1
00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:07,840
O-TEC is just another one of these base load renewable power sources that's available in

2
00:00:07,840 --> 00:00:09,600
a certain band.

3
00:00:09,600 --> 00:00:16,120
And turns out a lot of that geographic band is highly dependent on the flow of marine

4
00:00:16,120 --> 00:00:17,120
diesel.

5
00:00:17,120 --> 00:00:20,920
They're burning diesel fuel, not even like petroleum.

6
00:00:20,920 --> 00:00:29,200
They're burning the worst of the worst using 70 year old technology that is no longer manufactured.

7
00:00:29,200 --> 00:00:34,560
They can't get replacement parts and it's just breaking down and the logistics of getting

8
00:00:34,560 --> 00:00:38,360
oil to a lot of these places is driving the cost up.

9
00:00:38,360 --> 00:00:43,560
There's been a nice confluence of events in O-TEC over the last two decades with the

10
00:00:43,560 --> 00:00:47,800
development of offshore oil and gas infrastructure.

11
00:00:47,800 --> 00:00:53,560
This offshore oil and gas infrastructure development has brought the costs of a lot of the components

12
00:00:53,560 --> 00:01:02,800
of O-TEC, turbines, pumps, heat exchangers, larger and larger vessels down to the point

13
00:01:02,800 --> 00:01:09,160
where it is now competitive in a lot of these regions with oil and gas.

14
00:01:09,160 --> 00:01:14,200
And that means more cheaper, more plentiful energy for these regions, which of course

15
00:01:14,200 --> 00:01:22,560
means more human flourishing there.

16
00:01:22,560 --> 00:01:25,240
Greetings and salutations my fellow plebs.

17
00:01:25,240 --> 00:01:28,520
My name is Walker and this is the Bitcoin Podcast.

18
00:01:28,520 --> 00:01:36,000
The Bitcoin time chain is 842-738 and the value of one Bitcoin is still one Bitcoin.

19
00:01:36,000 --> 00:01:41,480
Today's episode is Bitcoin Talk where I talk with my guest about Bitcoin and whatever else

20
00:01:41,480 --> 00:01:42,480
comes up.

21
00:01:42,480 --> 00:01:45,720
Today, that guest is Nathaniel Harmon.

22
00:01:45,720 --> 00:01:50,400
Nate is a chemical oceanographer and the CEO and co-founder of OceanBit.

23
00:01:50,400 --> 00:01:56,960
They're building Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion or O-TEC technology to deliver 24-7 base load

24
00:01:56,960 --> 00:01:59,240
power across the world.

25
00:01:59,240 --> 00:02:03,960
Bitcoin mining is also a key part of their technology stack.

26
00:02:03,960 --> 00:02:07,960
This was a fascinating conversation and I know you're going to enjoy the heck out of

27
00:02:07,960 --> 00:02:10,760
it and learn a lot along the way.

28
00:02:10,760 --> 00:02:16,320
Before we dive in, do me a favor and subscribe to the Bitcoin Podcast wherever you're listening

29
00:02:16,320 --> 00:02:22,000
and give this show a 5 star rating or don't, Bitcoin doesn't care but I sure would appreciate

30
00:02:22,000 --> 00:02:23,000
it.

31
00:02:23,000 --> 00:02:27,080
Also just a heads up that you can head to the show notes for links to discounts on the

32
00:02:27,080 --> 00:02:33,920
Bitcoin only Bitbox O2 hardware wallet from Bitbox Swiss and on 5G SIM cards from Cloaked

33
00:02:33,920 --> 00:02:37,880
Wireless that protect you from SIM swap attacks.

34
00:02:37,880 --> 00:02:40,800
The promo code for both is Walker.

35
00:02:40,800 --> 00:02:44,240
If you'd rather watch this show than listen, you can head to the show notes for links to

36
00:02:44,240 --> 00:02:48,480
watch on YouTube, rumble and now on Noster via highlighter but if you're like me and

37
00:02:48,480 --> 00:02:53,880
you prefer to just listen to your podcasts, I highly recommend you check out fountain.fm.

38
00:02:53,880 --> 00:02:58,320
Not only can you send Bitcoin to your favorite podcasters to give value for value, but you

39
00:02:58,320 --> 00:03:02,200
can earn Bitcoin just for listening to this fucking podcast.

40
00:03:02,200 --> 00:03:06,520
And if you're already listening to the Bitcoin Podcast on fountain, consider giving this

41
00:03:06,520 --> 00:03:10,000
show a boost or creating a clip of something you found interesting.

42
00:03:10,000 --> 00:03:14,680
Finally, if you are a Bitcoin only company interested in sponsoring another fucking Bitcoin

43
00:03:14,680 --> 00:03:21,520
podcast, hit me up on social media or through the website, BitcoinPodcast.net.

44
00:03:21,520 --> 00:03:35,400
Without further ado, let's get into this Bitcoin talk with Nate Harmon.

45
00:03:35,400 --> 00:03:41,360
I started doing the role from the top things after it was kind of a meta podcast.

46
00:03:41,360 --> 00:03:45,240
I interviewed Peter McCormick, who I've just always really enjoyed.

47
00:03:45,240 --> 00:03:50,560
His is still one of the podcasts I listen to the most.

48
00:03:50,560 --> 00:03:53,720
And he was like, no, mate, you got my accent.

49
00:03:53,720 --> 00:03:55,200
My Peter imitation is terrible.

50
00:03:55,200 --> 00:03:56,200
I got to work.

51
00:03:56,200 --> 00:03:57,760
I'm like, no, mate, you got to roll from the start.

52
00:03:57,760 --> 00:03:59,080
Pre-roll is the best pot.

53
00:03:59,080 --> 00:04:01,240
And I was like, okay, I learned something new.

54
00:04:01,240 --> 00:04:05,360
You just start talking and you see what happens and sometimes you get some gems in there.

55
00:04:05,360 --> 00:04:12,640
But as part of my preparation for this, I was watching your chat with Peter.

56
00:04:12,640 --> 00:04:15,120
It was from about a year ago, I think.

57
00:04:15,120 --> 00:04:16,920
And just fascinating stuff.

58
00:04:16,920 --> 00:04:23,000
It was a good primer on a lot of this, but also excited because a year is a long time

59
00:04:23,000 --> 00:04:24,840
in the Bitcoin space.

60
00:04:24,840 --> 00:04:26,600
A lot can be done there.

61
00:04:26,600 --> 00:04:29,680
So Nate, excited to have you here today.

62
00:04:29,680 --> 00:04:33,440
Thanks for coming on another fucking Bitcoin podcast.

63
00:04:33,440 --> 00:04:35,560
It's a pleasure to have you here.

64
00:04:35,560 --> 00:04:36,560
Oh, it's awesome.

65
00:04:36,560 --> 00:04:38,360
Thanks for having me.

66
00:04:38,360 --> 00:04:39,360
Really excited.

67
00:04:39,360 --> 00:04:45,680
Yeah, besides Peter's, yours is great.

68
00:04:45,680 --> 00:04:51,120
But really, I'm just not, I don't know, I have too much work to do and I rarely, rarely

69
00:04:51,120 --> 00:04:53,840
listen to too much outside of YouTube.

70
00:04:53,840 --> 00:04:55,000
Wow.

71
00:04:55,000 --> 00:04:59,320
I'm honored that I'm included in that list with Peter.

72
00:04:59,320 --> 00:05:05,600
And I found the same for myself because I early in the Bitcoin journey was like podcasts

73
00:05:05,600 --> 00:05:11,680
were hugely helpful for me because sometimes you read stuff and it's like, this is going

74
00:05:11,680 --> 00:05:15,560
over my head a bit and I want to hear somebody like explain it in more detail and I want

75
00:05:15,560 --> 00:05:18,960
to be able to be driving or doing whatever else I'm doing while that's happening.

76
00:05:18,960 --> 00:05:19,960
And so loved podcasts.

77
00:05:19,960 --> 00:05:25,680
And then the further along you get, it's like, I still mind Fiat for a living.

78
00:05:25,680 --> 00:05:30,680
So this is, you know, this is my side hobby, which I enjoy very much.

79
00:05:30,680 --> 00:05:35,280
But Fiat work is not always conducive to having podcasts in my years.

80
00:05:35,280 --> 00:05:36,520
So I've had to cut down my consumption.

81
00:05:36,520 --> 00:05:40,560
Now I'm making one now too, you know, another fucking Bitcoin podcast.

82
00:05:40,560 --> 00:05:42,680
And so it's like, I still have my top ones.

83
00:05:42,680 --> 00:05:43,680
I love Peter's.

84
00:05:43,680 --> 00:05:48,520
I love Guy Swans because he just reads literally everything.

85
00:05:48,520 --> 00:05:54,000
Preston Pish has his great like Bitcoin show on the Investors Podcast Network.

86
00:05:54,000 --> 00:06:00,640
But I've kind of tamed it down from the list that I had before to basically those ones

87
00:06:00,640 --> 00:06:04,400
that I at least are in my recurring cycle.

88
00:06:04,400 --> 00:06:06,800
But glad that you're on this one.

89
00:06:06,800 --> 00:06:10,200
You know, Bitcoin podcast number go up, I think is a good thing.

90
00:06:10,200 --> 00:06:14,960
We need to saturate the podcast market and just really, really overwhelm all of the Fiat

91
00:06:14,960 --> 00:06:15,960
monetary podcasts.

92
00:06:15,960 --> 00:06:18,680
I think that's the key to mass adoption.

93
00:06:18,680 --> 00:06:20,520
Right, right.

94
00:06:20,520 --> 00:06:26,400
I think maybe a good place to start out here, let's start at the very beginning.

95
00:06:26,400 --> 00:06:30,040
And I like to ask a question that's pretty broad and you can take it any way you want

96
00:06:30,040 --> 00:06:31,040
to.

97
00:06:31,040 --> 00:06:32,280
There's no rules with it.

98
00:06:32,280 --> 00:06:38,160
But just quite simply, who are you and how did you get here today to be doing what you're

99
00:06:38,160 --> 00:06:40,160
doing?

100
00:06:40,160 --> 00:06:45,760
Yeah, uh, it's a great open-ended question.

101
00:06:45,760 --> 00:06:48,480
So my name is Nathaniel Harmon.

102
00:06:48,480 --> 00:06:50,200
I go by Nate.

103
00:06:50,200 --> 00:06:55,400
I am an oceanographer by training.

104
00:06:55,400 --> 00:06:58,120
So I studied the ocean in particular.

105
00:06:58,120 --> 00:07:05,760
I studied, I, you know, specialized in marine geology and geochemistry.

106
00:07:05,760 --> 00:07:16,000
So the things in the water that are not moving or moving by are not alive, right?

107
00:07:16,000 --> 00:07:17,000
So no biology.

108
00:07:17,000 --> 00:07:20,160
I'm not really a biological oceanographer.

109
00:07:20,160 --> 00:07:23,480
My wife is the biologist in the family.

110
00:07:23,480 --> 00:07:26,080
I am a chemical oceanographer.

111
00:07:26,080 --> 00:07:39,760
I did analytical chemistry, method development, process engineering, platform development.

112
00:07:39,760 --> 00:07:47,000
So you know, autonomous institute measurement platforms, buoys and whatnot.

113
00:07:47,000 --> 00:07:54,760
Um, yeah, it's, uh, it's been a life, you know, multiple phases.

114
00:07:54,760 --> 00:07:59,680
Uh, at one point I was a scuba instructor, which is really where I fell in love with

115
00:07:59,680 --> 00:08:00,680
the ocean.

116
00:08:00,680 --> 00:08:07,880
Um, you know, I taught, taught people how to dive in the keys, uh, and then moved out

117
00:08:07,880 --> 00:08:12,560
here to Hawaii with my wife, who at the time was a dolphin trainer.

118
00:08:12,560 --> 00:08:18,200
So we were, you know, a very ocean-centric, uh, couple.

119
00:08:18,200 --> 00:08:24,200
We got, uh, we decided we met in the keys and the Florida keys and decided to move to

120
00:08:24,200 --> 00:08:27,140
Hawaii after about three months of being together.

121
00:08:27,140 --> 00:08:29,600
So it was, uh, it was a quick turnaround.

122
00:08:29,600 --> 00:08:31,640
We've been together ever since.

123
00:08:31,640 --> 00:08:35,140
Um, yeah, we're, we've been married now.

124
00:08:35,140 --> 00:08:37,840
She's going to kill me for forgetting how long.

125
00:08:37,840 --> 00:08:45,840
We have, uh, one, one small child and, uh, you're a father now too as well.

126
00:08:45,840 --> 00:08:50,640
It's a trip that having this little human running around all of a sudden, it's just

127
00:08:50,640 --> 00:08:55,240
this fully fledged person and you're like, I'm just trying not to screw you up.

128
00:08:55,240 --> 00:08:58,360
You know, I'm just, you're, you're who you are.

129
00:08:58,360 --> 00:09:01,360
And, uh, I'm going to do my best just to, to nurture that.

130
00:09:01,360 --> 00:09:03,160
But yeah, my, I'm very early in this journey.

131
00:09:03,160 --> 00:09:04,860
It's only four months for me.

132
00:09:04,860 --> 00:09:07,080
So I've got some learning to do still.

133
00:09:07,080 --> 00:09:08,960
But not running around yet.

134
00:09:09,840 --> 00:09:12,320
No, no, flipping over constantly.

135
00:09:12,840 --> 00:09:16,280
Uh, just really, oh yeah.

136
00:09:16,280 --> 00:09:18,640
And so it's like just constant rolling over.

137
00:09:18,640 --> 00:09:21,960
It seems to really enjoy that, uh, smiles constantly, which is great.

138
00:09:21,960 --> 00:09:23,380
Finds everything hilarious.

139
00:09:23,600 --> 00:09:26,120
Uh, so he's going to be a prankster and a joker.

140
00:09:26,120 --> 00:09:28,040
I think that's, that's the vibe I get from him.

141
00:09:28,820 --> 00:09:35,800
I remember my, uh, my daughter's first method of locomotion was the continuous

142
00:09:35,800 --> 00:09:40,960
turning over and we would just see her rolling into the kitchen, rolling out of

143
00:09:40,960 --> 00:09:43,680
the kitchen cause she couldn't go forward and backward.

144
00:09:44,000 --> 00:09:50,280
It was just, you know, rolling over, uh, you know, over, and oh, forget it.

145
00:09:50,280 --> 00:09:51,760
It was the silliest thing.

146
00:09:52,480 --> 00:09:54,600
That's creative problem solving right there though.

147
00:09:54,600 --> 00:09:55,920
It's like, I can't figure out how to go forward.

148
00:09:55,920 --> 00:09:56,280
That's okay.

149
00:09:56,280 --> 00:09:57,280
I'll move side to side.

150
00:09:58,120 --> 00:09:58,480
Yeah.

151
00:09:59,520 --> 00:10:01,240
You have the tools in front of you.

152
00:10:01,480 --> 00:10:05,160
Uh, you only have a certain skill set, certain set of tools.

153
00:10:05,160 --> 00:10:08,680
And then you got to figure out how to use those tools in a creative manner.

154
00:10:08,680 --> 00:10:09,120
Right.

155
00:10:10,600 --> 00:10:11,360
Absolutely.

156
00:10:11,360 --> 00:10:12,280
So she did.

157
00:10:13,720 --> 00:10:18,720
And he did it quite well, uh, apparently because here we sit on another

158
00:10:18,720 --> 00:10:24,000
fucking Bitcoin podcast, uh, because, uh, as a direct or a, well, few orders

159
00:10:24,000 --> 00:10:31,000
down results of this guy, people, whoever deciding to just make money.

160
00:10:31,480 --> 00:10:33,160
Uh, it's kind of wild.

161
00:10:33,160 --> 00:10:36,400
Like sometimes I sit back and think about him like, what, what, what would the

162
00:10:36,400 --> 00:10:37,400
world look like?

163
00:10:38,000 --> 00:10:41,680
What would like many of our lives look like if Bitcoin just didn't exist.

164
00:10:41,680 --> 00:10:46,160
If there was that vacuum, you know, what would, what would all of us who are

165
00:10:46,200 --> 00:10:48,720
somehow involved in the Bitcoin space be doing?

166
00:10:49,400 --> 00:10:53,240
And it's kind of hard to, to imagine, I guess more of the same.

167
00:10:53,640 --> 00:10:56,000
Maybe some of us would have found tangential paths.

168
00:10:56,000 --> 00:11:00,520
Maybe somebody else would have come to market with some other sort of, you know,

169
00:11:00,520 --> 00:11:04,720
some other cryptocurrency, maybe if Bitcoin wasn't the, the progenitor of all

170
00:11:04,720 --> 00:11:06,080
of this, I don't know.

