You're listening to Unite and Heal America and KABC 790. This is Matt Matern, your host. I've got James McGregor of Blue Tribe. He's the CEO. James is hailing from Australia. So we're going across the globe here today to bring people in LA, a little enlightenment from the Australian continent. So James, welcome to the show.

Thanks. That's great to be.

Well tell us a little bit James, about your life path. And what, what brought you to work on the environment? I saw a little bit on your bio that you were in the army. And so that isn't normally known as the path towards environmentalism. But in your case, it was, well, it was yes.

So I think, I guess the result militaries around the world are there to protect the things that we love the most. And I guess the environment is sort of it's just a different mission these days. So yes, a lot of my background essays I was in the Australian Army and cavalry, so use around tanks and all that sort of stuff when I was young and bulletproof.

And then I ended up moving into managing research programs. And I ended up working for an organization called the CSIRO, which is Australia's national research, research agency, and all of your listeners at the moment, I can guarantee they're using CSIR CSIRO technology every single day because CSIRO were the inventors of Wi Fi, amongst many, many other things. And whilst I was there, I was working mostly in like renewable energy technologies or low emissions power generation technology.

So worked on some really cool stuff from smart grids to, you know, we built world record breaking solar technologies, we worked with a lot of the US labs, on some of those things around solar thermal power generation, we work on smart fridges, sustainable housing, biofuels, and for I guess, a tech nerd, like me as being a kid in a candy shop, in many ways.

But as we're working on these projects, and we're doing some very leading edge, leading edge research, I guess, I got increasingly frustrated that we had all these amazing ideas, you could see the problems in the world particular things like climate change, and we were developing all these amazing solutions, but they weren't getting out into the world to actually deliver the impact. So it was great research, but it wasn't actually getting commercialized, and being used out there in the real world.

And so yeah, I had those one of those sorts, you know, someone should really do something about these, you know, this great technology, and someone should get out there and do that to do something with this great stuff and make a real impact in the world. And then I had one of those dangerous thoughts that often get you into a lot of trouble. And it's, well, maybe I can do that.

But I didn't actually act on it. Yeah, it was one of those things of you know, I was in a good career and had a young family and you know, all those risks of trying to go out and do your own thing. And so yeah, it was really there was a degree of fear that was holding me back. And then in my personal life, at the same time, my mother got Motor Neurone Disease, which is you know, the about about a neuron disease. It's a horrible, horrible disease, which only typically has one outcome.

And my father at the time, who was also served in the army, he was the CEO of a not for profit that built custom bicycles for kids with cerebral palsy. And so he had to retire, retired from his job to become mums full time carer, and then eventually she passed away. And then, about a month after she died, he got diagnosed with lung cancer.

And then that progressed, and he ended up dying about 11 months after her mother. And it was one of those moments where you're sort of, you know, he died the day after his 65th birthday, and I was talking to my wife. So you know, I've had all these ideas about going out and trying to do my own thing. And I didn't want to get to 65 in a day and not have tried to do some of the stuff that I've been bouncing around my head for so long. And one of my things

My father used to always teach me as a kid, which I never really understood until I got older is that he said, You know, when you're afraid, fear is a good thing. Because fear has a job to do, right. And the fears job is to tell you when you need to bring courage to the table, right? Because without fear, Courage doesn't exist.

And so after he died, I dissociated that's it I quit my job, and I launched the company, and not with no plan. That's not a not a approach, I would advocate for people listening. But and then we're here we are today working on some amazing projects from TV show production, through to trying to deal with the problem of end of life solar panels and how to recycle them.

That's a fascinating story and a great one to tell as, of course, you know, condolences your view for your mom and your dad's passing, but, you know, it's a beautiful thing that you took that and brought it out into life and kind of brought their, you know, I'm sure there's energy as spirit to what you're doing now.

And, you know, I love the quote that your dad had about fear as a job to do and kind of tells us when we need to bring courage to the table. I think that's fantastic wisdom that we can always look at and can help us and tell us about some of the projects that you're working on. You're, you're based out of Sydney, is that correct?

Yes, I'm in a town called Newcastle, which is about, put it in American metrics about 120 miles north of Sydney, on the coast. So the area's as famous for some of the world's best surf beaches up here. If you like wine, it's one of the West best wine regions in Australia and internationally renowned for his wines. And ironically, given the topic that we're talking about today, it's also the largest coal export Harbor on the planet.

