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In this episode of The Climate Dad, host Mike Smith interviews Tem Tumurbat, co-founder of Nomadic Venture Partners, to explore the critical role of mining in the energy transition. They discuss how advancements in technology are improving mining efficiency, and the importance of recycling and circular economy practices in addressing climate challenges. Tem also shares his inspiring journey from Mongolia to the U.S., reflecting on the cultural values of sustainability and the responsibility to future generations in addressing climate change.
In this episode's Small Waves segment, Julie Schneiderman encourages listeners to make celebrations more sustainable by organizing community cleanup events. She highlights how these efforts can strengthen connections, raise environmental awareness, and create a ripple effect for global impact.
00:00 Introduction to Climate Tech and Mining
08:31 Tem's Journey in Mining and Entrepreneurship
09:40 The Importance of Mining in Energy Transition
11:42 Technology's Role in Mining Permitting and Sustainability
14:30 Innovative Solutions in Copper Mining
16:54 Recycling and Waste Valorization in Mining
19:03 The Unique Value Proposition of Nomadic Venture Partners
22:19 Personal Journey and Cultural Influences
33:18 Generational Responsibility in Climate Action
42:28 Small Waves with Julie Schneiderman
Mike Smith (00:17)
All right, welcome to episode 14 of The Climate Dad, the environmental podcast where we talk about and explain the news and science of climate change. I continue to be your host. My name is Mike Smith. I love my two great kids and I'm the founder of Aclymate the climate solution where we help businesses without sustainability teams to measure, reduce, report and offset their footprint, all without having to become a climate expert and with our expert guidance of Net Zero software. We're going to be joined today by my friend, climate mining expert, Tem Tumurbat. But first,
Here's your climate minute.
A new study from Climate Central reports that increased sea surface temperatures driven by climate have turbocharged the strength of tropical cyclones, also known as hurricanes in the Atlantic and Eastern Pacific or as typhoons in the Western Pacific. Intensity modeling has been failing to project rapid intensification events, and the study now confirms a climate-related footprint. It estimates that Atlantic hurricanes over the past six years have been on average 18 miles per hour stronger than would have been expected in a more typical environment.
miles per hour might not seem like that much. It's enough to jump the average storm up a whole level on the Saffir-Simpson scale, and the power of the wind should be remembered goes up at the square of the speed. This year's Hurricane Milton, for example, was 24 miles per hour stronger than expected based upon the study. Relatedly, the small Pacific Island nation of the Philippines has had a catastrophic typhoon season so far. In the span of just 24 days, six typhoons struck the country.
It would be the equivalent of six hurricanes striking the US East Coast in about three and a half weeks. And as if that wasn't incredible enough, four of those storms alone were category four or greater and landed within 10 days, three of them on the island of Luzon alone. Luzon's not that big. And the last category four to landfall within the United States was Hurricane Ian in 2022. It landed in Florida, killed 156 people and caused $112 billion in damages.
Luzon's about the same distance north and south as Florida, so imagine if Florida was hit with three Hurricane Ians in a week and a half.
That impact puts a point on the annual world climate conference known as COP29, Dubbed the finance conference, its primary goal was to reach a deal on finance from the industrial world towards the developing world. Many of the consequences of climate change are going to be borne most heavily by those within the developing world. Many of the causes of climate change are from actions of the industrial world. And as the developing world seeks to enter the global middle class, we cannot afford
from a climate perspective for them to follow the path that the industrial world has. Bluntly, it's just going to cook the planet. And this tension has between the have and the have nots for sustainable development has been a central theme for climate discussions going back to the 1990s. And it appears that agreements negotiated in Baku are going to pretty much leave everybody unsatisfied. That said, a small bit of good news on the climate front.
Sibi Arasu of the Associated Press is reporting about the use of refurbished EV batteries being used to provide reliable power in rural areas of the developing world. The article highlights how the batteries provide for stable electricity used by rural tailors in the southern India city of Bengaluru. And these tailors who only a few years ago were unable to rely upon it. It was affecting their livelihoods. A startup called Nunam N-U-N-A-M, took advantage of India's site as a growing site for the disposal of e-waste.
including those of the renewable energy transition. Interestingly, not only is this an immediate use of those materials, but the article goes on to say that a New Delhi nonprofit called the Council on Energy, Environment and Water sees this as an opportunity for a national effort in circularity in India, as 90 % of the materials in lithium ion batteries can be recycled and used to make new solar panels, batteries and wind turbines. It's obviously going to take some time to achieve industrial scale and years further to gain widespread adoption.
