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Deep Future

Implementing Science Fiction

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Descycle

The creation and destruction of electronics is a nasty yet unavoidable business. The creation involves mining for metals and the destruction entails polluting the environment. This is a growing global problem. What if there were a non-toxic, low-energy, scalable, and less expensive process to extract these metals out of the earth and electronics waste?

We’re thrilled to be working with Descycle, a clean technology company developing “Green” metals processing based on a novel class of chemistry, Deep Eutectic Solvents (DES) – simply mixtures of salts without water, in which metals behave differently than in water-based systems. Battery metals (e.g. nickel, copper, cobalt, rare earths, etc.); precious metals (e.g. gold, silver, palladium, etc.) can all be extracted through this process. This technology can obviate the use of pollutive smelters, toxic chemicals, and strong acids in metals processing.

Descycle has teamed up with mining companies and data center decommissioning partners to be the first-mover in many of these markets. The value of the positive environmental impact alone is hard to quantify. What is much easier to quantify is the value of the gold, palladium, etc. that is guaranteed to be in the e-waste. One ton of printed circuit boards will yield 253 grams of gold, 62 grams of. Palladium, and 1.2 grams of silver. We know this because we put in there. Mining a ton of stone might yield 9 grams of gold on a good day but we always strike gold in electronics waste.

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We’ve known the Descycle geologists and management team for over 10 years. They have a long track record in finance and mining and are also investors in Descycle. There’s also great potential that eutectic processes possess in extracting iron, zinc, aluminum, arsenic, mercury, lead, chromium, and sulphur from contaminated environments. We’re elated to join Descycle in addressing one of the world’s biggest problems.

Tags: Recycling

Risc0

civ·i·li·za·tion – the stage of human social and cultural development and organization that is considered most advanced

Creating better ways for humans to organize themselves, to cooperate and work together in new ways make it possible to become more “civil.”

One pillar of my own personal philosophy came from the Cypherpunks in the 1990s, the insight that we could use cryptography to create technologies that offer a level playing field, to preserve freedom. The most important & ambitious goal of all is to create a decentralized computing platform, accessible to everyone. To make that possible, we needed a way to transact, to reward people for contributing resources to the system – hence Bitcoin. The noise and hype around cryptocurrency since has obfuscated the north star. Cryptocurrency is a milestone, not a destination. We’re not just going to the moon, we’re going to the stars.

Decentralized computing must solve for these important attributes

  1. Decentralized – No central point of control, anywhere.
  2. Scalable – Linear growth with low latency, low cost, low energy.
  3. Secure – Bitcoin is the benchmark to meet or beat.
  4. Private – Private by default.
  5. Programmable – Support modern programming languages.
  6. Accessible – Any modern computer can participate without permission from any authorities.

Bitcoin solves 1, 3 & 6.
Etherium solves 1, 3, 5 & 6 (but now compromising on 3).
Cardano, Solana, Algorand, etc. are attempts to solve 2 by compromising on 1 &/or 3.

Risc0 is a zero compromise blockchain that solves 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 & 6. It addresses the systemic issues of current systems without tradeoffs.
I’ve known this team for over 20 years as they’ve worked on cryptographic protocols. They built & exited three companies together. Their new zero-knowledge powered blockchain is the first thing I’ve gotten excited about in crypto since beta testing Bitcoin and I’m proud to be among their investors.

Tags: Cryptocurrency, Cryptography

Ladon Robotics

No crew, no fuel, no emissions. We have (mostly) self driving cars, why not a self driving cargo ship? While we’re at it, why not make it sail in the wind?

Photo by Strandgutsuche

The shipping industry literally burns half of their operating budget, as fuel. Most people don’t realize that ships have two gas tanks: One with refined diesel, like you’d use in a semi truck, and the other full of “bunker fuel.” When the ship is close to shore, it burns the cleaner stuff, but as soon as it gets out of sight, it switches to burning the thick, black, unrefined gunk optimized for creating air pollution.

But why burn any fuel at all? We’ve been sailing across oceans for centuries.

Ladon Robotics is building autonomous ships driven by the wind and sun. We invested because this vision for the future of shipping is irresistibly better.

Tags: Robotics

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