Full Transcript for APAC Weekly - Episode 4

the sky, probably like a Uber. We book it, I put it up and they go into space. That is kind of a different deal compared to putting billion dollar satellites maybe once a year in space. Now, literally, we can fly every two weeks. 00:03:33:01 - 00:03:38:03 Oriel Morrison What's the timeline around when your first 3D printed satellite will actually go into space? 00:03:38:19 - 00:04:00:21 Flavia Tata Nadini We've got three or four satellites with 3D printed parts in space, and now we've bought a much bigger, much bigger 3D printer - it's millions of dollars, very big and is probably as big as a bus. It's a metal 3D printer that can start 3D printing all our satellites one after the other. And it's just not going to be the first one. 00:04:00:21 - 00:04:17:00 Flavia Tata Nadini We're going to have many. So we looked at the best technologies in in the US. We actually use some Australian companies and we are looking at Japanese companies, 3D printing electronics. That is the next frontier. 00:04:17:06 - 00:04:35:13 Oriel Morrison Now, now you are also using other types of technology, obviously, to  to make these satellites. And you're using tectonic, kinetic fusion technology to provide radiation shielding. For the layperson out there, including myself, what is this technology and how does it work in space? 00:04:35:13 - 00:05:00:01 Flavia Tata Nadini Our satellites are bombarded with radiation - they need to last - and they need to keep moving. So all these materials ... the science is very complex ... this is bringing things to the next level. So tectonic, that is one of the most successful Australian stories ... 3D printing titanium, for example. We started using new technologies ... these are really very specific materials. 00:05:00:19 - 00:05:08:08 Oriel Morrison Flavia, what can we expect from Fleet over the next sort of 5 to 10 years? I mean, what what does the sector look like if we look ahead to then? 00:05:08:22 - 00:05:32:02 Flavia Tata Nadini So the sector is growing incredibly worldwide. There is an ecosystem that is growing and it's exponential growth. And that's exactly where it should be. You know, the richest people in the world are space entrepreneurs, that is fascinating. So we live in a time that that's the case. Fleet is going to launch 200 satellites in the coming years, probably just in the coming six and seven years. 00:05:32:09 - 00:05:58:19 Flavia Tata Nadini We are providing services to almost all countries in the world. We are now looking for deposits of lithium and copper and critical minerals. So we serve the biggest problems of the world. Like we are big believers in fighting climate change and bringing energy transition and electric cars. And we are trying to use technology to solve this, to solve the biggest problems. 00:05:59:04 - 00:06:31:12 Flavia Tata Nadini And the first one that we are tackling is finding deposits of lithium, copper, nickel all around the world without damaging Earth. That is a very interesting topic and we use our satellite systems for that. So I really hope the next five years fleet will keep hiring. We're planning to have 100, 150 people ... having these satellites mass manufactured to serve, really serve, and give services to the the explorers or the world that want to find fuel. 00:06:31:18 - 00:06:54:14 Flavia Tata Nadini But not just any fuel to help the world to become a better place. So by helping finding new deposits, I think we are going to help solve one of the biggest problems Earth is facing right now. How can we move to renewable energy, to electric cars, to solar panels and having the critical minerals that we need without drilling Earth? 00:06:54:24 - 00:07:14:12 Flavia Tata Nadini And incredibly enough, space is coming to the rescue. So space is coming to the rescue, to the ultrasounds of Earth ... the sub surface ... which is very bizarre to think about it. But that's what space is all about. You know, with space technology, we can see Earth from the top and when you see Earth from there ... 00:07:14:17 - 00:07:29:15 Flavia Tata Nadini What you can achieve ... you know, you can even help everyone to look at the core of earth. This is how incredible it is. So I really look forward to all these incredible impacts that we'll have in the next 20 years with the sector. 00:07:31:00 - 00:07:46:01 Oriel Morrison Research from the University of New South Wales has proven the long held belief that not only is exposure to nature good for us, it's essential. And in fact, without having access to green spaces in our cities, our health may be adversely affected. 00:07:47:00 - 00:08:18:00 Xiaoqi Feng So what we find is that green space is really good for our mental health and also physical health and is through life of course. When the baby is still growing from mummy's belly all the way to our senior age. So we find that if people living closer to a certain amount of space - we typically find is 30% or more - they tend to be more physically active and they have better mental health, compared to their peers living with no or little space. 00:08:18:09 - 00:08:47:03 Xiaoqi Feng And what we find is that if people living with 30% or more tree canopies in their neighborhood, they reduce the risk of developing Type two diabetes. About 30% also reduce risk of developing hypertension, heart disease and also loneliness. So my research and my team's research shows that it's really important that that we have greener cities. 00:08:48:01 - 00:09:07:05 Oriel Morrison So if we take this into what's happening in in Australia, you're obviously based in Sydney ... Sydney and Melbourne have got targets when it comes to green space and how they want the cities to look. So if I look at these numbers, Sydney's target is 40% green cover by 2050 and 2040 respectively. 00:09:08:11 - 00:09:13:01 Oriel Morrison Is this achievable for a start and is this enough? 00:09:13:21 - 00:09:51:17 Xiaoqi Feng I think it is possible to achieve that target. The City of