But still, this is a bit of good news, both now and into the future. And that's your Climate Minute.
Let's talk quickly about Aclymate. If you're thinking about the ways to improve your impact on the planet, or maybe just your company is being required to report its footprint, we'd love to help you over at Aclymate, where we have the easiest, most intuitive climate solution for your business. We'll get you on a baseline environmental assessment, show you ways to reduce your carbon footprint, and we'll get you on the path to net zero. It'll help your environmental branding to win new customers and keep the most valuable ones, attract and retain the talent you need from the rising climate generation.
and our green business certification programs will help you complete a sustainability audit. Maybe you're just looking to improve those EcoVadis scores. Maybe you're looking to win certifications like CDP, B Corp, or Green Business Benchmark. Or maybe you're looking to purchase carbon offsets but need a reliable carbon credit broker. Well, at Aclymate, we got you covered. We have both a friendly climate accounting solution and also the best carbon offset programs and a leading selection of sustainable projects on the web.
Now, let's introduce you to today's guest. Tem Tumurbat is the managing partner for Nomadic Venture Partners. He's a friend of mine and really sharp on mining and the minerals transition associated with climate. You're gonna enjoy this interview.
Mike Smith (05:42)
All right, today I'm joined here on The Climate Dad by my friend and actually office mate and Tem Tumurbat He's the co-founder and managing partner for Nomadic Venture Partners. He's also, he and his partner Batchimeg are the host for the Industrial Climate Tech Summit that is held here in Colorado in October at the Colorado School of Mines in Golden, Colorado. A little bit of background before I get into this.
Tem's son and mine both go to the same school and when his son's a year behind mine, when he found out that they were going to be going to the same school, we ended up having an opportunity to office together. So I have the rare fortune of being able to see Tem on a near daily basis. And so I'm really glad to be joined by my friend. Tem, how you doing?
Tem Tumurbat (06:22)
doing well and thanks for having me. Really appreciate it, Mike.
Mike Smith (06:25)
Yeah, so Tem, introduce yourself to the listeners, a little bit about your professional background. I think you just operate in a really fascinating space around climate, specifically around mining. There's not a lot of people that do that.
Tem Tumurbat (06:35)
Yeah, I started actually my career starting a company when I was a student at Colorado School of Mines. And it's sort of an unfortunate situation that happened within my family when both my parents have been laid off four months apart. That put this huge question mark around who was going to pay for my tuition and whether I was able to actually finish my schooling. And during that time, I had number of conversations.
friends and family trying to decide what to do, whether I was going to take some time off and I was actually waiting some tables during the nights and weekends and so on.
But my dad actually gave me a lot of encouragement and he actually said, hey, if you want to start a company, I will be willing to go and get a commercial driver's license and be your employee number one.
So I then borrowed little funds and then bought a used truck and went into starting a company. So then this allowed me to actually not give up my schooling because it became this profitable business and employed both my parents and my sister and so on.
So I finished schooling, I finished my studies at Colorado School of Mines, got a mining engineering degree, worked for a couple of different mining companies, learned a ton about the whole industry, right? And I shifted my career into more of a financing role. I joined a group called Resource Capital Funds, which financed mining projects. It's a venture capital private equity firm that's based here in Denver, you know, with offices around the world.
And that's where I worked for almost five years and then about four years ago decided to leave that firm and start Nomadic Venture Partners and really focus on early stage, seed stage, companies to provide and invent solutions. So we all can achieve the net zero
goals and make this energy transition happen. So that's a little bit about me. I know that's probably a little more than what you wanted to hear,
Mike Smith (08:37)
Now that's everything I wanted to hear. There's a lot of fun things that I know about you. And I tell people about that all the time. One of them is, you really are an entrepreneur's entrepreneur. You started a trucking company for goodness sakes to pay for college. If I could look at 10,000 Americans, I bet there's maybe one in that group that does something like that. And I just have always really appreciated that about you, Tem.
And I think that's a really fascinating story and that's become this family business that's been successful moving forward. So I really enjoy that. The other thing that I think that most people don't really expect, and I think that you have a very unique foresight on, is how essential mining is to the climate transition. One of the things that you said to me once here in the office over lunch was everything you look at was either grown or mined.
as we think about the minerals associated with all sorts of new technologies necessary for the environmental transition. I've just been fortunate to kind of learn about that from you a little bit more. Maybe you could kind of fill in some color there and tell us about like why mining is so essential to where we're.
