Deep Dive: Kevin Yuen, Steve McArthur, and Alson Niu, PONTUS Proteins

As the global population grows to 10 billion by 2050 we will need to find new ways to feed everyone. As our water resources and productive agricultural land get stretched thinner and thinner we will need to find new and innovative ways to produce food! In today's episode we are discussing two innovative approaches to producing food which are very water conscious and that could be providing our food sooner than you might think!

Today we're discussing Aquaponics! Did you know that you can produce fresh vegetables and plant based proteins anywhere in the world using less water than it takes to shower with aquaponics?

You'll hear from the team from Pontus Proteins, an aquaponics company out of Vancouver, BC. Connor, Alson and Steve are taking aquaponics to the next level by integrating robotic harvesting, artificial intelligence and vertical farming.

Interested in learning more about Water Lentils and why you need them in your life?  Click here for more information about PONTUS proteins!

The Aquatic Bisophere Project
The ABP is establishing a conservation Aquarium in the Prairies to help tell the Story of Water.

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.

Transcript

David Evans: 0:20

Welcome to today's deep dive episode. Today we're talking to Pontus proteins about what they're doing to revolutionize agriculture and how we can grow food for the masses in downtown spaces in our cities, how we can bring agriculture to everyone, and how we can do it in a sustainable way. So I'm so excited that I got to chat with Connor Alston and Steve, the brains and the big thinkers behind Pontus proteins and their conversation with a lot of fun I had a great time I think a really enjoy so sit back, relax and get ready to learn about water lentils and why you need them in your life. water we doing? And how can we do better? your one stop shop for everything water related from discussing water to use and the organisms that depend on it. For all the global issues that you really never knew all had to do with water. I'm your host, David Evans from the aquatic biosphere project. And I just want to ask you something. What are we doing? How can we do better? All right, I'm so excited this week to talk to the team from Pontus. Now, they are revolutionizing the future of food production and how we're doing that in Canada. They're putting in so many different new technologies into aquaponic systems. And I'm so excited to chat with them about what even aquaponics is, and what the future is for this kind of technology in Canada. So, guys, welcome to the podcast. Can you all just introduce yourselves, and give us a bit of background? Thanks, for sure. Thanks

Connor Yuen, PONTUS Proteins: 2:49

so much, David, for having us on here. My name is Connor Yuan. I'm the CEO of Pontus. You know, we're really looking forward to showing everybody you know how our system differs, how we can be able to grow things in more of a sustainable way. And I'll throw it over to Steve just because He is the creator of this technology, and has done such a phenomenal job. And really good close friend of mine. So

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 3:08

Steve, thanks for having us on. So yeah, I'm Steve, the Chief Technology Officer of Pontus. We've been at it for just over two years now. We just turned public. So that's one of our biggest milestones. Our next is to build the facility that we've raised the money for. Oh, in Surrey, BC. So yeah, quick background, I've been in the aquaponic space for, Oh, geez, something like 12 years now, at least in terms of where my interest started. And where my research started. In 2014, we built a little prototype or not even a prototype per se, but a, you know, an r&d facility, a small little 1000 foot, there's 1000 square foot facility where we were growing all sorts of different things from, you know, flowering crops in the in the middle of winter to, you know, every lead is possible, basically, if it was green, and if it came from a seed, we tried growing it and then Pontus came to be because we, we were asked if we could grow water lentils with aquaponics. And the quick answer was, of course, it's been done. Then the next question from there was Okay, can we commercialize it? And short answer is yes, yes, we can.

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 4:21

Yeah, so I can just myself, my name is Alson Niu. I'm the VP of Pontus Pontus protein. Very excited to speak with you and let everyone know how we plan to create a better future, and to rethink everything we know about food, and you know, what is good for us?

David Evans: 4:39

Awesome. Well, I'm so excited to have all three of you on today. This is really exciting, an exciting project in Canada. Can you just give me an idea of how how did this project get started? And where did Pontus come from? And what gets you guys so excited about it?

