Elon Musk and Peter Diamandis LIVE on $100M XPRIZE Carbon Removal

Here we are on Earth.

Hey, Peter. To see Good to see you.

Yeah. We've we've known each other for a long time now. Yeah. Twenty one years, I think.

Yeah. Woah. It is. I think it was 2000. In in like Brazil. Brazil

Actually, similarly nice sort of setting.

Yeah. And and you're trying to convince me not to start a rocket company.

Yes. But you also said you're, like, really advising me not to start a rocket company because I'd lose all my money, which I thought I thought you're probably right. So I thought, you know, a 10% chance of success. But anyway, seems to have worked out.

Yeah.

Yeah. I our goal is, like, basically to do something that you know, to have it have it be sort of interesting, fun, and and ultimately useful, and to spur creative ideas for what is actually the smartest way to take the trillions of tons of carbon that we we've removed from the ground and will remove from the ground Mhmm. From deep, deep underground, and and and we've placed that carbon in the atmosphere and oceans, which obviously changes the chemical constituency of the surface of the earth. Yeah. And now I should sort of measure measure my statements in in that. I think I think we the earth like, I don't I don't think we're currently doomed, to be clear. This is very important very importantly, you know, there's there there are people in all all parts of the spectrum from ranging from nothing to worry about. C o two is just makes things better to we're doomed, there's nothing we can do about it. I am somewhere in the middle. So my concern with the c o two is not kind of where we are today or or even, you know, the current rate rate of carbon generation, but really, it if we if carbon generation keeps accelerating and we keep getting a that that increase in the in the Keeling curve, you know, the c o two possibly in the atmosphere. And if and if if if we keep going and if we're complacent, then I think we we could there there is some risk of of sort of nonlinear climate change. So so, you know, thus far, we that that we've seen the c o two possibly be be fairly linear on on our time scale, although it looks very exponential on geologic time scale. And but there there are certain potential nonlinear events, like if we raise the temperature to the point where we melt the Siberian traps or something like that.

Yeah. There's there's just a a massive amount of of sort of frozen dead plant animal matter in in Siberia. There's potentially trapped gases deep in the ocean if you if the ocean warms Yeah. That could be released. So, you you know, these these are just these are just risks that are not wise to take. And since we know that long term, we're gonna have to have renewable energy anyway, because we'll we'll we'll run out of oil and gas. It's not gonna last forever. So we know where this ends up. This has to end up with renewable, sustainable energy. It's tautological. It's really just a question of do we try to get there sooner or later? We should try to get there sooner. It's obvious. Why run the why run the ex how long do you wanna run this experiment?

You know, I said, I I am people sometimes think I'm sort of like I I I'm kind of in the middle of the spectrum. You know? And, I think if we stop c o two production today, which obviously we cannot do without civilization coming to a grinding halt, and mass starvation and and all sorts of terrible things happening. So we could not stop c o two generation today. But I think at the, you know, the sort of 400, possibly even 500 p p m level, I I think it's probably okay. But if, you know, as as the world industrializes and we're sort of at 8,000,000,000 people, get to 9,000,000,000 people, have a a lot more industrial output per person, You could see the, you know, you know, at at what what might be okay, it's sort of four or 500, possibly, of CO two in the atmosphere might become quite dire at a thousand. Yep. And the trend is certainly in that direction if we don't do anything about it. So that that's why I think it's just probably an unwise experiment to to run. Even if you think that the this this is why I think should be a compelling argument to even those who would assign a low probability to increase c o two causing problems. Like, let's say you think it's 99.9% likely that that adding all the c o two to the ocean's atmosphere is is gonna be fine. So that you so you're saying there's a point 1% chance of disaster. Well, there's only one we're still right now, we're only gonna get one planet. Even a point 1% chance of disaster, why run that risk? That's crazy. So so I think what's likely to play out is that we will continue to add a lot of a lot more CO2 to the ocean's atmosphere. Also, you know, ocean acidification, as you know, is is also an issue. It's you wanna you don't wanna sort of add carbonic acid to the oceans and and change the pH level because it destroys reefs and and all that.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Yes. So this is a problem.

Yeah.

Right. Exactly.

