About 50 years ago, a number of technologies came about and would revolutionize our world. Everything from automobiles to plastics, to electronics to satellites: All this sweet technology worked together to improve the lives of billions of people around the world and brought what we call the modern age, which I'll be honest: Having experienced it firsthand, I can say is pretty great. We all got to live in a time where distances could be covered quickly, unlimited food accessible in a matter of minutes, disposable products could be made cheaply, and best of all, we got to read knowledge from blog posts like this one, on a personal computer, which, as you are reading, is receiving information from outer space.

There's no denying it. That's awesome. But there's also isn't the full story something we don't talk about nearly as much as these flashy new machines but was nevertheless an equal part in shaping the world we know today is how technology impacted agriculture, what we eat and hence our human activity.

Sustaining our drug addiction to protein

There's a reason why most of humanity is seeking to consume proteins on a daily basis: It simply gives us super powers!

Energy metabolism is the general process by which living cells acquire and use the energy needed to stay alive, to grow, and to reproduce. How is the energy released while breaking the chemical bonds of nutrient molecules captured for other uses by the cells? The answer lies in the coupling between the oxidation of nutrients and the synthesis of high-energy compounds, particularly ATP, which works as the main chemical energy carrier in all cells.

There are two mechanisms of ATP synthesis: 1. oxidative phosphorylation, the process by which ATP is synthesized from ADP and inorganic phosphate (Pi) that takes place in mitochondrion; and 2. substrate-level phosphorylation, in which ATP is synthesized through the transfer of high-energy phosphoryl groups from high-energy compounds to ADP. The latter occurs in both the mitochondrion, during the tricarboxylic acid (TCA) cycle, and in the cytoplasm, during glycolysis. In the next section, we focus on oxidative phosphorylation, the main mechanism of ATP synthesis in most of human cells.

In short, along with reducing appetite, eating protein temporarily boosts metabolism. The body uses energy to digest and make use of the nutrients in food. This is called the thermic effect of food (TEF), and protein’s thermic effect is much higher than at of carbohydrates and fat. This is why athletes are in need of consuming proteins to reach high performances.

This is why SensFood, one of our Atlas Ventures sponsored the world champion Adam Ondra, to provide him with daily high protein snacks… that are actually sustainable for the planet. You will discover how by reading this blog post…

You will kill 7000 animals in your lifetime.

We really do a lot to sustain our addiction to proteins.

In a precedent article in this blog, we looked through the problem of limited landscape and the opportunity of aquaculture as a solution to feed mankind.

Now do you know that today, 60% of the food fishes eat in aquaculture comes from land animal proteins? Fishes eating cows to feed humans? This doesn’t make sense.

Meat has always been part of the human diet for over 2.6 million years. It is a big part of our diet today; whenever we’re eating a meal or a plate full of food, most of the time, there’s always a certain type of meat/protein on it. To no surprise, meats and animal products provide approximately 36% of the calories of the food supply, in which out of the 36%, red meat provides the highest proportion of calories at 15%, followed by dairy products (10%), animal fats (4%), eggs (1.6%), poultry (3.5%), and fish (0.9%).

Though the 36% might seem small, animal products actually provide on average approximately 45% of the total calories of all individuals (in which meat contributed 28% within the 45%). Sure, animal products may provide slightly less calories on average per individual compared to plant-based products; however, animal products provide more than 70% of zinc content, more than 80% of calcium content, and almost 100% of vitamin B12 content in our diet. This goes to show that regardless of the amount animal products, let alone meats contribute to food supply, they play a vital role in providing necessary nutrients to the human body, perhaps certain nutrients one wouldn’t be able to ingest from plant-based products. 

One of the factors, perhaps, why animal products (meats) contribute to less than half of the total calories of an individual’s diet on average is due to higher costs. When going into supermarkets, we would also notice that meats are going to be more expensive than vegetables. Sure, certain individuals are vegans or vegetarians, so meat wouldn’t be an option for them, but these groups are small when looking from a global perspective. The majority of the individuals still consume meat, so the market for meat still has a very high demand. Why? The fact that the majority of the people still consume and crave meat is due to the fact that it’s engraved into our brains and genetics. The consumption of meat marks it as a pivotal point in the evolution of the human brain. We are still wired to seek protein sources, in which meat is a very rich source of protein. Not only does our genetics and ancestors contribute to why we crave meat so much, but it is what I would consider as a “luxury commodity” in the market. Throughout history, we see that the demand for meats such as pork, chicken, and beef, typically rises along with higher income. Below is a graph which illustrates the meat supply per person with its relation to income. 

Here, we see the relationship between meat supply person and GDP per capita of different countries around the world from years 1990-2017. Looking at the graph overall, we see a trend that the higher the GDP per capita is, the greater the meat supply per person is. This goes to show that indeed, the demand for meat typically rises along with higher income, although some factors may affect such as a person’s religion, diet type, etc;.

