🎙️ What if solving the climate crisis didn't mean giving everything up — but upgrading how we live?
In this episode of Tangelic Talks, hosts Victoria Cornelio and Andres Tamez sit down with Josh Dorfman — climate entrepreneur, co-founder of Planted, and creator of Supercool — for one of the most grounded, honest, and energizing conversations of Season 4.
Josh's story starts in 1990s China, where he watched a billion people trade bicycles for cars and quietly understood what was coming for the planet decades before most people were paying attention. What followed was a 30-year career building companies, media platforms, and community ecosystems all pointed in the same direction: a low-carbon future that's abundant, not austere.
He also coined one of the most refreshingly honest concepts in climate communication — the Lazy Environmentalist. Because sometimes the best way to move people isn't to make them feel guilty. It's to make the right choice the easier one.
In This Episode:
🌱 The 1995 bicycle factory insight that changed everything
🏗️ How Planted turns fast-growing grass into carbon-negative building materials
💡 Why modern upgrades — induction cooking, EVs, solar — are inherently cleaner
🚿 The real story behind the Lazy Environmentalist — and why it resonated with millions
⚡ What $2 trillion in global clean energy investment actually signals
🎯 How to distinguish deployed climate solutions from well-funded science projects
🏙️ What forward-thinking city mayors are doing that corporations are still missing
🔋 China's long-term climate strategy vs. America's short-term innovation culture
📰 The two ways mainstream media fails on climate — and what to cover instead
🤝 Why you only need 4–5% of a population to trigger real systemic change
🔹 About Our Guest: Josh Dorfman is a climate entrepreneur, the creator of the Lazy Environmentalist media franchise, co-founder of Planted (recognized by Fast Company as one of the world's most innovative companies in 2024), and founder of Supercool — a platform dedicated to tracking what's actually been deployed in the low-carbon economy. His work spans sustainable furniture, community entrepreneurship, and carbon-negative building materials.
💬 Join the Conversation: Do you think the tools to solve climate change already exist — or are we still waiting for a breakthrough? Are you a lazy environmentalist?
Drop your thoughts below 👇
🌱 Support the Mission: Help us amplify stories of clean energy, equity, and climate justice. 👉 TangelicLife.org
🔖 #ClimateEntrepreneur #Planted #CleanEnergy #ClimateStartup #EnergyTransition #ClimateJustice #JoshDorfman #ClimateSolutions #ClimateOptimism #TangelicTalks
🎯 climate entrepreneur, lazy environmentalist, low carbon economy, carbon negative building, Planted startup, Supercool platform, climate solutions deployed, Josh Dorfman, climate optimism, green building materials, clean energy investment, climate innovation, energy transition, Tangelic Talks
In this episode of Tangelic Talks, hosts Victoria Cornelio and Andres Tamez sit down with Josh Dorfman — climate entrepreneur, co-founder of Planted, and creator of Supercool — for one of the most grounded, honest, and energizing conversations of Season 4.
Josh's story starts in 1990s China, where he watched a billion people trade bicycles for cars and quietly understood what was coming for the planet decades before most people were paying attention. What followed was a 30-year career building companies, media platforms, and community ecosystems all pointed in the same direction: a low-carbon future that's abundant, not austere.
He also coined one of the most refreshingly honest concepts in climate communication — the Lazy Environmentalist. Because sometimes the best way to move people isn't to make them feel guilty. It's to make the right choice the easier one.
In This Episode:
🌱 The 1995 bicycle factory insight that changed everything
🏗️ How Planted turns fast-growing grass into carbon-negative building materials
💡 Why modern upgrades — induction cooking, EVs, solar — are inherently cleaner
🚿 The real story behind the Lazy Environmentalist — and why it resonated with millions
⚡ What $2 trillion in global clean energy investment actually signals
🎯 How to distinguish deployed climate solutions from well-funded science projects
🏙️ What forward-thinking city mayors are doing that corporations are still missing
🔋 China's long-term climate strategy vs. America's short-term innovation culture
📰 The two ways mainstream media fails on climate — and what to cover instead
🤝 Why you only need 4–5% of a population to trigger real systemic change
🔹 About Our Guest: Josh Dorfman is a climate entrepreneur, the creator of the Lazy Environmentalist media franchise, co-founder of Planted (recognized by Fast Company as one of the world's most innovative companies in 2024), and founder of Supercool — a platform dedicated to tracking what's actually been deployed in the low-carbon economy. His work spans sustainable furniture, community entrepreneurship, and carbon-negative building materials.
💬 Join the Conversation: Do you think the tools to solve climate change already exist — or are we still waiting for a breakthrough? Are you a lazy environmentalist?