Tem Tumurbat (09:40)
Yeah, so we have a saying at Nomadic Venture Partners where more of a perspective, should say, that this energy transition in our view is actually a metals transition, right? Many of the great clean energy technologies that we know about, including solar and wind farms and batteries and EVs, I mean, basically name everything, Has a very specific dependence on
on mining because as you pointed out, everything, if you look around, is either mined or grown. And not many people know that mining is one of those very quiet spaces that we don't typically talk a lot about ourselves. then I think, you know, to me, it's a bit of a shame because mining plays an incredibly important role and it's quite fundamental to everything. Right. And now that we have this incredible transition that's happening,
What that means for the metals and mining space is that we're going to have this incredible demand for metals, demand for things that take up the physical world. And unfortunately, and there's a really good part to that story is that the mining industry doesn't have the same ability and same characteristics of other industries where money cannot just turn the faucet on and deliver all the...
or supply all the metals that we need. on average, it takes about 17 years to actually bring on new supply or build a new mine. So what does that actually mean? So we have this incredible demand story. Everybody's building solar when batteries, EVs, and so on. But we technically cannot deliver the metals. And that's where technology comes in.
to help provide that additional level of or additional stream of supply of metals. So it's quite fundamental and I love how we can apply technology to be able to deliver and help society achieve the net zero goals that we have for 2050.
Mike Smith (11:42)
So as I think about that, I think about like the size of that gap, 17 years is a long time. And maybe there's some regulatory stuff to accelerate that, like that's still, you know, best case scenario decade. So there's this gap and you say you fill that with technology. Is there a technology component here accelerating the ability to, permit and regulation or, know, what's your thesis about how technology fills those gaps?
Tem Tumurbat (12:03)
Yeah, it's a lot. think technology is one of the levers we can pull, right? Permit reforming or reforming the mining permitting processes is absolutely one, And then also there's this huge component most people don't typically talk about and know a lot about is mining's impact on...
the nature and environment as well as local communities and broadly society, While there are a ton of positive impacts, we also have some not so great negative impacts. And that's something that I think we have to be really mindful of. it's a complex situation. It's not as simple as, we just need to mine more and deliver the supplies we need. It's, okay, well, how do we do it in a way that's more sustainable?
The reason why it takes a long time is one, it takes many, many years to actually make these discoveries. It takes years to find a new ore deposit. And when that happens, people, especially investors, get tired. They don't want to keep funding companies that are not finding any meaningful discoveries. So it takes a lot of...
Trial tries to be able to find and make a new discovery. But once you make a new discovery, you have to then study the discovery, right? Do a lot of engineering and planning and trying to figure out if these projects will ever become an economic project, right? And once you have that idea, then you go into a permitting process and see if you can get approval. But that process on its own is also very...
time consuming, especially in Western countries like the US, where on average it takes four or five years to just get a decision on a typical project. But oftentimes it's actually even more than that. If you look at a project, a copper project called Resolution, in Arizona. I forget how many years, but it's been going on for long time, the permitting process. then typically, local communities or...
there will be NGOs who would be opposed to the idea of mining. And then that opposition slows down the permitting process. And there's so many things we can do to make that better. But I think trying to bring it back to technology, what technology can do is while mining companies take so long to be able to bring new projects,
Online, you can use technology to be able to extract value, extract metals from already existing assets much more quickly. And, and there's also a component of recycling and using waste, valorizing waste in the mining space. Mining is one of the industries that move, you know, huge volumes of rock and, and, and, and, then materials. Right. And then oftentimes we leave a lot of good stuff behind just because it didn't meet the
the economic cutoff grade. So there's a lot of interesting things that's already mined, already sorted, already crushed, that we could use to be able to help aid in delivering that supply. So that's where the technology comes in. It's not the only solution. It's one of the solutions. think technology, in my view though, it's one of the more important solutions that we can think of.
while working on some of these bigger issues that often have a multilateral geopolitical flavor to it.
Mike Smith (15:29)
Got it. I think a lot about this quote from John Sterman at MIT. And he talked about that there's no silver bullet for climate, but there's a lot of silver buckshot. We're beyond the point of where we can do just one thing. We have to do all the things now. So permitting reform is important, but also technology is very important, especially to fill kind of those short-term gaps as we ramp up supply. I know we've spoken over lunch a couple of times about some of your portfolio companies.
actually going to be sharing the stage at the Investor Climate Tech Summit with one of your portcos, Liz Dennett, PhD and CEO of Endolith. Maybe you can talk about a couple of your portfolio companies that doing some of these technology extraction, technology that enables extraction.
