Eli Dourado is Head of Strategic Investments at Astera Institute, a foundation funding transformative science and technology across energy, aerospace, AI, and other frontier sectors. Before joining Astera, he worked as a "regulatory hacker" at Boom Supersonic, where he helped navigate complex aviation regulations to make supersonic flight viable again.
In our conversation, we explore:
• How Eli's refusal to be pigeonholed led to a career reviving forgotten technologies
• How lifting the 1973 ban on supersonic flight could reshape aviation, after decades of stagnation and regression
• Why airships need to be massive to be economical, and how they could transform global logistics
• The untapped potential of geothermal energy and why drilling economics are the key bottleneck
• Why titanium could be the next material to undergo a manufacturing revolution
• How reading regulatory fine print can unlock trillion-dollar industries
• Why AI might not automatically solve our productivity problems
• The relationship between technological stagnation and potential civilizational collapse
• The fascinating possibility of harvesting antimatter in space
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Transcript: https://www.generalist.com/p/reviving-forgotten-technologies-eli-dourado
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Timestamps
(00:00) Intro and Eli's background
(04:11) Eli’s work at Astera Institute
(07:53) The frontier sectors Astera is betting on
(08:57) Eli’s path from academia to tech investing
(13:06) How Eli became involved with supersonic flight
(15:42) Why the airline industry entered “the great regression”
(18:38) The origins of the overland supersonic flight ban
(20:37) Working as a "regulatory hacker" at Boom Supersonic
(27:30) The current state of supersonic flight technology
(30:40) Eli’s cargo airship research
(37:20) What sparked Eli’s interest in airships
(40:23) Why airships fell out of favor as a way to travel
(42:53) How Jim Coutre found a path to profitable airships
(47:00) The pros, cons, and profit potential of airship travel
(50:08) A case for geothermal energy
(55:37) Understanding the “idiot index” and scaling titanium production
(58:36) Thoughts on AI and avoiding complacency
(01:02:00) The risks fueling a potential societal collapse
(01:06:10) Final meditations
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Follow Eli Dourado
Newsletter: https://www.elidourado.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/elidourado/
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Resources and episode mentions: https://www.generalist.com/p/reviving-forgotten-technologies-eli-dourado
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