Yeah. I think it's it's hard to complain. It's you know, the outcome so far has been been great. Although, obviously, to be you know, we've we've not we've not yet sent anyone to Mars and and hopefully will in the future. And in fact, just a few days ago or last early last late last week, guess, NASA awarded SpaceX

Yeah. So so SpaceX a SpaceX craft will be the the next craft to put humans on on the moon. Believe the first human will be a woman, actually, this time. Yes. So this is great. Yeah. So but, of course, we have to actually do it. And and then we've got tomorrow, we've got the our third astronaut launch

I mean, it's obviously a bit of gut economy because our rockets do produce carbon, you know. True. I call it, what a heavy grid. True. No. No. You guys He's obviously just in for the money. But let's talk about

Being a hypocrite by a bunch of rockets that that produce carbon. Here here's the problem is, right now, there is there's really no way to get around the physics of a rocket. So think it's important for the long term preservation and ultimately the expansion and extension of the scope and scale of consciousness and the long term probably survival of humanity and life as we know it. We must become a multi planet species. Because there are all these risks that we can't control.

Or we could do you know, we could have a World War III or something. Know, there's like, I'm optimistic about the future, but you but but you also say, like, okay. Well, so how long do you think civilization will last before there's a catastrophic event? If you say infinity, you're this is not correct.

Okay? This is this is not history does not suggest that. History just suggests we do dumb things to our civilizations all the time, you know, and and and you know, those ancient Egyptians, the Romans, ancient Romans, where are they now? Where where are they now? Yes. Civilizations. The Babylonians, Sumerians, the Yeah. You name it, you know. So there's been many civilizations that have risen and fallen. Anyway, we we gotta preserve we gotta become multi planetary, and right now, the only way to do that is with with with rockets that do burn fuel. But we do have a long term plan for sustainability of even rocket flights by generating propellant using sustainable energy, wind and solar Mhmm. To generate starting first with liquid oxygen. And for our Starship vehicle, it's almost 80% liquid oxygen Yeah. And 20% liquid methane. And the oxygen, it's obviously pretty easy to create that. You just use wind and solar electricity and air separator because you've the oxygen already in the air, the plants are making the oxygen. So you can electricity, basically, renewable electricity to create 80% of the propellant on the rocket. And then for the remaining 20%, you can use the Subadia process where you take you actually take c o two out of the atmosphere, and you combine that with water to create c h four and and more o two. Yep. And that's and that's in fact what we would do on Mars Sure. To generate propellant. Sure. So so so there is a long term plan for sustainable generation of propellant for the rockets. I do wanna emphasize that. And if there's some if there's some other way to do that now, we we certainly would. Yeah. But I'm I'm just trying trying to sort of address this apparent inconsistency and, you know, if bearing carbon is bad, what why why are doing it with rockets?

And just because it's like it's it's it's not they're just one of the other criticisms. Some of feel like, oh, is this some escape hatch for rich people? No. No. You know, they think it's like so, yeah, go to Mars reads like that ad book for for Shackleton going to the Antarctic. You know, it's it's dangerous. It's uncomfortable. It's a long journey. You might not, you know, come back alive. But it's a glorious adventure, and it'll be amazing an amazing experience.

Yes. You might not. It's gonna be uncomfortable, and then we probably won't have good food, and then all these things, you know? So if if if an arduous and dangerous journey where you may not come back alive, but it's a glorious adventure. Sounds appealing.

place. You still have

I mean, honestly, a bunch of people probably will die in the beginning. It's Yeah. It's tough sledding over there.

Yeah. Exactly. Not for everybody. We don't make anyone go. So it's volunteers only.

Yeah. So yeah. We've got hopefully a a great mission planned for tomorrow. This will be our third flight of of people to the space station. We have the test mission with two astronauts, then the first operational mission with four, the second operational mission with four. There's an international crew, a great group. I was just looking online, they're picking their hopefully not final meal, but they're gonna pick whatever their favorite food is from their country. So I'm actually heading over there tonight just to wish him wish him well.

Yeah. This is where people went to the moon. Yeah. Probably from that pad.

from Yeah. It's like Times Square. Times Square of launch launch pads.

