Tech Zero

A tsunami of lithium ion batteries will need to be recycled in the decades ahead to ensure the world has enough critical minerals for the energy transition. And big electric vehicle manufacturers like Mercedes-Benz are turning to an Australian to show them the way.

For more on the episode, visit the Tech Zero site on afr.com. AFR subscribers can also sign up for the weekly Carbon Challenge newsletter. 

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The world's first power station that runs on waste oat husks will get you thinking about the untapped potential in your household food scraps.

Background reading:

• Porridge power is the latest innovation to burnish South Australia’s reputation for being at the cutting edge of the global energy transition.

For more on the episode, visit the Tech Zero site on afr.com. AFR subscribers can also sign up for the weekly Carbon Challenge newsletter. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Background reading:

• When Samantha Langley realised that the tailings dam at BHP’s Nickel West mine could be a carbon sink, she could not have imagined it potentially offsetting all the company’s mining operations.
• The Clean Energy Regulator is considering making mine wastes eligible for carbon credits as BHP says one dam could offset its iron ore and nickel mines.

For more on the episode, visit the Tech Zero site on afr.com. AFR subscribers can also sign up for the weekly Carbon Challenge newsletter. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Meet the Dutch entrepreneur behind the cut price solar revolution that's caught the attention of an Australian mining titan.

Background reading

• The machines were about to be sold as scrap metal when Rombout Swanborn stepped in to save a factory that might hold the key to Australia’s hopes of becoming an ultra-low-cost solar manufacturer and breaking China’s stranglehold on the industry.

For more on the episode, visit the Tech Zero site on afr.com. AFR subscribers can also sign up for the weekly Carbon Challenge newsletter. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Joanne Howarth wants to fleece the polystyrene packaging industry. The Sydney entrepreneur is on a mission to replace those annoyingly-everywhere beads and other squeaky packing material made from oil or methane with something more environment-friendly: wool. Natural health company Blackmores is among the companies interested in the idea.

Background reading:

• Joanne Howarth’s lightbulb moment came while she was working for one of Australia’s biggest meal-kit delivery companies
• The Labor government has been urged to speed up a plastic policy that will only this year ban the burger ‘clam shells’ axed by McDonalds in 1991.

For more on the episode, visit the Tech Zero site on afr.com. AFR subscribers can also sign up for the weekly Carbon Challenge newsletter. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

How will we get to net zero? Australian Financial Review's reporter Peter Ker meets the entrepreneurs leading the charge into the new industrial revolution. Empires will crumble. Fortunes will be made. Episode one drops 6am AEST Thursday June 9.

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