Whenever we want to buy meat or any other grocery produce, one big thought always goes on in our head- price. And based on the statistics and common knowledge, we know that meat tends to be pricey. And of course, there’s a variance to prices of meats, to no surprise. Factors that influence those prices include the quality/grade of the meat, the way the livestock was raised/treated, and of course, branding. Let’s take a look at how the price of meat has changed overtime.

The graph above illustrates the average prices of beef per kilogram (in USD) worldwide from 2014 to 2025. We see that the year 2014 had the highest price and has seen a decreasing trend overall; however, it started increasing again in the year 2019 and will remain relatively stable till 2025. Sure, we see that the price dropped from 2014, but there are cons associated with such. One thing we know for sure is that ordinary vegetables (excluding premium organic vegetables) are much cheaper compared to meat, so meat can still be deemed as an expensive commodity in the market. In addition, there has been inflation throughout the years, causing meat prices to increase from last year by approximately 3.3% for beef and veal. Due to the pandemic, a lot of people are encouraged to stay home. In turn, employed people working from home have substantially more disposable income, earning more money to purchase those meats. Demand for meats went up approximately 2% from last year, and this year alone, it went up by 5.7%

This leads to an even bigger problem- the increase in consumption of meat. Why is this bad? I’m sure quite a number of people are unaware of this problem, and some do not see it as a problem, but the consumption of meat in itself is detrimental towards the environment. 

The two graphs go hand-in-hand; one shows the change in global GDP at current prices in 2020.

Sure, the prices of meats such as beef have decreased from 2014, but that decrease in price may lead to greater meat consumption. Above shows just that. We see the forecast of global meat consumption from 2020 to 2029. From the graph, we see an increasing trend. And the more meat we consume, the more detrimental it is to the environment. According to the BBC in an article which lists seven reasons why people are going vegan, one of the reasons was “going green”. What does that mean? They believe that consuming meat is not exactly “environmentally sustainable”. Huge amounts of land are needed to support and feed livestock, which leads to deforestation. In addition, it is estimated that approximately 8% of global human water use is used for irrigation systems for livestock crops. This process requires huge amounts of pesticides and fertilizers, which in turn, leads to water pollution. Not only the activities that are required to maintain livestock that are affecting our environment, but the livestock’s themselves also contribute to greenhouse gas emissions. How? Let me give an example: cows? A lot of people may be confused about how livestock such as cows contribute negatively to our environment.

Throughout the day everyday, cows emit a greenhouse gas called methane, which is very potent to the environment. In fact, methane is 28-34 times stronger than carbon dioxide in terms of its global warming potential. As a result, livestock and animal agriculture contributes to approximately 14-18 percent of human-caused gas emissions, even higher than transportation itself! This is very high and actually very problematic. This leads to more negative externalities. The more these greenhouse gases are emitted from livestock and deforestation, it leads to climate change, leading to more wildlife habitats being lost which contributes to extinction of various species. 

As a result, more people are looking into converting to veganism; however, meat is still meat. It’s insatiable going vegan when one has to completely go vegan. In a survey of 11,000 Americans, within approximately a year, 84% of the sample returned to eating meat. In fact, approximately a third don’t last over three months after completely quitting meat. One of the possible reasons why certain converts end up reverting back is due to their lifestyle of eating meat prior to converting to being vegans. As stated before, our meat cravings are buried within our genes for millions of years.

They searched for alternatives. And it’s working!

However, is there really a solution to mitigate pollution while satiating our cravings for meat? If one says “going organic” or “eating organic” is a viable solution, in my humble opinion, I believe that isn’t the way to go. 

Above shows the climate costs comparison between conventional meat products and organic meat products. Conventional livestock emissions arise from excretion of methane, manure, and deforestation. As for organic livestock, although they are often grass-fed, it leads to less meat being produced as they grow slower, which leads to a longer time to maintain these livestock’s before being slaughtered. In turn, this leads to similar climate costs between the two types of meat. As you can see, from my perspective, supporting and consuming organic meat is just as bad as supporting conventional meat. According to research available, consuming meat is a very inefficient way of eating due to its repercussions it poses on the environment. For 1kg of chicken we consume, it takes approximately 3.2kg of crops to produce. In some countries, in order to prevent climate breakdown by 2030, we need to consume 70% less meat and dairy from now.