Tem Tumurbat (16:07)
Yeah, so that's a great example that you just brought up because in the copper mining sector, many mining companies use these big hydro metallurgical facilities or processes, where they're using some kind of a solution to dissolve the copper that's in a rock and produce that through a electrochemical processing method.
And the unfortunate thing with that process, especially on the heap leaching side, is that on average, money companies are only producing 40 to 50 % at best and then leaving a lot of the copper behind. So there's a lot of opportunity. One, there's a ton of value that's being left behind. Two, what that means is there's a lot of great opportunity in trying to actually extract the copper.
and do it in a way that's much cheaper, environmentally friendly, and in a way that doesn't take 17 years. You can actually have a very direct impact on these companies' bottom lines and help deliver the copper that's needed. And what Endolith does is they have developed a technology to precisely apply microbes, engineered microbes to help
increase the recovery of copper. So just think about it, right? Instead of say, a mining company XYZ producing or recovering only 50 % of the copper that they have in their heap leaches Endolith could help them increase that to say 60%, 65 % or maybe even all the way up to 100 % depending on the situation. So that's a very interesting way, right? And in my view, that's one of the...
the quickest way to apply a very specific technology in a market that is huge, The copper industry is in couple hundred billion dollar market and it's one of the metals that is mostly needed to be able to make this energy transition happen and they can do that through their innovation and technology. So that's one example and we've got a couple other ones as well. I I love copper. Copper is one of my favorite metals. It's so fundamental.
and Endolith is operating in that sweet spot. We also have a portfolio company that is looking to use hydrogeochemical process or approach, I should say, to
to make new mineral discoveries and then also help these big heap leaching processes to be able to extract additional copper and so on. So we're very much focused on some of these technologies that can actually supply the metals that we need so that we can actually achieve the net zero goals that we have in front of us.
Mike Smith (18:41)
I think that what's interesting about that is that, because I'm sure some of the listeners right now are screaming like, know, zero waste and circular economy and recycling and yeah, absolutely. Everybody cares about that. I think I know you do too, right? We need to be more efficient the way that we use resources throughout their life and through their end of life and going, know, cradle to cradle on the structure. But then there's also this component of
The environmental damage is the cost has already been paid in a lot of these mines and there's a lot of resources there that are not being captured and this just.
takes from where this damage has already been happening to make it a more efficient way. It actually, in many ways, reduces the environmental impact of having to open up new mines because you're reducing the demand for new facilities. So I wonder if there's, like, if you could speak to some of the nuance of that, you know, as a guy that used to be focused very heavily on commodities and now a little bit more on the technology side of things.
Tem Tumurbat (19:33)
Yeah, I think so.
Mike Smith (19:35)
Thank
Tem Tumurbat (19:36)
To me, it's timing. If you talk to many of the mining analysts and people like Bloomberg and Bloomberg NEF and others, all of them have these very similar charts that say that the mining industry cannot deliver the supply that's needed to meet the demand. But then they also highlight how much resources are actually already
have been mined and moved and people can try to extract metals and therefore value out of it. And to me, that's an important piece that we need to keep thinking about because it's one thing to start new mines, but I frankly don't see our industry making a very quick change to reduce that average 17-year figure down to three years. I that's going to be, I think that's going to
take, it's going to happen, but over time, it's not going to happen in the next five years. Well, so in the meantime, what do we do? We can't not do anything. and as you pointed out, many of these assets already have lots of lots of these resources that the costs have been sunk, Capital costs have already gone into building these mines, the permitting process. Like a lot of these things have already happened. And if you
invest in the right technologies, you could speed up that process. The second thing that I want to talk about is, so that first one was just sort of like reusing waste, right? The second one is around recycling. was at a conference last weekend and one major mining company CEO mentioned, and this was a surprise to him. It was also a surprise for me as well is that he actually looked at recycling rates of these key metals. So it includes copper, aluminum and steel.
People know that we recycle aluminum, copper, and steel fairly well. And the volume of these metals that we recycle have been going up. But if you actually look at the recycling rates, we're actually recycling less than we had in 2012. So in the last 12 years, we're trying to recycle more and more. But the actual recycling rate itself is slightly going down.
in a time where we actually need secondary sources to be able to help the world meet these goals, right? Because primary sources of metals isn't gonna do it and you have to rely on secondary sources.