So we have export, something like 160-170 million tons of thermal and coking coal all around the world. And so being a sustainability professional in the coal Heartland is interesting. But there's also a lot of other great stuff going on. So like we're working on projects, looking at what to do with rooftop solar panels when people decide to get rid of them. So what we're seeing globally is that one of the biggest waste streams of electronic waste is actually rooftop solar.

And at the moment, there's not a real good way you can recite, recycle them to some degree. But a lot, a lot of these panels that are coming off roofs and going into basically landfill might only be 10-12 years old, and their service life is 30 years. So we're working on a project called Second Life solar, where we redeploy these rooftop solar panels into community solar gardens. The people who may not necessarily have access to solar access to their own solar plot, is an a secondhand solar panels. We're working on some of those new projects are in now we can.

Let me ask you a question a follow up question that why is it that people are getting rid of them after 10 to 12 years if they have a 30 year lifespan? Is it because they are they're upgrading to a better panel or what?

So typically, the reason they get rid of this is two main drivers. One is the for whatever reason on the property that the solar panels installed, they might have to do repairs to the roof or the roof upgrade. And it's actually cheaper to get rid of the panels than it is to take them off and put them back on. But the vast majority is that we're seeing people are starting to see the benefits of solar. So what they're doing is they're upgrading their system.

So 10 years ago, they might have put in, say, a two kilowatt solar system. And then today in sort of 2021, they're putting in panel systems between sort of five and 10 kilowatts. And over that time, all the electrical rules have changed. And actually, and so they create this creates some, there's some regulatory problems in Australia, around mixing those two, an old system with a newer system. So what happens is people throw away the older system and put in a bigger upgraded system, which is creating this waste issue. And we're seeing this, this trend is happening all over the world.

And I'm sure what's happening in the US as well, where we're getting these what we call adolescent systems, that are only partway through their service life and being disposed of as people go for, you know, bigger and better solar systems. But even though, even though the panels are perfectly serviceable for another 20 years.

So what are you doing to you're putting these in solar gardens, for areas that just don't have that type of, you know, solar system existing and using them to generate power for those areas that?

Yeah, so what we're trying to do is, so what we're developing is working with some of the research groups here developing a testing procedure to make sure that these panels, we can test them and confirm they still work, and that there's no safety issues with the operations on. And one of the challenges with this particular project, it's like it's a two sided problem.

So we need to incentivize the first the first who owns the panels now who's getting rid of them, to bring them to us or to actually contact us to collect them. So we need to incentivize them somehow. And then we will say, the technical issue of how to actually confirm the panels are serviceable and working and can be engineered and put into into our solar facility.

So on the sensitive side of things, we're looking at a range of incentives around the solar gardens, if you bring us your old solar panels, you're affected become a shareholder in the solar garden. And you can either choose to take a dividend from the energy we sell from the solar garden, or you can donate that money to illicit charities.

So we're trying to come up with a mechanism for encouragement that actually understand that these panels can have a second life and to bring a source and then there's just the purely engineering issues around how do you put if you've got 400 Different manufacturers of panel so typically, if you did a big solar garden, they would all be exactly the same panel, right? That all have the same electrical characteristics. which makes the engineering quite trivial.

But if you're bringing in one kilowatt from this house, and now from one kilowatt systems from 10,000 different locations, how do you actually get all of those panels to work together in a single solar field? And there are engineering solutions for that. But we're trying to make sure we do that as economical as possible to make the whole thing financially viable as well.

How far are you away from actually launch of one of these solar gardens created by the recycled solar panels?

The first project or demonstration project will go in later this year for the rank of Christmas fun, the seed going in I actually at a landfill facility or things where we actually going to use it to power the recycling facility. So it's in a town called Dubbo, in western New South Wales.

And so at the Mount, we've got the panels at a research facility being tested, and then they'll get deployed out later later this year. So we should have an operating system, hopefully, by personal C.

That's a real win win situation a doesn't get recycled, and then B, you can use it to power this facility. So there's a there's a secondary win out of the out of this situation, and great thinking in terms of incentivizing owners to give it to get, have them be shareholders or give them an opportunity to donate their shares, which probably gives them some tax benefits there too.

So you're listening to Unite and Heal America. My guest today is James McGregor, CEO of Blue Tribe in Australia. Fascinating stuff, and I think it helps inform us Californians, it's what we could do to improve our environment. We'll be back in just one minute.