It does. It's yeah. It'll be it's reused stage, so when the stages come back, they kinda get scorched. Yeah. So the black it's something people think, is that sort of something? No. It got scorched from reentry.

it and then it's just like, why bother? It's it's kind of hard to wipe off. It doesn't wipe off easily. Yeah. Because it's it's kind of like baked on there.

You kind of have to repaint it really.

Yeah. So I I think what we'd say is like flight proven. Flight proven. Yes. Yeah. So It's like a Lexus If this was an airplane, do you want to be on the first flight of that airplane when it comes out of the factory, or do you wanna be on a later flight? I'd say, let let somebody you know, let the test pilots do their thing before you you, you know, if they fly fly a plane. So you flying a plane, you wanna see that plane is flown a few times before you get in, I think. Yeah. So I I I think it should be on balance better. And then and then we'll also we'll also be reflying the the spacecraft. The Dragon. Yeah. The Dragon spacecraft. Beautiful. So we're trying to get the Reusability is obviously very important.

in many arenas, so reusability is important. Reusability in rockets is important.

Now there's some funny pictures of of basically the the sort of SpaceX as a as a kind of like a kindergartner, me being like what I would say twenty years younger. And, yeah, we're just in this tiny little warehouse in El Segundo. Yeah. I remember it well.

That's And it's

audacious. Yes.

Sure. Well, I think the thing that's least obvious from when it's, on the ground from the from the videos and pictures is the size of it. So it's it's gonna be the largest flying object ever. So it'll be twice the thrust and weight of the Saturn five. Amazing. So that's just for a and taller. So including the launch escape tower. So it's a very tall rocket. A hundred hundred to 120 meters tall.

The

Yeah. You can see in some of the pictures that have been released when it's landing on the moon, and the the people look like ants. Very it's a big rocket. This is this this rocket is capable of, you know, at least a 100 tons and probably closer to 200 tons of useful payload to the surface of the moon. So And and we're it's and we're designed to be far in excess of NASA's requirements. Yeah. And so it's really intended to be something that, you know, that can enable a permanently occupied base on the moon. So, you know, we've to put obviously permanently occupied base in in Antarctica, and it would be great to have one of one on the moon as well. Yeah. And you can do, you know, I think a lot more research if you have the scientists actually there. And we could have some some very powerful telescopes.

Yeah. Right. Exactly. It's it's a

Exactly. It's sort of it's just just off the coast. Mars is is much much much much further. Yeah. One last question. Yeah. So so it's but I think most actually, more important than the size of Starship is the fact that it is intended to be fully and Yeah. Rapidly reusable. Yeah. So this is the fundamental holy grail breakthrough needed for for access to space. To to make humanity a true space bearing civilization, we must have a fully and rapidly reusable rocket. Now we've made some progress in that direction with Falcon nine where the booster is reusable and the Dragon spacecraft upper portion is reusable, but the the second stage is not reusable. And the and and I would say right now, I would not say the Falcon booster spacecraft and and fairing, they're they're not rapidly reusable. Like, takes a fair bit of effort. Less effort than the much less effort than the space shuttle took. Yeah. But but

Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. We had four, and it took about a year a year to turn them around. You know, we're getting it down to a few months, basically, and soon, I think, probably under a month to turn around a booster. But it landing out to sea and then having to bring it back and then sort of taking a month or so to to get it ready for launches. So I wouldn't call that rapid by air aircraft standards. Whereas, Starship is intended to be both fully and rapidly usable. So the the booster comes right back to the launch pad, literally is caught by the the the launch tower. Yep. So it's it lands and is actually caught by launch tower arms, aspirationally. I mean, that there shouldn't be so That

Excitement guaranteed. Yeah. So the booster gets it comes back about six or seven minutes later and and caught so it's it's right there and then caught by launch tower arms and placed right back onto the launch stand. Amazing. And then the the ship is I actually want the ship also to be caught by the the launch tower. Now the ship will take it takes at least ninety minutes to orbit the earth. Yeah. And we may take more than one it may take three or four orbits to get the ground track realigned with the

The landing zone depending on where you are. Yeah. But the point is that the ship will come back and be right land right by the tower and be placed right back on. And so

It's and it's intended to be such that the booster can be used, I don't know, a dozen times a day. And the and the ship Wow. The ship could be, you know, basically every couple hours. And that that and that's mostly about reloading propellant and and mounting the ship. And then the ship could probably be used, you know, probably every, in in theory, every three hours if if you can make the ground track match.

