Full Transcript for Philippe Cousteau on Why Coral Reefs Are Disappearing and How to Rebuild Them

00:01:57,510 what are corals, 41 00:01:57,510 --> 00:02:02,250 and then what roles do reefs play in the oceans? 42 00:02:02,250 --> 00:02:04,440 - Coral reefs are critical ecosystems, 43 00:02:04,440 --> 00:02:08,190 and oftentimes, people forget just how important they are. 44 00:02:08,190 --> 00:02:11,280 They are arguably the most biodiverse ecosystem on Earth, 45 00:02:11,280 --> 00:02:12,930 land or sea, 46 00:02:12,930 --> 00:02:16,320 and they're much more than pretty fish and snorkeling. 47 00:02:16,320 --> 00:02:18,360 Coral reefs are, of course, 48 00:02:18,360 --> 00:02:20,610 critical to biodiversity and fish. 49 00:02:20,610 --> 00:02:23,730 Tourism, they provide about two and a half trillion dollars 50 00:02:23,730 --> 00:02:25,380 of goods and services a year. 51 00:02:25,380 --> 00:02:27,810 They contribute tens of billions of dollars 52 00:02:27,810 --> 00:02:30,330 to the global tourism industry, 53 00:02:30,330 --> 00:02:32,190 tens of billions to fisheries. 54 00:02:32,190 --> 00:02:33,900 Hard to estimate, but three quarters of a billion 55 00:02:33,900 --> 00:02:36,270 to one billion people rely on coral reefs 56 00:02:36,270 --> 00:02:38,700 for their livelihoods every year around the world. 57 00:02:38,700 --> 00:02:40,980 And so when I think of coral reefs, 58 00:02:40,980 --> 00:02:43,200 I think of them as infrastructure. 59 00:02:43,200 --> 00:02:44,823 Now, the really sad part, 60 00:02:46,200 --> 00:02:48,600 oftentimes when I'm giving talks or lectures, 61 00:02:48,600 --> 00:02:51,000 I'll ask people how much of the world's rainforests 62 00:02:51,000 --> 00:02:53,220 have disappeared in our lifetime? 63 00:02:53,220 --> 00:02:56,070 And the answer is usually 60, 70%. 64 00:02:56,070 --> 00:02:57,810 And I understand there's a lot of press and media 65 00:02:57,810 --> 00:02:59,970 around the rainforests and the decline of the Amazon, 66 00:02:59,970 --> 00:03:04,770 and it is terrible, but the answer is about 17 to 20%. 67 00:03:04,770 --> 00:03:08,550 Yet in our lifetimes, we've lost 50% of the world's reefs. 68 00:03:08,550 --> 00:03:09,720 And it's very possible 69 00:03:09,720 --> 00:03:12,030 that reefs become functionally extinct in our lifetime 70 00:03:12,030 --> 00:03:14,070 because of climate change and local pollution 71 00:03:14,070 --> 00:03:15,963 and development and overfishing. 72 00:03:16,800 --> 00:03:19,860 So coral reefs are in a much greater crisis 73 00:03:19,860 --> 00:03:24,270 than land terrestrial forests and rainforests by far, 74 00:03:24,270 --> 00:03:26,190 and yet most people give it a collective shrug 75 00:03:26,190 --> 00:03:27,390 and the global community largely 76 00:03:27,390 --> 00:03:28,800 gives it a collective shrug. 77 00:03:28,800 --> 00:03:30,180 And that's a really big problem. 78 00:03:30,180 --> 00:03:31,200 - I just have to jump in here 79 00:03:31,200 --> 00:03:34,560 because these are statistics that folks really need to hear. 80 00:03:34,560 --> 00:03:37,080 A global shrug, I mean, do you think it's... 81 00:03:37,080 --> 00:03:39,030 I know that there's a lot of reasons why, 82 00:03:39,030 --> 00:03:44,010 one is that there are a lot of barriers to going underwater. 83 00:03:44,010 --> 00:03:46,650 So most people haven't seen a reef, touched a reef, 84 00:03:46,650 --> 00:03:49,170 swam in one, looked at it with their own eyes. 85 00:03:49,170 --> 00:03:52,890 But I think also the average person 86 00:03:52,890 --> 00:03:54,780 isn't really familiar with coral. 87 00:03:54,780 --> 00:03:58,080 So can you even describe to us what are corals 88 00:03:58,080 --> 00:04:01,860 and what do they do and why do we need them to stay alive? 89 00:04:01,860 --> 00:04:03,000 - A lot of people do look at coral reefs 90 00:04:03,000 --> 00:04:04,890 and think of them as painted rocks, colored rocks. 91 00:04:04,890 --> 00:04:06,780 In fact, coral reefs are living organisms. 92 00:04:06,780 --> 00:04:11,460 Coral polyps are part plant, part animal, 93 00:04:11,460 --> 00:04:14,130 a little bacteria thrown in for good measure. 94 00:04:14,130 --> 00:04:15,840 They're fascinating creatures. 95 00:04:15,840 --> 00:04:19,140 They build like the apartment buildings of reefs systems. 96 00:04:19,140 --> 00:04:23,910 They construct little calcium carbonate homes around them. 97 00:04:23,910 --> 00:04:26,940 And over millennia, they build new layer 98 00:04:26,940 --> 00:04:28,560 upon layer upon layer upon layer. 99 00:04:28,560 --> 00:04:31,200 So the outer layer of a reef is the only layer 100 00:04:31,200 --> 00:04:32,100 that has living tissue. 101 00:04:32,100 --> 00:04:33,630 Everything underneath is essentially 102 00:04:33,630 --> 00:04:35,400 calcium carbonate limestone. 103 00:04:35,400 --> 00:04:37,440 And in fact, it is coral reefs that have built 104 00:04:37,440 --> 00:04:40,650 the Parthenon and the Washington Monument. 105 00:04:40,650 --> 00:04:43,920 Old limestone predominantly comes from the ocean. 106 00:04:43,920 --> 00:04:46,140 They are the critical structure builders 107 00:04:46,140 --> 00:04:49,860 of coastal ecosystems, tropical coastal ecosystems, 108 00:04:49,860 --> 00:04:52,170 and they are, as I said, one of the most, 109 00:04:52,170 --> 00:04:55,323 if not the most biodiverse ecosystem on the planet. 110 00:04:56,220 --> 00:05:00,090 25% of the world's seafood spends part of its life in 111 00:05:00,090 --> 00:05:02,490 or around or dependent upon a coral reef. 112 00:05:02,490 --> 00:05:04,380 So they are absolutely critical 113 00:05:04,380 --> 00:05:06,450 to the global ocean ecosystem 114 00:05:06,450 --> 00:05:09,300 and affect, as I said, hundreds of millions 115 00:05:09,300 --> 00:05:12,240 up to a billion people's lives very directly, 116 00:05:12,240 --> 00:05:15,390 from economic development and growth 117 00:05:15,390 --> 00:05:18,750 and jobs to protecting coastlines from storm surge 118

