why can't we solve these problems we
know what they are something always
seems to stop us why I remember March
the 15th 2000 the b15 iceberg broke off
the Ross Ice Shelf in the newspaper it
said it was all part of a normal process
a little bit further on in the article
it said a loss that would normally take
the ice shelf fifty to a hundred years
to replace that same word normal had two
different almost opposite meanings if we
walk into the b15 iceberg when we leave
here today we're gonna bump into
something a thousand feet tall 76 miles
long 17 miles wide and it's gonna weigh
two Giga tons I'm sorry there's nothing
normal about this and yet I think it's
this perspective of us as humans to look
at our world through the lens of normal
is one of the forces that stops us
developing real solutions only ninety
days after this arguably the greatest
discovery of the last century occurred
there was the sequencing for the first
time of the human genome this is the
code that's in every single one of our
50 trillion cells that makes us who we
are and what we are and if we just take
one cells worth of this code and unwind
it it's a meter long two nanometers
thick two nanometers is twenty atoms
in thickness and I wondered what if the
answer to some of our biggest problems
could be found in the smallest of places
where the difference between what is
valuable and what is worthless is merely
the addition or subtraction of a few
atoms and what if we could get exquisite
control over the essence of energy the
electron so I started to go around the
world finding the best and brightest
scientists I could at universities whose
collective discoveries have the chance
to take us there and we formed a company
to build on their extraordinary ideas
six and a half years later a hundred and
eighty researchers they have some
amazing developments in the lab I will
show you three of those today such that
we can stop burning up our planet and
instead we can generate all the energy
we need right where we are
cleanly safely and cheaply think of the
space that we spend most of our time
tremendous amount of energy is coming at
us from the Sun we like the light that
comes into the room but in the middle of
summer all that heat is coming into the
room that we're trying to keep cool in
winter exactly the opposite is happening
we're trying to heat up the space that
we're in and all that is trying to get
out through the window would it be
really great if the window could flick
back the heat into the room if we needed
it will flick it away before it came in
one of the materials that can do this is
a remarkable material carbon that has
changed its form in this incredibly
beautiful reaction where graphite is
blasted by a vapor and when the
vaporized carbon condenses it condenses
back into a different form chicken-wire
rolled up but this chicken-wire carbon
called the carbon nanotube is a hundred
thousand times smaller than the widths
of one of your hairs
it's a thousand times more conductive
than copper how is that possible one of
the things about working at the nano
scale is things look and act very
differently
you think of carbon as black carbon at
the nano scale is actually transparent
and flexible and when it's in this form
if I combine it with a polymer and a fix
it to your window when it's in its
coloured state it will reflect away all
heat and light and when it's in its
bleach State it will let all the light
and heat through and any combination in
between to change its state by the way
takes two volts from millisecond pulse
once you've changed its state it stays
there until you change its state again
as we were working on this incredible
discovery University of Florida we were
told to go down the corridor to visit
another scientist and he was working on
a pretty incredible thing imagine if we
didn't have to rely on artificial
lighting to get round at night we'd have
to see at night right
this lets you do it it's a nanomaterial
to nanomaterials a detector and an
imager the total width of it is 600
times and it takes all the infrared
available at night the space of two
small films and is enabling you to play
an image which you can see through I'm
going to show to tedsters the first time
this operating firstly I'm going to show
you the transparency transparency is key
it's a film that you can look through
and then I'm going to turn the lights
out and you can see off a tiny film
incredible clarity as we were working on
this it dawned on us this is taking
infrared radiation wavelength converting
it into electron what if we combined it
with this suddenly you've converted
energy into an electron on a plastic
surface that you can stick on your
window but because it's flexible it can
be on any surface whatsoever the power
plant of tomorrow is no power plant
we talked about generating and using we
want to talk about storing energy and
unfortunately the best thing we've got
going is something that was developed in
France 150 years ago the lead acid
battery in terms of dollars per watt
stored it's simply the best knowing that
we're not going to put 50 of these in
our basements to store our power we went
to a group at University of Texas at
Dallas and we gave them this diagram it
was in actually a diner outside Dallas
Fort Worth Airport we said could you
build this and these scientists instead
of laughing at us said yeah and what
they built was e box he boxes testing
new nanomaterials to park an electron on
the outside hold it until you need it
and then be able to release it and pass
it off being able to do that means that
I can generate energy cleanly
efficiently and cheaply right where I am
it's my energy and if I don't need it I
can convert it back up on the window to
energy light and beam it line-of-sight
to your place and for that I do not need
an electric grid between us the grid of
tomorrow is no grid an energy clean
efficient energy will one day be free if
you do this you get the last puzzle
piece which is water
each of us everyday need just eight
glasses of this because we're human when
we run out of water as we are in some
parts of the world and soon to be in
other parts of the world we're going to
have to get this from the sea and that's
going to require us to build these
salination plants 19 trillion dollars is
what we're gonna have to spend these
also require tremendous amounts of
energy in fact it's going to require
twice the world's supply of oil to run
the pumps to generate the water we're
simply not going to do that but in a
world where energy is freed and
transmittable easily and cheaply we can
take any water wherever we are and turn
it into whatever we need I'm glad to be
working with incredibly brilliant and
kind scientists no kind of than many of
the people in the world but they have a
magic look at the world and I'm glad to
see their discoveries coming out of the
lab and into the world it's been a long
time in coming for me eighteen years ago
I saw a photograph in the paper it was
taken by Kevin Carter who went to the
Sudan to document their famine there
I've carried this photograph with me
every day since then it's a picture of a
little girl dying of thirst
by any standard this is wrong it's just
wrong
we can do better than this we should do
better than this
and whenever I go round to somebody who
says you know what you're working on
something that's too difficult it'll
never happen you don't have enough money
ya don't have enough time there's
something much more interesting around
the corner I say try saying that to her
that's what I say in my mind and I just
say thank you and I go on to the next
one this is why we have to solve our
problems and I know the answer as to how
is to be able to get exquisite control
over a building block of nature stuff of
life the simple electron thank you
you