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Welcome to another episode of the Kronos Fusion Energy Podcast.

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I'm Priyanka Ford, the founder of Kronos Fusion Energy, and today we have the privilege of

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hosting Sushma Bhatia, our esteemed board advisor for environment and legislative affairs.

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Sushma's career spans over 20 years with diverse experience across public service, consulting,

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startups and leading technology firms.

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In addition to Kronos Fusion Energy, Sushma also serves as the director of GTM sales tools

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at Google, where she leads a team of product managers and engineers to develop state-of-the-art

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sales and partnership tools.

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Prior to this role, she was the global head of strategy and operations for payments and

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next billion users, shaping Google's financial services partnership solutions program.

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Additionally, Sushma is a board member for the state of California, appointed by Governor

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Gavin Newsom to the California Board of Environmental Safety.

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In this role, she provides strategic guidance and drives public engagement on environmental

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safety topics.

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Sushma's background also includes a successful tenure at Accenture, where she served as a

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business strategy executive and chief of staff for the office of the CMT, Chief Technology

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Officer.

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Beyond her professional achievements, Sushma holds an MBA from UC Berkeley and a master's

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degree in chemical engineering from the University of Southern California.

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Today we'll explore Sushma's extensive experience and her insights into technology, sustainability

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and fusion energy.

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We'll also discuss her contributions to environmental safety and her vision for a cleaner, more

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sustainable future.

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I met Sushma on a train in San Francisco over a decade ago, and we became quick friends,

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sharing common goals.

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Get ready for an insightful and engaging conversation with Sushma Patia.

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Here's my friend, Sushma.

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So I'll tell you that from an angle, from the angle of environmental protection alone,

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there's a lot we can do with AI.

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For example, EIRs or environmental impact reports can take an average of five years.

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Imagine if we could use AI ML, this is artificial intelligence and machine learning, to shorten

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this time frame.

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We could make quicker decisions related to development.

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Some other use cases for AI ML could be to detect illegal landfills, monitor forest health,

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monitor biodiversity and so on.

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Of course, all of this assumes that we will have unlocked the challenge of how energy

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intensive AI ML can be.

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So Sushma, you work, you're an environmentalist and you work with AI and machine learning.

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What is the connection between those two and how does that help society going forward in

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the near term as well as long term?

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I think there are a few different threads here to explore.

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One is today we have a huge environmental crisis.

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I think this is undeniable.

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Most people will agree that there are climate impacts that are touching everyone on the

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globe in different ways.

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So we're at a moment in time where every solution available has to be fully explored and not

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just explored in traditional sense of making incremental progress, but making step changes

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in how we think about environmental health protection.

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Those are two concepts that are very intertwined.

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At the same time, we have a new revolutionary moment that AI presents.

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It is promising and so promising in terms of the way it can impact all of us in a positive

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way, driving productivity and so on.

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We also know that AI is very energy intensive.

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So how might we use AI in ways that can drive greater environmental and health protection?

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How might we find more cleaner energy or cleaner ways to power AI to then ultimately build

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solutions for us?

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And that would be a very interesting use case to solve.

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I was reading a study earlier this week that said that it was the energy usage of one Google

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search versus one open AI prompt.

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And it was going to be the AI prompt uses up 10 times more energy than a flat Google

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search.

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Then it depends on what you're prompting, I guess, like the complexity of your prompt.

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But it would be-

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That and then the models.

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Exactly.

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Yeah.

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But it's really something.

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And also then we talk about cryptocurrencies and the computing load of that.

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Are you into that?

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Are you into cryptocurrencies, by the way?

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I am not, but my husband is.

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He dabbles in them.

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And I'm just acutely aware of all of the energy, how energy intensive even cryptocurrency is.

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I previously worked in a municipality, I think you're aware.

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And through my work in local government, I became aware of the health impacts from energy

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choices that we make.

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I was in roles where I would figure out what's coming out of smokestacks and what are the

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chronic and acute health impacts of things coming out of smokestacks.

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So this ultimately affects people.

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Sometimes when we think about energy choices, they can seem somewhat removed.

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But what brings this home for people is the connection that those energy choices are ultimately

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creating impacts in our bodies.

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We read about chemicals showing up in breast milk, for example.

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Those are largely coming from fossil fuels or chemicals that are derived ultimately from

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fossil fuels.

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So making that connection for myself was how I became more interested in energy choices

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and concepts of energy equity and creating policies or programs that allow consumers

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to have choices about where the energy comes from as a way to protect their own health.

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A lot of the energy production waste has gotten into food systems and water systems in the

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past as well.

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How do we measure these things and how do we mitigate this in the future?

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How do we right the wrongs of our ancestors?

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There is no single answer or solution, but I see this as a multitude of solutions.

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But they all start with greater awareness and a bias for action across businesses, communities,

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and regulators.

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Let's take, for example, waste products that we throw away every day.

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Now we know there is no such thing as a way.

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And there are some specialized hazardous waste landfills for materials that continue to be

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hazardous even after they're used or spent.

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We have come a long way in deepening our regulations as well as our enforcement activity to address

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these concerns that communities have, these communities that live by these landfills.

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They're called fence line communities.

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So similarly, let's look at biomonitoring.

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So biomonitoring is a program where we are able to look at the information of chemicals

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that accumulate in our bodies.

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So in our bloodstreams, in our breast milk, and so on.

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We are at a very early stage of using this data to inform policies and investments in

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programs such as the Safer Consumer Products Program.

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All of this is progress from the historic days, as you call it, when regulations were

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not as strict as they are today.

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The standards today are much more health protective and they continue to get better.

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So to bring us back, I think there is a greater connection now that we know that what we consume

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impacts our bodies.

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The choices we make, including our energy choices, they impact our health.

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And by consume, I don't just mean the food we eat.

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You ask the question about how do we solve for this?

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So ultimately, I'd like to say, vote with your dollar.

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And there's been campaigns in the past that talks about, hey, putting the burden on the

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consumers to make better choices, be more responsible, read the labels, and become scientists,

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so on.

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But I do think that there are more game changing, broader policy and programmatic decisions,

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new technology solutions that can make step changes more quickly versus relying on 8 billion

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people to make different choices.

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So how might we accelerate the transition to clean energy portfolios?

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I think that there have been some great examples of how, for example, these new policy choices

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and incentives, we've moved the needle in terms of electric vehicle adoption.

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How can we apply that model to drive the adoption of innovation?

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Yeah.

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So I think the more we automate some of these measurement processes, at least the more visibility

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we'll have into the situation.

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Would you say things are getting better over the last decade or worse?

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I've heard someone use a phrase called apocalyptic optimist.

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And I think I want to adopt that.

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I think I'm both and depends on the moment in time, which part of the equation dominates.

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And I think sometimes the apocalyptic view dominates and other times the optimist view

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dominates.

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I think today at this moment in time, I'm more of the optimist.

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I'm an optimist because, yes, these problems have existed, but there's also greater awareness

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and there is more solutions that are available to us, they're being developed and that we

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just need to get behind them and move them forward as quickly as possible.

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The fact that you and I are having this conversation and you have founded a nuclear fusion company

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and I'm all behind it.

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The fact that I 15 years ago or 20 years ago was one of the people that was vehemently

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anti-nuclear because I had only seen the nuclear fission side of the world and was looking

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at the portfolio of a municipality from that lens of how do we create a clean energy portfolio.

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And I'm really struggling to understand why nuclear energy was logged as a cleaner energy

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aspect of the portfolio.

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So I've made that switch in that last decade and now recognizing that this is a real possibility.

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That is the optimist part of me.

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While that's happening, there's also things around safer consumer products.

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There's a whole movement around creating brands that bring cleaner, safer ingredients and

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there's greater adoption of those.

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There's some third party labels that allow consumers to make choices that are safer for

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them.

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So all of this is the optimist side of me.

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I recognize there's a lot to do.

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In general, there are smart people working on the solutions.

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Yeah, I'm definitely hopeful as well.

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I feel there's one way to look at fusion in that it's going to help the larger things

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that you want.

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So if you look at Maslow's pyramid of needs or something, there's enabling AI and cryptocurrencies

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and industrial heating and all of that.

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And then there are parts of it where you're like, there are almost non-monetizable parts

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of it where you would have cleaner oceans, just less waste going into things, just the

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lack of radiation.

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I feel if there is this much amount of damage we can do in 150 years of industrial revolution,

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there's a lot that can be undone in a hundred years of whatever the opposite of that looks

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like.

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And I don't know what the opposite of that looks like, but I would like for fusion to

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be a part of that.

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I imagine AI is a huge part of it.

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And as you said, just knowledge of what's even going into our bodies is important, just

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as important as enabling cryptocurrency.

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It's also a very, very important thing, but there isn't a monetary profit attached to

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it.

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So during your switch, I definitely am curious to know about your anti-nuclear to pro-nuclear

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to pro-fusion anyway shift.

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What was that like?

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What was the thought process there?

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It's two things.

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One is completely just looking at the science, the science aspect of fission versus fusion

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and educating myself about how they're different.

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And the second thing is this moment in time.

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I keep talking about this moment in time because I think we've spoken about we are so close

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depending on who you speak to, we either reach a tipping point or we've crossed it or we

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are just about to reach it.

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So that forces the conversation of what can we do now to create that step change.

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And this fusion presents, first of all, from the science aspect, it is clearly different

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from fission.

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It is the offers the only option for clean, limitless clean energy as we spoke about.

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Yes, I think solar is a part of the mix and hydro is a part of the mix and all of these

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other clean energy sources are part of the mix.

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But the potential of fusion is so massive that if we can unlock it, it can create that

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step change very quickly for us.

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So I think to answer your question, there's two things.

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There's the science aspect, which is really digging in and understanding that fusion is

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very different from fission and that my point of views in the past were tied to fission

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and also the aspect of radioactive based.

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As you know, I have this bend of what are the health impacts from the choices we make

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and the choices we make as a society, not as individuals.

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And recognizing that fusion actually doesn't create those long lasting radioactive base

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like nuclear fission does.

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So the science aspect and then the second thing is the moment in time aspect.

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This technology has seen many breakthroughs in the recent days as early as the last two

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weeks.

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So it might be just get as a society, get that energy behind it and drive it to commercialization.

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Yeah, I agree with that.

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Fission always scared me.

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The reason it scared me is because the advent of it brought about the invention of so many

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weaponizable things.

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And especially like watching, did you watch Oppenheimer, by the way?

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I did.

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He did.

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Absolutely.

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He wanted to do fusion.

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The dude was all in on fusion.

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He wanted to do fusion and then he got distracted, I suppose, to say the least.

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Yes.

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And then if you talk about the concept, I talked earlier about the concept of there's

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no such thing as a way.

