Plastic Eaters and Turbo Trees E-Book

Tara Shirvani

• Herausgeber: edition a
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Seitenzahl: 182

Beschreibung

Trees that bind ten times more CO2 than those previously known or bacteria that simply eat up the plastic floating in the sea: Synthetic biology is one of the great opportunities to save the world. Tara Shirvani portrays this young scientific discipline that is fundamentally changing all of our lives in an exciting and easy-to-understand manner. It shows what benefits we can all derive from it now.

Leseprobe

PLASTIC EATERS AND TURBO TREES

Tara Shirvani

Plastic eaters and turbo trees

All rights reserved

© 2023 edition a, Wien

www.edition-a.at

Cover: Bastian Welzer

Typesetting: Anna-Mariya Rakhmankina

Set in Premiera

Printed in Europe

12345—26252423

ISBN: 978-3-99001-732-6

TARA SHIRVANI

PLASTIC EATERS AND TURBO TREES

How to Save the Climate, Remove all the Trash from the Sea, and Master the Rest with Brilliance

edition a

For Negin

Table of Content

Syn… what? What this book aims to do

The most widely used material in the world

When disposable fashion becomes haute couture

Turbo-trees and the solution to the CO2 problem

Plastic eaters and how we can clean up our oceans

Flying with a clear conscience and how Texas relates to that

The return of the mammoths and why no one needs to go hungry anymore

Why the first million will be the easiest to make

A green new world

Synthetic biology at home with you

Syn… what? What this book aims to do:

"Synthetic biology" is a relatively new term that may seem intimidating at first glance. But give it a chance and trust me, it's worth it! Are you still with me? Great, let's start with the most important point, namely that we can describe the development of humanity and the environment in six waves:

1. We hunt.

Environment okay.

2. We breed cattle.

Environment okay.

3. We produce goods.

Environment still okay

4. We develop plastics.

Environment no longer okay

5. We develop computers.

Environment not okay at all

6. We decode genetics.

Environment at a turning point

For the seventh wave, there are exactly two possibilities:

First option:

7a) We reduce CO2 emissions. Environment gets destroyed.

Second option:

7b) We cultivate bacteria. Environment okay again.

I can almost hear the outcry: the environment gets destroyed if we reduce CO2 emissions? Instead we should cultivate bacteria and develop genetically modified products? Seriously?! Are you kidding me?!

Let me briefly explain: when we talk about "trying to reduce CO2 emissions" and "environment getting destroyed," of course it doesn't mean that reducing CO2 emissions is bad. On the contrary, it’s the need of the hour. But if we continue with our basic ways of production, living, and feeding ourselves, it will be very difficult to preserve even parts of the environment. We develop electric cars, we recycle plastic bottles (although only 10% and a maximum of three times, leaving even more waste behind), we try everything possible, but – and if you're honest with yourself, you've had this feeling for a long time – it simply won't work out. Additionally, throughout history abstaining has never worked. Humans are selfish to some extent, and what argument can be used to deny all people on this planet the right to comfortable living, healthy food, or a refrigerator? Five billion people will surely say “we understand that you Americans and Europeans drive cars, live in fancy houses, and grab a beer from the fridge after the sauna. We would like that too, but yeah, we get it, we can't do it anymore because of the climate, so we'll just do without it!” Moreover, our population will continue to grow, reaching ten billion by 2070, and then it will likely start to decline again. So let's finally face the facts and say goodbye to this ostrich policy that is currently so popular.

In a nutshell: with all our conventional efforts to reduce CO2 emissions, we will not succeed in stopping climate change, halting the destruction of all – yes, all – ecosystems, preventing future pandemics, and avoiding devastating wars and refugee flows, ultimately leading to the extinction of our own species.

This should finally become clear to us. We will crash everything full throttle if we continue like this, regardless of expanding electric cars or reducing air travel. Why? Quite simply, all of our previous efforts only address the symptoms rather than the root cause of the whole dilemma.

So, is everything lost? Should those who are well off continue to party before everything goes down the drain, while it’s tough luck for everyone else?

Not necessarily.

Is there still a possibility to make this future – which looks anything but fun – slightly more beautiful, especially for our children?

Yes, there is.

There is hope as currently various technological developments are occurring and converging at the same time. The computing power of computers – driven by artificial intelligence – is growing faster than ever before, which is partly daunting but also very beneficial as it allows us to understand how everything on Earth is interconnected and structured at an increasingly rapid pace. Moreover, the costs and ease of understanding and altering biology – which focuses on breaking down, analyzing and reassembling the components of simple organisms like bacteria – have been dramatically reduced. As a result, we can now completely revolutionize the way in which we manufacture goods in the near future.

If we imagine the simplest form of an organism as a micro-factory that produces a certain product, then we can now modify this factory to produce ‘any’ product that we desire. This approach – where we dismantle and reassemble the components of the factory – is called "synthetic biology" or simply "synbio".

Now, let's briefly discuss the cause of the dilemma in which we find ourselves: we have a problem with CO2 in the atmosphere because we have burned so much oil and other fossil fuels. This is causing the Earth to become warmer, and there is increasingly less space for life. However, we are also growing in population, which means that we need more rather than less living space and – of course – more food.

Is it possible to address the root cause of the problem? Yes, it is. With the help of synthetic biology, we can replace industrial "dirty" factories and reactors with biological "clean" factories and reactors. The crucial point is that with newly assembled organisms, we no longer need combustion of fossil fuels. In other words, after 200 years of burning everything we could get our hands on, we will now be able to manufacture and produce goods at room temperature.

What about the CO2 already in the atmosphere? The plastic in the world's oceans? The melting polar caps? We can also tackle those challenges. We are developing other bacteria and enzymes that can remove waste and restore ecosystems. The industrial era of biology has arrived after the eras of fossil fuels and personal computers and digitalization.

At least if we want it to. It's up to us.

We can completely revolutionize the way in which we produce, eat, and live without having to sacrifice anything. Indeed, we can all do it, not just a select few. We can preserve our forests, seas, polar caps, animals, and plants and live in harmony with nature once again. We still have a chance to turn things around, but we must want it.

This book aims to show you how far synthetic biology has already advanced in some areas and will likely continue to progress in the near future. At the end of the book, several industries that are expected to experience the fastest and most drastic changes in their production processes are mentioned. If you already trust the right companies in these areas, you can simply sit back, wait and watch the value of such companies grow exponentially over time. In addition to interviews with leading experts in their field, each chapter concludes with a short personal anecdote. If you find these glimpses uninteresting, feel free to skip them.

I wish you an enjoyable reading experience!

Tara Shirvani