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 4:56

So I was mentioning that there was someone that came to us asking if we could grow water lentils with aquaponics from there was an exploratory, you know, building out a little testbed right with the greenhouse that we used to have the small one. It was originally designed to grow lettuce and all sorts of leafy greens microgreens herbs and spices kind of thing. And so I carved out a little Little area of that production and say okay we're gonna do some experiments with water lentils and ordered some started growing them and just they took over man like he just grows so freakin fast that you know I was doubling this space needed to keep expanding How many times did we do it I started with eight square feet right so like a two by four space yeah a little netted it all off, cordoned off a little section of the of the waterbed and said, Okay, you guys can grow here. And then within within days it was clear that like, Oh no, this stuff is like taking over or it wants to right. And so then we started realizing how, how incredibly quick this stuff grows, how much harvest that you can get every day. And then from there, it was just tons of experiments, we grew to a section of with 32 square feet. And then we're really able to start experimenting with, you know, how much can we harvest per day? You know, do we harvest 20%. And you know, what happens the following day, what happens if we harvest, you know, 80% of the bed, what happens and then we kind of dialed it into like, okay, we can harvest anywhere between 30 to 40 to 50% of the bed without any problems. And you know, we're figuring out what those problems are. If you if you harvest too much, you end up having algae issues, because there's too much exposed water and therefore, you know, the nutrients in the water plus the plus the whole of the season, the nutrients plus the lights end up becoming just breeding grounds for algae. So you have to combat that. But if you if you don't harvest enough, there's issues as well, because it grows so thick that it starts to choke itself out almost in a way like it's competing with itself. So yeah, we're kind of dialed in that sweet spot of how much we can produce. And then yeah, it just kept expanding. So eventually we we got rid of all of our latest production decided like, okay, let's, let's do this full tilt and had the entire greenhouse dedicated to Wonderland to production in different experiments. So we we started with different blends as well. So instead of just the the one that we originally ordered, we ordered five more from the Rutgers University, they have an Emporium they call themselves where they manage 1000s of different strains from around the world, whether it's Wolfie and microscopies from India, or lemna minor from well actually live in a minor. It's kind of everywhere now too. But anyway. So we we did some exploratory investigations on like which strains were best and why we thought they were best put some hypothesis together, and then started testing some stuff. Testing, if you know, one strain outgrew the other or if they were, you know, like as a competing or if they're more symbiotic. And yeah, it's been it's been interesting. We've dialed in on a recipe of a blend of five that we're going to market with. And that's kind of where we're at with with the commercialization on that side, besides, of course, the scale. So we went from 1000 square feet to the facility that we're building in theory now is just over 20,000 square feet. So a literally a 12x on the scale of the facility.

David Evans: 8:44

Yeah, that's a huge jump.

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 8:45

Yep. During that experiment, that's when me and Connor and Steve realized, well, I think we have something very interesting here in the form of water, lentils, especially with the attention around plant based protein. And the fact that the technology that Steve you know, developed is so revolutionary in the way that it grows things that it's it's actually taking plant protein to take making a different level in terms of how sustainable is how good it is for you and how clean it is in the way that we grow it.

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 9:11

Yeah, Connor and Connor and Olson, the three of us were really in it from the very beginning. As soon as soon as the answer was made of, yes, we can grow it. We came together and like Okay, let's do this. fun adventure ever since. Yeah, yeah. We're at a great place to like, I'm sure you've seen the press releases, like we just raised the 3.2 million for the for our first facility.

David Evans: 9:36

Yeah. Congratulations, guys. That's huge.

Unknown: 9:38

So we basically we did a financing at 15 cents for the 3.2 million that we raised to construct and build out the 20,000 square foot facility even though we actually leased that property, so we didn't have to build the building. But there will be some tenant and tenant improvements that need to be done in order for us to be fully operational. But attached to that financing at 50 cents. We also did a full warrant at 30 cents. So once those are exercise, they'll allow us the kind of company to have an extra$6.4 million of additional income to operate and be able to expand into different areas.