So what would be considered a viable solution to solve all this? Meat-substitutes! I believe that a lot of people are aware of meat substitutes, specifically plant-based meats. Plant-based diet is the way to go if one wants to lead a sustainable lifestyle. What exactly is a plant-based diet? The name itself is quite self-explanatory. Products such as meat are being created from non-meat ingredients such as soy, peas, mushroom, beans, wheat gluten, etc;. One pro is the fact that absolutely everybody can eat this! Vegans and vegetarians can enjoy these products, satiating their meat cravings while consuming exactly 0 percent meat! Not only does this satisfy various diet cravings, it also satisfies the environment and its fanatic counterparts. Forests are no longer being destroyed. In fact, if everyone went on a plant-based diet, we’d need 75% less farmland than we actually use today, an area equivalent to Europe, Australia, the US, and China combined! 

A lot of people might be thinking why would anyone buy plant-based meat when it has a chance to have different textures and not taste authentic? Is there really a market for plant-based products? In fact, there is a market for these goods. In fact, quite a big one at that!. In 2019, the plant-based meat market was valued at approximately $3.77 billion and is expected to reach $9.43 billion by 2026. In addition, the global plant-based meat market is expected to grow at a compound growth annual rate of 14% between 2019-2026. That is a huge leap, I would say. In addition, dollar sales of plant-based meat grew 45% the past year and 72% over the past 2 years, showing it’s likeliness to grow even more. To grasp a better visual of the market value of plant-based meat worldwide, I have provided several graphs to see the market growth potential for the plant-based meat market.

Based on the graph, we see that in 2019, the market value for the plant-based meat market worldwide stands at $11.1 billion, and will continue to rise throughout the years. By 2027, it’s expected to reach approximately $35.5 billion, over triple what it was 8 years ago! Seeing this as a great opportunity a lot of businesses have jumped into this market. Another graph shows how the value of the market has increased throughout the years 2018-2020. Between 2018-2019, the value jumped up by 19% whereas between 2019-2020, it jumped up by 45%! Not to mention, in the US, 98% of the people who purchase plant-based meat also purchase conventional meat, The tremendous increase in growth truly proves the market’s promising future.

The Protein Economy Watchlist:

Of course, as the market for plant-based meat is growing, more companies are having a take and are joining the growing market. Let’s take a look at some companies currently operating in this particular market.

• Beyond Meat: A Los-Angeles based plant-based meat company founded in 2009, which started launching its plant-based meat product in the US in 2012. With the mission to address and solve growing global issues (e.g. global warming, climate change), Beyond Meat has various plant-based meat products which include meats, sausage links, burger patties, beef crumbles, and breakfast sausages! Based on their website, they claimed that the environmental impact of their Beyond Burger is a quarter of what a US beef burger would do. If you want to find out, click here!

• Impossible Foods: A company that develops plant-based meat substitutes based in Redwood City, California, founded in 2011. With its mission of addressing global issues at hand, Impossible Foods offers packages of meat and patties on its website. Coming soon, the company will launch its Impossible Burger that will cost 20% less of what is offered online in grocery stores nationwide. If you are interested, click here to find out more!

But wait, it’s not only the plant-based meats that are offered as conventional meat substitutes. This may sound apprehensive, but there’s also INSECT-based proteins available in the market! It is very similar to plant-based meats, but instead of using plant products, insects are transformed into various meats! Per kilogram, insects offer roughly the same amount of protein compared to cattle. In addition, in order to grow 1kg of cattle meat, it takes 200 square meters of land whereas it only takes 15 square meters of land to grow 1kg of insects! This is also proportionate to the amount of water needed (22,000 liters needed to grow 1kg of cattle where it takes roughly 165 liters of water to grow 1kg of insects). With lower resources needed, it is safe to say it’s more sustainable to be farming for crickets rather than conventional livestock. In addition, the market for insect-based proteins is projected to grow too! For example, this year, the demand for insect protein is approximately 10,000 metric tons, but it is projected to grow up to 500,000 metric tons by the year 2030! To top things off, Charoen Pokphand Foods (CP) and Chiang Mai University have also signed a memorandum of understanding to develop insect proteins to encourage the agriculture sectors towards sustainable growth. Although of course, it’s still in its early stages so the prices for these proteins are quite high compared to its counterparts, but nevertheless, it’s a growing market! Below are some companies that are currently involved in the insect-protein based market!

• Ynsect: Founded in 2011 in Paris France by scientists and activists, Ynsect transforms insects into various protein goods for pets, plants, and human beings. With their purpose-built state of the art farms, the company aims to reduce carbon footprint and encourage sustainable consumption. With the usage of their patented vertical farms for Molitor and Buffalo worms currently produced in France and Netherlands, they enable themselves to produce their products worldwide, even generating $425 million from its investors. They recently got funded by Robert Downey Jr’s Footprint coalition, have been awarded the B Corp certification in 2021, and have met the highest standards of verified social and environmental performance with its carbon negative activities. To find out more about their products, click here!