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So when you talk about radioactive waste, where are you going to store that?

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There is no away.

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It ends up being stored in the soil somewhere and there's spent like communities there.

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There's a risk of meltdowns or natural disasters exposing them.

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That risk continues to remain for many, many, many hundreds of years.

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And that is my concern.

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It's like you're solving one problem with another.

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Yeah, I mean, tens of thousands of years, Sushmabu.

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I mean, do we even know if there'll be human beings around that will remember to take care

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of this?

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You know, like, how do things translate?

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It scares me too.

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It scares me too.

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We could undo millions of years of global evolution just by a couple of accidents here

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and there with fission.

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And that is not sustainable, just no matter how you look at that.

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As you know, I work as part of a government board.

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It's called the Board of Environmental Safety of California.

239
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And in this role, I often think about how might we reduce the generation of hazardous

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waste in California and how might we manage it safely within our state.

241
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And I've also become aware of how much has changed, not only in terms of our awareness,

242
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but also in terms of our regulatory response.

243
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In the past, it may have been legal to dig up the land and store unwanted lead paint

244
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cans there.

245
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It was also legal to develop that land with parks and communities and such.

246
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This was assumed to be safe when we were not aware that lead was, in fact, really toxic

247
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and that there was no safe level of lead in our bodies.

248
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We were also not aware that the movement of earth could perhaps cause exposures to that

249
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lead for future generations.

250
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When we draw the parallel to spent nuclear waste or radioactive waste, I feel it is exponentially

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scarier to imagine how we might inadvertently create risk of exposures for future generations.

252
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So in my mind, it's not sustainable.

253
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It's not part of the sustainable solution for us.

254
00:20:02,880 --> 00:20:05,360
However, fusion is so different from it.

255
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And that creates the optimism.

256
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Right.

257
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Of course.

258
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But also, from my perspective, I like it in terms of large scale commercialization.

259
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If we're going to enable all of these technologies in the future, everything is plugged into

260
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some sort of power somewhere.

261
00:20:24,240 --> 00:20:28,880
Have you heard of the incident where they found barrels of chemicals off the coast of

262
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California, like out where I live?

263
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Yes.

264
00:20:32,400 --> 00:20:33,400
Yes.

265
00:20:33,400 --> 00:20:34,400
What was that?

266
00:20:34,400 --> 00:20:35,400
I can't remember.

267
00:20:35,400 --> 00:20:36,400
What was that?

268
00:20:36,400 --> 00:20:37,400
It was from decades ago.

269
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I think well before regulations even existed.

270
00:20:41,600 --> 00:20:48,200
Today we've come a long way as we discussed, both in terms of addressing all this legacy

271
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pollution, but also in terms of creating more health protective regulations and programs

272
00:20:54,640 --> 00:20:59,120
for facilities that continue to operate in the state.

273
00:20:59,120 --> 00:21:08,200
Yeah, I often think about that with fusion being almost a clean slate a little bit.

274
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In terms of energy, what can be done in order to avoid some of the pitfalls, as you said,

275
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that other energy sources have caused this inequity?

276
00:21:25,380 --> 00:21:29,320
How do we avoid some of that when it comes to fusion?

277
00:21:29,320 --> 00:21:37,720
Is this something like governments need to prioritize certain communities over others?

278
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Is that even pragmatic if you want to have a successful country?

279
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What do you feel about that?

280
00:21:47,320 --> 00:21:49,440
Two things.

281
00:21:49,440 --> 00:21:56,920
One is if you look at what has happened with electric vehicle adoption, if you try and

282
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look at the statistics for where the electric vehicle charges are installed, like where

283
00:22:00,600 --> 00:22:01,600
is that infrastructure?

284
00:22:01,600 --> 00:22:06,480
You will find that there's fewer or there's less infrastructure for electric vehicle charging

285
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in those what I call traditionally environmental justice communities.

286
00:22:11,000 --> 00:22:12,320
Why is that?

287
00:22:12,320 --> 00:22:17,040
Clearly that's because there's some sort of disincentive or like the incentive is not

288
00:22:17,040 --> 00:22:20,320
quite there to drive adoption.

289
00:22:20,320 --> 00:22:25,680
And how can governments create programs, and I think this is already happening at the federal

290
00:22:25,680 --> 00:22:30,200
level, to make sure that that infrastructure is equitably available in environmental justice

291
00:22:30,200 --> 00:22:31,200
communities?

292
00:22:31,200 --> 00:22:32,200
So that's one.

293
00:22:32,200 --> 00:22:37,000
The second thing which I think will happen by default as clean energy gets adopted is,

294
00:22:37,000 --> 00:22:40,840
I'm sure in your lifetime you've been past a refinery.

295
00:22:40,840 --> 00:22:45,440
There's refineries that exist today and there's communities that live by refineries.

296
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And those end up being those environmental justice communities.

297
00:22:48,560 --> 00:22:51,000
They see higher burdens of pollution.

298
00:22:51,000 --> 00:22:56,960
But in a world where we have distributed clean energy options, there's less of those refineries

299
00:22:56,960 --> 00:23:02,000
living in communities or like less communities living by refineries that are spewing out

300
00:23:02,000 --> 00:23:03,120
air pollutants.

301
00:23:03,120 --> 00:23:10,760
So I think that becomes a great equalizer where you take out one aspect of what creates

302
00:23:10,760 --> 00:23:15,080
the environmental burdens in these communities, which is dirty energy.

303
00:23:15,080 --> 00:23:20,080
And I think I want to call out that distribution aspect of things, because the distribution

304
00:23:20,080 --> 00:23:25,360
itself with all of the trucks moving back and forth, that creates a whole other level

305
00:23:25,360 --> 00:23:26,360
of pollution.

306
00:23:26,360 --> 00:23:28,180
It's another lever that creates pollution.

307
00:23:28,180 --> 00:23:33,080
So if we have distributed clean energy, there's less transportation, there's less emissions

308
00:23:33,080 --> 00:23:37,200
coming out of the smokestacks or there's no smokestacks, plus there's less trucks moving

309
00:23:37,200 --> 00:23:40,960
back and forth, moving the energy source back and forth.

310
00:23:40,960 --> 00:23:51,120
Yeah, when I was at COP 28 in December, I talked about using fusion energy industrial

311
00:23:51,120 --> 00:23:54,280
heat for processing liquid fuels.

312
00:23:54,280 --> 00:23:58,280
And I see I've driven by a lot of these communities.

313
00:23:58,280 --> 00:24:02,940
And I think it's not so much the liquid, it's not so much the oil itself.

314
00:24:02,940 --> 00:24:09,240
It's like the processing of the oil is like doing more damage to the environment than

315
00:24:09,240 --> 00:24:15,080
the exhaust from your car after you put it in your car.

316
00:24:15,080 --> 00:24:21,240
They're both harmful, but the processing part is so dirty in so many levels.

317
00:24:21,240 --> 00:24:24,660
And we feel like that's something that can be cleaned up with fusion.

318
00:24:24,660 --> 00:24:27,960
And also, petroleum's not going anywhere.

319
00:24:27,960 --> 00:24:33,240
I'm sitting in my room and I know half the things here are made out of plastic and that's

320
00:24:33,240 --> 00:24:34,920
pretty much petroleum.

321
00:24:34,920 --> 00:24:37,200
Yes, absolutely.

322
00:24:37,200 --> 00:24:45,040
Which is why we're agreeing that it's, I think, we solve not all the problems with clean energy,

323
00:24:45,040 --> 00:24:50,600
but we solve a chunk of it, a significant chunk of it in terms of the immediate climate

324
00:24:50,600 --> 00:24:52,360
challenges we're facing.

325
00:24:52,360 --> 00:24:59,360
Plus we solve an aspect of the health burdens and pollution that communities are experiencing.

326
00:24:59,360 --> 00:25:00,880
We solve these challenges.

327
00:25:00,880 --> 00:25:07,200
And then there's more, which with targeted policy and programs, we can solve for, like

328
00:25:07,200 --> 00:25:09,520
the use of plastic, for example.

329
00:25:09,520 --> 00:25:10,520
Right.

330
00:25:10,520 --> 00:25:11,520
Right.

331
00:25:11,520 --> 00:25:16,520
And I think even when we're talking about economically disadvantaged, we're looking

332
00:25:16,520 --> 00:25:20,080
at it from an America perspective because we're here.

333
00:25:20,080 --> 00:25:27,200
But it's also, I mean, economic disadvantage means something entirely different in poorer

334
00:25:27,200 --> 00:25:37,440
countries where there are countries that don't have electricity for 12 hours a day and things

335
00:25:37,440 --> 00:25:38,440
like that.

336
00:25:38,440 --> 00:25:46,160
And you think about what that does economically to what they can manufacture, to the education

337
00:25:46,160 --> 00:25:48,160
of their children.

338
00:25:48,160 --> 00:25:55,400
And I was born in India and so I kind of understand having a light bulb in your house makes a

339
00:25:55,400 --> 00:25:57,600
huge difference, just that one thing.

340
00:25:57,600 --> 00:25:58,600
Absolutely.

341
00:25:58,600 --> 00:25:59,600
Absolutely.

342
00:25:59,600 --> 00:26:04,680
The scale of the problem we're talking about is depending on where you are, it is so much

343
00:26:04,680 --> 00:26:07,200
can be so much more amplified.

344
00:26:07,200 --> 00:26:11,400
And the sense of urgency can be so much more amplified, like the flooding in Pakistan,

345
00:26:11,400 --> 00:26:15,040
like we've heard about, it's a historical level of flooding.

346
00:26:15,040 --> 00:26:20,960
But I think this is where I talked about the burden is not shared, the responsibility is

347
00:26:20,960 --> 00:26:25,560
shared comes in is the burdens are not distributed equally.

348
00:26:25,560 --> 00:26:34,080
And this is why the urgency that the moment calls for is maybe not felt equally across

349
00:26:34,080 --> 00:26:36,120
the globe.

350
00:26:36,120 --> 00:26:42,960
I know that in terms of regulatory stuff, that it's a little bit positive here in that

351
00:26:42,960 --> 00:26:48,240
fusion is going to be regulated differently than fission and that America is making it

352
00:26:48,240 --> 00:26:53,600
easier for fusion energy startups to kind of grow and build and flourish.

353
00:26:53,600 --> 00:26:56,520
But how do we translate that globally?

354
00:26:56,520 --> 00:27:00,520
You've lived in a lot of places globally.

355
00:27:00,520 --> 00:27:02,880
What do you think?

356
00:27:02,880 --> 00:27:05,960
Change can happen in my perspective in two ways.

357
00:27:05,960 --> 00:27:11,880
And I do think that regulations and government agencies will have very significant role to

358
00:27:11,880 --> 00:27:14,400
play in creating a whole system.

