My guest today is Nick Buegel returning to the podcast. In this episode, Nick and I go deep into what he's been exploring during the pandemic. As we all know, the pandemic has put unique stress on almost all of Nick and us nonetheless. But what Nick decided to do was, in many ways, make the most of the situation.
He spent many days and hours outside of nature, walking around different parks. Over time that sparked an interest in him to explore what is happening within climate change and the broader environmental as a movement, what's going on at a policy level. what's going on at a technology level how do people think about the environment?
For Nick, it's really coming down to how we think about ourselves as the human species and facilitate the length that our species is around. As far as I know, and most of us know is that Earth is our home. If we're actively hindering the quality of life on this planet through our own actions, that is then at odds with our existence. It's very much the selfish thing for Nick that he wants to protect this planet from having a future for humanity.
Beyond that, this has always been one of the core elements of why I do this podcast: Nick is not an environmental science expert. He's not an expert in environmental policy, but he cares enough to explore and share his beliefs and opinions, and he's willing to share them in a way so that other people can maybe pick up the torch where he left off. I'm going to do my best to share as many of the links in the show notes so that you can explore on your own. I think that's the point of all of this is you don't have to be someone with a fancy degree or an acronym after your name to give a shit about something.
I know for a fact we didn't get everything right. There will be points that people can argue whether or not it's true. My job is to allow people to share their conclusions and what they believe authentically. I really feel strongly about this because they think we don't have enough of this right now. And so with that, I hope you enjoy this conversation with Nick Buegel.
Show notes:
(00:03:57) Building a moral framework
(00:07:58) Does human consciousness value itself too much?
(00:11:26) This not meant to guilt-trip our existence
(00:12:40) The impact of the industrialization
(00:14:46) Value in skepticism but don't ignore data
(00:18:30) The Greenhouse Effect
(00:19:52) Amount of solar energy that hits the earth
(00:21:38) Why should we care about this and other impacts
(00:24:12) How can we start changing
(00:26:48) Carbon Credit System
(00:28:15) Carbon Neutral
(00:33:22) Influence of government on the environment
(00:38:38) Oil spills are great for GDP
(00:41:13) New technology on the horizon
(00:43:57) Wood Plastics
(00:47:21) Carbon Sequestration
(00:50:53) Being aware of the rate of change
(00:51:58) Tapered Approach
(00:54:53) Changing the approach to power with solar
(01:01:43) Sharing the world
(01:06:47) Biochar - What is it?
(01:10:28) Closing
