Fully Charged Live – Robert Llewellyn & Dan Ceasar

David Hunt 0:32
Hello, I’m David Hunt, CEO and founder of Hyperion executive search and your host for the leading Queensland podcast. Last with caution and compliance being followed live events are back. I shall soon be speaking in Berlin at ecosummit. But before that, I’ll be in Farnborough in the UK at the awesome fully charged live outdoor events. I expect many of you are familiar with the AW things clean mobility and energy YouTube channel fully charged. If not, you should be because we’re amazing content to check out 10 years worth in fact, as well as having over 100,000 subscribers and 2 million monthly views. The fully charged team have also been running fantastic events in the UK, and Austin, Texas. And then COVID unfortunate traps that flow. Now they’re back starting in the UK in September. With more events to follow. I speak to fully charged founder and host Robert Llewellyn TV actor and presents from Red Dwarf cult hero. And also the presenter of scrappy challenge which many of you will be familiar with. My good friend Dan Cesar, who’s now the CEO, and actually recently a presenter on fully charged to look at what we can expect at this event. And I say looking forward to other international events that are up and coming. We’ll share a bit of that information as well. I hope you enjoyed the episode. Hey, Gwen is great to have you with us. Robert Dan from pretty charged. Thank you very much for inviting us over and last weekend. It’s good, I can’t tell you I’m absolutely beside myself that I’m actually going to within the next couple of weeks be talking and attending events, one of which of course, is fully charged, live outdoors in farmer in the UK. And really kids hear a lot more about about what’s going on there what people can expect. And when the first two are amazing. And I’m sure there’s even more going on this year so we can get to hear about that. But before we do i mean our audience is probably crossover to a smaller extent, Robert, but you started the fully charged channel back in 2010. Yeah. Thinking back then a couple of things really one of which did you foresee? Or how surprised are you how far both technology has come? In that time since you started? Those first episodes with? Probably you’re in a phone? Yeah. In terms of how technology is evolved? We’ll start with that one. So you know, Did you really think you’ll get to a point where there was easy mass adoption going on?

Robert Llewelyn 2:56
No, I think I can be honest, I mean, I thought some I could sense. And also for the previous probably four or five years, I could sense something big was brewing. So I mean to put just a very quick bit of backstory, I worked spent a lot of time in California in the early noughties making British TV series scrapheap challenge, the American variant of that junk yard was so I spent a lot of time in California with engineers and I never when I was doing that, that it meant nothing to me. It’s on reflection, I can look back and go, Oh, because that I met all these people that were working on battery management systems, you know, big battery packs, electric drive trains, you know, energy energy management systems in software. You know, when people said that, I’m working on battery management systems for software. What I don’t know what you’re talking about doesn’t mean anything. And it’s on reflection, I can see that there was some seeds were planted then. Then then sort of took version later. But it was really the understanding of which happened later on. Like in the mid naughties. I met two amazing people from the California Air Resource Board, or estimates public Air Resources Board. Anyway, amazing young people, both scientists who explained the the long term impacts of burning fossil fuel, but I mean, they were very much focused on Los Angeles. That was a key area at that time. So we’re talking about Los Angeles in the 80s. And 90s was one of the most polluted cities and on the planet, which is really weird. Think back next now we think of it most polluted city, it’s gonna be in China. You know, this was Los Angeles, modern city, but two and a half million cars on a massive network of highways, that at peak times, you know, catastrophic traffic congestion, a stupid transport system, basically the private car, you know, and that’s what and that was that what they were doing was trying to mitigate that impact on particularly on children and all people so they were amazing studies. Have a school that was next to a big highway, the IQ levels the health of those children in primary schools, this is young children and a school up in that Hollywood Hills for very rich people. And it was appalling the difference, you know, the kids in school near the highways were really suffering really high levels of asthma, lots and lots of associated illnesses. And the kids in fresher air were not affected by you know, all that stuff, which is now you know, punch in the face obvious. But at the time, it was going really well. If I drive my really cool muscle car, it has an impact on other people. Because I was driving a really cool muscle car, I was given a loan under a Ford Mustang, it was really cool. It made a really cool sound. And it did about eight to 10 miles to the gallon. And it was kind of it was that there was a slow, I wish I could claim an overnight, or realisation It took years, you know that I went, Oh, God, maybe this isn’t good, eventually. So out of that whole process, you know, I came back to the UK, sold my ridiculous performance golf, are 32 and bought a Prius, you know, and that was really the start of that kind of transition. That was sort of the mid noughties and, you know that and then understanding why Toyota had made the Prius which was absolutely down to California legislation, which we don’t need to go into now. But that, you know, there was a definite political move, and a very popular political mood it was, you know, it was people were elected. We’re on the, you know, the premise of them reducing pollution and air pollution in cities in California. So that was where it sort of came from. And it was it was, I think I got numerous little switches, one of which, you know, I think it’s only fair to acknowledge them was Top Gear, was the Top Gear did a particular show in I think 2009, where they reviewed the Tesla Roadster, which by then I driven. And it’s so interesting because these things come back again, again, the hydrogen fuel cell, Honda clarity, which the two cars they tested. And they said in this show, obviously, the future is going to be hydrogen, because that’s much easier to use. You just fill it like a petrol car. And as all this nonsense with batteries, you’re gonna have to throw them away, because that was our experience of batteries. Then you have a rubbish Sanyo laptop in 2009. What happens the battery false debates or, you know, it wears out. So our experience of batteries was relatively negative, and very easy, simplistic piece of

