😎 A Cool Summer With A Smart Guy 😎

A Summer Update

A Cool Summer with a Smart Guy

I spent my summer with Andrew Ponec (CEO and Co-founder of Antora Energy). I want to thank him for taking a chance on me. You gave me an awesome summer. 

Andrew's most interesting attribute is his ability to find mistakes. Whenever I made a mistake, he would see it fast. He was always right.

For example, I analyzed corn processing plants. Andrew took one look at the analysis and said, "Something's not right here." I checked again, and he was right. I made a mistake.

I learned 2 big lessons from Andrew:

Lesson 1: Conservation of Energy

Conservation of energy is a tool to help you know how much energy you need for a process.

I showed Andrew my algae carbon capture concept. He invalidated it in 8 minutes. He showed me the energy required for the entire reaction. Even if algae was free, the energy to turn it into a fuel would be too expensive to beat natural gas.

Lesson 2: Conservation of Mass

I found a company that takes CO2 and water to make CH4 (natural gas). I did the math (stoichiometry). It was too expensive compared to natural gas from the ground.

These two rules helped me find flaws in many climate companies. I even found problems in ones that raised 100s of millions of dollars. Investors never find these problems because they never look for them. More lessons are in the article below. 

The First Principles of Analogies

At the beginning of my internship, I worked on different ways to pitch Antora. I tried many pitches. I recorded myself and watched it back. Every time I got to the technical section, I would get bored.

I locked myself in a room for 3 days to figure out the problem. After many experiments, I learned the real purpose of analogies: entertainment.

The breakthrough came when I compared the battery with how a robber steals from a bank. The analogy was solid. I laughed many times while alone in the room.

The bank robber analogy was entertaining. The other analogies were not. Why was the analogy entertaining? The analogy helped me get into storytelling mode. 

What are the components of storytelling mode? The key components are rate of speech, range of volume, tonality, pitch & melody, and pausing. Varying these components brings your speech to life. These components naturally vary in every story you tell. Good analogies help you get into storytelling mode. As a result, the audience is more entertained when you pitch. 

What Made “Asking For Forgiveness Is Better Than Asking For Permission” Real For Me

At the airport, I made a friend. It was time to board the plane. We were standing in a long line because our plane ticket said to go there. My friend and I met an older man who told us to go to the shortest line, even if it wasn't our line. We did and no one checked.

This situation taught me that it is better to ask forgiveness than permission. The situation was not about bending rules. It was about what you believe you can do. 

The belief the airport people would stop us made us not take the action of going into a shorter line.

We had a permission mindset. We can't do X because of Y. 

A forgiveness mindset is about doing what you want/need to do until somebody stops you. 

In the permission mindset, what is blocking you is imaginary. In the forgiveness mindset, you only get blocked by real things. 

I compared the situation to a previous belief I had. I used to think you needed to be PhD/Professor to start a hardware climate company.

I can't start a climate company because I'm not a PhD. The blocker is imaginary.

I can't start a climate company because I haven't fixed this problem yet. This blocker is real. To get rid of this blocker, I need information not credentials.