171
00:11:06,080 --> 00:11:07,960
It's a, that's always what I figured.

172
00:11:07,960 --> 00:11:09,040
It's a wild thought experiment.

173
00:11:09,880 --> 00:11:15,880
I always, I always liken Bitcoin to a, um, a discovery rather than an invention.

174
00:11:16,400 --> 00:11:18,800
Um, like it was always out there.

175
00:11:18,800 --> 00:11:24,360
The tools to create it were always out there, but, um, nobody had put them all

176
00:11:24,360 --> 00:11:29,640
together in the correct order and somebody would have done it eventually.

177
00:11:29,640 --> 00:11:34,840
Uh, you know, realizing that the key, the thing that no one had tried was to

178
00:11:35,560 --> 00:11:36,640
just disappear.

179
00:11:40,640 --> 00:11:45,360
It, it's a thing that I think is almost, would be almost impossible for most people.

180
00:11:45,800 --> 00:11:51,000
Like that took a special type of person to be able to remain anonymous and then

181
00:11:51,000 --> 00:11:55,440
to completely pull back from it and, and truly disappear.

182
00:11:55,440 --> 00:12:01,680
And then to whatever he, she, they are doing now has not touched the coins.

183
00:12:01,680 --> 00:12:02,880
Maybe they're no longer alive.

184
00:12:02,880 --> 00:12:07,200
Who knows, but it's, it's wild to think about like Bitcoin would not exist as

185
00:12:07,200 --> 00:12:07,720
it does today.

186
00:12:07,720 --> 00:12:11,280
If, if Satoshi did not disappear, it's, it's not, it's not possible for it to

187
00:12:11,280 --> 00:12:11,680
exist.

188
00:12:11,680 --> 00:12:12,840
That's a throat to choke.

189
00:12:13,240 --> 00:12:16,400
And as it is now, there is no throat to choke, which is wonderful because

190
00:12:16,400 --> 00:12:18,040
there's a lot of people who want to strangle it.

191
00:12:19,360 --> 00:12:19,520
It's a kid.

192
00:12:19,520 --> 00:12:21,040
It's turd with it.

193
00:12:21,040 --> 00:12:21,960
Yeah.

194
00:12:22,560 --> 00:12:22,880
Yeah.

195
00:12:22,880 --> 00:12:25,520
Yeah.

196
00:12:25,520 --> 00:12:29,600
A lot of regulatory problems by simply not existing.

197
00:12:31,280 --> 00:12:38,000
When we were in the hospital, you know, the, for the birth of our daughter, you

198
00:12:38,000 --> 00:12:41,200
know, the lady comes in and is like, Oh, do you want me to fill out the social

199
00:12:41,200 --> 00:12:42,160
security form?

200
00:12:42,160 --> 00:12:43,080
And I took a second.

201
00:12:43,080 --> 00:12:44,280
I was like, wait a second.

202
00:12:45,440 --> 00:12:46,560
Do I?

203
00:12:49,040 --> 00:12:50,040
And I had to.

204
00:12:50,080 --> 00:12:51,400
So they say, yeah.

205
00:12:51,400 --> 00:12:53,400
There's no choice.

206
00:12:53,400 --> 00:12:54,400
Yeah.

207
00:12:54,400 --> 00:12:56,400
There kind of should be a choice though.

208
00:12:56,400 --> 00:13:00,960
Social security is such a weird thing because that system, like we were never

209
00:13:00,960 --> 00:13:06,640
meant to use the social security number as our like de facto government

210
00:13:06,640 --> 00:13:07,520
identifier.

211
00:13:07,520 --> 00:13:08,760
That was never the idea.

212
00:13:08,760 --> 00:13:11,160
They just had no other system.

213
00:13:11,160 --> 00:13:17,000
The social security law do not use this, this number for identification.

214
00:13:17,000 --> 00:13:17,600
It's.

215
00:13:17,600 --> 00:13:20,760
And then here, here we are now.

216
00:13:20,760 --> 00:13:24,360
However, many years later, and it's like, nope, that's, that's basically the one

217
00:13:24,360 --> 00:13:28,240
number that you need to be able to do anything and prove that you are a person,

218
00:13:28,240 --> 00:13:32,480
a citizen in the U S and of course, so that you can, you know, be taxed

219
00:13:32,480 --> 00:13:33,880
appropriately and such.

220
00:13:33,880 --> 00:13:38,760
But it, it's just so, it's kind of an example of a really good example of a

221
00:13:38,760 --> 00:13:43,240
temporary solution just becoming permanent because of inertia.

222
00:13:43,240 --> 00:13:45,320
And we're, we're not going back on that.

223
00:13:45,320 --> 00:13:50,440
And then meanwhile, it's just childishly easy to scam people out of their social

224
00:13:50,440 --> 00:13:52,320
security, their socials and get access to that.

225
00:13:52,320 --> 00:13:55,960
And you send it unencrypted so many times and it touches so many people and it's

226
00:13:55,960 --> 00:13:59,440
like, oh God, this is a really terrible system.

227
00:13:59,440 --> 00:14:00,440
Like shock.

228
00:14:00,440 --> 00:14:04,840
It's just blown out there for everybody.

229
00:14:04,840 --> 00:14:06,840
It's, it's a mess.

230
00:14:06,840 --> 00:14:13,600
Well, now speaking of systems, if I may, I would love to kind of dive in a little

231
00:14:13,600 --> 00:14:18,200
bit and talk about systems involving the ocean.

232
00:14:18,200 --> 00:14:22,680
I would like to talk about O-TEC specifically, which is what you are

233
00:14:22,680 --> 00:14:27,080
passionate about, focused on building a company around.

234
00:14:27,080 --> 00:14:33,840
Can you talk about ocean bit a little bit at, at maybe a, a high level in terms

235
00:14:33,840 --> 00:14:39,160
of what O-TEC is, what it, what it kind of enables.

236
00:14:39,160 --> 00:14:43,320
And then we can maybe get into some of the more, the more nitty gritty about it.

237
00:14:43,320 --> 00:14:44,320
Sure.

238
00:14:44,320 --> 00:14:51,040
Yeah, so ocean thermal energy conversion or O-TEC, which I hate the acronym because

239
00:14:51,040 --> 00:14:53,880
it's not intuitive.

240
00:14:53,880 --> 00:14:59,400
So I'm trying to, trying to, trying to start saying ocean thermal now, like

241
00:14:59,400 --> 00:15:02,720
geothermal, because that's essentially what it is.

242
00:15:02,720 --> 00:15:09,400
It's a, it's kind of an offshoot of geothermal where instead of using the heat from the,

243
00:15:09,400 --> 00:15:16,200
you know, the coming up from, you know, the center of the planet, right?

244
00:15:16,200 --> 00:15:20,280
You're using the heat that's retained in the surface layer of the ocean.

245
00:15:20,280 --> 00:15:25,720
So right, the sun shines on the ocean, gets nice and warm here in Hawaii.

246
00:15:25,720 --> 00:15:28,840
It's very warm all year round, right?

247
00:15:28,840 --> 00:15:29,840
No wetsuit required.

248
00:15:29,840 --> 00:15:32,640
I don't know where, where are you located right now?

249
00:15:32,640 --> 00:15:36,600
Oh, in, in just Balmy, Illinois.

250
00:15:36,600 --> 00:15:39,480
Uh, we'll just say Illinois generally.

251
00:15:39,480 --> 00:15:44,800
The, I, I've lived, I've lived in a couple of places.

252
00:15:44,800 --> 00:15:49,680
I've lived out on the West coast for a little bit, but I've somehow found my way back to

253
00:15:49,680 --> 00:15:50,680
the Midwest.

254
00:15:50,680 --> 00:15:52,680
I'm a small town Wisconsin guy, like very small town.

255
00:15:52,680 --> 00:15:56,160
That's why I'm still, you know, habit of drinking Miller light.

256
00:15:56,160 --> 00:15:57,400
I can't get around it.

257
00:15:57,400 --> 00:15:59,960
It's like my, my body requires it somehow.

258
00:15:59,960 --> 00:16:04,200
But yeah, Wisconsin and Illinois is where I've lived for most of my life.

259
00:16:04,200 --> 00:16:10,240
I've never been to Hawaii and it is on my list of places I need to go like as soon as

260
00:16:10,240 --> 00:16:12,600
possible.

261
00:16:12,600 --> 00:16:15,560
It just looks too beautiful to ignore for too long.

262
00:16:15,560 --> 00:16:16,560
Yeah.

263
00:16:16,560 --> 00:16:19,240
It's, it's definitely a very special place.

264
00:16:19,240 --> 00:16:24,920
And you know, we, we got warm water all year round, right?

265
00:16:24,920 --> 00:16:31,680
As does most of the tropics and a lot of small island development states.

266
00:16:31,680 --> 00:16:39,560
And yeah, it, uh, ocean thermal energy uses that difference in temperature between the

267
00:16:39,560 --> 00:16:43,200
warm surface water and deep cold water.

268
00:16:43,200 --> 00:16:45,640
You run what's called a Rankin Cycle.

269
00:16:45,640 --> 00:16:48,920
So it's just like a steam steam engine.

270
00:16:48,920 --> 00:16:54,680
You're taking heat from one location and moving it to a heat sink.

271
00:16:54,680 --> 00:17:00,320
So the cold water, you're moving heat from the warm water to the cold water, uh, which

272
00:17:00,320 --> 00:17:03,160
is mediated by a working fluid.

273
00:17:03,160 --> 00:17:06,000
So in our case, we use ammonia.

274
00:17:06,000 --> 00:17:10,720
Um, it's the best for the particular temperature range.

275
00:17:10,720 --> 00:17:15,120
And you use the warm water of the surface to boil that ammonia, right?

276
00:17:15,120 --> 00:17:16,880
Turn it into a gas.

277
00:17:16,880 --> 00:17:23,500
That gas now flows through a turbine, which spins, of course, you can extract electricity.

278
00:17:23,500 --> 00:17:28,880
Then you condense that gas back to a liquid using the cold water.

279
00:17:28,880 --> 00:17:34,800
And then you just pump that ammonia back to the warm water heat exchanger and it just

280
00:17:34,800 --> 00:17:37,920
goes around and around and around in a big loop.

281
00:17:37,920 --> 00:17:43,400
Um, so it's a, you know, a base load component and we can go into that, you know, a little

282
00:17:43,400 --> 00:17:44,400
more later.

283
00:17:44,400 --> 00:17:47,200
Um, it's a base load energy source.

284
00:17:47,200 --> 00:17:49,280
So it's available all year round, right?

285
00:17:49,280 --> 00:17:53,760
I don't have to wear a wetsuit in Hawaii, even on, you know, the coldest day of the

286
00:17:53,760 --> 00:17:54,760
year.

287
00:17:54,760 --> 00:17:57,620
Uh, that's, that's energy.

288
00:17:57,620 --> 00:18:03,600
And there's a lot of places in the world right now that are hurting because of the uncertainty

289
00:18:03,600 --> 00:18:07,840
in the, you know, the cost of diesel fuel.

290
00:18:07,840 --> 00:18:15,840
Uh, you know, just the logistics of getting oil or diesel or coal to, uh, you know, some

291
00:18:15,840 --> 00:18:20,000
of these far flung places just drives that cost up here in Hawaii.

292
00:18:20,000 --> 00:18:22,840
We're paying 46 cents per kilowatt hour.

293
00:18:22,840 --> 00:18:29,440
Um, because we're, you know, we're not, we don't have that energy independence and O-Tech

294
00:18:29,440 --> 00:18:36,760
ocean thermal can provide that energy independence to a lot of places.

295
00:18:36,760 --> 00:18:42,000
I appreciate the primer on it because, uh, until you were the person who actually, when

296
00:18:42,000 --> 00:18:45,720
I started following you on Twitter, this was, you were the one who introduced me to this

297
00:18:45,720 --> 00:18:50,800
concept and I, I had looked into it, uh, back then, I don't even remember exactly when

298
00:18:50,800 --> 00:18:57,560
that was, uh, but then I've been looking into it more since and it's really kind of fascinating

299
00:18:57,560 --> 00:19:04,880
and it seems so in a way obvious and simple that you kind of say, well, well, wait a minute,

300
00:19:04,880 --> 00:19:07,760
why hasn't, why is nobody doing this?

301
00:19:07,760 --> 00:19:13,360
And I understand it, the technology itself has been around for like a hundred years,

302
00:19:13,360 --> 00:19:14,640
something like that.

303
00:19:14,640 --> 00:19:18,680
Can you talk a little bit about, okay, this is a technology that's been around, I mean,

304
00:19:18,680 --> 00:19:22,960
for multiple generations, why did it not find traction?

305
00:19:22,960 --> 00:19:28,920
What, what, what was the barrier to it that like it's been around for so long and it seems

306
00:19:28,920 --> 00:19:34,400
so obvious, especially for places like Hawaii, places in the tropics, places around the equator.

307
00:19:34,400 --> 00:19:36,240
Why did this not catch on?

308
00:19:36,240 --> 00:19:43,800
Well, yeah, like you said, it's been around for first conceptualized like 150 years ago,

309
00:19:43,800 --> 00:19:51,720
Jules Verne in 20, 20,000 leagues under the sea was the first real inspiration.

310
00:19:51,720 --> 00:20:01,200
Um, then, uh, the first plant was constructed in the 30s, 1930s.

311
00:20:01,200 --> 00:20:08,120
Um, of course, that was not great timing for alternative energy sources, right?

312
00:20:08,120 --> 00:20:11,840
I mean, there were, uh, you know, electric cars at the time.

313
00:20:11,840 --> 00:20:17,760
Uh, there was a big competition between electric vehicles at the time and, you know, combust

314
00:20:17,760 --> 00:20:21,760
ICEs, uh, internal combustion engines.

315
00:20:21,760 --> 00:20:28,440
And there were, uh, you know, there was a couple of massive oil discoveries in the Middle

316
00:20:28,440 --> 00:20:31,280
East in the US.

317
00:20:31,280 --> 00:20:35,080
Um, and that, that was the end of it, right?

318
00:20:35,080 --> 00:20:43,680
It's, uh, I always liken, uh, I always liken fossil fuels to, you know, fiat.

319
00:20:43,680 --> 00:20:48,400
Um, you know, you're borrowing against tomorrow for gains today.

320
00:20:48,400 --> 00:20:57,080
Um, and that's kind of been the story of O-TEC is they've been competing with fossil fuels.

321
00:20:57,080 --> 00:21:04,160
Uh, and, you know, there was, see the largest O-TEC plant built to date was the one megawatt

322
00:21:04,160 --> 00:21:06,520
O-TEC plant here in Hawaii.

323
00:21:06,520 --> 00:21:15,960
So, you know, uh, decent scale and floating ship conversion, uh, here in Hawaii deployed,

324
00:21:15,960 --> 00:21:17,760
everything went fine.

325
00:21:17,760 --> 00:21:21,320
And there was, um, a project to build a 40 meg right.

326
00:21:21,320 --> 00:21:26,680
The next step after the one megawatt O-TEC plant was a, uh, 40 megawatt O-TEC plant

327
00:21:26,680 --> 00:21:28,880
here in Hawaii.

328
00:21:28,880 --> 00:21:37,400
And that was done during the Carter administration, Jimmy Carter, and after Carter lost reelection,

329
00:21:37,400 --> 00:21:42,080
Reagan came, took all the solar panels off the, you know, the White House roof, but he

330
00:21:42,080 --> 00:21:48,920
also cut funding for, um, all the renewable energy projects that were going on.

331
00:21:48,920 --> 00:21:55,440
So it set us back, that one action set us back on solar, on wind, and of course on O-TEC.

332
00:21:55,440 --> 00:22:05,800
They had that project, the one through which I have the copy of the full, full design study,

333
00:22:05,800 --> 00:22:08,840
engineering report design study here.

334
00:22:08,840 --> 00:22:14,240
And they, these things only now exist in, uh, in paper because it was done in the 80s.

335
00:22:14,240 --> 00:22:22,240
See, I kept this plan that they spent millions of dollars on, uh, you know, to develop, to

336
00:22:22,240 --> 00:22:29,960
go get the parts, to do the feasibility studies, the environmental impact studies, all ready

337
00:22:29,960 --> 00:22:30,960
to go.

338
00:22:30,960 --> 00:22:34,760
Reagan comes in and just chops its head off.

339
00:22:34,760 --> 00:22:40,800
Uh, and if that, that single decision hadn't been made, we would have O-TEC all over the

340
00:22:40,800 --> 00:22:41,800
world right now.

341
00:22:41,800 --> 00:22:45,720
And I'd probably be working at some other O-TEC company.

342
00:22:45,720 --> 00:22:51,520
Um, yeah, it's just been, you know, bad timing, right?