359
00:27:14,400 --> 00:27:24,760
I think that actually innovation and technology, that in itself is the other creator of change.

360
00:27:24,760 --> 00:27:30,640
And I'm saying this because if you look at AI, for example, now, you called out how energy

361
00:27:30,640 --> 00:27:37,520
intensive a search on a large language model can be relative to a traditional search.

362
00:27:37,520 --> 00:27:38,520
That is true.

363
00:27:38,520 --> 00:27:47,720
And as AI, the use of AI accelerates and intensifies, these technology providers are going to be

364
00:27:47,720 --> 00:27:51,440
asking about cleaner options for themselves.

365
00:27:51,440 --> 00:27:55,920
And because they're going to have to report to their shareholders in terms of some level

366
00:27:55,920 --> 00:28:01,320
of ESG like governance, what is their mix of energy use, they're going to start to look

367
00:28:01,320 --> 00:28:03,920
for a cleaner energy solution.

368
00:28:03,920 --> 00:28:07,840
So I think that is they're both equally important.

369
00:28:07,840 --> 00:28:14,960
In fact, if ideally they would both be happening in parallel to create that impetus and the

370
00:28:14,960 --> 00:28:19,440
energy that's required to more propel this forward.

371
00:28:19,440 --> 00:28:30,160
Yeah, I think about how difficult it is to for a technology like fission to have global

372
00:28:30,160 --> 00:28:36,000
commercialization because of the regulation for it.

373
00:28:36,000 --> 00:28:41,280
And just like the weaponizable qualities of it and the environmental impact, all of those

374
00:28:41,280 --> 00:28:42,600
things, of course.

375
00:28:42,600 --> 00:28:50,240
So we have to we almost have these like global regulatory committees that stop the building

376
00:28:50,240 --> 00:28:53,400
of fission plants in certain countries and whatnot.

377
00:28:53,400 --> 00:28:59,360
And I feel like all of that, we can avoid all of that with fusion.

378
00:28:59,360 --> 00:29:03,200
So globalization would be a little bit easier if but it.

379
00:29:03,200 --> 00:29:09,840
Yeah, I don't know which which way the regulation will go globally with this.

380
00:29:09,840 --> 00:29:18,800
Yes, I mean, typically regulation comes in when there is any potential for harm.

381
00:29:18,800 --> 00:29:26,160
There's aside from a license to do business in a country, there's aspects of energy, water,

382
00:29:26,160 --> 00:29:31,960
wastewater, social impacts that that business can create.

383
00:29:31,960 --> 00:29:38,800
And this is why most governments run something like something called EIR process or EIR reporting,

384
00:29:38,800 --> 00:29:43,920
which is an environmental impact risk assessment to figure out is it OK to cite this kind of

385
00:29:43,920 --> 00:29:48,520
a business within within their communities and what sort of impacts would that create,

386
00:29:48,520 --> 00:29:50,600
is that acceptable risk and so on.

387
00:29:50,600 --> 00:29:55,200
But and there's clearly established impacts when it comes to fission.

388
00:29:55,200 --> 00:30:00,680
But fusion is completely different than I would imagine that there's many governments

389
00:30:00,680 --> 00:30:05,320
haven't even quite figured out how do you do even regulate fusion.

390
00:30:05,320 --> 00:30:10,240
And is there I think in order to answer that question, like some some of what is required

391
00:30:10,240 --> 00:30:14,320
is education in educating the regulatory agencies, educating the communities.

392
00:30:14,320 --> 00:30:17,960
Hey, not all not all nuclear energy is the same.

393
00:30:17,960 --> 00:30:19,400
This is different.

394
00:30:19,400 --> 00:30:23,920
And doing that often more frequently in the early stage, like now before it starts to

395
00:30:23,920 --> 00:30:28,840
get commercialized or actually help commercialize it more and bring it to market more quickly.

396
00:30:28,840 --> 00:30:31,240
Yeah, get ahead of it.

397
00:30:31,240 --> 00:30:32,240
Yes, absolutely.

398
00:30:32,240 --> 00:30:33,240
You can.

399
00:30:33,240 --> 00:30:34,240
I know.

400
00:30:34,240 --> 00:30:42,880
There is a breakthrough in in Google where you are with like the material sciences.

401
00:30:42,880 --> 00:30:48,880
We talked about this a few weeks ago where, you know, basically used an EI to have to

402
00:30:48,880 --> 00:30:51,960
have material to build material compositions.

403
00:30:51,960 --> 00:30:55,720
Why haven't we used a eye to end poverty?

404
00:30:55,720 --> 00:31:01,280
Sushma, like why haven't we tuned in a high to basically give us all the answers to end

405
00:31:01,280 --> 00:31:02,280
poverty?

406
00:31:02,280 --> 00:31:05,080
Would we listen to that?

407
00:31:05,080 --> 00:31:11,240
Maybe I will have to achieve what they call AGI, Artificial General Intelligence.

408
00:31:11,240 --> 00:31:16,480
And at that point or well before that point, maybe government agencies will have systems

409
00:31:16,480 --> 00:31:23,840
in place to disallow the development of AI to the degree that it can give us that level

410
00:31:23,840 --> 00:31:28,000
of intelligence, because what if one of the solutions is like, let me just end humanity.

411
00:31:28,000 --> 00:31:30,600
Like in this humanity, there's no need for housing.

412
00:31:30,600 --> 00:31:31,600
There's no need for poverty.

413
00:31:31,600 --> 00:31:34,840
Like all of these become become a point.

414
00:31:34,840 --> 00:31:37,640
And joking and getting ahead of myself.

415
00:31:37,640 --> 00:31:42,000
I think we're very the AI race is very nascent.

416
00:31:42,000 --> 00:31:45,880
I think many questions have not quite been answered.

417
00:31:45,880 --> 00:31:52,120
Actually the because I live in Silicon Valley, I hear the word AI a million times a day,

418
00:31:52,120 --> 00:31:54,440
but there are parts of the world that have not heard it.

419
00:31:54,440 --> 00:31:55,440
Right.

420
00:31:55,440 --> 00:32:00,000
Like there are parts of the world that don't know what shy GPT is or Gemini is or so on.

421
00:32:00,000 --> 00:32:05,040
So I'd say they're very, very early in the race and there's a lot more development that

422
00:32:05,040 --> 00:32:07,760
is already happening and that's going to continue to happen.

423
00:32:07,760 --> 00:32:14,280
I do think that as the development is happening, there is development of regulations happening

424
00:32:14,280 --> 00:32:19,440
in Europe as traditionally been the outsourcer of regulations, as I call it.

425
00:32:19,440 --> 00:32:24,440
A lot of the regulatory frameworks that in Europe or France, Germany, and so on.

426
00:32:24,440 --> 00:32:29,160
So we see them again, taking the front seat on regulating AI.

427
00:32:29,160 --> 00:32:33,920
And I do see many, many, they are doing this and I see many other countries.

428
00:32:33,920 --> 00:32:37,080
So I think all of these things are going to shape up, shape out.

429
00:32:37,080 --> 00:32:42,160
I think what would be really great is governments are typically slow to adopt it, but it would

430
00:32:42,160 --> 00:32:47,240
be great for governments to start using AI to drive the greater good.

431
00:32:47,240 --> 00:32:51,400
Like I mentioned this example of the AIR, they typically take five or 10 years.

432
00:32:51,400 --> 00:32:56,720
Wouldn't it be great if we could use AI to accelerate the timelines and make development

433
00:32:56,720 --> 00:33:03,080
decisions more quickly and understand health and social impacts and make better choices?

434
00:33:03,080 --> 00:33:05,920
So all of those things, I think, can happen now.

435
00:33:05,920 --> 00:33:06,920
Yeah.

436
00:33:06,920 --> 00:33:08,920
Yeah, that is the problem.

437
00:33:08,920 --> 00:33:12,520
Humanity is not the AI, I guess.

438
00:33:12,520 --> 00:33:13,520
That's weird.

439
00:33:13,520 --> 00:33:14,520
Yeah.

440
00:33:14,520 --> 00:33:15,520
Yeah.

441
00:33:15,520 --> 00:33:16,520
So, oh no.

442
00:33:16,520 --> 00:33:23,240
So the best way to have an energy efficient house is not have a human in it.

443
00:33:23,240 --> 00:33:24,240
That's what we're saying.

444
00:33:24,240 --> 00:33:25,240
Yes, at this stage, all of us.

445
00:33:25,240 --> 00:33:26,240
At this stage, yeah, it's too bad.

446
00:33:26,240 --> 00:33:35,760
Maybe we'll make ourselves useful to the AI overlords and they'll decide not to destroy

447
00:33:35,760 --> 00:33:40,640
us or we'll have singularity and we'll all become one.

448
00:33:40,640 --> 00:33:43,640
We'll need a power system.

449
00:33:43,640 --> 00:33:44,640
Neuralink, something like Neuralink.

450
00:33:44,640 --> 00:33:46,640
We'll all come together.

451
00:33:46,640 --> 00:33:47,640
There you go.

452
00:33:47,640 --> 00:33:48,640
Yeah.

453
00:33:48,640 --> 00:33:53,320
I see amazing things with bionic arms and legs.

454
00:33:53,320 --> 00:33:58,080
Seeing bionic arms that make you want to chop your arm off.

455
00:33:58,080 --> 00:33:59,920
We should probably cut that one out.

456
00:33:59,920 --> 00:34:00,920
Yeah.

457
00:34:00,920 --> 00:34:01,920
Yeah.

458
00:34:01,920 --> 00:34:10,520
So let's talk about ethical considerations.

459
00:34:10,520 --> 00:34:18,960
How do we, how do we, there are clean, even with fusion, there are clean ways to do fusion

460
00:34:18,960 --> 00:34:21,720
and there are dirty ways to do fusion.

461
00:34:21,720 --> 00:34:31,440
And there are a lot of ways where the way that humanity decides to commercialize fusion,

462
00:34:31,440 --> 00:34:36,620
there are many ways we could do it where it almost offsets the good and clean energy it's

463
00:34:36,620 --> 00:34:39,800
doing it by having like a really dirty supply chain.

464
00:34:39,800 --> 00:34:41,160
Do you see what I'm saying?

465
00:34:41,160 --> 00:34:46,160
Like so there has to be a way to keep it pure.

466
00:34:46,160 --> 00:34:50,200
How can we, how can we ensure that?

467
00:34:50,200 --> 00:34:55,360
So the example, one example of what we just talked about is like an electric vehicle.

468
00:34:55,360 --> 00:34:58,960
And oftentimes this question has come up about are electric vehicles truly clean?