populist analysis, which, of course, after a wonderful hero, Mr. J. Clark’s and local farmer to me, you know, it can jump at any opportunity. And I just think that is, so the surprise for me then is say 2010. Clearly, everyone who watched the BBC agreed with him. Hydrogen was the future and battery costs are just a silly joke. Which is sort of what, what kind of galvanised me to, to possibly contradict that. And then if you come back to 2021, you know, there are now three potential nodes actually only to potentially highly expensive and impossible to fuel hydrogen fuel cell cars on the market. And what at battery electric cars with a massive electric charging network, which is expanding at unbelievable rates, and the adoption of electric cars is, you know, as we’ve seen, and I mean, all the manufacturers or whatever, that’s going up really, really fast. And diesel and petrol sales are falling, you know, so I don’t think I could have seen it. I couldn’t, I can’t see the future. Unlike lots of people who comment. They tell me, they’ve been there, they’ve been to the future, they can see what’s happening. That’s all hydrogen.

David Hunt 8:40
Don’t you just love Twitter. And he responds. Now, listen, when I started in clean tech back in 2007, is very much focused on solar. And Dan clearly has been around the renewables block, where we first came to meet, talking about renewables way back when and I know, I did see, I’d like to say, you know, that soldier would absolutely be phenomenally disruptive. And, you know, again, it’s something which people have predicted against and time and time again, as as prove people wrong. But I didn’t really see the battery thing for many years, none, obviously. And subsequently, obviously, electric vehicles only work on the premise of the battery. So all this has really changed. And I think there’s a contrast the, you know, technology since that time, 2010 to now is just phenomenally in terms of cost, performance, energy density, all this stuff has gone astronomical growth, exponential growth. However, if we start quickly to look at policy support, and the recent IPC c report, you know, it was it wasn’t surprising. It’s still shocking to those of us who lived this stuff day in and day out. I think that’s really one of the challenges when I don’t know how you responded how you guys feel no, given that we don’t dedicate so much of our time to try to solve this problem, the best way we can in our own little way. Yeah. And then you get faced with these headlines of, you know, code read, and it’s like, yeah,

Robert Llewelyn 9:57
I mean, that’s, I wanted Dan to respond to that. Well, but I mean, it is, you know, the It’s been one of my anger sort of low level anxieties about fully charged is that, you know, you’re we’re focused on the the large, substantial Boulder. That is the electric car market and the technology within that, you know, again, look at this amazing these things are happening on this huge boulder that huge boulders rolled off a mountain the size of the Himalayas, which is the challenge ahead of us, you know, in terms of, of weaning ourselves off fossil fuel? Because I mean, essentially, what however we do that that is our, the job of the next two generations is how do we stop burning these fuels to do all the things we need to do, and I’m sure, in 100 years time, we still will be burning some fossil fuels. But without any hesitation, it’s really painfully obvious, it will be a fraction of what we do today, you know, that we are developing technologies that are cheaper, cleaner, longer lasting, more sustainable, easier to recycle, but the list goes on and on. And they are going to be an economic draw. And I think that is the real critical thing that is becoming more obvious is that it’s the the draw, it’s a draw rather than a push. It’s that there are people that want to change and that want to use different technologies that is a push up from the bottom that is a effectively a draw down from the top. We’re going give us an electric car. No no have the diesel one. No, I don’t want the diesel one. I want the electric What about the plug in hybrid? No, I don’t want that. I want the electron we hear this constantly this battle with with and so that eventually those people at the top who are telling us diesels clean use a plug in hybrid, or the con jobs of self charging hybrids, you know, really offensive nonsense. They’re not succeeding. And that’s what I sort of pray and I push for them not succeeding. But I think that the that it has become such a topic now that people are aware of it. And there is a an interesting thing I heard yesterday, which was when when you meet people, you know socially now they go oh god, I’m sorry. I had it last night. feel so bad came in a diesel? You know, and you go on? Yeah, right. Don’t worry about it. Well, next car will be electric, you know, people are aware of it people, even people who five years ago would have totally poo pooed any alternative and so it just doesn’t work. It’s never gonna work.