343
00:22:51,520 --> 00:22:57,120
Fossil fuels are great source of energy, right?

344
00:22:57,120 --> 00:22:58,760
They're super energy dense.

345
00:22:58,760 --> 00:23:01,120
Uh, they're transportable, right?

346
00:23:01,120 --> 00:23:06,240
Coal, you can just put coal in your pocket, light it on fire and get energy.

347
00:23:06,240 --> 00:23:10,640
You know, oil is a liquid, so it's easy to transport.

348
00:23:10,640 --> 00:23:13,200
Natural gas is a little more difficult.

349
00:23:13,200 --> 00:23:17,480
Um, but they're trade easily transportable.

350
00:23:17,480 --> 00:23:23,800
They're super energy dense and most importantly, they're centralizable, right?

351
00:23:23,800 --> 00:23:28,040
So you can have centralized control over the flow of oil.

352
00:23:28,040 --> 00:23:34,640
Think there's a couple of kingdoms located in the Middle East that are, you know, Petro

353
00:23:34,640 --> 00:23:35,640
states, right?

354
00:23:35,640 --> 00:23:42,240
The United States is one of the top producers and the exporters of fossil fuels.

355
00:23:42,240 --> 00:23:49,840
We've got a handful of super majors that essentially run the show, right?

356
00:23:49,840 --> 00:23:57,960
They influence, you know, a handful of people sitting on the boards of these very few companies

357
00:23:57,960 --> 00:24:00,800
influence geopolitics.

358
00:24:00,800 --> 00:24:07,840
And I think it was like just a few days ago that there was a report about illegal collusion

359
00:24:07,840 --> 00:24:19,720
between all these companies and Saudi Arabia to keep the price up of oil today, which is

360
00:24:19,720 --> 00:24:23,200
of course one of the reasons we have this inflation problem.

361
00:24:23,200 --> 00:24:28,760
It turns out that it was collusion within a couple, with just a couple of people.

362
00:24:28,760 --> 00:24:34,400
And here we're talking, just to clarify, OPEC, not OTECH, which I think is another

363
00:24:34,400 --> 00:24:36,240
reason to maybe change the acronym.

364
00:24:36,240 --> 00:24:39,880
It's really too close to OPEC.

365
00:24:39,880 --> 00:24:41,640
Can be too easily confused.

366
00:24:41,640 --> 00:24:44,240
But apologies for the interruption.

367
00:24:44,240 --> 00:24:48,480
Wanted to clarify for the listener, OPEC colluding here, not OTECH.

368
00:24:48,480 --> 00:24:51,280
And it's not just OPEC.

369
00:24:51,280 --> 00:24:55,560
It's all of the U.S. companies too.

370
00:24:55,560 --> 00:24:56,560
Or was it?

371
00:24:56,560 --> 00:24:58,760
Honestly, yeah, I'm curious.

372
00:24:58,760 --> 00:25:01,240
I mean, this is the interesting thing.

373
00:25:01,240 --> 00:25:08,720
So I think that if I talk about the Bitcoin space specifically, there is oftentimes a

374
00:25:08,720 --> 00:25:16,680
knee-jerk reaction to any sort of, quote, renewable or green energy.

375
00:25:16,680 --> 00:25:23,640
And that's because obviously there have been, well, we look at things like wind and solar,

376
00:25:23,640 --> 00:25:26,280
which have some massive drawbacks.

377
00:25:26,280 --> 00:25:32,520
If we talk about solar specifically, you're completely tied to the production of these

378
00:25:32,520 --> 00:25:39,800
rare earth metals that are dug up by literally children in Africa.

379
00:25:39,800 --> 00:25:47,680
Like this is not a, it's an exploitative industry that has also been massively subsidized to

380
00:25:47,680 --> 00:25:52,160
even have a chance of existing because the economics didn't make sense.

381
00:25:52,160 --> 00:25:56,240
And I think there's this general knee-jerk reaction to anything that is deemed as green

382
00:25:56,240 --> 00:26:01,880
or renewable, again, to say that, well, this must just be another scam.

383
00:26:01,880 --> 00:26:03,480
But I think it'd be helpful.

384
00:26:03,480 --> 00:26:10,360
I'm curious, would you agree with the statement in general, more energy use, more energy abundance

385
00:26:10,360 --> 00:26:13,800
equals more prosperity and more human flourishing?

386
00:26:13,800 --> 00:26:16,240
Like we should be trying to harness as much energy as possible.

387
00:26:16,240 --> 00:26:18,240
A statement you agree with?

388
00:26:18,240 --> 00:26:21,000
100%.

389
00:26:21,000 --> 00:26:25,280
I think that's important for people to realize as they're, if you're listening to this and

390
00:26:25,280 --> 00:26:32,720
thinking this is some other green tech climate change, we, Fagenda scam, you're a person

391
00:26:32,720 --> 00:26:37,000
who believes that we should harness as much energy as we can.

392
00:26:37,000 --> 00:26:39,040
That is good for human flourishing.

393
00:26:39,040 --> 00:26:44,280
And with ocean thermal, you see, and not to put words in your mouth, but an opportunity

394
00:26:44,280 --> 00:26:49,080
to harness a massive amount of completely untapped energy.

395
00:26:49,080 --> 00:26:51,000
Can you maybe expand that a little bit?

396
00:26:51,000 --> 00:26:55,040
Because I think it's important for Bitcoiners who maybe are looking at anything renewable

397
00:26:55,040 --> 00:26:58,720
and saying, okay, I'm not falling for this one again.

398
00:26:58,720 --> 00:26:59,720
Yeah.

399
00:26:59,720 --> 00:27:06,520
I mean, it's like most renewables, they are location specific.

400
00:27:06,520 --> 00:27:13,280
Geothermal only exists where you have geothermal available.

401
00:27:13,280 --> 00:27:18,960
You can't just, I mean, I guess you could drill down farther, but there's economic

402
00:27:18,960 --> 00:27:21,640
problems with that.

403
00:27:21,640 --> 00:27:25,520
You can't just build a river where one was not.

404
00:27:25,520 --> 00:27:28,560
You can move a river, but there's consequences.

405
00:27:28,560 --> 00:27:35,560
So with a lot of baseload renewable energy sources, they're only available where they're

406
00:27:35,560 --> 00:27:36,560
available.

407
00:27:36,560 --> 00:27:39,360
And this is even inclusive of nuclear as well.

408
00:27:39,360 --> 00:27:44,840
You need massive amounts of pooling water for nuclear power.

409
00:27:44,840 --> 00:27:46,520
And that's just simply not available.

410
00:27:46,520 --> 00:27:56,440
You also need restrictions on, you have fallout zones like nuclear, does it work for Hawaii?

411
00:27:56,440 --> 00:28:04,320
And OTEC is just another one of these baseload renewable power sources that's available in

412
00:28:04,320 --> 00:28:08,880
a certain band, geographic band.

413
00:28:08,880 --> 00:28:15,360
And turns out a lot of that geographic band is highly dependent on the flow of marine

414
00:28:15,360 --> 00:28:16,840
diesel.

415
00:28:16,840 --> 00:28:23,960
And they're burning diesel fuel, not even petroleum.

416
00:28:23,960 --> 00:28:37,680
They're burning the worst of the worst using 70 year old technology that is no longer manufactured.

417
00:28:37,680 --> 00:28:40,560
They can't get replacement parts.

418
00:28:40,560 --> 00:28:42,040
And it's just breaking down.

419
00:28:42,040 --> 00:28:47,440
And the logistics of getting oil to a lot of these places is driving the cost up.

420
00:28:47,440 --> 00:28:53,560
And there's been a nice confluence of events in OTEC over the last two decades with the

421
00:28:53,560 --> 00:28:58,400
development of offshore oil and gas infrastructure.

422
00:28:58,400 --> 00:29:04,960
So then, and, you know, this offshore oil and gas infrastructure development has brought

423
00:29:04,960 --> 00:29:13,560
the costs of a lot of the components of OTEC, you know, turbines, pumps, heat exchangers,

424
00:29:13,560 --> 00:29:20,960
larger and larger vessels down to the point where it is now competitive in a lot of these

425
00:29:20,960 --> 00:29:25,480
regions with oil and gas.

426
00:29:25,480 --> 00:29:30,520
And that means more cheaper, more plentiful energy for these regions, which of course

427
00:29:30,520 --> 00:29:36,440
means more human flourishing there.

428
00:29:36,440 --> 00:29:43,200
I appreciate the clarification on that, because again, for folks that are listening or watching,

429
00:29:43,200 --> 00:29:49,160
I think it's important to take a step back to check our biases at the door when we encounter

430
00:29:49,160 --> 00:29:50,840
new things.

431
00:29:50,840 --> 00:29:59,800
And this is one of those things where, again, I don't see a ton of reasons to be anti-ocean

432
00:29:59,800 --> 00:30:00,800
thermal.

433
00:30:00,800 --> 00:30:09,840
I guess what are the common pushbacks that you encounter when you're raising this topic?

434
00:30:09,840 --> 00:30:15,600
What do people bring up as why, you know, I don't like this or why it won't work or why

435
00:30:15,600 --> 00:30:17,520
we should forget about ocean thermal?

436
00:30:17,520 --> 00:30:23,160
Well, it's been proven for almost 100 years now.

437
00:30:23,160 --> 00:30:25,920
1931 was the first plant built.

438
00:30:25,920 --> 00:30:31,680
So there's no question whether it works or not.

439
00:30:31,680 --> 00:30:38,600
There's always been a question of the cost, but that's simply a matter of production capacity,

440
00:30:38,600 --> 00:30:45,400
economies of scale, which luckily, like I just said, with advancements in offshore oil

441
00:30:45,400 --> 00:30:55,000
and gas, some of those gains have already been made in production capacity, economies

442
00:30:55,000 --> 00:30:56,000
of scale, right?

443
00:30:56,000 --> 00:31:01,920
We can buy our first, for our first commercial development, we're just going to buy off the

444
00:31:01,920 --> 00:31:08,960
shelf components thing, you know, the HDP extrusion pipes, you know, these turbines

445
00:31:08,960 --> 00:31:16,680
exist, large scale water pumps, ammonia systems, you know, every ice cream refrigeration facility

446
00:31:16,680 --> 00:31:23,320
is using an ammonia refrigeration system, which is just a rank in an ammonia ranking

447
00:31:23,320 --> 00:31:25,040
cycle run in reverse.

448
00:31:25,040 --> 00:31:30,960
In fact, for our R&D facility, we're going to run a ammonia compressor in reverse because

449
00:31:30,960 --> 00:31:36,640
it's cheaper than getting a custom turbine made.

450
00:31:36,640 --> 00:31:42,520
Yeah, it's, you know, cost.

451
00:31:42,520 --> 00:31:46,800
The environmental impact is extremely minimal.

452
00:31:46,800 --> 00:31:50,440
You know, you're pumping cold water up to the surface.

453
00:31:50,440 --> 00:31:55,880
Of course, anytime you have a large piece of equipment in the ocean, you're going to

454
00:31:55,880 --> 00:32:04,160
have some impact, but it's, you know, one, rather than a, you know, wind turbine or wave

455
00:32:04,160 --> 00:32:08,040
buoys, they're, you know, singular.

456
00:32:08,040 --> 00:32:14,640
So they only have, you know, one mooring system rather than dozens and dozens and dozens of

457
00:32:14,640 --> 00:32:23,640
mooring systems driving multiple piles, causing, you know, massive amounts of sound pollution.

458
00:32:23,640 --> 00:32:31,240
There's a lot of the problems in offshore renewables are avoided with O-Tech and, you

459
00:32:31,240 --> 00:32:32,760
know, it's fairly benign.

460
00:32:32,760 --> 00:32:42,280
It has almost no carbon, you know, virtually zero carbon emissions and it can be run carbon

461
00:32:42,280 --> 00:32:43,280
negative.

462
00:32:43,280 --> 00:32:54,720
So, you can produce, you know, CO2, marine CDR, so marine carbon dioxide removal just

463
00:32:54,720 --> 00:32:58,760
by harnessing the deep water, the nutrients in your deep water.

464
00:32:58,760 --> 00:33:07,240
So there's really not that many objections, you know, altering fishing patterns is one,

465
00:33:07,240 --> 00:33:11,840
you know, one thing, but of course you put something big in the ocean, fish are attracted

466
00:33:11,840 --> 00:33:12,840
to it.

467
00:33:12,840 --> 00:33:17,040
So it becomes an easier spot to fish.

468
00:33:17,040 --> 00:33:23,840
And really the environmental impacts are numerical model or Dr. Zirard Nehaus had done, you know,

469
00:33:23,840 --> 00:33:30,520
large scale global couple climate modeling on this and found that it's not really until

470
00:33:30,520 --> 00:33:37,640
you get to the, you know, sort of five to eight terawatt range for electricity production

471
00:33:37,640 --> 00:33:44,320
that you start altering, you know, the thermal structure of the ocean and then cooling it,

472
00:33:44,320 --> 00:33:50,000
right, which is kind of the direction you would want to go because I don't know if you've

473
00:33:50,000 --> 00:33:55,720
seen this year, but it's been a absolute torture.

474
00:33:55,720 --> 00:34:01,160
We're breaking, you know, records six Sigma above the average.

475
00:34:01,160 --> 00:34:02,760
It's been absolutely brutal.

476
00:34:02,760 --> 00:34:08,520
But you know, I look at the, I look at the sea surface temperatures just straight and

477
00:34:08,520 --> 00:34:13,240
moaning, and I go, well, that's, that improves the efficiency of O-Tech.

478
00:34:13,240 --> 00:34:21,280
So yeah, I mean, five terawatts of electricity is more electricity for some, so then all of

479
00:34:21,280 --> 00:34:24,280
humanity uses today.

480
00:34:24,280 --> 00:34:30,440
So it's, there's a lot of potential and very little drawback.

481
00:34:30,440 --> 00:34:34,040
You can build it with off the shelf components.

482
00:34:34,040 --> 00:34:37,320
So it's not like you'd have to, you know, create a new industry.

483
00:34:37,320 --> 00:34:43,880
You're just, you know, outside of titanium, it's steel.

484
00:34:43,880 --> 00:34:50,360
We have plenty of sources of steel and I think Norway just sound a massive titanium deposit.

485
00:34:50,360 --> 00:34:56,720
So I think the price of titanium is going to come down, which is always a good thing.

486
00:34:56,720 --> 00:35:01,320
Speaking of good things, it's always a good idea to review your Bitcoin security setup

487
00:35:01,320 --> 00:35:05,200
and upgrade it with the latest and greatest open source hardware.

488
00:35:05,200 --> 00:35:12,600
Head to bitbox.swiss.walkr and use promo code Walker for 5% off the fully open source

489
00:35:12,600 --> 00:35:16,480
Bitcoin only, Bitbox O2 hardware wallet.

490
00:35:16,480 --> 00:35:20,520
Then get your Bitcoin off the exchange and into your own self custody.

491
00:35:20,520 --> 00:35:26,000
The Bitbox O2 is seriously easy as hell to use, whether you are brand new to Bitcoin,

492
00:35:26,000 --> 00:35:30,040
starting out or you're a seasoned psychopath and maybe you already have a few hardware

493
00:35:30,040 --> 00:35:31,040
wallets.

494
00:35:31,040 --> 00:35:32,800
Again, it is fully open source.

495
00:35:32,800 --> 00:35:36,240
You can head to their GitHub and verify for yourself.

496
00:35:36,240 --> 00:35:38,160
Please do not just trust me.

497
00:35:38,160 --> 00:35:44,920
Plus, when you go to Bitbox.swiss.walkr and use the promo code Walker, not only do you

498
00:35:44,920 --> 00:35:49,480
get 5% off, but you also help support this fucking podcast.

499
00:35:49,480 --> 00:35:51,480
So thank you.

500
00:35:51,480 --> 00:35:57,720
Now, I appreciate that because again, it seems that so much of this, so much of the pushback

501
00:35:57,720 --> 00:36:01,000
is again, cost driven.

502
00:36:01,000 --> 00:36:04,160
It's about the economic feasibility of this.

503
00:36:04,160 --> 00:36:10,920
Like with so many projects that involve harnessing energy in stranded or in isolated places where

504
00:36:10,920 --> 00:36:17,480
there is a potential energy abundance, but because the location is isolated, because

505
00:36:17,480 --> 00:36:25,240
perhaps the population around it is small and also perhaps not having a ton of capital

506
00:36:25,240 --> 00:36:29,520
to invest in this themselves, it requires external investment.

507
00:36:29,520 --> 00:36:34,480
And that external investment says, well, when am I going to see a return on my investment?

508
00:36:34,480 --> 00:36:36,560
Obviously, what's in it for me?

