you mostly focus on?
Why did you call it climatewater project on Substack?
What's the reasoning behind thetitle?

Speaker 2 (08:44):
Well, right now, one of the big existential threats
and problems for the world isthe climate, and I wanted to put
some emphasis on that part ofthe equation of the water,
because I think the part on theland it's a lot more at least
it's been a lot more understood.
But I think people are notalways connecting what's

(09:07):
happening on the land with water, with what's happening in the
climate, but because there's acoupling between the land and
the climate through the treesand the lakes and the soil
that's evaporating, there's avery important thing, so I want
to focus on that.

Speaker 1 (09:23):
And so what is that important connection with me?
We've had Walter Yenne on theshow a while back, i'm thinking
two and a half years almost, orat least more than two, but I
will link it below as well.
We basically said stop focusingtoo much on carbon.
There's a water vapor to focuson and the water cycle to focus
on, as we've de-vegetated prettymuch most of the earth, or at

(09:46):
least large quantities.
How would you describe why thisevaporation is so important,
and not only to create rain,which it does, and we'll get to
that, but also in this heatingand cooling that we're in the
middle of and being hit by, aswe're talking, end of May,
beginning of June 2023.
There are droughts everywhereand floods everywhere, and fire

(10:08):
season hasn't really startedanywhere yet, i think, but
actually some places for sure,it seems.
definitely we're off balance.
So why is that vapor part andthat evaporation part so
important?
also for heating and cooling?

Speaker 2 (10:22):
Yeah, so when the rain comes down it can flow all
the way back into the ocean.
But if you slow that water sayyou have more forest or soil
that's more absorbent and staysin the land for longer and then
when it vapor transits it canevapotransit There's more water
left on the land to actuallyevapotransit.
If you can imagine, it's likethere's a certain amount of

(10:44):
water on our continents but ifit's all rushing out during the
wet season, then there's lesswater there to evapotransit And
that evapotransit water combineswith the moisture blowing
inland from the ocean to createrain.
So you're going to affect theamount of rain on your land In
the dry season.

Speaker 1 (11:04):
Yeah, So basically you're by missing the
evapotranspire effect becauseyou don't have vegetation, you
don't have full grown forests,et cetera, et cetera Basically
rushing down the water when itfalls and it does fall, but then
it creates floods andeverything it rushes to the
ocean.
It's basically lost and you'lllose that effect of 10%, 20%,

(11:25):
30%, 40%, 50%, 80%, whatever itis, depending on where you are.
So you miss the rain part aswell, which means you get even
less water coming down.
So it becomes sort of anegative cycle.

Speaker 2 (11:38):
Yeah, you can think about it.
There's an interesting way,because the rivers can still
have the same amount of watergoing out to the oceans, but if
you slow it down you actuallyhave more water on the land.
So an analogy it's a little bitcounterintuitive, but analogy is
to think there's a museum right, and people coming into the
museum at the same rate and thenthey're leaving at the same
rate.
But if they're just seeing thepictures in one room and then
leaving immediately, thenthere's not going to be that

(12:00):
many people in the museum.
But if they stay in the museumfor like two, three hours for a
long time, then they go back out.
The in rate into the museum andthe out rate is the same in
both cases, but in the firstcase there's a lot fewer people
in the museum and the secondcase there's a lot more people
in the museum.
It's the same with the water onthe land If it's slowed down,

(12:20):
because when it goes, if thesoil is holding it so it's
slower to go out, you still havethe rivers flowing, but with
the same amount total going out,but it ends up being a lot more
water than land.
So it's a little bit of acounterintuitive thing, but it's
kind of-.

Speaker 1 (12:32):
Yeah, because you get this competition fear thing,
like yeah, but if my land or myneighbor's land, my upstream,
whatever holds the water longer,it means there's less water for
me, or there's less water inthe river, people downstream, et
cetera.
But that of course doesn'tchange.
but the rule is, or the aimshould be, slow down as much as

(12:53):
possible And you have longerwater, probably as well in the
season, depending where you are.
If you have issues, let's saylater in the dry season, with
your river flows.

Speaker 2 (13:02):
Yeah, so one of the things with river flows that
people don't always realize isthat it's coming up from the
aquifers too And the groundwateris feeding the rivers in the
dry season.
So if it just flows over theland as runoff, then it flows
out all during the wet seasonand you don't have much left for
the dry season.
But if you can actually slowthe water so that it kind of

(13:22):
sinks in and goes underground,then it can come out two, three,
four, five months later duringthe dry season so your rivers
can keep running.
So it's a way to keep yourlandscape hydrated more during
the dry season.
And also if your aquifers arehigh enough so that the tree
roots can reach it the treeroots is called hydraulic
redistribution can bring up thatwater during the dry season And

(13:45):
then the mycelia can actuallypass it to other trees who maybe
don't have deep enough roots toget to the groundwater table,
and so that keeps it hydratedAnd then some of that connected
then evaporate, transpire intothe dry season too, so it
actually lessens the extremeSort of dampens the crazy peaks

(14:07):
that we're seeing now everywhere.
You can think of groundwaterkind of like the ocean too
groundwater because they're hugebodies of water.
Groundwater is way more waterthan the surface water.
It's like a buffer.
So they did studies in theAmazon rainforest.
During the wet season, the treeroots actually push down water
into the groundwater And thenduring the dry season they'll

(14:28):
pull it up And so you'rebasically creating a more even
amount of water.

Speaker 1 (14:35):
It's about 10% of that And, of course, that for
that you need trees, you needperennial crops, among them
trees with deep roots, deepsystems to be able to play that
sort of the pump to go up andthe pump to go down, depending
on the water source.
So slow down, make sure it getsstored And when in the dry
season you need it, it will comeup.

(14:57):
If you have perennial crops itwill, which is a sort of counter
to the thing that in a dryseason the aquifer can lead to a
continuous streaming river.
But we've seen that many timesin history.

Speaker 2 (15:09):
Yeah Yeah, it is a little bit counterintuitive.

Speaker 1 (15:12):
Water is weird.
Let's just say it Water isweird.

Speaker 2 (15:15):
So yeah, this whole slowing water, it's like it has
counterintuitive, it's like ithas counterintuitive properties.
And so there's a phrase that'sspread through the permaculture
and agriculture, agroecologyworld, invented by Brock Doleman
.
He called it slow it, sink it,spread it.
And then he has been proposingas long as with Erika Geese, who
wrote What Water Wants a slowwater movement.