00:05:18,750 --> 00:05:20,460 that's getting increasingly worse. 119 00:05:20,460 --> 00:05:22,350 So they look pretty, 120 00:05:22,350 --> 00:05:25,170 but they provide a structural function, 121 00:05:25,170 --> 00:05:27,810 almost like infrastructure that is critical 122 00:05:27,810 --> 00:05:31,230 for coastal health of the ocean. 123 00:05:31,230 --> 00:05:33,570 - I know that you and I believe coral reefs 124 00:05:33,570 --> 00:05:34,740 are inherently valuable. 125 00:05:34,740 --> 00:05:37,050 They should just exist whether they're providing services 126 00:05:37,050 --> 00:05:40,890 or not, but they also do protect coastlines 127 00:05:40,890 --> 00:05:44,940 where humans live from storm surges and flooding. 128 00:05:44,940 --> 00:05:47,070 - Yeah, they do, and that's something, 129 00:05:47,070 --> 00:05:50,310 we think about coral reefs as shields, coastal shields. 130 00:05:50,310 --> 00:05:54,120 Now, coral reefs can absorb up to 97% of storm surge. 131 00:05:54,120 --> 00:05:56,760 They can reduce wave height up to 84%, 132 00:05:56,760 --> 00:06:01,110 and so in a world with increasingly catastrophic cyclones, 133 00:06:01,110 --> 00:06:04,800 hurricanes, typhoons, coral reefs play a very important role 134 00:06:04,800 --> 00:06:08,910 along tropical coastlines to reduce the storm surge. 135 00:06:08,910 --> 00:06:11,670 In coastal communities, it's the storm surge, not the wind, 136 00:06:11,670 --> 00:06:14,493 that can be so damaging and so destructive and deadly, 137 00:06:15,870 --> 00:06:19,650 and so both to land-based infrastructure, 138 00:06:19,650 --> 00:06:22,200 homes, businesses, and also people's lives, 139 00:06:22,200 --> 00:06:25,050 thousands of people can die from these massive storms, 140 00:06:25,050 --> 00:06:28,710 and just the storm surge may cost the global economy 141 00:06:28,710 --> 00:06:31,530 tens of billions, up to over a hundred billion a year 142 00:06:31,530 --> 00:06:34,830 in mitigation costs and construction and repair costs 143 00:06:34,830 --> 00:06:37,110 when these storms come through and coral reefs collapse. 144 00:06:37,110 --> 00:06:40,140 And as I said, warming ocean temperatures 145 00:06:40,140 --> 00:06:44,520 are causing corals to die, but going back a hundred years 146 00:06:44,520 --> 00:06:46,500 in a lot of these communities, overfishing, 147 00:06:46,500 --> 00:06:49,590 dynamite fishing, a lot of places in Asia 148 00:06:49,590 --> 00:06:51,480 throw literally dynamite in the water. 149 00:06:51,480 --> 00:06:53,190 It explodes and stuns the fish. 150 00:06:53,190 --> 00:06:55,440 They float to the surface, they scoop them up with the net, 151 00:06:55,440 --> 00:06:58,140 but that dynamite just happens to destroy everything else, 152 00:06:58,140 --> 00:07:01,320 to cyanide fishing that they'll also do, 153 00:07:01,320 --> 00:07:04,380 to squirt cyanide on these reefs to get the fish stunned 154 00:07:04,380 --> 00:07:06,630 and they scoop them up and it kills everything, 155 00:07:06,630 --> 00:07:09,480 to development and human waste causing too much nutrients 156 00:07:09,480 --> 00:07:10,980 in the water that causes algal blooms. 157 00:07:10,980 --> 00:07:12,570 That's a big problem in places like Florida 158 00:07:12,570 --> 00:07:13,680 and the Caribbean, 159 00:07:13,680 --> 00:07:16,530 or to outright just destruction for ports, piers. 160 00:07:16,530 --> 00:07:20,730 So reefs have been under onslaught for over a century, 161 00:07:20,730 --> 00:07:24,270 and now with climate change, warming ocean temperatures, 162 00:07:24,270 --> 00:07:26,700 it's just really another nail in the coffin 163 00:07:26,700 --> 00:07:27,933 that's terrifying. 164 00:07:29,040 --> 00:07:30,600 - [Peter] Philippe hasn't just studied decline 165 00:07:30,600 --> 00:07:31,560 from a distance. 166 00:07:31,560 --> 00:07:34,650 He's watched it happen underwater over decades, 167 00:07:34,650 --> 00:07:38,010 returning to the same reefs and seeing what remains. 168 00:07:38,010 --> 00:07:39,960 He has a term for why the disappearing reef 169 00:07:39,960 --> 00:07:42,660 has gone unnoticed by much of the world. 170 00:07:42,660 --> 00:07:45,333 He calls it shifting baselines. 171 00:07:46,410 --> 00:07:49,290 - To your point, it's been relatively invisible, right? 172 00:07:49,290 --> 00:07:53,280 We haven't had huge campaigns dating back decades 173 00:07:53,280 --> 00:07:55,470 and decades to protect the reefs. 174 00:07:55,470 --> 00:07:58,200 This is something that has been coming up 175 00:07:58,200 --> 00:08:00,660 after we as a society have realized 176 00:08:00,660 --> 00:08:03,870 we've kind of gone past these critical points. 