You're listening to Unite and Heal America with Matt Matern, your host and our guest today, James McGregor, Blue Tribe, CEO there. And James, we're just talking about what you're doing in Australia. And I wanted to pivot to another topic as far as a TV show that you're creating and why you're creating it. What do you think the effect of this show is going to be? On your community?

So we are so we're doing lots of diverse projects from Seoul recycling through the reality TV shows. So so it's probably gonna tell you once the battery while the makings of a shaman. So we were working on projects were with national, other state governments here in Australia, where they asked us the question, how do we get the homeowners to upgrade their homes or build more sustainable housing at scale? So not just like a niche market? Which sustainable housing is these days?

How do we get everyone interested in building more sustainable homes? And the go to strategy for I guess, people in the sustainability space for the last 3040 years? Is Yeah, let's just educate people, right? Well, let's give them a factory, let's tell them why it's good for the environment, let's give them a good business based on what the feedback I get from their energy efficiency. And the problem with that approach is that

it assumes that human beings are rational, human beings make decisions based on rational thought. And a lot of them not unfortunately, but the way human beings human beings are hardwired to make emotional decisions, right. So if you go back 1000s of years, and we were out hunting out on the plains, if something with a big T came along to eat you, you had to immediately respond to the chemicals being produced in your brain.

So things like cortisol, oxytocin and ghrelin, and run away immediately, or you got eaten by that thing with big teeth, right? So so those human beings that responded to chemicals being produced in their brains survive, to then find mates to then reproduce. And you have that you played that cycle over 1000s of years, and have us here today. And so human beings are still driven by emotional decision making. And so and if you don't believe me, let me give you a scenario.

So imagine, you go down to the local mall, so you have these old food courts going through there. So maybe you go down to your local mall, and you want to get a chicken sandwich, right, so you head down to the section of the mall for the food court that sells chicken sandwiches.

And there's two shops, the ones we sell chicken sandwiches and chicken sandwiches or as the one on the left, so we sold chicken sandwiches, there's 10 people in line, there's been a buzz, there's lots of activity going on. Everyone looks really happy. And then the other shop on the right is empty. It's deserted. There's not a soul there right. Now, as far as you know, they're both the same price they both produce the same quality food line you choose.

Alright, boy, the one with the people in it, right?

That's right. Yeah. And so most people so 80% of people would choose along with 10 people for no right good rational reason in that but what's happening in their brains is there's alarm bells going off right going, there's something wrong here. I don't have the information to make that decision. Therefore I'm gonna go with the tribe wrong and go with the herd right because they must know something I don't. And so human beings have evolved to make these emotional decisions very, very quickly.

And then we'll, we'll post rationalize that later about why we had to buy that knife to cut through a shoe that took off in the morning, when we came home from the pub, we'll come up with a reason why we really needed that. But we actually we really made an emotional decision. And so when we looked at the research, what we found was that TV shows and storytelling is the way human beings have passed on knowledge for 1000s and 1000s of years, right, and TV shows excellent at activating people's emotions.

And so we got this idea Well, if if that's the mechanism for getting people to buy into an idea, it doesn't matter whether you want them to buy a sports car, or upgrade the kitchen benchtop. A TV show is a vehicle to get people emotionally invested in an idea. And so we've actually developed up this TV show called renovate or rebuild, which is literally coming to the last two days of filming at the moment, we'll go to air on Australian networks in late August. And the TV show looks like any other lifestyle type TV show, right?

It's got a very particular format. In this case, it's based around a family who owns a property, they fronted work out, do they knock it down and start again, or should they renovate their home. And we have two teams competing to sort of pitch their ideas to get them to win the competition. And there's, you know, there's a prize at the end of all those sorts of things. So it looks very typical to a lot of lifestyle TV shows.

But what we do is we build into the storyline and the narrative of the show, we talk instead of talking about the really cool style of kitchen benchtop, we're talking about stuff like insulation, and solar panels and battery systems and energy efficiency. And the analogy, I use it to be like when you're trying to get your kids to eat vegetables, and you might make spaghetti bolognese, and you'll blend up the vegetables into the mints. So the kids don't know the vegetables are in there.

So very much the TV shows very much along those lines. So it's the show about how to build a healthy, efficient, sustainable home. But all that sustainability stuff is sort of just hidden in the storyline. So you sort of you're learning this stuff as you go by enjoying enjoying an entertaining TV show. And the research shows that this, this is the way sort of how to get to a mass audience. And so that's what we're, that's what we're doing.