(15:36):
And I think it's really goodbecause if we can kind of focus,
i think it's a catchy phrase,slow water, because there's
actually a slow food movementand a slow money movement And it
kind of you know, it kind ofconnotes a little bit the
slowness kind of like connotes alittle bit let's connect back
into the rhythms of nature andslow down.

(15:57):
But it's actually a key aspect,you know it's one.
If you would try to summarizethe whole thing you want to do
with water, slow water might bea very good way of summarizing
it.

Speaker 1 (16:07):
Which is a good title maybe for the series.
So, and then you mentionedvegetation leads to rain, which
already sounds counter-duitivefrom what we always learned.
I think we always learned like,okay, rain leads to vegetation,
like there's no forest withoutrain.
We're going to go much deeperinto the the with Anastasia and
with others, of course, but thisI feel like we cannot repeat

(16:30):
enough, that there is a likethat rain is created very
differently than we learn inschool.
So how, how does rain?
how does rain get?
gets created or triggered, ithink maybe it's a better word
And why is that so differentfrom what we we always learned
in school?
like heavy clouds and then theyfall down, et cetera, and then
it rains.
It's slightly different, if I'mnot mistaken.

Speaker 2 (16:51):
Yeah, you're right.
Well, it's interesting in likesome of this, you know,
regenerative world people dotalk about forest creating rain,
but the scientists didn'treally believe that until you
know, after the 2000,.
When they started measuring,say in Amazon, you can measure
the isotopes of water, and theisotopes of water they traveled
all over the ocean is actuallydifferent than if it comes from
closer, like from a forest.

Speaker 1 (17:13):
So did they capture the rain drops and they could
basically tell the source.

Speaker 2 (17:16):
Yeah, so they could tell the the onset of the wet
season, the forests actuallywere evaporate, transpiring,
they're almost like triggeringthe onset of wet season, and so,
um yeah, because they could seethat the water had come from
the forest to create the rain,and then from like forest,
downstream or downwind probably,yeah, like like where the, the,

(17:38):
the, this, this sky river camefrom.

Speaker 1 (17:40):
So they could basically see okay, this, this
drop came from, not from theocean, but came from something
much closer.

Speaker 2 (17:45):
Yeah, so.
So climate science is beginningrewriting, i mean, and also the
people doing the precipitation,recycling, the small water cycle
, had been saying this too, butit's, it's now kind of becoming
a bit more seeping into themainstream climate science.
Yeah, forests do create rain Andthere's a there's actually a
number of aspects that also maybe influencing this.

(18:07):
So, um David Sands, hediscovered, um, i think in the
seventies or eighties, um thatbacteria were starting to, um
that they could float up in theair and actually seed rain.
And then the people discoveredthat fungi spores could too, and
then also liken um some ofthose molecules So they could
float up in the air currents andthen seed the rain.

(18:28):
So rain, when a water vapor,when it's in the air, it needs
to be above um saturationhumidity, but it also needs
something to nucleate it to formrain, and so, and and this is
still a bit of a nascent field,but it seems like there's also,
you know, little microorganismsthat can seed the rain, and so
in the forest you have more ofthese.
So that's one aspect, um,that's also.

Speaker 1 (18:49):
Oh, let's, let's, let's, double click on that.
Um the, the forest, not onlytranspire um water molecules,
but also certain bacteria,certain.
You mentioned a few other umorganisms that trigger the rain,
like, without that, even if youhave a very quote, unquote
heavy cloud, it, as long as ithas, it doesn't have these um,

(19:10):
uh, these organisms, rain is nottriggered, which means,
literally, the forest not onlycreates the rain, but also
triggers the rain.

Speaker 2 (19:16):
Yeah, uh, i mean it's still a bit of a nascent field
of study, because I mean thereare other things that trigger
the little things in the air too, like dust and other things.
You know, pollution and otherthings can trigger the rain too.
But it seems like when you havemore vegetation it it more of
these microorganisms can go inthe air And so, um, so that can
play a role.
And then another thing that canplay a role that Francina

(19:37):
Dominguez uh uh, climatologistat university, illinois has been
studying is that the forestcreate the turbulence.
So when wind is blowing along,it can be blowing very fast,
right, but if it doesn't slowdown enough, it's hard for the
water vapor molecules to findeach other and to nuclear into
rain.
So if you can slow that airdown, and so what?

Speaker 1 (19:56):
so not only do it, what do we have to slow down?
but also the air.

Speaker 2 (19:59):
Yeah, so the forest kind of create this turbulence
and it can go up to a kilometerlike this turbulence, and so
it's slowing down enough.
And her, her simulations showthat the forest can slow down
the wind enough to create rain.
Um, so that's another aspect.
And then there's also theAnastasia Macariva, um, uh and
uh, victor Gorshov theory aboutthe biotic pump.

(20:20):
Um, and that's also a bit It'sdebated, it hasn't?

Speaker 1 (20:25):
merged into climate science.

Speaker 2 (20:27):
But if you go into the physics there's a lot of it
that makes sense.
So their theory is that whenyou have a lot of water vapor it
flows into the air And thenwhen it condenses, so water
vapor is 2,000 times the volumeof liquid water.
So you suddenly have this kindof partial vacuum.
You still have the other gasesthere, but everywhere the water

(20:47):
vapor is gone, so it's like avacuum.
And if you do this with an oildrum, you put steam in it and
then you cool it down, that'syour steel oil drum will just
implode.
I mean, that's that much power,so it's a huge amount of power.
And people developing the steamengine in the early, long time
ago they would have all sorts ofinjuries because things were

(21:08):
imploding all the time when thesteam condensed.
And so the same thing ishappening in the clouds And it
pools basically Yeah, so itcould kind of create a vacuum.
Yeah, and so that creates thishuge pool.
And what their work is sayingis that this can create a tap
into the Amastereco cycle, thelarge water cycle that's coming

(21:28):
in from the ocean.
They can increase that flow.
The traditional Amasterecoscience view of how we create
that flow is that the land heatsup and that creates the air
rising, and so then thattriggers the whole thing.
And so they're not disagreeingwith that, they're just saying
that there's added effect.
And then, when they publishedit, some other Amastereco

(21:49):
scientists said well, the latentheat effect, when clouds,
because of the water vapor whenit condenses, also releases heat
, well, that causes the cloudsto heat up and release heat And
that causes further uprising.
And so that's also howthunderstorms create.
And so that's the standardreason for how we create
thunderstorms and thunderstormsAnd Macaroon and Koshia, and

(22:11):
then the warm summer day, lateafternoon.