177 00:08:03,870 --> 00:08:05,190 But before we get to solutions, 178 00:08:05,190 --> 00:08:06,870 I want to talk about your lifetime 179 00:08:06,870 --> 00:08:10,170 because I am anticipating that you got in the water 180 00:08:10,170 --> 00:08:11,790 when you were a kid, 181 00:08:11,790 --> 00:08:15,450 and I imagine you still get in the water as an adult. 182 00:08:15,450 --> 00:08:20,450 So what kinds of declines in coral reef health 183 00:08:20,550 --> 00:08:23,460 and existence have you seen in your own lifetime 184 00:08:23,460 --> 00:08:25,710 and what has that actually looked like? 185 00:08:25,710 --> 00:08:27,900 - I actually did a piece for Discovery several years ago 186 00:08:27,900 --> 00:08:30,390 down in the Florida Keys, and I knew one of the filmmakers 187 00:08:30,390 --> 00:08:32,070 that had filmed there for decades, 188 00:08:32,070 --> 00:08:33,870 and so we got him to give us some footage 189 00:08:33,870 --> 00:08:35,910 that he had shot in the 1980s. 190 00:08:35,910 --> 00:08:39,690 And then this was probably, I want to say 2008 maybe, 191 00:08:39,690 --> 00:08:40,980 so it's quite a bit ago, 192 00:08:40,980 --> 00:08:43,170 so about 20 years later, 25 years later. 193 00:08:43,170

--> 00:08:47,370 And we went back to the exact same spot that he filmed 194 00:08:47,370 --> 00:08:49,350 and we played the footage side by side. 195 00:08:49,350 --> 00:08:50,910 Having grown up diving and snorkeling 196 00:08:50,910 --> 00:08:52,740 and seeing these places, 197 00:08:52,740 --> 00:08:54,390 one of the challenges we faced is this idea 198 00:08:54,390 --> 00:08:55,560 of shifting baselines, 199 00:08:55,560 --> 00:08:57,810 that every successive generation's baseline 200 00:08:57,810 --> 00:08:59,640 for the health of the ecosystem and the environment 201 00:08:59,640 --> 00:09:02,490 is what they were first exposed to. 202 00:09:02,490 --> 00:09:06,090 As I said earlier, even my grandfather saw a massive decline 203 00:09:06,090 --> 00:09:08,880 from the '40s to the '60s that raised alarm bells for him. 204 00:09:08,880 --> 00:09:11,790 Nowadays, we'd look at the '60s and go, "Paradise." 205 00:09:11,790 --> 00:09:14,370 So our context changes. 206 00:09:14,370 --> 00:09:18,870 My context certainly from the '80s to now is terrifying, 207 00:09:18,870 --> 00:09:22,590 but seeing it side by side, the same exact places 208 00:09:22,590 --> 00:09:25,380 with the same cameramen filming them, 209 00:09:25,380 --> 00:09:27,870 seeing what in the '80s were these abundant, 210 00:09:27,870 --> 00:09:31,380 beautiful elkhorn reefs, huge schools of fish 211 00:09:31,380 --> 00:09:36,120 and all of this life, clear, clean, beautiful blue water, 212 00:09:36,120 --> 00:09:38,340 and then the late 2000s, 213 00:09:38,340 --> 00:09:41,100 all of that coral was dead rubble covered in algae 214 00:09:41,100 --> 00:09:42,573 and a few fish poking around. 215 00:09:43,530 --> 00:09:48,060 And we've seen the Great Barrier Reef. 216 00:09:48,060 --> 00:09:51,030 First time I visited the Great Barrier Reef was in the '90s, 217 00:09:51,030 --> 00:09:53,160 going back just a few years ago for a syndicated show 218 00:09:53,160 --> 00:09:54,760 that I hosted for several years, 219 00:09:56,250 --> 00:09:58,290 it was bleached and covered in algae again, 220 00:09:58,290 --> 00:10:00,270 the same places that I'd been that were abundant. 221 00:10:00,270 --> 00:10:04,620 So it really is, you think of it on land, 222 00:10:04,620 --> 00:10:07,410 like seeing an abundant, beautiful rainforest 223 00:10:07,410 --> 00:10:09,870 and going back a few years later and it's been clear cut 224 00:10:09,870 --> 00:10:11,520 and there's some shrubs left. 225 00:10:11,520 --> 00:10:13,260 That's essentially what we're doing in the ocean, 226 00:10:13,260 --> 00:10:14,550 but at a much larger scale. 227 00:10:14,550 --> 00:10:16,980 Again, half the world's coral reefs have disappeared, 228 00:10:16,980 --> 00:10:18,990 about 17% of the Amazon is gone. 229 00:10:18,990 --> 00:10:22,530 So we're doing it much more rapidly in the ocean. 230 00:10:22,530 --> 00:10:25,230 I guarantee you if half the Amazon disappeared, 231 00:10:25,230 --> 00:10:27,900 people would be losing their minds. 232 00:10:27,900 --> 00:10:30,873 But because it's in the ocean, people are kind of like, 233 00:10:32,047 --> 00:10:35,730 "Meh, it's still blue, what's the problem?" 234 00:10:35,730 --> 00:10:36,990 - Just as an opinion question, 235 00:10:36,990 --> 00:10:40,020 if we were to continue with business as usual, 236 00:10:40,020 --> 00:10:43,380 how close do you think we are to losing reefs entirely 237 00:10:43,380 --> 00:10:45,900 if there weren't interventions? 238 00:10:45,900 --> 00:10:48,270 - Functionally, coral reefs will disappear in our lifetime 239 00:10:48,270 --> 00:10:50,280 if we don't take drastic measures. 240 00:10:50,280 --> 00:10:53,220 That is a fact, a tragic fact. 241 00:10:53,220 --> 00:10:55,740 And the reality is that while there will be pockets of reefs 242 00:10:55,740 --> 00:10:59,700 that no doubt survive, we've identified areas of reefs 243 00:10:59,700 --> 00:11:01,860 that are still being resilient, 244 00:11:01,860 --> 00:11:06,860 at scale as a functioning ecosystem around the world, 245 00:11:07,830 --> 00:11:10,530 it doesn't help the Caribbean very much 246 00:11:10,530 --> 00:11:13,380 to have reefs in Indonesia, few smattering of reefs survive 247 00:11:13,380 --> 00:11:15,150 when the reefs in the Caribbean have disappeared. 