Well, it's a great idea, I actually am kind of kicking around TV show ideas here in LA, because of the same reason essentially, trying to take these ideas of environmental protection to the masses. And, and quite frankly, one of our guests on the on the show, the radio show recently had talked about as an advertising executive, he had, you know, talked about kind of reframing the way we talk about the environment.

Because the way we talk about environmental problems, isn't very persuasive. So he was talking about a pollution blanket versus the other ways that are more scientific that people talk about climate change, which don't hit people emotionally very effectively.

Yeah, I think I think yeah, I think people who work in the sustainability space, and we've been doing this on all been guilty of this, we try to educate people into making good decisions, but we don't make the information meaningful to them. Alright, so. And I agree that the whole issue around being really scientific, talking to people in scientific terms about climate change assumes that there are climate scientists and they understand what we're talking about.

So we need to make some of these issues more accessible to people and talk about what's the benefits of them are behaving in a different way for their lifestyle, right, not for what we think's important for them. Now, because the mission is not enough. Like now I'm a sustainability person. So I wake up in the morning, I think about well, how can I help my clients, reduce carbon emissions or reduce waste or whatever I live in living in dream, dreaming, sleep about that sort of stuff. 99.9% of population don't wake up, didn't wake up this morning saying, I need to reduce my carbon footprint, right?

They were like, I gotta get the kids to school gotta get to work, or go buy some groceries, or to go to the doctor's, you know, I've got to get kids to sport. I had a million other things on their mind. And the environment was not one of them. Right? But what we need to do is to work out all those things that they're doing throughout the day, how can we attach environmental, environmental behavior to those sorts of benefits?

So if we people upgrade the energy efficiency of their home, maybe they love going out to dinner with friends, right? So if your home is more energy efficient, that means you're going to have more money in your pocket, so you can go out to dinner more often. Right? So the tangible benefits are important to them. But the outcome from our perspective is a reduction in carbon emissions because they're using less energy.

So I think we need to sort of have the I 100% agree with the way we've framed environmental issues and how we approach that is has been completely wrong, and which is why we've polarized and that's why we've got this issue. We've got climate deniers and climate believers, that they they all want the same thing. You Interestingly easy guy when our goal came out with these inconvenient truths, I used to do a lot of public speaking at community events.

And I had this event where we had about 100 people in the room also about climate change, and some of the renewable energy technologies were developing. And it was 5050. Down the middle of that there was people who believe that climate change is real, and humans are causing and the other half of the room just thought it was all rubbish and the climate have always been changing. And I remember when I, when I was a kid, it was no harder today than it was when I was a kid.

And they were willing to like almost get into a physical fight over their opinions. And so I stopped, actually his presentation midway through and half of the people out outside that believed in climate change, and that kept the other half in the room. And I got them to write a list and say, like, sit down as a group and cart with the five or 10 things that you want in the future for your kids, right. And then I brought on the back of the room, we've got the present back there list and had exactly the same list, right, it was exactly the same thing.

And so they wanted clean air, they want to great biodiversity, they wanted more renewable energy, they wanted their kids to enjoy the natural wonders of the world, right. And so I sort of said to the group, but both what both of you want exactly the same future, yet, you're willing to get into a punch up over the science of climate, which none of you are qualified to talk about? Because none of you are climate scientists. If we all want the same future, acting on climate change today just gets us there quicker.

So what are we all fighting about? Right? So. So I think we need to find that common ground and get people to understand what's in it for them for this future world where we've treated the environment properly. And we've looked after the planet, and then frame the information to them in terms of what's in it for them, as opposed to what we what we think they want. It's what actually what they want.

Well, that it kind of goes to as a trial attorney, there's a there's kind of a famous school of thought that you refer to as the reptilian brain and talking to people's reptilian brain. And, and that's kind of the oldest part of the brain in the back of the head.

And, and it's, it's the fight or flight type response. It's the emotional response. It's, it's the automatic system, and that, you know, part of that is getting, making it clear to say a jury that they are going to benefit by helping out your client. And that's, there's a benefit to that. And, and when people then see that benefit to them, they act, you know, more likely that they're going to act in accord with that.

Yeah. 100% Yeah, it's, it's, it's, we call it that with them, what's in it for me? You need to find out what that is, and then frame your position around that.

Right? So what, what kind of research did you do going into creating the show to see what were the things that might be most effective at communicating to, to a mass audience?