469
00:34:58,960 --> 00:35:03,560
If you look at the life cycle of electric vehicles, all of the energy it takes to produce

470
00:35:03,560 --> 00:35:10,000
the vehicle might sometimes be greater than the lifetime emissions that one vehicle might

471
00:35:10,000 --> 00:35:11,000
produce.

472
00:35:11,000 --> 00:35:17,080
So I think this is sort of a societal question, but a great question for governments to answer,

473
00:35:17,080 --> 00:35:22,840
which is with any technology, any workflow, any process, there's a spectrum of ways to

474
00:35:22,840 --> 00:35:23,840
do it.

475
00:35:23,840 --> 00:35:28,840
And if I look at the parallel of how we handle those today, it's through regulation.

476
00:35:28,840 --> 00:35:34,160
We basically have situations where any business in California, for example, would have to

477
00:35:34,160 --> 00:35:38,360
get a permit to operate, especially if it is using hazardous materials and generating

478
00:35:38,360 --> 00:35:39,360
hazardous waste.

479
00:35:39,360 --> 00:35:46,280
So on a case by case basis, the regulators would go in and say, hey, like I, for this

480
00:35:46,280 --> 00:35:48,840
particular workflow, there's cleaner ways to do this.

481
00:35:48,840 --> 00:35:51,920
I'm going to require that you use the cleanest ways to do this.

482
00:35:51,920 --> 00:35:56,240
And they would include those requirements in a permit condition within the permits to

483
00:35:56,240 --> 00:35:59,760
say this is the only way you can operate in California.

484
00:35:59,760 --> 00:36:06,520
And of course, this creates some level of inequities from state to state because a facility

485
00:36:06,520 --> 00:36:09,600
would have different set of requirements they would have to meet if they were to operate

486
00:36:09,600 --> 00:36:13,040
in California versus Nevada versus Arizona and so on.

487
00:36:13,040 --> 00:36:19,040
But we at a principles level in California that said, we uphold the highest levels of

488
00:36:19,040 --> 00:36:20,840
environmental and health protection.

489
00:36:20,840 --> 00:36:24,680
And that means that's going to translate to certain requirements for you.

490
00:36:24,680 --> 00:36:27,920
And that is a cost of business, cost of business in California.

491
00:36:27,920 --> 00:36:33,720
So drawing that parallel in your world, I think in the world of fusion, I do see regulatory

492
00:36:33,720 --> 00:36:39,440
agencies stepping up and creating different set of requirements to ultimately move them

493
00:36:39,440 --> 00:36:44,440
along the spectrum of the cleanest nuclear fusion options available.

494
00:36:44,440 --> 00:36:47,960
And this might take time because this requires education.

495
00:36:47,960 --> 00:36:52,240
So if you think about the kinds of permits and permit conditions that were written 10

496
00:36:52,240 --> 00:36:58,200
years ago, very different from what is written into a permit condition or a permit today.

497
00:36:58,200 --> 00:37:04,040
Because agencies have learned what that, what cleanest way of functioning or working is.

498
00:37:04,040 --> 00:37:08,780
So that might happen in the future in order to where some what you call dirtier forms

499
00:37:08,780 --> 00:37:13,720
of nuclear fusion come to market, then the regulatory agencies learn and then sort of

500
00:37:13,720 --> 00:37:16,480
move them along the spectrum over time.

501
00:37:16,480 --> 00:37:19,840
Yeah, there are zoning issues now.

502
00:37:19,840 --> 00:37:25,320
Like if you have, I think if you have any system whatsoever that produces neutrons,

503
00:37:25,320 --> 00:37:33,600
which all fission systems do, they have to be in a certain location away from XYZ, like

504
00:37:33,600 --> 00:37:35,760
a certain civilization or whatnot.

505
00:37:35,760 --> 00:37:43,200
But I think that basically any experiment, any energy production, anything that produces

506
00:37:43,200 --> 00:37:53,320
neutrons has to be outside of, of, of busy large cities, which is why I think when I

507
00:37:53,320 --> 00:37:59,360
first started with the fusion energy and we were thinking about where to build our facility,

508
00:37:59,360 --> 00:38:04,520
somebody asked me, they said, are you the type of, are you the type of fusion that can

509
00:38:04,520 --> 00:38:06,880
even build in California?

510
00:38:06,880 --> 00:38:09,400
And I didn't understand that question.

511
00:38:09,400 --> 00:38:15,920
And I looked into it and it turns out that if you have a neutron producing fusion energy

512
00:38:15,920 --> 00:38:21,720
system, so even if you are Lawrence Livermore National Lab or Berkeley or, or, you know,

513
00:38:21,720 --> 00:38:29,360
or UCLA, if you have, or General, General Atomic Dynamics or General Atomic, sorry,

514
00:38:29,360 --> 00:38:35,400
is in California as well, any of these fusion energy experiments that have neutrons have

515
00:38:35,400 --> 00:38:41,240
to be far away and anything, and we're yet to have an experiment that does not produce

516
00:38:41,240 --> 00:38:42,240
neutrons.

517
00:38:42,240 --> 00:38:44,900
So we would be like one of the first ones.

518
00:38:44,900 --> 00:38:50,220
But I feel like California has a vague idea, but I don't, but you're right.

519
00:38:50,220 --> 00:38:53,760
I don't think the knowledge exists.

520
00:38:53,760 --> 00:39:01,920
And what I fear is that I don't want to inadvertently make the same mistakes that the people that

521
00:39:01,920 --> 00:39:08,240
dumped off the California coast, those barrels made where they didn't do enough research

522
00:39:08,240 --> 00:39:13,800
to know the impact of their waste over the course of the next four decades.

523
00:39:13,800 --> 00:39:19,600
And now we're sitting here scratching our heads as how could we allow this to happen?

524
00:39:19,600 --> 00:39:20,600
Yes.

525
00:39:20,600 --> 00:39:26,120
It's, it's growing to me that that even happened.

526
00:39:26,120 --> 00:39:30,880
And I would even say like to your question point about zoning laws, they exist today

527
00:39:30,880 --> 00:39:32,520
because we've learned from the past.

528
00:39:32,520 --> 00:39:34,960
There were some meltdowns and health impacts and so on.

529
00:39:34,960 --> 00:39:39,240
And then those we learned as a society and created zoning laws and so on.

530
00:39:39,240 --> 00:39:41,640
I can also tell you, are they good enough today?

531
00:39:41,640 --> 00:39:42,640
That's questionable.

532
00:39:42,640 --> 00:39:48,280
Like there are situations where you'll find what looks like industrial polluters that

533
00:39:48,280 --> 00:39:51,200
are next to communities because the zoning allows for it.

534
00:39:51,200 --> 00:39:56,120
So whatever we, what we thought was good enough 10, 15 years ago is no longer good enough,

535
00:39:56,120 --> 00:40:01,200
which means we have to keep getting better in the way we regulate, in the technologies

536
00:40:01,200 --> 00:40:02,480
we use.

537
00:40:02,480 --> 00:40:11,640
And the regulations just create a way to push people along that spectrum of the cleanest,

538
00:40:11,640 --> 00:40:16,440
most environmentally friendly, most health protective option that it was.

539
00:40:16,440 --> 00:40:21,760
Does regulation get in the way of economic progress, Sushma?

540
00:40:21,760 --> 00:40:26,960
And if so, is there a number where it's worth the price?

541
00:40:26,960 --> 00:40:32,720
Like it's just kind of collateral damage where money is more important, but then there's

542
00:40:32,720 --> 00:40:39,040
a point where no matter how much money it's not worth doing the damage or something like

543
00:40:39,040 --> 00:40:40,040
that.

544
00:40:40,040 --> 00:40:41,440
Where is that threshold?

545
00:40:41,440 --> 00:40:47,840
And should a government have to enforce such a thing?

546
00:40:47,840 --> 00:40:56,480
I think you're asking really important, beside to problem questions.

547
00:40:56,480 --> 00:41:02,400
I from my perspective believe that regulations are important and have a role to play in a

548
00:41:02,400 --> 00:41:09,200
capitalist society where businesses, companies are optimizing for shareholder value and their

549
00:41:09,200 --> 00:41:16,760
bottom line, choosing options that are not as health protective or create pollution in

550
00:41:16,760 --> 00:41:21,640
the environment might create or generate more profits for them.

551
00:41:21,640 --> 00:41:26,920
So regulations do have a role to play where we're collectively moving society towards

552
00:41:26,920 --> 00:41:32,520
cleaner options and leveling the playing field to some degree so that that burden is equally

553
00:41:32,520 --> 00:41:36,000
shared and everybody has to move along.

554
00:41:36,000 --> 00:41:40,440
Having said that, it is a really difficult problem to solve.

555
00:41:40,440 --> 00:41:46,720
And I will tell you from, I was at a board meeting yesterday, there are many communities

556
00:41:46,720 --> 00:41:52,320
very upset at the pace of government that it is not protective enough.

557
00:41:52,320 --> 00:41:58,960
And there's equally equal number of upset permit holders and businesses that feel that

558
00:41:58,960 --> 00:42:04,480
government is too health protective and imposing too many requirements.

559
00:42:04,480 --> 00:42:10,280
So I'd say, I joke about this, I often say everybody hates us equally, we're getting

560
00:42:10,280 --> 00:42:11,280
it right.

561
00:42:11,280 --> 00:42:18,840
And it translates from something and that joke aside, there are some principled ways

562
00:42:18,840 --> 00:42:21,960
of doing this to make this equitable.

563
00:42:21,960 --> 00:42:26,040
For example, we think about something called cancer risk and there's a number to it.

564
00:42:26,040 --> 00:42:31,320
So we say, as a society, we've said, hey, if the cancer risk is one in a million, that

565
00:42:31,320 --> 00:42:32,320
is acceptable.

566
00:42:32,320 --> 00:42:38,080
If a new process, a new permit, something we're creating is going to create a risk

567
00:42:38,080 --> 00:42:42,000
of one person getting cancer amongst a million people, that is acceptable.

568
00:42:42,000 --> 00:42:44,320
But everything beyond that is not acceptable.

569
00:42:44,320 --> 00:42:49,040
So then we require best available control technologies and so on to reduce that cancer.

570
00:42:49,040 --> 00:42:53,000
So I'm just giving you one example, but there's so many other examples like this of numbers

571
00:42:53,000 --> 00:42:59,800
we use to help make that decision and trend that balance carefully between economic benefit

572
00:42:59,800 --> 00:43:02,440
versus environmental health protection.

573
00:43:02,440 --> 00:43:06,120
And I actually like to believe that there is no trade off.

574
00:43:06,120 --> 00:43:08,240
This is an artificial trade off.

575
00:43:08,240 --> 00:43:14,760
Ultimately, it is this trade off doesn't actually exist if we can get it right.