Speaker 1 (22:13):
That's how we think about the thunder basically,
yeah, in many places of theworld.

Speaker 2 (22:19):
So, yeah, let me just continue.
So they were saying that, yes,they're not disagreeing that
that's also a big effect.
But they're saying that in thewhole atmospheric cycle, the
large water cycle, becauseyou're heating up the water, it
then takes longer to come downagain, and so in terms of
speeding up the whole Amasterecocycle, that's not a big effect

(22:40):
locally it does, but whereas theBiodic Pump Pop the condensing
of that water vapor to createthe vacuum that will actually
drive the whole atmosphericcycle.
And so and they're saying thatthe forests know when the they
do it at the end of dry season,the start of wet season, because
that's when the extra waterevaporator transpired by the

(23:02):
forest can actually push theamount of water vapor in the air
over the humidity point, thesaturation point, so that it can
then create more of thiscondensation and drive the thing
.
So it's really key when you doit, like you need to kick the
system right, you kick thesystem right at that point So
you initiate wet season.
That's what the scientistsstudying the isotopes of water

(23:24):
in the Amazon found that itseems like the trees are
releasing a lot just at thestart of the wet season to kind
of initiate the wet season,which is a very different story
To notch the whole system intoplace.

Speaker 1 (23:34):
Yes, so I imagine it also depends how you do it, and
I'm saying you and the pluralyou, including the trees,
because a forest is not a forestLike this.
I think this the theory startsto show, or the practice starts
to show as well.
Like this is not a monoculturetree plantation.
They release very differentisotopes, et cetera.
They release very differentorganisms compared to a very

(23:55):
full grown Amazon rainforest.
So there's a which is alsocalled rainforest for a good
reason, but like does thematurity or also the like, let's
say the biodiversity or thediversity of the forest?
what is research saying therein terms of what kind of trees
do we need to plant to kickstartthis, or where and how, or what

(24:16):
does the research say that?

Speaker 2 (24:19):
So some recent research has found that if you
have more biodiverse forest asopposed to monoculture forest,
you have 30% extra organicmatter in the soil, and so
that's huge, because that meanswhen the rain does fall down,
you actually can hold each extra1%.
But yeah, so when you haveextra organic matter in the soil

(24:42):
it can absorb way more.

Speaker 1 (24:45):
Yeah, it's, i think, 20,000 gallons per acre.
The number isn't enormous.
Google it if you want to findit, but it's very important.

Speaker 2 (24:53):
Yeah, each 1% organic matter increases the 20,000
gallons per acre foot of howmuch it can absorb And so,
anyway, so they increase theamount of it can absorb a bit in
the forest.
So that means that and if youlook at, if you just go outside
and there's not tree forest,like when you get into the dry

(25:14):
season, the soil is all dry, butif you go into the forest you
can look under the leaves anddig a little inch, like the soil
can be still wet And that'sbecause the forest is able to
hold a lot of that wetness in it.
So that's key.
So it's holding into the dryseason And so that helps it then
have enough water toevapotranspire to trigger the

(25:35):
wet season.

Speaker 1 (25:35):
And, in addition, the wet season, basically.

Speaker 2 (25:37):
Yeah, there's also that hydraulic redistribution
effect I was talking about,where the tree roots can also
bring up the water that's storedin the groundwater up during
that thing, and that's really.
This is another effect that Imean the soil, the land,
atmosphere connection has beenCoupling has been not studied
enough, but the groundwateratmospheric study I mean
Francina Dominguez is one of theclimate scientists studying has

(25:59):
been very little studied, butthe groundwater is affecting the
rain too, and so that's animportant thing we have to think
about Basically.
We have to think about as athree level connected system the
atmosphere, the land and thegroundwater.
And that's why we have toactually marry some of these
scientists.
The hydrogeologists need to betalking more to the climate
scientists need to be talking tomore the regenerative soil,

(26:22):
permaculture, regent, ag people,because they're all These
levels are connected, you know.

Speaker 1 (26:29):
And have you seen a growing interest in those
connections, i mean since youstarted the sub-stack, but also,
of course, devastating fires inCalifornia followed a couple of
years later, like the beginningof this year with devastated
floods, like, do you see a shiftin attention and interest to go
literally deeper into this andlook for root causes and root

(26:50):
solutions?
Or has it been sorry punintended relatively superficial?

Speaker 2 (26:55):
I think that the connection between land and
groundwater has been.
During the recent Californiafloods.
There were more people talkingabout oh, we need to guide more
of this because it's a hugeamount of water, but because our
land is not able to absorb itall.
It could have had better soiland other things.
People were talking about morehow to recharge the aquifers,
but the connection to theatmosphere wasn't talked about.

Speaker 1 (27:18):
Yeah, that is basically drought, fire, flood
cycle that has been going on fora long time in many places, but
it's very destructive And thenit also triggers each other
basically, and sort of becomes adownward spiral, if you want,
unless you intervene and spreador slow down the water.
spread it and with that,re-vegetate.

Speaker 2 (27:42):
Yeah, so you bring up a very important thing that I
think, if there's one, there'stwo things that really people
should focus on.
One is slow warning.
The other is this drought, fire, flood cycle, and these things
just need to be marketed theheck out of.

Speaker 1 (27:55):
Let's start here.
We have a small audience, butlet's start here.
So in Australia fire flood.

Speaker 2 (28:00):
They had droughts in 2001 to 2008,.
and then they had fires in 2008, 2009, huge, some of the
biggest fires, and then they hadfloods, i think, 2011.
And then they had huge droughts2012 to 2018.
These are rough numbers.
And then they had fires againin 2018, 19.

(28:21):
And then they had floods againin 2021.
But people weren't connecting.
And this is happening in Greece, in California, where we had
droughts and fires, and thenthis earlier year with floods,
spain just recently.