So we worked with a number of universities and they basically went or went and looked at some of the most successful TV shows that had influenced consumers choices, and some of these were not shows around trying to influence better choices, or shows that we're really effective and looked at what was it that they did that, that the we could emulate through our show, which we can hear about,

James, I'm gonna just cut you off for a second there because we're gonna go to our break and we'll be right back and James is gonna pick that up. You’re listening to Unite and Heal America and KABC 790. This is your host, Matt Matern, listening to talking with James McGregor the Blue Tribe in Australia. And we'll be right back with Jameson, just one minute.

You're listening to Unite and Heal America and KABC 790. This is Matt Mater. And our guest, again, James McGregor of the Blue Tribe. And James, we're just talking about the TV show that you're creating, and how it is that you were able to put together a show that will hopefully be persuasive to people to change their behavior regarding the environment.

Yeah, so so this show is very science driven, in terms of its design. And leading in the design phase of the project. We worked with a lot of universities, a lot of social scientists, and I'm a electrical engineer. So we're not known for our social skills. But I do have a social scientists and behavioral scientists. And what they did is they went and had a look at shows around the world that were really effective at engaging audiences and getting them to act in some way, whether it be buying a new house or changing their behavior in some way or not, and also not always in good ways, but shows that were effective in achieving that and they looked specifically at sustainability as well.

And one of the interesting things about it One of the problems with the word sustainable is that if I go and ask 100 people, what does sustainability mean to you? I'll get 100 different answers, right? It's, it's a term that's not very well defined. It's open to a lot of interpretation. And when it comes to housing, what we found was that when when we talked to someone about living in a sustainable house, what they that thought that meant was that they needed to grow dreadlocks, live in a commune, wear a tie dye shirt in a hobo house with around a floor with no electricity, electricity in the house.

Right. So that was their impression of when we use the term sustainable housing. That's what they thought the standard housing was. And we talked earlier about, you mentioned before the reptile brain. So yeah, human beings have grown up to be very tribal, right, because being part of a tribe means you're safe, right, you're protected, and you have access to resources. And therefore human beings that were part of a tribe were more successful.

And so you'd be very tribal people. When you say you should build a sustainable house, people think of that dreadlocks and tight Asha and living in a commune and I go, that's not my tribe, therefore, that house is not for me, right. And you basically lose, you turn them off, right?

So so when you start, one of the big lessons that fit into the designer show was that using words like sustainable and green and eco conscious is actually very polarizing actually scares off a lot of the audience. So in an actual TV show, we don't actually do some banned words like eco and green, sustainable, we touch on very, very light touch, but there are we don't use that terminology.

So the other thing, what the researchers identified was that when people think about these types of homes, the way they describe these homes is their homes that are comfortable, right. So they're warm and warm in winter, and cool in summer. They feel healthy, they feel fresh, they've got lots of natural light. And so the vocabulary that consumers use to describe a housing product that was sustainable, was completely different to what the builders would use to describe a housing product.

So they would talk about passive solar design, and that talk about insulation and thermal mass, and new values, which is a a thermal measure of how Windows perform, for example. And so they were using the wrong vocabulary. So a lot of the TV show work, you allowed us to then work out how to actually discuss sustainable housing, design principles, and use it in a vocabulary that people understood and recognized.

And so you know, the TV show design, we focused a lot on some very basic principles about how to make our home sustainable, right. So things like that, where you locate your daytime living areas in the northern hemisphere, where you guys are, so you want to locate your, your daytime living areas on the southern side of your property, right. So that way, you get access to all that natural light during the day, in winter, you can bring all that beautiful with the sun to heat up the space for free.

We then talk about the building envelope not being wrapped in a nice blanket way around, which is the insulation and air tightness. And we talk about the appliances you put into the home around the energy efficiency and how to identify energy efficient clients versus not energy efficient. And typically that have like an Energy Star rating.

And then we talk about how to actually produce your own power. So overall product we're positioning the TV shows what we call a net zero energy home. So it's a home that produces the same amount of energy from renewables that consumes.

But we also feature extremely architectural and beautifully designed homes that look like any other house. It's just that they're more comfortable, they're cheaper to run, they're healthier, and they're healthy to live in. And that's how we position. And that was all sort of off the back of what the research taught us. consumers really want.

So in terms of selling the homes, you have kind of any relationships with builders or that are going to build these homes.

Yeah. So so part of the strategy for the TV show is that now that we have a whole lot of partners on the TV show, we have companies that do insurance by the wall systems, we have one of the partners are featured on the show, as high performance windows, we have a solar companies, battery companies, and the Tesla features in our show as well.