576
00:43:14,760 --> 00:43:15,760
Right.

577
00:43:15,760 --> 00:43:23,440
So there's a gauge and there's a calculation of risk for all of these technologies.

578
00:43:23,440 --> 00:43:30,480
But the fact that we even need to have it makes it that it's not a win.

579
00:43:30,480 --> 00:43:32,960
Everything is a loss.

580
00:43:32,960 --> 00:43:36,440
But one is lesser of a loss than the other.

581
00:43:36,440 --> 00:43:41,320
In this situation where we're not talking about newer technologies like AI, we don't

582
00:43:41,320 --> 00:43:43,720
have that calculus built out for AI yet.

583
00:43:43,720 --> 00:43:48,120
And that's why we earlier spoke about how there's government agencies looking at AI

584
00:43:48,120 --> 00:43:52,200
from the perspective of where do we play, how do we play, we want innovation, but at

585
00:43:52,200 --> 00:43:58,600
the same time, we don't want to fit all of these downstream impacts from this technology,

586
00:43:58,600 --> 00:44:01,360
like potential risk of AGI and so on.

587
00:44:01,360 --> 00:44:06,200
So there are these unanswered questions and there's new technologies that come up, but

588
00:44:06,200 --> 00:44:13,640
where we've had legacy answers from processes that exist, we use regulations to move folks

589
00:44:13,640 --> 00:44:14,640
along the spectrum.

590
00:44:14,640 --> 00:44:16,720
What is the risk of AGI?

591
00:44:16,720 --> 00:44:23,280
So is AGI just the fact that AI has a conscience, like it has decision making without actually

592
00:44:23,280 --> 00:44:28,240
us having to give it a decision based on a logic?

593
00:44:28,240 --> 00:44:29,240
Is that what it is?

594
00:44:29,240 --> 00:44:35,360
Is it just like, it's gone rogue and now it has a mind of its own and we fear that?

595
00:44:35,360 --> 00:44:36,360
Are we to fear that?

596
00:44:36,360 --> 00:44:46,680
So it's something called alignment problem, which is in theory, if the AI is working to

597
00:44:46,680 --> 00:44:54,960
solve for us, so we are completely aligned, then it makes sense for the AI to produce

598
00:44:54,960 --> 00:45:00,160
whatever it's producing with understanding that we have the same definition of a set

599
00:45:00,160 --> 00:45:01,160
metric.

600
00:45:01,160 --> 00:45:07,000
But if there's no alignment, then that creates a problem for us because then AI could make

601
00:45:07,000 --> 00:45:13,000
decisions that are not aligned in terms of what we would like to achieve with that answer.

602
00:45:13,000 --> 00:45:18,520
Oh, Sushma, but human beings make decisions against their own wealth.

603
00:45:18,520 --> 00:45:19,520
All the time.

604
00:45:19,520 --> 00:45:20,520
All the time.

605
00:45:20,520 --> 00:45:21,520
All the time.

606
00:45:21,520 --> 00:45:27,480
I think that's made like for today, that was probably just not the best thing for me.

607
00:45:27,480 --> 00:45:28,480
Yeah.

608
00:45:28,480 --> 00:45:29,480
Yes.

609
00:45:29,480 --> 00:45:35,320
And this is where I worry that part of me worries that this AI world is going to create

610
00:45:35,320 --> 00:45:43,960
8 billion versions of truth because I'm only going to, my alignment or my focus is to get

611
00:45:43,960 --> 00:45:50,280
content that concerns my bias already.

612
00:45:50,280 --> 00:45:53,400
So the content that's reinforced in my confirmation bias.

613
00:45:53,400 --> 00:45:59,760
So if we have that happening 8 billion times over, that's like every single person walking

614
00:45:59,760 --> 00:46:02,160
around with their own version of truth.

615
00:46:02,160 --> 00:46:04,840
And what does that mean for other than society?

616
00:46:04,840 --> 00:46:07,880
No, that scares me a little bit.

617
00:46:07,880 --> 00:46:10,480
But I'm happy to, it scares me a little bit.

618
00:46:10,480 --> 00:46:16,160
Be like, wow, we cannot as a society agree on fact because we think 8 billion versions

619
00:46:16,160 --> 00:46:17,160
of fact agree.

620
00:46:17,160 --> 00:46:23,960
See, I'm thinking that the only reason we have all of these issues is because we don't

621
00:46:23,960 --> 00:46:26,960
have AGI yet.

622
00:46:26,960 --> 00:46:38,040
I feel like humanity is what is messing up, is what is feeding the bias.

623
00:46:38,040 --> 00:46:46,000
I think conceptually with AGI, that bias itself would be removed and it would just kind of

624
00:46:46,000 --> 00:46:47,600
tell us what's best.

625
00:46:47,600 --> 00:46:48,600
Yes.

626
00:46:48,600 --> 00:46:51,200
So right now, like this whole thing.

627
00:46:51,200 --> 00:46:53,640
Yeah, that's exactly right.

628
00:46:53,640 --> 00:47:00,080
Like, so this, you know, you may have heard about this, but how AI is hallucinating or

629
00:47:00,080 --> 00:47:01,080
like telling people.

630
00:47:01,080 --> 00:47:02,080
No, I haven't.

631
00:47:02,080 --> 00:47:03,080
How are you happy?

632
00:47:03,080 --> 00:47:04,080
What is the thing?

633
00:47:04,080 --> 00:47:10,200
So just for the LLMs that are the generative AI solutions out in the market, if you test

634
00:47:10,200 --> 00:47:16,240
them and various journalists have tested them to various degrees and they start to hallucinate,

635
00:47:16,240 --> 00:47:20,320
I think there was one New York Times reporter that was asked to read his lines and there's

636
00:47:20,320 --> 00:47:30,080
a whole bunch of biases that the current generative AI tools are starting to demonstrate.

637
00:47:30,080 --> 00:47:35,920
And the whole concept behind that is when someone puts in a prompt, the existing AI

638
00:47:35,920 --> 00:47:41,920
solutions are transforming the prompt so that they add more color to the prompt that a user

639
00:47:41,920 --> 00:47:42,920
is providing.

640
00:47:42,920 --> 00:47:49,880
So ultimately to, in an attempt to give better responses of the AI generative response, they're

641
00:47:49,880 --> 00:47:53,200
transforming the prompt that a user gives.

642
00:47:53,200 --> 00:48:00,080
And in some cases, what happened recently was the prompt transformations were in the

643
00:48:00,080 --> 00:48:07,200
intent of transforming them to create more inclusive solutions or responses that might

644
00:48:07,200 --> 00:48:08,800
be more inclusive.

645
00:48:08,800 --> 00:48:15,040
The transformations were done behind the scenes to the point that when someone asked AI for

646
00:48:15,040 --> 00:48:18,880
a picture of the founding fathers, the image that the AI generated was a bunch of brown

647
00:48:18,880 --> 00:48:19,880
people.

648
00:48:19,880 --> 00:48:20,880
Right.

649
00:48:20,880 --> 00:48:23,440
So it's things like that.

650
00:48:23,440 --> 00:48:26,680
But all of that just gets to your point.

651
00:48:26,680 --> 00:48:33,080
There's such a high degree of human intervention in the AI development process that it's bias

652
00:48:33,080 --> 00:48:34,400
in bias out.

653
00:48:34,400 --> 00:48:35,400
Right.

654
00:48:35,400 --> 00:48:43,080
And that bias went the other way a few years ago in that it was only able to recognize

655
00:48:43,080 --> 00:48:45,120
white male faces.

656
00:48:45,120 --> 00:48:46,120
Yes.

657
00:48:46,120 --> 00:48:47,120
Correct.

658
00:48:47,120 --> 00:48:52,840
Especially with like, my goodness, especially with facial recognition with the companies

659
00:48:52,840 --> 00:48:54,960
and things like that, there were issues.

660
00:48:54,960 --> 00:48:59,040
And now it's kind of so nobody's nobody is getting away.

661
00:48:59,040 --> 00:49:05,440
I think everybody is affected by it one way or the other, no matter who you are.

662
00:49:05,440 --> 00:49:06,440
Interesting.

663
00:49:06,440 --> 00:49:09,360
Yes, a lot of problems for us to solve.

664
00:49:09,360 --> 00:49:13,960
I'd say like bringing this back full circle, like if I actually want to solve the AI problem,

665
00:49:13,960 --> 00:49:17,360
which is not a problem, but essentially like develop this technology, put it in the hands

666
00:49:17,360 --> 00:49:21,960
of eight billionish people on earth, that's going to require a lot of energy.

667
00:49:21,960 --> 00:49:26,000
It's going to create a lot of productivity and it's going to really improve people's

668
00:49:26,000 --> 00:49:27,000
quality of life.

669
00:49:27,000 --> 00:49:28,000
So I fundamentally do that.

670
00:49:28,000 --> 00:49:30,480
But then it's very energy intensive.

671
00:49:30,480 --> 00:49:35,560
So how could we solve that now versus creating even more health impacts from dirty energy

672
00:49:35,560 --> 00:49:40,160
and having and like flooding our health care systems that are already pretty burdened?

673
00:49:40,160 --> 00:49:42,680
Yeah, it's all connected.

674
00:49:42,680 --> 00:49:44,720
But it always it all comes down to energy.

675
00:49:44,720 --> 00:49:48,680
I mean, sometimes I think maybe that's me because that's my world.

676
00:49:48,680 --> 00:49:50,560
But but it's the truth.

677
00:49:50,560 --> 00:49:54,200
Everything comes down to energy and how we use it.

678
00:49:54,200 --> 00:49:55,960
Yeah.

679
00:49:55,960 --> 00:50:01,360
How do we get how do we get young people who are unhappy and not on?

680
00:50:01,360 --> 00:50:02,880
And that that's bothering me.

681
00:50:02,880 --> 00:50:07,240
I really this reading that earlier this week, it really bothered me.

682
00:50:07,240 --> 00:50:10,760
They're all unhappy because they don't see hope in the future.

683
00:50:10,760 --> 00:50:15,000
So it's why you you're on the cutting edge of a lot of things here in terms of AI, machine

684
00:50:15,000 --> 00:50:17,080
learning, fusion energy.

685
00:50:17,080 --> 00:50:22,320
How do we get how do we get these guys to be a little happier and participate and be

686
00:50:22,320 --> 00:50:23,320
hopeful?

687
00:50:23,320 --> 00:50:30,640
So I don't actually see the lack of optimism in youth as much.

688
00:50:30,640 --> 00:50:34,960
And this might be the getting to the apocalyptic optimism part of me, which is I'm more of

689
00:50:34,960 --> 00:50:39,240
an optimist on this side, because I'll just tell you from the example yesterday.

