Zeus: From cloud-seeding to nuclear reactors - the new investor era of climate action

Our stalling over the past 30 years will soon leave us little choice.

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A record-breaking drought has caused parts of the Yangtze River to dry up — affecting hydropower and shipping routes, limiting drinking water supplies and even revealing previously submerged Buddhist statues. The Yangtze is China’s most important river, providing water to more than 400 million people. Images by the Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission show a comparison of the Yangtze and Jialing rivers, near Chongqing, over the past three years. 

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(David Callaway is founder and Editor-in-Chief of Callaway Climate Insights. He is the former president of the World Editors Forum, Editor-in-Chief of USA Today and MarketWatch, and CEO of TheStreet Inc.)

SAN FRANCISCO (Callaway Climate Insights) — I had lunch this week with a German entrepreneur in town raising money for a laser fusion company, which is seeking to create an entirely new — and safe — source of renewable energy through nuclear fusion, not the controversial fission used by our nuclear reactors now.

As with all new scientific endeavors, Moritz von der Linden admitted the process will take billions of dollars of investment and years to build out, and that’s only if his team can prove it works. A huge risk for investors, of course. More on Von Der Linden’s company, Marvel Fusion, to come in later columns as it progresses. But I mention him today because I was struck by his assertion that only dramatic new scientific and financial efforts can help us stop the climate catastrophe we’ve already set in motion.