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THE FRONTIER LINE
Hosts Wayne Aston and David Murray explore the critical global pillars of infrastructure development and energy production, from traditional methods to future-forward advancements. The Frontier Line covers the latest industry news, energy innovations, and sustainability trends that are shaping the future. Through expert interviews with industry leaders in renewable energy, utility-scale battery storage, and waste-to-energy technologies, the podcast provides insights into the evolving landscape of energy efficiency and sustainable infrastructure. By focusing on the intersection of innovation and the politics of energy, The Frontier Line highlights transformative ideas and technologies poised to deliver cost-efficient, resilient, and sustainable solutions for global industries.
THE FRONTIER LINE
American Spec Industries
Witness the transformation of waste into wonders as we journey through the inspiring story of American Spec Industries (ASI). What if trash could be the treasure that reshapes industries? We unravel the drive and vision behind ASI, a pioneering force committed to revolutionizing waste management with groundbreaking extrusion technology. Join us as we uncover the military-inspired branding strategies and relentless pursuit of innovation that have propelled ASI to the forefront of sustainable solutions, all while battling the challenges of startup life and the quest for crucial funding.
Discover the art of sustainable design with ASI's commitment to cradle-to-cradle philosophies, inspired by visionary literature that challenges traditional recycling norms. Learn how ASI reimagines the lifecycle of materials, from everyday plastics to treated woods, and aims to steer society away from single-use dependencies. Our discussion paves the way for a rethink of recycling challenges and highlights how ASI’s inventive processes are remolding our interaction with waste, offering practical solutions that promise to reduce landfill reliance significantly.
Explore how ASI's innovations aren't just changing conversations around waste but are actively redefining what's possible within the rail and construction industries. Their termite-resistant and eco-friendly rail ties, tested successfully in Salt Lake City, stand as a testament to what sustainable industrial development can achieve. Beyond products, ASI's outreach to rural communities and international rail projects signifies a broader vision, striving not only for technological breakthroughs but also for meaningful economic and cultural contributions. Tune in to gain insight into these transformative initiatives and ASI's ambition to inspire a global shift towards sustainable production practices.
Good morning. Good morning, happy to be back in studio. Thanks for joining us again today, guys. I feel like we got some momentum here. We do.
Speaker 2:It's been great to talk about all of the different subjects, all the things where we are tackling in our world, and let's keep going yeah let's do it.
Speaker 1:The last episode we really keyed in on the Valley Forge Impact Parks and I slipped the teaser in there about another company that we've developed together called American Spec Industries, and so I felt like we better jump right on that one here, because I think we gave the cliffhanger for the listeners and really wanting to make sure that anyone paying attention to the show understands why we're doing what we're doing, which I felt like we articulated nicely in the last episode I think so but also provide a comprehensive perspective on how we're implementing the things we're talking about, because anyone can get up here in front of the mic and talk about energy, some of these subjects that we're trying to tackle here. Different thing altogether to try to stand up a business around some of this technology. That's right. So with that, I'll give you the floor to kick it off here, if you want, on ASI, on ASI.
Speaker 2:Well, so American Spec Industries is a company that actually and this is prior to even us meeting each other I had heard about a product and I knew a little bit about some of these composite products in the market, and I heard about a product that was coming in development and really had a lot of promise. Lo and behold you know this many years later uh, we've acquired the company, um, and we are excited to be bringing what they are doing and now what we are melding into everything we're doing and bring this new vision forward, because it really is the product. The more I talk about it, the more I hear about it, the more people say that's a world-changing product. You are sitting on gold. I'm like, no, this is something that's yes.
Speaker 2:As a business, we think it could be phenomenal as a product that could make a market difference in lots of different spaces. It's also that. So it's very exciting to be involved with american spec and what they're doing. So I mean, I I want to know you and I've talked about a little bit how did you because this is this is something started, this, this is something you have been working on prior to me, prior to us how did it happen for you. How did this all come about? Because here we are today and we're on the cusp and have you to thank.