509
00:36:36,560 --> 00:36:38,800
Is this going to make money?

510
00:36:38,800 --> 00:36:47,000
And it seems that now this is kind of this beautiful thing about Bitcoin is that you

511
00:36:47,000 --> 00:36:58,920
have now a new way of making these sorts of projects not just viable, but profitable,

512
00:36:58,920 --> 00:37:03,840
where you no longer need to justify, well, you're going to be spending however many millions,

513
00:37:03,840 --> 00:37:05,040
billions of dollars.

514
00:37:05,040 --> 00:37:10,080
And we can't exactly say how many years until you start to see a return on that, but we

515
00:37:10,080 --> 00:37:11,080
swear it's coming.

516
00:37:11,080 --> 00:37:15,360
It's like, no, no, no, we'll plug in some miners and get it going from day one.

517
00:37:15,360 --> 00:37:22,400
So I would love maybe, perhaps before we get into the Bitcoin side of things, can you talk

518
00:37:22,400 --> 00:37:27,320
a little bit about where OceanBit is at in this process?

519
00:37:27,320 --> 00:37:31,760
I know you're running some proof of concept, some pilots, but can you talk about that and

520
00:37:31,760 --> 00:37:39,560
what kind of the planned build out is for you guys in terms of what sorts of facilities,

521
00:37:39,560 --> 00:37:45,120
whether they be land-based or floating and mobile?

522
00:37:45,120 --> 00:37:46,120
What does that look like?

523
00:37:46,120 --> 00:37:50,120
You mentioned already some of the inputs that are becoming more economical already, but

524
00:37:50,120 --> 00:37:54,680
where are you guys at right now as a company, as an organization?

525
00:37:54,680 --> 00:38:00,920
And what are you targeting in terms of actually starting to deploy this at scale?

526
00:38:00,920 --> 00:38:03,840
What does scale look like for OceanBit?

527
00:38:03,840 --> 00:38:07,800
And maybe what kind of timeline are we talking about here?

528
00:38:07,800 --> 00:38:09,200
Sure.

529
00:38:09,200 --> 00:38:18,960
So right now we are operating and executing on three major components of the business.

530
00:38:18,960 --> 00:38:25,400
So first is technical development of what we call demand response O-Tech, which is that

531
00:38:25,400 --> 00:38:31,920
coupling of not just Bitcoin mining, but high density compute in general.

532
00:38:31,920 --> 00:38:42,720
Like most companies in the mining space, we realized fairly early on that Bitcoin mining

533
00:38:42,720 --> 00:38:54,880
is just one type of high density compute and other options are super computing, large language

534
00:38:54,880 --> 00:39:03,840
model training, things that require purpose built data centers.

535
00:39:03,840 --> 00:39:09,160
You can't just convert easily plug-in high density compute to an Amazon cloud server

536
00:39:09,160 --> 00:39:11,660
data center.

537
00:39:11,660 --> 00:39:17,160
Those are general purpose computing, general purpose cloud computing servers.

538
00:39:17,160 --> 00:39:23,960
But you really need to, for high density compute, you have to custom-mild your HVAC

539
00:39:23,960 --> 00:39:31,840
system, custom-built electricity distribution, and oftentimes build purpose-built power

540
00:39:31,840 --> 00:39:38,440
plants like all the supercomputers, Lawrence Livermore, at all the different national labs,

541
00:39:38,440 --> 00:39:42,600
they all have power plants built specifically for them.

542
00:39:42,600 --> 00:39:47,920
And so Bitcoin is just one flavor of that high density compute.

543
00:39:47,920 --> 00:39:54,240
So we're doing the technical development of demand response O-Tech, which is our, you

544
00:39:54,240 --> 00:40:01,680
know, patented coupling of high density compute with low temperature heat engine or, in our

545
00:40:01,680 --> 00:40:03,760
case, O-Tech.

546
00:40:03,760 --> 00:40:11,760
We are doing the technical qualification of our vessel design with, we are working with

547
00:40:11,760 --> 00:40:19,160
one of the marine classification societies, DNV, on the technical qualification of our

548
00:40:19,160 --> 00:40:20,160
vessel design.

549
00:40:20,160 --> 00:40:29,680
So we're building vessels, re-purchasing, refitting existing vessels into power plants.

550
00:40:29,680 --> 00:40:33,080
And we're working on the technical qualification with DNV.

551
00:40:33,080 --> 00:40:40,320
You know, this is de-rissing that, you know, for insurance purposes, for project financing

552
00:40:40,320 --> 00:40:41,920
purposes.

553
00:40:41,920 --> 00:40:49,840
And then we are now engaging in commercial development with our first 25 megawatt power

554
00:40:49,840 --> 00:40:50,840
plant.

555
00:40:50,840 --> 00:41:00,120
So we're, and I will let the, we have an agreement with a country, and I will let them, you know,

556
00:41:00,120 --> 00:41:07,160
I'm going to save the announcement for them once we finish the initial feasibility analysis.

557
00:41:07,160 --> 00:41:15,600
Yeah, so that's really where we are and what we're executing all at the moment.

558
00:41:15,600 --> 00:41:17,080
That's quite incredible.

559
00:41:17,080 --> 00:41:20,680
I appreciate you keeping it close to the chest with the country.

560
00:41:20,680 --> 00:41:30,240
But you know, I'm just thinking, okay, it's tropical, perhaps equatorial, given that that's

561
00:41:30,240 --> 00:41:31,240
a nice sun.

562
00:41:31,240 --> 00:41:36,440
I won't ask you to reveal anything else, but that's fascinating.

563
00:41:36,440 --> 00:41:43,320
And I think, you know, maybe I can ask this without giving anything away.

564
00:41:43,320 --> 00:41:51,600
Does the country involved also plan to utilize this O-Tech generation for Bitcoin mining?

565
00:41:51,600 --> 00:41:55,200
Is that part of the plan that you guys are working on with this country?

566
00:41:55,200 --> 00:41:57,320
Or how does that work?

567
00:41:57,320 --> 00:42:06,080
We, this will go back to, you know, demand response O-Tech, demand response ocean thermal.

568
00:42:06,080 --> 00:42:14,880
The demand response to the Bitcoin mining component is a key piece in the economic and

569
00:42:14,880 --> 00:42:24,480
thermodynamic puzzle and electrical puzzle of our, you know, novel plan ship designs.

570
00:42:24,480 --> 00:42:30,960
So the, you know, I don't know if you've ever been in a data, a mining data, Bitcoin mining

571
00:42:30,960 --> 00:42:31,960
data center.

572
00:42:31,960 --> 00:42:35,360
It's hot, right?

573
00:42:35,360 --> 00:42:40,080
So these computers put off quite a bit of heat that needs to be processed, needs to

574
00:42:40,080 --> 00:42:41,600
be dealt with.

575
00:42:41,600 --> 00:42:53,040
Well, since O-Tech relies on a, you know, 30 degrees Celsius to 4.5 degrees Celsius, Delta

576
00:42:53,040 --> 00:42:59,440
T, difference in temperature between that warm surface water and the deep cold water.

577
00:42:59,440 --> 00:43:06,560
And the, you know, the heat coming off the miners is about 50 degrees Celsius.

578
00:43:06,560 --> 00:43:12,720
We can reincorporate that heat back into the initial power generation cycle.

579
00:43:12,720 --> 00:43:15,680
So essentially getting changed back.

580
00:43:15,680 --> 00:43:17,520
So we can produce a little bit more power.

581
00:43:17,520 --> 00:43:22,360
We can increase the, if you want to get, you know, go down the rabbit hole, we can increase

582
00:43:22,360 --> 00:43:30,680
the quality of the working fluid at the turbine outlet, which increases the lifespan of the

583
00:43:30,680 --> 00:43:31,680
turbine.

584
00:43:31,680 --> 00:43:32,680
Right?

585
00:43:32,680 --> 00:43:34,920
So it's a pure gas coming out.

586
00:43:34,920 --> 00:43:42,680
We get more energy, you know, better, you know, more efficiency for the cycle.

587
00:43:42,680 --> 00:43:48,600
But it also serves, and it also serves as a demand response mechanism.

588
00:43:48,600 --> 00:43:56,960
You know, the, you know, if, in order to respond to differences in load on a power plant, you

589
00:43:56,960 --> 00:44:05,920
know, we're able to cycle miners on and off at, you know, within seconds rather than,

590
00:44:05,920 --> 00:44:07,040
you know, hours, right?

591
00:44:07,040 --> 00:44:14,200
If you want to turn on a natural gas, a simple cycle beaker plant, if it's not already spinning,

592
00:44:14,200 --> 00:44:16,520
it's going to take hours to turn on.

593
00:44:16,520 --> 00:44:23,160
If you're, you know, going from cold start on a diesel generator, it's going to take

594
00:44:23,160 --> 00:44:28,520
hours to start versus miners, right?

595
00:44:28,520 --> 00:44:30,640
They can, you know, be shut off.

596
00:44:30,640 --> 00:44:34,280
I don't know if you've ever seen how to turn off a Bitcoin miner.

597
00:44:34,280 --> 00:44:36,920
It's not the best way to do it.

598
00:44:36,920 --> 00:44:38,800
You just kind of pull the plug out, right?

599
00:44:38,800 --> 00:44:42,200
There's no, like, on off switch on it.

600
00:44:42,200 --> 00:44:46,800
Usually you want to suspend the mining process and you drop your, you know, usage down to

601
00:44:46,800 --> 00:44:56,840
like 0.4 Watts, 0.4 to the lots or something, and then you just pull the plug, but you still

602
00:44:56,840 --> 00:44:57,840
just pull the plug.

603
00:44:57,840 --> 00:44:59,840
You can turn these mires off in seconds.

604
00:44:59,840 --> 00:45:09,880
And so as a response mechanism to differences in end consumer consumption, that is a very

605
00:45:09,880 --> 00:45:16,760
powerful tool to balance out, you know, supply and demand issues, right?

606
00:45:16,760 --> 00:45:22,360
If they need more power, we can turn the miners off, make that available almost instantly.

607
00:45:22,360 --> 00:45:27,000
If they need less power, we can turn miners on.

608
00:45:27,000 --> 00:45:34,680
And then the other interest, so that's the thermodynamic coupling, the electrical coupling,

609
00:45:34,680 --> 00:45:44,440
and then on a sort of Otec unique aspect is that, you know, I've mentioned that Otec

610
00:45:44,440 --> 00:45:50,920
is baseload power, but there's a little caveat there.

611
00:45:50,920 --> 00:45:57,400
It's only baseload power based on the coldest day of the year.

612
00:45:57,400 --> 00:46:00,800
So, you know, the coldest day of the year, right?

613
00:46:00,800 --> 00:46:07,440
If I have a 25 megawatt power purchase agreement, I need to be able to supply that 25 megawatts

614
00:46:07,440 --> 00:46:10,760
year round, right?

615
00:46:10,760 --> 00:46:15,320
And you know, the annual cycle and even the diurnal cycle, right?

616
00:46:15,320 --> 00:46:20,840
The water gets warmer during the day and in the summer and it gets colder at night and

617
00:46:20,840 --> 00:46:21,840
during the winter.

618
00:46:21,840 --> 00:46:28,320
So, in order to meet that power purchase agreement, I have to be able to generate 25 megawatts

619
00:46:28,320 --> 00:46:31,800
of power year round.

620
00:46:31,800 --> 00:46:37,400
And so that means that every other day of the year that's not the coldest day of the

621
00:46:37,400 --> 00:46:43,840
year, I'm actually generating more power than that power purchase agreement.

622
00:46:43,840 --> 00:46:51,000
In the past, Dr. Luis Vega, who's an advisor to our company and is the godfather of Otec,

623
00:46:51,000 --> 00:46:57,880
also happens to be my neighbor, he had been able to negotiate a power purchase agreement

624
00:46:57,880 --> 00:47:04,840
for, you know, that baseload component based on the coldest day of the year and then a

625
00:47:04,840 --> 00:47:11,960
variable intermittent rate on the, that excess energy that you produce every other day of

626
00:47:11,960 --> 00:47:14,440
the year.

627
00:47:14,440 --> 00:47:20,960
And one of the things that's never been really discussed in the literature around Otec is

628
00:47:20,960 --> 00:47:29,440
the economic impact of having to sell during the summer 20% of your power production at,

629
00:47:29,440 --> 00:47:37,200
you know, dog shit, you know, four cents per kilowatt hour price.

630
00:47:37,200 --> 00:47:44,240
And so this is another way that Bitcoin mining plays a big role because we, what we can do

631
00:47:44,240 --> 00:47:47,360
is we can stack just a little bit extra.

632
00:47:47,360 --> 00:47:52,520
So instead of having, you know, 25 megawatts of power production on the coldest day of

633
00:47:52,520 --> 00:47:59,880
the year, in this particular case, we would have 27.0 something megawatts available on

634
00:47:59,880 --> 00:48:01,840
the coldest day of the year.

635
00:48:01,840 --> 00:48:09,800
We have a, you know, data center running a bunch of miners, able to soak up that excess

636
00:48:09,800 --> 00:48:15,600
energy, you know, and during the cold, the cold, during the winter time, winter in the

637
00:48:15,600 --> 00:48:20,320
tropics, it's a slightly colder, right?

638
00:48:20,320 --> 00:48:24,760
But not just a little bit.

639
00:48:24,760 --> 00:48:27,200
You can run the miners underclock.

640
00:48:27,200 --> 00:48:30,760
So you have 100% of the miners running underclocking them.

641
00:48:30,760 --> 00:48:33,120
So they're slightly more efficient.

642
00:48:33,120 --> 00:48:37,440
And then throughout the year, as the sea surface temperature heats up, but you're producing

643
00:48:37,440 --> 00:48:42,200
more power, you can shift those miners from underclocking to overclocking throughout the

644
00:48:42,200 --> 00:48:49,960
year, so the same number of miners can be run throughout the year, going from underclocking

645
00:48:49,960 --> 00:48:51,680
to overclocking.

646
00:48:51,680 --> 00:48:59,240
So you're not, you don't have anything sitting there idle, idling, you know, no dead weight.

647
00:48:59,240 --> 00:49:05,960
And then now, because you have that excess power and you have a buyer for that power,

648
00:49:05,960 --> 00:49:13,280
rather than an intermittent rate, you can now negotiate a peaker rate.

649
00:49:13,280 --> 00:49:20,680
So not only can the O-Tech plant function as a base load production, but also in a peaker

650
00:49:20,680 --> 00:49:26,640
capacity, so, which is having more energy available for peaker capacity in the summer,

651
00:49:26,640 --> 00:49:34,120
when it's, you know, 40, when you're pushing 40 degrees Celsius, takes a lot of air conditioning,

652
00:49:34,120 --> 00:49:35,440
you know, to deal with that.

653
00:49:35,440 --> 00:49:43,480
Of course, it's only getting hotter, and you can, this year has been absolutely brutal.

654
00:49:43,480 --> 00:49:51,840
So having that excess capacity that can be made available within seconds is very useful,

655
00:49:51,840 --> 00:49:58,080
because now we can sell that at a peaker rate, that capacity if needed, at a peaker capacity,

656
00:49:58,080 --> 00:50:00,880
it's, which gathers a much higher rate.

657
00:50:00,880 --> 00:50:06,800
So, you know, we're looking, targeting around for our first power plant, roughly 20 cents

658
00:50:06,800 --> 00:50:13,520
per kilowatt hour on a first of its kind bill, which is pretty, which is damn good.

659
00:50:13,520 --> 00:50:20,520
And then, you know, using that Bitcoin mining stacked on top of that as our margin, so we're

660
00:50:20,520 --> 00:50:27,240
able to sell at, you know, sell into a PPA at, you know, just about the LCOE, use the

661
00:50:27,240 --> 00:50:37,360
Bitcoin mining on top as a margin, then that's somewhere between 12 and 20% of the production.

662
00:50:37,360 --> 00:50:44,480
And then that capacity is available as peaker capacity, which gets, you know, upwards of

663
00:50:44,480 --> 00:50:48,960
40, 50 cents per kilowatt hour.

664
00:50:48,960 --> 00:50:52,000
So yeah, that's a lot.

665
00:50:52,000 --> 00:50:59,480
It's a, you know, very useful function, you know, turning what once was an intermittent

666
00:50:59,480 --> 00:51:03,880
production, and most of the time, it would just be thrown away.

667
00:51:03,880 --> 00:51:10,480
Now we're able to monetize that excess consumption and make it available for, you know, times

668
00:51:10,480 --> 00:51:11,480
of emergency.

669
00:51:11,480 --> 00:51:18,560
It's either you buy the peaker capacity or you have an entire grid blackout.

670
00:51:18,560 --> 00:51:24,960
And so, you know, that's, that adds to grid reliability.

