Everybody in the Pool

Hosted by Molly Wood

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144

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Jun 2026

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About the show

Enough with the "problem porn." We all know the climate crisis is a big deal. This podcast is entirely about solutions and the people who are building them. Entrepreneurs are inventing miracles; the business world is shifting; individuals are overhauling their lives; an entirely new economy is being born. Don't be the last one in. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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June 11, 202646 min

E139: Make fusion energy, then repeat. Inertia Enterprises, Part 1

Fusion has been “ten years away” for decades — but one corner of the field just crossed a line that changes the conversation. In December 2022, Lawrence Livermore National Lab’s National Ignition Facility achieved ignition: a self-sustaining fusion reaction that produced net energy. And they’ve repeated it.So what happens when you take the only fusion approach that’s proven to work, and focus less on new physics… and more on building the industrial supply chain to do it again and again, cheaply and reliably? You get a field trip!In part one of a two-part field trip to Livermore, California, Molly visits Inertia Enterprises’ “House of Fusion” to meet two of the company’s co-founders:Jeff Lawson (yes, that Jeff Lawson — founder of Twilio and majority owner of The Onion) on the business case for commercializing ignition, and why Inertia thinks the economics are finally ready.Mike Dunne, former Lawrence Livermore power-plant designer and Stanford professor, on what it takes to turn a lab breakthrough into a power plant — from a gigawatt-scale “engine” that can follow renewables on the grid, to building a million precision fuel targets a day.We talk about:What “ignition” actually means — and why it’s different from “fusion someday”Why Inertia is starting with the only physics regime that’s been proven to produce net fusion energyThe two big bottlenecks: high-power diode lasers and mass-manufactured fusion targetsHow scaling semiconductor manufacturing could drive laser costs down (and why “1,000x” matters)What a fusion target is: a tiny fuel capsule inside a miniature “oven” (and why lead beats gold for economics)Why a fusion plant looks more like a high-RPM engine than a one-off experiment — and how that changes everythingPotential early markets beyond electricity: high-temperature process heat for steel, cement, and fertilizerWhat it looks like to build a fusion company in Silicon Valley: Apple/Waymo-style process engineers, high-end metrology, and a Nerf gun used as a stand-in for high-speed target trackingThunderdome. Yes, really.Links:Inertia Enterprises: https://inertia.com/Everybody in the Pool: https://www.everybodyinthepool.com/Subscribe to the Everybody in the Pool newsletter: https://www.mollywood.co/Become a member for the ad-free version of the show: https://everybodyinthepool.supercast.com/Join our Discord! https://discord.gg/2EsDhwQC2z Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

June 4, 202629 min

E138: The Solar Revolution You Don't Need a Rooftop For

If you’re on a mission to make your home greener, solar panels might seem like an obvious place to start. But for renters, apartment dwellers, and homeowners who can’t afford a traditional rooftop solar installation, solar has long been out of reach — until now.This week on Everybody in the Pool, Molly talks with Cora Stryker, co-founder of Bright Saver, about a simple climate technology that's already taken Europe by storm: plug-in solar.Also known as balcony solar, these small solar systems can be installed without contractors, plugged directly into a standard outlet, and start generating electricity immediately. More than 4 million systems are already in use in Germany, but in the United States, regulations have kept the technology largely off the market.In this episode, Cora explains how plug-in solar could open up access to clean energy and lower electricity bills for millions of renters and homeowners. She also shares how Bright Saver is driving a wave of legislation across the country aimed at making these systems legal.We talk about:What plug-in solar is and how it worksWhy millions of Europeans already use balcony solar systemsHow renters and apartment residents can benefit from generating their own electricityWhy traditional rooftop solar remains so expensive in the United StatesThe regulatory roadblocks slowing adoption, and whether safety concerns cited by utilities hold up to scrutinyHow Utah, Maine, Maryland, Virginia, and Colorado are leading the way on legalizationWhy affordability may be the key to scaling climate solutionsThe surprising coalition of climate advocates, free-market supporters, and energy-independence champions backing plug-in solarLinks:Bright Saver: https://brightsaver.orgAll episodes: https://www.everybodyinthepool.com/Join our Discord! https://discord.gg/2EsDhwQC2zSubscribe to the Everybody in the Pool newsletter: https://www.mollywood.co/Become a member for the ad-free version of the show: https://everybodyinthepool.supercast.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