Speaker 1:Yeah well, it is a cool story and I love to hear successful startup stories. I really, really enjoy hearing other entrepreneurs who push through all of these obstacles to make things happen. Having had the opportunity to start up dozens of companies, most of which never did anything, but having a couple that have done significant revenue or significant value, it's addicting. I personally kind of have this perpetual optimism, like I know what's possible. I feel like and maybe I'm overly optimistic about my own capabilities, but with American Spec Industries I met two gentlemen years ago I want to say maybe four or five years ago and they presented this technology that you alluded to hearing about many years ago, and they were referring to this as advanced extrusion technology, and as they explained this whole situation to me, you know, they explained that they had this way to basically turn trash into something really useful, and so the concept was really scintillating for me. I was like, oh my gosh, that's fire.
Speaker 2:Like wait, you can take trash and you can turn it into wait, we can use this stuff again. That was my first reaction, yeah.
Speaker 1:And so I dove in. I recognized that a prototype had been developed, so the product had been proven to some extent. Some testing had been developed, so the product had been proven to some extent. Some testing had been done.
Speaker 1:And I also looked at it from the perspective that I've never successfully raised capital on a tech startup. I've raised a lot of capital in real estate development or construction or different real estate deals, so I've been very in the niche of real estate financing and I recognize this was not that, and so you know I at first it was a. That's really cool. Let me know if I can help with anything. As my mind continued to kind of absorb the potential and I started to further, I started to kind of more deeply understand how far-reaching it could be. I'm like man, I've got to figure out a way to leverage what I I'm good at and and somehow fold it into this and get this sucker funded. And so started a new business, became partners with these initial guys, um, american spec industries. I'd like to talk about the names. We talked about valley for a little bit and they're not just pulled out of a hat.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean something yeah, they all mean something. Um, I didn't, I didn't want to, I didn't want to talk about some green material kind of name. That was forgettable and so, um, I came up American Spec Industries, kind of keying into the military and kind of the program, when we talked about that is kind of present in all of our businesses veteran owned, operated really strong military presence within the workforce. But you know, being in the military, there's this term called mil spec and everybody knows in the military, you know mil spec versus a civilian specification for any piece of equipment it's a much higher standard. You know helicopters, for example. You have you have a Sikorsky and that's a really nice commercial helicopter that you know purchase. But then you also have sikorsky's blackhawk which is, you know, a million dollar, multiple million dollar machine that has capabilities that nothing, nothing in the civilian market could, nothing. It's proprietary, it's so far advanced that it's not even available.
Speaker 2:Well, and on that I mean I'll say I mean I I've had that experience I've gotten, I've had the opportunity to fly in civilian helicopters and actually spend for a civilian, spend a fair amount of time in a Blackhawk. I was shocked at the difference. I mean they're just not even in the same category. Yeah, you know, one kind of takes off like this, the other one's just ghosts. I think they were explaining. It's like, it's like the uh, it's like the great four chevrolet pickup, whatever car ran like you know of the military, like it is. Just it's there, it's always going to work, it's you can beat the crap out of it. Dependable, dependable, wrong, yeah, right. And so when you talk about dependable strong and having that spec, that means something yeah, one of it.
Speaker 1:You know american made means something to me too, you know what I'm saying, and there's no great distinction of american made products versus otherwise, and so that's a big piece of the puzzle for us is this is an american technology made in america. These factories we're standing up are proud to be American and veteran operated, and so that's a little bit of the naming convention history there. But to dive into this technology, I wanted to test these claims because they seemed outrageous, like how do you take a truckload of garbage and turn that into something, into a viable product? Into a viable product, into a viable product? Now I want to make a distinction because you and I read several books earlier this year and I want to. I want to key back in on some terms we might have touched on early in episodes, but but everyone's familiar with the term recycling. Right, and recycling has, it feels like it had kind of its boom. It's still in some areas is a thing, but it's nothing like it was 10 years ago. It the the luster of recycling is far diminished based on logistics and what's happening in the world, and so there's this new term called upcycled.
Speaker 1:This particular product and process that American Spec Industries has is a true cradle-to-cradle upcycle. It's an upcycle process and technology. I'll refer to it as clean tech waste conversion. Yeah, clean tech waste conversion is what technically we're referring to this as, and this could, this could feature extrusion technology, could feature other uh, you know, hot press or different mechanical processes. It's, it's simple. There's no chemical involved in in what's happening here, but it's a combination of, of removing certain parts. So if we take a truckload of garbage in, you got to take metal, glass, some of those recyclable materials. You take that out anyways. Those have different uses, but everything that's left over in that pile of garbage, for the most part, has gone to the landfills, and so what we're saying is we can take that and through a combination of extreme heat and extreme pressure, we can convert that into something of value.