671
00:51:24,960 --> 00:51:29,760
And it's just incredibly important faucet.

672
00:51:29,760 --> 00:51:31,640
I love that.

673
00:51:31,640 --> 00:51:34,880
And I think this is such a fascinating rabbit hole.

674
00:51:34,880 --> 00:51:40,200
And again, for me, like, I only found out about like what the hell Otech was, even though

675
00:51:40,200 --> 00:51:44,320
it's been around for 100, 150 years, whatever it is, I only found out about it because I

676
00:51:44,320 --> 00:51:48,280
started following you on Twitter and was like, Otech, what the hell is that?

677
00:51:48,280 --> 00:51:50,360
And I'll, let me do some research on this.

678
00:51:50,360 --> 00:51:55,880
And again, it's, it seems that it's such a, a beautifully simple solution, like you're

679
00:51:55,880 --> 00:52:02,880
using a difference in temperature that in tropical zones always exists between the deep,

680
00:52:02,880 --> 00:52:08,840
deep cold water and the surface tropical temperature water where you can swim without a wetsuit

681
00:52:08,840 --> 00:52:11,320
year round feels great.

682
00:52:11,320 --> 00:52:16,360
And I'm curious for these miners, I would assume you're using immersion miners.

683
00:52:16,360 --> 00:52:17,360
Is that correct?

684
00:52:17,360 --> 00:52:18,920
Are there any additional benefits there?

685
00:52:18,920 --> 00:52:23,520
Like are there any additional efficiencies that can be gained by using immersion miners

686
00:52:23,520 --> 00:52:28,840
versus, you know, a lot of, I've, I've, I've seen, I was toward riots facility during

687
00:52:28,840 --> 00:52:32,600
BitBlock boom when I went there and I got to see kind of the standard setup where they've

688
00:52:32,600 --> 00:52:38,560
got kind of the, the hot room in the middle of one of these, you know, massive racks and

689
00:52:38,560 --> 00:52:40,680
boy, that room, it could have been a sauna.

690
00:52:40,680 --> 00:52:43,720
Like it was already hot cause it's Texas.

691
00:52:43,720 --> 00:52:45,840
And I'm, again, I'm a Northern climate guy.

692
00:52:45,840 --> 00:52:47,680
So I was, I was not doing so well in the heat.

693
00:52:47,680 --> 00:52:49,520
I'd also, I was a bit hungover too.

694
00:52:49,520 --> 00:52:55,640
So I was especially not doing well, but then we went into the immersion facility that they

695
00:52:55,640 --> 00:53:00,520
were building out there and it was quiet and it was cool.

696
00:53:00,520 --> 00:53:03,040
And so are you guys using immersion miners?

697
00:53:03,040 --> 00:53:04,040
What does that look like?

698
00:53:04,040 --> 00:53:07,360
Anything interesting that's able to happen because of that immersion mining?

699
00:53:07,360 --> 00:53:14,200
Yeah, we're, I mean, that's the plan is to use immersion mining, right?

700
00:53:14,200 --> 00:53:18,600
We're, you know, we're limited in space, right?

701
00:53:18,600 --> 00:53:20,640
We're on a, on a vessel.

702
00:53:20,640 --> 00:53:23,440
So we have limited space.

703
00:53:23,440 --> 00:53:30,680
So we need to create as much energy density into a small amount of space as possible.

704
00:53:30,680 --> 00:53:37,840
And so two phase immersion is the highest energy density available.

705
00:53:37,840 --> 00:53:42,920
And it's a simpler system, you know, rather than right now, I think a lot of people are

706
00:53:42,920 --> 00:53:46,120
using single phase.

707
00:53:46,120 --> 00:53:51,480
But over time, you know, as these miners get more and more efficient, as you're able to

708
00:53:51,480 --> 00:53:57,360
put more and more power into each, you know, each unit, you're going to inevitably have

709
00:53:57,360 --> 00:54:01,760
to move to two phase immersion.

710
00:54:01,760 --> 00:54:05,320
And it's a, you know, there's less pumps involved.

711
00:54:05,320 --> 00:54:08,720
It moves on its own.

712
00:54:08,720 --> 00:54:15,880
And it enables us to, like I said, with the thermodynamic coupling, dump that heat very

713
00:54:15,880 --> 00:54:20,320
efficiently back into the, the Rankin cycle itself.

714
00:54:20,320 --> 00:54:28,480
So when, you know, the miners boil the, the immersion fluid, it turns into a gas, then

715
00:54:28,480 --> 00:54:34,400
you need a, you know, heat sink to condense it back to a liquid.

716
00:54:34,400 --> 00:54:41,720
And we can dump that right back, use the working fluid of the O-Tech cycle power, you know,

717
00:54:41,720 --> 00:54:45,360
power system to, as that coal source.

718
00:54:45,360 --> 00:54:50,040
So we get that heat back into the power generation.

719
00:54:50,040 --> 00:54:53,920
At least that's the, that's the current plan.

720
00:54:53,920 --> 00:55:00,840
We will, you know, things could change, but that, that has been and is still the current,

721
00:55:00,840 --> 00:55:02,920
the current thinking on there.

722
00:55:02,920 --> 00:55:04,520
Okay.

723
00:55:04,520 --> 00:55:07,440
That's, that's, that's fascinating.

724
00:55:07,440 --> 00:55:11,240
Maybe can you just kind of paint a picture of these vessels?

725
00:55:11,240 --> 00:55:15,960
Like what they, what they actually look like, what kind of rigging, I mean, I'm assuming

726
00:55:15,960 --> 00:55:21,280
you're, you're dropping some piping really deep, like really deep.

727
00:55:21,280 --> 00:55:24,840
So it's a lot of piping, presumably, but can you paint a little bit of a picture of what

728
00:55:24,840 --> 00:55:27,880
do these vessels, what will they look like?

729
00:55:27,880 --> 00:55:31,600
And what's kind of like, like how, just out of curiosity, how big of a crew do you need

730
00:55:31,600 --> 00:55:33,160
for these things?

731
00:55:33,160 --> 00:55:34,480
Are they pretty much stationary?

732
00:55:34,480 --> 00:55:36,720
Do they move around a little bit?

733
00:55:36,720 --> 00:55:42,080
What, what is the actual operation of one of these ocean thermal vessels look like?

734
00:55:42,080 --> 00:55:49,400
Well, the vessels themselves are just repurposed container ships or bulk carriers or, you

735
00:55:49,400 --> 00:55:51,520
know, oil transport.

736
00:55:51,520 --> 00:55:57,520
The, depending on, you know, the market at the time, you know, they got their, it's a

737
00:55:57,520 --> 00:56:01,480
very cyclical market on vessels.

738
00:56:01,480 --> 00:56:09,720
There's usually one type of vessel that is more expensive at a time, at any given time,

739
00:56:09,720 --> 00:56:14,240
and there are, and then the other ones are, you know, cheaper.

740
00:56:14,240 --> 00:56:15,320
It doesn't really matter.

741
00:56:15,320 --> 00:56:18,560
We just need a, you know, a hull.

742
00:56:18,560 --> 00:56:23,600
So regardless of what vessel we would acquire, it would look like a container ship from the

743
00:56:23,600 --> 00:56:27,560
outside, and we're just going to hollow it out, stick a power plant.

744
00:56:27,560 --> 00:56:32,520
So from the outside, it's not going to really look like anything, it'll just look like a

745
00:56:32,520 --> 00:56:38,480
container ship without a bunch of containers on it.

746
00:56:38,480 --> 00:56:46,160
And then, yeah, so you have the vessel as top sides, having a, you know, big vessel.

747
00:56:46,160 --> 00:56:52,880
We can weight it, you know, we can ballast it so that it sits really, really low in the,

748
00:56:52,880 --> 00:56:59,240
in the water, which improves the efficiency, cuts down on parasitics, you know, parasitic

749
00:56:59,240 --> 00:57:03,480
to pump, you know, load, things like, cunts.

750
00:57:03,480 --> 00:57:08,200
The higher you have to pump water, the more energy it takes to pump that water, right?

751
00:57:08,200 --> 00:57:13,760
So if you have, you know, you're pulling water into a vessel from outside and you're sitting

752
00:57:13,760 --> 00:57:20,160
nine meters below the surface, you've got nine meters of head available that you don't

753
00:57:20,160 --> 00:57:21,760
have to pump, right?

754
00:57:21,760 --> 00:57:27,560
So you want those heat exchangers, all that water to be as low as possible in the vessel

755
00:57:27,560 --> 00:57:29,960
because it increases efficiency.

756
00:57:29,960 --> 00:57:32,360
So that's helpful.

757
00:57:32,360 --> 00:57:38,120
For our initial vessel, we are, which we're going through the technical qualification

758
00:57:38,120 --> 00:57:45,840
on, we are considering a freestanding hybrid riser system.

759
00:57:45,840 --> 00:57:55,840
So there will be, you know, down to, there'll be a mooring system and between two and three,

760
00:57:55,840 --> 00:58:07,200
either three, 3.2 meter diameter pipes or two, four meter diameter, HDP rigid pipes, you

761
00:58:07,200 --> 00:58:17,040
know, go extending down from 30, 40 meters down to the 1000 meters, then there will be

762
00:58:17,040 --> 00:58:26,280
a flexible piping from there that will, you know, slightly, there'll be a, you know, a

763
00:58:26,280 --> 00:58:31,960
valve that goes to flexible piping, which will then come up out of the, you know, from

764
00:58:31,960 --> 00:58:37,920
the surface and will actually, you know, come over the side of the vessel rather than having

765
00:58:37,920 --> 00:58:47,240
a, rather than having a gimbal or having to, you know, drill through the hull, hull penetrations

766
00:58:47,240 --> 00:58:54,520
are a big pain in the ass to get, you know, insured, clasped.

767
00:58:54,520 --> 00:59:02,280
So having them for the initial system, having them come up and over the side is, you know,

768
00:59:02,280 --> 00:59:09,520
I'm going to cut down on costs, cut down on insurance costs, cut down on time and make

769
00:59:09,520 --> 00:59:14,360
it easier to attach, detach for the initial deployments.

770
00:59:14,360 --> 00:59:19,200
Yeah, I think that answered all those questions.

771
00:59:19,200 --> 00:59:24,360
No, I love, I mean, no, no, no, I mean, it's, it's, it's really, it's, it's really, it's

772
00:59:24,360 --> 00:59:25,360
really, really cool.

773
00:59:25,360 --> 00:59:29,840
And I was kind of wondering, cause I'm, you know, imagining like this pipe just coming

774
00:59:29,840 --> 00:59:33,000
right from the bottom of the ship, but obviously that doesn't make a lot of sense.

775
00:59:33,000 --> 00:59:38,400
Like if you get some really intense weather and you need to be able to presumably like

776
00:59:38,400 --> 00:59:45,760
drop that pipe and, and go, you don't want that thing to be actually, yeah.

777
00:59:45,760 --> 00:59:53,280
That's how in the past that, that was the, the initial thought on, you know, previous

778
00:59:53,280 --> 00:59:56,960
vessel designs of ours and of others.

779
00:59:56,960 --> 01:00:06,880
Yeah, you can just, you know, you have a gimbal system or just a, you know, pass through

780
01:00:06,880 --> 01:00:12,200
and it's absolutely possible in your, you know, HDPE is fairly flexible, even though

781
01:00:12,200 --> 01:00:13,760
it's rigid.

782
01:00:13,760 --> 01:00:21,480
So you've got, you know, you've got wiggle room and the, you know, the two systems are

783
01:00:21,480 --> 01:00:27,080
really, because the vessel is so large, they would be uncoupled.

784
01:00:27,080 --> 01:00:30,520
They wouldn't be a cup, they wouldn't be, you know, acting as a coupled system.

785
01:00:30,520 --> 01:00:35,600
So they'd be uncoupled and you can, you can handle large pipes coming through the, you

786
01:00:35,600 --> 01:00:39,560
know, right through the hole.

787
01:00:39,560 --> 01:00:45,200
Just it's wild, wild to think about this, the scale of this.

788
01:00:45,200 --> 01:00:53,280
And so, I mean, again, this seems like an idea whose time has come.

789
01:00:53,280 --> 01:00:58,680
But when I say whose time has come, the time has been here, but the economics have come,

790
01:00:58,680 --> 01:01:04,840
perhaps it's finally at a place where because of the component costs being reduced because

791
01:01:04,840 --> 01:01:11,360
of other factors, and then also because of the fact that Bitcoin exists, Bitcoin mining

792
01:01:11,360 --> 01:01:16,720
exists, the need for not just Bitcoin mining, but other, other really high density compute

793
01:01:16,720 --> 01:01:18,520
operations exists.

794
01:01:18,520 --> 01:01:23,120
This is kind of this beautiful confluence of factors that is like coming together.

795
01:01:23,120 --> 01:01:32,360
And again, it seems, it seems crazy to me that for all of the, the talk of climate change

796
01:01:32,360 --> 01:01:37,680
out there that I don't hear more about OTEC, like this, this is what kind of blows my mind.

797
01:01:37,680 --> 01:01:43,920
Because again, once I learned about this, it seemed just like really obvious, like,

798
01:01:43,920 --> 01:01:49,360
well, okay, cool, you're using the Delta T that the difference in temperature and you're,

799
01:01:49,360 --> 01:01:53,320
you know, okay, is there a minimal ecological impact around?

800
01:01:53,320 --> 01:01:57,280
Yeah, yeah, probably, you know, your chain, you're pumping a lot of water up and you're

801
01:01:57,280 --> 01:01:58,720
putting water back in.

802
01:01:58,720 --> 01:01:59,720
Okay.

803
01:01:59,720 --> 01:02:03,000
But these things as you're building them can be mobile, you can move to a spot where you're

804
01:02:03,000 --> 01:02:08,080
going to have the least amount of impact, but it just seems crazy to me.

805
01:02:08,080 --> 01:02:13,360
Is there more coming out in, let's say the mainstream scientific literature that is supporting

806
01:02:13,360 --> 01:02:14,360
OTEC?

807
01:02:14,360 --> 01:02:16,280
Ocean, I'm going to start saying ocean thermal.

808
01:02:16,280 --> 01:02:18,040
I'll stop saying OTEC, I promise.

809
01:02:18,040 --> 01:02:21,560
But is there, is there more that's starting to come out for like in favor of this, like

810
01:02:21,560 --> 01:02:26,120
a second, you know, renaissance of this technology where people are saying, hold on, it's been

811
01:02:26,120 --> 01:02:28,680
around for a hundred, hundred and fifty years.

812
01:02:28,680 --> 01:02:31,120
It now makes sense.

813
01:02:31,120 --> 01:02:32,400
Why aren't we?

814
01:02:32,400 --> 01:02:34,120
Why aren't we trying to do this more at scale?

815
01:02:34,120 --> 01:02:38,720
I mean, are there other, are you guys one of the only companies I would assume focusing

816
01:02:38,720 --> 01:02:39,720
on this?

817
01:02:39,720 --> 01:02:42,120
Are there a lot that I just, I'm not educated and I'm ignorant of these?

818
01:02:42,120 --> 01:02:43,120
I don't know.

819
01:02:43,120 --> 01:02:45,160
What does that landscape look like?

820
01:02:45,160 --> 01:02:50,920
Yeah, the competitive landscape is really starting to pick up.

821
01:02:50,920 --> 01:02:57,600
There are a number of companies that are working in the space.

822
01:02:57,600 --> 01:03:03,600
There's, you know, there's Global OTEC is one.

823
01:03:03,600 --> 01:03:05,080
They're out of the UK.

824
01:03:05,080 --> 01:03:13,240
They're deploying, they're doing their technical qualification on a circular platform design

825
01:03:13,240 --> 01:03:15,640
right now.

826
01:03:15,640 --> 01:03:21,840
There is OTE Corporation.

827
01:03:21,840 --> 01:03:29,120
They have been working on a SBIR program.

828
01:03:29,120 --> 01:03:39,040
I think with the army on that one and there may, there may be a plant in development with

829
01:03:39,040 --> 01:03:40,040
them.

830
01:03:40,040 --> 01:03:45,960
Mitsui, which is one of the largest shipping companies in the world, has been in the space,

831
01:03:45,960 --> 01:03:53,280
and is starting to really ramp up their involvement in the space.

832
01:03:53,280 --> 01:04:03,480
Shell has put some capital into a couple of companies, one out of companies and organizations

833
01:04:03,480 --> 01:04:10,120
out of India, a couple here, one here in Hawaii on the heat exchanger side.

834
01:04:10,120 --> 01:04:18,240
Phil Mackay, Shell has invested in one of an OTEC company out of Houston that's working

835
01:04:18,240 --> 01:04:29,400
on a multi a multi purpose power state offshore power station.