But certainly every say six to nine hours. Or call twice a day for the ship. We'll make more ships than there are boosters. So and I think if you once we have the floating space platforms, we we can set the put the position them such that the ship can come back in a single orbit. Amazing. So then it could be like, you know, let's say if you get three ship launches per day, that's a thousand flights a year of each with a 100 to a 150 tons of Now

Yeah. I think I wanted to spur ideas and thinking about the long term need to capture carbon. And, you know, I think this is one of those things that's gonna take a while to figure out what the right solution is

And especially to figure out what what the best economics are for for c o two removal think through all the consequences. You don't want the cure to be worse than the disease. Yeah. Know, sometimes people say, Well, just plant a bunch of trees. I'm like, That's not so easy. You know? A trillion trees. Sure. Exactly. And then you go to like, okay, you need get fertilizer, you're gonna water them, where's the water gonna come from, what habitat are you potentially destroying where the trees used to be. It's not just a no brainer of just go plant a bunch

We should plant some trees. I'm in favor of planting trees. It's just not a question of like, okay, know, there are like vast sections of like the Sahara Desert or the, you know, some large barren areas, very dry areas in The US where you can, in theory, plant a lot of trees, you're gonna need a lot of water. Yeah. And you're need, like, like, you're gonna have to cultivate them. It's not like they don't just throw some cheese on the ground.

Yeah. And I mean, so just I think it'll be good to sort of kind of frame the the frame the debate and and understand, okay, what things are really gonna move the needle? How much are they gonna move the needle? You know, if we're talking about getting tens or hundreds of billions of tons of carbon, in in what form will that carbon be? Yeah. Will it be stable over time? And like I said, what is it going to cost humanity to do? However it's paid for, what is it going to cost? What's the thing that's going to be most affordable? I think there are a lot of open questions on this. There are.

Yeah. Think by the way, we're we're we're very much open to adjusting the rules to be clear to everyone. Like like, meaning, if things aren't working or for whatever reason, like, we need to adjust rules, we'll we'll adjust rules. The the the fundamental goal is to have spent a 100,000,000 and actually end up being probably like a 120,000,000 or whatever with cost of managing the prize and everything. So it'll be, at the end the day, probably something like a $120,000,000 spent. And hopefully, that's spent well and usefully. And that what comes out of it is something that matters to the future. So that that's the that's the goal, to be clear. And so if people have, you know, ideas for adjusting the rules

Right.

Yeah.

Yeah. So we're we're super open to critical feedback. Don't hesitate to, you know, yell and say if this is how it should be different in some way or whatever. You know, the goal is just to, like, let's have it be a useful exercise and have people have a good time trying to figure out this problem. I think it's sort of a it's a fun problem to try to work on. And, yeah, we just want it to be useful at the end the day, you know, and and and and have it not be sort of an academic exercise or something that never amounts to anything.

Everything works on PowerPoint. That's exactly. You can have a PowerPoint presentation for a teleportation system to the Andromeda Galaxy and and and even have a simulation of like, look, here we are, boom, you're in the according to the slide, you're now teleported to Andromeda.

I'm like but it doesn't actually work, you know?

Yeah.

Do they have to they're Do they have to pull out a thousand tons or just show that the rate, it works?

Like a literal thousand tons, we weigh it. We're On a scale.

to run for month, that's okay.

Alright. And I mean, in a month, they have, you know, like a 100 tons. And it needs to fit on our weighing machine or something. Know? Like, I don't know. Gonna weigh it tomorrow.

And we'll get it down and ship you out on our end.

It's very hard to make something real. In in my view, prototypes are trivial and production is hard. Yeah. And there's the general generally, think it's the prototype that is the hard thing. Prototypes are well, I mean, obviously, you're gonna have that percent of inspiration, but as the saying goes, it's one percent inspiration, 99% perspiration. Yeah. Ideas are plentiful. Actually getting it done is very hard. You could say, for example, what about the, you know, the idea of going to the moon? It's easy. Going to the moon is hard. So that's that's why it's not the idea, man. Yeah. Yeah.

