Can Desalination Solve Water Scarcity? | Sachin Nair, CEO @ Hydron

Oh, today on the show we have Sachin Nair. And as you can see in the background, we also traveled for this episode. I visited Sachin in the laboratory outside of Allentown, PA. He is the co-founder of a company called Hydron. Hydron is a desalination company that is a semi-finalist in the Global X

Prize for water scarcity. If you don't know what that is yet, it already sounds amazing because of the name. But you can look it up if you want more information. We talk about it in the episode. So you can just do that as well.

But Sachin has an awesome perspective on not only what it looks like to go from lab to commercial deployment, but he also has a great relationship to entrepreneurship. He had a very steady corporate job for a long time, had this idea that he knew could change the world, and felt the responsibility, which is a

theme that we see on the Grove, but felt the responsibility to bring this impact to the world. So it's very inspiring conversation. I know you'll find it as well. Thank you as always to our sponsors, CleanTech Growth Lab. If you're looking to grow in CleanTech, they are the people to do it with. And

the producers of this podcast, Grayson Friends. And with that, I give you Sachin. Oh, welcome to another episode of The Grove. Shout out to our sponsors mentioned just before this. But without them, it would not be possible to interview awesome people doing awesome things like Sachin. Welcome.

Thank you. What's going on? So, big topic of the day, desalination. Sure. Other topics, water scarcity. What are we going to do? There's all this information that I've been exposed to recently about the state of water, the interest in water, investment vehicles, people that are getting excited or worried, you know, whatever's driving capital, but desalination is a

very interesting space, very interesting solution to certain problems in general. You have a very interesting approach to it. So, before we get into what it's been like to grow this company and where you guys are going, if you give a brief introduction of yourself and what you're building.

Sure. Suchin Iyer, I'm co-founder and CEO of Hydron. We are a water technology company trying to solve this huge environmental issue. And we're in the desalination space. Right now, we're just focused on oil and gas wastewater. But desalination is a global problem, right? Anytime you make anything that uses water in the chemistry,

now you end up, once you make your product, you end up with that wastewater that is very salty. The same thing with drilling for oil. And you drill for oil, it comes with four to five times water than oil.

Then what do you do with that water is the question. Cuz it's too salty for a lot of technologies, and that's what we're trying to address, right? If you talk about an environmental problem for our generation, this is one of them. And that's one of the main reasons for me to do this.

Quick introduction of myself. Yeah. I'm a chemical engineer by training. And I build new chemistries that come out of the lab. How do you How do you scale that up? How do you make a larger plant? How do you build large facilities that can build or make tons and tons of material, right? That's been my

background and that's my experience, and I'm bringing that to Hydron. Where we are taking this from the lab, as you see here, into commercial units that we're building up. So, then question, did you ever imagine you would be a founder?

Or did something happen at some point you "Now I'm going to do it." No, this was this all came about together. This is an idea I've I've had for a while and uh me and my co-founder Sarah, we we met on Y Combinator. We started talking about the problem.

And uh and it just came together. It was just um not premeditated. I didn't think we would form a company like this. But then the question came up, you know, who is going to do this? I have a lot of friends and I was in the oil industry as well that uh that talk about this kind of

waste water and uh and it was a time, you know, to see, "Okay, let's give it a shot." And here we are. So, what what was what was that moment though? So, you said you and your co-founder met on Y Combinator.

Yes. So, I guess there was a moment in time where I guess that would have been after you had decided to pursue it or maybe you were messing around with the idea. You know, when was it that you came across uh this approach or desalination the concept um and what was the process of going from, "Okay, no

way I would do this." to, "Maybe I'll do it." to now we're here, you know. Yes, so there was a process involved. Once we talked about this this idea and uh obviously I do my homework. That's the first thing. So, I had a full-time job before this Mhm.

and I continued doing that while I was working on this conceptually to see if all the numbers added up. You know, as an engineer, it was important for me to figure out if if the technology is going to do what it's supposed to.