836
01:04:29,400 --> 01:04:39,000
So the incorporated solar, wind, wave and OTEC with pretty sure if I remember correctly,

837
01:04:39,000 --> 01:04:44,200
their, their, their focus is on subsea OTEC.

838
01:04:44,200 --> 01:04:52,520
So, you know, melting the OTEC to the sea floor rather than at the surface.

839
01:04:52,520 --> 01:05:02,800
There are the Koreans, the Japanese are ramping up their OTEC in the Chinese as well.

840
01:05:02,800 --> 01:05:11,240
So the Chinese last year deployed a floating, a floating 20 kilowatt OTEC power plant.

841
01:05:11,240 --> 01:05:16,160
So that was their first OTEC deployment just last year.

842
01:05:16,160 --> 01:05:24,160
So it's, yeah, I mean, it's, it, it feels like OTEC is at a inflection point right

843
01:05:24,160 --> 01:05:25,160
now.

844
01:05:25,160 --> 01:05:33,200
And, you know, we're, it's, once the first power plant is built, there will be a gold rush.

845
01:05:33,200 --> 01:05:38,400
You know, once the first at scale power plant has been built, it turns into just an absolute

846
01:05:38,400 --> 01:05:41,320
bold rush.

847
01:05:41,320 --> 01:05:48,000
Are these other companies, organizations, nation states that are pursuing this right

848
01:05:48,000 --> 01:05:54,920
now, are they incorporating Bitcoin into their economic models like you guys are?

849
01:05:54,920 --> 01:06:00,680
Or is it some are some aren't, I assume that China perhaps is not given their, their stance

850
01:06:00,680 --> 01:06:03,040
on Bitcoin mining at least publicly.

851
01:06:03,040 --> 01:06:04,680
But what does that look like?

852
01:06:04,680 --> 01:06:06,680
Are you guys unique in that respect?

853
01:06:06,680 --> 01:06:07,680
Yeah.

854
01:06:07,680 --> 01:06:11,280
I mean, that's really what we brought to the table.

855
01:06:11,280 --> 01:06:16,920
Our unique innovation was that coupling of high density compute with OTEC.

856
01:06:16,920 --> 01:06:20,200
You know, we have the patent.

857
01:06:20,200 --> 01:06:32,160
We have a PCT, the PCT patent that covers 140 countries or something.

858
01:06:32,160 --> 01:06:38,760
So you know, it's, we, you know, we've had discussions about incorporating our demand

859
01:06:38,760 --> 01:06:45,880
response IP, into their economic, into, you know, some of their economic models, and we'll

860
01:06:45,880 --> 01:06:49,360
see where that goes.

861
01:06:49,360 --> 01:06:55,800
It's interesting because one would think that given the history of, of ocean thermal, and

862
01:06:55,800 --> 01:07:01,520
even though many of the component prices have become more economical, that there is still

863
01:07:01,520 --> 01:07:08,040
a huge kind of gap in, in capital to deal with here.

864
01:07:08,040 --> 01:07:14,080
And that what you guys are doing at OceanBit is uniquely positioned to address that gap,

865
01:07:14,080 --> 01:07:19,320
to actually make it not just like, oh, we need to subsidize the heck out of this thing.

866
01:07:19,320 --> 01:07:23,840
And then maybe in the future, once we've subsidized it for enough years, it'll be profitable enough

867
01:07:23,840 --> 01:07:29,800
for the free market to take over, which, which seems to be how the, at least as an American,

868
01:07:29,800 --> 01:07:31,360
the United States treats a lot of things.

869
01:07:31,360 --> 01:07:33,840
Like that's how the United States treats solar, right?

870
01:07:33,840 --> 01:07:38,640
We're, we're reviving these, these solar companies that went bankrupt however many years ago,

871
01:07:38,640 --> 01:07:39,640
and bringing them back.

872
01:07:39,640 --> 01:07:46,240
And there's, I think a lot of, anytime you involve like large, large government subsidies,

873
01:07:46,240 --> 01:07:51,520
which get larger by the year thanks to inflation, there's a lot of potential for just corruption

874
01:07:51,520 --> 01:07:53,320
and mismanagement and misuse.

875
01:07:53,320 --> 01:07:55,600
And it's, it's a market distortion.

876
01:07:55,600 --> 01:08:04,880
And so what I see from you guys is an opportunity to make ocean thermal genuinely make economic

877
01:08:04,880 --> 01:08:11,200
sense from the start without needing to ask for these subsidies, without needing to pump

878
01:08:11,200 --> 01:08:14,480
a bunch of taxpayer or printed money capital into this.

879
01:08:14,480 --> 01:08:20,440
It's like, it actually makes economic sense to do this right now.

880
01:08:20,440 --> 01:08:22,920
And so I think that's just, that's beautiful.

881
01:08:22,920 --> 01:08:23,960
And again, it seems that that

882
01:08:23,960 --> 01:08:26,400
I'm not going to turn down any money, you know, any subsidies.

883
01:08:26,400 --> 01:08:27,400
Well, no, no, no.

884
01:08:27,400 --> 01:08:29,920
I mean, we're still in the fiat system, right?

885
01:08:29,920 --> 01:08:33,560
And if the fiat system wants to give you a subsidy, absolutely.

886
01:08:33,560 --> 01:08:39,320
But what I'm saying is it, it gives me a lot of hope in the economic model that you're

887
01:08:39,320 --> 01:08:45,640
discussing that it actually does make sense that you, yes, if the government says I want

888
01:08:45,640 --> 01:08:50,600
to hand you a billion dollars, well, you know what, it's we're a late stage fiat, like why

889
01:08:50,600 --> 01:08:56,120
not, why not take it, but you don't need to like you can actually make this work.

890
01:08:56,120 --> 01:08:59,400
And perhaps the subsidies would speed things along a little bit.

891
01:08:59,400 --> 01:09:02,320
And perhaps one could make an argument in favor of subsidies.

892
01:09:02,320 --> 01:09:06,060
I'm, I am generally against them at a principal level.

893
01:09:06,060 --> 01:09:11,280
But that being said, if, if late stage fiat wants to throw you a bone, you know, you may

894
01:09:11,280 --> 01:09:15,840
as well chew, but you know, it is what it is.

895
01:09:15,840 --> 01:09:20,440
But I think, I think that this is just such a, a fascinating area again.

896
01:09:20,440 --> 01:09:25,400
And I'm curious if there are perhaps like, what are the air?

897
01:09:25,400 --> 01:09:29,560
So we, you know, we've discussed a little bit like what, what is ocean thermal and kind

898
01:09:29,560 --> 01:09:34,040
of how it works and ocean bits approach to it in Bitcoin mining, how that factors in.

899
01:09:34,040 --> 01:09:37,920
Are there some kind of second order potential effects of this?

900
01:09:37,920 --> 01:09:44,080
Like, like, I know, you know, desalination is going to be something that the world needs

901
01:09:44,080 --> 01:09:50,080
in the coming years, but it's incredibly expensive because it's incredibly energy intensive.

902
01:09:50,080 --> 01:09:54,040
Does ocean thermal help some of these things?

903
01:09:54,040 --> 01:09:57,400
Like does it, does it help speed along some of those or make them more economical?

904
01:09:57,400 --> 01:10:02,840
What are, what are the other kind of pleasant unintended benefits of ocean thermal, maybe

905
01:10:02,840 --> 01:10:07,720
outside of just what it appears on the surface?

906
01:10:07,720 --> 01:10:18,120
Yeah, what's really interesting about ocean thermal is that it, it's able to sort of hack

907
01:10:18,120 --> 01:10:24,640
these, you know, these fundamental equations, right?

908
01:10:24,640 --> 01:10:35,840
On the, both the desalination side and the carbon, you know, carbon dioxide removal side,

909
01:10:35,840 --> 01:10:40,320
you know, in order to, you know, desalinate sea water, which as you point out is going

910
01:10:40,320 --> 01:10:46,160
to be as, you know, water scarcity ramps up, you know, it's getting hotter and hotter,

911
01:10:46,160 --> 01:10:54,000
especially at the equator, you're going to have water, you know, increasing water scarcity

912
01:10:54,000 --> 01:11:00,800
in order to desalinate water, you have to remove, you have to remove the salt content

913
01:11:00,800 --> 01:11:01,800
from it.

914
01:11:01,800 --> 01:11:07,320
And the only way to do that because it's in solution is to boil it.

915
01:11:07,320 --> 01:11:11,280
You know, you can, you just have to, you have to boil it.

916
01:11:11,280 --> 01:11:17,920
And so when you boil it, the, you know, the, the water vapor rises up and the salt's left

917
01:11:17,920 --> 01:11:19,120
behind.

918
01:11:19,120 --> 01:11:24,800
So the equation is, you know, you have your water, you have to add its water and salt,

919
01:11:24,800 --> 01:11:32,440
you have to add energy to the equation, outcomes, you know, water vapor and solid salt.

920
01:11:32,440 --> 01:11:33,560
That's the equation, right?

921
01:11:33,560 --> 01:11:35,880
You have to put energy in there.

922
01:11:35,880 --> 01:11:42,800
O-TECH gets around that particular equation through what we've been discussing has been

923
01:11:42,800 --> 01:11:45,200
our closed cycle configuration.

924
01:11:45,200 --> 01:11:51,040
There is a, a second way to run ancient thermal power plants.

925
01:11:51,040 --> 01:11:53,560
That's called open cycle.

926
01:11:53,560 --> 01:12:00,400
And you use a flash evaporation process rather than having a working fluid, ammonia in our

927
01:12:00,400 --> 01:12:09,040
case for the closed cycle, you use a flash evaporation in a, you know, you create a vacuum,

928
01:12:09,040 --> 01:12:17,480
you have a filter, large filter, fancy filter, but a filter, you create a vacuum, you run

929
01:12:17,480 --> 01:12:25,080
that, you know, that warm water through the filter and into that vacuum chamber.

930
01:12:25,080 --> 01:12:32,120
That causes some of that water to flash evaporate on the spot creating, right?

931
01:12:32,120 --> 01:12:35,640
You know, you leave the salt behind, you leave a brine behind.

932
01:12:35,640 --> 01:12:41,840
So some portion of the warm water that you're running through the system, flash evaporates,

933
01:12:41,840 --> 01:12:50,560
then you can take that vapor, run it through a turbine and then use the cold water to condense

934
01:12:50,560 --> 01:12:51,800
it back to a liquid.

935
01:12:51,800 --> 01:12:56,480
But now that liquid is, of course, fresh water.

936
01:12:56,480 --> 01:13:04,280
So and you have a, with open cycle, there's a different set of challenges, not challenges,

937
01:13:04,280 --> 01:13:07,000
it's been proven for a long time.

938
01:13:07,000 --> 01:13:16,240
Luis Vega, Dr. Vega had built a 210 kilowatt open cycle power plant here in Hawaii, back

939
01:13:16,240 --> 01:13:25,200
in the, back in the 80s, is the first power, first OTAC power plant connected to the grid.

940
01:13:25,200 --> 01:13:32,880
You know, the difference really is, is in costs and of the size of certain components.

941
01:13:32,880 --> 01:13:39,920
So for closed cycle, you need large heat exchangers, no way to get around it.

942
01:13:39,920 --> 01:13:49,000
On the, on the open cycle side, you don't need as many, you need way less heat exchangers,

943
01:13:49,000 --> 01:13:53,160
but you need a giant turbo.

944
01:13:53,160 --> 01:13:57,080
Happens to be the low pressure side of the, of a nuclear turbine.

945
01:13:57,080 --> 01:14:03,960
So if the, you know, nuclear industry is to ramp up, open cycle OTAC becomes far more

946
01:14:03,960 --> 01:14:05,320
viable.

947
01:14:05,320 --> 01:14:07,880
Right now it's hard to get your hands on one of those turbines.

948
01:14:07,880 --> 01:14:12,000
So we're, you know, not, our initial focus is on closed cycle.

949
01:14:12,000 --> 01:14:15,000
We visit very simple.

950
01:14:15,000 --> 01:14:17,360
All the components are available.

951
01:14:17,360 --> 01:14:18,360
Yeah.

952
01:14:18,360 --> 01:14:25,880
So it's, it's an interesting dynamic where you can get both energy and desalinate water

953
01:14:25,880 --> 01:14:27,760
from the same system, right?

954
01:14:27,760 --> 01:14:33,040
Rather than having to put energy in, you get energy out and water.

955
01:14:33,040 --> 01:14:38,520
And this is, you know, definitely very, very useful in a lot of small island development,

956
01:14:38,520 --> 01:14:40,000
developing states.

957
01:14:40,000 --> 01:14:47,080
And then on the MCDR front, right, permanent dioxide removal, the, you know, thermodynamic

958
01:14:47,080 --> 01:14:50,680
equation is you take fossil fuels, right?

959
01:14:50,680 --> 01:14:53,160
Big chunk of hydrocarbon.

960
01:14:53,160 --> 01:14:59,720
You light that, you know, hydrocarbon on fire with some oxygen.

961
01:14:59,720 --> 01:15:05,280
You produce, you know, outcomes energy and, you know, CO2, right?

962
01:15:05,280 --> 01:15:06,280
That's the equation.

963
01:15:06,280 --> 01:15:13,680
You hydrocarbon, oxygen, fire, outcomes energy and CO2.

964
01:15:13,680 --> 01:15:20,640
So in order to get that CO2 from the atmosphere back into a, you know, more manageable form

965
01:15:20,640 --> 01:15:28,000
that can be stored, sequestered, you know, for long periods of time, you have to reverse

966
01:15:28,000 --> 01:15:29,720
that equation, right?

967
01:15:29,720 --> 01:15:37,560
So you need to put energy into the system to get that, to pull that CO2 out of the air

968
01:15:37,560 --> 01:15:43,960
and then, you know, turn it into some, you know, more manageable form.

969
01:15:43,960 --> 01:15:51,800
That's an issue because as the energy transition ramps up and, you know, the CO2 in the atmosphere

970
01:15:51,800 --> 01:15:54,360
is going to just snowball, right?

971
01:15:54,360 --> 01:16:03,320
It's an exponential, you know, it's an exponential sort of equation where the more we burn, the

972
01:16:03,320 --> 01:16:12,480
longer it's going to continue to rise for and, you know, it's just compounding on itself.

973
01:16:12,480 --> 01:16:18,440
We're going to have to not only develop new energy sources to replace the aging fossil

974
01:16:18,440 --> 01:16:26,080
fuel infrastructure, plus more energy to, you know, keep humanity going, but we're also

975
01:16:26,080 --> 01:16:33,760
going to have to develop more energy sources and more power generation to remove CO2 to

976
01:16:33,760 --> 01:16:38,560
get us back to where, you know, today.

977
01:16:38,560 --> 01:16:45,280
The OJAC gets around this thermodynamic equation because that deep water that you're pulling

978
01:16:45,280 --> 01:16:51,920
up to condense the work, either the working fluid or that, you know, that water vapor is

979
01:16:51,920 --> 01:16:56,760
highly nutrient debts.

980
01:16:56,760 --> 01:17:02,920
And you can harness those nutrients to grow, you know, phytoplankton.

981
01:17:02,920 --> 01:17:09,800
And those phytoplankton will uptake carbon from the atmosphere and as they die and sink,

982
01:17:09,800 --> 01:17:15,200
below the photic layer, they take that carbon with them, sequestering it for, you know,

983
01:17:15,200 --> 01:17:16,840
a thousand years.

984
01:17:16,840 --> 01:17:22,960
Of course, depending on where you are in the thermal k-line circulation, you know, somewhere

985
01:17:22,960 --> 01:17:27,720
between 500 and a thousand years, which is valuable, right?

986
01:17:27,720 --> 01:17:32,040
And you're, you have that cold water, you're using that cold water to produce power, so

987
01:17:32,040 --> 01:17:36,000
power comes out of the situation, out of the, you know, the system.

988
01:17:36,000 --> 01:17:42,040
But also on the back end, almost as, you know, for free, you can, you know, there's a little

989
01:17:42,040 --> 01:17:43,240
bit of tweak you have to do.

990
01:17:43,240 --> 01:17:47,800
You have to increase the density by combining it with your warm water flow.

991
01:17:47,800 --> 01:17:54,800
You need to, you know, introduce some turbulence into your return flow so that it mixes faster

992
01:17:54,800 --> 01:18:00,880
so that the settling velocity, the settling plume settling depth, you know, where that

993
01:18:00,880 --> 01:18:07,240
deep water plume settles is still within the photic layer, but essentially you can, you

994
01:18:07,240 --> 01:18:12,800
know, with the right configuration, you can get that MCDR for free, which is of course

995
01:18:12,800 --> 01:18:21,200
a product that you could sell carbon credits or, you know, renewable energy credits or

996
01:18:21,200 --> 01:18:28,880
whatever the, you know, the system that's inevitably developed to help offset other

997
01:18:28,880 --> 01:18:33,720
emissions of other carbon based power plants.