May 28, 202632 min

E137: The Missing Ingredient for Fusion Energy

We need to triple global energy production by 2050. Renewables are scaling fast, but the real wild card that could change everything might just be fusion. The physics and engineering are closer than ever, but there’s a critical materials problem standing between us and unlimited clean energy.This week on Everybody in the Pool, Molly speaks with Dr. John Elling, a Los Alamos chemist turned serial entrepreneur who’s working on a solution that he believes will change the world. Both fusion and next-generation fission reactors rely on enriched lithium isotopes, and existing enrichment methods are slow, expensive, and require massive facilities. Dr. Elling’s company, Molten Salt Solutions, is developing a simpler, cheaper process and building the US's first commercial production facility for enriched lithium — the ingredient that could determine whether fusion energy ever actually reaches the grid.We talk about:The big problem facing both fusion and advanced fission right now: the unmet demand for fuelA refresher on the science behind enriched lithium and nuclear energyThe world’s growing energy demands, and why fusion will help us meet the 3x demand we’ll face by 2050Why the US dismantled its only enrichment facility and why Russia currently holds the only meaningful supplyHow Molten Salt Solutions' mercury-free, scalable process differs from how governments did it during the nuclear weapons eraThe race to supply fusion developers with material they need now, before commercial reactors even existWhy the current administration's push to reduce regulatory barriers for small modular reactors is accelerating demand for lithium-7John's case for why fusion is the final frontier of humanity’s energy evolutionLinks:Molten Salt Solutions: https://www.moltensaltsolutions.com/All episodes: https://www.everybodyinthepool.com/Join our Discord! https://discord.gg/2EsDhwQC2zSubscribe to the Everybody in the Pool newsletter: https://www.mollywood.co/Become a member for the ad-free version of the show (and support future field trips): https://everybodyinthepool.supercast.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

May 21, 202632 min

E136: The “Recovering Real Estate Broker” Making Greener Buildings

You’re doing all the right things to make your home greener: you switched to solar and induction, you remember your reusable bags, and you always compost your scraps. But some of the biggest climate impacts of the building you live or work in? They were locked in the day it was built — in the concrete, the steel, the glass. And that matters, because the built environment accounts for roughly 42% of global emissions.This week on Everybody in the Pool, Molly sits down with Ben Stapleton, the CEO at the U.S. Green Building Council of California, to talk about what it actually takes to make our buildings work for the climate instead of against it. Ben has spent over 20 years at the intersection of sustainability, real estate, and innovation, and he’s got a refreshingly practical outlook: the solutions exist, the business case is there, and the work is already happening, even when the federal government is pulling back.We talk about:Why buildings — not cars — are the biggest source of carbon emissions, and what that means for climate strategyThe difference between operating carbon and embodied carbon, and why that means we need two different performance standards for buildingsHow building performance standards work and why California is building a statewide framework to get there by 2030How to get developers to root for performance standards: sell them on lower energy costs, lower insurance premiums, and higher resale valuesWhat rebuilding after the LA fires could look like if we get it right, and why waiving the all-electric requirement was a missed opportunityUSGBC California's Net Zero Accelerator and the startup trends Ben is tracking in green building techLinks:U.S. Green Building Council of California: https://usgbc-ca.org/All episodes: https://www.everybodyinthepool.com/Join our Discord! https://discord.gg/2EsDhwQC2zSubscribe to the Everybody in the Pool newsletter: https://www.mollywood.co/Become a member for the ad-free version of the show (and support future field trips): https://everybodyinthepool.supercast.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

May 14, 202642 min

E135: The Battery That Pays You Back with Lunar Energy

Home batteries are having a moment, but for years, getting one meant cobbling together a solar panel from one company, an inverter from another, a smart panel from a third, and hoping they'd all play nice. This week on Everybody in the Pool, Molly takes a field trip to Mountain View, California, to visit Lunar Energy, where founder and CEO Kunal Girotra has built the fully integrated solar-plus-battery ecosystem he always wished existed.Plus: a tour of Lunar's working showroom, where we flip a breaker, watch the app react in real time, and find out what happens when you leave the oven on during a power outage.We talk about:Why Kunal left Tesla Energy to build a fully integrated home energy ecosystemHow Lunar's modular, stackable battery blocks work (think Lego bricks for your garage wall)The real math on savings: how a solar and battery system can cut your bill by $2,000/year, and Lunar's AI adds another $500 on topHow "virtual power plants" are actually very real, and why Lunar wants to rename them "distributed power plants"Why Northeastern states are leading on VPP policy, and what utilities in other regions need to change to keep upLinks:Lunar Energy: https://www.lunarenergy.com/Sunrun (Lunar's leading VPP partner): https://www.sunrun.com/Green Mountain Power: https://greenmountainpower.com/All episodes: https://www.everybodyinthepool.com/Join our Discord! https://discord.gg/2EsDhwQC2zSubscribe to the Everybody in the Pool newsletter: https://www.mollywood.co/Become a member for the ad-free version of the show (and support future field trips): https://everybodyinthepool.supercast.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