Drop your thoughts below 👇
🌱 Support the Mission: Help us amplify stories of clean energy, equity, and climate justice. 👉 TangelicLife.org
🔖 #ClimateEntrepreneur #Planted #CleanEnergy #ClimateStartup #EnergyTransition #ClimateJustice #JoshDorfman #ClimateSolutions #ClimateOptimism #TangelicTalks
🎯 climate entrepreneur, lazy environmentalist, low carbon economy, carbon negative building, Planted startup, Supercool platform, climate solutions deployed, Josh Dorfman, climate optimism, green building materials, clean energy investment, climate innovation, energy transition, Tangelic Talks
Category
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LearningTranscript
00:00It took me a really long time, honestly, coming home from China, about five or six years until I
00:05realized that the way that I was going to try to affect change starting out was to think like,
00:10we're in America, we're a consumer culture. I am going to see if I can create companies or work on
00:15businesses that help consumers start to consume in a more sustainable manner. That's my starting
00:21implementation recently with like the mayor of like, former mayor of like Barranquilla in Columbia,
00:26right? And he did something where he was like, look, we're going to go plant all these trees.
00:31And people are like, no, it's gonna be too expensive or no, like they're going to get in
00:34the way. And he was like, well, look at this. In London, where trees have been intentionally planted,
00:42the value of the buildings and the homes on those streets have gone up by 10%. And that means tax
00:47revenue has also gone up by 10%. And so the return on investment for the city, if we plant these
00:53trees
00:53in a very hot area where kids are like, sometimes even passing out on the way to school, will not
00:58only have these health benefits, it's actually going to pay for itself. There's a return on
01:02investment to the city, right? I immediately thought like, oh, my God, she's attracted to me.
01:07Yeah, I was like, I was like, she's attracted to me. This is crazy.
01:12Yeah, so I was like, what's going to happen?
01:16Where's this night going? I'm going to a new apartment, never been there. I'm subletting a room.
01:20There's a roommate. I don't even know where the key is. Like, what?
01:34Welcome to Tangelic Talks, your go-to podcast from Tangelic, where we dive into the vibrant world of
01:40clean energy, development, sustainability, and climate change in Africa. We bring you inspiring
01:46stories, insightful discussions, and groundbreaking innovations from the consummate-making waves in
01:51the global community. Tune in and join the conversation toward a brighter, greener future.
01:56Let's get started.
02:01Hello, everyone. Welcome to Tangelic Talks, a podcast at the intersection of energy, equity,
02:06and empowerment with your host, Undress to Mez, Victoria Cornelio. Victoria, can you please
02:12introduce this week's wonderful guest? Yes. Today on Tangelic Talks, we're talking about climate
02:18action that actually fits into real life with Josh Dorfman. Am I saying that correctly?
02:24I really like your last name. It's really cool. Josh is a climate entrepreneur who spent his career
02:31building companies at the front lines of the low-carbon economy. Most recently, he was a co-founder
02:35and CEO of Planted, spelled without the E. A carbon-negative building materials startup
02:41recognized by the Fast Company as one of the world's most innovative companies of 2024.
02:46Through his work, including Supercool, which you should check out, Josh makes a compelling case
02:51that we already have the tools to solve the climate crisis. The challenges in technology alone,
02:55it's leadership, accessibility, and scale, which is exactly where we're going to jump into today.
03:00So thank you for being here, Josh.
03:01Thank you for having me. And thank you for saying that you think my last name is... I don't know
03:09what
03:09you said, that you like it. I rarely hear that.
03:12It's cool.
03:12Really? It's so cool.
03:14Yeah.
03:14Yeah, no, you've got a stage name.
03:16You know, the funny thing is, the funny thing is, when I was in business school, I dated this girl
03:23from Germany. And I went to visit her and meet her whole family in Frankfurt. And apparently,
03:27like, Dorfman is not too distant from, like, Doofman, which means village idiot. And her
03:33grandma, the whole time, was just like, Doofman. And I was just trying to be... I'm like, yeah,
03:39sounds close enough.
03:40Dorfman!
03:41Yeah, yeah, yeah.
03:43Right. Well, that makes me like it even more. It's quite funny.
03:48It's very good. It's a bit of a stage name. How did you, with such a cool name, get into
03:53this
03:53sort of intersection that you're in? You're working with leaders, businesses, but in the
03:57sustainability space, which is sometimes, I can imagine, quite the challenge.
04:01Yeah, I mean, accidentally, I would say. And the quick story for me is, it goes back 30 years. I
04:07was in China a year after university, 1995, thinking about, just thinking, okay, if I can get myself to
04:14China, something cool will happen. I will go to the other side of the world, see if I can, you
04:19know,
04:19live, thrive, and survive. So I got a job teaching English on a university. And within a month, I got
04:24another job working in a factory that made bicycle locks. It was an American company called
04:30Kryptonite. And I was like, this is awesome. I'm still thinking like CIA or State Department or who
04:36knows what the future is going to be. But I'm here, I'm learning Chinese, I'm going to learn the
04:38culture. And now I'm like on a, you know, in an academic setting, and I'm in a factory, like,
04:43you know, awesome. And eventually, I went to work for that company full time. And after two
04:49years, just being so focused on their infrastructure and their, their transportation infrastructure,
04:56and thinking, there's a billion people riding bicycles here, we've got the best bicycle lock
05:00in the world, I am going to strike it rich and retire by like 25 or 26, which none of
05:06that happened.
