Air Quality Innovations: Finding Data in the Smog

02/01/18 • 23 min

Beijing's smoggy air has sparked a wave of creativity, giving rise to a range of products that aim to protect the public and their health. One innovative start-up, Kaiterra (formerly known as Origins), creates portable, high-accuracy monitors that measure and map the world’s air. Kaiterra's "laser eggs" have shed light on pollution data that was previously hard to come by for consumers in China and worldwide.

We sit down with Liam Bates, co-founder and CEO of Kaiterra, to hear about how Kaiterra got its start, learn how laser eggs actually work, and explore the potential for a small start-up to help solve global air pollution challenges. Sneak preview: Turns out that being a Chinese TV-star DOES prepare one to become CEO of a tech company!

Check out more about Kaiterra on their website: www.kaiterra.com.

Check out more about Kaiterra on their website: www.kaiterra.com.

Previous Episode

A Slice of Sustainability: China's first F&B B Corp

Jade Gray set out with a mission to create the “Patagonia of Pizza.” Originally from New Zealand, today’s guest has pioneered sustainable entrepreneurship in Beijing over the past two decades. He is the co-founder of Gung Ho! Ventures, which includes the Gung Ho! Pizza restaurants in Beijing. To become the “Patagonia of Pizza,” Jade’s company has turned their operations inside out looking for ways to achieve holistic sustainability from using upcycled construction materials to cutting power use. In recent years, the company became the third “B Corp” in China. “B Corp” is a designation awarded to businesses that demonstrate excellence in their environmental, community, labor, and governance practices. We talked with Jade about how he has managed to take on sustainability in his relatively small company and how the ideas his company espouses are beginning to take root more widely in China.

You can find Gung Ho! Pizza’s B Corp evaluation here: https://www.bcorporation.net/community/gung-ho-pizza

Next Episode

Playing Serious Games for Policy Change

China is a country with over 600 million gamers. What if all of this game playing could lead to good? With its Serious Games Initiative, the DC-based Wilson Center is working to communicate science and policy complexities through the world’s most dynamic medium: gaming. Most recently, the Serious Games Initiative teamed up with another Wilson Center project,“Storytelling is Serious Business,” to introduce local Chinese NGOs to how games like “Card Against Calamity” and “Eco Chains” could serve as vehicles for policy change. In this episode, we chat with Beijing Energy Network veteran speaker Jennifer Turner, director of the Wilson Center’s China Environment Forum, and her colleague Elizabeth Newbury, who directs the Wilson Center’s Serious Games Initiative. Jennifer and Liz share their experiences introducing "serious games" to NGOs in China during their most recent trip and discuss the potential for local NGOs to leverage gaming to improve China’s environmental policies. Jennifer also reflects on her 18 years of building bridges between Chinese and US environmental civil society and where Chinese green civil society may be headed going forward. You can read more about the Serious Games Initiative on the Wilson Center’s website here: https://www.wilsoncenter.org/program/serious-games-initiative. And if you listened to our second ever episode with Jennifer on “poo power,” you might be keen to check out the hot-off-the-press "InsightOut Issue 4 - Waste Power: Can Wastewater Revolutionize Pollution Control and Clean Energy in Cities?," also on the Wilson Center’s website here: https://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/insightout-issue-4-waste-power-can-wastewater-revolutionize-pollution-control-and-clean.