And this is not a new concept, right? There's there's this concept's been around for a while, but people have never implemented it the way we are doing. Mhm. So, went back to the drawing board, did the numbers, and convinced myself first that this is doable.

And then ago was that? This was about a year ago. Okay, yeah, great. And and then we we found this lab space here at Ben Franklin Technology Ventures. There was a lot of startup companies as you saw. Well, after you met your co-founder, right?

Yes, so you had convinced yourself that it was doable. Yes. And then you said, "Okay, first thing I'm going to do is go to Y Combinator?" Or did you do something else? No, so that we met on Y Combinator and we talked about the problem while we were there, right? And then the question was and at the time I had a

full-time job. Right, yes. So then question was, "How do we take this forward?" Yeah, yeah. And there was no way you could develop a technology like this part-time. And and then sure enough quit my job and here we are.

Well, that's a massive decision to do that. So, it is. I think just you know, the the reason I like to cover a little bit about the personal journey, you know, outside of building the technology, commercialization stuff is cuz a lot of times growing a business comes down to the people. And there are so

many people that have great ideas and they pursue it for a period of time and they just don't go through with it for long enough or consistently enough. Or they never leave the part-time job, you Or sorry, the full-time job. The the opportunity is always there and then you never jump off the the deep end. So,

Yes. So, how how is it that you made that decision and if there was somebody that was listening that is in a similar position, has this idea and maybe it's Hopefully it's not a a competing technology. [laughter] But if someone else, you know, has a full-time job, they have something very impactful they could bring to the world

and they're just not sure about leaving a full-time job, What do you say to that? A startup, from what I've known or known at the time, requires a undivided attention. There can be no part-time. It has to be something that you you feel from the inside.

And and that's my case. I was like, if this has to succeed, it has to be at 100% on my effort. And there was no ifs, ands, or buts about it. And I just said, let's do it. And I think that any kind of startup requires that kind of attention.

Uh and uh and this is a this problem requires that kind of attention from someone like me. I looked at uh obviously when you do a startup, you look at who else is doing this. And I did that. And I looked at the teams, and it was very clear that someone with my

background can get this done. And uh convincing myself to do that, that was the first thing. And the second thing was convincing my wife to to accept that. You know. So, if uh if there's other founders out there who are who are trying or who have great ideas, but they want to do something uh

I would recommend take the leap. The younger you are, the better. [laughter] So, um but uh but in our case, uh I had 100% support from my family. Incredible. And that's important, you know. This is not an easy journey.

Yeah. And uh there is ups and downs. Uh there's a lot of downs. And uh there are some highlights, you know. So, it's like it's Can you survive that? Right, right. And um yeah, jumping full full on was the only way to do it.

Well, thank you for doing that. Thank you for making that decision. Cuz uh we wouldn't be here today talking about it. So, if that decision happened around a year ago, would you say? Yeah. So, around a year ago, um two questions for you.

First, is there anything that came from your career, or your life even, before a year ago that has significantly impacted the way that you choose to navigate this experience? Uh and then second, over the last year, what have you learned?

Sure. So, I have always been part of teams that build out new techs. And typically in an R&D environment in a large chemical company, you you work on a project couple of years, you take it through commercialization, and you move on.

And uh so, you see a lot of different things. And I would say half the things that I worked on didn't go anywhere uh in these uh in these roles. And and and you pick up all these things that technically for uh that may not work. And that's what we're we me and my team is bringing

to the table. We've done this for so long, we know it technically what where things are going to break. Mhm. And what what not to waste time on. Mhm. And so we're so when and I looked at, like I said, the other teams working on this kind of problems, these kind of technologies,

and I didn't see the depth of experience that that we may have. Mhm. So, um so that is what we're Great. trying to be how we're trying to be different. Uh because, like I said, as a problem uh the this requires this kind of attention.