Speaker 1:It just happens that American Spec Industries has chosen to focus on products of critical national infrastructure. So these are products that have historically been used. Well, have historically been chemically treated wood products. So you imagine bridges, marine pilings, utility poles, railroad tracks, the rail ties underneath the steel rail All of those types of infrastructure have been traditionally over 100 years, by the way been built with these toxic, by the way. Toxic, chemically treated wood products, hardwoods of various types using creosote and other very harmful environmental chemicals. We, what we've done, is we've developed a way to replace those products with something that's far superior from a performance standard, but also from an environmental standard, and we'll talk about cost efficiencies as well as we get on into this. Okay, so there's. There's the backstory on how I got involved and kind of what it is that's developing, and here we are together now Absolutely Well, and I will say so, you, and this has been an education for me as well.
Speaker 2:And this is when we talk about the cradle to cradle and the idea behind that. And it was a book written, and I forget their names. The author's off the top of my head. You can go look it up. It's a good read for anybody who wants to read.
Speaker 2:They really took a good approach to this and what I've learned in it is sort of it's their thesis was it's a design problem. It's always a design problem, and we are designing products currently that really can't be broken. So we want to recycle them. Well, it's really hard because they haven't been designed well. So, if you want, let's just say you pick a table and you know that eventually, maybe it's no longer going to be a table. So we have this notion of, oh, it's cradle to grave, but instead of okay, well, how do we break that table apart? Well, there's glue in there, there's metal parts in there, there's metal parts in there. So it makes it really difficult, which is what, where you, where you, you talked about on the recycling front. Recycling is great, but recycling has its challenges because you've got to deal with all these other things. It's not just you can't just go put a piece of wood and go, okay, great, now turn it into. You know, take this wood and then either mill it down and put it into some other product. It's it.
Speaker 2:The thesis again of that book was let's we need to think about how, or or people who are doing these companies need to think about how you're designing these products from the get go. What are the parts, what are the and how can they be reused over and over and over again. So and and getting away from single use products. So, in the case of where we are with this, let's just pick plastics, and Plastics are a main component. You know we use, you know we're going to use them in our in, in, in this material. We don't care if there's food goo, we don't care if none of that. Well, we want to just give us our plastic. So, the plastic bags Well, there's different types of plastic.
Speaker 1:There's different types, why there are all kinds of different polyolefine plastics. Just there's different types of plastics, there are all kinds of different plastics, polyolefine plastics, just a distinction. In water bottles, yeah, there's the plastic material of the bottle and there's a plastic material of the lid Right, and those are two different things. Well, one of those is not fully recyclable If you don't take that lid part off.
Speaker 2:You ask anybody truly in the recycling if that lid doesn't come off, that little ring doesn't come off, that little edgy ring, they might just say we can't recycle that Right, and because it'll mess up the entire thing, and so it gets very difficult to do these things. So this is where this gets kind of exciting, because then we can say, yeah, we don't really care, we can use all of it. And in the case of plastic bags, plastic bags have been argued about, legislated against. All kinds of stuff have happened. You know, we use them at our stores, we get them, we reuse them at home. Eventually they may end up in a landfill.
Speaker 2:Now, the reason they haven't been taking them is because we have an overflow of plastic bags and it's the quality of the plastic. The companies that exist right now don't want them anymore, right. Which is like okay, now don't want them anymore, right. Which is like okay, we don't want to recycle bags anymore. Well, we still have them, right. That's where products and processes like ours with American Spec are so much more geared towards that cradle to cradle, like let's take the plastics that serve their purpose. They allowed you to carry food home. They were the tray for the food that you got home to eat, whatever it might be, and let's put them back into a product that can then go back out into the environment, break it down, break it down into a non-toxic way, but use it as a product that we're already using wood and usually it's it's it's wood treated with preservatives that are not typically healthy. Yeah, and let's, let's replace this stuff. We don't have to rely on as much lumber. We can take the stuff that is also creating a problem for all of us garbage and actually start to use it in meaningful ways in in meaningful, non-toxic, non non you know impactful ways on the environment.
Speaker 2:We want to rid the world of some of these problems. We want to get rid of landfills or help them diminish landfills, not add to them, and right now there haven't been any. You know, I'm sure there are out there and I'd love to hear more companies who are trying to tackle this problem. This is our solve. Our solve is let's take the stuff that we've all thrown away, that we've used once or a couple times and thrown away. It's at the end of its life cycle and get it back into this cradle to cradle. We're going to continue to rebirth this Even for our products. They could get out there theoretically and maybe be in use for 30 or 40 years.