David Evans: 10:13

Wow, that's awesome guys. You guys are crushing it in this field. That's I'm so impressed all about water. lentils and I mean, I haven't really heard too much about water lentils myself. So yeah, I'm, I'm so curious about water lentils and, and aquaponics. So I'm sure we'll get to why water lentils? But can you guys just maybe go through a little bit of what is aquaponics? And? And is it really different word for just aquaculture or hydroponics?

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 10:43

Common misconception but short answer is it's it's neither it's it's in fact it's the combination. So maybe you could say it's both, but it's not one or the other, it's it's absolutely both. It's the combination of hydroponic kind of technology where you've got plants growing in water. Normally with hydroponics, you're adding, you know, you've got some sort of mixing basin where you're adding a little bit of chemical, a little bit of chemical B, and then you know, maintaining certain nutrient levels. So you might add a little bit more magnesium, or if your irons a little low, or the plants are going yellow, that might add more of another thing, you know, so that's a constant kind of monitoring until you really dial in on that recipe. And then, you know, the pros and cons of hydroponics. I mean, hydroponics is usually quite expensive on water, you're, you're draining that water basin, or that mixing tank, you know, every 10 days or so flushing it out and adding a new mixture. And it's just generally expensive for to get those nutrients. And then also, it's not really great for the environment, like it's mined and manufactured ingredients. Okay, so then let's shift to arco culture. Aqua culture is just the farming of fish is really all that's really talking about, I guess, I guess it could be things like shrimp and such as well. I mean, it's kind of open ended. But it's a seafood farming essentially. But anyways. So aquaculture by itself isn't a great solution. A lot of aquaculture facilities are kind of this experiencing similar things, but for different reasons that they're also having to exchange their water very often, because the nutrient load coming from the fish, right? Basically all the effluent that they're creating the ammonia from the gills, as well as the the solid waste that they're producing, has to go somewhere. So with an aquaculture facility, you're constantly flushing this either to a field or to, you know, a sewer or septic tank, or however you're dealing with it. And, you know, inputs wise, you're, you're, you know, you're buying fish feed, and you're maintaining the water and everything. So so that those are the two differences. Now, what aquaponics is, is it's kind of like a match made in heaven in the sense that you take the pros and the cons of both hydroponics and aquaculture you get, you get all of the pros, but none of the cons. So so you have the nutrient load that's coming from the fish that gets utilized by the plants, you're no longer having to buy nutrients for the plants, it's all coming from the fish, you still have to pay for fish feed, of course. But that's we can we can talk about the finances later, but are the operating costs and everything. But if you if you'd like to dig into the details there, but it's minuscule compared to the revenue that you're getting at the other end. And then the really, really big one, though, for not just for operating costs and everything, but for environmental concerns is that your we don't have to flush water anymore. Right? Right. So we boast about it all the time in our in our social media posts, and everything is saying that we recycle or reuse at least 95% of the water. And I'm going to be doing like a really granular analysis of our consumption. And essentially, our sewer usage, I guess, going forward like this, that is next coming year, we kind of be quite analytical about it. But I'm certain that we'll be able to show it's even better than 95%. Like, we're expecting to only need to draw something like point two liters. Point two is at point two gallons or point two liters. Off the top my head I don't remember, per hour and it's like over the year that's nothing like it's it's you know, using a shower uses more water than we're using

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 14:30

is a Steve for the basic people or that the people that don't have a basic understanding of aquaponics do you manage explain to them like the process of what it actually is? And then the benefits to both parties in terms of the plants and the fish in the system?

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 14:44

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I'm kind of jumping all over the place in terms of economics.

David Evans: 14:51

money away from me Go for it.