Speaker 1 (28:34):
I think they skipped the fire part, but they had an
eight month drought and amassive floods.
Now Northern Italy the same.
The whole winter was dry.
They skipped luckily the fireone for now also, because there
are not so many trees left, butthe floods haven't been less
destructive.

Speaker 2 (28:50):
Yeah, british Columbia, they had droughts and
then they had fires and thenfloods, and then Brazil was
having those three.
So this is a pattern all aroundthe world, and for some reason,
the only person I know who'spromoting is Zach Weiss and he's
calling it the watershed deathspiral.
But it's somehow and this is weneed to get a lot more the
climate scientists, because Ithink what they do is they focus

(29:11):
on one thing, but they haven'tactually and that's part of this
whole thing of the systemsthinking they haven't seen that
there's a connection, and so letme just explain the connection
between the three.
So the drought will obviouslydries up everything, so that so
that it creates fires is not ispretty obvious.
But the floods to fire a fireto floods is not quite so
obvious.
But what if you, if your firesget too intense, like

(29:33):
traditionally in nature, you dohave fires, and they're smaller
scale, but if it gets toointense, what happens is that
this waxy coating happens on thesoil, And so that means that
the soil is no longer to absorbthe rain as much, and so that's
one problem is that then, twoyears later, after your fire,
when the rains come, they'rejust going to flow downhill and
they'll cause huge floods below.

(29:56):
And then the other thing is thatthe fires, can you know,
destroy some of the vegetationthat's holding in the soil, and
so what happens in floods isthat there's so much water and
maybe it's stopped furtheruphill, but then it accumulates
and it just creates theselandslides.
That triggers more, biggerlandslides, and so you need to
kind of like after, after a fire, it's really key to to go in

(30:21):
and kind of remediate the soilmulch or whatever.
And then it's also key toreplant because and depending on
where you are like, willow is anative species That's a very
good, very fast growing treethat also holds, has deep roots.
So you want deep roots to holdthat.
Stop those landslides.

Speaker 1 (30:38):
You know the flood will come.
The rain will come at somepoint and it will become a flood
unless you take measures.

Speaker 2 (30:44):
You need to raise awareness whenever there's a
huge fire anywhere in the world.
we need to tell people hey, youbetter careful, because you're
gonna have big fires in twoyears, Big floods.

Speaker 1 (30:52):
Yeah, big floods.

Speaker 2 (30:52):
So, yeah, so, unless you kind of go in and really
remediate the soil and replantAnd also like a vegetation and
the drought also lead to biggerrain, like bigger spike rain
even like events.

Speaker 1 (31:04):
Has anybody researched that like that the
rain actually is moreconcentrated and leads to even
bigger floods instead of beingspread out better?

Speaker 2 (31:12):
Yes, uh, uh, uh, anastasia and and Macariva and
and Victor Gorshov did studystuff also about we actually may
be triggering bigger rains too,um, but maybe we should get
back to that after I justreached this cycle, and then
that's a bit more Um, uh, yeah,yeah, it's another very

(31:32):
important aspect of this wholething Um, uh.
So after the floods, whathappens is that huge amounts of
topsoil I mean that topsoil is,like means key to the
agriculture and it's key toplant growth, right And so we're
losing a lot of this, uh, a lotof this soil.
And so what happens then?
when you then have rains overthe next two or three years, a

(31:53):
lot less is being held in thesoil, so you're decreasing the
small water cycle, um, and also,you know, you're decreasing the
amount the aquas fill up,because those you need the soil
to help guide it into theaquifers, and so it's causing a
huge problem, and so then you'remore likely to have droughts a
few years later, um, and so thenthe cycle continues on and on

(32:13):
again, um, and so again, afterfloods, it's important to kind
of build up the soil, and youknow, i mean, if there are, you
know, lots of techniques inregen, ag and permaculture to
kind of grow soil quickly, um,and also, biodiversity is
important Birds can replantseeds, and squirrels and all
sorts of animals um a playerrole in regenerating ecosystems.

(32:33):
So, um, so, yeah, so that's so.
That's the basic cycle.
This, this, this drought, fire,flood cycle, um, that is such a
big deal, um, that I really feellike we need to focus on it,
and and and and, you know,talking about the whole
investing.
I think there's a wholeinvesting uh thing too, because

(32:54):
a lot of people can regeneratelocally, a lot of the stuff does
help deal with, you know,floods or fires or droughts, um,
and so insurance companies, forone, would be very interested
in doing a lot of this, uh,helping ameliorate a lot of this
natural disaster, so they couldfund some company that's going
in to local bioregions andinitiating helping people, you

(33:16):
know, start these projectsbecause, because it needs to be
done, uh, at the local level,yeah, so, Yeah, no, it's a good
bridge to to the finance side.

Speaker 1 (33:26):
I mean, who picks up the bill of these devastating
fires and floods in many, anddroughts as well is is either
insurance companies or taxpayers, like we see now massive
payouts in in Spain for thedrought, um, for for farmers and
and now the floods, and same inItaly.
Of course, there will be a lotof work to to restore the houses

(33:49):
lost and all of that.
And so you're saying, you'rementioning insurance companies,
and have you seen, like have youseen, examples of that
connection?
almost It feels like this superfar away world of insurance
companies and maybe also textpaying money taxpayers, because
they pick up the bill at the endof of the floods and of the
fires and of the drought as well.

(34:09):
Um, to start intervening thereor to quickly getting to action,
or is that something that wejust really have to work on?

Speaker 2 (34:18):
Um, yeah, I'm not quite so clear on like, who's
how much insurance comes.
I knew, I do know, inCalifornia that they're they're
looking for alternativesolutions And so they.
So they're asking, you know,because they're having to pay
out billions and billions ofdollars, Um, like PG and E, the
electric company here, like when, when these things happen, like
they're looking for differentsolutions.