Sydney used our research. It's 40%, as you say, because we found that 30% or more could have the health benefits - physical and mental. But it will take a bit of a wait I think to achieve that because where are we going to plant the trees? The trees will take time to grow - it's not one night you see there's a big tree grow outside of your home ... and there's also the quality of the green space. 00:09:51:18 - 00:10:20:16 Xiaoqi Feng Are we going to just simply have new parks or are we going to also have the high quality parks that everyone feels safe to go? And there are enough things for them to enjoy and to play with their friends and family and where are we going to play?  00:10:20:22 - 00:10:32:04 Xiaoqi Feng So those questions do remain. And I hope that we not only just target the 40%, but also think about carefully where and also the quality of the green space. 00:10:32:04 - 00:10:48:12 Oriel Morrison When you talk about quality, that's an interesting point because, you know, does it really matter what type of green space it is? You know, whether it is a park with tall trees and gardens and so forth, or whether there's a huge patch of grass in the middle of the city, I mean, how important is the type of green space? 00:10:50:01 - 00:11:18:09 Xiaoqi Feng Oh, we find the type of green space is very important because. We've all experienced, you know, a hot day and you may see some trees around in the pathway, but they're not cool enough - they could not provide the shade that we need. And I'd also say that some of the places that have a lot of grass, looks nice, but there's no cover from the tree canopies or shade, for a really hot day. 00:11:18:24 - 00:11:38:23 Xiaoqi Feng We could not really use this space so carefully, with the design, we need to think about what type of green space and also type of the shrubs or trees that we need to plant is very important. Again, this is why I think urban planning and ways of nurturing restoration really need to work together. 00:11:39:05 - 00:12:00:09 Oriel Morrison When you're talking about collaboration between the professions, how do you find more green space? You know, when you're working within an urban environment that's full of sky skyscrapers and busy roads, you know, whether it's filled with cars or public transport or whatever it is, how do you find more green space? 00:12:01:05 - 00:12:34:00 Xiaoqi Feng Very good question. I know that this is really difficult, especially places like Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane. The land has become more expensive than ever because people want to live in those nice cities. So how we could reserve the space for green space for people to be active, you know, socially connected. So I see some really good innovative examples. So for example, like Tokyu, like Singapore, super cities that have a lot more population than us. 00:12:34:19 - 00:12:55:16 Xiaoqi Feng I was impressed that one day when I was in Tokyo ... I think it's called Ginza Six Shopping Mall ... in the rooftop there's a beautiful garden, really large and you can see great views. You can do yoga there. And what I really like that is not just, you know, everyone gets all these benefits of the green space. 00:12:55:16 - 00:13:22:03 Xiaoqi Feng The view is open to everyone. We do have apartments in Australia, but as you know, most of them they may have a small garden either on the rooftop or within the complex, but it's only allowing the residents access to it. We should be more innovative and working with engineers as well. 00:13:22:03 - 00:13:36:15 Xiaoqi Feng Think about how we design those urban green spaces, but also think about who can access it.  00:13:36:17 - 00:13:50:13 Oriel Morrison Professor who is setting the standard here, I mean, when you look out there globally and you say, cities in Australia or cities anywhere in the world should be trying to achieve this? Who sets that standard? 00:13:50:15 - 00:14:17:02 Xiaoqi Feng From what I observe, I think there are many cities doing really well and they're trying to get ahead. So like Singapore is a really green city. Many of us probably have already been there and even when you get to the airport, it's very green. I think they are really ahead. But on the other side the world ... cities in Canada ... they are trying to achieve the 30 percent as well. And also mentioned, for example, like in Sydney, we have this 40% target. So I'm so glad about that. Many cities realise how important the green space is to our physical and the mental health and they are taking action. 