05:06But what I ended up realizing was like, there's a billion people riding bicycles here, none of them
05:10want bicycles, and they're building highways and tunnels and bridges so fast. I don't know anything
05:14about climate change. But what does it mean when there's a billion people, more people riding,
05:17driving cars? And then what does that mean when the same happens in India and Eastern Europe and
05:23other developing countries as they raise their standard of living? Ultimately, that led me to
05:29a lot of eye opening around global warming, climate change, whatever, you know, word you want to call
05:33it. And that led to a whole, you know, journey career, then it's kind of the nexus of business and
05:38sustainability into the work I do today. That's so cool. So what did you do after China? Where'd you go?
05:44How did you start this pathway once you had that realization?
05:48Well, I came back to the States eventually and decided that I was going to go get my MBA,
05:54go to business school, and still very interested in international business. So I went to a school
05:59called Thunderbird, which is a fascinating place. It's actually on an Air Force base in just outside
06:05of Phoenix in Glendale, Arizona, started by an admiral right after World War Two, who felt like,
06:11okay, with the rebuilding of Japan, and with the rebuilding the Marshall Plan of Europe, we're
06:15going to need American executives who know culture, business, and language to go overseas and kind of
06:23be these emissaries and help do this. And so that was the foundation for this business school. And so
06:27you, so I ended up going there, and it was in Glendale, Arizona, which is a place that's, has just
06:34about every fast food chain, kind of anything that's sort of soulless and not local, like just
06:41go to Glendale. And then in the middle of that is this Air Force base, which was, it's probably the
06:46most international place in America, maybe outside the UN in New York City, because you get like
06:52students coming there, MBAs from all over the world, and Americans who actually have been overseas
06:56and are going back overseas. So I went there. And as I was going through business school, and then I
07:01went through the dot-com bubble, I still couldn't shake this feeling like I've seen the future. I
07:06saw it in China. I know what's coming. I can get very excited about this business school course about
07:12international marketing and bringing like Colgate toothpaste to Saudi Arabia for like 10 minutes.
07:17And then I'm like, yeah, that's fun and interesting and cool. But like, there's a crisis that is coming,
07:24and I can't be thinking about toothpaste in Saudi Arabia. It took me a really long time, honestly,
07:30coming home from China about five or six years until I realized that the way that I was going
07:35to try to affect change starting out was to think like, we're in America, we're a consumer culture,
07:40I am going to see if I can create companies or work on businesses that help consumers start to
07:46consume in a more sustainable manner. That's my that's my starting point. So I started a company in
07:502004. It was called Viva V, kind of like Viva V, live life. And it ended up becoming like a
07:56modern
07:56design sustainable furniture company. So I was gathering furniture designers from all over
08:02America, who were about my age, probably, you know, late 20s, early 30s, who were had enough
08:08kind of apprenticeship and expertise and knowledge to design really cool stuff. And we're also have a
08:14similar mindset of like, they wanted to make stuff for themselves that was contemporary, that was
08:18modern, but that was also environmentally responsible. And that that combination of modern
08:23contemporary design, and sustainability was entirely new, two decades ago. You know, it's still moving
08:31and growing. And it's not fully mainstream yet. But it was like nothing. And what was so fascinating to
08:37me was one to try and build a business around that. And I had a couple of showrooms in New
08:40York City when
08:41I lived in for four years, because I was bootstrapping this thing. That's a whole different, you know,
08:45story. But what was so interesting to me was like, something was happening across America, probably,
08:50you know, across the world, where people were like, at the same time waking up to this idea,
08:56how can I live a modern contemporary lifestyle, and align that with my values about the environment
09:01around social causes? How could we do that? And so it was really fun to be there, as that was
09:07kind of
09:07taking root in America two decades ago. That's so cool. I love your excitement. Your excitement is
09:15very infectious. I can imagine that's why you've mobilized people, because it's not enough to just
09:20have a good idea. And I don't know, you might not even have the solution, but you're kind of just
09:25there, like, there is something we need to do. The thing that worries me when I hear people talking
09:30so passionately is, especially in the climate crisis is urgency leads to quick action, right?
09:37It's like, there's an emergency, we have to fix it. Now we have to do this. Now, how do you
09:41balance
09:41that? Like, how do you make decisions when it comes to speed, scale, and then the integrity of
09:46putting everything together? Yeah, that's a, I love that question. And then I would layer on top
09:51of it, as someone who works in startups, that brings its own urgency. And then you're balancing
09:56what is urgent versus knowing it's going to take years to actually, you know, sometimes commercialize
10:01a technology or a product, right? So, you know, that timescale thing is really tricky, and especially
10:08around climate, where we think we've got to, you know, we've got to mobilize people now. And yeah,
10:13if they wake up, and they're like, Oh, my God, I want to go, go, go, go, go, and they're
10:16actually
10:16in that space. And then they're like, Ah, well, geez, like, can I really keep this up for, you know,
10:2150 years or net zero by 2050? Like, how do you sustain? Gosh, you know, it's a really good question.