248 00:11:15,150 --> 00:11:18,960 And actually in most places, up to 95% of the reefs 249 00:11:18,960 --> 00:11:21,660 in the Caribbean have already disappeared. 250 00:11:21,660 --> 00:11:23,610 Massive alarm bells, huge problems. 251 00:11:23,610 --> 00:11:25,290 - I think that's so poignant 252 00:11:25,290 --> 00:11:27,360 that we essentially are creating 253 00:11:27,360 --> 00:11:29,490 this negative feedback loop, 254 00:11:29,490 --> 00:11:34,230 like destroying coral reefs is impacting human communities, 255 00:11:34,230 --> 00:11:37,140 which impacts ecosystems larger and larger, 256 00:11:37,140 --> 00:11:40,230 and we could turn it into a positive feedback loop, 257 00:11:40,230 --> 00:11:44,070 where healthy ecosystems enhance the ability 258 00:11:44,070 --> 00:11:45,900 for healthy human communities 259 00:11:45,900 --> 00:11:47,850 and healthy human communities protect the reefs. 260 00:11:47,850 --> 00:11:49,380 And that's where we're at. 261 00:11:49,380 --> 00:11:52,500 We're trying to shift the feedback loop 262 00:11:52,500 --> 00:11:54,630 from negative to positive, 263 00:11:54,630 --> 00:11:57,540 and people like you are doing that. 264 00:11:57,540 --> 00:11:58,373 - [Peter] The technology to grow 265 00:11:58,373 --> 00:12:01,410 and restore coral reefs already exist. 266 00:12:01,410 --> 00:12:04,740 The problem isn't science, it's the scale. 267 00:12:04,740 --> 00:12:07,710 Philippe has spent decades working on that problem, 268 00:12:07,710 --> 00:12:11,580 starting with a chance meeting with one scientist in Florida 269 00:12:11,580 --> 00:12:12,873

that changed everything. 270 00:12:14,220 --> 00:12:15,390 - I want you to talk to us 271 00:12:15,390 --> 00:12:18,450 about the efforts to restore coral reefs, 272 00:12:18,450 --> 00:12:23,450 kind of the conventional style versus some more innovative, 273 00:12:24,420 --> 00:12:28,173 more scalable approaches that you've been spearheading. 274 00:12:28,173 --> 00:12:30,840 - I was 19 years old and I met a scientist 275 00:12:30,840 --> 00:12:32,490 named Dr. David Vaughan, 276 00:12:32,490 --> 00:12:35,460 who was based out of Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institution 277 00:12:35,460 --> 00:12:37,200 in Fort Pierce, Florida. 278 00:12:37,200 --> 00:12:41,040 He had pioneered multiple different kinds of aquacultures 279 00:12:41,040 --> 00:12:42,960 over the decades of his career, 280 00:12:42,960 --> 00:12:45,960 things like clams and oysters, shrimp, 281 00:12:45,960 --> 00:12:49,050 and he turned his attention to coral. 282 00:12:49,050 --> 00:12:52,620 So he started growing corals in land-based nurseries, 283 00:12:52,620 --> 00:12:57,620 farms essentially, and found that they would grow faster 284 00:12:58,530 --> 00:12:59,910 in land-based farms. 285 00:12:59,910 --> 00:13:03,420 And he did that initially for selling those corals 286 00:13:03,420 --> 00:13:05,733 into the ornamental aquarium industry. 287 00:13:06,600 --> 00:13:09,960 Now, because most corals, even today, 288 00:13:09,960 --> 00:13:13,470 in that industry are caught and harvested from the wild 289 00:13:13,470 --> 00:13:18,470 and sold into wild reefs, into aquariums. 290 00:13:18,540 --> 00:13:21,390 - This kind of sounds like poaching kind of. 291 00:13:21,390 --> 00:13:23,670 - Yeah, in a way, I mean, a lot of it's illegal, 292 00:13:23,670 --> 00:13:27,660 some of it is legal, but we're essentially degrading 293 00:13:27,660 --> 00:13:30,423 these already degraded systems to sell into aquariums. 294 00:13:31,260 --> 00:13:33,577 - It doesn't make any sense, and so Dr. Vaughan said, 295 00:13:33,577 --> 00:13:35,970 "Could I farm these, like you would farm saplings 296 00:13:35,970 --> 00:13:37,920 in a greenhouse, and sell those?" 297 00:13:37,920 --> 00:13:40,980 So we're reducing pressure on the ornamental business 298 00:13:40,980 --> 00:13:43,650 off of wild reefs. 299 00:13:43,650 --> 00:13:44,940 So when I met him, I said, "Wow, Dave, 300 00:13:44,940 --> 00:13:46,290 this is pretty amazing technology. 301 00:13:46,290 --> 00:13:49,380 Do you think we could actually grow these corals 302 00:13:49,380 --> 00:13:53,700 in captivity for restoring wild reefs, 303 00:13:53,700 --> 00:13:56,040 not just to sell into the ornamental industry?" 304 00:13:56,040 --> 00:13:58,230 And Dave said, "I don't know, but I think so." 305 00:13:58,230 --> 00:13:59,760 He started a lab at Moates, 306 00:13:59,760 --> 00:14:01,800 Marine Laboratory down in the Keys, 307 00:14:01,800 --> 00:14:06,180 and pioneered all the technology that everybody