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 14:54

Now he's actually good at keeping me on point I can get lost in the weeds sometimes. Let me tell you about the science. So in general, what aquaponics is all about is the like I said it's the combination of aquaculture and hydroponics so really higher level it's it's a combination of fish and plants. Most importantly though it's the the right amount of fish to the right amount of plants right there has to be a symbiosis there of nature. demand from the plants versus nutrient output from the fish right then just to make it a little bit more complicated is that there's a third player that we don't really talk about too much, which is like the biological engine, something that you might appreciate with your their biology background is that there's two different types of nitrifying bacteria, specifically nitrosomonas and nitrobacter. That are responsible for converting the effluent from the fish into the plant food so so aquaponics in general, is this like trifecta golden ratio of the right amount of fish to the right amount of bacteria to the right amount of plants, and to make it all in one ecosystem so that everybody's happy. So Steve, I think that's a really good point that you just hit on right now, just cuz I think of a lot of people who they hear we grow plants using aquaponics. They just imagine a big pool with fish in it and the plants on top, right, so it's much more intricate than that. So maybe Steve will just allow you to kind of explain the cycle and how that works. Yeah, so we don't have him growing in the same body of water. We actually have 10 different fish tanks that the fishers are, you know, swimming in throughout the facility. 910 11 Actually, I just counted, there's 11. So live in fish tanks. And then there's one large basin that we call the mbbr, which is the moving bed bioreactor, which is giant, sorry, which is a giant body of water that has a bunch of surface area available for the for the bacteria. So that's where we're farming essentially the nitrosomonas and nitrobacter. And then in a bunch of in another room in basically sealed away and another biosecurity room is our giant racking or shelving that have these water beds that are coming, you know, like picture a bathtub, except it's only about six inches of water, it even less than that, say five inches of water. And then this this, this bathtub is eight feet wide. And 144 feet long. So these massive water beds that the water lentils are growing on and then we haven't been shelved so that we're lighting them with LEDs. And then there's just enough space between the water and the LEDs to have a robot that's able to go in there and do our harvesting for us.

David Evans: 17:38

Wow, robot harvesting. That's so cool. Yeah, we've

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 17:41

named him harv.

David Evans: 17:44

Our

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 17:45

Yeah, so hard stands for harvesting automation autonomous vehicle, just because engineers love acronyms.

David Evans: 17:53

That's awesome.

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 17:55

Yeah, the coolest, the coolest part about this. And Steve touched on it earlier is the fact that it's it's very a symbiotic relationship between all parties here. Because you have a problem where when you're farming, fish, agriculture, traditionally, that is basically spending the entirety of his life in his own waste, right. As Steven talked a little bit more about how it works, but as far as I learned this is that fish, they basically pee through their gills or skin as ammonia. And then we have bacteria that uses that ammonia and converts it into plant food for the plants. And because we're doing that, then we're also in exchange cleaning the water for the fish, so that the water that is slimming is always clean. And that's why we're able to recycle so much of it as well. CVV just

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 18:39

Yeah, no, that's, yeah, that's quite accurate. Yeah, absolutely. You got a buddy.

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 18:44

Yeah, so um, we're very excited about kind of being able to take this into the limelight, because there's a lot of other things that we account for, we plan to use solar energy, which is a huge plus, right, because we're lowering our energy consumption even more, as well as the fact that it's almost like a laboratory environment where we're completely bow secure, which is a huge issue with contaminated food sources and food security that we might see in the next 50 100 years that we're tackling here. As well as the fact that we can use this technology to grow plants everywhere, anywhere, so that countries don't have to spend so much energy shipping containers across the world, just so that they have bananas, you know, across the country, instead of just have it locally grown, because we have the right climate for indoors. And it's a completely secure zone, and it has its own climate, we're able to grow plants that should not be able to grow in their environment, or that time

David Evans: 19:37

of year. Right. That's so cool. Like, yeah, you can just grow basically anything as long as you have correct nutrients and and the cycle correct. So I guess you guys have plans for bananas in the future or something like that. Just a little hint there,

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 19:53

that I just threw bananas out there for fun. It doesn't stop. It doesn't start and end with water, lentils. But we just want to do one thing right first, and that is innovating the plant protein sector. But then from there, obviously, we're not going to stop there, right? We're going to walk through and take Steve's technology and really impact the world and be able to educate a massive variety of on a global scale of what this technology can do for us. Yeah,

David Evans: 20:18

so either On the like, when we're talking about this technology, is this being used a lot in Canada? Or around the world? is this? Is this something that we've been using for a while? Or is this really revolutionary now and it's starting to grow?