690
00:50:39,240 --> 00:50:44,120
Yesterday's board meeting, I had maybe over a dozen UC data students show up and talk

691
00:50:44,120 --> 00:50:49,480
about how the issue you thought we were discussing were important to them.

692
00:50:49,480 --> 00:50:51,520
And that just made.

693
00:50:51,520 --> 00:50:53,880
Firstly, for me, my heart sank.

694
00:50:53,880 --> 00:50:55,200
It's like this is what we need.

695
00:50:55,200 --> 00:51:01,840
We need you to be more engaged, you to show up and have their voices be heard.

696
00:51:01,840 --> 00:51:02,840
And that matters.

697
00:51:02,840 --> 00:51:07,800
So I do think that there's an awareness gap.

698
00:51:07,800 --> 00:51:13,120
I just if we can cross that awareness gap and get drive more awareness with you, they

699
00:51:13,120 --> 00:51:19,160
will be more engaged is my my optimism is is that it's an information problem.

700
00:51:19,160 --> 00:51:22,800
And of course, information problem is a very hard one to solve in the world of tic tocs

701
00:51:22,800 --> 00:51:29,400
and Instagrams and so on that that drive their attention away from real issues like energy

702
00:51:29,400 --> 00:51:31,080
and climate and so on.

703
00:51:31,080 --> 00:51:37,840
So how might we may perhaps even using these platforms drive awareness and get them engaged.

704
00:51:37,840 --> 00:51:39,840
Any thoughts on Tic Toc ban?

705
00:51:39,840 --> 00:51:44,200
Do you think that will actually happen?

706
00:51:44,200 --> 00:51:48,760
So there's a lot of hurdles before my personal point of getting there's a lot of hurdles

707
00:51:48,760 --> 00:51:53,640
before it can it can pass like it passed the House vote at their Senate and then the president

708
00:51:53,640 --> 00:51:57,160
has signed it like those both.

709
00:51:57,160 --> 00:52:01,880
There's two different steps in the process, but this bill on the table can fail at.

710
00:52:01,880 --> 00:52:08,560
But there's also the issue of like, if the bill were to be passed and signed into law,

711
00:52:08,560 --> 00:52:13,440
then like, how do we decide who the new owner of Tic Toc can be in the US?

712
00:52:13,440 --> 00:52:19,800
Like, what does to say that whoever decides to reject the investor group decides to buy

713
00:52:19,800 --> 00:52:25,280
Tic Toc is not biased in some way or like doesn't have interest in the Chinese government

714
00:52:25,280 --> 00:52:31,040
in China and so on that can meet the principles of what this ban is about.

715
00:52:31,040 --> 00:52:34,240
I think that hasn't quite been solved.

716
00:52:34,240 --> 00:52:40,200
I think on paper it says the president must approve who this new entity, whoever the new

717
00:52:40,200 --> 00:52:43,840
entity is that ends up owning Tic Toc in the US.

718
00:52:43,840 --> 00:52:45,600
But is that good enough?

719
00:52:45,600 --> 00:52:53,520
Like do we think that the president one person alone will have this power to decide?

720
00:52:53,520 --> 00:52:58,920
There's a lot of theories like depending on which presidential candidate wins, do we think

721
00:52:58,920 --> 00:53:02,320
that they will make an unbiased decision?

722
00:53:02,320 --> 00:53:07,640
So I think and also there's another question now polling, right?

723
00:53:07,640 --> 00:53:10,160
How is Biden versus Trump?

724
00:53:10,160 --> 00:53:14,240
How are they doing with the polls in respect to youth?

725
00:53:14,240 --> 00:53:16,320
And youth are the ones that are using Tic Toc.

726
00:53:16,320 --> 00:53:21,640
So will the presidential candidates feel like they're going to be penalized by voting for

727
00:53:21,640 --> 00:53:22,640
or against the ban?

728
00:53:22,640 --> 00:53:24,920
And how does that factor into the decision?

729
00:53:24,920 --> 00:53:30,120
Yeah, I don't have to be glad I don't have to make this decision to tell you.

730
00:53:30,120 --> 00:53:31,120
Yeah, me too.

731
00:53:31,120 --> 00:53:32,120
Me too.

732
00:53:32,120 --> 00:53:35,000
I don't envy people that have to.

733
00:53:35,000 --> 00:53:39,360
But I think it's like such a fundamentally for me, it's like a freedom.

734
00:53:39,360 --> 00:53:42,560
It's just like a freedom of speech, like freedom of knowledge thing.

735
00:53:42,560 --> 00:53:45,800
Like I should be able to learn whatever I want to.

736
00:53:45,800 --> 00:53:49,720
And if I'm watching the propaganda video, I should be allowed to watch the propaganda

737
00:53:49,720 --> 00:53:52,480
video and decide whether or not I get propaganda.

738
00:53:52,480 --> 00:53:55,080
I guess, but I don't know.

739
00:53:55,080 --> 00:53:56,880
It's more subliminal than all that.

740
00:53:56,880 --> 00:53:58,720
And I understand.

741
00:53:58,720 --> 00:54:05,880
But I feel like I don't think anything should be censored whatsoever.

742
00:54:05,880 --> 00:54:09,160
So I think it's just different.

743
00:54:09,160 --> 00:54:15,480
But I feel differently about how my daughter, I want a lot of things censored for her.

744
00:54:15,480 --> 00:54:16,480
There is.

745
00:54:16,480 --> 00:54:17,480
There you go.

746
00:54:17,480 --> 00:54:18,480
You know, you don't.

747
00:54:18,480 --> 00:54:19,480
I mean, that's true for society.

748
00:54:19,480 --> 00:54:24,480
Like I don't want something being imposed on me, but I want to be able to impose some

749
00:54:24,480 --> 00:54:29,160
sort of control mechanism on someone else.

750
00:54:29,160 --> 00:54:31,680
Well, I would never.

751
00:54:31,680 --> 00:54:37,600
I don't care about what an adult human being does with their life, but I don't want my

752
00:54:37,600 --> 00:54:40,960
11 year old, you know, just, I don't know.

753
00:54:40,960 --> 00:54:41,960
I don't want her.

754
00:54:41,960 --> 00:54:46,520
I don't think that she has the ability to decipher what is propaganda and what is not.

755
00:54:46,520 --> 00:54:49,800
I only think that I know, but maybe I don't either.

756
00:54:49,800 --> 00:54:53,200
So yeah, I don't know.

757
00:54:53,200 --> 00:54:55,160
Yeah, glad I don't have to decide.

758
00:54:55,160 --> 00:54:56,160
You're right.

759
00:54:56,160 --> 00:54:57,600
But I like my tick tock.

760
00:54:57,600 --> 00:55:00,600
I will miss it.

761
00:55:00,600 --> 00:55:02,960
I like for what it is.

762
00:55:02,960 --> 00:55:05,600
What I don't think is going away.

763
00:55:05,600 --> 00:55:08,680
Whatever the bigger looks like, I don't know.

764
00:55:08,680 --> 00:55:10,840
I think the face of it might change.

765
00:55:10,840 --> 00:55:11,840
Yes.

766
00:55:11,840 --> 00:55:12,840
Yeah.

767
00:55:12,840 --> 00:55:15,720
It's just going to make it boring.

768
00:55:15,720 --> 00:55:19,400
Something will change, but it's hard for me to imagine that it's you just doing this in

769
00:55:19,400 --> 00:55:20,400
the US.

770
00:55:20,400 --> 00:55:21,400
Yeah.

771
00:55:21,400 --> 00:55:27,000
I'm just going to chase the algorithm to where all the fun conspiracies are gone.

772
00:55:27,000 --> 00:55:29,000
That's too bad.

773
00:55:29,000 --> 00:55:32,880
Kind of liking watching the lizard people videos.

774
00:55:32,880 --> 00:55:33,880
Yeah.

775
00:55:33,880 --> 00:55:40,400
Well, hurry up then Priyanka, before that happens, make really solid nuclear fusion

776
00:55:40,400 --> 00:55:46,960
viral content for youth to consume so that they can show up government agencies and found

777
00:55:46,960 --> 00:55:53,160
a table to get fusion more incentive money to flow into fusion so they can get commercialized

778
00:55:53,160 --> 00:55:54,160
sooner.

779
00:55:54,160 --> 00:55:55,160
Oh man.

780
00:55:55,160 --> 00:55:56,160
I don't know.

781
00:55:56,160 --> 00:55:58,720
It's hard to make energy interesting.

782
00:55:58,720 --> 00:56:01,480
It's just about the most boring topic ever.

783
00:56:01,480 --> 00:56:02,480
People don't understand.

784
00:56:02,480 --> 00:56:09,080
It's so fundamental to our reality that it's like, I don't know.

785
00:56:09,080 --> 00:56:13,800
You could tell young people that we can build a lot of things with it, clean the planet,

786
00:56:13,800 --> 00:56:15,480
solve a lot of things.

787
00:56:15,480 --> 00:56:22,480
Or fundamentally when you start talking about energy and oil and steel and cement, and

788
00:56:22,480 --> 00:56:27,320
these are all not exciting topics, but it's what we're all built on.

789
00:56:27,320 --> 00:56:29,400
So I don't know.

790
00:56:29,400 --> 00:56:31,160
I am not an exciting person.

791
00:56:31,160 --> 00:56:37,640
I would not know how to make things exciting for young people, but we should make TikTok

792
00:56:37,640 --> 00:56:38,640
videos.

793
00:56:38,640 --> 00:56:41,160
You should make them Sushma.

794
00:56:41,160 --> 00:56:46,800
Actually on that topic, there are some nonprofits that work with you to get them engaged on

795
00:56:46,800 --> 00:56:50,880
solving social and environmental challenges.

796
00:56:50,880 --> 00:56:55,320
One I was associated with called Fishbowl Challenge does this.

797
00:56:55,320 --> 00:57:01,200
You globally get together in different cohorts and solve for a problem that they're passionate

798
00:57:01,200 --> 00:57:02,200
about.

799
00:57:02,200 --> 00:57:10,280
So I just wish that that could be on steroids and would drive more engagement to solve for

800
00:57:10,280 --> 00:57:14,960
what you and I just spoke about, which is getting more youth engaged because we ultimately

801
00:57:14,960 --> 00:57:21,680
need them to get us out of this fossil fuel system we're in, that sort of new energy to

802
00:57:21,680 --> 00:57:23,800
create that change.

803
00:57:23,800 --> 00:57:24,800
Yeah.

804
00:57:24,800 --> 00:57:31,440
And younger people now are more knowledgeable than even I was when I was in my teens.

805
00:57:31,440 --> 00:57:36,040
My parents definitely had no idea what was going on with all this when they were 16,

806
00:57:36,040 --> 00:57:37,040
17.