uses today 308 00:14:06,180 --> 00:14:09,840 for aquaculturing corals in land-based nurseries, 309 00:14:09,840 --> 00:14:11,640 things like microfragmentation, 310 00:14:11,640 --> 00:14:14,040 where he proved you could grow corals 20 times faster 311 00:14:14,040 --> 00:14:16,860 on land than they can grow in the ocean. 312 00:14:16,860 --> 00:14:19,440 And we can harvest heat-tolerant corals 313 00:14:19,440 --> 00:14:23,640 that would eventually, more resilient corals will take over, 314 00:14:23,640 --> 00:14:26,910 but on a geological timeframe, we don't have that timeframe. 315 00:14:26,910 --> 00:14:29,957 We're operating in a human time, destructive timeframe. 316 00:14:29,957 --> 00:14:32,457 And so we can grow heat-tolerant corals much faster 317 00:14:32,457 --> 00:14:35,490 and outplant them back into the wild. 318 00:14:35,490 --> 00:14:38,490 So 22 years or so goes by, 319 00:14:38,490 --> 00:14:40,770 Dave made all this technology available to the world 320 00:14:40,770 --> 00:14:44,340 and many NGOs and nonprofits are utilizing it, 321 00:14:44,340 --> 00:14:46,500 but at a very, very small scale. 322 00:14:46,500 --> 00:14:49,350 So in 20 years, we've restored about one square kilometer 323 00:14:49,350 --> 00:14:51,570 of corals and lost thousands. 324 00:14:51,570 --> 00:14:53,880 And so we were both very frustrated that, 325 00:14:53,880 --> 00:14:57,360 my goodness, we have a big problem, 326 00:14:57,360 --> 00:14:59,430 this technology isn't scaling. 327 00:14:59,430 --> 00:15:02,490 So it's not scaling in scope and size the way it needs to 328 00:15:02,490 --> 00:15:04,740 to outpace ecological decline. 329 00:15:04,740 --> 00:15:07,710 We're losing thousands. We've built one. 330 00:15:07,710 --> 00:15:10,680 I did history at uni, I'm not really good at math, 331 00:15:10,680 --> 00:15:13,320 but I know those numbers don't work out so well. 332 00:15:13,320 --> 00:15:17,640 And so the question then is, what's holding us back? 333 00:15:17,640 --> 00:15:18,473 We have the technology, 334 00:15:18,473 --> 00:15:20,400 we know how to grow these corals quickly, 335 00:15:20,400 --> 00:15:22,500 and a lot of NGOs are doing really laudable work 336 00:15:22,500 --> 00:15:26,130 and it's lovely and really important and I support it, 337 00:15:26,130 --> 00:15:29,220 but replanting a few meters of reef is irrelevant 338 00:15:29,220 --> 00:15:31,770 to actually preventing these systems from collapsing. 339 00:15:31,770 --> 00:15:34,200 So we realize we need to stop thinking about coral reefs 340 00:15:34,200 --> 00:15:38,100 as these biodiverse ecosystems and restore corals by hand, 341 00:15:38,100 --> 00:15:40,623 planting them onto some rubble in the ground. 342 00:15:42,120 --> 00:15:44,760 We need to actually think of reefs as what they are, 343 00:15:44,760 --> 00:15:47,340 which is infrastructure, and the good news is, again, 344 00:15:47,340 --> 00:15:52,050 I think that so many instances from marine-protected areas 345 00:15:52,050 --> 00:15:54,180 to technology and tracking fisheries 346 00:15:54,180 --> 00:15:57,000 to regenerative farming on land 347 00:15:57,000 --> 00:15:59,700 and rebuilding the carbon sequestration potential of soil, 348 00:15:59,700 --> 00:16:04,050 we know there are extraordinary solutions that exist. 349 00:16:04,050 --> 00:16:07,650 Now, the question is not to keep researching them, 350 00:16:07,650 --> 00:16:12,150 not to keep testing them, but to deploy them at scale. 351 00:16:12,150 --> 00:16:14,310 That's the challenge, I believe, 352 00:16:14,310 --> 00:16:17,580 for the next iteration of the environmental movement. 353 00:16:17,580 --> 00:16:20,580 - This has been just a tremendous education for me, 354 00:16:20,580 --> 00:16:23,640 and what keeps coming up for me 355 00:16:23,640 --> 00:16:27,210 is how incredibly intersectional this approach is. 356 00:16:27,210 --> 00:16:31,230 So in the past, we've had conservation biologists, 357 00:16:31,230 --> 00:16:34,050 like myself, I am a trained biologist 358 00:16:34,050 --> 00:16:36,570 working on these issues and coming up with solutions. 359 00:16:36,570 --> 00:16:40,170 But it sounds like with the company that you've created 360 00:16:40,170 --> 00:16:42,810 focused on solutions for reefs, 361 00:16:42,810 --> 00:16:47,810 you have people with skills in biology and ecology, 362 00:16:48,060 --> 00:16:50,070 but also urban planning 363 00:16:50,070 --> 00:16:53,100 and business, certainly finance. 364 00:16:53,100 --> 00:16:55,830 I mean, tell me about all of the different skill sets 365 00:16:55,830 --> 00:16:59,070 that come to play to make this successful. 366 00:16:59,070 --> 00:17:00,840 - Well, it's what's so fascinating about this work. 367 00:17:00,840 --> 00:17:04,200 Fundamentally, the team that we've brought together 368 00:17:04,200 --> 00:17:06,450 is just what you're saying, it's multidisciplinary. 369 00:17:06,450 --> 00:17:10,653 We have 3D construction printers, engineers, biologists, 370 00:17:11,490 --> 00:17:14,070 farmers that are farming the coral 371 00:17:14,070 --> 00:17:16,020 the way you would farm anything, 372 00:17:16,020 --> 00:17:18,360 technologists using AI and machine learning. 373 00:17:18,360 --> 00:17:22,080 We have engineers that are just building tanks 374 00:17:22,080 --> 00:17:24,030 and maintaining these systems, 375 00:17:24,030 --> 00:17:26,400 divers and marine biologists that are going out 376 00:17:26,400 --> 00:17:28,200 and planting these corals and restoring these reefs 377 00:17:28,200 --> 00:17:29,310 and monitoring and tracking them. 378 00:17:29,310 --> 00:17:31,500 People building underwater drones that we're testing 379 00:17:31,500 --> 00:17:33,930 and training the AI models to monitor 380 00:17:33,930 --> 00:17:35,490 and maintain these reefs over time. 381 00:17:35,490 --> 00:17:36,450 Because when you think about them 382 00:17:36,450 -->