Mike Smith (21:56)
That's interesting. was having a coffee yesterday actually with a friend named Eric, who was his former business was in the manufacturer of wind turbine towers. And they had an innovative technology that made it a much more efficient system. And one of the big ways they actually reduced their emissions footprint was because the footprint of their steel was 90 % lower than the competing technology because
their technology allowed them to use recycled steel. And that recycled steel had like a lower footprint in both the manufacturer and then in the reprocessing associated with it. Let's pivot a little bit here to why, I mean, you're a venture capitalist. You got into this because you want to make money. And more specifically, not just you, you need to make money for your shareholders, your limited partners.
You, as far as I can tell, are amongst a very small group of people that have put together both the knowledge and the experience of mining and the climate side of the equation. So I was wondering if you could talk about why some of this stuff may be very obvious to the listener based upon the fact that there's these huge demand curves and there's a lot of gaps in the supply, but why you think that what you're doing is
a very special value proposition for limited partners.
Tem Tumurbat (23:07)
Yeah, that's a great question. And I think it goes back to what you said earlier, right? Not many people are doing what we do, right? And maybe just for the audience or the listeners benefit, we're a seed-stage climate tech fund, But we specifically focus on three sectors and it's metals and mining, And industrials, like metal production,
to steel making, copper smelting, aluminum refining and so on. And then trucking, that's because I happen to have a very specific view on how to decarbonize that space. And when you look when you look at the world of people who know a lot about mining, aren't that many people actually mining while from a volumetric perspective, it's a huge industry. In fact, it will be a $10 trillion industry.
over the next 50 years or so. But when you actually try to find people who work in the mining industry, aren't that many of us, and it's actually a small community. And I happened to graduate from one of the best mining engineering schools in this country. And I can remember, think it was only one of 12 graduates at our graduation ceremony. It was kind of interesting because you would have the mechanical engineers,
volume engineers go up on stages and there are hundreds of people graduating. Whereas mining industry, or our graduating class was pretty small. It's going up a little bit. think in the US on average, we're sort of graduating 600 or so mining engineers on an annual basis. But if you look at what China is doing, there's 1.4 million students enrolled in mining engineering programs.
So think about that. So if you eliminate China for a second, by virtue of people who know a lot about mining and then also who know how to invest in the mining space, we're sort the only one. And that's interesting. it gives us a lot of edge, if you will, if you compare us to other...
Climate tech VCs who may be a little bit of a generalist, right? They're happy to take exposure in the mining space, understanding the need and understanding this great demand story and how mining needs to be sustainable We'd like to think that we can pick the right companies, right? Because we know we have this knowledge of what
people in the mining industry have tried in the past and have failed. And there's a lot of like institutional knowledge that we have, not just ourselves, but within our LP community, as well as our expert network that we hope that we can actually exercise a bit of a competitive edge there. And that's why our LPs really like us, right? Because not only do we know about these spaces, we have worked in these spaces.
And we have very specific views and it also helps if you're the only one that's doing what we do.
Mike Smith (26:03)
I was just going to sing your praises a little bit. What I find fascinating about, again, some of our lunchtime conversations is how often these climate generalist funds bring you into the party because they really don't know a whole lot about mining and about and not to belittle them, like it's a specialized field, but it's it seems.
Tem Tumurbat (26:20)
Great.
Mike Smith (26:22)
From my entrepreneur's perspective, every mining deal goes through you. Do you feel like that's an accurate statement or am I blowing things up a little too much here?
Tem Tumurbat (26:30)
I frankly don't know the exact number because there's no way to actually know. But we've estimated and I think we probably see more than 70, 75 % of the deal flow that's out there. And it's great because of these partnerships that we have forged in the last three and half years with other investors who understand the importance of the metals and mining space. And they want to work with us and they want to help.
They want to co-invest in, they want to help de-risk some more portfolio companies and that's great. And so what they do is they say, hey Tem we've got this incredible, incredibly interesting company that you should take a look at and let's compare notes. Is this something that you think is worth pursuing or maybe we should pass because the previous version had been tried 10 years ago and failed, whatever it may be, right?
And that's a really interesting situation because we want to work with everybody else in the climate tech space. That's one of the things that I love about the climate tech sector in general is people are very collaborative. People want to work together. And we like that we have a place in that sector where we can be seen as the default go to climate tech VC when it comes to these very specific sectors that we know.
I mean, same thing in the trucking industry. There are funds who focus on trucking industry and that they also reach out to us because I know trucking in and out, mean, both my parents, including my mother, is a truck driver. So I get to hear about their personal stories, their challenges, the things that they could do better if there was a technology to solve. Anyway, so there's a lot of things that sort of like it's part of me, part of my DNA that...
that is hard to sort of replicate.
So I don't know if it's all of it or I don't know if we actually see every single deal.
