TED Talks Daily - The powerful promise of Earth’s harshest places | Lei Zhang

Episode Date: August 5, 2025

Clean energy visionary Lei Zhang loves the Gobi Desert — the most Mars-like place on Earth. Why? Because of the promise it holds to provide the free, abundant solar and wind energy to fuel humanity���s next leap forward. Sharing the story behind one of the world’s largest green hydrogen projects, Zhang shows how Earth’s harshest landscapes could unlock more energy reserves than the world consumes today, and encourages us all to get a little more creative in how we think about the future.For a chance to give your own TED Talk, fill out the Idea Search Application: ted.com/ideasearch.Interested in learning more about upcoming TED events? Follow these links:TEDNext: ted.com/futureyouTEDSports: ted.com/sportsTEDAI Vienna: ted.com/ai-viennaTEDAI San Francisco: ted.com/ai-sf Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

You're listening to TED Talks Daily, where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity every day. I'm your host, Elise Hu. Clean energy visionary Lei Zhang says clean energy is bringing about an age of possibility. In this talk, he brings us to the Gobi Desert, a massive desert that stretches across northern China and southern Mongolia, where one of the world's largest green hydrogen projects can be found. He shares how this and other barren landscapes hold more energy reserves than the world consumes today and reminds us all to get a little more creative. Where others see emptiness, he sees abundance.

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we share actionable insights from those leading change. Each episode features government and public sector leaders offering inspiration and practical strategies for peers across the globe. Download leading into tomorrow wherever you get your podcasts. This episode is sponsored by Colgate Periogard. You know, when we get a paper cut or nick a finger while prepping dinner, we don't hesitate to grab a bandage or clean it up right away. But when it comes to our gums, a little tenderness or bleeding when we brush,

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Mars like in the planet, barren and empty. Wind blows all year round. Sandstorms happens often. In the winter, temperature is as low as minus 40 degrees. In the summer, it reaches 40 degrees. It's useless. But it's my most favorite place. I come to Gobi with a belief.

I believe this could be the new space for our civilization. When people see useless, barrenness, emptiness, I see abundance, I see abundance. abundance if you look at the barren desert it is filled up with abundant renewable energy the strong wing and the shining sun they are infinite and never am i found out the important equation between energy and our prosperities two thousand years before in the Industrial Revolution, our global GDP only grew five times. Why? Because we are only able to use five times energy. Natural energy, agriculture then transferred to muscle power. Since industrial revolution, our global GDP expanded 100 times because we are using 100 times more energy.

So abundant fossil fuel energy has been turned and create forces to drive the machines, create materials like steel, create fertilizer to improve the food productions. Today, it's even creating tremendous intelligence for humanity. So how can we unlock such a big potential from desert to push humanity to a next level of prosperity? Because one hour solar radiation is able to meet our entire annual demand of energy.

It is free and it is green. In front of Gobi, we have to solve three challenges. The first one, how can we capture the rough and raw wind energy? Just as steam engine is able to turn coal energy into motion, we end up with wind turbine to capture wind energy to turn into electricity. Most importantly, is to really design the wind turbine is able to survive in the extreme wind condition in the desert. Secondly, how can we build avoiding to build a long distance

or thousands of miles transmission lines, which is costly and extremely expensive. We end up with the largest off-grid renewable system by integrating wind turbine solar panel storage with AI orchestrations. Okay, then the last remaining challenge, how can we utilize such abundant, locally made electricity? we end up with a solution to build net zero in the industrial park,

which is going to produce energy-intensive products like batteries and green hydrogen and ammonium, those green molecules. Why green ammonia? One ton of green ammonia is able to hold 10,000 kilowatt-hour electricity. Most importantly, the green molecule is so important for us to decarmonize our economic system. It's the most difficult hard-to-obey segment. The green hydrogen is going to be used to making green steel, to make natural chemicals, to make green aviation and shipping.

So, what's about today? just right in the heart of Gobi Desert, the first Nazero Industrial Park has been built. It is totally off-grid, 100% by renewable energy. It is making the state-of-art battery. But most importantly, it is the lowest cost of battery among or envision production base. Why?