00:14:38:05 - 00:14:51:15 Oriel Morrison As the world rapidly transitions to renewable energy sources, there are clear questions over the future of fossil fuels. Jason Dasey spoke with a globally respected energy economist about this trillion dollar question. 00:14:53:08 - 00:15:31:09 Roberto Aguilera Well, to put it into context, after the pandemic, there was an unprecedented pressure for the fossil fuel industries to improve their environmental performance throughout the entire supply chain, including in the delivery of those products. Now, with everything that's been going on this year with Russia, Ukraine, some of that has begun to slide off of the policy agenda. And other important topics like energy, security and affordability have taken centre stage because consumers want their energy services to be available and they don't want to pay excessively high prices for them. 00:15:31:09 - 00:15:48:18 Roberto Aguilera So it's kind of a confusing time for fossil fuel producers. They're trying to reduce their emissions or offset their emissions, but at the same time provide accessible energy to the world to ensure that there is economic growth everywhere, particularly in the developing world. 00:15:49:04 - 00:16:01:16 Jason Dasey We are seeing energy markets pivot towards natural gas over oil and coal, but gas has its own green credential challenges. Is this a transitionary energy source would you say? 00:16:02:04 -

00:16:26:13 Roberto Aguilera Natural gas, around a decade ago, was something of a golden fuel. It was thought to be the bridge fuel towards a low carbon future. But just over maybe the past three or four years, even natural gas has  become pretty unpopular because it's still a fossil fuel, even if it's the cleanest of the fossil fuels, it emits much less CO2 than oil and coal when burned. 00:16:27:04 - 00:16:54:09 Roberto Aguilera But nevertheless, natural gas does likely have an important role in the long term future, in that it can also help with the development of renewables because of course, sources like solar and wind have the problem of intermittency. They're not always available when needed. So this is where you need backup, such as natural gas, which can be brought online and offline very quickly. 00:16:54:16 - 00:17:01:14 Roberto Aguilera And therefore, gas can indeed lead to increased development of renewables. 00:17:02:06 - 00:17:21:20 Jason Dasey While supply chains have been disrupted over the past couple of years due to the pandemic, we've also seen the oil prices go up and up and we're seeing that affecting the prices at the pump. But oil largely underpins transport fuels. So what is a realistic pathway to batteries and or hydrogen fuel cells powering our supply chains? 00:17:23:01 - 00:17:55:08 Roberto Aguilera It's a good question. The transportation sector is particularly difficult to decarbonize because there's no large scale substitute to oil derived products. It's different for electricity where you have competing sources like gas, coal, nuclear and renewables. But it's really an oil-centric market in transportation. There are some other options that are more expensive, and are experiencing rapid growth from a low base. 00:17:55:14 - 00:18:28:19 Roberto Aguilera But you said electric vehicles and hydrogen fuel cell vehicles and they are becoming more competitive these days with high fossil fuel prices and it can even be cheaper to run an electric vehicle. But there's that upfront cost, which is more expensive. Even the cheapest electric vehicle might be three times more expensive than the cheapest petrol based vehicle. And then there's hydrogen, too, which will also have to compete, economically speaking, with the alternatives with devices that use alternatives like the electric vehicle. So hydrogen probably has a brighter future in longer haul heavy duty transportation like the trucking industry, for example. 00:18:38:01 - 00:18:50:16 Jason Dasey You touched on hydrogen there. The stakes are high in the global race to conquer the production, storage and transport of green hydrogen at scale and consumer affordability. What countries are leading the way and how? 00:18:52:11 - 00:19:18:24 Roberto Aguilera Australia is one of the leaders because we have a national hydrogen strategy and although it does give some importance to hydrogen for domestic usage, exports are a big part of it and of course that will primarily target the

Asia-Pacific, the usual trade partners like Korea, Japan, China. It will also go to Europe, which is expected to be a major importer of hydrogen. 00:19:19:05 - 00:19:42:20 Roberto Aguilera And it makes sense because we have the strong renewable potential here, which is needed for the electricity that is applied to water to extract the hydrogen. But we also have natural gas which can also be separated into hydrogen. The problem is that there's a CO2 byproduct, but if that can be captured and stored underground with cars and also that would be a clean hydrogen option. 