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 20:33

That's point. That's a great question. The short answer is that aquaponics has been around for I was gonna say centuries, but I mean, that's, that's undervaluing it. I mean, the Aztecs had a version of, of aquaponics. The Chinese early Yeah, the Chinese have had a version of aquaponics going back

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 20:56

in Egypt, too.

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 20:57

That's right. Yeah, Egypt as well. I mean, the way that the Aztecs did it is that they they repurposed a lake and they turned the top surface of it into like a floating kind of garden. So essentially, the they made these Reed rafts that would then be planted with soil and there was gaps between the reeds so that the plants that they put in the soil could dip or sorry, dig their way down and drink drink straight from the nutrient rich water because there's fish in the water. And then the Chinese have been doing it with a combination of crops plus carp. I believe it's carp anyways, and, and yeah, so. So in terms of like, you know, generally using fish to provide nutrients for plants that's been around for a crazy long time. In terms of commercializing it, though, it is relatively new. So back in, I think it was 1979 is when Dr. James Wood cosi put a research facility together in the University of Virgin Islands. And it's been the him and his colleagues that really revolutionized the commercialization of this, we're actually turning, you know, things like lettuce production, leafy green production, into something like what Ponte is is doing now, the innovations that Pontus is getting behind is on the automation of side of things. So so we're really proud of our Siva system, the vertical aspect of growing. So the facility that we're moving into, or sort of renovating, or however you want to meet the facility that we're releasing, anyways, it's 30 feet tall, in the inside. So it allows us to really maximize that space. And or sorry, it challenges us to really maximize that space, rather, and so are our harve that I was mentioning, is able to go up on wall basically all the way up to the ceiling. But there's you know, we're planning nine rafts, or raft beds or water beds, I should say, full of these lentils and, you know, a human safely can manage the first three levels kind of thing. Whereas harv will be able to go all the way up in terms of revolutionising the or, or innovating the the octophonic space. Yeah, going vertical is one of two of the really big things, maybe even three of the innovations on or have the entire industry. I mentioned three. So I'll touch base on the other two real quick. So the second one is the difference between a coupled aquaponic system versus a decoupled oncoplastic system and the biologist and you would be able to appreciate this, I think so. The typical aquaponic system is like I've described before or a couple couponing system is basically one not necessarily body of water. But one ecosystem of water that's held at the same temperature, it has the same nutrient levels, basically, throughout, you know, the pH is the same, you know, all of the like the specific parameters that you'd be measuring for, whether it's, you know, ppm of nitrogen or right, it's basically the same. Yeah, yeah, it's fairly homogenous throughout the entire system. Whereas what we aim to do, what we've had engineered is a decoupled chronic system, meaning that the fish side of things of the facility, so 10.5 metric tons of fish throughout the year, they're swimming around in their own ecosystem in their own kind of loop, I suppose I should call it and then the plants are in their own loop. And then there's a third loop that allows for nutrient exchange between the two but but the the flow rates in these ecosystems are really important. So there's on the order of about 12,000 gallons per hour in circulation on the fish side, and same on the plants on the on it side. But then there's another loop at about 12 times less of is the new exchange loop, so about 100 gallons an hour. And so so that's actually pretty dang important though because it lets you change the temperature or some of the system parameters of each side without messing with the other side. Right so so on the on the fish side, for example, if we wanted to grow rainbow trout and we do rainbow trout are kind of princesses. They only want to be at about 16 degrees Celsius. And if you warm it up too much, they don't like it if they if you cool it down. Too much they stop eating like they again, they don't like it. So you know, somewhere that's kind of the Goldilocks thing, you've got to lock it, the fish temperatures in at about 16 degrees Celsius, whereas water, lentils are warmer weather species they they prefer, you know, easily above 20. But closer to 29 are actually 29 is kind of that that max of, you know, you can actually see some some, they don't like it if it gets harder than 29 is what I'm saying. Anyways, so so a decoupled aquaponic system is just simply you kind of separate the two fish and the plants, but it's not just you know, all coculture on one side and hydroponics on the other because you still have that nutrient exchange between the two. It's just you're you're kind of concentrating those nutrients before it goes over.