• Sens Foods: A company founded in 2016 which specializes in cricket-based protein! Through collaborating with local universities about cricket farming, the company chose to farm in Thailand due to its extensive knowledge for cricket farming. With their mission of “maximizing the good” and “minimizing the bad”, Sens Foods offers various products that enable sustainable consumption which includes flavored protein bars, chocolate, chips, pasta and more! And yes, currently, they’re sponsoring Adam Ondra, defined as the best professional climber in the world! To find out more about its products and how good it is, click here!
  

SensFoods is currently fundraising a new funding round and Atlas have a 200,000$ allocation for it’s angels investors; with investment tickets are starting at $5000 via Atlas. If you are interested to learn more contact: djoann@theatlascapital.com

Newsletter wrote by Sila Rithirueng & edited by Atlas Society’s team

Be watching, or be the solution…

Since the launch of Atlas Society, for my birthday on February 16th, we have been very busy trying to get this thing up and running. This week we are glad to tell you that we walked the talk and actually put together an actual syndicate of nearly 100 angel investors across 25 cities in our Atlas Society. Moreover after almost 70 discussions since March, we have curated 5 companies in which we strongly believe in their capacity to make profits and making real impact, while following the investment thesis of my book: The Adaptive Economy.

For our laser focused investment thesis, here are the 3 problematics we cared about in 2021:

• Regenerating our planet’s biosphere, forests and oceans.

• Feeding the world sustainably and in a circular manner.

• Sharing the access to high paid tech jobs to everybody.

Atlas Ventures Program is a 12 weeks fundraising support aiming to connect sustainability tech companies with investors sensible to sustainability. In that sense the 5 companies we selected alongside this investment thesis will be meeting 12 investors during the program and be promoted to our wider network.

After working so much on this last few weeks, we were are able to kick off Atlas Ventures Program last Thursday on Zoom for our Slack Members and I’m glad to share the details of how it went to you with our YouTube recording today. 

Now, finally, here are Atlas Ventures pitch videos, for your entertainment:

Trashlucky - An exited Ecommerce CEO went surfing, turned into building the 4.0 recycling infrastructure for his country.

Managing waste is a big deal for the 6th biggest polluting country in the world. While governments are busy coping with the pandemic, with food delivery and ecommerce packaging: the output of plastic trash have never been higher. This company uses IOT, gamification and eCommerce delivery to turn waste into millionaires. Check out their story and business model here.

Evergrow - Enabling the world largest automated vertical farming facilities, with container farms and IOT.

Traditionally, farming is done in open fields, water is spread on the land and fruits, vegetables etc. are growing while the water evaporate to clouds. Powered by the latest innovations of IOT, vertical farming and controlled environment farming is enabling tripling the food production while saving 90% of the water. Check out their story and business model here.

Sens Food - 60% of proteins we produce are use to feed animals we eat for… proteins. They are challenging this.

Of the 104m km2 habitable spaces our planet provide, we are using 51% of this for agriculture and 77% of this agriculture output is used to feed livestock’s, in which 62% of this livestock is used to feed other livestock. In April 2021, Robert Downey Junior’s VC Fund decided to put a stop to that nonsense, by investing 200m$ in Ynsect, a similar player in the alternative protein field. We believe Sens Food could be the next big one to produce proteins for aquaculture and pets. Check out their story and business model here.

Adaptivity - Unemployment is the fastest growing market in the world, they bet AI & reskilling can solve that.

In APAC, during the pandemic alone, more than 81m jobs have been crushed, and an estimated high time record of suicides have been registered in the poorest parts of our society. People simply can’t cope loosing their income to tourism and other traditional industries. In the meantime, millions of well paid jobs have been created by eCommerce and the wider Digital Economy, however the lack of awareness in how to access these careers create the largest mismatch of demand and supply in the work history called the “Digital Talents Crunch”, and only a few wealthy access to these tech jobs today. This is unfair and Adaptivity wants to solve this digital employability problem with AI and reskilling for vulnerable blue collars as well as Fortunes 500. Check out their story and business model here.

Wildchain - Our past 50 years of activity have crushed 70% of the wildlife. Well, now you can use your bitcoins to stop this madness.

If nothing is done, by 2050, the UN estimates that humans will have wiped out 98% of the biosphere. Your kids will never see a deer, a bear, an elephant etc. Still, the only thing most of us think about these days is spending money in Ripple, Bitcoin, NFTs and other gambles. So why not using now your crypto to sponsor a wild animal to be protected through an NFT smart contract that you will own for your while life as a wildlife conservationist? This is the crazy amazing product this company is building. Check out their story and business model here.

The beginning of our journey need your help.