00:17:37,770 as critical infrastructure, 383 00:17:37,770 --> 00:17:40,650 you build a port, a road, a rail and it breaks down, 384 00:17:40,650 --> 00:17:42,210 you don't just say, "Oh, good luck." 385 00:17:42,210 --> 00:17:44,100 You maintain it over time. 386 00:17:44,100 --> 00:17:48,060 So it is bringing together a multidisciplinary approach 387 00:17:48,060 --> 00:17:49,770 to solving this kind of a problem 388 00:17:49,770 --> 00:17:53,340 that is the only way we're going to be able to do it. 389 00:17:53,340 --> 00:17:55,050 - Can I just back you up for a moment, 390 00:17:55,050 --> 00:17:58,620 because did you say 3D printing coral? 391 00:17:58,620 --> 00:18:00,360 - So we're not 3D printing coral. 392 00:18:00,360 --> 00:18:02,550 We're 3D printing the underlying structure. 393 00:18:02,550 --> 00:18:04,740 So think about it as the foundation. 394 00:18:04,740 --> 00:18:07,680 So coral reefs, as I said, over millennia, 395 00:18:07,680 --> 00:18:10,530 each generation of coral will build its little home, 396 00:18:10,530 --> 00:18:12,390 and then the next generation will build a little home 397 00:18:12,390 --> 00:18:14,970 on that and millions of them all together, 398 00:18:14,970 --> 00:18:16,470 they layer upon layer upon layer, 399 00:18:16,470 --> 00:18:17,940 and that's how a reef is built. 400 00:18:17,940 --> 00:18:19,230 We don't have that time. 401 00:18:19,230 --> 00:18:21,180 When coral dies, surprisingly, 402 00:18:21,180 --> 00:18:24,600 that structure degrades relatively quickly, 403 00:18:24,600 --> 00:18:26,910 and so hence, Caribbean islands 404 00:18:26,910 --> 00:18:29,370 that not only don't have coral, they don't have reefs, 405 00:18:29,370 --> 00:18:31,050 so there's no protection from this storm surgery, 406 00:18:31,050 --> 00:18:34,230 or Vietnam and the Philippines and Indonesia, et cetera. 407 00:18:34,230 --> 00:18:37,470 So what we do is use 3D construction printers 408 00:18:37,470 --> 00:18:42,470 to actually mimic what that coral structure would be, 409 00:18:43,140 --> 00:18:46,380 the nooks and crannies, the hydrological nature of that 410 00:18:46,380 --> 00:18:49,470 in order to diffuse and distribute the energy 411 00:18:49,470 --> 00:18:52,560 from storm surge, which is what regular coral reefs do. 412 00:18:52,560 --> 00:18:55,680 Currently, sea walls, which is usually the solution, 413 00:18:55,680 --> 00:18:56,910 they're designed literally as that, 414 00:18:56,910 --> 00:18:59,700 a wall to stop the energy of the ocean, 415 00:18:59,700 --> 00:19:04,700 and that energy then is diverted up or down the coast, 416 00:19:04,980 --> 00:19:08,130 digging out beaches, destroying currents, 417 00:19:08,130 --> 00:19:10,620 destroying the hydrology of those areas. 418 00:19:10,620 --> 00:19:12,270 So seawalls can eventually break down 419 00:19:12,270 --> 00:19:14,700 because you can't beat the ocean. 420 00:19:14,700 --> 00:19:17,760 Reefs evolved over millions of years with the ocean 421 00:19:17,760 --> 00:19:20,550 to diffuse and disperse that energy with all, again, 422 00:19:20,550 --> 00:19:22,410 the little pillars and nooks and crannies and cracks 423 00:19:22,410 --> 00:19:24,060 and caves, et cetera. 424 00:19:24,060 --> 00:19:26,160 So we can reprint that kind of structure 425 00:19:26,160 --> 00:19:31,160 with 3D construction printers to high fidelity, high detail, 426 00:19:31,230 --> 00:19:32,940 place that in the water, 427 00:19:32,940 --> 00:19:35,400 and then you plant the corals on top of that 428 00:19:35,400 --> 00:19:37,113 and then let them do their thing. 429 00:19:38,100 --> 00:19:39,990 - [Peter] The commercial model in the 3D printing 430 00:19:39,990 --> 00:19:41,880 solved the infrastructure problem, 431 00:19:41,880 --> 00:19:45,840 but the coral itself still has to survive in warming water. 432 00:19:45,840 --> 00:19:48,180 That's where nature has quietly been doing 433 00:19:48,180 --> 00:19:49,710 something remarkable, 434 00:19:49,710 --> 00:19:52,010 and Philippe has found a way to accelerate it. 435 00:19:53,010 --> 00:19:57,720 - So I also heard you talk about when the King of Jordan, 436 00:19:57,720 --> 00:19:59,670 when you got that person's attention 437 00:19:59,670 --> 00:20:03,360 and they were so jazzed by these solutions, 438 00:20:03,360 --> 00:20:05,760 you mentioned that that part of the world 439 00:20:05,760 --> 00:20:08,340 has some heat-tolerant corals, 440 00:20:08,340 --> 00:20:11,490 and considering we have a warming climate, 441 00:20:11,490 --> 00:20:13,860 is this something to get excited about? 442 00:20:13,860 --> 00:20:16,410 - It's actually the resilience of nature. 443 00:20:16,410 --> 00:20:19,200 So we see heat-tolerant corals around the world, 444 00:20:19,200 --> 00:20:20,100 which is the good news. 445 00:20:20,100 --> 00:20:22,680 Those corals over, again, a geological timeframe 446 00:20:22,680 --> 00:20:26,160 will no doubt take over that ecosystem, 447 00:20:26,160 --> 00:20:28,200 but we don't have that time. 448 00:20:28,200 --> 00:20:31,447 So we instead, right, so for example, a stony coral, 449 00:20:31,447 --> 00:20:34,183 like a porites, like a brain coral, 450 00:20:34,183 --> 00:20:37,950 maybe think of like a kind of half dome lump of coral, 451 00:20:37,950 --> 00:20:40,320 the size of a dinner plate can take up to 75 years 452 00:20:40,320 --> 00:20:42,000 from one polyp to grow that big. 453 00:20:42,000 --> 00:20:44,880 In the farm, we can engineer those in two years. 