00:19:43:08 - 00:20:02:13 Jason Dasey I think we all agree that, you know, clean fuel, clean energy is the way to go. But, you know, fossil fuels, we're so used to them. And it's can be politically unpopular, can't it? We've seen an election in Australia recently and it can be politically unpopular in rural areas to move away from fossil fuels. So how do you think we can get over that? 00:20:02:16 - 00:20:45:01 Roberto Aguilera It's complicated because as we've seen, the public is supportive of improved environmental performance and efforts to stabilise climate. Yet at the same time, they require affordable energy. So everybody has a role to play, including the the public, with our choices, policymakers, with the rules they set up, and the producers themselves, importantly, including of oil and gas. And they're doing whatever they can to obtain that social license to operate like investing in clean technologies like CCS or hydrogen or nature based offsets, like the planting of of trees, whatever they can do to reduce emissions throughout their supply chain. 00:20:45:10 - 00:21:01:01 Jason Dasey Well, you grew up in Alberta, Canada. It's an oil and gas city in Canada there and in Australia, we're seeing a big uptake of of solar. So how's Australia doing compared to Canada, another country when it comes to the uptake of solar. 00:21:01:10 - 00:21:46:11 Roberto Aguilera Well, Australia, Australia's still fairly dependent on fossil fuels when it comes to exports and also for our own domestic energy mix. It's the same with Canada. You mentioned Alberta. That's a place whose economy seems to go up and down together with the the price of oil. That being said, despite that heavy reliance on fossil fuels in Australia, we are very advanced here with the development of solar, which makes sense because we have such huge solar potential and also wind potential and that is expected to continue, especially now that these industries are likely to get more policy support with the new government. 00:21:46:24 - 00:22:00:03 Jason Dasey And elsewhere in Asia. You mentioned Australia being ahead of the curve compared to other countries. What about, you know, big countries in South East Asia being so reliant on fossil fuels? How difficult will it be to get them to come through to clean energy? 00:22:01:20 - 00:22:29:16 Roberto Aguilera Those countries also have ambitious goals to decarbonise and are seeing

rapid progress. The problem is that all of this comes from a very low base, so renewables are growing much faster than the fossil fuels. But overall, oil, gas, coal still play an important role. And some of those countries in Asia, of course, are on more modest incomes. So it becomes harder for them to afford an energy transition. 00:22:29:22 - 00:22:44:12 Roberto Aguilera Yet on the demand side, on the consumption side, they'll play an important role, too. And they are implementing policies and making agreements with producers like Australia to also embark on an energy transition. 00:22:45:16 - 00:23:02:18 Oriel Morrison More than 80% of energy generation in law is hydro, powered by its 77 dams known as the 'battery of East Asia'. The landlocked nation is now focusing on electrification of transport. Our correspondent in Laos, Steve Cleary, has more. 00:23:03:18 - 00:23:29:10 Steven Cleary Gauging public sentiment in Laos is always challenging, but I guess if we're following social media and commentary of the general public, it's generally seen as a positive in terms of accessing electricity as being one of the big social and economic changes, particularly in rural Laos, over the past decade. 00:23:30:05 - 00:23:35:10 Oriel Morrison What is the role here, Steven, that the Laos-China Railway plays in this journey? 00:23:37:06 - 00:24:10:19 Steven Cleary So the Laos-China Railway, which opened in December of 2021, has the capacity to export and import goods using electrified transport and taking the pressure off the off infrastructure and also decreasing the pollution that's associated with fossil fuel. Transportation is a very important step, which is seen as a very important step inside Laos, and particularly inside the government. 00:24:11:13 - 00:24:56:17 Steven Cleary And so this particular project, as well as a potential connection between Thailand and Vietnam via a port city in Vietnam, is seen as really key to a policy of taking the country from being landlocked to land linked. So making sure that Laos is not isolated from the sea and isolated from markets and transportation, but really strengthening the country's sovereignty by trying to create a balance between its different geographical neighbors as well as international partners. 00:24:56:17 - 00:25:40:20 Steven Cleary And a lot of that is to do with increasing prosperity and trade and investment has a lot to do with that. So therefore, these rail developments, and particularly as they're electrified, do play a key role in achieving these policy aims. This is seen as a clean and renewable resource and something that ... Laos has a natural advantage in terms of its geography and this capacity to harness the water from the Mekong and its tributaries to electrify rural areas, particularly as well as to raise revenue from export. 00:25:41:16 - 00:25:56:06 Steven Cleary And so this really fits in with the socio economic development goals of the country, which is quite key to maintaining the legitimacy of the government and the political system. 00:25:57:17 - 00:26:21:03 Oriel Morrison Thank you for joining us on APaC Weekly. I'm Oriel Morrison. To stay across the important conversations shaping our future. Visit us at APaC network dot com.