Because there's tremendous free, abundant renewable energy. And we are also building in the desert the largest green hydrogen project in the world. 1.5 million tons, green hydrogen and green ammonia. The first phase

300,000 times, is commissioning now. We're not supposed to build the largest. Our goal is to make the cheapest. To make green hydrogen as cheap as great. Why the cost is so vital? Because history told us this 100 times energy growth is the result of cost reductions.

In order to unlock these tremendous renewables, we have to make renewable energy much lower than fossil fuel. There are two firm of energy. One is electron. One is a molecule. Today, renewable has already win the battle against electricity. So renewable energy is much lower on making electricity. But there's still another battle,

is green molecule, is about two or three times expensive than gray molecule from coal and gas. We have to make as cheap as possible have this cost parity to the grade. So we should redesign the entire energy system, and we redesigned the equipment, then reduce costs significantly.

So first, we designed AI-regulate the wind turbine, which is able to capture more energy, why reduce costs significantly. We are also designing the world, first hybrid energy storage system by combining lithium battery with supercapacitor is able to supporting grid with much less cost and we are improving the efficiency of electrolyzer by innovating membranes and electrode significantly in order to make the construction work in the desert much easy, much cheaper.

We designed modular prefabricate hydrogen plant, which is made the construction work in the desert is as easy as stacking Legos. And we are also developing AI physical model starting from predicting weather wind and the solar to manage grid automatically. So today, we already achieving the lowest cost of green hydrogen and green ammonia in the world.

But there's still some gaps. I believe within three years, by 2028, we are able to make such prosperity to gray. to gray. Why I'm so convinced, if you look at the last 20 years, the cost of wind and the solar have been reduced 90%. For the last of five years, the cost of energy storage has been reduced 90%. And the day, the green electricity still be a majority cost of green hydrogen. So by combining the significant improvement on the electrolyzer and the hydrogen factory, we are for sure to achieve such a prosperity.

By the time we achieving prosperity to grade for molecules, it is going to be a milestone for our humanity because we are going to remove the last bottleneck which preventing us to unlock tremendous renewable energy. It's last borderline. It is going to open the gate to tremendous new possibilities. Just imagine, as we repeated in the history, within next 100 years,

if we are able to use 100 times more energy, how the world will look like. We are going to harvest the soup intelligence with AR data center everywhere. We are going to desalinate seawater and turn the desert into green oasis. We are going to remove poverty even by producing our food and protein in the basement,

we are going for sure to reverse climate crisis by taking carbon from the air and turn into building materials. And we are even able to make interstellar traveling as a daily routine. So, where's the answer? The answer is just right in the heart of the desert. From Sahara in Africa to Middle East, from Australia to Gobi,

there are a hundred times energy than what we need. It's infinite, green, and free. It's up to our technology. So, ladies and gentlemen, this natural transition is not a costly burden for us. It is indeed the one and only pathway for us, for our humanity, to achieve a new way. new great prosperity. Thank you. Thank you.

That was Lejean, speaking at TED Countdown Summit, Nairobi in Kenya in 2025. If you're curious about TED's curation, find out more at TED.com slash curation guidelines. And that's it for today's show. Ted Talks Daily is part of the TED Audio Collective. This episode was produced and edited by our team, Martha Estefanoz, Oliver Friedman,

Brian Green, Lucy Little, Alejandra Salazar, and tonsica Sarmar Niven. It was mixed by Christopher Faisi Bogan, additional support from Emma Tobner and Daniela Ballerazo. I'm Elise Hugh. I'll be back tomorrow with a fresh idea for your feed. Thanks for listening.

This episode is brought to you by the Leading Into Tomorrow podcast from EY. We talk a lot on this show about ideas that shape our world. But what about the people shaping the future of public service? In leading into tomorrow, EY brings you discussions with government and public sector leaders who are navigating complex challenges and transforming their organizations to serve citizens better. From managing an evolving risk landscape to exploring how AI is reshaping government, these leaders aren't just talking innovation. They're living in and the conversations go deep. Not just the what, but the how.

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