It's like

to go to the moon. I patented it. Okay. Good.

Yeah. So I think fully considered cost actually just means that if there areyou want to look at both the benefits and the cost actually. If in sequestering carbon or removing it from the atmosphere or oceans has some, perhaps, some environmental impact, which might be small, but it's not negative. Mhmm. That certainly needs to be taken into account. And and then, by the same token, if what's done is in extracting carbon is a useful product Sure. From which you can generate revenue, then that should count too. Alright. So I don't know. I'm just sort of saying for argument's sake, like, let's say you could create, you know construction Rock view. Material like, you know Put cement. Cement. Yes. Yeah.

Some kind of useful rocks that are rocks that are useful or sand or I don't know. Yeah. Something that's useful for construction, then you could say, okay, well, this is what we could sell it for. And, you know, and then just fully consider pros and cons and and say, this is what, you know, if if we need to pay to have it done in the future, which we probably will have to do, then what's the what's the lowest net cost?

No, talked about absolutely.

be worse than disease.

came Well, up just the rate of carbon sequestering is to far exceed the rate at which, say, it is potentially dissolving back into the atmosphere. Yeah. So, you know, like, if if yeah.

Yeah. Maybe with maybe there's a small amount that that has lost. Maybe it's not perfect. Yeah. I think we don't probably wanna set it to, you know, a 100% for a hundred years. But if it's like, I don't know, 90% for a hundred years, that's probably okay. Mhmm. You know? So it it just needs to be something that if we scaled it up, would it work?

which is sense test test really.

It can't it can't be niche. Yeah. It can't be inherently niche.

Yeah. You do. Yeah. Scalable. Scaling is hard. Yeah. So, yeah. I I don't know what the answer is here, really. But I think if if a lot of smart people work on this, there could be some really creative solutions.

Absolutely. Yeah. And I think just to clear, looking for pragmatic solutions. It doesn't need to be perfect. You know, but it's it's gotta be something that just fundamentally, if we scaled it up, would it would it work? Yeah. That's it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Right?

Yeah. I mean, we wanna reward people who have done great work. Yeah. Fund fundamentally. I'm I'm open to increasing the price size too over time. So if it turns out like, hey, somebody really, really kicked ass and and and somehow there's not a price for them, we'll also add some more to the price. That's that's extraordinary. Yeah. Absolutely. I want somebody to have like, spent like, you know, massive blood, sweat, and tears, have done something useful, and then get nothing for it, that would be pretty bad. Yeah. So but I I think also, you know, this somebody's gonna probably get a company out of this, you know, because I think this will be a need long term. And, you know, so and and so this is kinda like you can also think of it as, you know, free venture money. Yeah. You know?

And free free free money for a company.

Yeah.

Just giving some people some seed money, basically. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. We've we've done a lot of student competitions, for example, Hyperloop. Just trying to, you know, spur ideas in advanced transportation. And it's it's really just basically an electric car and a vacuum tube, to be precise. I mean, and we've had several of them. And and, you know, the the last competition, I actually got, like, I think halfway to the speed of sound. Yeah. Pretty impressive. And as the the thing was, you had to get to the fastest speed and then and then stop without crashing. Yeah. So that's pretty it's it's kind of exciting. It's like, this thing gonna, you know, get what speed is it gonna get up to? Are they gonna slam the brakes on in time or is it gonna hit the crash barrier at the end? So it's pretty fun. Then we kind of got to I put that on pause and now we're doing tunneling competitions. Nice.