To make all this happen, we had the help of our amazing Altas Society Team and I would like to recognize them: with Jet, interviewing startups and producing dozens of video interview on our Youtube Channel, with Pupe we got online events and social media running well, with Etienne we reviewed the applicant’s financials and interviewed each founders, with Fit, we talked with Asian family offices and formulated the strategy and lastly with our interns, we saved lot of time on operations.

But that’s not all: A lot of supporters, maybe including you, answered our phone calls, referred us investors, spent hours with us brainstorming strategy and shared our stuff on social media: The Atlas team and I are grateful for you to be part of the beginning of this journey, Big Thank You!

Now how you can help?

If it is not done yet, apply to join our Atlas Society by clicking here and be part of the people driving the solutions to our planet and society crisis. That is the way we can get in touch and chat how you would like to contribute to the Atlas.

Join the Atlas Society

Else, you can help spread the word on Social Media with this message:

—————————————————

We believe tomorrow’s heroes will be founders with companies that will demonstrate economic growth that benefits both the society as a whole and our planet.

We are a community of entrepreneurs, investors, executives, and influencers building a technological future that is inclusive to all humans and sustainable for the planet.

We are The Atlas Society. 

Join us at www.theatlascapital.com/society

#atlassociety #sustainabilitytech #BETHESOLUTION

—————————————————

For you, reader, Atlas selected 5 promising sustainability tech companies saving the world today AND not (yet) valued at nonsense valuations (like Tesla for example).

Following the launch of Atlas Society in March this year with the aim of helping startups in the sustainability space, we are proud to kick off our 12-week Atlas Ventures Program where 5 selected startups will be connecting every week with the investors of the Atlas network (including you?). These 5 startups cover industries that are crucial towards advancing sustainable technology and reducing our industry’s negative footprint on the planet.

All eyes on the mission

“Atlas Society is a network of entrepreneurs, investors, corporate executives, and influencers building a technological future that is both inclusive to all humans and sustainable for the planet’s future.”

Why Atlas Ventures Program? In the midst of what is scientifically recognized as the 6th mass planetary extinction, we believe that the Titan Atlas is having a lot of work right now, alone, holding all the pressure humanity has put on our only habitable planet.

We believe tomorrow’s heroes will be founders with companies that will demonstrate economic growth that benefits both the society as a whole and our planet. This is why at Atlas, we believe this problem is actually a market opportunity, with a market size:

Sustainability tech startups face a unique path compared to other startups. They require a more robust network full of experts, influencers, investors, and potential partners who are already sensitive to why sustainability & tackling the climate change crisis is so important this decade.

This is why we are creating a global society of entrepreneurs, investors, and citizens to support him on that task of preserving Earth via establishing a sustainable civilization through tech entrepreneurship.

Atlas Venture Program is an inclusive fundraising support 12 weeks online Bootcamp for startups CxOs selected on the belief that their business holds the key to advancing society and reversing the environmental collapse. During the 12 weeks, the selected sustain tech startups will meet the 80 angels in Atlas Capital’s investment syndicate as well as partners VCs investing specifically in the ESG sector.

Develop sustainable assets.

For investors, many feel like investing in tech is great, but investing in tech that is useful and here to provide a better future to our children is even better. The ESG sector - investment funds that focus on Environmental, Social, and corporate governance issues, has become a rapidly growing trend in financial markets as climate risk leads investors to reassess their positions and how it affects the bottom line and the earth. As part of the broader stakeholder capitalism movement, impact investing funds have topped $250 billion (CNBC) and sustainability assets have doubled in value over the past three years.

More info https://www.theatlascapital.com/accelerator

 “It’s not a question of choosing between costs of investing in sustainable transformation and profits. These should go together. It’s a question of re-framing our minds. You do not breathe or eat. You have to do both.” The Atlas

Here is why Atlas is a new type of Venture Capital, enabling individuals in Atlas Society to participate in the support of the portfolio companies at every level of their capacity: as citizens, Atlas Society members invest in the network by consuming the products of the Atlas Ventures; as corporate partners, Atlas Society members can enable collaborations between their companies and Atlas Ventures, and as Investors Atlas members can access stakes in the fast-growing technologies companies selected and grow their wealth as the sustainability transition is becoming the new normal around the globe in the new post covid world.

With the opening of the Atlas Ventures Program, you will be able to invest in these companies, (or simply become their client) and make yourself and your money part of the solutions to save our planet.

How to join Thursday’s announcement event:

You are invited to come online to meet the founders of these exciting companies, hear their business models, and learn more about how you can help them!

Here will be the event agenda: 

• Short Atlas Introduction (5 mins)

• Introduction of the 5 companies selected (5x5 mins)

• 12 Weeks Program Introduction from Atlas Team (10 mins)

• Audience Q&A (15 mins)

For current members of Atlas Society’s Slack Group: turn on your Slack notification on the general Atlas channel to be notified when we drop the Zoom/video link.