454 00:20:44,880 --> 00:20:45,713 - Wow. 455 00:20:45,713 --> 00:20:47,820 - So we can harvest a small amount of donor corals, 456 00:20:47,820 --> 00:20:51,240 grow them out exponentially faster in our farms 457 00:20:51,240 --> 00:20:56,100 and create heat-tolerant and sexually mature corals 458 00:20:56,100 --> 00:20:58,950 and replace those in the water that would take 75 years 459 00:20:58,950 -->

00:21:02,400 for one dinner plate size, then one larvae out of a million 460 00:21:02,400 --> 00:21:03,870 would survive and it would land 461 00:21:03,870 --> 00:21:06,087 and then another 75 years for that, 462 00:21:06,087 --> 00:21:08,490 and that's the timescale we're talking about. 463 00:21:08,490 --> 00:21:09,380 We don't have that time. 464 00:21:09,380 --> 00:21:11,520 So we can accelerate that dramatically. 465 00:21:11,520 --> 00:21:13,500 And the good news is there are heat-tolerant corals 466 00:21:13,500 --> 00:21:14,880 all over the world. 467 00:21:14,880 --> 00:21:16,473 We don't exactly know why. 468 00:21:17,550 --> 00:21:21,210 The underlying process is that when the water gets warmer, 469 00:21:21,210 --> 00:21:24,120 corals have a symbiotic relationship with the algae 470 00:21:24,120 --> 00:21:25,740 that we call zooxanthella. 471 00:21:25,740 --> 00:21:28,710 And as the water temperature increases, 472 00:21:28,710 --> 00:21:31,140 zooxanthella metabolism increases, 473 00:21:31,140 --> 00:21:33,810 and therefore, they create more free radicals that are toxic 474 00:21:33,810 --> 00:21:36,270 to the coral and the coral ejects that zooxanthella. 475 00:21:36,270 --> 00:21:38,580 Problem is that algae also photosynthesizes 476 00:21:38,580 --> 00:21:40,380 and creates some food for the coral. 477 00:21:40,380 --> 00:21:42,240 So when coral bleaches, it's not dead, 478 00:21:42,240 --> 00:21:45,270 it's just evicted the algae that gives it its color. 479 00:21:45,270 --> 00:21:47,250 It's when the coral, after three or four weeks, 480 00:21:47,250 --> 00:21:49,620 it actually slowly starves to death. 481 00:21:49,620 --> 00:21:51,870 And when it turns green and mucky full of algae, 482 00:21:51,870 --> 00:21:53,130 then it's dead. 483 00:21:53,130 --> 00:21:57,090 And so when corals bleach, if the temperature gets better, 484 00:21:57,090 --> 00:21:59,820 they'll re-invite that algae back and they'll recover. 485 00:21:59,820 --> 00:22:02,001 But there are corals out there that, for some reason, 486 00:22:02,001 --> 00:22:04,830 aren't as fussed by those free radicals 487 00:22:04,830 --> 00:22:07,800 that the zooxanthella create in higher water temperatures. 488 00:22:07,800 --> 00:22:10,830 Lots of research into the underlying reasons for that. 489 00:22:10,830 --> 00:22:12,810 We don't know necessarily, 490 00:22:12,810 --> 00:22:15,000 but there's a lot of research that's happening. 491 00:22:15,000 --> 00:22:17,490 But what we do know is that practically and functionally, 492 00:22:17,490 --> 00:22:18,570 we can pull stuff out of the water, 493 00:22:18,570 --> 00:22:21,783 grow it, and replant it, and we are running out of time. 494 00:22:22,620 --> 00:22:25,830 The challenge, the trap we can find ourselves in 495 00:22:25,830 --> 00:22:28,710 is researching forever. 496 00:22:28,710 --> 00:22:30,600 Research, research, research, research, research, research, 497 00:22:30,600 --> 00:22:31,855 research, research, research, 498 00:22:31,855 --> 00:22:32,850 and then we're going to do a little more research. 499 00:22:32,850 --> 00:22:34,473 Meanwhile, the corals are dying. 500 00:22:35,610 --> 00:22:39,390 And there's a point where we need to continue the research, 501 00:22:39,390 --> 00:22:41,370 but we also need to say enough is enough, 502 00:22:41,370 --> 00:22:44,973 good is good enough, and it's triage time. 503 00:22:46,320 --> 00:22:49,000 We need to start putting stuff back in the water 504 00:22:50,348 --> 00:22:53,670 and rebuilding these systems, and that's what we're doing. 505 00:22:53,670 --> 00:22:55,980 And the good news is it works anywhere in the world, 506 00:22:55,980 --> 00:22:58,620 and again, the good news is the technologies exist. 507 00:22:58,620 --> 00:23:00,630 It's just finding a way to make these 508 00:23:00,630 --> 00:23:03,390 investible, profitable investments 509 00:23:03,390 --> 00:23:06,720 that protect land-based infrastructure and people's lives 510 00:23:06,720 --> 00:23:09,090 and rebuild fisheries and tourist amenities 511 00:23:09,090 --> 00:23:12,360 to unlock the scale of capital needed to do the work. 512 00:23:12,360 --> 00:23:14,430 It's doable. It's doable. 513 00:23:14,430 --> 00:23:17,520 - For all intents and purposes, we have reason to believe 514 00:23:17,520 --> 00:23:21,960 that this could make a huge positive impact 515 00:23:21,960 --> 00:23:23,430 for coral reefs worldwide. 