David Hunt 12:22
Oh, you stroke 10 a day now? Yeah,

Robert Llewelyn 12:23
I’ve cut right down. I only smoke filters. Because I mean, as an ex smoker, I absolutely get that. You know, that is a. And I think that that is the other flip side I’m trying to keep in check myself is that there was a period of about five years as an ex smoker where I would walk past people smoking in the street and think it was utterly disgusting. The smell was you know, and I even if I wouldn’t say anything, but I’d be disgusting. How could they do that? After I’d been doing it for 25 years, quite heavily. And I’m just worried I don’t want to do that with people who still drive diesels. You know, they didn’t make the diesel. It wasn’t their idea. They don’t support the the decisions of the fossil industry, you know,

David Hunt 13:04
it can be fairly tribal things I’m going to move on to bring down into falls asleep. But he says jokingly, but interestingly, I know that you recently you’ve done the the Holmes series on fully charged technology which which you know, rated the home rather than the vehicle, which is, which is really great. And I know that that’s you know, where your sort of history lies in terms of heating in particular, which is one of those big, unaddressed areas that really is, is a challenge that needs to be addressed and addressed quickly. And yeah. So again, you and I have known each other for some time, we’ve been battling as best as we can, how have you found the last few weeks of looking at the you know, what’s gone on in the world, which is just catastrophic. And it’s that yin and yang of the surge, good stuff going on, you want to be really optimistic, because there’s so much good stuff going on. And we got to leave on to the to the event where there’s so much good stuff to be seen. But it has been an interesting few weeks.

Dan Ceasar 14:03
I think so and I think, obviously the IPCC report was Monday just got just gone. And it was really interesting to look at that. And actually, that had quite an impact on on me seeing that written down in black and white. But more than no more so than actually seeing a lot of these crises that extreme weather events kind of unfold. But, you know, occasionally even I can be kind of, oh, how can we how can we science our way out of this? And I absolutely think we’re very fortunate we get the ringside seat on all these different technologies. And to me, it’s clear that technically we can science our way out of these problems. In fact, we know we could probably write it down on a on a fact packet to continue the analogy that we could we could write down what we should be deploying right now. It’s just I don’t think the government or governments around the world necessarily understand that And I think one of the things that we crossed paths many times over the years was I set up an energy storage Alliance about five or six years ago. If you think about what the lithium ion battery has done, particularly in the last 567 years in terms of decreasing cost and increase in density, how can politicians who are not in the sector keep up with that? And journalist By the way, how can how can they and actually, they’re obviously clearly not listening, sadly, to leaders in clean tech podcast or, or watching enough, fully charged, and you know, that wish to bash the UK government? In particular, all governments, I think, have their blind spots on this. You know, in UK Government, we I think the transport minister has an electric car, but none of the others do. Yeah, yeah. And you’ll know, for a while until you’ve driven one, variants, one, live with one for a little bit, you don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m afraid that is either to be brutal. So it’ll be nice. If you have them. Let’s get a few of them in electric cars, as I’m saying, you know, it’s possible because I think that might start to shift the narrative, but they are surrounded tepid, typically by establishment companies, establishment lobbyists. And that’s obviously difficult. So we would say, look, you know, wind, solar and batteries all the way they might be going, Yeah, well, some of that, but also hydrogen and CCS, and we’d be going,

David Hunt 16:19
well, that hasn’t come from clean, let’s get as much

Dan Ceasar 16:24
as possible. And, you know, talk to us to anyone who’s pre listened to this who’s in your hands, it’s, it’s, it’s fairly obvious, but to politicians still, I think they are out of date. And, and things will continue to change. And in fact, change will continue to accelerate. That’s the problem, isn’t it? With all of this stuff, you know, I mean, solid state hasn’t happened just yet. But you know, battery advancements are coming, right, you know, and lithium ion is just improving and charge times and everything is, is getting quicker and quicker and quicker. So, at the moment, I think it is if politicians are career politicians, and they just hop from post to post, I think that’s problematic in energy and transport, because I think it’s such a fast moving, especially specialised area, so I’d love it if Robert was in charge, or you’re in charge David are over in charge

David Hunt 17:18
of such a great place, he wouldn’t be.

Robert Llewelyn 17:20
You wouldn’t love it. If I was in charge, it’d be a mess. I’d be coming out of number 10. What did I say it was going to do? is going to invade some I forgot. Sorry.