I hope we get to that point at some point, but if I were to sort of estimate, yeah, it's certainly a huge piece or a huge share of the market that we look at.
Mike Smith (28:35)
Yeah, you have an incredible work ethic. So I know you're moving through them all rapidly. We've had some discussions actually about how you can use technology to potentially improve that deal flow too. But I want to go to the DNA side of things. You said it's in your DNA. And the name of your company is Nomadic Venture Partners, right? Which hearkens back to, I think, a little bit of your ancestry. And then I was also thinking a little bit about the...
Tem Tumurbat (28:44)
Mm-hmm.
That's right.
Mike Smith (28:58)
fact that you go to Colorado School of Mines and some of the history of Colorado itself as a mining capital of the world in many respects there. So, you know, I'd love it if you tell a little bit more of your personal story about where you came from. Your name's not Mike Smith. It's not American vanilla. It's an immigrant's name. know, tell me what's going on here.
Tem Tumurbat (29:17)
Yeah, well, actually, I mean, really appreciate you asking this question. I love kind of, you know, talking about my home country. So I was actually born and raised in Mongolia during a very interesting time when Mongolia was going through this incredible change and disruption. And that meant, you know, my parents had to be very entrepreneurial. I actually look up to my dad as my, you know, one of my main, main, role models because he was someone who I think is actually,
an OG venture capitalist. One of the reasons why I love the private equity, the venture capital space is this market inefficiency. There's a lot of inefficiencies built into these private markets. what was happening back then was because of this new, by the way, democratic revolution happened in Mongolia in 1990, free market economy, democracy office was just burgeoning in this country, in our country.
That also meant that people didn't have jobs. If you did, you worked for the government, right? People didn't own anything because it was more of a socialist country, right? There were limits on what you could actually own. Like physically, You weren't allowed to own cars, And there's all kinds of things that were quite interesting. And once you disrupt a country in totality, people had to be very entrepreneurial and have this venture mindset, what I call.
And he anyway, and his buddies pulled their resources together and rode trains all the way to Western Germany, 8,300 kilometers, And buy whatever they can find that they think that they can actually flip for a lot of money back home. cars was one of the things that the people actually needed in Mongolia. So they went and then on a train ride, buy some used cars, drive it all the way back.
Quite the adventurous journey. then selling for 4 5x, which is quite fascinating. And that had a huge impact on my upbringing and my perspectives on how to potentially capitalize.
Now, fast forward, our family immigrated to the US. Why Denver? A lot of people ask me, why did you move to Denver out of all the places that you could move to? It's quite interesting because there were a couple of Mongolian students who had been sent by the state-owned mining company to study at Colorado School of Mines in the early 90s. And that effort paid off hugely where after the...
went back and then told how great the school was and the training and all of that. Mongolian government started sending more and more students and then Denver became this landing spot for Mongolian immigrants. So at one point, like we were the sort of the epicenter of Mongolian immigrant community,
And it all happened because of mining, which is kind of interesting, right? To kind of close it, look back. Now, I want go back to something that you've asked earlier, Mongolian people, who are they, right? Why did they named the firm Nomadic Venture Partners? And that's because Mongolian people historically have been, and to a large extent today as well, Nomadic people, half the country.
have the population still are nomadic people. They herd their livestock and follow their animals, right? And they have to move. They have to move at least four times a year. So because of that, right, minimalism and durability is a sort of part of their identity and part of their DNA. And sustainability is also a huge aspect of who they are. Because they have to depend on
on their animals and depend on the environment. They have always been very thoughtful people when it comes to using their natural resources and making sure that they conserve what they can and ensure that the environment isn't disrupted. the idea of reclamation, idea of sustainability is not a concept. It's exactly what you do. There shouldn't be anything else. Even their clothes and shoes are designed to be very
very friendly to the environment, you can not create a lot of actual footprint and surface disturbances. And then when they use things,
nothing gets wasted. And so those kinds of things have always been part of our personal values, right? Cultural values. And, and, know, having moved to the United States where we're such a consumptive society, right? We're happily, you know, using plastic water bottles, use it once, throw it away. It's quite fascinating how different that is and how foreign that felt like. And then we wanted to bring a lot of those.
ethos right into what we do with Nomadic Venture Partners and we wanted to pay homage to our ancestors and elders who instilled these values and we think that the society will be and every company should be. Today we have this classification for companies like Aclymate as a, you are a climate tech company but my hope is that in the future we won't have any climate tech companies. Every company should be a climate tech.
And we don't have to debate whether ESG is important or not. It should just be part of everybody's best practices.