No. Honestly, think we're we're we're gonna you know, I mean, for, I don't know, five or seven years, I for a long time, I was like, if you ask me what opportunities do you see, I said tunneling, and they think I was joking, but I think this is the way to solve traffic in, congested cities. Almost every major city is congested. So and and with, as autonomy, gets better and better, and you have robo taxis and everything, the robo taxis will be cheaper than a bus or subway. And people will want it and it'll take you point to point, you know, even when it's, like, raining and snow. And it's you know, so it's it's gonna be better also, I think, for you know, from a public health standpoint, like, if there's another pandemic and, you know, how do you get around? You know? It's like you you know, it's just difficult to go into in crowded spaces. So then anyway, so I think tunnels are gonna be really important in the future for relieving congestion in in cities. So, you know, I I hope others start tunneling tunneling companies and just improve tunneling technology. That you can have effect these wall tunnels just going all the way through this, you know, three d, multiple levels. And we're we're the first operational one in Vegas that's Yeah. It's gonna go into operation, I think, in a few months.

Yeah. Was awesome. Yeah.

I played mindpunk against the monkey. You did? Did it? Yeah. No. Alright. But it hadn't practiced as much yet. So now it might be able to beat me. Monkeys have very good agility. Yeah.

They can swing through the trees, we cannot. Not very well, you know? Yeah. So I think a monkey actually could could play like a fast twitch video game really well.

Or better maybe better than a human.

Yeah. Exactly. Esports,

Yeah. Turns out the monkeys actually love playing video games and and

And drinking smoothies. No. It's just like humans. I mean, basically, humans love snacks and video games and so do monkeys. You know?

Yeah.

Sure. Well, I mean, you can certainly pull out there's there's lot there's lots of ways to get carbon out of the air. Yeah. It could adsorb it many different ways.

that is are

Okay. There's

Mhmm. That's not true.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Earth is gonna face a massive population collapse Yeah. In in a over the next twenty, thirty years. Massive. Yeah. And it's this this is definitely, you know, most civilization you know, a question of, like, is civilization gonna die with a bang or a whimper? This would definitely be dying with a whimper.

But the birth rate is very low.

Fourth I mean, in in in most of Europe, Russia, Japan, Korea, Singapore, you know, it's it's it's well below replacement.

I think so.

Yeah. I I think the the world is generally getting better. You know, I have some concerns about advanced AI, like, know, that that that's a risk. If I say, like, existential risks, I'd I'd say super advanced AI is one. Mhmm. And and probably the second biggest risk after that is population collapse.

No. The population collapse the thing about demographics in both ways, you know what's gonna happen in twenty years because you know the birth rate last year. Yeah. It takes like twenty years for a person to grow

So we we know what the adult population is gonna be twenty years from now because we know what kids were born last year. I think it's we have a a serious issue with population collapse.

That's far bigger than people realize. And, you know, the social networks and everything were I mean, the social support networks were not really set up for a high ratio of retirees to workers. So then Well,

Yeah. Robots. Exactly. We'll need those we'll need those robots. But Yeah. You you don't wanna have the the youth effectively enslaved to take care of the elderly. Yeah. You know, which is what would would kinda happen if if you have an upside down demographic pyramid.

In the

know how to

Well, think it's not unless the cost is affordable, it's not scalable. I mean, I thought the the prior math was was pretty sensible there. You know, we could we could afford something perhaps which is one or 2% of GDP, but it would be extremely painful if it was 20% of GDP. We'd start having to cut into healthcare and all sorts of social care programs. And if it's 200% of GDP, it's not happening at all. So why don't we just let them know that the audio feed is coming through?

No. Actually, think something's not scalable unless if the cost is low. Yep. So or at least if the cost at scale is low. Mhmm. Yeah. I mean I mean, I guess cost is scalable. You can say, I could plant a tree. Yeah. Sure. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. But we we need to solve the problem. And and and so both cost and scalability need to be addressed. It's like, is it gonna be remove enough carbon to matter? Mhmm. And can we afford it as a civilization? Yep. Those are the two things that that matter. Yep. And then just obviously making sure that it ends equestrian the the carbon. We're not at the same time creating some new environmental issue. So

Yeah. Or maybe it is, but it can only be cure has got be much better than the disease. Yeah. Obviously. Yeah. So it doesn't matter if you take some medication, maybe there's slight side effects, but you generally want the medication to be much better than the disease. So it just got to make sense. Like, we can see a path to this, to working at scale and and solving a problem. Yeah. It has to have some chance of that.

