If there has ever been an audacious goal, it is in the space of social impact entrepreneurship. The goals in this space are ultimately those of humanitarian concern.

Get into this space and you’ll be looking to: address Climate Change and Global Warming, Fossil Fuel Emission, Plastic Pollution, Income Inequality, Water and Food Scarcity, not to mention social structures that perpetuate issues in each of these subject matters; Social Impact is an intense space!

Social Impact is a space for people who are switched on intellectually, care deeply about the human race, know that politics is not working quickly enough, have good self-care routines, are great net-workers, and understand how business can play a vital role in addressing these issues before time runs out, currently understood to be in 2030 when Climate Change and Global Warming become irreversible.

Since 2008, I’ve been to numerous events, related to this space, in person and online. I want to let you know that I am more optimistic now than I ever have been!

Seven Developments to Be Aware Of

I) The International Society of Sustainability Professionals is a well established and professional global network. I’ve been to a few of their events in the US over the years and they’ve grown into quite a vast and well-connected group of individuals.

II) Shrilk is patented property of the Wyss Institute at Harvard University. They have developed a process for turning chitosan, a derivative of chitin (which is a long chain polymer found in seashells insect shells and mushrooms) into a nutritious plastic replacement that can actually be amended into soil and foster new plant growth. Used properly, the waste material will sequester excess harmful atmospheric gasses in the terrestrial biosphere (plants, trees, soil, etc,.) The only problem with this technology is that the raw material is currently very expensive (as no one group has been funded to duplicate chitosan itself). That is why I commissioned the development of a trade secret for chitin duplication, so that something like Shrilk will become commercially viable to address pressing environmental issues with plastic, e-waste and vehicle part pollution.

III) Desalitech is an ocean water to drinking water conversion company and from what I can see, on the global stage, is the most cost-effective, and electricity efficient, robust businesses that can increase available drinking water, in addition procuring salts and other compounds found in sea water, useful for other purposes. Using a process, we could reduce ocean acidification and increased saline content to preserve sea-life at the same time as producing drinking water.

IV) In academia, Professor Javier Gomez Fernandez was one of the researchers behind Shrilk, he has gone on to develop methods of using chitin derivatives for building materials to 3D printed wind turbines. Fernandez’s efforts could be incredibly useful in conjunction with Professor Mark Z. Jacobson’s plans for offshore wind development in the US and around the world. Jacobson’s research is incredibly interesting because as the offshore wind turbines turn to make electricity, in his computer models, approaching storms lose some of their strengths and can actually reduce damage from hurricanes while making large amounts of electricity. Chitin plays a role in offshore wind because wind turbines can be built much stronger than current designs, as some derivatives of chitin have tensile strength ten times higher than steel. There’s also active ongoing development of offshore wind turbines along the east coast of the US. Ultimately the plan is to build wind turbines about 20 miles offshore from Maine to Georgia. There’s an organization that formed around some of Jacobson’s work. My favorite resource of theirs is here.

V) There’s currently a startup competition going on in regards to converting gaseous carbon dioxide to calcium carbonate. This material is a sand-like substance. Note that in the competition stage, they’re using fossil fuel sources for their carbon dioxide because it is concentrated, while they are working towards converting atmospheric carbon dioxide (which is absolutely necessary given how devastating excessive CO2 is).

VI) In conjunction with the above competition, there is MacRebur which is working to take waste plastic, post-consumer plastic, possibly even ocean plastic, and make it into road resurfacing materials. Backed by Richard Branson and run by Toby McCartney, they already have a bunch of contracts in Europe and they’ve just received a few more in the United States. If the startups from the competition, MacRebur, and the ocean cleanup project (currently collecting the Pacific garbage patch) work together, the Earth’s excess carbon dioxide and waste plastic could be used to build and resurface roads, while addressing Climate Change and Global Warming, lengthening the timeline for us to survive on Earth.

VII) Millionaires and billionaires that care about the individuals’ life story are getting very interested in making social impact investments as they also recognize their connection to humanity. Additionally, Bloomberg has developed ESG metrics for analyzing Environmental Social Governance metrics, for investors concerned with related issues. These metrics essentially evaluate a company based on their performance of addressing environmental issues, social issues and how their companies are managed.

In Conclusion:

From my perspective, in collaboration with social media activist communities (NGOs, non-profits) and the social impact market, I believe it is more likely than not, that we will reverse Climate Change and Global Warming BEFORE 2030, at a rate that will cause us to avoid the runaway scenario, while using the existing social structures of democracy and capitalism.