For non-members of Atlas Society’s Slack Group: Join our slack to be given the Zoom link. Yes if you are interested, I really want you to join us to chat on Slack… Click here:

Join Atlas Society's Slack

3 years ago at a dinner with my co-founders of GetLinks, we were discussing how I was writing these blog posts and some of them were going viral sometimes (like this one). At some point, one of my co-founders said: “Hey, you should write a book about the Future Of Work”, we all laughed about this. But the idea grew in my mind and started to push me to wake up at 5 am in the morning to think about it more seriously.

Aftermath.

In case you don’t know, I wrote a book the next year and published it in January 2020.

As you can imagine, it hasn’t been easy to find time to do anything else than taking care of GetLinks, but, had a trick:

During the past 10 years, during my many trips across Hong Kong, Singapore, San Francisco, or Europe; anytime I was meeting someone interesting, I put some references in my iPhone notes. I had 4300 notes with an average length of 30 words, that’s 129,000 words. Wasn’t easy to curate the notes on food recipes and the notes on Distributed Solar Photovoltaics market data but after a while, I had my 50,000 words in the 200 pages of The Adaptive Economy.

Now the real deal for you here is that in the book I tried to consolidate what would be my understanding of what the world could look like 10 years from now, what industries would be hiring the most and where would investors pour money into.

The data crunching hell.

In 2019, a lot of 5 am market data-crunching happened — as you can see maybe 10% in this data-driven newsletter — that might be something useful for you to understand where money will flow next decade: that’s your leverage (and mine too!).

I have done those researches for myself, but now you can leverage them.

And as you might guess, I’m now leveraging on the insights developed while writing this book to create an investment thesis for myself during the next 10 years.

There is a lot of not data-driven blah blah out there these days about “making an impact” so it is great for me to have a compass to help me cut the BS and focus myself and my activities a bit more.

Of course, this is not for everyone, some people have different core values and priorities in life.

Personally, I look at life believing that time is the rarest resource in the universe, and most of my good days, I try my best to make the highest daily output ratio on the formula (today achieved) x (positive impact made)/(death clock remaining time).

And the first thing about helping make an impact, you be to help myself. So how could I invest my time in pushing all my activities in GetLinks and outside of GetLinks to make the most impact in terms of carbon offsetting while also building my wealth?

Here is the summary of what I learned:

The area where the most impact can be done by 2050 (Markets ROI VS Carbon Offset):

1. Green Energy — Improving the sources of the power we consume every day.

2. AgriTech & Biosphere Recovery — IOT, RPO, AI to improve food sources & cycles that mitigate biodiversity loss in our forests ocean, and air.

3. Mobility & New Work — Transforming how we get around and for what reasons.

4. New cities & Circularity — Pushing the boundaries of where we live and how we make it sustainable.

Yes, I have decided that for the next 10 years, I will do my best to make GetLinks help more companies that have a positive impact. I have decided that for the next 10 years I will personally solely help companies that are following these 4 pillars listed above.

The results: clearer FOCUS

• Help me & my peers get my focus clear and avoid being on call with people that aren’t thinking alike

• Help me & my peers making a big impact on my time because each company I will be talking to on zoom etc is working on reducing gigatons of carbons or saving the world.

• Help me & my peers building their wealth with better leverage than others because the companies in these markets will benefit from Trillions $ valuations.

• Finally, I feel that I’m not escaping my responsibilities towards my generation and my planet: I’m part of the maybe 1m people defining the future of our society and planet. And that feels great, you should try!

Help yourself: join us.

I’m now decided to put together a VC fund of $20m, aiming for close in Q4 2022. I’m taking the data of The Adaptive Economy, and including them into the Atlas investment thesis under the “Atlas Economy”.

Of course, I will still support GetLinks as Group strategy Officer as it will be one of the champions in Atlas Fund One representing the “New Work” pillar, in the meantime, there are some other companies that I want GetLinks to help with hiring and with its network of corporate clients and amazing investors: sharing is caring!

During the past 12 months, I have gathered around myself some friends & like-minded people sensible to sustainability in an investment syndicate. There are now 82 of you and I can only thank you for your trust. Now let’s get to 100 impact angels!

To not wait until 2022 end to make an impact, during the past 3 months we worked on launching a support system for sustainability tech companies. It is called Atlas Ventures Program and this basically fits in the category of “online fundraising coaching accelerator”.

During Q3, for basically 12 weeks we will help accelerate 5 companies that fit in the investment thesis of the Atlas Economy and match them with investors of our syndicate as well as some affiliated sustainability tech VCs we had the chance to meet last year.

Soon enough — 15 June — we will announce in this newsletter the 5 winners we selected for Atlas Ventures Program after reviewing more than 93 applications.