David Hunt 17:31
Where’s the cat? We’re gonna try and segue back to something you said. Robert, and then obviously talk a little bit about the events in Farnborough because I think what’s really interesting now and what’s been good if you can’t say anything has been good from the catastrophic events that have happened and the IPCC report is that even more so people are waking up and that bottom down drive that says no, actually, we’re not going to put up with clean coal, we’re not going to put up with our let’s just transition to a slightly cleaner diesel engine. It’s a case of No. and No, as much as we can operate politicians, and we do and many of them deserve it. They do have challenges because yeah, things aren’t moving quick, and it’s difficult to keep up. They do have lobbyists than there is and it’s difficult not to listen to pay your bills. But equally, you know, they they’re driven by votes. And if, you know, not just young people old oldies like us, as well, they’re all getting on board. And I think that’s my optimism is such that hopefully, because of what’s happened recently, people will stop and there’ll be enough swelling. And that’s my dodgy segue into the fully charged live events. Because the first one we planned for you guys plan that turned up and we were expecting another that you can share with me, but it was just phenomenal. There was just such an up swelling of people. And it was like literally got asked that we were shoulder to shoulder. I think that shows, you know, not just testament to the channel. But to give you know, the episode that’s going on

Robert Llewelyn 18:52
to the presence of the subject. Yes, the topic in a way is, is what drove that crowd. I mean, that was and I’ve got to give Dan his due because he did have to push me. I mean, I was very sceptical. I was gonna, no one’s gonna come to, you know, particularly Silverstone. I mean, cuz I grew up quite near that I knew what a pain analysis was to get there. It’s not it’s not exactly on, you know, easy to use public transport network. It’s a very car oriented place. But actually, it did work. And I have to, you know, acknowledge that to Dan, he did an incredible job. And that first day, you know, that was a very strong memory. The first day, the first day we let everyone in. I was just, I was frightened. I just thought this is terrifying. There’s so many people that are queued up outside and we’re all so happy and we’re all cheering and I’m just like, this is insane. And we more than doubled that size the second year. And I guess I don’t know what, where we are now down but we’re certainly bigger than we this one will be the biggest we’ve done yet. And you know, it is quite a challenging prospect from just personally, you know, on a purely personal level, because it’s such a big event. It’s such a responsibility to have as well to make it work to make people have a good time when you’re there is a, you know, it’s an incredible job and an incredible team that Dan’s put together that puts out because I have very little input into the often the day to day organising of it, which is a really good thing at benefits the audience experience without any question.

David Hunt 20:17
Before we go into the farmer again, cuz obviously you I was I spoke at the event in Austin, Texas, again, that was one of the things when you’re in, you know, Texas, big Republic, Republican and the fossil fuel heartlands. And again, there was a massive episode of attendance there, you know, even in what, Austin’s a little bit different, but we’re just about to say, but it’s still, you know, Texas. And as much as I did end up in an F 151. point I tried to avoid a deal would also end up in the rivian, which was nice. So just to the point that there’s that much upswell. And yeah, clearly now you’ve moved too far and reframe from from Silverstone, home of the ash. There’ll be some, some fuel cell phones and biofuel aircraft to be seen. But what’s the kind of just for this year? Dan, what have you put together? Well, how is it going to differ? I’m going back to the point of what people can see, touch and feel and hear, of course, what’s, what are the key exciting things for the show coming up?

Dan Ceasar 21:16
Well, it will be bigger, quite a lot bigger. And I guess we have to be really grateful to the fact that we’re in a growth sector, because you know, right now, growth isn’t ubiquitous. So we’re very, very fortunate in that respect. It’s been interesting, because of vaccines and such, like, probably four months ago, confidence of whether it would take place was kind of a kind of a 70 80%. And not not definite, but obviously, as people got double jab, the increased confidence went up. And we’ve always said, This show will be outside. So when we got to farm refers that we looked at them when all look at that lovely exhibition hall, it’s beautiful. 12,000 metres, no pillars brand new, you know, ooh, isn’t that amazing. And ironically, we are pretty much not using that there’ll be a couple of doors, but largely the show is is outdoors. But as you say, they have the edge there. So there’s quite a lot of outdoor space. And we think that’s the right move for this year’s show. So we’ve got a tonne of space to display things, I think some of the key highlights are things like test drives. Typically when people get an electric car and try it then normally not far away from from buying one as a result. So we’ll let the technology speak for itself. An exhibition I think of getting over like 200 participants, so again, quite a bit quite a bit bigger. And then my favourite bit is the live talks, you know, so there’s, I think there’s 50 live sessions over the three days different every day is different. And I’ll have people like Robert, jack Scarlet muddy mode, Helen chesky, he made a couple of heating ones, talking to experts on on stages. And for me, as someone who had been passionate about energy for a long time, when we did Silverstone 2019, we did a session, Rob did a session on batteries. And that we could get about 1000 people into that room at a push. And I remember looking around that every seat was full, it was standing room only all around the sides of that room. And I was thinking yeah, you know, batteries are the new rock and roll. And I was very proud because you know, been talking about it for a long, long time. And it really the live sessions are just something else, you come away with so much knowledge. And then you can go around and have some fun and talk to all the energy companies that the clean technology companies that bite companies boards, you know, scooters as the commercial vehicles own there as well. So yeah, it really is. I mean, as an energy geek, it’s kind of a great shame. We don’t really get to walk around