807
00:57:37,040 --> 00:57:44,800
Today, 16, 17 year olds, they understand more than we did at that age.

808
00:57:44,800 --> 00:57:47,600
That does give you a lot of hope.

809
00:57:47,600 --> 00:57:48,600
And you're right.

810
00:57:48,600 --> 00:57:53,880
We have to appeal to the things that they care about.

811
00:57:53,880 --> 00:57:54,880
Yeah.

812
00:57:54,880 --> 00:57:56,880
And energy is invisible.

813
00:57:56,880 --> 00:57:57,880
You're right.

814
00:57:57,880 --> 00:57:58,880
Energy is invisible.

815
00:57:58,880 --> 00:58:02,520
So how do you make it visible so that they can then engage with it?

816
00:58:02,520 --> 00:58:03,520
Right.

817
00:58:03,520 --> 00:58:04,520
Yeah.

818
00:58:04,520 --> 00:58:05,520
That's the perfect way to say it.

819
00:58:05,520 --> 00:58:06,520
Yeah.

820
00:58:06,520 --> 00:58:07,520
And it's not exciting.

821
00:58:07,520 --> 00:58:08,520
It's not exciting.

822
00:58:08,520 --> 00:58:14,560
Things like an energy power plant takes like a decade to build.

823
00:58:14,560 --> 00:58:20,080
That's not like an exciting new app or like a fashionable new like ripped jeans or something.

824
00:58:20,080 --> 00:58:21,080
Like it's just not.

825
00:58:21,080 --> 00:58:28,160
This is where I think there's an opportunity in those like environmental justice areas

826
00:58:28,160 --> 00:58:33,240
to do something that's related to clean energy, maybe bringing clean energy there first because

827
00:58:33,240 --> 00:58:38,440
in those communities, what I've seen is the youth are very engaged because they experience

828
00:58:38,440 --> 00:58:42,200
the burdens firsthand.

829
00:58:42,200 --> 00:58:43,600
That propels them into action.

830
00:58:43,600 --> 00:58:49,680
So maybe there's a world where the clean energy solutions for a change go to those communities

831
00:58:49,680 --> 00:58:50,680
first.

832
00:58:50,680 --> 00:58:55,800
Did you, where did you grow up Sushma?

833
00:58:55,800 --> 00:58:56,800
Where were you born?

834
00:58:56,800 --> 00:58:58,360
I was born in India.

835
00:58:58,360 --> 00:59:02,360
I grew up between the Middle East, Singapore and then India.

836
00:59:02,360 --> 00:59:08,960
Did your upbringing lead you to be involved in environmental justice then?

837
00:59:08,960 --> 00:59:15,160
Like when you were young, did you see environmental injustices where you grew up?

838
00:59:15,160 --> 00:59:20,120
I saw them, but honestly, I didn't have the vocabulary then to understand that they were

839
00:59:20,120 --> 00:59:24,280
environmental injustices or energy not good views.

840
00:59:24,280 --> 00:59:28,640
I think that vocabulary came now, like in the last decade.

841
00:59:28,640 --> 00:59:35,120
So yes, I had asthma as a child growing up when I was my parents lived right next to

842
00:59:35,120 --> 00:59:39,640
a freeway, but now I would never do that for my kids because I know about the health impacts

843
00:59:39,640 --> 00:59:42,160
that can cause, but that's where they lived.

844
00:59:42,160 --> 00:59:49,320
And I also experienced conflict, which I fundamentally believed is conflict, like energy based conflict

845
00:59:49,320 --> 00:59:53,280
during the Gulf War when Iraq invaded Kuwait.

846
00:59:53,280 --> 00:59:58,000
One of the first things Iraq did was to set the oil wells on fire so that there wouldn't

847
00:59:58,000 --> 01:00:02,440
be access to energy within Kuwait or Delhi.

848
01:00:02,440 --> 01:00:06,920
It was a way to control the government of Kuwait.

849
01:00:06,920 --> 01:00:12,440
And so I experienced that as well, which then brings me to where I am today and why I'm

850
01:00:12,440 --> 01:00:15,320
passionate about the issues that I work on.

851
01:00:15,320 --> 01:00:16,480
Yeah.

852
01:00:16,480 --> 01:00:26,200
I also think about not just like the cleanliness of fusion energy, but like the things that

853
01:00:26,200 --> 01:00:34,560
have affected peace, shall we say, historically because of energy has been because like there

854
01:00:34,560 --> 01:00:39,840
are deposits of oil in specific places on this planet.

855
01:00:39,840 --> 01:00:45,040
And so there is like, that's not just that's environment doing the people injustice, I

856
01:00:45,040 --> 01:00:46,040
guess.

857
01:00:46,040 --> 01:00:50,920
I don't know how that quite works, but it's not something that we had a role in as people

858
01:00:50,920 --> 01:00:54,480
that's just hitting the lottery or you don't.

859
01:00:54,480 --> 01:00:58,560
And that's caused people to fight over land and all of this.

860
01:00:58,560 --> 01:01:03,360
And then you think about fusion and all of the raw materials that go into fusion can

861
01:01:03,360 --> 01:01:07,760
be made in a lab just about anywhere in the world.

862
01:01:07,760 --> 01:01:11,920
And so there is like an equalizer there.

863
01:01:11,920 --> 01:01:18,000
But then there's also a possibility where one country can just make more of the hydrogen

864
01:01:18,000 --> 01:01:22,440
isotopes or it has more access to go to the moon and come back.

865
01:01:22,440 --> 01:01:27,720
And so now I think part of the space race that we see between a few countries now also

866
01:01:27,720 --> 01:01:32,880
has to do with getting helium three from the moon, getting other resources from the moon

867
01:01:32,880 --> 01:01:35,560
and being space faring.

868
01:01:35,560 --> 01:01:40,880
And that's like the next frontier for resources.

869
01:01:40,880 --> 01:01:48,840
But I feel like at least in terms of world peace, we don't have this like specific deposits

870
01:01:48,840 --> 01:01:55,080
here and there that dictate who has power over who.

871
01:01:55,080 --> 01:01:56,080
Yeah.

872
01:01:56,080 --> 01:02:04,040
I always think about water, water and desalination of water.

873
01:02:04,040 --> 01:02:09,280
In the Middle East when you were growing up, was your water, all of it desalinated?

874
01:02:09,280 --> 01:02:11,280
Were you in one of those countries?

875
01:02:11,280 --> 01:02:14,320
No, not when I was growing up.

876
01:02:14,320 --> 01:02:23,120
The water was shipped from across the globe because a lot of the Middle East doesn't really

877
01:02:23,120 --> 01:02:24,120
have it.

878
01:02:24,120 --> 01:02:31,440
But desalination has, I think, again, from a moment in time perspective, that option

879
01:02:31,440 --> 01:02:39,640
15 years ago when I was going to the municipality, it was one of the many considerations and

880
01:02:39,640 --> 01:02:42,760
the focus was on water use reduction.

881
01:02:42,760 --> 01:02:49,560
I think where we are today is water use reduction is a nice to do, but we really need to focus

882
01:02:49,560 --> 01:02:53,080
on alternative solution very quickly.

883
01:02:53,080 --> 01:03:00,480
And because of that desalination is not a nice to have, but a must do.

884
01:03:00,480 --> 01:03:01,480
Yeah.

885
01:03:01,480 --> 01:03:11,520
I've seen in near Dubai, there are these fission powered desalination plants that are like

886
01:03:11,520 --> 01:03:15,160
hundreds and hundreds of acres of tanks.

887
01:03:15,160 --> 01:03:21,360
And it's just like this ecosystem of one form of energy feeding the other and then producing

888
01:03:21,360 --> 01:03:25,400
water as well as electricity and all of these things.

889
01:03:25,400 --> 01:03:31,680
But they're complex infrastructures and they're very, very expensive to build.

890
01:03:31,680 --> 01:03:41,120
It's interesting because I feel like water is almost more important than fuel.

891
01:03:41,120 --> 01:03:48,080
That most of the conversations in the sort of popular populous ethosphere is about fuel

892
01:03:48,080 --> 01:03:50,280
and not that much about water.

893
01:03:50,280 --> 01:03:53,160
I worry more about water.

894
01:03:53,160 --> 01:03:56,160
So that'll be interesting.

895
01:03:56,160 --> 01:04:01,720
To add to your comment about water, what I want about is in a world where we start to

896
01:04:01,720 --> 01:04:08,800
put an emphasis on distribution of water and there's less local sources of water and water

897
01:04:08,800 --> 01:04:11,040
gets distributed in bottles and so on.

898
01:04:11,040 --> 01:04:15,920
There's then the issue of microplastics and water and how that creates health impacts.

899
01:04:15,920 --> 01:04:16,920
Yeah.

900
01:04:16,920 --> 01:04:17,920
It's disgusting.

901
01:04:17,920 --> 01:04:24,400
I was reading something about yoga pans being made out of plastic.

902
01:04:24,400 --> 01:04:26,440
Recycled plastic.

903
01:04:26,440 --> 01:04:27,440
Yeah.

904
01:04:27,440 --> 01:04:32,640
I think it breaks your skin barrier and gets in your bloodstream.

905
01:04:32,640 --> 01:04:33,640
Yeah.

906
01:04:33,640 --> 01:04:34,640
Yes.

907
01:04:34,640 --> 01:04:37,440
I think I've known of this.

908
01:04:37,440 --> 01:04:42,640
Sometimes the early signs, the creative part of you hear about the early signs before it

909
01:04:42,640 --> 01:04:43,640
becomes mainstream.

910
01:04:43,640 --> 01:04:50,920
That one and also the issue of PFAS and Teflon and those nonstick products showing up in

911
01:04:50,920 --> 01:04:51,920
the bloodstreams.

912
01:04:51,920 --> 01:04:54,920
I've known for a long time.

913
01:04:54,920 --> 01:04:55,920
Yeah.

914
01:04:55,920 --> 01:05:01,040
No, I meant like, yeah, I think we live in a place where we have the luxury of knowing

915
01:05:01,040 --> 01:05:03,920
these things early in the game.

916
01:05:03,920 --> 01:05:09,440
I was watching a TikTok video, by the way, I'll tell you, where this woman literally

917
01:05:09,440 --> 01:05:16,880
in order to make her food crispier, she used to, as her oil was frying and she used to

918
01:05:16,880 --> 01:05:22,320
have her potatoes or chicken or whatever in the oil, she used to throw in a plastic bag

919
01:05:22,320 --> 01:05:25,080
so that her food would come out crispier.

920
01:05:25,080 --> 01:05:28,520
And she fed thousands of people this way.