(34:38):
Um, I know in China that theystarted a whole sponge city
concept because they, theydestroyed a lot of their
wetlands and other stuff there.
Um, because there's so muchpeople, it's hard for grass to
grow and, you know, vegetationto grow.
But they started having huge,huge floods, Like, um, you know,
millions of people wasdisplaced, And so they realized

(34:58):
they had to do something, And sothey started a sponge city
concept where they startedputting in wetlands again, They
started moving people offfloodplains, They, you know,
made the rivers curve more, soit slowed down.
They, they, they worked onslowing the water, Um, and they
getting the rain infiltratedinto the land, And so the more
when big rains come in andinfiltrates into the land, the

(35:18):
less you're going to have allthat water flowing into big
cities.
So I think there's at this timethere's 30 pilot sponge cities
and uh, you know it's a hugeproject because the whole
Chinese government gets behindit.
Um, so that is an example whereit's having quite a bit of
success of implementing a lot ofthis uh, slow water, rebuilding
soil, you know.
Rebuilding wetlands um, movingpeople off floodplains strategy,

(35:42):
Um, uh, and I do know ingeneral.
I do know also local governments, you know, because they can be
really concerned about floods,and so they, you know, sometimes
, uh, they'll put in bioswales.
Bioswales A a, a swale is alittle indentation in the land
so that when rain flows it getscaught in these swales.

(36:03):
And so, uh, i know, in in theSan Francisco Bay area, like in
Alameda, where it's a moredanger of flooding, like they'll
put in bioswales and differentthings to capture some of this
um water.
And so there's, there's variousimplement, you know, hodgepodge
solutions that localgovernments do, um yeah.

Speaker 1 (36:23):
And if you would be, i mean, there are a few people
listening to this that work inthe financial sector, either
investing their own money orother people's money.
So I always like to ask, ofcourse, without giving
investment advice, but whatwould be your main message?
I mean, you repeated two thingsalready, like slow water down
and drought, fire, flood.
But if we would record this ina theater in California and it's

(36:45):
full of financial people quote,unquote what would be the main
message you want to send themhome with, to remember from an
evening for sure filled with alot of information they didn't
hear yet?
So what would be your mainmessage to tell the financial
world in either Wall Street orLondon or New Delhi, et cetera,
to take home with about the workyou're doing?

Speaker 2 (37:07):
Well, the return on investment is huge in this area
because fires, floods, you know,and droughts are causing
billions and billions of dollars, trillions of dollars,
worldwide.
right, so your return oninvestment is huge if you invest
in some of these soilremediation stuff like this, and
it's relatively true.

Speaker 1 (37:25):
If you're able to get the payment, yeah, if you're
able to get somebody to pay forit, that's the like your return
could be huge if you're able toget the local government or
pension funds or figure out away to get paid for the value
you create.
Right.

Speaker 2 (37:40):
Because well, yeah, at the moment you know they're
having to pay out billions ofdollars when these things happen
, And so someone's losing.

Speaker 1 (37:46):
But it doesn't mean automatically you get paid if
you save them that money.

Speaker 2 (37:50):
But I do think yeah.
So I think there's variousaspects of people who pay, like
the government.
If you can get the government,you can get the insurance, so
you could work with localgovernments, you know, get them
to do partnership and come inand do things.
The other thing is that peoplethemselves are very concerned.
I mean, everyone's concerned.
If you're in an area where thenatural disaster can happen And
if you can lower your risk by10%, you know there's lots of

(38:13):
stuff you can do to lower therisk.
So one of the things I've beenproposing is like wildfires If
you can have more groundwater,then you can.
You know the tree roots canbring up that groundwater during
fire season.
Then you actually lower yourrisk maybe by 5%, 10%, but
that's a pretty big deal.
So, and neighbors can do that,they can build swales and stuff

(38:33):
like that, and so you canactually get even the landowners
to contribute or even and alsodo the work.
And so people would be probablya lot of people would be
willing to put in $1,000 intothe kitty And you have a lot of
people in your town putting$1,000 each to reduce.

Speaker 1 (38:49):
To lower the risk of a devastating fire by 5% or 10%.
Yeah, like yeah, so peoplewould be willing to do that.

Speaker 2 (38:55):
So that's a big kitty there.
And so I think and you can dothis in various ways You could
set up your company as aneducation company So you could
come in and you're educatingpeople on this, on slow water,
the small water cycle, the youknow, drought, fires cycle.
The various things you can dois slow it, sink it, spread it,
and so you do a training courseand then have people activate

(39:16):
themselves.
You know that could be one wayto do it And I think you know,
and so and what you can do isyou can kind of sell.
I mean there's there's thingsthat go viral now and there's
grassroots movement.
So you can get some kind of, say, a slow water group in your
town.
So you set up the structure, soyou're guiding, you're guiding
the inhabitants of that town toform these collaborative groups

(39:38):
where they come together andthey doing the actions.
But maybe they need a littlebit of professional help in
certain places and there'scertain things you might need to
do, like certain earthworkswhich are digging certain things
to catch the water.
Maybe you need professionalhelp to come in and do that work
with the tractors and stuff.
Or if they decide to dopermeable pavement.

(39:58):
You can set up on the back endthe professional services that
you bring in.
But you're you're kind ofguiding the facilitation process
and maybe the local governmentcan pay, but maybe the insurance
governments can pay for it,maybe they would also be willing
to pay you, you know, for acourse you come in and do course
, that everyone pays 50, 100bucks or to take to learn how
they can deal with these naturaldisasters.

(40:19):
Yeah, so I think yeah, as youcan set up some kind of startup
that because this is billionsand billions of trillions of
dollars, like I still like thisis a huge sector.
That's going to be a huge partof the process.
It's a huge sector that's likeright for huge amounts of.
I mean, you don't want to bedoing this for profit, but there
is a lot of money availablepotentially in this sector And

(40:42):
so what would you do if you had,let's say, a billion dollars to
invest in this space?

Speaker 1 (40:47):
How would you put it to work?
or where would you put it towork?
I would ask for specific dollaramounts, but I would ask for
what would you focus on?
What would be the main?
three parts, four parts, twoparts you would focus on in
terms of if you had the luxuryand the burden to put a lot of
money to work, in this case,let's say a billion dollars.

Speaker 2 (41:09):
Maybe three problems I would do the bi-regional
approach, get grassrootsmovements happening around the
slow water concept.
The second one would be Whichshould be relatively cheap, yeah
.
And then the second one is aneducational campaign.
So that's where you canactually kind of yeah.
And then the third one is Ireally think that you want to

(41:29):
kind of bridge academia withthis, because you know, in
certain countries the scienceplays a big role in governments
determining it, and so if we canget think tanks and getting
academics to kind of bring to, Ilove it how you say certain
countries Yeah.
Certain countries you can dostuff without.
They're not so interested indoing the science to the

(41:49):
government, to the implementpolicy.