Mike Smith (34:25)
And increasingly it is. One of the things that we're seeing here at Aclymate is how much this is an expected behavior up and down throughout supply chains. We've been onboarding a few customers here, especially recently talking about how they need to report what their footprint is in order to be able to make more efficient decisions. so it's exciting about how that is becoming part of the mindset of the population because
Again, ESG performance is ultimately at its core an analysis of risk and exposure. And so if you are using materials or creating pollution in a way that will no longer be accepted or it has a point of extinguish, then you are creating the risk of stranded assets. So that's at the core of risk there.
Tem Tumurbat (35:11)
Mm-hmm. That's right.
Mike Smith (35:13)
I loved how you were telling a story about your father there. You this is The Climate Dad And so like, you know, he had an effect upon you. I wonder if you could tell a little story about like, you know, the effect that you hope to have upon your children.
Tem Tumurbat (35:18)
That's right.
Yeah, and that's probably one of the reasons why Batchimeg and I started this firm, right? So four years ago, we were actually reflecting, like many people were probably right during the pandemic, about their jobs, about their livelihoods, whatever it may be. And we were actually reflecting quite heavily on that. And we quickly discovered that we had to actually do something about some of these big sort of global
know, shifts that were happening at that time. And we said, what if we actually try to figure out a way to put what we know, our skill sets, our networks to work? you know, could there be something interesting here? So we actually hired an executive coach who helped us work through a framework.
It's called the Ikegai model. think you know a lot about it. Like you do, you know, if you can find something that you'd love to do and the world needs and you're good at it you actually have the experience in the skillset and if you can get paid for it, like that would be sort of the ultimate thing you want to be doing. and, and we went after a few sessions, we discovered that Holy cow, like we should absolutely, you know, put our efforts towards, you creating a company that.
like we know how to, how to identify the best companies and, and, and these companies will solve big problems for the world. And then, and then we think we can make a living in a doing it. then, know, going back to my DNA kind of a thing, like being an entrepreneur is who I am. And, that's what I love doing. Right. so that was really sort of an instrumental kind of a moment for us, to, kickstart, what we do, but, but through that reflection, what we discovered is, that Holy cow, like,
I have not been fully tuned into some of the societal changes and environmental impacts that we were having that could lead to quite sort of uncomfortable livelihoods for everybody, including my kids and my families. And if you look at what's happening in Mongolia, the average temperatures are actually going.
up faster than what you would see elsewhere. then, know, desertification is taking over the country, A lot of these herders and nomadic people who depend on the natural resources and the land, They're becoming squeezed, So lot of those kinds of personal kinds of things, including thinking about the future of my two kids, it may just
perfect sense, like I had to do something.
Mike Smith (38:03)
Yeah, in my previous company, RenewWest, I had the opportunity to bring my children and my wife to plant, and my father, actually. So all the generations. Do the big planting project we did in California. you know, my children were able to go skiing in Tahoe and we went hiking in the Redwood Forest and proud dad moment. Their favorite part of the whole trip was planting trees. so it was the same thing for my father.
So it's fun to kind of see like that generational tie from father to son in our cases, and then from, you know, in our cases, father to our children. And I think there's a lot of that in the climate space about where people start to feel a responsibility to generations coming and generations past.
Tem Tumurbat (38:34)
Right.
Mike Smith (38:44)
So, that leads me to one of questions I ask a lot of our guests, which is, if you were going to write a book, Tem, what would it be about?
Tem Tumurbat (38:50)
That's a great question, Mike. And I've always, as a father, have looked for books to give to my kids to read about and specifically focusing on rocks and minerals. And every time I go to a library, I'm always disappointed that the sections are literally this short. There's only a handful of books and they're extremely outdated. And...
And that disappoints me, right? So if I were to actually write a book, I would probably write children's book.
books like our series or volumes, specifically focused on the importance of rocks and minerals. And not necessarily, right, like being this like, hey, Billy, my son, rather, you should learn about rocks and minerals. It's more like actually do a fiction or create all kinds of interesting chapter books that, you know, his buddies could read and get a lot of kick out of it. But, you know, at the same time, learning the importance of
of metals and mining and how it plays a critical and fundamental role in delivering this energy transition. So really appreciate you asking me that question because I think about this every time I go to my library, I get frustrated and I always think to myself like I should write a book or I should do something
Mike Smith (40:06)
Yeah, I know at least two children that would read that book, both of mine, they love rocks. We were on a backpacking trip last weekend and my son found, you he knows all the minerals and granite, know, quartz and feldspar and mica and all that. And we were looking up at a big rock wall and there was a big kind of stripe through it. I was like, what do think that is? And he goes, it's probably quartz. And I was like, it's too thick. It's probably not quartz. And then we climbed up to the top of the saddle and there was a huge thick vein of quartz there.