921
01:05:28,520 --> 01:05:31,080
And it was mind blowing to me.

922
01:05:31,080 --> 01:05:35,280
This was happening like last year and this guy was talking about how his grandmother

923
01:05:35,280 --> 01:05:36,680
does this.

924
01:05:36,680 --> 01:05:41,080
And he was saying it in the most nonchalant way where he was like, hey, I have a hack

925
01:05:41,080 --> 01:05:42,080
for you.

926
01:05:42,080 --> 01:05:44,160
Do you know how you make your food crispy?

927
01:05:44,160 --> 01:05:45,160
Throw in a plastic bag.

928
01:05:45,160 --> 01:05:46,160
Are you kidding me?

929
01:05:46,160 --> 01:05:47,160
Oh gosh.

930
01:05:47,160 --> 01:05:48,160
Yeah.

931
01:05:48,160 --> 01:05:51,160
So I think we have the luxury of knowledge.

932
01:05:51,160 --> 01:05:52,160
Yes.

933
01:05:52,160 --> 01:05:54,160
I mean, the awareness piece.

934
01:05:54,160 --> 01:05:59,760
And now, if you go back to our AI conversation, think about a world where every single person

935
01:05:59,760 --> 01:06:05,920
is getting their own versions of truth and their own hacks without like there being a

936
01:06:05,920 --> 01:06:14,160
collective base of knowledge that we consider facts, like plastic, that's bad for you.

937
01:06:14,160 --> 01:06:18,320
In a world where this gentleman is not even getting served up content that tells him plastic

938
01:06:18,320 --> 01:06:20,800
is bad for him, he's going to continue to do it.

939
01:06:20,800 --> 01:06:22,800
No, it was a woman.

940
01:06:22,800 --> 01:06:23,800
It was a grandma.

941
01:06:23,800 --> 01:06:24,800
Or a woman.

942
01:06:24,800 --> 01:06:25,800
Or a grandma.

943
01:06:25,800 --> 01:06:26,800
That's right.

944
01:06:26,800 --> 01:06:27,800
Yeah.

945
01:06:27,800 --> 01:06:28,800
So she's going to continue to do it.

946
01:06:28,800 --> 01:06:34,160
And I've definitely been in situations where when I did my community work, I met a family

947
01:06:34,160 --> 01:06:40,640
who came to one of the community meetings and talked about how their child had eczema

948
01:06:40,640 --> 01:06:46,040
and one way she was attempting to solve for it was putting the kid in a tub of water with

949
01:06:46,040 --> 01:06:47,040
bleach.

950
01:06:47,040 --> 01:06:48,040
Oh my gosh.

951
01:06:48,040 --> 01:06:49,040
Exactly.

952
01:06:49,040 --> 01:06:50,040
Exactly.

953
01:06:50,040 --> 01:06:53,040
So we truly have the knowledge gap.

954
01:06:53,040 --> 01:06:54,040
Yeah.

955
01:06:54,040 --> 01:07:01,480
I just wonder if the society, if AI can be used for good, but like will that exacerbate

956
01:07:01,480 --> 01:07:08,800
this knowledge gap and create worse outcomes for some in the tunnel, folks that are already

957
01:07:08,800 --> 01:07:09,800
disproportionately burdened.

958
01:07:09,800 --> 01:07:10,800
Yeah, no, I know.

959
01:07:10,800 --> 01:07:19,760
I feel like even more that this just makes me even more on the side of we need AGI to

960
01:07:19,760 --> 01:07:21,760
rescue us from humanity.

961
01:07:21,760 --> 01:07:22,760
We should.

962
01:07:22,760 --> 01:07:25,760
I'm just like, oh man, people.

963
01:07:25,760 --> 01:07:26,760
Yeah, cool.

964
01:07:26,760 --> 01:07:31,760
This might be a good starting, a stopping point for us.

965
01:07:31,760 --> 01:07:32,760
What do you think?

966
01:07:32,760 --> 01:07:35,760
On the light or not?

967
01:07:35,760 --> 01:07:40,760
Or not, or not, depending on who you look at it.

968
01:07:40,760 --> 01:07:41,760
I don't know.

969
01:07:41,760 --> 01:07:42,760
Yeah.

970
01:07:42,760 --> 01:07:45,760
Now that we've had enough, there's a good stopping point.

971
01:07:45,760 --> 01:07:46,760
That's true.

972
01:07:46,760 --> 01:07:48,760
What do you think?

973
01:07:48,760 --> 01:07:50,760
Anything you want to leave us with here?

974
01:07:50,760 --> 01:07:57,760
Anything you want to say about what do you think, not what do you think it will look

975
01:07:57,760 --> 01:07:58,760
like.

976
01:07:58,760 --> 01:08:00,760
Yeah, maybe what do you think fusion will look like in 20 years?

977
01:08:00,760 --> 01:08:03,760
But more like what do you want it to look like?

978
01:08:03,760 --> 01:08:05,760
I want to know that more from you.

979
01:08:05,760 --> 01:08:08,760
What do you want fusion to look like?

980
01:08:08,760 --> 01:08:18,760
What I want is if I had a magic wand, every county, I think about how people have greater

981
01:08:18,760 --> 01:08:23,760
connection within their local communities, within their county level.

982
01:08:23,760 --> 01:08:29,760
But everything that happens beyond the county, even at the state level or federal level or

983
01:08:29,760 --> 01:08:34,760
global level, there's so much cognitive overload they cannot connect to.

984
01:08:34,760 --> 01:08:40,760
So I see a world where within their little city or county unit, there's a clean energy

985
01:08:40,760 --> 01:08:43,760
source that they're able to tap into.

986
01:08:43,760 --> 01:08:50,760
And they have a full awareness of not just their energy portfolio, but their environmental

987
01:08:50,760 --> 01:08:51,760
burdens, health burdens.

988
01:08:51,760 --> 01:08:55,760
They're collectively able to make decisions within that county unit.

989
01:08:55,760 --> 01:08:57,760
Wouldn't that be great?

990
01:08:57,760 --> 01:08:58,760
We talked about zoning.

991
01:08:58,760 --> 01:09:00,760
What gets located within that?

992
01:09:00,760 --> 01:09:03,760
What kind of development happens within that city or county unit?

993
01:09:03,760 --> 01:09:04,760
That would be great.

994
01:09:04,760 --> 01:09:07,760
That would be the world that I'd love to live in.

995
01:09:07,760 --> 01:09:15,760
I know how to influence my little county to introduce more parkland or make a choice about

996
01:09:15,760 --> 01:09:18,760
affordable housing versus the library and so on.

997
01:09:18,760 --> 01:09:20,760
That, I think, is ultimate.

998
01:09:20,760 --> 01:09:25,760
I think we're far from it because the energy choices are not really choices that can be

999
01:09:25,760 --> 01:09:27,760
made at the local level.

1000
01:09:27,760 --> 01:09:30,760
Those choices are made for us.

1001
01:09:30,760 --> 01:09:33,760
And that's what I'd like to see change.

1002
01:09:33,760 --> 01:09:34,760
That's awesome.

1003
01:09:34,760 --> 01:09:40,760
Are those choices made for us because of why, do you think?

1004
01:09:40,760 --> 01:09:46,760
Is it because we have a capital incentive and we should have more of a social incentive?

1005
01:09:46,760 --> 01:09:48,760
Is it just that?

1006
01:09:48,760 --> 01:09:53,760
I think today, if you as a consumer think about your own energy bill, do you have a

1007
01:09:53,760 --> 01:09:58,760
choice to go to a different utility provider and say, no, I don't like your energy mix.

1008
01:09:58,760 --> 01:10:00,760
I like somebody else's energy mix.

1009
01:10:00,760 --> 01:10:01,760
No, you don't.

1010
01:10:01,760 --> 01:10:05,760
So that's what I mean. We don't really have a choice in terms of who your provider is

1011
01:10:05,760 --> 01:10:07,760
and what does their energy mix.

1012
01:10:07,760 --> 01:10:13,760
There is a negotiation that's hopefully happening between the utility provider and a state

1013
01:10:13,760 --> 01:10:16,760
agency perhaps, a federal agency.

1014
01:10:16,760 --> 01:10:22,760
But there's less choice that an end user has to say, hey, I do this.

1015
01:10:22,760 --> 01:10:25,760
I want to invest more money and change my energy mix.

1016
01:10:25,760 --> 01:10:26,760
You don't have that choice.

1017
01:10:26,760 --> 01:10:30,760
And that's the choice I think I would like to have.

1018
01:10:30,760 --> 01:10:31,760
Yes, me too.

1019
01:10:31,760 --> 01:10:36,760
I wholeheartedly vehemently agree with that so much.

1020
01:10:36,760 --> 01:10:39,760
I want that choice as well.

1021
01:10:39,760 --> 01:10:43,760
And I didn't even know how much I wanted it until you articulated it.

1022
01:10:43,760 --> 01:10:46,760
And now I want it more than ever.

1023
01:10:46,760 --> 01:10:47,760
Perfect.

1024
01:10:47,760 --> 01:10:49,760
When you start to make choices on your own, you can.

1025
01:10:49,760 --> 01:10:52,760
The choice I've been able to make is to have a solar roof.

1026
01:10:52,760 --> 01:10:53,760
I have a solar roof.

1027
01:10:53,760 --> 01:10:55,760
I have an electric vehicle and I have a charger in my home.

1028
01:10:55,760 --> 01:10:58,760
But if you give me agency, I will make more of those choices.

1029
01:10:58,760 --> 01:11:01,760
But when I don't have agency, I cannot make them.

1030
01:11:01,760 --> 01:11:02,760
Yeah.

1031
01:11:02,760 --> 01:11:09,760
A big example is like the lack of the number of cell phone service providers in

1032
01:11:09,760 --> 01:11:11,760
America versus Asia.

1033
01:11:11,760 --> 01:11:18,760
And the competition of it and the price fixing and all of that, it's annoying.

1034
01:11:18,760 --> 01:11:20,760
The price fixing is annoying.

1035
01:11:20,760 --> 01:11:25,760
It doesn't bode well with a free market and that bothers.

1036
01:11:25,760 --> 01:11:27,760
Yeah, I agree with you.

1037
01:11:27,760 --> 01:11:28,760
Yeah.

1038
01:11:28,760 --> 01:11:30,760
Thank you so much for this, Sushma.

1039
01:11:30,760 --> 01:11:31,760
Thank you.

1040
01:11:31,760 --> 01:11:34,760
On that note, on that vision, we're going to make that happen, right?

1041
01:11:34,760 --> 01:11:36,760
Yeah.

1042
01:11:36,760 --> 01:11:37,760
Cool.

1043
01:11:37,760 --> 01:12:04,760
Any quick plans for the weekend?