Mhm. And uh yeah, so that's been our our goal from the beginning. And uh and I guess I'd say, you know, other than other than the fact that there are a lot of doubts, is there anything that the last 12 months has taught you that you're bringing into the next 12 months.

Oh, 100%. So, most of this comes from um from our customers. So, when we talk about this kind of technology, their feedback has been critical. We For example, you know, we we we we are a qualified team for the Xprize Water Scarcity Contest.

Congrats. Thank you. So, our our So, you know, we we built a demonstration unit for that. And um our initial thinking was we'll build a much larger pilot facility, so that we can demonstrate the technology. But, when we went out to our customers, they were happy with just that smaller demonstration unit Mhm.

um being deployed at their site. And so, we we we we said, "Okay, that's what we're going to do." So, you have to be agile. You have to be flexible enough that uh your plans can change every other day.

And so, that is one important thing that I've learned that And that is a core strength for startups. Right? As a As having part of uh being part of larger companies, uh you couldn't do that. Cuz you have four layers of management you have to get approval for for changes. And in our

case, we make turns on a dime. Right? And that is very advantageous to us. So, a customer comes to us with a water sample, we get that get that turned around in a couple of days. Yeah. Uh so, this really gives us an edge. And um and we you know, that that's one of the

things I've learned. Um and also the the freedom, right? Um you get to pick what you work on on a particular day, depending on what the demands are. Yeah. Um and uh and that also is a is a core strength for startups, right?

And and that's why you see this trend among If you look at like traditional chemical industry, they grow and grow and then at some point split off because the efficiency is just lost. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right. But well then let's let's cover our bases uh and just talk about what desalination is. Just to cover it. I will say

just from one of my uh recent podcast episodes, I learned for the first time that desalination is not just water or sorry, not just salt from water, but it's uh ions from water. Right. true? It is true. Huh.

Cool. [laughter] So yes. Yeah, so what is what is desalination? Desalination is like anytime you take uh any component out of water, right? Like it need not be So salt can be like typical like table salt, like sodium chloride. Uh it could also be magnesium chloride or all these other components that that are just dissolved in the

water. All right, well the problem and and depending on the industry, with oil and gas, it's it's a lot of sulfates and and chlorides and and other things in the water. So if it's uh from base from a textile industry, it's going to be very different based on what the process is.

So um but how do you take that salt out of the water? What technologies do you use? And that is desalination. And once you once you take those hard components out of the water, what you get is clean water, which you can use for all kinds of industrial purposes. You can also use

it for drinking or egg purposes, right? So that is desalination. So how how has just a brief history of the era I'm going through, um the whole story of desalination, but how did the current makeup of the market come to be? You know, the first instances of it were 60s? I have no

idea. Right. But uh you know 50 years ago, you're right. Huh. Yeah, well I'm on a roll. [laughter] So you know, so so the first instances of it were back then. Uh I know desalination happens at wastewater facilities. For example, you're talking about industry, oil and gas. So, how did how did it come about that the

desalination industry is where it is now? All right. So, the first method of desalination is boiling off the water. Right? You boil off the water, you condense it, you get clean water on the other end. That's that was the only known way to do it.

But, that takes a lot of energy, right? In the last uh you know, 50 years ago, 60 years ago, there was a lot of new polymers that was that was invented at DuPont. One of the places I worked at. So, the the plastics made it possible to make a filter that can filter out the salts.

Right? Um so, that was where reverse osmosis comes in. What it is is you push the clean water through a filter at high pressure. Only the water gets through. Everything else stays on the other side. And then, at that point, you're after a few years, the filter dies, and then you replace it, get a new

one, just like your filter at in your house. So, that's how um desalination really works, and that's the history. So, 50 60 years ago, you built a lot of these um polymer systems, plastic membranes, and it's grown, right? Almost all of the Middle East drinking water is coming from seawater osmosis uh systems. And um they

have limitations, which is uh on how much salt. So, eventually, when you push something through a filter, it gets clogged. Sure. And uh what we're trying to do is get around that problem because we are not using a a filter in our process.