Now if you wanna help, or do not agree: get in touch

Say hi: Djoann@theatlascapital.com

Last week, what was the common point between Tesla, Vitalik, India, COVID, and ESG? Bitcoin!

Did you like that newsletter? Sponsor my brain to keep writing with only 5$!

Quick Snapshot

Last week was a big week for crypto. Starting with a good news: Vitalik Buterin, the computer scientist who created Ethereum (ETH), told IEEE Spectrum that mining cryptocurrency can be “a huge waste of resources, even if you don’t believe that pollution and carbon dioxide are an issue”, Buterin said. “There are real consumers – real people – whose need for electricity is being displaced by this stuff.”

Wednesday, Vitalik donated cryptocurrency worth $1 billion to support covid-19 relief work in India, possibly the single-largest philanthropic contribution to help covid-stricken Indians from any country or individual in history.

On the other end, while the recent fall has dented Musk’s fortune, bitcoin also poses a threat to the company’s mission toward a “zero-emission future” and poses serious questions for governments and corporations looking to curb their own carbon footprints.

Bitcoin mining – the process in which a bitcoin is awarded to a computer that solves a complex series of algorithms – is a deeply energy-intensive process.

“Mining” bitcoin involves solving complex math problems in order to create new bitcoins. Miners are rewarded in bitcoin.

Earlier in bitcoin’s relatively short history – the currency was created in 2009 – one could mine bitcoin on an average computer. But the way bitcoin mining has been set up by its creator (or creators – no one really knows for sure who created it) is that there is a finite number of bitcoins that can be mined: 21m. The more bitcoin that is mined, the harder the algorithms that must be solved to get a bitcoin become.

Now that over 18.5m bitcoin has been mined, the average computer can no longer mine bitcoins. Instead, mining now requires special computer equipment that can handle the intense processing power needed to get bitcoin today. And, of course, these special computers need a lot of electricity to run.

The week Bitcoin farted

Last Wednesday Elon Musk announced his new position in a major U-turn on Wednesday, Tesla (TSLA.O) won't use or accept bitcoin until he can be sure it's produced sustainably. Tesla is also looking at other cryptocurrencies that use less than 1% of the energy burned by bitcoin, he added.

*Figure 1: Click here to see the Tweet

Prompting speculation among some experts about whether he had a plan to wean the crypto industry off the fossil fuels that power "mining," the energy-intensive process that creates coins.

Tesla could itself take an active role in helping make bitcoin greener by investing in new projects aimed at boosting the use of renewable energy in mining, according to more than a dozen cryptocurrency specialists interviewed by Reuters.

"Musk and Tesla certainly have the resources to support existing efforts to fully move bitcoin to renewable energy," said Diana Biggs, CEO of crypto startup Valour.

But such ventures could take years to get off the ground.

Another potential route is for Tesla to shift from bitcoin to more eco-friendly digital currencies that don't rely on mega-computers spawning new tokens, according to the experts.

As of April 2020, 75% of the mining of bitcoin is concentrated in China, whose economy is still heavily reliant on coal. The mining pool statistics are obtained from https://btc.com/stats.

Bitcoin’s price has risen almost 70% so far this year. As it goes up in price, the revenue to miners also increases, incentivizing more participants to mine the cryptocurrency.

Last month, a coal mine in the Xinjiang region flooded and shut down. This took nearly a quarter of bitcoin’s hash rate — or computing power — offline, according to crypto industry publication CoinDesk.

According to one source, a single bitcoin transaction uses the same amount of power that the average American household consumes in a month.

In March, China’s Inner Mongolia region said it would shut down cryptocurrency mining operations in the region due to concerns over energy consumption.

GREENER OPTIONS?

After his original tweet, Musk followed the next day with a chart showing bitcoin's power consumption. "Energy usage trend over past few months is insane," he wrote.

Yet environmentalists have criticized bitcoin's energy consumption and its reliance on fossil fuels for years, not months.

The bitcoin network is responsible for 55 million metric tons of CO2 annually. Bitcoin mining uses about the same amount of energy annually as Sweden, or Malaysia, or Egypt, data from the University of Cambridge shows. read more

*Figures 2 & 3: Click here to see the graphs from The Gardian & CIA

Annual energy consumption and ranking by countries a are obtained from cia.gov (www.cia.gov), carbon emission and ranking by countries b are collected from global carbonatlas (www.globalcarbonatlas.org).

Much of it is powered by coal, the dirtiest of all fossil fuels. Chinese miners accounted for about 70% of production, data from the university shows. Many use fossil fuels, switching to renewables like hydropower during the rainy summer months.

In theory, blockchain experts have said, it would be possible to track which bitcoins have been produced sustainably, also giving Tesla an option to only accept greener bitcoins.