David Hunt 23:47
with you know, those really super self charging hybrids. There are no technology. No, it’s fantastic technology. Yeah. You don’t have to plug it in.

Dan Ceasar 24:01
Well, I mean, I mean, our audience are really, you know, our audience are really very sad. And actually, if you get one of those alone, there probably would be pitchforks and riots, I think, you know, they really, really gravitate towards puri V’s in particular.

Robert Llewelyn 24:16
But it would be quite good fun to have an old Prius on a stand with a huge thing saying self charging hybrid just just for the

Dan Ceasar 24:26
Burning Man conference. I’ll tell the team Shall I, Robert? Yeah.

I’m not as involved in it as before I write the programme of content, but we have a team that that that does it. And it’s actually it’s kind of it’s too big for us. Now. That’s that is a testament to where that shows. Got to and now we can’t wait because you mentioned Twitter and YouTube earlier. I mean, I’ve had some brilliant conversations and made some brilliant friendships with people I’ve never met on Twitter. Yes, but equally it can be At times it can be slightly conflict ridden area, and YouTube comments. Similarly, people only really come along to kind of have a bit of a bit of a moan or or you misspelt this or so getting feedback from real humans. is it’s been so overdue, isn’t it? You know. So that’s probably something we were really looking looking forward to. But there’s loads there in terms of new cars, converted cars, I mean, anything that’s electrified, all the clean technologies there as well. So if you want to buy a heat pump, or if you want to, you know, look at, I don’t know, a thermal battery, all that kind of stuff is there as well. So, really exciting. And then probably for your audience, it’s worth saying that we do actually have a business day on that on the Friday as well. Right? And we’ve got Michael Liebreich, who I’m sure you know, well, I’m sure your audience knows well, as a keynote for that. We’ve also got a rival, the battery based electric, van and bus company, they’re they’re keynoting as well for that. So on the Friday, there’s a there’s a business day, too. And in a way, what do we do the business day? Well, we do the business day, because we quite like business leaders walking around the consumer show and going out on my boss. Because going on yeah, this is a bit more advanced than we then we realised, yeah. And then they go back into their office and say, maybe we should accelerate our fleet to EBS, or whatever, you know, whatever the kind of thing is, so yeah, for us, we absolutely cannot cannot wait for the third, fourth and fifth of September. And I’m also quite excited about the sixth

David Hunt 26:37
sleep in another day. In my diary, what happens on the sixth day? It’s been so it’s been so long overdue. Yeah, during this hour? Well, I think what’s really critical, and we’ve talked about this before, is we live in a bit of a clean tech bubble most of our audiences do. And it’s all we discussed and see and feel and touch or very day. And I brought home to me about a year ago now. And it’s just like long, because it’s natural event pre COVID. But I was invited to speak at an event, which was not anything to clean technology, but transportation as a broad thing, just transport. And I was lit I was absolutely gobsmacked at just how nobody in the audience knew anything about electrification of transport at all, apart from a few people who might have seen a Prius, or you know, more than two miles in leaving.

Robert Llewelyn 27:32
Just to understand what these people were, who worked in what we would broadly describe as the transport industry. You know, it was

David Hunt 27:38
just general logistics, knows logistics and transport people, you know, and they were talking about, do we do invest in hydrogen trucks? Do we invest in the latest diesel trucks kind of thing? And I’m saying no. batteries, please. But going back to the point, and we will live in this little bubble, I think what’s really, really critical and you’ve touched on, it’s not just for consumers, but going back to the business leaders and fleet leaders is to see and touch and feel this stuff. And to realise actually, it is nicer, cleaner, cheaper, better to run all those kind of things that we know, we all know, because we didn’t read it every day. And that’s what I found is for the event, there are so many young people there. Obviously, it’s very much a family orientated event. Yeah, certainly on the weekend. And you’re just exposing young people and old to stuff they just aren’t aware of. So it’s not for me. It’s nice for us geeks to go and meet each other and stab each other on the back and give each other a bit of a rah rah because we will need that from time to time. But it’s those people who are not engaged that come engaged because of events like this.