Okay. That's how it's different from other technologies. So, then so then, good transition because that is one of our next questions is uh you know, what you guys are doing in the field. But, basically, you're saying that there's really just two halves to the story, which is first that method that you spoke about where you

evaporate the water and then capture it and then second is reverse osmosis. Is there really not been any major steps, I guess, or changes in that timeline? That's right. That's right. Yeah. So, that's So, those are the two main the thermal technology, so you can evaporate the water using heat boil it off and then

you have the plastic the membrane systems. And this is what we're trying to do is the third type of desalination system. And and this See, every every technology has its own like um you know, advantages and disadvantages. Ours is only looking at waste water that's really really salty that these other technologies cannot work with. For

example, when you boil off water with a lot of salt in it, that salt, once the water boils off, the salt is going to deposit on the surface of anything that's heating up and then eventually it's just going to scale it, right? Then you have to scrape the thing off or clean it off somehow and it's it's going

it's going to be very difficult. So, what we're trying to do is not not do that. Our technology does not have that kind of heating surfaces. So, now is Hydron. So, you made it. So, so how did it How was it that you came across this new method or you know, cuz it's

it's it's always it's always amazing to me to learn about history of an industry that has been as extensive as desalination that has been dominated by two approaches and all of a sudden we have you know, a new approach that that that is seemingly viable. You know, how how did you come across this and why is it that

you're convinced that that this has a place? Right. So, with Hydron, we looked at where are the bottlenecks. The bottlenecks is how much energy do you need to run your process? Cuz that's defines your economics. So, we try to look at all the technologies out there, see how can we reduce the overall energy footprint to desalinate.

That's how we came across this idea. This is not a new idea. This literature to do this the way we desalinate has been in the literature for the last I don't know, 30-40 years. Okay. So, what we said is, okay, why hasn't it really taken off?

Good question. Right. So, it is based on the economics. So, what we did is, remember I was talking about doing the homework? Yes. Is go back to the drawing board and say, okay, what does a num- what do the numbers look like? How can we make this five times better?

And that's kind of what we've done. Uh we've taken that, we've spent enough time in the lab to make what's out there five times better. Now we are economic. Now this can compete with every other technology that is out there. Before that, there was this huge gap.

Yeah. And people didn't wouldn't want to adopt, right? So, that's the the job for any startup. You need to have that advantage over other technologies. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Right. And also the need is there. For example, in Texas, the oil and gas water has no place.

So, right now, you cannot put it underground because when you put it underground, it causes earthquakes. Sure. Right. Or if you have to store it above ground, but you're making 20 million barrels a day. Yeah. How much can you store above ground?

Sure. Yeah. So, that's so So, right now there is a huge demand for this technology and they're willing to pay. Right. Right. Right. So, that So, that closes the the price um you know, gap. Sure. Okay. So, we have this idea. Uh, you you did the homework. You convinced you guys you yourselves uh we can get a little bit

into the technology. But, what I'm most fascinated by is now you have this novel approach to something extremely difficult. How do you go about getting your first getting the first customers? The first the the cuz a lot of times in these industries uh the slowest moving industries hard to pay industries nobody wants to be the first and second or the

fifth. Everyone will be the the 10th. They're like, "Hey, come on. Do it." you know, but uh how how have you managed to uh to build your first partnerships? So, we've been lucky enough and our business is based on on price.

What we're saying is you know, we will do this for a third of the cost of your disposal. So, our customers are paying, let's say, a dollar per barrel of water to dispose of it, get rid of it.

Is this just cold outreach? You just call them, say, "Hey, we'll do this for you." Conferences, uh you know, contacts in the industry. Okay. So, uh and um and once we reach out to them, say that, "Okay, this is our price point. You know, we'll say we are 30 cents a barrel." And they're obviously interested.