Speaker 1 (41:50):
But still, i think that a lot of this we're talking
about it because in the 2000s,scientists started to be able,
maybe because of technology, andthey started measuring a lot of
things.
Otherwise we wouldn't betalking about this.
So a lot of this has to becoming from science, actually,
and from practitioners as well.
So you would definitely putquite a bit of it to work in
terms of basic science, what wedon't know yet, what would be

(42:12):
main parts you're most excitedabout, to put some scientists to
work to dig deeper.

Speaker 2 (42:18):
Well, i think modeling and this is kind of
where I'm interested in doingsome of this work too is
modeling like the flood, fire,drought cycle, so treatment ways
to do that, and the whole smallwater cycle and vegetation,
like how the vegetation isaffecting it.

(42:39):
I think more work needs to bedone.
There are people working on it,but it needs to be expanded.
So it goes under differentnames.
One is land atmosphere couplingor vegetation atmosphere
coupling.

Speaker 1 (42:50):
Yeah, because that could be huge if we can start
showing what to restore whereand why, like what to plant
where and why, and what it couldpotentially trigger or less
trigger in terms of extremefloods, etc.
But also if you can startbringing back rain in certain
periods of the year in certainplaces.
that's I mean, it sounds likemagic and la-la land, but it

(43:14):
does open up a whole new worldof impact and potential in terms
of regeneration, not justtalking about, oh, i regenerated
my farm, however big it is, butI actually restored rain up
land or I actually contributedto XYZ.
I mean that's a very excitingpath or scenario.

Speaker 2 (43:33):
Yeah, so Milan.
Milan is a climate scientistfrom Spain and he was asked by
the Spanish government toinvestigate why Spain was losing
its rain.
And he found that, oh, it'sbecause we're destroying the
small water cycle, we're pavingover so much of the land and
we're destroying the forest thatthat small water cycle is not
contributing to the rain as muchas there's lessing rain.
And he did a calculation thatsaid I mean, it really depends

(43:55):
where you are, but in the world,but about six miles by six
miles is enough to start havingan impact on the rain.
So you do need to restore thatmuch land to begin having a
calculable effect.
And then it really depends onwhere you are in the world, like
how big the small water cyclecontributes to the actual rain.

Speaker 1 (44:14):
That's massive.
We'll have him later in thisseries, So I'm definitely going
to ask on the latest on that andlike six by six, I mean it's
not nothing, but it also soundsdoable from like a global
perspective or a Spainperspective.

Speaker 2 (44:27):
Yeah, And what it actually impacts the rest of
Europe to like.
So the air moisture blows infrom the ocean and then it goes
over Spain and then it goes intothe Mediterranean Sea right,
But if you don't, if you don'tcapture that water vapor, it
actually impacts the flow ofwater to the rest of Europe.
And I think he wrote a papersaying that certain floods in

(44:50):
the rest of Europe will actuallydo to what's happening in the
Spain And so these continentaldevices are all in this boat
together basically.

Speaker 1 (44:57):
We're all in it together, like floods in Germany
were triggered by, like thebutterfly effect, floods in
Germany triggered by thevegetation of Spain.
Hopefully it resolves a fewheated discussions in in
Brussels as well, which would benice.

Speaker 2 (45:12):
Yeah.
So there's lots ofinterconnected because the
atmospheric circulation doesmove to other countries.
What you do in one countryaffects other countries, so a
lot of this needs to be moreaware of.
And so in Spain is one of thoseplaces, and the Sinai Peninsula
, like Tist van der Hoven, who Iinterviewed on my podcast,
they're re-greening the Sinai,the Egyptian government, because
it used to be.
Possibly in 10,000 years it waskind of very fertile And maybe

(45:35):
they did this flood, drought,fire cycle that kind of
destroyed some of it as combinedwith the kind of wobble in the
Earth's orbit, but because theyfound civilizations and more
lush rivers and stuff flowingthrough the Sinai Desert, which
is all gone now.
So they're looking to restoresome of that forest to the Sinai
Desert.
But that actually affects themoisture blowing from the

(45:58):
Mediterranean to the Red Sea andthe Indian Ocean, and so
they're thinking that.
So then that that will affectall the, because there's a lot
of drought in Africa and MiddleEast.
But actually some of that, ifyou can bring down some of that
water moisture onto the land inthe Sinai, then it actually
creates wind patterns thatactually blows it into Africa

(46:20):
and the Middle East.
So you're actually affectingand in the Middle East there's
dangers of water wars becausethere's such a lack of water,
but you could actually possiblybring back water.
So that could be a key, anotherkey acupoint project.
And so you want to look aroundthe world to where there's key
restoration projects whichactually affect the atmospheric

(46:42):
circulation in a way thatactually impacts a lot of the
world.
So and Anastasia, i thinkthey're called- there.

Speaker 1 (46:49):
We had Maddie on the podcast and they called their
company the Wettermakers, whichis very yeah, it's a perfect
title.
But also it sounds in manycases complete magic and way too
good to be true, and I thinkthey had a big interview I think
it was in The Guardian with atitle I'm going to put it down
in the description, in the shownotes but something like we lack

(47:10):
the imagination to believe thatthis could be possible, And
that's probably the case.
Like, if you start talkingabout restoring some of the
rains and water cycles in theMiddle East and also East Africa
and the Horn of Africa I mean,somalia is just suffering a
massive flood as we speak Butalso I think they were talking
about the it's not called thehurricanes in the Indian Ocean,

(47:31):
but anyway, the massive stormsthat battle a lot of that are
triggered by water vapor as well.
So there's a lot of thatconnecting this.
But as soon as you starttalking about that, i think a
lot of investors and people arejust going to say, ok, that's
just too complex, too big, likewhere to start and what kind of
effects we have.
This is just way over my head.

(47:51):
So let's click to the next oneor let's ignore because it just
gets too much, i think.
So it's also we have to beaware of not, i think, not
overcomplexify, but also make itfor many people that just start
paying attention to watercycles not make it too big or
too massive, even though it isconnected, but to watch out for

(48:13):
that effect.