Last month, Jack Dorsey’s fintech company, Square, and Cathie Wood’s Ark Invest put out a memo claiming that bitcoin will actually drive renewable energy innovation. However, critics said they had a vested interest in doing so.

Alexander said the debate around bitcoin’s environmental impact was misguided as most transactions with the digital asset aren’t happening on the blockchain.

“Almost all the trading is not done on the blockchain,” she said. “It’s done on secondary markets, centralized exchanges. They’re not even recorded on the blockchain.”

Cryptocurrencies that consume less energy, such as the seventh-largest coin XRP, may present other concerns, experts said.

Investors have worried about XRP since U.S. regulators charged blockchain firm Ripple, a major backer of the cryptocurrency, with a $1.3 billion unregistered securities offering last year. Ripple has denied the charges.

Some have also suggested changing bitcoin's protocol itself, to lower its power consumption. Yet getting all users in bitcoin's decentralized network of miners, run by no oversight body, to agree would be challenging, experts warned.

"The whole bitcoin mining ecosystem has invested billions of dollars in hardware," said Jack Liao, CEO of Chinese mining firm LightningAsic. "How can they change the protocol? Change means a loss of billions."

Here is a list of Bitcoin alternatives if you are curious, I don't know what to think of it personally so I let you have a look.

THE POWER OF ESG

Regardless of whether bitcoin is actually a polluter or not, the negative connotations around its energy consumption have worried investor’s consciousness of companies’ ethical and environmental responsibilities.

ESG, or environmental, social, and corporate governance, has become a growing trend in financial markets, with portfolio managers increasingly incorporating sustainable investments into their strategies.

Some Tesla shareholders may be worried that the company is betting big on bitcoin while also claiming to be a green energy company.

“Bitcoin backers will be wondering where this leaves the future of the cryptocurrency,” Laith Khalaf, a financial analyst at investment firm AJ Bell, said in a note Thursday.

“Environmental matters are an incredibly sensitive subject right now, and Tesla’s move might serve as a wake-up call to businesses and consumers using Bitcoin, who hadn’t hitherto considered its carbon footprint,” Khalaf added.

Bonus: 3 Myths about Bitcoin mining for your dinner conversation tonight

A digital currency economist breaks down why renewable energy doesn’t really make Bitcoin or Dogecoin sustainable:

"Even if, hypothetically speaking, this whole network was running on renewable energy. Still, it doesn’t solve the sustainability issues of bitcoin. Bitcoin uses excessive amounts of hardware. You have a bunch of specialized equipment that can only do bitcoin mining. The moment they become unprofitable, there’s nothing you can do with them. You can’t repurpose them, you can’t use them as a home computer. It’s trash. And they don’t last very long, on average maybe one and a half years. So you’ve got millions of devices that are becoming obsolete extremely fast. That just results in a big pile of electronic waste down the line. It’s already the case that a single bitcoin transaction is equivalent to throwing away an iPhone 12 mini in terms of materials, that’s already how bad it is." Alex de Vries, a digital currency economist who has consistently called out bitcoin’s growing greenhouse gas emissions. He runs the blog Digiconomist, which keeps a running tab on bitcoin’s estimated energy use and emissions.

Myth one: bitcoin mining is becoming more efficient

Bitcoin’s carbon emissions are not the network’s only dirty secret. In 2011, competing miners could win the bitcoin bingo with an average laptop. Today, viable operations require investing in warehouses filled with specialized hardware known as Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASIC). As the majority of mining costs come from energy to run these units, bitcoin miners are always careful to use the cheapest. To avoid wasting energy, the global arms race for bitcoin requires ASICs to be replaced with newer and more efficient models every year.

ASICs can’t be easily repurposed for general computing. Redundant units create around 11,500 tonnes of hazardous electronic waste each year, much of which is dumped on cities in the global south.

Myth two: bitcoin encourages investment in clean energy

Chinese hydroelectric power plants are popular spots for bitcoin mining. While China cracks down on the industry, 61% of bitcoin mining is powered by fossil fuels.

Cheap coal in Australia has found new buyers through bitcoin, as formerly redundant coal mines are reopened to power mining. Miners are willing to move anywhere for residual energy, increasing the profitability of natural gas in Siberia and supporting oil drilling in Texas.

Myth three: bitcoin replaces the need for gold mining

Gold mining is one of the world’s most destructive industries. Bitcoin was originally intended as a digital replacement for gold that was also a deflationary means of exchange, capable of rendering wasteful banks and regulators redundant.

But for many institutional investors, gold is being bought to hedge against bitcoin’s volatility. Tesla poured US$1.5 billion into bitcoin, but also declared an interest in gold. While bitcoin is currently experiencing all-time price highs, gold hit one of its own in 2020.

Sources and references here, here, here, and here.