He was, I took a picture of him. He was very proud of, of, of being able to identify that. So, and then I know, yeah, my dad was a geologist. so I think he would have given me that book too. So, yeah, there's a need in the marketplace. and if there's a passion, when you have the time, I would encourage you to write it.
Tem Tumurbat (40:38)
That's super neat.
I'll certainly consider. Thanks Mike.
Mike Smith (40:51)
Okay, yeah.
Mike Smith (40:52)
So I think we need to stop it there, but this has been a great interview. Tem, I always love talking to you. That's why I love sharing an office with you. So thank you for joining me today on The Climate Dad. And thank you for everything that you're doing in the clean tech, climate tech, mining tech space.
Tem Tumurbat (41:08)
Thank you for having me. I had a great time.
Mike Smith (41:16)
I loved Tem He's just an entrepreneur's entrepreneur. He's really focused on getting his, his work and the job done. And frankly, I'm just really grateful to have him as a friend. Now, before we wrap up and we get to Julie Schneiderman and her small wave of the week, we want to hear from you here at The Climate Dad. Please go to Aclymate.com and, or send an email to theclimatedad at Aclymate.com to submit a question for us or for the show. Again, Aclymate is spelled A C.
L-Y-M-A-T-E. If your business needs help measuring, reducing, reporting, or offsetting your company's climate footprint, reach out to our team here at Aclymate, and we're going to get you set up with the best, the most affordable, and easiest climate solution out there. We really pride ourselves on great customer service and putting a human face on the problem. Thanks again to my friend, Tem Tumurbat, of Nomadic Venture Partners for joining us, and thank you all for listening. I'll be back next time with a breakdown of all things climate.
Make sure to subscribe to The Climate Dad where you get your podcasts to share, like, and comment on social media. I'm Mike Smith. You've been listening to The Climate Dad. And here she is, Julie Schneiderman of EcoStiks with your small wave of the
Mike Smith (42:34)
Hi, welcome to Small Waves, where small waves make big waves to collective collaboration for big impact. I'm Julie Upcycled. I'm your host. And today I want to continue the conversation with the exploration of the UN Sustainable Development Goals that we talked about last week as a place to ground and take action. So I encouraged you last week to take a few minutes to go through the goals and see which one resonated with you.
I chose UN SDG 14, Life Below Water. This goal calls for us to conserve and sustainably use the ocean, seas, and marine resources. It's about protecting the lifeblood of our planet. And I believe that each of us can play a role in achieving it. So as I reflect on turning 50, I've been thinking about how I can align my celebration with my values and my SDG goal.
So instead of a traditional party, I'm planning a beach walk and cleanup. Not only does this feel meaningful to me, but it's also a powerful way to engage friends and family in making a tangible impact for our planet. So today I want to share this idea as an eco hack for you and your next celebration and explore how collective action can amplify the impact. So imagine this, you send out invites for your birthday, but instead of gifts,
You ask for guests to bring gloves, maybe reusable buckets, and then to bring a heart for the place you cherish. In my case, it's the ocean. So you gather at your favorite place, share a moment of gratitude for nature, and then spend an hour or two walking together, creating connection, picking up trash, and connecting over the shared purpose of protecting nature and the environment. This isn't just about picking up litter. That's a big part of it.
is about raising awareness. you're showing your loved ones the beauty of the places you love by celebrating this way. You're also sparking those conversations about community, sustainability, conservation, and our shared responsibility for our planet. But not only that, you're continuing and amplifying that conversation. So potential projects and things that might come just from this beach cleanup. So you have a ripple effect.
Now let's talk collective action. So if each of us hosted a cleanup event for a special occasion, maybe a birthday, anniversary, even just a Sunday afternoon, we could create again, this huge ripple effect. Imagine hundreds, even thousands of small cleanups happening across the globe. The waste we collect could be measured, tracked, and turned into data to demonstrate impact all in celebration of ourselves, our friends, and our community.
So as my 50th birthday approaches, as well as the holidays, I invite you to join me wherever you are. Whether it's a beach or river or a park or in the city, let's turn our celebrations into opportunity for change through collective collaboration. Together, our small waves will make big waves. Thank you for listening to Small Waves. Let's keep inspiring, building community, taking action and measuring our impact together.
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