Speaker 2:Let's just say, eventually, maybe one breaks or cracks, we take it back in and start right over. We take that thing, we don't throw it away, we take it back in, it becomes feedstock for a new set of whatever it is. Maybe that day we're making something else. We're not making rail ties, maybe we're extruding a utility pole? Sure, so it goes from rail tie to utility pole. So that bag is now in things that are actually helping us. That's right, and instead of us having to continue to grow, forest or deal with all these things which are it's a real impact. Um, we 'll still need wood product, we're still gonna. We're still need all kinds of wood products, but it lessens the need for them and and solves a major problem in the process well, talking about feedstock, dave, you know there's some really interesting key things.
Speaker 1:You mentioned the plastic bags totally relevant. There's also plastic straws that seems to be in the headlines. Yeah, what about used tires? That's also a major problem, major problem of how to dispose of used tires and all the rubber and the steel in those tires. And I'm talking about not just car tires but mining tires. If you, if you look at like kinnikot mining operations with these huge earth moving tractors, these tires are, you know, eight feet tall, nine feet tall.
Speaker 2:They're massive, massive had one on my playground when I was a kid yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1:Everyone yeah, that's right. Everyone has had one of those tires on a playground yeah yeah, those, those are not.
Speaker 1:I mean, those are not. There's no real effective way to dispose of those, and so our solution can reconstitute all of that. Those are a few examples. If we dig into feedstock, so getting into the weeds, here what we're doing is we're building a facility called a MRF or a materials reclamation facility. Within that MRF, on every one of our project sites, we can receive train car loads or truck car loads of waste. Each facility is being designed to process upwards of 500 metric metric tons of waste annually. That's a lot. Okay. We feel like if we get enough of these facilities online, we can start to move the needle on reducing landfill mass From there.
Speaker 1:As we receive it, it's sorted. Those handful of valuable recyclables are sorted and sent off. The rest of it continues to go through a sorting process. It goes through a separation process, a washing and drying process, and then it is split, chipped, pelletized and reduced down to basically an aggregate that looks kind of like the paper insulation you'd imagine blowing into the wall. It's kind of a gray, colorful, almost paper-like looking aggregate. That's what the process is to create feedstock, and then there we can take that feedstock in commodity scale and put that into each of our machines and do whatever we're going to do with it Produce the rail type, produce the utility pole or whatever it is we want to extrude or press at that point. Again, no chemicals involved in the process. So as we expose this to extreme heat, extreme pressure, there's an interesting chemical. There's an interesting chemical. Maybe we call this a reaction, but what comes out on the end of this is a carbon negative product, rather than having a chemically treated toxic product.
Speaker 1:And let's just talk about rail ties for a second. Everyone is aware that rail ties should not be used in landscaping and in fact in many municipalities it's illegal because they've been deemed toxic. We know it'll leach into the soil. If you try to build a garden with vegetables in it, it could kill you if you use these toxic rail ties and plant your vegetables in close enough proximity to that. But the environmental issues of rail tracks leaching into the soil are far-reaching.
Speaker 1:So there just hasn't been historically a better solution. So for over 100 years the rail operators are it's cost-effective, it works, it meets the safety standards. This is what we're using, and I would dare say that just based on the fact that there have not been a commercially viable alternative that is carbon negative and also affordable and also can meet the safety standards is the reason why there hasn't been a widespread adaptation or migration to something superior. It just hasn't been there. Adaptation or migration to something superior, it just hasn't been there. We're aware that you know, there's a small fraction, maybe five to seven percent of the entire railroad market consists of concrete ties. Concrete ties, again, use up valuable mineral. They use lime, they use different chemicals in there that aren't cheap, aren't inexpensive, and there's a lot of disadvantages to using concrete tiles in a rail system.
Speaker 2:Well, and they have to put in place a whole new infrastructure just to install them. New tooling, new tools new fasteners.