998
01:18:33,720 --> 01:18:39,840
So that's really, again, I continue to be more and more fascinated by this because this

999
01:18:39,840 --> 01:18:45,160
seems to be a much like Bitcoin and never ending rabbit hole.

1000
01:18:45,160 --> 01:18:52,240
And again, I think that it's, it's really important, like I'm of the opinion that, that

1001
01:18:52,240 --> 01:18:54,480
pretty much everything is good for Bitcoin.

1002
01:18:54,480 --> 01:19:03,920
Even when I see Bitcoin being used in Bitcoin mining, being used in new and innovative ways,

1003
01:19:03,920 --> 01:19:05,640
I think that's wonderful.

1004
01:19:05,640 --> 01:19:12,680
And I don't care if that is being used in Texas to, to balance the load that ERCOT is

1005
01:19:12,680 --> 01:19:19,080
dealing with and to, you know, take some of those gas peaker plants owned by, I think

1006
01:19:19,080 --> 01:19:24,400
a lot of them are owned by Buffett and Charlie Munger rest in peace.

1007
01:19:24,400 --> 01:19:32,560
And also deal with the fact that the sun sets at night and, and wind blowing is intermittent.

1008
01:19:32,560 --> 01:19:39,000
I don't care if it's being used there or if it's being used to literally just handle

1009
01:19:39,000 --> 01:19:43,680
excess power generated by the difference between the cold water at the bottom of the

1010
01:19:43,680 --> 01:19:45,880
ocean and the warm water at the top.

1011
01:19:45,880 --> 01:19:47,920
I think that's just fascinating.

1012
01:19:47,920 --> 01:19:52,560
And I think that the more ways that we find, because that's the beauty of, that's the beauty

1013
01:19:52,560 --> 01:19:56,360
of Bitcoin mining is it's like, you just, you just need power.

1014
01:19:56,360 --> 01:19:58,520
You just need electricity.

1015
01:19:58,520 --> 01:20:04,560
And the more ways that we find to find these stranded areas of electricity, like that's

1016
01:20:04,560 --> 01:20:06,600
great for Bitcoin.

1017
01:20:06,600 --> 01:20:12,240
And so again, I think this is just, yeah, that's all it is, right?

1018
01:20:12,240 --> 01:20:15,360
And it's so much energy.

1019
01:20:15,360 --> 01:20:16,960
Yeah.

1020
01:20:16,960 --> 01:20:17,960
Go ahead.

1021
01:20:17,960 --> 01:20:20,360
Oh, it's just a tool.

1022
01:20:20,360 --> 01:20:26,200
It's a new component of, you know, of the grid stack.

1023
01:20:26,200 --> 01:20:36,000
And it, it has use within the entire supply chain of, you know, energy, how we, you know,

1024
01:20:36,000 --> 01:20:42,600
the pipelines themselves that transport oil and gas throughout the country.

1025
01:20:42,600 --> 01:20:48,960
There's wasted energy there, you know, the awesome things that are being done with, you

1026
01:20:48,960 --> 01:20:55,480
know, methane flaring, which is very important, right?

1027
01:20:55,480 --> 01:20:59,800
It was uneconomical to go in and cap that methane.

1028
01:20:59,800 --> 01:21:04,880
Well, now, now there's an economic incentive to do that.

1029
01:21:04,880 --> 01:21:11,880
You know, the waste, waste gas from landfills.

1030
01:21:11,880 --> 01:21:18,280
I mean, there's just so many use cases to where, you know, Bitcoin mining can be applied

1031
01:21:18,280 --> 01:21:24,560
to, you know, improve the grid in just a multitude of ways.

1032
01:21:24,560 --> 01:21:30,600
It's just a, it's a tool that you can use, that it's just a new tool that we have access

1033
01:21:30,600 --> 01:21:31,600
to.

1034
01:21:31,600 --> 01:21:35,800
And it's, it's quite a wonderful multi-tool at that.

1035
01:21:35,800 --> 01:21:42,200
And I talked with, with Daniel Batten on, on this show about CH4 Capital.

1036
01:21:42,200 --> 01:21:44,320
He's a fascinating guy, a lovely guy.

1037
01:21:44,320 --> 01:21:47,200
And that was such an interesting conversation.

1038
01:21:47,200 --> 01:21:54,400
And again, this is one of those cases where, as with ocean thermal is as with landfill

1039
01:21:54,400 --> 01:21:55,400
gas mining.

1040
01:21:55,400 --> 01:22:01,000
It's one of those things where it's, it's so, like it seems too good to be true.

1041
01:22:01,000 --> 01:22:05,200
It seems like in the case of ocean thermal, like you mean you're just, you're just dealing

1042
01:22:05,200 --> 01:22:09,800
with a difference in temperature and because of that, you can generate power and that power

1043
01:22:09,800 --> 01:22:15,040
can be actually financed by, that build out of that power can be financed by Bitcoin mining.

1044
01:22:15,040 --> 01:22:21,000
And with Daniel's case with landfill mining, it's like, you mean you can literally turn

1045
01:22:21,000 --> 01:22:23,560
trash into treasure?

1046
01:22:23,560 --> 01:22:28,400
You can literally take methane, which I think, I think that everybody, no matter where you

1047
01:22:28,400 --> 01:22:34,000
stand on the quote, climate debate, I think that everybody can agree that they don't want

1048
01:22:34,000 --> 01:22:35,000
to breathe methane.

1049
01:22:35,000 --> 01:22:38,760
And like, if you say that, yeah, I want to breathe methane, that's great.

1050
01:22:38,760 --> 01:22:42,600
Go stand on a, go stand in a landfill for a while and then I'll believe you.

1051
01:22:42,600 --> 01:22:45,160
Like I don't think that anybody wants that.

1052
01:22:45,160 --> 01:22:50,360
And it's again, one of those things where it just, I don't find very many, very many

1053
01:22:50,360 --> 01:22:53,200
reasonable critiques to it.

1054
01:22:53,200 --> 01:22:58,200
And again, I think that fossil fuels, as you pointed out earlier, are incredibly important

1055
01:22:58,200 --> 01:23:01,280
because they're a super energy dense medium, right?

1056
01:23:01,280 --> 01:23:02,960
That's, they're incredibly energy dense.

1057
01:23:02,960 --> 01:23:09,440
They have allowed us to, you know, progress as a civilization to where we are right now.

1058
01:23:09,440 --> 01:23:14,800
And through that, we're also able to build incredible pieces of machinery and all these

1059
01:23:14,800 --> 01:23:22,160
other things that then enable us to explore other technologies like ocean thermal, which

1060
01:23:22,160 --> 01:23:26,520
previously were not economical, but now are.

1061
01:23:26,520 --> 01:23:28,520
And I think that it's beautiful.

1062
01:23:28,520 --> 01:23:39,720
And renewables are low time preference versus fossil fuels are high time preference.

1063
01:23:39,720 --> 01:23:43,360
You know, it's, it's their, you know, their fiat fuels, right?

1064
01:23:43,360 --> 01:23:53,280
I mean, the US dollar is propped up by, of course, oil and the trade of oil in US dollars.

1065
01:23:53,280 --> 01:23:56,600
And you know, there's unintended consequences, right?

1066
01:23:56,600 --> 01:24:02,000
Yeah, you're using that energy, you know, today, but we're going to have, we're starting

1067
01:24:02,000 --> 01:24:10,240
to see those effects of, you know, 150 years of burning coal on, you know, prop yields,

1068
01:24:10,240 --> 01:24:11,240
right?

1069
01:24:11,240 --> 01:24:14,520
Prop yields this year have been abysmal all over the world.

1070
01:24:14,520 --> 01:24:22,280
You know, temperatures across the world are just, I mean, six sigma above what they, you

1071
01:24:22,280 --> 01:24:29,440
know, what the pre industrial average is, you know, every, this is the hot 2023 was

1072
01:24:29,440 --> 01:24:33,400
the hottest year we've ever recorded.

1073
01:24:33,400 --> 01:24:38,880
You know, water scarcity issues are popping up all over.

1074
01:24:38,880 --> 01:24:45,920
You're seeing massive, you know, floods, droughts.

1075
01:24:45,920 --> 01:24:51,360
You're seeing, I mean, it's, it's.

1076
01:24:51,360 --> 01:25:00,600
And it's the result of, you know, centralized, centralized fuel source.

1077
01:25:00,600 --> 01:25:06,960
And had I always liked to think about the, you know, the alternate universe of what if

1078
01:25:06,960 --> 01:25:14,120
fossil fuels, we hadn't had access to, you know, easily accessible fossil fuels, and

1079
01:25:14,120 --> 01:25:21,280
we were forced to develop society around alternative energy sources like, you know, hydropower,

1080
01:25:21,280 --> 01:25:22,280
right?

1081
01:25:22,280 --> 01:25:28,520
Where, you know, since we build cities, large societies around large sources of renewable

1082
01:25:28,520 --> 01:25:35,880
energy, yeah, we would have, it would have taken longer to develop, but we wouldn't be,

1083
01:25:35,880 --> 01:25:42,680
you know, we want it would be more, you know, it would be a more robust system to changes.

1084
01:25:42,680 --> 01:25:48,840
You wouldn't be, you know, a lot of our agriculture, a lot of our, you know, infrastructure is

1085
01:25:48,840 --> 01:25:55,240
built around stable climate, and we've, we're jeopardizing that at the moment.

1086
01:25:55,240 --> 01:25:57,760
And that's going to have, you know, adverse effects.

1087
01:25:57,760 --> 01:26:02,600
You're going to see people having to move out of certain areas because they just become

1088
01:26:02,600 --> 01:26:06,400
unhospitable.

1089
01:26:06,400 --> 01:26:10,480
And you're, you're already seeing this, you know, migrant crisis is all over the world

1090
01:26:10,480 --> 01:26:16,440
are, you know, political instability caused by famine or drought, right?

1091
01:26:16,440 --> 01:26:20,280
Those are, you know, first and second order effects.

1092
01:26:20,280 --> 01:26:27,560
And I mean, this year has been 2023 has just been, and when I say six Sigma, that means

1093
01:26:27,560 --> 01:26:31,200
that there is, there is no ambiguity in that.

1094
01:26:31,200 --> 01:26:34,880
Like it's, you, there is no explanation.

1095
01:26:34,880 --> 01:26:38,120
It's, I think it's like, oh, what is a six Sigma?

1096
01:26:38,120 --> 01:26:42,360
It's like one in so many billion chance.

1097
01:26:42,360 --> 01:26:49,320
But, you know, it's how we, we determine if, you know, something is real or not is how

1098
01:26:49,320 --> 01:26:55,040
many, you know, order, how many orders of magnitude, how many standard deviations away

1099
01:26:55,040 --> 01:26:56,880
we are.

1100
01:26:56,880 --> 01:27:04,840
And you know, I think Bitcoin is the key to this energy transition because it's uniquely

1101
01:27:04,840 --> 01:27:07,840
suited for it, right?

1102
01:27:07,840 --> 01:27:13,320
You know, with fossil fuel infrastructure, it's, you know, I'm going to simplify things

1103
01:27:13,320 --> 01:27:20,000
here, but fossil fuel infrastructure in general, it's a low capital expense, high operational

1104
01:27:20,000 --> 01:27:21,680
expense, right?

1105
01:27:21,680 --> 01:27:27,200
You know, spinning up, trying to can build, you know, a bunch of coal power plants, because

1106
01:27:27,200 --> 01:27:29,560
they're generally pretty cheap to build.

1107
01:27:29,560 --> 01:27:38,440
Um, you know, we've built on the, for 100, 100 years, the economies of scale exist.

1108
01:27:38,440 --> 01:27:44,880
So you can build them cheap, but you have that additional cost that you need to acquire

1109
01:27:44,880 --> 01:27:47,720
the fuel to burn, right?

1110
01:27:47,720 --> 01:27:57,680
And so that's operational expense versus renewable infrastructure, you know, hydrodans, geothermal

1111
01:27:57,680 --> 01:28:09,960
nuclear, um, Otec, these things are high capital expense, but relatively lower operational

1112
01:28:09,960 --> 01:28:10,960
expense, right?

1113
01:28:10,960 --> 01:28:18,080
It doesn't, once you build large scale renewable power plants, well, it costs nothing for the

1114
01:28:18,080 --> 01:28:19,280
sun to shine.

1115
01:28:19,280 --> 01:28:21,400
It costs nothing for the wind to blow.

1116
01:28:21,400 --> 01:28:23,480
It costs nothing for the geototherm.

1117
01:28:23,480 --> 01:28:31,320
Um, and, you know, it's that difference that, and you can't turn it off.

1118
01:28:31,320 --> 01:28:36,440
Like if the sun is shining, or, you know, the river is flowing, it's really a use it

1119
01:28:36,440 --> 01:28:42,840
or lose it sort of situation where, you know, you either have someone to use that energy

1120
01:28:42,840 --> 01:28:44,840
or it's just wasted.

1121
01:28:44,840 --> 01:28:50,960
Um, you know, with fossil fuels, you simply just don't burn the excess fuel.

1122
01:28:50,960 --> 01:28:56,760
That's the most economic solution as you know, with the happening and the hash price, uh,

1123
01:28:56,760 --> 01:29:02,560
you know, collapsing, you're going to end up with a, you know, each, each epic, uh,

1124
01:29:02,560 --> 01:29:08,240
Epoch that continues that hash price is going to go further and further down.

1125
01:29:08,240 --> 01:29:15,080
And eventually that operational expense of having to, you know, acquire that fossil fuels

1126
01:29:15,080 --> 01:29:18,800
is never going to, you know, never going to pay for the mining itself.

1127
01:29:18,800 --> 01:29:29,040
But if you have very low marginal cost solar or wind or, you know, geo where, well, now

1128
01:29:29,040 --> 01:29:32,200
it's all, it's essentially zero.

1129
01:29:32,200 --> 01:29:33,880
If no one's going to buy it, it's zero.

1130
01:29:33,880 --> 01:29:35,240
Uh, it has no cost.

1131
01:29:35,240 --> 01:29:36,240
You had zero.

1132
01:29:36,240 --> 01:29:42,840
So regardless of what the hash price is, Bitcoin mining has a incredibly important

1133
01:29:42,840 --> 01:29:49,320
function in taking that curtailment and dealing with that curtailment and providing a revenue

1134
01:29:49,320 --> 01:29:53,560
source to these, you know, renewable energy developers.

1135
01:29:53,560 --> 01:29:59,080
Um, and I think it's, you know, it's the, it's the key piece of the puzzle that's been

1136
01:29:59,080 --> 01:30:05,880
missing, uh, is that, you know, how do you deal with curtailment?

1137
01:30:05,880 --> 01:30:12,640
And that's again, uh, where Bitcoin as with ocean thermal or as with landfill gas money,

1138
01:30:12,640 --> 01:30:17,360
Bitcoin mining itself, at times seems too good to be true, right?

1139
01:30:17,360 --> 01:30:21,120
Because it's like, well, and I think that's where a lot of the skepticism comes in from

1140
01:30:21,120 --> 01:30:25,320
the outside where it's like, okay, yet you're saying Bitcoin fixes this and Bitcoin fixes

1141
01:30:25,320 --> 01:30:26,320
that.

1142
01:30:26,320 --> 01:30:29,640
And now you're saying Bitcoin mining fixes all of this and it is our solution.

1143
01:30:29,640 --> 01:30:32,640
But, but I think we're seeing the narrative shift.

1144
01:30:32,640 --> 01:30:39,760
I think, I think there's a palpable change in the palpable shift in the overton window

1145
01:30:39,760 --> 01:30:45,680
around Bitcoin mining where the evidence is stacking up so much that it's becoming, I

1146
01:30:45,680 --> 01:30:50,920
mean, just really an untenable position to hold that while Bitcoin is, you know, burning

1147
01:30:50,920 --> 01:30:52,840
the planet or whatever.

1148
01:30:52,840 --> 01:30:59,720
But I'm curious kind of what, from your perspective, like what, what is your, if you had to explain

1149
01:30:59,720 --> 01:31:07,680
it like I'm Elizabeth Warren, for example, how, how would you explain like the, what's,

1150
01:31:07,680 --> 01:31:14,280
what's your elevator pitch for ocean thermal plus Bitcoin equals good thing that you should

1151
01:31:14,280 --> 01:31:16,280
support?

1152
01:31:16,280 --> 01:31:18,280
Yeah.

1153
01:31:18,280 --> 01:31:21,200
Uh, yep.