Yeah, yeah. Uh so, at that that point it's our job to convince them that our technology actually can deliver at that price. Right? And we have done enough homework in terms of our pricing and our design and our engineering to convince them that, "Yes, this is possible." Yeah.

Plus, we have been testing their waters in our lab. Yeah. And we have shared our results with them. Yeah. So, for them, now it's taking that leap into saying that, "Okay, this small thing in the lab here can deliver what they're saying, but can it actually work when it's Right.

10 times as big?" Right. Or 50 times as big. Right. So, that's why that's why we're building this out in stages. So, our demo unit is much bigger than what you see here in the lab. Yeah. It's uh it can do, you know, 5 to 10 barrels a day.

Yeah. And we've already run that for X prize. Mhm. And it can it can deliver the the results. Wow. So, then the question is the next step. So, you know, you go in stages. So, then so then at the at the very beginning you went to conferences and you reached out to contacts in the

industry and you started with um uh you started with tests in the lab. Yes. To validate. Yes. [clears throat] So, once once you had enough validation, how was it that you went uh you know, how was it that you financed? How was it that you uh established the relationship with with a partner to be able to deploy a pilot on

site? Was it Was it just an evolution of that existing relationship or was it again a new Right. So, we have been testing their water. We have relationship with their technical team. So, they understand how we work, what kind of technical data we provide in terms of our testing. And we share whatever we

can in terms of the technology. And that's enough to convince their technical team Okay. that this is viable at this price point. Okay. And then the question is, obviously, these systems are not run by people sitting in their offices. It's run by technicians out in the field and they have to be comfortable with this. So,

that's what we're doing right now. So, we have one small demonstration unit that we are deploying to a customer. And we want to build multiples of these to go to multiple customers. So, that's that's what we're doing right now. So, in that way we integrate the technology very early on with their with our customers' teams. And they're

comfortable with it because it's it's a step change. Looks doesn't look like any other membrane system or any other desalination system. So, they have to get accepted by the people who are going to run this. Yeah. And that's what we're doing right now.

So, to the extent that you can discuss it, what is specifically the the innovation that that you guys have achieved? Right. So, it is to what our process does is it's a liquid that sucks up clean water like a sponge.

So, you mix our liquid with dirty water, it picks up clean water, and then we warm it up. And once you do that, it rejects the that clean water it sucked up. So, it's like squeezing the sponge on one side.

And you keep doing that, right? So, you you pick up clean water on one side, you squeeze the sponge on the other side, and you keep doing that. So, this liquid just goes around in a closed loop. So, that's why it doesn't really matter how much salt there is because it's only going to pick up clean

water. And that's it. Wow. So, what what do you what do you see Okay, so two questions. First one's I guess not specifically related to your trajectory, but there's there's a really interesting conversation at this event in New York that I went to around water technology, and it was about the viability of a market for after

desalination, the the brine that's left over, mining that for for the nutrients inside of it. So, Yes. Is there anything that you guys have to do with that because it's your technology, or is it still up to the the company to do with that brine that they would like?

See, oil and gas customers those those are our biggest customers right now. They their biggest problem is the disposal water. How do you get rid of this stuff? Sure. So, what we're saying is we'll clean up at least half of it.

Sure. Right. The rest of the half, they're just going to do whatever they were doing with their original water. So, you know, they save on that 50%. Okay. Right. But, if we have to extract like like lithium, there is quite a bit of lithium in in this produced water that we can extract. So, but we're not really

focused on that right now. There are other technologies, other startups, other companies who can take our concentrate and take break pull out lithium or iodine or any of the other components. And and we are work talking to some of them.