Speaker 2:They have seemingly been willing to do. They want to try new things. They want to try things that are more efficient, perhaps less impactful. It's just, the options that they've had to look at aren't great and there have been some attempts at composites, but they are old composites. This is the, not to name any names. But if you've built some decks and you've used some of the composite materials, you've realized very quickly the limitations, especially after one summer of warping. Absolutely, you know. That's where we, you know, we feel like we know we've solved that, we've gotten past that. We've. We've gotten past the the structural deficiencies of a lot of composites because of our proprietary solutions, and that's a game changer, we think.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Let's just touch for a minute on those specifics of nomenclature of the product, because these are the exciting sales points to a community or to an operator of why this is so exciting, to an operator, of why this is so exciting. So what we're talking about is we're talking about being able to convert upcycle waste into a carbon-negative product that has the spanning and tensile strength of steel, yet it can be cut with traditional saws and tools, fasteners that can be used, the same as wood fasteners. So the same rail spike you'd use in a wooden tie you can use in this material.
Speaker 1:Um, you're talking about a product that is fire resistant and we're we're trying to r&d this to make it fire proof. Okay, uh, it's mold proof, which means that it's ideal in seaboard communities where we have high humidity, high moisture content. We were just talking to a very prominent figure up in one particular state close to us talking about an area where the utility poles, basically, are installed in the ground and they have water for several feet deep For irrigation there and some farming, and, yeah, several feet deep, and they discovered that there's nothing left, they rot out.
Speaker 1:It doesn't matter what kind of treatment you put on that wood. Yeah yeah, with time it's going to rot out. We're talking about a product that is termite resistant and pest resistant. So, unlike wood, this product that we're producing with waste, you're not going to have any. You know what do we call that Pest? Any pest risk with termites or the like. You're also talking about a product that is not susceptible to freeze-thaw conditions.
Speaker 1:You alluded to the deck material and I won't name the names either. We all know who they are, but we know that that material is really flexible. It expands and contracts in the heat and the cold's not structural. It's not designed to be structural, it's more of a cosmetic uh. It could be used in fence or deck, but it's it's rare to be using something like that as a structural uh component. That's why it's not used in construction of homes, right? Um, this product that we're able to do with American Spec Industries is not susceptible that. It does have the rigidity to qualify as structural cross-member. So you could build a huge bridge for a train track with this material without the freeze-thaw expansion element to it. So, given all of that nomenclatureature, comparing it to wood. It's far superior to wood. When we talk about warranties, our studies have shown that that the the average lifespan of a wooden, chemically treated wooden rail tie requires replacement every five to eight years, depending on where it's location.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and depending on the weight, the weight the rail, what they see, could be, you know. So you get 12, 14, 16 years out of them, but that you know it's not as long as you think. That's right. I mean, what we know is that the you know, the rail industry replaces every year Millions and millions and millions of ties. Two companies alone, the numbers are about 10 million ties just to the big guys a year just to replace their existing ties, and so it's a significant. We don't have, say, the train infrastructure of some of the other parts of the world, right, where we have massive train infrastructure. I mean, this is something that's a real issue for them and they're replacing it all the time.
Speaker 1:And it's just part of their budget. One thing that I found was pretty shocking, as we hired third-party professionals to produce a study for us on the North American rail tide market, just so that we, as business owners in a startup, could clearly understand the lay of the land, big question for us was how are these millions of rail ties being disposed of every year? When they pull them out of a track after its life cycle, then what happens to them? Well, the answer was not exciting. The answer was well, there is no disposition plan. We basically, they basically are stacked up stockpiled.
Speaker 2:There used to be. Companies would take them and they're not selling them anymore. I mean, they're not to your point, like people used to buy them for gardens, everything else. Well, that market's gone away. So and that's right they're. They're just stacking them, they're stockpiling. Yeah, they don't know what to do with them in many cases.
Speaker 1:So this is a commodity level problem. This is that, like this is a commodities level lumber problem where we've got all these, you, these, these rail ties that are no longer serviceable, that have been removed from a track, that don't have a disposition plan, and so how unique for us to be able to go in, collect those rail ties, extract the creosote from that wood, dry it split it, chip it Very environmentally friendly way to deal with it, how it needs to be dealt with appropriately.
Speaker 2:That's right.
Speaker 1:That's right and break that, tie down into allotized particulate what we call aggregate and reconstitute that into the mix that we're using with all of the other waste products that are going into the ingredient.