10:28For me, I am, I'm someone who, I think of myself as just as a creative, and my creative expression
10:40often takes the form of starting companies, you know, but I don't really think of myself as like,
10:47Oh, I'm an entrepreneur. I just think of like, there's something that I think is missing in the
10:52world that I really want to bring into the world. And so, you know, I've worked on a number of
10:57different companies, a number of different products written books, had TV shows, I mean, it's,
11:00I've been very fortunate. But it's also, for me, it's like, I know, or I know the lane I want
11:08to be
11:08in, in terms of the kind of change I want to affect, but I'm very open to kind of taking
11:13on new
11:14projects and keeping it fresh for me. So I can still stay kind of, you know, energetic, and recognize
11:21that this is my project for now. This is the work I'm doing for now. It may not be the
11:25work for my
11:26entire life. And I'm okay with that, as long as I'm in my lane of trying to continue to affect
11:30positive change around solving the climate crisis. Definitely. Is there a personal attachment that you
11:36have to just what's happening on the climate sector in general? Is there a specific pain point
11:42that you sort of deal with, or that you're trying to solve with the companies that you create
11:47at the moment? No, I wouldn't say so. I mean, I'm very, always just very focused for me on carbon
11:53reduction. I know we have like the UN sustainability development goals, and I support all of that. But
11:59for me, it is really about there is this climate crisis. And that is where my focus goes. And I
12:06would
12:06say, probably just something in my own personality, in my own psyche, why that is just feel so core to
12:14me,
12:14is that I've always been someone who is looking for, like, what's the biggest thing happening in
12:22the world? How do I go be part of it? How do I position myself? Because like, I want to,
12:26you know,
12:27be in the biggest arena. And that's why I went to China in the 1990s, because I was thinking about
12:33diplomacy, international relations. And I thought, you know, to me, it was like, okay, it's very obvious
12:37that in the 21st century, China and the US, this will become the most important bilateral
12:43relationship in the world. And that was an early insight. I wasn't the first one to figure that
12:49out. But I but certainly it was pretty early to see that and I wanted to position myself to have
12:55a role in it. And then because I was there, I started to see this other thing like, oh, this
13:00sustainability thing is going to become huge. And I was keying into some early research that was taking
13:05place in like 1998, around what were they called different names, but like the bohemian bourgeoisie,
13:11it was like all these 60s hippies, and radical kids who like grew up and went to Wall Street,
13:17and what wanted really nice stuff, but they wanted to be like gardening and back to the land. But now
13:22they wanted to wear their like Prada shoes in the garden, you know. And I just thought like,
13:27yeah, this is gonna this is it, this is going to be massive in the 21st. And this is where
13:31my values
13:32are moving. I want to play in that space. And so that has never changed for me. There's been other
13:36little sort of side things that I've been involved in, like, in some respects, I took a break from
13:42sustainability climate in 2013. My family, like my wife, my young kids, we moved to Asheville, North
13:50Carolina, I'd been working for Amazon. And within Amazon, I was building this business called vine.com,
13:55like tomato on a vine, which was like, an online natural organic sustainability, like specialty
14:02website, Amazon, Amazon owns a bunch of websites. I didn't love working within, you know, kind of the
14:07Amazon empire. It wasn't a great fit for me. And there was a lot about that, that was frustrating. So
14:14I
14:14moved down to Asheville. And I was like, well, this place in general is aligned with my values, because
14:18it's kind of like, you know, it's like Burlington, Berkeley, Asheville, these sort of kind of, you know, as
14:24this actress, Kirsten Dunst, they filmed a movie in Asheville called Masterminds. And I heard her on,
14:29I don't know, Jimmy Kimmel, or Jimmy Fallon talking about her time in Asheville. And she's
14:32like, yeah, it's basically where like hippies go to die. So that's like where I was raising my
14:35family, you know, I was like, okay, well, whatever I do here, it's probably going to be aligned with
14:39my values. And what I ended up doing was I got hired to run something that I built called Venture
14:43Asheville, which was essentially building Asheville, North Carolina startup community and entrepreneurial
14:49ecosystem. So how do you help founders get the capital, get the team, get the mentorship,
14:55get all the resources to build high growth companies. And a lot of those companies by
14:59virtue of that type of culture, a lot of those companies were sustainably driven.
15:03So my work was to support the city. So it wasn't like, you know, directly like one to one,
15:09everything's sustainable. But I did that work. And as I was doing that work, I was like, oh,
15:15this kind of startup community entrepreneurial ecosystem thing, this is going to be a really
15:18big deal. And I was like, I'm not the first one to see it, but I'm kind of early to
15:23see it.
15:24And I love doing that work too. And now it is a really big deal, you know, all over the
15:27world.
15:27So like, that's my sort of, I don't know if I would say superpower, but it's like, it's like,
15:33because I'm probably thinking so much about where the world's going. I came to those things. And for
15:37me, the one thing that just never really, the one thing that's completely stuck is climate change,
15:43biggest challenge of the 21st century. I'm just always going to work on this.
15:47Yeah. And it sounds like you've got an incredible gut feeling.
15:51Yeah, I suppose that's right. Yeah. Thank you.