Well, generally, the the market systems work very well when prices are accurate. And the problem we have right now is that, we're not correctly pricing the cost per ton of CO two in the atmosphere and oceans. So and there are various attempts to try to get get at this with subsidies and whatnot, but but really the market system will work work well if the market systems work well if there's not a pricing error. Yeah. And we have a pricing error in that we are not paying for this externalities. In classic economics, it's just an unpriced externality in the we're we're not paying for our garbage removal. So then garbage piles up. You know? So and so the the logical thing to do, and I think the, you know, vast majority of economists would agree, is to put a tax on carbon, and then you can find ways with with tax rebates and whatnot to sure it's not a regressive tax that it does not unfairly, know, negatively, disproportionately negatively affect people on low incomes with with tax rebates and stuff. Yeah. So I think that's the way to that that that's the thing that systemically I think is important to address it. If you correctly price something, the market system works. Yeah. Prices are just information. Grab the wrong information. So

Yeah. Think so interesting thing on Mars is that Mars is a primarily CO two atmosphere, but it also has some nitrogen and carbon and other trace elements. Nitrogen and argon, I should say, in addition to primarily CO two. So in order to produce propellant on Mars, we would take the c o two from the atmosphere, combine that with water ice. Mars has a lot of ice under the dust.

Yeah. Yeah. Mars is just is basically covered in ice. Yeah. It's it's just got dust too. So it's hard to see the ice under the dust. But there's there's I I believe if if you warmed Mars up, you'd have an ocean with an average depth depth I think of almost a mile or something like that on the northern part of the of the planet. It's like something like 40% of the planet would have an ocean potentially up to a mile mile deep or something like that. Extraordinary. Like a like a not a big. It wouldn't be like just a little lake or something like that. So so so you take the water ice, h two o, and you combine that with the c o two in the atmosphere. Use something like this body process where you run it over a ruthenium catalyst and you get basically Methane. Yeah. You get methane. You get CH four and o two oxygen. And that's that's actually why we designed the starship to use methane oxygen is because we can actually create that

Yeah. In fact, literally by pulling the c o two out of the atmosphere That's combining with water Yeah. And then and then using that as propellant. And so actually by its very nature, Mars has to have a sustainable sustainable energy sustainable rocket propellant.

Like which technologies?

think there should be more trees. Yeah. Let's do it.

like Yeah. Yeah. It will. The thing is that generally, if if trees can grow somewhere, they generally they usually do grow. They they, you know, they like, unless some of they generally

I mean, the Amazon is quite a thick quite a big, big, big, thick jungle. I've flown over the Amazon many times, and that is one hell of a jungle. In fact, that, like, you would fly for long periods of time and see nothing. No lights, no fires, no nothing. Just darkness. And then eventually, like, fly over Brasilia, the capital, and, out of nowhere, there's a bunch of lights. But but there's just this you know, in in order to have a big increase in in in tree biomass, we would we would have to irrigate and, you know, provide manure, you know, like like basically fertilizer and we'd have to cultivate.

Yeah. So then you say, okay. Well, what's the energy cost of the of the fertilizer and the getting the fresh water there and, you know, just making it habitable for trees. It's it's it's you gotta factor in the, you know, the energy cost of the fertilizer and and the energy cost of the water Mhmm. And all that. So it's like, okay, what's the actual net carbon result? It's it's not as good as people might think. It's, again, I'm not saying I'm anti tree. I'm pro tree. But it but it it would just be very difficult to to blanket the Sahara with trees. Yeah. So let's this is

Yeah. Sure. Absolutely. What How do get things done?

Neuralink and Boring are very small companies, I should emphasize. Like, these are tiny compared to SpaceX and Tesla, which is

Well well over 90% of what I do is just SpaceX and Tesla. Yeah. So, you know, Neuralink and Warren Company are each just a a few 100 people.

people.

Yeah. So it's it's as big. SpaceX is like over 8,000 people. So

Well, varies. I mean, my my I mean, the first company way back in the day, Zip2, what I did was I just wrote software, you know. So I didn't have any money. So I came out to with Zip2I, I came out to go do grad studies at Stanford. I had a $100,000 in, like, student debt and one computer. And I was gonna actually work on advanced capacitors for use in electric vehicles.