Speaker 2:There is no. Generally speaking, there is no cradle to grave for Reltas. It's. We do these things, they're one use products and then they just sit there. There's really, you know, historically there have been some recycling. They you know parts of the industry have used different preservatives. You know they would say less toxic than creosote, but still Copper sulfate. Yeah, there's still some concerns over long-term impact. Either way, these are sitting, they're not being used. It's cradle and the grave is somewhere else. Well, we are saying no, no, they don't need to go to the grave.
Speaker 2:Also, here's how we can also help this whole industry is we can take these, we can solve that, also that part of of the problem and take those that have been used. Trees are already growing, they already felled the trees, made the ties, all this stuff. All we need to do is get the toxins out of there. Fortunately, there's some good partner companies out there that are already tackling that problem and saying okay, help us solve this. Then we take what's left over and put it right back in, and that goes right also into the feedstock. I mean it's getting into this cyclical solution of like, how do we take the existing problems and turn them into solutions, as opposed to eyesores or things that are sitting on the sides of railroads. And you know, next time you're driving next to a railroad, look, you're going to find dozens or hundreds of ties just kind of left, and it's because they're trying to deal with it as well, and there's no easy solution.
Speaker 1:So disposition of old rail ties or utility poles or marine pilings falls squarely within the scope of us focusing on reducing landfill mass. To us, it's it's waste product that that's not being properly managed or properly disposed of, and it's nice to be able to include some of these ancillaries into that equation of landfill reduction. Had a really interesting series of conversations two years ago it's an ongoing conversation with authorities in one of the African nations and we were talking about the railroad expansion plans and you know they shared with us that Africa by and large has a great ambition to expand rail all over the continent. But it fast turned into the conversation of electrification and we learned that only about 30% of the African continent is electrified, meaning there's a vast amount of electrical development and infrastructure to be done. There's a vast amount of electrical development and infrastructure to be done, and they shared some frustration with us about the traditional means of procurement. Specifically, they had investors who had recently spent a little over $300 million planting a forest in order that they could grow these hardwoods so they could harvest and use for utility poles, in order that they could grow these hardwoods so they could harvest and use for utility poles. And as we got into this conversation and helped them understand what we were able to do with our extrusion technologies, with waste, the corollaries started to light up in their minds like oh my gosh, not only do we not have to wait a decade or more for this thing to grow, we could have it now and we could be eliminating a massive problem which is our waste management problem. We could kill two birds with one stone and have a superior product.
Speaker 1:And then we got talking about some of the advantages of the utility poles, of this nomenclature, like fire resistance. What happens when a massive forest fire blows through a city, like in california recently? Right it, and wipes out all of that utility infrastructure? Right, it'd be helpful if you had a utility pole and withstand thousands of degrees and and and open flame. So it's, it's not just novel. It's not just a novel upgrade or superiority in the product. It's a utility advantage of the product that I think will save anyone willing to use it. Anyone willing to upgrade their systems will save, you know, billions of dollars in the long run.
Speaker 2:Well, and I, you know one thing I, I, you know, I wanted to ask early on. It's like why hasn't anyone done this? Why is it? I always ask OK, why hasn't this been solved? What is the what's the blocker?
Speaker 2:The more I've learned, the more I've talked to you know the science, the scientists, the engineers behind this and really understood this is a really difficult solve. It's not something that is just easy to bring about. Not something that is just easy to bring about and and so now, and so, understanding that I understand why there haven't been better solutions to date, because it is not easy. It's still not easy. I mean, that's that's why you know we're we, you know we're, we are jumping into the mix, lending our expertise to move this forward, because we realize that it's a challenging, challenging prospect and so. But we also see the value, we believe the value, we see the vision and this.
Speaker 2:You know we talk about all kinds of things, but we know when we solve this, we solve massive problems. Yes, we'll have a successful business and this will be great and all the things. But this is the kind of thing that really does start to change, perhaps, how we deal with some of these. Well, not perhaps, but how we're currently dealing with our landfill problems. It changes maybe how we build certain things, the materials we use, the reliance on other types of materials. Yeah, it's competitive industry. There's going to be probably a lot of groups that don't want us because we're going to be natural competitors. Our thing is like look, we're using trash and we're making a lot of it, and so you know there's a lot of trash to deal with and we know, feedstock wise, there's so much garbage out there. Yeah, unfortunately, we know feedstock wise there there's so much garbage out there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, unfortunately, we're not going to run out of it. Yeah, um, and, and that's a and. We know that and we know that we all, we know that we offer this superior solution. Ultimately. That doesn't mean that other groups can't solve it. It just means that we are now, we want to be, and I think we will be part of that's that solution set. One thing that you hadn't mentioned yet that impressed me is the insulation factor on this stuff. It's astounding. It's astounding. So you start thinking about some of the potential uses for a product like that and having a product that has a great, has an amazing insulation factor, and so it just keeps going and going and going and I go okay, this is too good to be true. And then, having held the stuff, seen the stuff now, reading all how it's been deployed in the ground for over a decade and how it's lasted and how it's gone through all the tests, no, it's the real deal.