15:55It's like, see, it's a huge town to see writing on the wall and see most people ignore it and
16:02say,
16:02no, actually, I'm going to go for it because the writing is on the wall, right? Most people just
16:07don't. They're like, nah. Ignorance is bliss. Remember? No, I was, I was going to ask, you
16:13know, like we, you sound very much like someone who's very optimistic about our, our, our place
16:19and where we can go, right? What we can do about climate change, about sustainability. How would
16:25you respond to the people that say that, that what you want is like to have your cake and eat
16:31it too,
16:32you know, you want there to be like, like a bunch of startups you want. Um, I think realistically,
16:39right. Um, you want to be able to, to, to keep on having all these luxuries and being able to
16:46consume these unique products and, and constantly have innovation while also helping the environment,
16:53which, which I, I feel a lot of people are skeptical, skeptical about. They're like, we have
16:57to cut back on everything. You know, how would you respond? Or what would you respond to that?
17:02Do you agree? Do you disagree?
17:04What I would say, and I mean this kindly is they don't know what they're talking about.
17:13Ooh. Okay.
17:14Because if you look at where we're going, I would say two things. And I, and I know that sounds,
17:20maybe that sounds harsh and it sounds probably harsher than the, the way I think about it. But,
17:25um, I think two things, if you look at what's happening today and the business models that are
17:30emerging, um, and this is the realm that where I, where I, where I think about a lot, but not
17:35even
17:35just business models. If you talk to mayors of like cutting edge cities, um, which I do like the,
17:39like I had a conversation recently with like the mayor of like former mayor of like Barranquilla in
17:45Columbia. Right. And he did something where he was like, look, we're going to go plant all these trees.
17:50And people are like, no, it's going to be too expensive or no, like they're going to get in the
17:53way.
17:54And he was like, well, look at this in London where trees have been intentionally planted.
18:00Um, the value of the buildings and the homes on those streets have gone up by 10%. And that means
18:06tax revenue has also gone up by 10%. And so the return on investment for the city, if we plant
18:12these
18:12trees in a very hot area where kids are like sometimes even passing out on the way to school,
18:17we'll not only have these health benefits, it's actually going to pay for itself.
18:20There's a return on investment to the city. Right. And if we build these parks and if we'd like take
18:25care of our parks, we will revitalize the local economies and we will have places where people
18:30can congregate and we can bring more greenery and towards like, et cetera, et cetera. Right. So
18:33that's not even like, uh, me pitching a business, right? That's like the mayor of, you know, in
18:39Columbia who knows that it's ridiculous to even think about like the responsibility of, of his citizens
18:46for climate change. When the carbon impact of one of their sins is like one 15th of an American,
18:51but yet the business case or the economic case is so compelling. And so to me, what I think is
18:58like
18:58on this macro level where if you're in a city and you're thinking you're the mayor, you're in city
19:04planning, you're, you're like, Hey, I want to, how are we going to raise the quality of life for our
19:09citizens? What should we do? Right. Anything you do to do that to, you know, you, Oh, okay. We got
19:15to fix public transit. We got to put in better bike lanes. We got to create more pedestrian friendly
19:19places for people to be able to get to where they want to go. All of that's going to raise
19:23the
19:23quality of life and all of that's going to cut carbon footprints. Right. And it's like the linkage
19:28goes both ways. This, when you look at, I was recently talking with an executive, this guy has an
19:33amazing job at Schneider Electric, which many consider it's always winning these awards when the most
19:37sustainable companies in the world. It's a French company. They do a lot of like infrastructure.
19:41I mean, stuff, it's like invisible stuff, but they're a big company. And the guy I was signing
19:46who's written like six books, he's the head of their internal think tank. And his job is to like,
19:50think about what's going to happen 25 years from now and work backwards and be like, where should we
19:53go as a company? Like, like, like who could have a better job? And he said to me, he's like,
19:59can you think of anything, Josh, that is like a modern upgrade that is not electric? Anything,
20:10right? Like electric cars, right, are way better than gas powered cars. Things that are happening
20:14in homes today where, you know, induction range cooking is considered by many top chefs to be far
20:22superior than cooking on a flame. The problem is that if you live in a house with, and you want
20:27induction range, and at least in America, you can go buy that, that oven, that stove, whatever,
20:32but you might need to spend thousands of dollars to run a different power line to your kitchen.
20:37So this company called copper figured out, well, geez, if we put a battery inside the induction range,
20:43then you can just plug it into the same outlet as your toaster. And the battery will charge during
20:48the day. And the three, maybe four times you want to cook, you're going to have all the energy you
20:52need and you can avoid that. Right. And so the modern thing is actually the better quality of
20:57life thing, better cooking and increasingly accessible. So when I, where I'm going is
21:00like, we're, however, we upgrade our lives from here on, it's going to be electrified. And if you
21:06can, and we see, this is the last thing I'll say, and I'll pause, but like in 2024 and in
21:112025 globally,
21:13over $2 trillion each year was invested into clean energy. That's solar, that's wind, that's electric
21:18vehicles, that's upgrading grids, $2 trillion. In 2025 was $2.2 trillion globally. It's the first year
21:25that that's ever doubled what's gone into fossil fuel investment. And so like the scale of what we
21:31can't see, because a lot of the stuff is like invisible, but solar fields that are like hectares,
21:36like hundreds, if not thousands of hectares, right? This is the world that we're moving into.
21:41And so I think that the future is, can be, there's no guarantees, can be better than today,
21:49abundant, more prosperous. And by trying to pursue that, we will cut carbon. Can I give one more example?