May 7, 202631 min

E134: Inside Denver's Local Climate Action Playbook

Washington and the COP conferences get all the headlines, but some of the most creative and effective climate action in the world is emerging from city halls — and Denver's Office of Climate Action is one of the best examples of what's possible.This week, Molly zooms in on the Mile High City as she talks with Chelsea Warren, Marketing and Communications Manager for Denver’s Office of Climate Action, Sustainability and Resiliency. Chelsea has spent years building one of the country's most effective city-level climate communications programs, making the case that local government is where climate action gets real.We talk about:Why local government is the frontline of climate action, and why local action matters more than everHow Denver used the rollback of federal climate policies to motivate voters to fund local climate initiatives like solar, e-bike rebates, heat pump programs, and moreUsing the science of behavioral change to effectively promote climate actionGoodwill pop-ups, ice cream collaborations, and other non-traditional ways Denver activated around a climate campaign, and delivered 128 million impressions in the processWhy financial incentives and positive social comparison beat education every time when it comes to motivating climate actionThe perception gap: most people wildly underestimate how many of their neighbors care about climate actionHow effective, human-centered storytelling can combat pessimism and inactionThe co-benefits frame: reaching people through health, savings, and quality of life, not just the environmentLinks:Denver's Office of Climate Action, Sustainability, and Resiliency: https://www.denvergov.org/Government/Agencies-Departments-Offices/Agencies-Departments-Offices-Directory/Climate-Action-Sustainability-and-ResiliencyThe Denver Climate Project: https://www.denvergov.org/Community/Denver-Climate-ProjectAll episodes: https://www.everybodyinthepool.com/Join our Discord! https://discord.gg/2EsDhwQC2zSubscribe to the Everybody in the Pool newsletter: https://www.mollywood.co/Become a member for the ad-free version of the show: https://everybodyinthepool.supercast.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

April 30, 202630 min

E133: How a Little Tracker is Making Supply Chains Greener with Tive

Trillions of dollars worth of goods move around the planet every year, and a shocking amount is lost, spoiled, or discarded. That wasted food, medicine, and equipment isn’t just a business problem; it’s a massive, underappreciated climate problem.This week on Everybody in the Pool, Molly talks with Krenar Komoni, CEO and founder of Tive, a supply chain visibility company that helps businesses track and monitor shipments in real time. What started as a GPS tracker for his father-in-law's trucking company has grown into one of the fastest-growing companies in supply chain tech. Tive’s small-but-mighty trackers don’t just follow a shipment’s location — they also monitor temperature, light, and shock along the way, helping businesses intervene before a load of strawberries (or a shipment of vaccines) becomes a very expensive, very wasteful problem.We talk about:Why real-time shipment visibility is a key ingredient in creating a greener supply chainHow temperature monitoring can save hundreds of thousands of dollars of food and medicine from going to wasteWhat "permanent disruption" and climate change means for global supply chainsHow route data is helping companies find faster, more fuel-efficient paths they didn't know existedTive's commitment to sustainability in its own products, including lithium-free trackers and a tracker recycling programWhy AI agents will be hungry for real-time supply chain data, and what that could unlock for global efficiencyKrenar's 10-year vision: tracking 5-10% of all global shipments (and why that would be a very big deal)Links:Tive: https://www.tive.com/All episodes: https://www.everybodyinthepool.com/Join our Discord! https://discord.gg/2EsDhwQC2zSubscribe to the Everybody in the Pool newsletter: https://www.mollywood.co/Become a member for the ad-free version of the show: https://everybodyinthepool.supercast.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