Speaker 1:Well you're absolutely right about that, you know, and one of the one of the biggest um misnomers when I talk to investors about the product is does it smell or is there any off gassing? Does it leach into could it much into a wall or drywall, something like that? And the answer is no. Uh, because of the proprietary heat and pressure, there is no smell. It's funny because there actually is a smell.
Speaker 2:Do you know what? Did you hear? What the smell is when they, when they manufacture, when it's processed, when it's processed, yes, it smells like cake. It smells. It smells like a baking cake. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, that's right. So which is like? I guess it does have a smell.
Speaker 1:If you hate the smell of cakes, you're not gonna like this, right, you know but well, the the off gassing is a serious issue because if we were ever to go into an environment where we were trying to permit this or extrude, you know, dimensional lumber for construction, for example, off gassing would be a it'd be a non-starter, like if you had, if you had, smell or residue that came off of this. You could never use this in that type of application. Right, you might could use that in a rail tire utility pole, but but it's, it's a bonus that it's, um, that we don't have those issues. And so, um, I just lost my train of thought. No, that's all right.
Speaker 2:I looked at the clock and lost my train of thought because I, I feel like we're going to keep going and I'm like, okay, we got, you know, make sure we're trying to keep them, you know. So you hold to a certain rough time, that's okay. I well, that's okay.
Speaker 1:Well, back to your point. That's what it was. You made a statement about having rail ties in a line. So that's one of the things Dave is. When we talk about how difficult it is, it's important for the listeners to understand that we're way past concept on this. So, technically, this is not a startup. Technically, we have the prototype machine. There are prototype products that have been laying, installed any line of track in salt lake city for over a decade. If you go out and you walk this line of track and I've done this a number of times and taken photos you can tell a massive difference of the wood ties that are split, all the heck and we're put into the same time.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, there was one of our ties, one of their typical ties, and they had the oak ties. They were falling apart. That's right. Now they need to be replaced, that's right. And the only thing with ours is like oh yeah, the steel leaps a little bit of color from the steel, that's it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they look almost brand new, not chipped, not not split, still intact, and that's exciting because we've been able to prove with the prototypes that it's viable and we've been able to also have the testing done to meet all of those rail line standards to show that you know it is viable for all of the reasons and meets or exceeds um deflection standards and and and and other specific to rail line operations that you'd have to meet.
Speaker 1:And so making the distinction raising capital for a startup versus something that's proven in a prototype is a much different deal. It's a whole different deal is a much different deal. It's a whole different deal. Now, still, because I don't come from a background of raising capital for tech startups, it felt like it would be prudent for us as a team to go and develop startups, industrial projects where we could provide a home to a company like this. So if we could create enough momentum with a well, not even traditional, but a a robust industrial development plan that could provide the power, that could provide rail access, could provide all the things that this type of factory would need, then wouldn't that be a cool setup that we could, we could sell that, we could raise capital for that, which is what we've done, which and continue to do.
Speaker 2:That's the circle. That's where we are is. This is why, why we are what doing, what we are we've. We think we were trying to solve all these things in a, in a I go in a synergistic way and this is what's come out of it. That's right.
Speaker 2:All of the other things, it's like okay, we've got, we want power, but we want, you know, we want, we don't want to just to be, we see this as a green product. Well, it is a very, very, very green product, or carbon negative product. We want to keep that. So we've got to have power. That's. What can we do with renewable power? What can we do so that that led to this, that led to like okay, let's understand that.
Speaker 2:What other companies are out there? Oh well, there are companies that can deal with the other part of the feedstock that we can't deal with. Right, that would be interesting to team up with them, because then we're we're reducing the amount of infrastructure needed for to come. Well then, if we're doing these kinds of power solutions, well then, what's you know what? And data centers, and this is where this all starts to work together, and that's right. If to bring around the synergy of of where we are today, and you know. So it's it all. I think I would say it started with americans back yeah trying to solve this, solve it.