And so what we've done is similar to a whole lot of brands that have products that help people build these types of homes. And one of the characteristics Yes, of the building industry. The building industry is built off the back of demand. You know, if consumers want it, the building industry will deliver it right. If they get consumers coming and saying I want this type of house, the builders will build it, but they won't build it without that demand signal.

So one of the ideas behind the show is to work with a small number of partners and builders and developers and help them be really successful at selling Have lots of products, and then having the rest of the industry see that clear demand signal and then bring product to market so becomes effectively the new normal.

So where are you at in the in the process of creating the new normal in Australia.

Right at the beginning. And I think there's interestingly, this whole global pandemic and COVID has sort of created almost like the perfect storm of conditions for people when stuck in their homes for you here in Sydney, we're in a lockdown at the moment, due to an outbreak of this latest spirit of COVID. So people have been stuck in their homes for the last year and a half.

And they were suddenly realize that their homes are freezing in winter, or they're stinking hot in summer. And they've, they've noticed that deficiencies of their homes, because they've been in them 24/7. All right. And so we're actually seeing like a massive building boom going on here in Australia, people are upgrading their properties. And so there's lots of work going on around the regulators around improving energy efficiency.

And we're seeing lots of demand for this sort of product. And what what our challenge is at the moment is to actually get the building industry to bring that product to market at scale at the moment is very a small small number builders offer the software housing that we would like to see in the market.

And the idea is to get the rest of those builders along, which is where the TV shows are really meant to help them generate that demand so that they that it's almost like slapping you in the face saying what consumers want this, they're gonna start knocking on your door asking for it, you better start building it.

Right? Well, I know that one of my previous guests, Mayor, Rex Parris, of Lancaster, California, he has been championing this for quite some time, and he's gotten a number of builders to help build more energy efficient homes in that community. And it works. I mean, they've, they've been able to sell those homes and and improve the energy efficiency of the community. So it it's a win win scenario.

Yeah. And that's submitted, but just even just on the operating costs, I think there's a bit of an urban myth that these homes cost more to build. But they don't. It's 20 years ago, yes, I think they were more expensive to build. But these days, you know, people forget that when you build these highly energy efficient homes, there's things you can take out of the house that you no longer need. So you need a small air conditioners and a small hot water systems, you need less lighting, because they're so efficient, right? So because using all that natural light.

So cost wise, they're saying what it needs is just smart design of who could be consciously design those homes for those high performance. I mean, look, California has led the world in many ways with your regulations around energy performance. So you guys are sort of almost a beacon in the on the distance with everyone so trying to catch up to. But the standard we need need to get to globally is beyond even what California is doing at the moment for new builds.

And I think the real challenge is also in all those existing homes that are out there like building a new home to high standards easy. Upgrading and retrofitting and doing home improvement to an old home brings up a whole lot of challenges. And that's why I'm part of the show is looking at that renovate option. So the show people some good tricks, and things I can do to upgrade their homes economically.

But to get all those amazing benefits around Yeah, homes that are healthier homes and more comfortable homes are more efficient, homes that are cheaper to run, and they're just nicer homes to be into. And a sustainable home just means a quality home. Because you can't get it to perform to high standard if it's not done properly.

Well, let me let me ask you, I mean, you've said some nice things about California. You know, where do we stand compared to Australia in terms of getting to net zero? How far ahead or how far behind? Are we are we've kind of equal where, where those two entities stand?

Yeah. So so I think we look at California, particularly in California as well down the path towards heading towards its are compared to where we are in Australia. I think we compare US and Australia in general, we're probably about the same about the same level in terms of our pathway towards zero, though your current president is a lot more bullish on this, which is fantastic.

That's great to see. So so I think between the two countries, we're probably in a similar position to whether our pathway towards zero. But I think California, everyone's got a lot of work to do to get there. But I think California is probably leading the pack or why malaise at the moment anyway.

Yeah, well, it's good to hear I mean, I what I try to remind people is that California has has an economy that's outperformed the rest of the United States economy over the last couple of decades so we can both have a clean and healthy economy. That's That's good. growing at a good rate. So sometimes that what what is sold is that, oh, if we go greener and go net zero, then the economy is going to fall to pieces. But the truth is, that's, that's not the case.