21:54You know, I'm just like rambling on here. Okay. So you mentioned, you mentioned in the intro that I
21:59had started this company called Planted. I recently returned to Planted as a fractional chief marketing
22:05officer, because now we're, we're what, five years in and we're evolving as a company. So I've come
22:10back in to kind of clarify the story, kind of coordinate the team, take us on this next part of
22:14the mission. Planted makes building materials out of fast growing grass, kind of like bamboo. It's
22:22not bamboo, but it's thinner. And we're to pull carbon from the atmosphere, 10 times faster than
22:27trees, because this grass grows 10 times faster than trees. It's structural, it has the same kind
22:31of structure trees. And then I started this thing with a team of SpaceX, these brilliant engineers. And
22:36so we took a mill that has massive smokestacks that's spewing lots of, you know, like carbon
22:43emissions into the air by trying to take trees and turn them into like plywood or materials to build
22:47homes. We basically shrunk that thing down to something that's like 140 feet long, goes in any
22:53warehouse, you can plug it in. And out the other end comes like similar building materials, just made
22:58out of grass instead of trees. And we work with the largest home builder in America now, D.R.
23:03Horton, that gave us an order last year for a hundred million of these panels. And so this means
23:09every time you build a house now with our materials, you're actually taking carbon from the atmosphere
23:13and locking it away in your walls. And it's stronger and it's more moisture resistant. And so in my mind,
23:19it's like build more. The more you build, the more you're actually taking carbon from where it's like
23:24really harmful in the atmosphere and putting it somewhere where, because it's carbon is actually
23:27good as like a useful building material, you're putting it somewhere where it's doing good. Carbon's just in
23:32the wrong place and we need to put it in the right place. And so that's what informs my mental
23:36model.
23:38That's really awesome. I think, I think that's like a mentality that a lot of people,
23:42a lot of people, a lot of people would go away from it just on, on principle, even though it's
23:48not
23:48practical, right? Like they're like, okay, maybe, maybe we can, but we shouldn't because all this chase
23:54of innovation is what got us here in the first place. Right. But I like to talk, I like really
23:59like
23:59talking with people that are like, no, no, no. If you really look at the practicality, it's just
24:03way more practical to do things, to just go with the progress. And at least in this field, right?
24:09Because there's progress that's kind of, but as a sustainability thing, it's just the way it just
24:15seems like, it seems like we are really developing the technologies to trap carbon, to, to make
24:22people's lives better, more convenient and sustainable. Right. I mean, I guess what I'd
24:30say is like, I, that's the future that I latch onto. And I also see the, the flip side of
24:35it,
24:35right? It's just not my focus because there's nothing I can do about it. And what I mean by that
24:40is, you know, we started planted about in a town called Oxford, North Carolina, about 45 minutes
24:47north of Raleigh, Durham. And it's awesome. We moved into a former American spirit cigarette factory
24:53because they shut down. And so there's like, we're actually in this tobacco factory. There's
24:57these cool murals on the wall. And I feel like, okay, these past century, this, this industry from,
25:03you know, that is beyond its time is going away. We are the 21st century thing. And we started this
25:08whole new climate crop and we've got tobacco farmers converting to our crop. And it's an amazing story.
25:13Right. But at the same time, when I first moved down or was looking at, well, where are we going
25:18to live as we move to Raleigh, Durham? When you drive on the outskirts of Raleigh, you know,
25:22you just see, cause this is an area that's one of the fastest growing in America, just the, this,
25:28just suburban spread and sprawl. Right. And, and, and, and you hear the governor. And at this time,
25:36like for a number of years, I was on his entrepreneurial council. And so that was a nice experience.
25:40And I would go down for meetings too. And I would then know I would like drive around,
25:43be like, where are we going to live? And I would see the sprawl. And I'd be like, Hmm,
25:46here's a democratic governor. He's very practical. He's getting, you know, a lot of props because
25:49he's got a climate plan for North Carolina, but that is a bunch of BS because you can have all
25:55the climate plans you want. But if you're going to allow suburban sprawl, that just like people are
26:00going to be in their cars forever. And like, we have to convert to electric, but it might not happen
26:04fast enough. Right. I get all that too. Right. Like that's, I'm not blind to the arguments of why
26:10that, that someone would say, you know, kind of countering what I'm suggesting. Like I see all
26:17that too, but I guess the question is, or I guess my view is both can be true at once.
26:23Right. And so
26:24where do you want to put your attention? Not to deny like this sad reality of how we are developing
26:29as
26:30humans at the same time as this new thing is birthing called the low carbon economy, but where
26:34do you want to focus your attention? Because that's really like the one thing you can control,
26:39right? That's what you have agency over is where do you want to go put your focus and what do
26:44you
26:44want to affect in the world? Yeah. And was that the motivation behind the lazy environmentalist then
26:49sort of understanding that as passionate and driven as you are with all these big ideas,
26:55there's still a big number of the population that is like, I have no idea,
26:59like there's, there's no point. The lazy environmentalist started in a, in an extremely
27:05personal place. And that's when I mentioned, I'd started this furniture company and I decided I
27:10actually started, I left out a little bit of my story, but I had gone into a PhD program at
27:15George
27:15Washington university to study political science and environment and China. And, and, you know,
27:21I probably had some like Jack Ryan fantasy, if you know, cause like get my PhD and be like,
27:26cause you know, cause I'm kind of an idiot that way. And I was a semester into this thing and
27:31I was
27:32like, Oh hell no. My brain just does not, like, I can't, I just can't like, I have to go.