516 00:23:23,430 --> 00:23:25,620 There are obviously still, unfortunately, 517 00:23:25,620 --> 00:23:28,500 huge threats, right? 518 00:23:28,500 --> 00:23:30,150 There's a lot working against reefs, 519 00:23:30,150 --> 00:23:31,590 but there's some pushback. 520 00:23:31,590 --> 00:23:33,840 You're creating ways to push back 521 00:23:33,840 --> 00:23:36,960 and to keep the reefs thriving and building 522 00:23:36,960 --> 00:23:38,250 and coming back stronger. 523 00:23:38,250 --> 00:23:42,090 So let's say that in places we can fast-forward 524 00:23:42,090 --> 00:23:44,190 to a certain amount of time and see it working. 525 00:23:44,190 --> 00:23:47,220 What does a restored reef look like 526 00:23:47,220 --> 00:23:49,320 and what does it bring along with it? 527 00:23:49,320 --> 00:23:52,920 What other biodiversity gets kind of pulled back in 528 00:23:52,920 --> 00:23:54,780 to that restored ecosystem? 529 00:23:54,780 --> 00:23:59,780 - I dream every day of a world where we rebuild abundance 530 00:23:59,880 --> 00:24:01,920 in the ocean, and it's possible, 531 00:24:01,920 --> 00:24:03,300 where people can feed themselves, 532 00:24:03,300 --> 00:24:07,680 where shorelines and coastal ecosystems are healthy 533 00:24:07,680 --> 00:24:11,400 from mangroves and wetlands and seagrass and coral reefs, 534 00:24:11,400 --> 00:24:13,140 where my daughters can live in a world 535 00:24:13,140 --> 00:24:15,300 that was as rich as the one that I was born

into, 536 00:24:15,300 --> 00:24:19,050 reefs teeming with life, microorganisms and crustaceans 537 00:24:19,050 --> 00:24:20,430 and mollusks and fish. 538 00:24:20,430 --> 00:24:23,730 And I dream of a world where coral reefs will continue 539 00:24:23,730 --> 00:24:26,220 to provide the foundation for a healthy, abundant ocean 540 00:24:26,220 --> 00:24:27,810 for generations to come. 541 00:24:27,810 --> 00:24:30,030 And that's what we are dedicated to doing, 542 00:24:30,030 --> 00:24:33,600 and we do not accept that there's no hope. 543 00:24:33,600 --> 00:24:35,280 - Yeah. Yeah. - There's always hope. 544 00:24:35,280 --> 00:24:37,140 - And then, Philippe, a challenging question I'm asking 545 00:24:37,140 --> 00:24:39,960 for you is what can the average everyday person do 546 00:24:39,960 --> 00:24:42,390 to help support coral reefs? 547 00:24:42,390 --> 00:24:44,670 - Conservation in nature shouldn't be a partisan issue. 548 00:24:44,670 --> 00:24:46,170 It should be a bipartisan one. 549 00:24:47,100 --> 00:24:49,350 Also, when we think about where we go on vacation, 550 00:24:49,350 --> 00:24:51,180 looking for resorts and developments 551 00:24:51,180 --> 00:24:52,740 that are protecting their coastlines 552 00:24:52,740 --> 00:24:55,240 and investing in restoration projects 553 00:24:56,280 --> 00:24:58,410 and supporting their communities. 554 00:24:58,410 --> 00:24:59,940 Shopping is politics as Bono said, 555 00:24:59,940 --> 00:25:02,040 and we have a lot of power with our wallets. 556 00:25:02,040 --> 00:25:04,860 And just recognizing the superpower that each of us have 557 00:25:04,860 --> 00:25:07,410 as storytellers, be it to an audience 558 00:25:07,410 --> 00:25:11,340 in a television program like "Wild Kingdom" 559 00:25:11,340 --> 00:25:14,850 or around the dinner table, that we are storytellers 560 00:25:14,850 --> 00:25:16,230 and we need to help people understand 561 00:25:16,230 --> 00:25:18,060 that humanity cannot thrive on this planet 562 00:25:18,060 --> 00:25:19,473 if the ocean cannot thrive. 563 00:25:20,490 --> 00:25:22,530 - [Peter] Half the world's coral reef gone 564 00:25:22,530 --> 00:25:24,360 in a single lifetime. 565 00:25:24,360 --> 00:25:28,170 95% of the Caribbean reefs are already lost, 566 00:25:28,170 --> 00:25:31,470 and yet, brain corals that would take 75 years 567 00:25:31,470 --> 00:25:35,220 to grow in the wild, farmed in only two. 568 00:25:35,220 --> 00:25:37,650 Reefs rebuilt kilometer by kilometer 569 00:25:37,650 --> 00:25:39,750 from the ocean floor up. 570 00:25:39,750 --> 00:25:41,070 The science works. 571 00:25:41,070 --> 00:25:44,790 The question now is whether we can move fast enough. 572 00:25:44,790 --> 00:25:46,710 This is "Back from the Brink" 573 00:25:46,710 --> 00:25:48,927 from Mutual of Omaha's "Wild Kingdom." 574 00:25:49,870 --> 00:25:52,453 (gentle music) 575 00:25:53,460 --> 00:25:56,160 - If this episode was super intriguing for you, 576 00:25:56,160 --> 00:25:58,530 follow or subscribe, leave a review, 577 00:25:58,530 --> 00:26:01,170 and send it to the ocean lover, the snorkeler, 578 00:26:01,170 --> 00:26:02,670 or the person in your life 579 00:26:02,670 --> 00:26:05,910 who had no idea coral reefs were even in crisis. 580 00:26:05,910 --> 00:26:08,523 I'm Dr. Rae Wynn-Grant, and I'll see you next time. 581 00:26:09,570 --> 00:26:11,160 - [Narrator] The "Back from the Brink" podcast 582 00:26:11,160 --> 00:26:14,340 is sponsored by Mutual of Omaha's "Wild Kingdom," 583 00:26:14,340 --> 00:26:17,010 hosted by Dr. Rae Wynn-Grant, 584 00:26:17,010 --> 00:26:19,020 narrated by Peter Gros. 585 00:26:19,020 --> 00:26:21,060 Executive producers are Jen Wulf 586 00:26:21,060 --> 00:26:22,650 and Jenny Van Soelen. 587 00:26:22,650 --> 00:26:25,853 Podcast production by Lower Street Media. 588 00:26:25,853 --> 00:26:28,603 (dramatic music)