I mean, we've we've got hundreds of companies that are public companies that are building products that are green. So there are tons of green jobs out there if we, if we go in that direction, but we'll talk a little bit more about that when we get back after our break. You're listening to Unite and Heal America, and KABC 790. Your host, Matt Matern and James McGregor, a Blue Tribe CEO out of Australia. So we'll be back in just one minute.

You're listening to Unite and Heal America with Matt Matern, your host. We've got James McGregor on from across the Pacific Ocean, James, we were just talking about profit and purpose. And some of the things that you're working on back in Australia. And I know that that's a topic near and dear to my heart is that we can have a capitalistic approach towards cleaning up the environment.

And I know there's hundreds of publicly traded companies here in the US that are working on green solutions to our problems. So green jobs can be created and are being created. Talk to us a little bit about the green economy and Australia and what you see in the future.

Yeah, look, I 100% agree, I think the oftentimes there's this belief that profit and purpose are like two ends of the spectrum, and opposite ends of the spectrum. But in fact, I think they actually mutually supporting concepts. And we're certainly there's lots of evidence emerging around companies that produce great products that also do great things for the planet outperform companies that don't.

And so if we look at something like say, the UN Sustainable Development Goals, for example, what I what I described as the world's most important to do list, just addressing the sustainable building goals on their own, is a $4 trillion marketplace, right?

What we're talking about is the end, lifting people out of poverty and cleaning up the oceans and making our cities smarter. And all those making our food system sustainable. All these great outcomes is a massive market opportunity for businesses. But it's not just a trillion sounds like that's something for the global markets to deal with. Part of the philosophy around our business is that we believe that every business can be a force for good.

And every project we work on can be a force for good. And that comes down to even through. One of the things that we like to say when we work with our customers is that every time you do business with something great happens in the world. And and we do that by philanthropy and just through the nature of the projects that we do. And it all comes down to local coffee shop, right.

So it doesn't have to be GE or Amazon that needs to do this stuff like the local corner store can actually do stuff that actually makes the world a better place. Just our local coffee shop, for example, recently, completely got rid of single use coffee cups, alright, so if you want to go buy a cup of coffee, you have a personalized mug, which you leave there has your name on it, and they will wash it for you take it home, you can bring it back. But then they've actually eliminated all that waste just from a coffee cup, right.

And now what they now have is a now they save 20 cents per cup of coffee, which doesn't sound like a lot. But when a cup of coffee is like $4. That's a reasonable profit margin that goes back into their pocket. But they also have this loyal customer base, because now I've paid like $10 my mug that they have there, I feel obliged to the user now.

So they're probably getting more cups of coffee off me. And they're saving waste, and they're making it a little better place. So I think there is lots of things that people can do in their businesses.

But we were talking a little bit off on the break about cost accounting for the externalities economic term of which is things that occur related to a business that aren't necessarily on the balance sheet. And for companies like Exxon, for example, that are polluting, but don't put on the balance sheet, what the cost, the true costs of that pollution are, and I think we're starting to move in that direction.

We're forcing or encouraging companies to put on the books to tell their shareholders, hey, we have this potential cost which relates to our activities of polluting the country. What are you seeing seeing in Australia on that front?

Yeah, so I think there's there's also our financial suits for examples now made it almost mandatory for organizations to disclose their climate risks, for example. I mean, a lot of our companies now we work with companies in the minerals sector in the mining sector as well. And so, you know, they, they realize that there are these external alleys and their social life, I think, for those sorts of organizations, whether it be mining or organizations that have large pollution plans, this concept of via their social licence to operate is under threat, as is a real threat.

That's not It's not mistaken. And they see that and they they're starting to change their behaviors, and they're learning as they go. Right. And I think that's important when he sort of goes to the theme of the show, right? So you're not in Hill America, or, as we saw in the whole United heal the glow? There are, there are people who are coming from a place that it's very hard for them to transition towards net zero, right.

And we, and the one major coal mining center here in Australia, and I think one of the things I often say to people is, yeah, we need to distinguish the war on call, compared with the war on coal mining communities, right. So the war on coal is a war on the technology, right? It's the wrong fuel source. There's lots of alternatives, but there are people whose livelihoods depend on it right.

And if you go to war with them, human beings are in trouble. They're just going to dig in, right? And you're never going to get anywhere. So we need to make sure that we bring them with us. So we give them the tools and resources and skills and opportunities so that they become part of building that future. And they see the opportunity for themselves. So yeah, I think we've seen that in our…

How are you doing? How are you doing that in Australia, because I just read an article about this here in the States and saying that, you know, some of the solar companies are not paying their employees wages that are similar to people coming out of, say, the energy sector or things like that. So how are you addressing that those concerns there in Australia?