27:37And so I
27:38started Vavavi. I quit that program. I was just such a doofus. I was like 30 years old. I emailed
27:44all my
27:45like professors. I'm like, Hey, sorry, family emergency, you know, like not coming to class.
27:50And in a PhD program, like they're just like way too lenient. Cause I guess they figure you're like
27:54a responsible person, you know? And I'm like, I'll keep the student loans, but I'm going to like,
27:59just do my own thing for a little bit. And I'll, you know, be a TA for this class or
28:03whatever. And
28:04started trying to build this company. And anyway, I realized I was going to move it to Brooklyn after
28:08about a year and a half. I had one employee, um, working for me in DC, just this little startup
28:13working out of my house, a little e-commerce site to begin with. And she wasn't moving to New York
28:18with
28:18me, but we made a deal. I was like, look, if you help me pack up, I will, cause I'm
28:23moving to
28:23Brooklyn. I'll give you the van that we would take to trade shows and stuff as, as like a parting
28:28gift. Um, this has been great working together. So she was like, yes. And we get, and so we,
28:34she helps pack me up and we get on the New Jersey turnpike. It's late at night. It's probably like
28:39midnight. Now we're driving up to Brooklyn to go to this apartment where I'm subletting room. I
28:45and, um, Lucy, this young woman is, I mean, I was young too, but whatever. She's like in the
28:50passenger seat, like, like kind of hyperventilating, like, and I'm like, what is going on? I'm like,
28:55are you all right? And she says, Josh, look, I have to ask you something. I have to get this
28:59off
28:59my chest. This was in 2004. She's like, I couldn't ask you when you're my boss, but you know,
29:05you're not my boss anymore. I'm like, Oh, that's all true. She's like, there's something I just
29:08really need to know. And so I immediately thought like, Oh my God, she's attracted to me. I was like,
29:16I was like, she's attracted to me. This is crazy. Yeah. So I was like, what's going to happen?
29:23Where's this night going? I'm going to a new apartment. Never been there. I'm subletting a
29:27room. There's a roommate. I don't even know where the key is. Like what, what's going on? You know?
29:31So I, I get really nervous and I'm like, but this is kind of cool. So I'm like, it's okay.
29:35You know,
29:35you can tell me anything like what, anything. It's totally fine. So finally she works up her
29:39nerve and she's like, okay, I don't want you to take this the wrong way. Um, but are you really
29:44an environmentalist? And she's like, you know, so, so first of all, not at all attractive. She's
29:49like, you're always in the shower. You barely recycle. You were going to throw your bed out.
29:52I took it to the homeless show. Like basically like you are an a-hole and a hypocrite and you're
29:57selling all this eco stuff, but like, you're the worst environmentalist I've ever met. And, um,
30:02and I just like, I almost just started laughing cause it was like so true. You know, it was so
30:08true. And she's like, and I don't understand you cause you're devoting your entire life to this
30:13mission and cause, but like what? And so the lazy environmentalist, I wrote a blog about myself
30:21cause I figured, you know, I'm just going to own this authentically. It's true. And so I wrote a
30:25little blog on our little furniture company's website called the lazy environment about myself.
30:30And I was like, I take long showers. I do my best thinking in the shower. I'm not going to
30:33change
30:34even though I really care about the environment. And I know I'm using water and energy. I need a
30:39amazing low flow shower head, right? With sick pressure to solve this for me, right? I want an
30:44Audi TT convertible. If I could afford it, I don't care if it's electric or biodiesel or hydrogen. Like
30:50if it's green and it's what I want, but it's what I want, I'll do it. But I'm, I'm lazy
30:55and I need
30:55convenience. And I feel like there's millions of Americans who feel like I do that. If it were
31:00easy for us and aligned with our values and fit our lives, cause we're so busy,
31:04we would do it too. And that, you know, I was like, I'm a lazy environmentalist. And then
31:08right place, right time. That concept became a, you know, a Sirius XM radio show and a reality TV show,
31:15but it was born out of that recognizing my own behavioral challenges. Right. And feeling
31:24like probably a lot of other people would feel that way too.
31:26Then in that case, if someone, you know, who's listening wanted to contribute to climate solutions,
31:32but they're kind of like, ah, but I have to fly to give this workshop about how to cut carbon,
31:37you know, like all these things that we deal with in the climate space, what would you tell them?
31:43Well, I'm hearing two things. I'm hearing one, the hypocrisy of like, okay, well, so one,
31:49if like, you know, I think about that. I, every time I see Katy Perry flying somewhere to like talk
31:53about climate change, I'm just like, what? Like, first of all, I'm like, why is anybody even writing
31:58about this? Because like, this is so stupid. Um, you know, or like, and, but then like the
32:04criticism of like, oh, well, Al Gore, you know, flies all over the world giving his talks. And I'm like,
32:09what else is he supposed to do? You know? So of course he's going to go fly all over the
32:13world.