Dan Ceasar 28:35
I think something’s changed in the last year and a half two years in that before actually we all the promotion we did for all four fully charged live one and two was all through the channel. And through our Twitter feed celebrities broadly all through fully charged and we didn’t really spend a penny anywhere else. We might have given Mark Zuckerberg like 500 quid or something. But I’m not sure he needs it. He noted Yeah. So we did it all through the channel. And the reason for that was obviously we have this you know, we have this audience but actually this year, we’ve slightly changed tack obviously we’re promoting it through the channel. But for the first time as you all know, most people you speak to again, I’m sorry I came in that diesel my next car might be electric and more much more open minded to it. So it’s time for example, we were actually doing some sort of local radio advertising and we’re doing got some other other things planned. So it’ll be interesting to see how that changes the blend of people that attend you know, something might not even heard of the mighty Robert Llewellyn. They might want not clearly Who is this guy?

Robert Llewelyn 29:37
That’s plenty. There’s plenty of highly intelligent people. I’ve got a clue. Right?

Dan Ceasar 29:44
So that’ll be interesting because then you’ll get you’ll get some fully charged people come into the stand and probably know more about charging them some of the car companies Yeah, yeah. Get some other people understand you won’t know a thing. So that will be fascinating to watch. But yeah, I think the genius of what Robert As done with a channel is created something that pulls consumers through because David and I must have been together to about 7 million industry. Yes, every industry talks to itself gives itself a pat on the back reassures itself that it’s going in the right direction. But the trick has always been how do we get consumers engaged in this the combination of the electric car being the aspirational, emotive product for the ears, and then channels like fully charged, and there’s lots of other great YouTube channels out there, of course, as well, that’s what the podcast has really started to create some sort of consumer poll. And so yeah, we really cannot wait, I can’t wait to, to talk to all of our old friends on their on their electric car, and they’ve got zappy. And they’ve got solar panels, and they’re just working out what to do next. But wouldn’t it be nice if we can convert a few more people from an established start?

David Hunt 30:49
Those are the people I love. When I start them plug in, you plug in and you or you get people to drive past and see when you drive plugged in, and there’s like stats and conversations and people are getting nervous. That’s the kind of fun stuff because first of all, I have to stop myself for just launching into 15 years,

Robert Llewelyn 31:08
let’s get a basic understanding of the kilowatt hour. That’s what that’s for me, walking across this supermarket chasing a poor man who’s stupid. You got to be you’ve got to do it in small doses. I mean, I think the the big picture challenge for the human race, you know, which is what you kind of started all this out. And David is, is, you know, it’s so important now that, and I think this is a shift that we’ve made on the show, and it wasn’t that conscious. But because it’s become such a colossally important topic we’ve I didn’t ever mention climate change, or the climate, in fully charged for the first probably eight years, it just wasn’t a topic that I ever referred to. I definitely talked about local area, air pollution, children breathing in toxic fumes out plenty of stuff about what comes out of the tailpipe of car and how negative that is, but not the climate. And we have started mentioning it. And when you do you immediately get the kick back from the sort of, I don’t know what to call them. People who don’t think science is real. I can’t say I think it’s all a plot or whatever. I’m not just not interested in them. But the fact is that we’ve kind of had to talk about the it’s not even the elephant is the elephant herd in the room. You know, it’s such a big topic. And then you look at the sort of the combination of excitement and dread that is connected with that, you know, that we have no choice, we have to make these changes on a colossal scale around the world. And I’m in fact, I’ve just been listening to Michael Liebreich podcast about that, about the hydrogen debates and how hydrogen comes back and back and back. And how it does, you know, it does have an important role. It’s not like we’re not going to use hydrogen fantastic. Technology is connected with it. But then it’s it is this, you know, the confusions that you can so if you’re a clever lobbyist, to delay change, and there’s no question that that that hydrogen is on very unfairly, it’s not fair on the technology, but hydrogen has been used to delay change. So how can we get people to buy diesel for another 10 years? Tell them that hydrogen is the future? And then they start worrying about it? And they don’t you know? That that’s a very difficult topic to discuss with someone in the carpark when you’ve plugged your car in. And they want to know what how much range it’s got. Well, let me tell you about the hydrogen economy myth