Speaker 2:How do we? How do we, how do we do this in a way that's meaningful? How do we, how do we raise money the right way? And I'm going to say this you know, I see it a lot and I think AI has changed this a little bit. I mean, I see some AI companies that have actually been just a few years in business and have like exploded, although the, the technology and the intelligence, has been building for years. But you know, most people see, I mean you and I have seen, because we've been plenty on the, I mean on the on the fundraising side, on the business side you know, when we see, oh, they're a startup, well, usually it's like they're a 10-year startup.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, yeah, so many of these projects are like it's when the public finally learns out, learns about a company, chances are they've been around in some iteration for a lot of years trying and kind of getting their foundation under them, and then, when they finally do make it, it's like, oh, my gosh, they finally made it. Wow, this is a start. Like no, no, no, they started eight years ago, they started 10 years ago, they started 12 years ago and it's been this constant progression. So I mean, I look at it kind of like this We've done all of that stuff, we've gotten all of those things for this company out of the way, we've gotten the prototype done, we've solved those things, we've gotten the study. Now it's a matter of okay, it's the next iteration of this, right, yeah?
Speaker 1:Well, and it's a beacon of an example from construction standards. We touched on this in a previous episode. But setting a standard for the park, the Valley Forge, invictus Parks of a manufacturing company and a plant that has net zero standards, extreme efficiency standards, the most cutting-edge water reclamation standards available, all of these things are being designed into these facilities, these production facilities, for every American spec industries plant. So you've got that MRF and then you've got the production facility.
Speaker 1:Well, that's our, one of our ways of showing other manufacturers hey, for not much extra you can implement this and this. And here are the savings. This is how this pencils. Here's the financing mechanisms or tax incentives we were able to use to make this a much more efficient building. Here's how we were able to bring advanced creosote extraction to the table without releasing these serious carcinogens into the air that still meet the highest standards for the EPA of air quality. So these are all really important components to the design and the building of the actual facility, let alone what the product is, but the actual building of the building itself. I just wanted to underscore that here as we kind of wrap up, because American Spec Industries is committed to that standard of excellence from the ground up.
Speaker 2:And it goes to our belief that we do this the right way and we invest in the right kinds of things. Invest in in in the right kinds of things, it will benefit the community the most and those communities will be our lifeblood. I mean, you know they will, they will, they will want this, they will support it, they're going to be working there, they're going to be the ones doing this, and so we want it to be something that they're very happy to go to work every day. They're very happy to say sure, I love this in my community because I don't feel like it has an impact at all. In fact, it's actually raised the standard of our community. That's our goal, absolutely. It is finding that synergy between community and our Valley Forge Parks and we think it's possible, we think we can do this and we will do this and it will work and we will set that standard for everyone else to say see, you think about this a little bit ahead of time, not that people who develop don't think about things, but you kind of reconfigure how and how you approach these. Well, you might be able to solve and check a lot of boxes, and I think that's one of the things that's attracted me from the initial get-go is your vision for that, to solve that?
Speaker 2:So this is from how everything is done. It's always in my mind how is everybody winning? Are we all getting? Is everybody getting what they need out of this? And how do we do it better? Right, and continuing that process and leaving, you know, leaving ourselves, uh, an opportunity to show that, um, we can invest, reinvest back in in many cases, in many cases, rural America and stand up and help these communities that have been the lifeblood of our cultures and our states and our I mean everything, everything we are, and make sure they don't go into, you know and disappear.
Speaker 2:We understand that. We understand that balance, that fine balance of like these communities are struggling. We're all going to the big city and they are and they don't want their way of life changed and I can respect that. So how do we do that? How do we do a big industry without changing their way of life markedly, where they can be very proud and happy that they have this wonderful community, but then it has the financial bedrock that is going to allow it to continue to progress into the next 40, 50, 60 years, absolutely.
Speaker 1:And for any of the listeners who want to explore a little bit more about Valley Forge Impact Parks or American Spec Industries, I'd invite you to go to the websites. Yes, we've got an amazing web development team. You can go to valley forge impactcom or you can go to American spec industriescom. They're both informative sites you can read up, you can contact us. So I'd invite you to do that and thank you for joining us. Thank you so much.