David Evans: 26:05

Yeah, you're trying to maximize your growth potential by giving it like its best case scenario of top parameters that it needs to prosper. Yeah, exactly. fewest cases, yeah, you

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 26:15

don't have to compromise anymore. Right. Whereas with with a basic aquaponic system, or just a couple component system, you absolutely are compromising, you know, there's a range of where the fish will be happy, there's a range of where the plants would be happy, and you try to make them both happy. But in some of the streams, you know, with specifically rainbow trout and water, lentils, you would have a problem if you weren't decoupled them. So that's one of the other big innovations that we're putting into the commercial commercialization of water, lentils and, and our aquaponic system in general. And then the third would just be on the automation side. So now we plan to hire, at least for up to eight people for this new facility that we're building. So it's not that it's going to be completely hands off and everything robot. But on the automation side, we are focusing on having this the at least the harvesting part of the water lentils automated. And and that's something that's really important for us, you know, from my phone, I can monitor the the state of the entire facility from before, you know, for like, Are there any doors open? What's the temperature over here is how is the water temperature all the pumps running are all the filters clean? Is the H back working properly, you know, is the filter need to be changed on anything right, just like the system parameters of the of the aquatic ecosystem, being able to have a close monitor on that is really important. And then the next step for that is to introduce an AI to the whole mix. So we teach a machine, we start feeding it all of this data, right? Like, you know, here's here's how much product that we're producing with these environmental parameters. And then once once it starts learning the conditions that it's that it's in, we give it creative control, where we say okay, so if you tweak the, you know, the amount of iron, for example, in the, in the water, but with a we actually I should talk about that, too. So we have a nutrient control system, working with a company called Think Tank automation, where you can really dial in the amount of specific additives if you wanted to. So, for example, the iron that I mentioned, you know, you can add a little bit of key lated iron, what happens with that, right, so what happens if you change the pH by point 01? You know, does that affect the amount of product that you get out of it? Or what about the light?

David Evans: 28:47

is how do you get the best recipe to really just get the best production? Right? How do you get a tasting just right or growing the best that it can? Yeah,

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 28:56

yeah, exactly. So in our first year or so of being in full production, we'll start building this database to be able to feed a machine learning algorithm to be able to start experimenting. Now we have a lot of these parameters dialed within certain ranges just from the experiments that we've been doing for the last couple years. But we're really excited to see what the machine can do. You know what I mean? Like, we're really excited to see like, you know, is there anything that we didn't think of? Or is there anything that you know, that we have closed, but could be closed? Or it could be better? That whole phrase? faster, better? stronger?

Unknown: 29:32

machine, you can do

David Evans: 29:33

that? Yeah, that's awesome. I mean, adding in the AI component is revolutionising so many different areas of our lives. And even with the work that I've been involved with, within wildlife biology in recognizing bird calls in hours and days and days of recordings, and rather than sitting there with headphones on, then you can teach things to look for things like that. And, and yeah, this is a perfect case within agriculture. Smart ag is such a huge movement. It's awesome that you guys are integrating this so early on into your system and to be such a big part of your system moving forward.