Speaker 2 (48:14):
Right, yeah, yeah, yeah, although there are some
big projects that are happening,like in Africa there's this
whole Great Green War projectand in China they did massive
restoration, so yeah, so maybethose people who are kind of
doing it you could, but on otherprojects maybe it's a little
bit.
Yeah, you maybe want to thinksmaller.

(48:36):
It's great if it happens, butit should have.

Speaker 1 (48:38):
I mean it should happen also, like this project
should happen because of thelocal impact and the regional
impact.
And then it's amazing if it hasimpact like continents further.
But that's because we don'tknow Right.
These are many suggestions wedon't have the models to, we
don't have the examples nor themodels to tell us.
but you would definitely focuson these with your fund, let's

(49:00):
say, on these acupuncture pointswhich could have these massive
effects to three continents downthe line.

Speaker 2 (49:06):
basically, yeah, I also want to bring up Africa
here, because I think Africa isa really sad case and that, like
a lot of people were able toactually create their own food
and all that stuff.
But what's happening is thatthe Sahara, for instance, is
just certifying at really fastrate, and what happens in some
of these African countries isthat they chop down some of the

(49:26):
trees if I would And a lot ofthe stuff is getting destroyed
And so it's no longer able toabsorb the rain And so it
creates.
It creates more desertificationand less rain, and a lot of
people in Africa have talkedabout how they watched as stuff
got cut down, frost got cut downand stuff that the rain

(49:47):
disappeared.
And so I think because there isa lot of aid coming into Africa
to help with starvation and allsorts of other issues, but I
think if they actually focus onregenerating the soil and other
stuff and doing permaculturethere's people doing small scale
permaculture things, but theseprojects could be much on a much
larger scale They couldactually do a lot of good to

(50:12):
have multiple effects on foodand other issues and health in
Africa, and so maybe some ofthese NGOs and other stuff could
be investing in this approachAnd they could learn a bit from
the Indian approach.
So India, there's somethingcalled the Pani Cup, and then I
was talking to Minnie Jen she onmy podcast.

(50:35):
She works in India with over athousand their projects is
called the Flow Partnership,that they've worked with a
thousand different villages Andso what they do is they get the
villages to self-organize, totalk about the water situation,
come up with a solution, butalso to learn what other
villages do, becausetraditionally there's a lot of
ways.
They call them Joeheads, whichare kind of the swales and the

(50:56):
ponds that capture the water in.
So they'll build these pondsand Joeheads and swales to
capture the rain so that itstays there, so they have enough
water for the dry season andthe crops keep growing, because
a lot of crops are dying andpeople go back to those big
cities and don't leave the smalltown.
So this project hasreinvigorated the local

(51:16):
agricultural scene and also gavethem drinking water and all
sorts of stuff.
But basically it's a verybottom up approach.
So that's why they can workwith that many groups on a small
budget And I feel like thiskind of approach would be very
useful in Africa, and I recentlybegun talking to some of the

(51:38):
people, africa is really dying.
I mean, a Saturday is in Europeor America, or even in India or
China.
It's really sad in Africa Andwe're going in with the
smartphone and all the EVtechnologies.
We're mining the heck out of,say, the Congo for these lithium

(52:00):
and destroying all the watercleanliness.
Anyway, because we're treatedAfrica as this mining thing that
we can mine for all ourcomputer and stuff.
We're not paying attention tothat And that's destroying all
the land there And it's reallydestroying the water stuff.
So it's extremely sad and it'scausing a lot of wars and other
stuff there.

Speaker 1 (52:22):
So you definitely focus a big chunk of your fund
to invest on the continentbasically, and focus on the
acupuncture points there.

Speaker 2 (52:34):
Because I think it has huge ripple effects, just
because this, yeah, then if youactually restore the thing, then
you have less of this hugeimmigration into Europe.
Recently with all the AfricansAnd people worry about these
climate migrations.
But if you can actually restoresome of that thing that affects
, and then also because thelarge atmospheric circulation,

(52:57):
what happens in Africa isactually impacting- the world
elsewhere too.
And the line Milan and alsoAnastasia Macaribu.
yeah, Because they were sayingthat the water blows into the
Indian Ocean and stuff like thatis actually creating more
hurricanes there, And so thePakistan.

(53:17):
the recent floods may have beento do with all the extra water
moisture that didn't getcaptured when it blew over the
Sinai Desert in Africa, And sothen it creates more.
that moisture then is morelikely to form hurricanes and
then create atmospheric riversand blow, So like there's this
huge ripple effect.
So I don't know.
I think it'd be good for us tofocus our attention of what's

(53:39):
happening in Africa, becauseeverything is so connected that
has big effects on everythingelse.

Speaker 1 (53:48):
And as a final question, which usually leads to
other questions, but if youunfortunately no longer have
your fund, but you do have amagic wand, a magic power to
change one thing and one thingonly, what would you change
overnight?
Could be make everybody awareof something, or could be

(54:12):
capture or rain, i mean, couldbe literally anything, but only
one thing.

Speaker 2 (54:15):
I mean I would kind of capture, bridge this climate.
I don't know, i'm not sure, butI mean there's multiple things
I could say, but one thing is tobridge the climate movement to
the land work movement, thepermaculture, agroecology,
regenerative ag thing.

Speaker 1 (54:28):
What's your main argument there to get them into
the room, like a water vapor isimportant, or what's an opening
sentence you can use in that?
I'm asking because, like, somuch attention goes into the
carbon space and the climatespace rightfully so But it feels
like the rest is a bit ignoredand it plays a massive role in
cooling and heating and cooling,as we discussed before.

(54:51):
Like, what's your openingsentence to, let's say, climate
scientists to get him or herinterested in the water stuff?
quote unquote.