April 23, 202629 min

E132: The Data Center’s Climate Redemption Arc with Lucend

Data centers don't exactly have a reputation for being climate heroes… but what if they could be? This week on Everybody in the Pool, Molly sits down with Jasper de Vries, co-founder and CEO of Lucend, to talk about the surprisingly wild world of data center optimization — and why the industry has been leaving billions of dollars and millions of megawatt hours on the table.In this conversation, Jasper explains how Lucend’s platform uses machine learning and sensor data to make data centers dramatically more efficient. He also lays out a vision for the industry’s future; one where data centers generate their own renewable power, store it in batteries, and feed flexibility back to the grid on demand.We talk about:Why data centers are sitting on a goldmine of untapped efficiency, and why they haven't captured it until nowHow Lucend uses 280 billion sensor readings to open up the "black box" of data center operations, saving customers an average of 25% on energy and 30% on waterWhy it’s so hard to make even the smallest changes in how a data center operatesHow "transparent AI" builds operator trust by showing every step of the recommendation processThe water vs. energy trade-off in cooling, and why it's more complicated than headlines suggestWhy Scope 3 emissions from hardware are the dirty secret behind Big Tech's broken climate pledgesThe vision for data centers as flexible grid assets, and what’s needed to get them thereLinks:Lucend: https://www.getlucend.com/All episodes: https://www.everybodyinthepool.com/Join our Discord! https://discord.gg/2EsDhwQC2zSubscribe to the Everybody in the Pool newsletter: https://www.mollywood.co/Become a member for the ad-free version of the show: https://everybodyinthepool.supercast.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

April 16, 202631 min

E131: The Shark Tank-Style Fix for Climate Philanthropy with 1.5°Climate

Less than 2% of all philanthropic giving goes to climate, and a big reason why is something Greg Rock calls "donor paralysis." People care, but the landscape is so complex that many well-meaning donors don’t take action.This week on Everybody in the Pool, Molly sits down with Greg Rock, Executive Director of 1.5°Climate, a free national donor collaborative that's borrowing the energy of VC pitch competitions to make climate philanthropy more accessible, more exciting, and more impactful. With 600+ members and $35 million moved to over 100 organizations, 1.5°Climate is proving that you don’t have to be a billionaire, or an expert in climate tech, to make a real difference.We talk about:Why less than 2% of philanthropic giving goes to climate, and what we can do to change thatHow 1.5°Climate's Shark Tank-style virtual pitch events connect donors directly with vetted climate organizationsThe three criteria that define a high-impact climate investment: catalytic potential, leverage, and gap-fillingWhy 1.5°Climate funds nonprofits that aren’t exclusively climate organizations like cattle trade associations and agricultural projectsHow the team shifted from federal to state and local climate action after the 2024 electionThe innovations Greg and 1.5°Climate are most excited about right now: next-gen geothermal, agrivoltaics, and moreLinks:1.5°Climate: https://onepointfiveclimate.org/All episodes: https://www.everybodyinthepool.com/Join our Discord! https://discord.gg/2EsDhwQC2zSubscribe to the Everybody in the Pool newsletter: https://www.mollywood.co/Become a member for the ad-free version of the show: https://everybodyinthepool.supercast.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

April 9, 202632 min

E130: How Mill Is Scaling Food Recycling from Homes to Whole Foods

There’s no shortage of stats to demonstrate the sheer magnitude of our food waste problem: A whopping 40% of food grown for human consumption goes to waste; $400 billion worth of food gets thrown away every year in the U.S — roughly 1.5% of GDP; Food waste is responsible for 8-10% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Must we go on?That’s why, after building the Nest Thermostat, Harry Tannenbaum and Matt Rogers turned their attention to our kitchens. They created Mill, a sleek appliance that quietly turns your food scraps into an odorless, coffee-ground-like material, and in the process, began changing the way people think about what they buy and throw away.And Mill isn’t stopping at our kitchen counters. This week on Everybody in the Pool, Harry returns to the show to talk about how Mill is turning their attention to the places where food waste really piles up: grocery stores, restaurants, stadiums, and beyond.We talk about:Why food waste is a $400 billion problem hiding in plain sight, and why nobody’s actually measuring itHow the data Mill collects is already changing consumer behavior, and what that means at commercial scaleWhat Mill Commercial looks like: a modular, dishwasher-sized unit that processes hundreds of pounds of food per dayThe Whole Foods partnership: deploying Mill infrastructure across all locations by 2027, backed by Amazon's Climate Pledge fundWhy dehydrated food waste going directly to chickens is a tighter, more valuable loop than compostingThe vision for residential distribution: bundled with waste services or utilities, the way Nest thermostats scaled through utilitiesLinks:Mill: https://mill.com/All episodes: https://everybodyinthepool.com/Join our Discord! https://discord.gg/2EsDhwQC2zSubscribe to the Everybody in the Pool newsletter: https://www.mollywood.co/Become a member for the ad-free version of the show: https://everybodyinthepool.supercast.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.