David Hunt 33:37
combined sums beautifully touching to start already about the the talks because again, I’m privileged, I’ve been talking, I think, on the Saturday and have done in the past, but you’ve got some proper experts if you’d like, you know, go back to the science you what scientists had into their skin. And you’ve got some great presenters like Maddie, Maddie mote, who’s BAFTA winning, present, all that kind of stuff. So there’s some really interesting stuff. And I think that’s what, again, I was trying to perhaps get across is the worst electric vehicles are, as we said before, sort of kind of a great gateway drug for to get people into our conversation. Great to hear of any cars you’ve got there, because that is a topic but also like to perhaps maybe just in closing, look at some of the other areas of either technologies and or talks that you’ve got, because, again, we have both audiences who are in other aspects of, of clean technology. And it’s not all about vehicles, either as a topic, but also of course, fully charged to bear in mind the the heating, or the house episodes that you’ve been doing recently. So firstly, I guess how many cars can people go and see and test drive? Because there are lots of people that are motivated by that, but what about some of the other topic areas where people can come and learn and listen and find out more about?

Dan Ceasar 34:42
So I think we’ve got about, we’re running a few 1000 test drives. So I think we’ve got something like a hundreds electric cars out on test drive I think we’ve got including classics and conversions and other electric vehicles, probably until about things four wheels, we’ve got lots of things materials as well, probably 150 different things I would say, electric vehicles from I think a 1906 electric vehicle right out to some stuff that is more more sort of concept driven, normal cars. And then also some there was an episode where Robert got in a skid steer loader and it was episode with Robert on a tractor, we tried to incorporate all the things you might have seen on the channel, as well. So we will have a rival there. We’ll have volta trucks there. So there’s, there’s a fantastic group of things to see. But as you rightly say, you know, it’s it’s, it’s all about energy and transport. And so we’ve got Yes, I think some really interesting sessions, you know, obviously, when we write them, we write them kind of to maybe pique people’s interest. But one of the first ones we’ve got is, you know, that great debate how far ahead is Tesla and can it be caught? which is always a always an interesting, one sec, one over open conversations. We’ve got things like, you know, how can we get, you know, governments more involved other car companies going fast enough, but then also, yeah, loads of things about heating, home technology, jack Scarlett’s gonna bring his you know, sort of automotive knowledge to bear and I’m really wishing I had in front of me the list of all the different sessions. We’ll just talk to Robert for a second, I

David Hunt 36:22
will post them of course, on the episode page, we’ll post links to see exactly what’s happening and hopefully buy tickets and be great to see obviously, some of my widgets there as well, as I’m sure some will suddenly be rocking up. But yeah, it’s a super exciting event. And just again, get out to me but I do remember seeing a number of episodes when we went deep in lockdown of how many different ways can you do things in your back garden?

Robert Llewelyn 36:42
The garden studio was was in great demand. Yeah, I mean, the other one that I just think is which I know we’re doing we’re covering is sort of the material thing because that’s a great topic of, you know, where the materials come from, how do we have enough all those all those questions, because that’s the thing I hear constantly. And you just think it’s just a brilliant that’s kind of perfect example of Fudd if you’re spreading fear, uncertainty and doubt you don’t need any facts, you just you don’t even even need a sentence you just go batteries. That’s all you need to say. Oh, oh mining. Like we’re not mining stuff to build a diesel car. No, that just comes out.

David Hunt 37:22
Very very nice conversation now let’s not go into that. Yes.

Dan Ceasar 37:30
Well to that To that end, we’ve got you know, things which which really kind of look at at batteries and where the materials are gonna, gonna come from, you know, the ethical nature of those things. We talk about funds, which is you know, fear uncertainty and doubt and how to fight we’ve even got a session called kids can change the world, which is talking to youngsters as well. We’ve got no frankly, you know, we’re obviously labelled very much as a car channel often but obviously we you often hear us say Actually, there should be fewer cars, lighter cars, more shared cars. And we so we talked about walking and cycling and electric bikes and public transport and those things as well because if stop burning stuff and decarbonisation is the heart of the channel, then it’s about looking at that looking at all of that. And, you know, saying to people, you know, you might have two cars do you do you really need that is always changing over time. So, I mean, in terms of in terms of sessions, we also talk about electric flight. Now, which is a really exciting topic, but also things like food miles disruptors, vehicle to grid, you know, the the kind of list goes goes on the science behind the energy transition, I think we got Helen to host that one. And not Robert, I think,

Robert Llewelyn 38:41
I can’t understand why I’m sure. I’m very pleased.

