Welcome back. Well, guess what? Today is Earth Day and
to market.
We are taking a look throughout the show at everything
from renewable energy to what you can do in your
community.
We're going to kick off our coverage this morning by
taking a deep dive into ocean exploration.
The ocean makes up about
71% of the Earth's surface.
Despite its size and it's important to life on Earth,
the majority of what goes on beneath the surface is
still largely unknown.
Organizations like the Schmidt Ocean Institute are working to improve
our understanding
using new technology to go where no human is gone
before.
Let's bring in the Schmidt Ocean Institute Co founder Wendy
Schmidt for more on this.
Wendy, good morning. Thank you for joining us here.
Morning. Happy Earth Day. Happy Earth Day to you as
well.
Great to spend it with you.
So we want to talk part about what your organization
does,
which is really cool. So you actually have this research
ship,
it's called the Falkor 2.
It is free. As my understanding scientists can say.
I want to come on board.
I want to do research here.
Tell us about this, about this kind of program that
you've created and what type of discoveries have been made
on this ship.
When we started doing this about
in 2013, we launched our first ship.
The problem is that there isn't a lot of ship
time for scientists who want to do this kind of
research.
That's the gating item. So my husband and I thought,
let's make the ship time available as much as possible
for scientists all over the world.
We've had more than 1100 of them so far.
And in exchange for this free time on our laboratories,
our robotic vehicles, our high speed computing,
all those tools, they share their information in real time
with other scientists because the oceans are under attack.
As you know, it's a critical time to accelerate our
understanding of the ocean for all the reasons that we're
here today to celebrate Earth Day.
So with that in mind,
what kind of voyages do you see in the future
for Falkor 2?
Well, we're going to be in all of the ocean
basins.
We were in five countries this past year.
Since 2023, we did 9 expeditions.
Some of the upcoming ones are fascinating.
We're going to Antarctica. We're going to look at the
interface between the the ice and the movement caused by
climate change and the systems underneath that water.
It's never been mapped before.
We have been in an age of discovery for this
last year.
I have to say, I used to think the age
of discovery was the 15th,
16th, 17th centuries when people were finding mountain ranges and
oceans and rivers and all those features.
They even found China. I think they found out where
it was.
But now we're in a new age altogether.
It's like seeing the Earth from space back in
1969. Now we're looking at the ocean in real time
with our all of our senses using our robots,
and we're discovering life on Earth again.
And tell us the connection that I know you say
is so important between what's going on in our oceans,
what's going on in our seas and land.
What does that connection? What does it mean for climate
change?
What we're really looking at here is a question of
resilience.
Resilience in the ocean and a system that's been evolving
for 4 billion years and resilience on land,
resilience in our soil. Everything we do on land affects
the ocean.
And we depend on the ocean for every other breath
we take,
for all of our primary protein.
And there's so much to discover there that could be
of use to humans for medicine in the next pandemic.
Heaven knows our exploration will help us protect the ocean
and create the resilience that it's meant to have.
Our impact is affecting that now,
and that's what has to change.
So if you compost at home and you look at
the packaging you buy and you really question how much
of that plastic should be in your life,
it's going to end up in the ocean.
40% of the of the debris in the ocean is
plastic packaging.
Make some little changes, right?
We can reduce our emissions by going solar if we
can,
right? Use your local produce,
your local farmers markets, right?
Support local resilience. Cause soil health is ocean health.
That's how to think about it in just a few
seconds.
What's your message to people who feel like climate change
is such a big problem right now?
They're overwhelmed by it. We're all overwhelmed by it,
but I think individual actions will add up together.
And those things I just mentioned leading to resilience,
if that's the thing you're really thinking about,
you will help the ocean because all of us really
want to be part of the solution,
not part of the problem.
And really good tips that anybody can kind of grab
onto farmers market,
reducing plastic, things like that.
Wendy Schmidt, thank you so much.
Happy Earth Day, we appreciate your time this morning.
It's really incredible the work you're doing.
Thank you.