Speaker 2 (55:03):
Well, first, to look at some of the work that some of
the climate scientists aredoing is just not getting enough
attention around the wholesmall water cycle, precipitation
, recycling, And that this workis has been done by some
scientists.
And then, in terms of, like,the cooling effect, like I think
that's a huge thing that peoplebecause what happens is the
water vapor, it's like sweating,So it brings up that heat from

(55:27):
the earth and then it moves itup higher the atmosphere And
then when it's higher in theatmosphere, that heat when it
gets released again when youform clouds, it doesn't have to
go through as much of thegreenhouse gases lower down And
so then it can actually radiateinto space And so it can
actually cool the planet thiswater So we can make the planet
sweat, literally.
Yeah, and so definitely a lot ofclimate scientists agree that

(55:49):
it's locally cooling.
They don't necessarily agree asmuch that it's globally cooling
, but like, if they look at thework of Anastasia McReeven,
they're kind of doing they'repinpointing some of the areas in
the climate model is like maybeit's a little too technical to
get into, but there's a certainway they parameterize everything
with the convection, convectiveadjustments.
That doesn't take into accountthe forest evaporator and

(56:12):
various things.
And so I think we need to focusa little bit on the attention
that these two have beenpointing out about the areas in
some of these climate sciencesthat then would raise a lot more
attention that actually it'sactually can cool the planet.
I mean, intuitively, you canmake a lot of sense.
I mean you move that watervapor higher into the air where
it releases heat, so it doesn'thave to go through a greenhouse
gas so it can escape to space.

(56:32):
So then you cool the planet.

Speaker 1 (56:34):
So it's playing a huge role in cooling the planet,
but it's been completely undermodeled, or I think what Yenne
said like was too difficult tomodel, so we didn't look at it
And that sounds a bit sad andinteresting but also a huge
opportunity Like there is thispotential and we need a lot more
research, that there is a wayto cool the planet and we're

(56:55):
definitely overheating withvegetation, with healthy soils,
with healthy forests, et cetera.
That is not being part of thecurrent, let's say, the broader
mainstream climate discussionAnd it should be.
At least it should be part ofthe discussion and we should
look into it.
Not saying we shouldn't, ofcourse, the emissions and fossil
fuels et cetera, but at leastlet's investigate the potential

(57:17):
cooling of healthy vegetationand have the, let's say, the
earth sweat a bit more.

Speaker 2 (57:23):
Yeah, i think yeah, if you want to put investment
money like one place you mightget a lot of return investment
investing in, because she'sthey're bringing a lot more
scientists into their mixture,kind of creating a think tank
around this and just putting alot more energy and research
into this, because more and morescientists are kind of starting
to agree with this And thatwill have ripple effects.

Speaker 1 (57:42):
But it can be faster.

Speaker 2 (57:43):
Yeah, i think yeah, because and we can also, and
that group maybe could also dothis research on this flood,
drought, fire cycle.

Speaker 1 (57:50):
Which probably triggers.
I mean, the drought has to dowith heat, the flood has to do
with heat or cooling.
The fire definitely needs heat.
So there is a very importantheat component locally, but also
on the largest system.
Let's say that's completely.
We only look at a greenhousegases on a global level and
that's sort of it, instead oflooking at the potential of

(58:12):
cooling of vegetation.
And I think if we look atsatellites over the last or
imagery and models, we'vede-vegetated quite a bit.
But it's not.
I mean, some places havedefinitely gained tree cover and
Europe is one of them.
But then we can argue what'sthe level, the diversity, et
cetera, and how much does ithelp?
Or is it a large forest?
We just did an interview in,let's say, north of Costa Brava

(58:37):
And there's a lot of forest, butit's overgrown monoculture
forest that was abandoned ahundred years ago.
That's not a healthy forest Andyou can see it.
It's suffering And it needs alot of work to be able to play a
role again in the cycle.
It's currently not, and it'scurrently playing a role, but
not a very constructive one,let's say more destructive one.
So there's forest and forestand trees and trees.

(58:59):
But I want to thank you so muchfor your time and your work.

Speaker 2 (59:03):
Can I just say one more thing?
Yeah, of course.
Of course, one thing and justan investment the education
thing, like one thing, likethere's a whole permaculture.
They have a whole way of doingpermaculture cause.
I think creating a climate,permaculture, like bringing
those things together and thencreating education, training a
lot of people.
That way you can kind of createsome money to educate as well.

(59:23):
Or you create your own kind ofthing, like Elaine Ingram did
with the Soil Food Web, kind oftraining people, training people
in learning about theseconnections, and then you know,
and so that's, that's anotherinvestment opportunity.

Speaker 1 (59:35):
Yeah, Now there's, there's a an opportunity on the
education piece.
It's not easy.
I mean, what Elaine did isabsolutely amazing to be able to
create an education piece outof it and things.
that is doing quite a bit ofthat tech wise and others.
It's, of course, but because ofthe technology we have now.
I mean, we're recording thisonline.

(59:55):
Yes, there's lithium, which hasbeen mined horribly in many
cases, but it also enables us todo to write on sub stack and to
record this.
So there is there areopportunities now for crazy
drought, fire, flood videos togo viral.
And there there is this, thistech, to be available to,
available to us.
So we definitely, we definitelyshould use it and trigger

(01:00:18):
because, yeah, education can beglobal and can be not saying
instant, but at least much morestructure or much faster than
than not so long ago, where ithad to go through multiple
cycles of scientists, then intoschool curriculum And then we
had to wait 20 years beforepeople were in some kind of
position of of any kind of power, and that just way too slow at
the moment.

Speaker 2 (01:00:38):
Yeah, actually, like maybe like a carbon tax.
like there's a carbon tax,right, so there's maybe a water
tax.
Like when you buy your EV andyour lithium batteries and your
smartphones, think about whatyou're doing to destroy Congo
and like put in some money thathelps, you know, remediate the
soil and the stuff in Congo andother African countries.
So yeah, so that's a way tokind of maybe funnel money from

(01:01:01):
all out And what just seems tobe more connected?

Speaker 1 (01:01:03):
Yeah, destroying Really water intensive?
Yeah, absolutely.
And so with that, i want tothank you very, very time.
Thank you for what you do inthis space.
Obviously, i will link as muchas possible in the show notes
below, and I thank you so muchfor coming on here and share The
fascinating look into intowater.

(01:01:24):
There's way more to do.
We're going to cover it in fromall different angles, but thank
you so much for coming on hereand share.
Thank you, i really appreciateit.
Thank you so much for listeningall the way to the end.
For the show notes and links wediscussed in this episode,
check out our website investingin regender agriculturecom.

(01:01:46):
Forward slash posts.
If you liked this episode, whynot share it with a friend or
give us a rating on Applepodcast?
that really helps.
Thanks again and see you nexttime.

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236 Alpha Lo - What if water is more important than carbon

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}236 Alpha Lo - What if water is more important than carbon