David Hunt 38:46
Maybe a scientist. Yeah. But actually,

Robert Llewelyn 38:48
just very briefly, I mean, all the things like 10 years ago, when I started fully charged, you know, I could I could fantasise and imagine that possibly, some levels of shipping could be electrified, that all road transport could be. It never even occurred to me. I didn’t even think, oh, what about aeroplanes? Oh, no, that won’t work. I didn’t even think that. And now we’re seeing and I’ve seen one, it’s extraordinary proper full size passenger planes, 100% of battery electric aircraft, who ever would have thought of that? And I think, you know, they’re not going to be they’re going to be in our lifetimes. And when I say that, for me, that is quite soon, because. But you know that we’re deaf. I will definitely see in my lifetime, you could fly from city to Paris to London on an electric plane, which is like I cannot you know, that is unimaginable at that with that. That’s

David Hunt 39:35
phenomenal, isn’t it? Yeah. Zero. Eva Falmouth took off on my podcast some time ago. And again, I know that a rat farmer actually recently did some some stuff with b a. So yeah, actually, that’s phenomenal. That’s one of the things that we talked about. And I’m speaking at eco summit in Berlin, the week after and, you know, pre pandemic, we all travelled far too much. And we justified it to ourselves by offsetting planting trees which we do and that’s that’s good and But it doesn’t solve the problem just go back to your point about just doing less what’s really interesting Steve member of my team, they recently you know, to to diesel family sold to to do diesel cars got one Tesla Model three, and they’re coping home, they’ve got a kid who knows all this stuff you think, well, I have got children, I can’t do it. We will make excuses for ourselves. But it’s great to see. And we many at the show, of course, but people like Steve have just like transformed and it’s not that difficult. Really, you know, once you’ve got over it.

Robert Llewelyn 40:26
Yeah, it’s not a big sacrifice to drive a Tesla to be perfectly male, the cliche, you know, oh, my God, I really suffered by translating to driving a Tesla. Okay.

David Hunt 40:40
He’s very excited. I think his kids even more excited about Yeah, I’m sure. There’s so much to be done so much to see really looking forward to meeting you guys down there. And to get an involved we’ll put some links to the event on the episode page. And, of course, to share amongst our audience. So those of you who are in the UK, if you can please get down to Farber, great to see you. Briefly though, we’ve got an international audience. Dan, I know that obviously, we had Austin in the past, what’s the plans for fully charged live shows, and a little bit cautious as a pandemic, and all that kind of stuff. But what potentially is coming down the line? Well, September 6, we sleep I think.

Dan Ceasar 41:19
until October and November, there will be some copper related activities and fully charged, I’m sure. So we’re working on that in the background. And then in March next year, we go to Amsterdam, fully charged live Europe. Really excited about that, just leaving the country excites us right now. And then the plan is to go to Austin in April, April 23. And 24th, we’re pretty confident we’ll be able to do that. But we also need to be the flying. And certainly Robert and I are again, desperate to get out the country and planning to go over there in the fall. So we can start that the ball rolling on the American show. But Austin’s just incredible, right? Because you’ve got you’ve got you know, Tesla there now, you know, reviens stuff that they’re doing is incredible. spoke to a British firm yesterday, we’re also setting up out there, I don’t think I should name them. I don’t think I’m supposed to know. So there’s some really, really exciting things. And then the plan is to do Australia towards the back end of next year as well. But yeah, unfortunately COVID caveats do apply. And we have to just just think that through but yeah, hopefully, everyone will get a couple of shots in the arm over the next year or so. And kind of that that sort of thing will will resume but frankly, you know, we want to fly to those with purpose. You know, we don’t want to necessarily run those actually in the future of Latin American to run the one else did and someone Australia and one on one Australia and so we don’t necessarily need to go we just been Robert in

David Hunt 42:49
a hologram.

Dan Ceasar 42:51
By the way, it’s much better than red door. And. And so but ultimately, you know if we can get people excited when you were Austin David, and we said to people, how far have you driven and people are driven from the tip of the tip. And they flown in from the Dominican Republic and they driven electric as well

David Hunt 43:17
as the supercharger highway has been.

Dan Ceasar 43:19
Yeah, Jordan. So yeah, we we can’t wait to do that sort of thing again. So yeah, we’ll learn it’s the data set that you can buy tickets now. But obviously in the modern day world, sometimes tickets roll over into a different date. But we’re very very hopeful. But yeah, September the sixth is a day of rest for me and Robert. And then number of charging hybrid on September the second.

David Hunt 43:43
third, fourth fifth in farm bruh. Yeah, be amazing. see lots of people so it’s gonna be hugely populous. Have you ordered enough pies this time? vegan pies.

Robert Llewelyn 43:54
vegan food? And there’s a lot of food.

David Hunt 43:56
Yes, we’ll all survive. But listen guys, great to talk to you really looking forward. Hold on for everything that you guys are doing. And yeah, really looking forward to Tim meeting speak and engaging with real humans in a real situation. Thank you so much.