32:14I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I, right. I know Greta Thunberg, she took a sailboat to,
32:20you know, she's sailing, you know, and now flying. It's like, well, okay. I mean, I, I get the,
32:26the, you know, the stand she's taking. I don't know. I don't know the answer to that because I just
32:32think this is really complex. And I think people have to figure out where those lines are for,
32:41for themselves, you know, like, because, you know, the question is, what do you think really
32:52moves the needle? And what I mean by that is, do you think, okay, I have a job where I
32:59need to get on
32:59in a, in a plane and go fly somewhere to give a talk? What happens if I get to that
33:03talk and I
33:04influence someone who influences someone who influences someone like, how do I quantify that
33:09value versus what I can clearly quantify is like, I'm one of 150 people on this plane,
33:16this plane emits XYZ carbon. I may be responsible for this and much carbon, even though this plane was
33:21going to fly, whether I was on it or not, like how you do that math and, or how you
33:27kind of think
33:28about that equation in your own mind. I don't have an answer for how someone lines up their own
33:35equation to figure where they net out. I don't know. I do think that we are still in this movement
33:41building phase. And I still think that like, you don't need to move everybody. So if you're in a
33:47position to get on a plane and go move the people who are open and want to get moved, I
33:51feel like
33:52that's still a really good thing to do. And the only thing I would say to quantify that, and it's
33:55not a
33:56direct link, but I will say this, cause this is my mental model years ago. And I can't think of
34:01the woman's name. She's, I thought she was a professor. She may be a professor at Harvard,
34:04but this woman studies, um, movements like mass movements that are successful. And it's not
34:09necessarily mass movements for climate, but like mass movements for, let's say massive political
34:14change, like in Argentina, where maybe they're trying to topple the government or, or create reform,
34:20like that type of thing, right? As countries are, and a lot of it's democratization, but her research
34:25found that you don't need the whole country to mobilize to actually affect that change. And the
34:31tipping point tends to be when something like four to 5% of the population is in the streets,
34:39that tends to be the tipping point. Cause at four to 5%, that means that everybody knows somebody
34:44who's out there. It could be an aunt, an uncle, a cousin, a daughter or whatever, but everybody knows
34:49someone and everybody has a stake now in those protesters or marchers or mobilizers being safe
34:56and, and how the government's going to react. And that tends to be when change happens. And that says
35:01to me, we don't need everybody, right? Like you need some amount of critical mass who really cares
35:07to keep caring. And we're going to get there.
35:09Yeah. And it sort of exemplifies what we always hear about the importance of networking, right?
35:14It might be worth taking that plane to go give that talk. Cause you'll be in the right rooms
35:18with the right people, meet the right people, and then they will spread it over. And yeah,
35:23we're, we're social creatures. So networks are extremely important to us and we love a good story,
35:28you know? So if you can tell the right story to the right person, not everyone needs to hear it,
35:34but the right person's kind of going to carry that with you. So what's, what's your story?
35:38What narrative do you want to leave us with?
35:40I would just say that there is so much more good stuff happening than many of us realize.
35:50And I do think that the key thing for all of us is to decide where we're going to put
35:57our focus,
35:58right? Not to, not to deny the scariness of this moment, the overwhelm of what's happening in climate,
36:05the impacts that communities are already feeling today, right? That is so difficult and so challenging
36:13and so hurtful and harmful. And yet to hold that, to that understanding and see that the future we,
36:23we really want is actually being built today. You know, it's not evenly distributed, right? It's not
36:29everywhere at once, but the, the pieces are out there. And the more that I do think, like you're
36:34saying, the more we, we focus there and spread that information as fast as possible. That's my theory
36:40of change, right? Like to understand what is real, what is operational, what is commercialized,
36:45what is de-risked so that others could do it too, and then help that awareness move as fast as
36:50possible
36:50around the world. So we can get to this, you know, abundant, prosperous, low carbon future.
36:55I love it. Thank you so much, Josh, for being on Tangelic Talks. We're going to stay on for a
37:00bit
37:00longer, but you can find Josh on our blog and all his links, all his work. We're going to stay
37:08on
37:08with him so he can talk us through some climate solutions, finance, and a bit of scaling, because
37:13I really want to touch on that again. Is there anything that you want to let our listeners know
37:18that is coming out for you that you want to plug, website that you want them to check out?
37:23Yeah, thank you. Well, our website for Supercool, so where we're covering the rise of the low carbon
37:28economy and the companies helping to build it, is getsuper.cool. We just launched a new newsletter
37:35so that comes out on Tuesdays called Deployed, and Deployed is what happened in the past week
37:41to build the low carbon economy, what went operational. I love it. It's a really cool, it's like,
37:47to me, it's like the new geography of the low carbon economy. And so, yeah, if people are
37:54interested in that type of thing, I'd encourage them to check it out. Perfect. We're going to link
37:58that on the blog, so check it out at TangelicLife.org, and we'll catch you guys on the next one.
38:03Bye.
38:03Bye.
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