You've seen that. Way way back in the day. Yeah. So and I spent a couple of summers working on that before in in Silicon Valley before going to Stanford. And then that that summer, I was like, you know, the Internet's gonna be something that really changes the the it's gonna be one of the biggest impacts on on humanity. Know, it's like humanity communication will go from being like osmosis to humanity having a nervous system where you could access any part of humanity's knowledge from from anywhere, from any connection anywhere. You could be in the middle of the Amazon Jungle and have access to all of humanity's information. More more than if somebody was living in the library of congress. So I was like, well, I I wanna be part of creating that. And so I just started writing software. I've been writing software for a long time, but I actually wrote the first maps and directions on the Internet, the first white pages, first yellow pages by And then, you know, we've hired a few interns, and then my brother joined, another friend of mine, Greg Currie, who's passed away. And and then we got some venture funding. Thought it was crazy that these guys were gonna give us like they gave us like $3,000,000. And I was like, this is insane. It's us and some interns they're giving us $3,000,000. This was crazy. I'm not gonna bet you. Mad. I So

Useful things. Let's try and squeeze in a few more Well, mean, I think, like the the things you have to remember, like, for for for SpaceX, it was just literally like, okay. We we should become multi you know, multi planet species and these are like long answers. So but but I think in general, if you wanna recruit people that are really talented and driven, you have to state what's the mission, what's the problem we're trying to solve, and just be clearly willing to pour a lot of blood, sweat, and tears into it and have a convincing argument for why it matters. You know, there's you know, I'd say like there's three three major things for you know, in terms of motivation. It's like, first of all, somebody's gotta look forward to coming to work in the morning. Like, if they're like, are they enjoying the the the work itself intrinsically? That's very important. And the right work environment can really make make a big difference there. I think the ideally is that they're also feel like that their rewards will receive fair financial compensation, like that the that, you know, the that the financial rewards are are are good and fair. And then third, for the really for the best people in the world, they wanna know are they is what they're doing gonna matter? Yep. Like, so if they spend ten years doing this, will it make a difference to the world or, you know, will people notice? Will matter? You know?

What sort of tonnage are they able to do?

I think so. Sure.

there is there an age limit or anything?

to convince people to make life more more measurable for themselves, this is a hard argument to win. Yeah. So with with Tesla, when we when we created Tesla, we're like, okay. Look. We we gotta make a car that's exciting and and and fun and and looks good. And then people don't have to if you're trying to convince people to that in order to save the environment, have to wear a hair shirt and and make life miserable and your food's gonna be terrible. It's that's this is a uphill battle. Okay? So at Tesla, we're like, we're we're just gonna make electric cars that are better than gasoline cars. Yeah.

Yeah. Lower cost for maintenance. Yeah. They look beautiful. They're faster. Then they have all sorts, you know, cool advanced technology. They're more fun. You don't have to go to gas stations, which are nasty. And so, you know but you gotta solve long distance problem with superchargers. So I think it is actually, you know, gonna be be way more palatable to people if if if it's if whatever solution is is removing carbon does not make their quality of life worse.

Well, it's not fully self driving.

getting there. It's getting there.

I think I I I was I was always kinda like a crazy kid, suppose. Was just very curious about the world and how do we come to be here, what's the meaning of life, and all that. And I always had a really intense desire to understand things and learn. Yeah. I mean, I had sort of an existential crisis, I guess, when I was 11 or 12 or something, just trying figure out what it's all about, you know. And ultimately, we the conclusion that we don't really know the answer, but if we increase the scope and scale of civilization, then we we have a much better chance of understanding the meaning of life and why why we're here or even what other right questions to ask. So therefore, we should strive to expand the scope and scale of consciousness to better understand the questions to ask about the answer that is the universe.

Yeah. I hope you all have a good time and get some some productive stuff coming out of it. That'd great.

Is this like Twitter's clubhouse thing? This is Twitter's clubhouse, yes. Okay.

Yeah. It's gonna be a late night. I'll be up all night because launch is pretty early in the morning.

Sure.

pretty wild seeing that. It is. That feels like the future.

That's pretty insane.

Yeah. Yeah.

Alright. Thanks, Alright. Pleasure.