Catching up on another episode with Jesse Shrader – environmental engineer turned Bitcoin infrastructure builder – as he unpacks how building sewer systems unexpectedly prepared him to build financial pipes for the future of money. From wastewater treatment to decentralized liquidity markets, Jesse shares how open-source technology, renewable mining, and the Lightning Network are reshaping what Bitcoin can actually do.

In this episode, you’ll learn:
• How Jesse’s background in environmental engineering led him to co-found Amboss and build infrastructure for Bitcoin’s Lightning Network.
• Why Bitcoin mining isn’t as “dirty” as critics claim—and how renewable energy and stranded power (like hydro in Africa) are part of the story.
• What makes Bitcoin different from altcoins—and why “the next Bitcoin is Bitcoin.”
• How the Lightning Network adds speed and privacy without compromising Bitcoin’s 21-million supply and auditability.
• Whether quantum computing and SHA-256 encryption are real threats—or just headline-grabbing narratives.

Michael Peres sits down with Chip Carter — creator and host of Where the Food Comes From — to explore one of the most fascinating questions of our time: How will we grow food in space? After thousands of farm visits and decades in media, Chip’s journey has taken him from small-town farming roots to standing on a NASA launch pad — and now into conversations about feeding astronauts on the Moon and beyond. Together, they dive into lunar soil experiments, zero-gravity farming, the Artemis program, and what it really takes to grow lettuce where DoorDash doesn’t deliver.

In this episode, you’ll learn:
• How Chip went from wanting to “get out of farming” to telling agriculture’s untold tech stories
• Why modern farming is powered by robotics, AI, drones, and blockchain
• How scientists successfully grew plants in actual lunar regolith
• The challenge of watering crops in zero-gravity
• Why the Moon is becoming a launch platform for deep space exploration
• How bio-unit lunar farms could create breathable atmosphere and grow food on the Moon
• What growing plants in space reveals about life beyond Earth

Catching up with Les Johnson, former Chief Technology Officer at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center and veteran space technologist with a forty year career in aerospace, as he digs into the real engineering behind interplanetary travel, solar sails, nuclear rockets, and the future of humanity in space. From leading advanced propulsion programs at NASA to writing both hard science and science fiction, Les brings a rare mix of technical depth and big picture perspective.

In this episode, you’ll learn:
• How Les went from a 12 year old kid dreaming of NASA to Chief Technology Officer at Marshall Space Flight Center
• How solar sails and nuclear thermal rockets really work – and why they may be key to deep space and Mars missions
• What makes sustaining life on Mars so difficult, especially when it comes to radiation and long term survival
• How Les thinks about existential risks like AI, nuclear war, and quantum computing as “slow catastrophes” rather than movie style disasters
• Why he’s skeptical we must have a single “theory of everything” and how his liberal arts background helps him explain complex physics to everyday people