{"podcast":{"title":"Liquid Assets","slug":"liquid-assets-6572676","podcast_index_feed_id":6572676,"rss_url":"https://anchor.fm/s/dc2b3d10/podcast/rss","website_url":"https://liquidassets.cc","image_url":"https://d3t3ozftmdmh3i.cloudfront.net/staging/podcast_uploaded_nologo/36838212/36838212-1686013601184-72c9258d41da3.jpg","author":"Ravi Kurani","episode_count":61,"summary":"From policy to profit, Liquid Assets uncovers the business and technological implications of water in a changing world.","last_synced_at":"2026-06-20T06:18:29.292133+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/liquid-assets-6572676"},"episode":{"title":"Plantd's Josh Dorfman: Building Homes From Grass, Not Trees","slug":"plantd-s-josh-dorfman-building-homes-from-grass-not-trees","published_at":"2026-03-07T20:45:50+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/liquid-assets-6572676/plantd-s-josh-dorfman-building-homes-from-grass-not-trees","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/liquid-assets-6572676","url":"https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/ravi-kurani/episodes/Plantds-Josh-Dorfman-Building-Homes-From-Grass--Not-Trees-e3g3bet","audio_url":"https://anchor.fm/s/dc2b3d10/podcast/play/116550557/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2026-2-7%2F419506051-44100-2-0367cc23de415.mp3","summary":"Ravi Kurani sits down with Josh Dorfman, CEO and host of Supercool, to trace his journey from sustainable furniture startups to co-founding Plantd, a carbon-negative building materials company using renewable grass to replace plywood in homebuilding. Josh shares how Plantd landed a relationship with D.R. Horton (America's largest homebuilder) for 90,000 homes, why he left the CEO role to launch Supercool—a B2B media platform spotlighting real-world climate solutions—and the innovations he's most excited about, from AI-powered HVAC to recycling rare earth magnets. The conversation explores how two former SpaceX engineers moved to North Carolina to grow miscanthus grass and turned it into structural boards that are stronger than plywood in all directions—yet feel identical in a construction worker's hands. Josh breaks down three macro trends proving the low-carbon economy is scaling, spotlights companies like BrainBox AI (cutting building HVAC costs by 25% and carbon by 40%) and Zum (using AI to cut Oakland's school bus fleet from 140 diesel buses to 72 electric ones), and shares the remarkable story of Aeroseal—a 1990s duct-sealing technology shelved for a decade that became a $400M+ company when the right founder came along. In this episode, we discuss: From Furniture to Carbon-Negative Building Materials : Josh's path from running sustainable furniture companies in Brooklyn to co-founding Plantd with two former SpaceX engineers, a company that replaces plywood with boards made from renewable grass, grown by former tobacco farmers in North Carolina. Making Sustainability a Drop-In Replacement : Plantd's boards are designed to feel identical to traditional plywood for construction workers, same density, same nail behavior, so adoption requires zero behavior change. The…","meta_description":"Ravi Kurani sits down with Josh Dorfman, CEO and host of Supercool, to trace his journey from sustainable furniture startups to co-founding Plantd, a carb…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":2311,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/liquid-assets-6572676/episodes/plantd-s-josh-dorfman-building-homes-from-grass-not-trees/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/liquid-assets-6572676/plantd-s-josh-dorfman-building-homes-from-grass-not-trees.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}