But, but that's not the focus for the company. Great. So, well, thank you. Yeah, I was curious. But, so then as far as as when you're seeing something that's very close to my heart is commercialization, is go to market of technologies like yours. And so, when you're looking at let's just say oil and

gas because that's where you're focused at the moment, where you're looking at the market for oil and gas companies, how how is it that you anticipate navigating that space? Is it leveraging again the existing relationships? How do you anticipate, you know, getting in touch with new ones? Are we talking about specifically, you know, America

and Texas? I I think on the phone we spoke about Canada and something like that. So, yeah, what what are your thoughts around positioning yourself there? With oil and gas, it's not a huge you know, customer base if you think about it. There is five or six large players, you know their names. And then they hand

over the water to water processing companies. And there is maybe 25, 30 of them. And just in the US, but they're all and that is the depth of the market and the customer. And we've talked to at least half of these water water processing companies. And uh they they are really interested. So,

in terms of us getting a market penetration, as long as we can convince a couple of them, the news just spreads. We don't have to spend any more time on convincing others. And that is really uh and every and everybody is connected. It's not like this huge customer base that we need to

address. Yeah. Uh so, in that respect, we're pretty lucky. Nice. Okay, okay. So, so then uh in in the same way, uh I've spoken to uh a couple other people in the space. And just like anything, I guess it surprised me cuz I knew nothing about desalination before um you know, interviewing uh a bunch of people in the

space on this podcast. Uh but it's it's something interesting to me creating a technology that specifically addresses a certain kind of waste water. Cuz in my again, my ignorance, like there's just dirty water and it needs to be cleaned, you know? And so, there's and so, there's a lot of different kinds of uh

waste water. And there's uh a lot of different kinds of technology, some that are built specifically for some kinds of um waste water. So, how is it that you know, how how many of the technologies the desalination technologies that exist are looking to address uh this similar space, which is uh the extracted water from oil and gas

or mining, maybe? Um and how many of them are are more I don't know, waste water facility treatment plant oriented, you know? How like who else is is playing in this space? Um there is obviously all of the traditional desalination technologies, the thermal technologies that are pretty much very mature. Okay. Then the membrane-based

reverse osmosis, forward osmosis, these kind of technologies that are also fairly, you know advanced in terms of who the players are the the big players and they build you know multi-billion dollar facilities out in the Middle East providing critical drinking water for for the communities and so those that system is established what we are trying to address is the

other waters that cannot be treated Right. efficiently and the player there are a few startups in the space Sure. and we're all trying to do the same thing Okay. working on similar technologies different configurations and frankly there is enough business and there is as far as I see it this is not a competition

Mhm. we all need to succeed and that's where I'm coming from because there is so much water to be treated Mhm. in Texas we make like I said 20 million barrels of water a day. That's enough to supply New York City for 8 months Mhm.

so this is the amount of water we make in a day so you know I want all of us to succeed and each of the technologies is specified for a particular waste stream. It makes us really focused and make sure we succeed in that you know lane Right right.

so instead of us you know looking at five different types of water chemistries and water chemistries are all different and how they interact with your system or your technology is also different so if you try to focus on multiple different kinds of waterways it's like saying there is crude oil then there is like gas then there's diesel

then there is you know so that it's just like that the chemistries are so different right so you have to you know fix and focus on one lane and that's what we're doing So is so is that then the vision for the next 12 months, let's say, 12-18 months.

That'll be the vision for the next 24 months at least. 24 months. 24 Focus on oil and gas wastewater and get ourselves through the pilot phase and to the commercial phase. And then we'll see. Great. Um some something that I wanted to make sure to cover uh in the in the theme of going to market and

commercialization is that uh you're here, you're doing this, you know, you have your experience. You got great energy. And you know, I love for this problem, which I love. Uh you have your co-founder. I'm excited to meet to add some, you know, some day. And and your team of uh of interns. How has it been for you to

um to delegate, you know, to to hire the the talent needed to to fuel this? It is It is critical. Uh as as an engineer, that's been my greatest blessing, I would say. I just had great mentors who who guided me.