Yeah, so a lot of a lot of that work here is my view is a sustainability is a team sport, and you can't, you can't do it on your own. And what we're seeing is a lot of coming together of academia, research and development, with government with private industry. And particularly here in the Santa Rosa, we're leading an initiative here in Alabama called net net zero Hunter.

And it's about transitioning this coal reliant industry or community towards a netzero future. And what we're doing is we're currently looking for, yeah, there are a million options towards Net Zero, ie ever solar and battery systems, you can go for circular economy around manufacturing, you can go for green chemistry, this whole stack of things that so what we're doing, we're looking at what is the makeup of the skills and the jobs in the sort of incomes that people have in this region.

And we're identifying technology solutions that are best aligned to the existing skill set. So it's not hard for some of the transition out of working in a power station to start working in a battery manufacturing facility or, or managing a electrical system for energy storage, for example. It's not hard for someone who's got a background as a boilermaker, making pressure vessels or power stations to move into a manufacturing role, which requires the same sort of welding skills, right?

So it's almost like someone's that we have to pick the winners to suit their workforce that we have today. And get people tell the story, right? This comes back to this TV show, right? Teller tell the story of what the future looks like, and what what is their role in that story? Right? Are they Luke Skywalker? Obi Wan Kenobi right? Now? What is their place in iron? Ewok? Right?

What's their place in the story of the future that we all want. And I think that narrative is is really important and having people being part of creating the story. And when people can see the future, then all that fear goes away like that they're not, they're not going to dig in into the trenches to defend their position. Because now that we're now we're all sort of moving to that same future. So the same as that lecture I gave when I split the two groups up, right?

They all wanted the same thing. But if we focused on today, and what was happening today that we're going to get into a punch up. And so yeah, so this project we're working on is around as a number of elements. So the narratives are really important piece around painting what that future looks like, and how each person in the region fits into that story.

And then there's also the idea of, let's actually we have to pick some winners here and choose technologies and choose areas to invest in, that are best suited to the population for this particular region. So we give them a clear opportunity to participate in what's going to be a better future. So

Is there a plan in terms of how quickly that region is going to get away from coal? And where are you at in that phase or phase 10% Done 5% or how far are you from that goal from that goal?

So we're setting a goal for 2050 Today, I'll hope we will ratchet that back at some point and I guess we're just starting on that journey. Now, I think the you know, is staying. There's lots of activity around the innovation spaces, lots of work in that R&D area in the region, we've got some of the best research capability here and Hunter, or anywhere on the planet for some of the problems.

And now it's really about getting some of that infrastructure on the ground. So hopefully next couple years, we'll start seeing that start to emerge.

Yeah, I mean, it's it's certainly disheartening to see so many countries using coal. And I know China's has been exporting coal plants to various third world countries, for their power generation needs, which seems counterproductive to what our ultimate goal is. And it seems that China does have an interest and is taking some positive steps towards helping improve the climate.

But that that's not one of them that you any engagements at zero a lot closer to China, then then we are as to what you see their path? Because obviously, they're the one of the biggest polluters on the planet right now.

Yeah yeah, I think I did a lot of work in China. When I was doing research projects, I think there's lots of activity going on. I think on the issue of coal, I mean, the Stone Age didn't come to come to an end because he ran out of stones, right. And I think the same is gonna happen with coal. And so like investing in coal fired power plants, I think is very risky these days.

And I think it will come to its natural course, I think what I'm seeing like a massive momentum across the globe around moving away from that and to better solutions. And I think it's like a wave that's not going to be stopped. An individual actually countries are important, but yeah, we'll we'll have to see how the future plays out. But a crystal ball or the very happy.

Well, James, it's been a pleasure having you on the show, and we hope wish you the best with your TV show, launch and tell us where we can tune in on Netflix or whatever platform you're gonna be streaming this from now on.

We hopefully will be on a US network as well, at some point, not after long after production. So I'll, I'll drop you a line.

We'll definitely post it up here and we wish you the best going forward. You've been listening to Unite and Heal America and KABC 790 This is Matt Matern, your host, and you've been listening to James McGregor, a Blue Tribe CEO of this company back in Australia.

So tune back in next week, and we'll look forward to talking with a great guest again next week.