1154
01:31:21,200 --> 01:31:29,720
24 seven base load renewable power with a demand response, a built in demand response

1155
01:31:29,720 --> 01:31:33,520
component for coastal communities and the blue economy.

1156
01:31:33,520 --> 01:31:36,360
I mean, I'm sold.

1157
01:31:36,360 --> 01:31:39,760
You know, out of curiosity, I think maybe you touched on this a little bit earlier,

1158
01:31:39,760 --> 01:31:43,920
but just to, to make sure we drive it home.

1159
01:31:43,920 --> 01:31:49,000
What are we actually talking about in terms of the scale of potential power generation

1160
01:31:49,000 --> 01:31:51,760
for ocean thermal?

1161
01:31:51,760 --> 01:31:59,200
Like what, to, to a layman, like what are we really talking about here in terms of numbers?

1162
01:31:59,200 --> 01:32:01,680
Um, yeah.

1163
01:32:01,680 --> 01:32:11,080
So I mean, the rate limiting step on ocean thermal power production is going to be the

1164
01:32:11,080 --> 01:32:12,120
feedback, right?

1165
01:32:12,120 --> 01:32:17,440
The cooling of the, the ocean, um, you know, the changing in the thermal structure of the

1166
01:32:17,440 --> 01:32:29,120
ocean and it's about five terawatts of electricity, which is just a, a, a mind, mind blowing amount.

1167
01:32:29,120 --> 01:32:33,800
Um, yeah.

1168
01:32:33,800 --> 01:32:39,560
That's so, and, and again, for the layman out there, including myself, typically we see

1169
01:32:39,560 --> 01:32:45,480
like Bitcoin's energy consumption measured in, in terawatt hours, which is the amount

1170
01:32:45,480 --> 01:32:50,320
of terawatts over the, the course of, uh, like they typically average out like this is how

1171
01:32:50,320 --> 01:32:53,760
many terawatt hours it will use over one year.

1172
01:32:53,760 --> 01:32:59,080
Can you equate that just again, uh, for those of us who, who do not know, uh, what's the

1173
01:32:59,080 --> 01:33:01,720
thing, not have these things sort of top of mind?

1174
01:33:01,720 --> 01:33:05,840
What does that kind of look like?

1175
01:33:05,840 --> 01:33:11,640
So because I mean, I assume we're talking total number of hours in the year, uh, amount

1176
01:33:11,640 --> 01:33:14,200
of generation at any given time.

1177
01:33:14,200 --> 01:33:21,240
To get to terawatt hours per year, uh, you know, terawatts is a unit of power.

1178
01:33:21,240 --> 01:33:25,560
Uh, terawatt hours is a unit of electricity.

1179
01:33:25,560 --> 01:33:33,640
So, you know, you multiply terawatts by what is it, 8,760.

1180
01:33:33,640 --> 01:33:39,000
And you get, uh, what is this?

1181
01:33:39,000 --> 01:33:44,640
44,000 terawatt hours or so.

1182
01:33:44,640 --> 01:33:50,680
Um, from, yeah, yeah, five terawatts times 8,760.

1183
01:33:50,680 --> 01:33:51,680
Yeah.

1184
01:33:51,680 --> 01:33:55,120
40, 44,000 terawatt hours.

1185
01:33:55,120 --> 01:34:01,360
So wait, that's, uh, if I'm correct, I think according to, uh, to Cambridge, uh, Cambridge's

1186
01:34:01,360 --> 01:34:07,000
research, Bitcoin is like 150 terawatt hours, right?

1187
01:34:07,000 --> 01:34:08,280
Per year, something like that.

1188
01:34:08,280 --> 01:34:13,280
I mean, so we're talking multiple orders of magnitude greater than the Bitcoin network.

1189
01:34:13,280 --> 01:34:18,160
I mean, this is, this is like an unfathomable, unfathomable amount of energy.

1190
01:34:18,160 --> 01:34:20,000
I can't even say unfathomable right now.

1191
01:34:20,000 --> 01:34:22,400
That's how unfathomable it is.

1192
01:34:22,400 --> 01:34:23,400
Yeah.

1193
01:34:23,400 --> 01:34:26,120
That, that's nuts.

1194
01:34:26,120 --> 01:34:30,800
And, and it's, I mean, that's the crazy thing is it's just kind of like it's just sitting

1195
01:34:30,800 --> 01:34:31,800
there.

1196
01:34:31,800 --> 01:34:38,920
Most of our planet is, is water, is salt water, you know, but it's, it's all around us.

1197
01:34:38,920 --> 01:34:43,000
And again, it's kind of one of those things where, I mean, I, I love an idea whose time

1198
01:34:43,000 --> 01:34:44,720
has come.

1199
01:34:44,720 --> 01:34:53,360
And I love the symbiosis of something like ocean thermal with Bitcoin because I just,

1200
01:34:53,360 --> 01:34:59,880
it's incredible when one technology can make another actually viable.

1201
01:34:59,880 --> 01:35:04,800
And it's this, you know, a hundred years ago, of course, they couldn't have conceived that

1202
01:35:04,800 --> 01:35:09,240
something like Bitcoin was going to come along and change this equation of economic

1203
01:35:09,240 --> 01:35:10,720
viability.

1204
01:35:10,720 --> 01:35:15,200
But now here we sit at this really fascinating time.

1205
01:35:15,200 --> 01:35:20,200
And to think as well about the, the second and third order effects of this sort of technology

1206
01:35:20,200 --> 01:35:27,160
and how, I mean, so much, there are a lot of people living in tropical climates and,

1207
01:35:27,160 --> 01:35:34,000
and equatorially that can genuinely benefit from this and that can drive down their cost

1208
01:35:34,000 --> 01:35:40,520
of energy, i.e. their cost of living, because energy is, that's the base component of most

1209
01:35:40,520 --> 01:35:43,520
of every economy on the planet, right?

1210
01:35:43,520 --> 01:35:45,680
What is your cost of energy?

1211
01:35:45,680 --> 01:35:50,400
And to see that driven down by the natural resources that they have around them, and

1212
01:35:50,400 --> 01:35:53,480
again, it's just like, what's your delta T?

1213
01:35:53,480 --> 01:35:54,600
What's your change in temperature?

1214
01:35:54,600 --> 01:35:57,520
I just think that's, it's beautiful.

1215
01:35:57,520 --> 01:35:59,320
It's beautiful to see.

1216
01:35:59,320 --> 01:36:00,320
Yeah.

1217
01:36:00,320 --> 01:36:04,200
I'd appreciate it.

1218
01:36:04,200 --> 01:36:05,200
It's cool.

1219
01:36:05,200 --> 01:36:06,200
And I'm curious.

1220
01:36:06,200 --> 01:36:10,000
So, I mean, if somebody's listening to this and they're like, okay, this is really fucking

1221
01:36:10,000 --> 01:36:11,500
cool.

1222
01:36:11,500 --> 01:36:15,160
Are you guys, if you can talk about this, are you guys, are you guys, are you guys, are

1223
01:36:15,160 --> 01:36:17,400
you guys, are you guys hiring?

1224
01:36:17,400 --> 01:36:20,080
Are you still seeking investment?

1225
01:36:20,080 --> 01:36:23,440
Anything like that for somebody who, who's like, I just think this is really cool and

1226
01:36:23,440 --> 01:36:26,680
I want to drop what I'm doing and get involved in this somehow.

1227
01:36:26,680 --> 01:36:29,440
Is there a way for them to do that?

1228
01:36:29,440 --> 01:36:31,800
Absolutely.

1229
01:36:31,800 --> 01:36:40,480
On both of those in Cal's, we are, you know, you've been in touch with me on Twitter, Nate

1230
01:36:40,480 --> 01:36:49,200
Hawaii, on LinkedIn, Nathaniel Harmon, through our website, we have contact, reach out if

1231
01:36:49,200 --> 01:36:51,280
you have a skill set.

1232
01:36:51,280 --> 01:36:58,920
And you know, this is, I mean, that's how I met my, our, our co-founder, Sam Benson.

1233
01:36:58,920 --> 01:37:03,120
He reached out after he heard one of our, one of our podcasts.

1234
01:37:03,120 --> 01:37:08,880
And you know, we've been working together now with him for a year and a half.

1235
01:37:08,880 --> 01:37:14,520
We, you know, he's, he's been kicking ass.

1236
01:37:14,520 --> 01:37:19,160
And so we made, you know, brought him on as a, as a, as a co-founder.

1237
01:37:19,160 --> 01:37:27,840
And yeah, if, you know, he, he was a, he managed vessels for TK.

1238
01:37:27,840 --> 01:37:37,400
He'd, you know, overseen vessel conversions, vessel refits for the Australian Royal Australian

1239
01:37:37,400 --> 01:37:38,400
Navy.

1240
01:37:38,400 --> 01:37:43,400
He'd done sister integrations on RVs, research vessels.

1241
01:37:43,400 --> 01:37:49,920
He's like, I've been working in, you know, in and around the ocean my whole life.

1242
01:37:49,920 --> 01:37:52,280
And this is something to add together.

1243
01:37:52,280 --> 01:37:53,760
So absolutely.

1244
01:37:53,760 --> 01:37:59,120
If anybody, if you have any sort of, you know, technical skill set, business skill set, we

1245
01:37:59,120 --> 01:38:04,040
can absolutely use, use your assistance.

1246
01:38:04,040 --> 01:38:05,040
That's awesome.

1247
01:38:05,040 --> 01:38:09,680
I'll link your Twitter of course and the website in the show notes.

1248
01:38:09,680 --> 01:38:13,960
I'm curious also, this is a completely unrelated topic, but are you reading anything right

1249
01:38:13,960 --> 01:38:18,160
now that you would recommend for others to ingest?

1250
01:38:18,160 --> 01:38:22,160
Am I reading anything?

1251
01:38:22,160 --> 01:38:27,000
Fiction, I mean, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I,

1252
01:38:27,000 --> 01:38:33,880
I, I, I, I, I read, I read, I read a lot of scientific papers.

1253
01:38:33,880 --> 01:38:37,640
So that makes sense.

1254
01:38:37,640 --> 01:38:38,640
Yeah.

1255
01:38:38,640 --> 01:38:45,400
If I could recommend one book that really assisted me, I'm not, not currently reading

1256
01:38:45,400 --> 01:38:51,400
it, but it would be a Capital in the 21st Century by Thomas Piketty.

1257
01:38:51,400 --> 01:39:03,000
It's a monetary history of modern age, you know, going back 350 years or so, looking

1258
01:39:03,000 --> 01:39:11,600
at, you know, the, the Bank of England and just the movement of capital.

1259
01:39:11,600 --> 01:39:18,000
It helps, you know, when I first started learning about Bitcoin, I knew I had to go teach myself

1260
01:39:18,000 --> 01:39:23,320
C++ to read the cupboard, right?

1261
01:39:23,320 --> 01:39:29,560
And if you're to understand monetary history, you need a good history lesson, how we, where

1262
01:39:29,560 --> 01:39:36,800
we came from and how we got to where we are today and the need for, you know, Bitcoin.

1263
01:39:36,800 --> 01:39:43,840
And yeah, Capital in the 21st Century, Thomas Piketty, it's heralded as one of the, one

1264
01:39:43,840 --> 01:39:48,680
of the best economic books of the last 100 years.

1265
01:39:48,680 --> 01:39:57,560
And then he has a follow up on a Capital and ideology, which is, you know, how I, how ideology

1266
01:39:57,560 --> 01:40:05,240
influences the movement of Capital throughout an even longer history period.

1267
01:40:05,240 --> 01:40:09,400
I haven't checked either of those out myself.

1268
01:40:09,400 --> 01:40:12,200
So now I've got a couple of good recommendations to dig into.

1269
01:40:12,200 --> 01:40:13,200
I appreciate that.

1270
01:40:13,200 --> 01:40:15,840
900 pages of real thickness.

1271
01:40:15,840 --> 01:40:16,840
Oh, wow.

1272
01:40:16,840 --> 01:40:17,840
Okay.

1273
01:40:17,840 --> 01:40:18,840
All right.

1274
01:40:18,840 --> 01:40:19,840
So I got it.

1275
01:40:19,840 --> 01:40:22,040
So it's, it's a real dig in type of book.

1276
01:40:22,040 --> 01:40:27,520
Well, and it's the type of book where you need to use the, you know, the, you know,

1277
01:40:27,520 --> 01:40:38,960
the, the, the web portal, which has, you know, the, you know, the addendums, the, yeah, it's

1278
01:40:38,960 --> 01:40:41,600
a real thick.

1279
01:40:41,600 --> 01:40:43,120
It's a real thick, please.

1280
01:40:43,120 --> 01:40:44,120
Okay.

1281
01:40:44,120 --> 01:40:49,600
Well, I appreciate the warning in advance, just so we all know what we're prepared for.

1282
01:40:49,600 --> 01:40:55,520
You know, I, first of all, I appreciate you sharing your scarce time because, you know,

1283
01:40:55,520 --> 01:40:59,120
time is scarce, Bitcoin is scarce, but Bitcoin podcasts are abundant.

1284
01:40:59,120 --> 01:41:03,000
And I appreciate you joining me on this one.

1285
01:41:03,000 --> 01:41:04,280
Anything else to leave us with?

1286
01:41:04,280 --> 01:41:07,200
Anything else that we failed to cover here today?

1287
01:41:07,200 --> 01:41:11,320
Because, I mean, again, this is just fascinating and I love what you guys are doing.

1288
01:41:11,320 --> 01:41:16,080
I'm very certain it's going to be very successful and I wish you the best of luck.

1289
01:41:16,080 --> 01:41:24,440
But is there, is there anything we failed to cover or any parting words?

1290
01:41:24,440 --> 01:41:26,360
The ocean is life.

1291
01:41:26,360 --> 01:41:35,240
We came from the ocean and it holds the key to humanity's future, you know, we need to

1292
01:41:35,240 --> 01:41:36,960
take care of it.

1293
01:41:36,960 --> 01:41:40,360
Need to take care of the land as well.

1294
01:41:40,360 --> 01:41:44,560
Yeah, try not to throw trash into the ocean.

1295
01:41:44,560 --> 01:41:48,360
That's it.

1296
01:41:48,360 --> 01:41:51,160
This is good advice for everyone.

1297
01:41:51,160 --> 01:41:56,920
Throw it into a landfill at least so that Daniel Batten can mine Bitcoin with it.

1298
01:41:56,920 --> 01:41:58,440
At least do that much.

1299
01:41:58,440 --> 01:41:59,440
You'll be doing it.

1300
01:41:59,440 --> 01:42:00,440
You're in a good service.

1301
01:42:00,440 --> 01:42:03,320
Well, Nate, thank you so much for your time again.

1302
01:42:03,320 --> 01:42:04,320
Appreciate it.

1303
01:42:04,320 --> 01:42:08,200
Looking forward to seeing you in the flesh here hopefully soon at some conference or

1304
01:42:08,200 --> 01:42:09,200
another.

1305
01:42:09,200 --> 01:42:11,800
But until then, thanks so much.

1306
01:42:11,800 --> 01:42:12,800
Awesome.

1307
01:42:12,800 --> 01:42:13,800
Aloha.

1308
01:42:13,800 --> 01:42:26,120
And that's a wrap on this Bitcoin Talk episode of the Bitcoin Podcast.

1309
01:42:26,120 --> 01:42:31,360
If you're a Bitcoin only company interested in sponsoring another fucking Bitcoin podcast,

1310
01:42:31,360 --> 01:42:34,840
head to bitcoinpodcast.net slash sponsor.

1311
01:42:34,840 --> 01:42:39,680
If you're enjoying the Bitcoin podcast, consider giving a five star review wherever

1312
01:42:39,680 --> 01:42:45,120
you listen or sharing this show with your network or don't Bitcoin doesn't care.

1313
01:42:45,120 --> 01:42:49,160
You can find me on Noster by going to primal.net slash Walker.

1314
01:42:49,160 --> 01:42:54,200
And if you want to follow the Bitcoin podcast on Twitter, go to at TIT coin podcast and

1315
01:42:54,200 --> 01:42:55,920
at Walker America.

1316
01:42:55,920 --> 01:43:01,320
You can also find the video version of this podcast at youtube.com slash at Walker America

1317
01:43:01,320 --> 01:43:04,400
and at Walker America on rumble.

1318
01:43:04,400 --> 01:43:05,400
Bitcoin is scarce.

1319
01:43:05,400 --> 01:43:10,520
There will only ever be 21 million, but Bitcoin podcasts are abundant.

1320
01:43:10,520 --> 01:43:16,960
So thank you for spending your scarce time to listen to another fucking Bitcoin podcast.

1321
01:43:16,960 --> 01:43:36,640
Until next time, stay free.