And this is what we're trying to do even with the company, right? This is not a sexy space. You probably heard from other founders. Water Everybody thinks takes it for granted, right? Yeah, I think it's fancy you ask. I think it's pretty sexy. But no, I appreciate that.

Yeah, so so that's the thing, right? Everybody's talking about the newest, latest technologies out there. But water technologies have Everybody thinks it's mature, there's nothing more to do there, right? So, how do we bring interest to this this area? How do you bring new new talent?

Sure. And that's what we're trying to do here, you know. So, we have a great team of uh young uh engineers and they're excited about this problem. And um the the thing with oil and gas has got a bad rap, you know, it's because it's uh you know, if you talk about global warming, if you

talk about all these issues with pollution. But even if we have everybody has an electric car, you still need plastics. You still need all these components that come from oil and gas. You cannot replace it. The best way to fix this is to make it clean.

Right? And how do we bring people on board so that they are excited about this problem? That's what we're trying to do. Yeah, I think that's such a I It has been brought up a number of times in a few episodes. And it is something that has drastically changed my own opinion about climate change, about this

you know, the the the biggest umbrella under which what we're talking about, you know, climate tech, all this you know, making it clean, all of this stuff. And the the shift in perspective of looking at it and saying oil and gas we've you know, for uh for whatever reasons have very significantly built the foundation of

our society on top of. And so I had a very interesting conversation about what a transition looks like, which is a different conversation, but the reality is we do need it like you're saying. So, the approach is to not demonizing it, but looking at it and saying this needs to change. This is a huge reason why

we're in this uh position in the first place. But it's not like we can just uh have it disappear. You know, things would fall apart. So, so I appreciate you bringing that up. So, I have two more um two more planned questions for you. And the first one is uh what is the biggest hurdle for you

right now as far as uh growing Hydron? And how is it also an opportunity? So, our obviously as all startups, our biggest hurdle is capital. So, we need capital to grow. We need capital to deploy these units. And this is a hardware intensive process.

We have to make stuff that needs to get deployed at customer sites before we can generate more business. That's just the way it is. And that requires a lot more capital than if you think about like, you know, a software business or or or any any service-based business.

Right? So so that is that is our biggest bottleneck. And the second thing is obviously talent is a problem. You know, the the new generation, we want them excited about this problem. Uh especially with water and engineering, uh it's difficult to find the right talent, I have to say.

And so we're trying to bridge both. And that's why we have relationship we are here at Lehigh University. Uh we have their IBE program interns working with us. Uh it's been a fantastic cohort this year. Cool. I'm really happy to shout out Then Freight with partners.

Yes. And uh and Lehigh so that's that. And it's a it's beautiful outside as well. I'm not getting paid to say that. But uh so so the last thing then, af- with all this work uh to be done and the importance of what you're working on, what inspires you?

Oh, I can see how this is going to turn out at the end. And and that's what drives me, you know, like I can see, you know, these commercial units cleaning water at at these sites for our customers, you know, and in broader making, you know, usable water for for all kinds of new purposes,

which really didn't exist. You know, and it's it's something that that just drives me. It's like um it's like finding, you know, a new water source like completely out of nowhere. Right? That didn't exist. So yeah. Well, that uh that definitely inspires me. And I'm really uh I'm really excited uh, personally about your technology and and

what you guys are building and uh, that's why I wanted to come out here and do this. I appreciate it. you for coming. Yes. If anyone else was uh, inspired to get in touch or follow along, what's the best way to do that?

Uh, you can find me uh, on at hydronacell.com. So, that's one place and uh, and we're also on LinkedIn. And all social media. So, reach out. Uh, come work for us. That's right. Come explain the come explore the technology and uh, um, yeah. That's that's uh, let's let's fix this.

Yeah, that's right. Awesome. This was a wonderful conversation. Thank you so much. Well, thank you, Blake. Look forward to the next one. Okay, absolutely. All right.