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 30:04

Well, all we have to do, right? Because for us, if you ask us where we see it in 510 20 years, right? We want to see it in giant skyscrapers in the middle of New York. You know, just example. It is probably not going to happen. Maybe not. Maybe potentially but yeah, for To build the world, all types of produce that our community needs, we needed all types of different climates and a way to mount monitor all of that, and a human kind of monitoring 550 60 different plants growing, and the different climates has to thrive under that that's very, it's not very realistic. So we have to integrate the AI system, right? I see. So I feel like, that's why we're taking this approach to be able to put it on scale, and to remove human error out of the equation.

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 30:47

And I mean, just the having a computer monitor things for you is insanely smart. I mean, it's, it's been around in the egg tech space long enough that now there's so many like off the shelf monitoring systems and nutrient delivery systems that are out there, but not necessarily with creative control. You know what I mean? Like, it's, it's like, preset Valerie's, like, you know, keep a sensor in the water. If the value is get below this, then add a little bit more, but but that's assuming already that the humans have the most perfect recipe already dialed Exactly. But if if you're experimenting with different blends, or different species, in general, they're all going to be just a little bit different. And you know, it might even change throughout the year. So you might have a recipe that's dialed in great for the summer, but if the ambient temperature changes, or if the dewpoint changes, you know, maybe the transpiration rate change, like there's all sorts of stuff that a computer would be able to notice and adapt for on the fly. And to Olson's point, if one person or even a team of people were responsible for monitoring versus something that can monitor the situation like 100 times in a second, if you wanted it to like, yes, it's a totally different playing field. Yeah,

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 32:07

totally. Just add one more point, we have literal air showers when you walk into the facility, so that biosecurity is a huge point for us that we're continuing to expand upon.

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 32:18

You know, what an air shower is David? No,

David Evans: 32:20

no, I don't please tell me

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 32:22

Yeah, air showers like, have you ever seen those movies where you go into like a laboratory like one of those. And it sprays all air, we're taking that onto a food scale, so that nothing we don't know or want enters of the city. And this is a huge topic, considering a couple factors. One is that COVID-19 started off from contaminated food sources, just like every other disease out there. And for us to remove that instead of spending billions and billions of dollars on mothers like tracking or vaccination or studying about the disease, or preventative education that we have to do now, because it's too late. Instead, work on a way to secure a food source to make sure that nothing like this happens again, where the food that we eat is as clean as can be. This is actually one of the biggest focuses of us as a company is educating the world on why we need to do this and why we need to do this now. And we just had a great learning lesson that we can expand upon and move towards so that we can prevent something like this from happening again, just because there's contaminated food source. The other thing is that we're able to have food security, because if you look at China, I don't know if you heard but they have this clean play policy where if you're limited to the amount of dishes you can order based on how many people were in the dining room, you know, yeah, there's a huge, huge news. And locusts are tearing through this is maybe six months. I can't remember exactly. But about a year ago, we're locust tour throughout Africa. Yeah, the Middle East, all

David Evans: 33:48

episode coming out about that.

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 33:50

Yeah, exactly. So this is a huge security is a huge issue. And since ancient times, humans have been at the mercy of Mother Nature, per se, when the crops fail, when natural disaster happens, we lose all control. And we've managed to control it to a certain extent with the use of chemical fertilizers and chemical pesticides. However, what do we give up in exchange for that? Right, so so that's why for our company, it's a lot more our technology, revolutionize agriculture on so many levels, because it's secure. It's and we have food security, we have biosecurity, it's sustainable. And all the reasons that Steve listed without the automation and the AI, we've have a lot of grounds covered. And we think that we can change how everyone thinks how food is produced on a natural skill. And yes,

Unknown: 34:35

like, like Austin saying, is really just about doing things in the right way. You know, I mean, like, if you didn't have all of this previous knowledge of how our agriculture was done, and how plants were grown, you know, the first thing I'd want to make sure that there's no chemicals or synthetic things that I'm eating because of you know, that's It's never good for the body. Number two is like, you know, I wouldn't want necessarily birds flying over and go into the bathroom right on it. You know, I mean, there's a lot of things that, you know, we can be able to stop by by doing it in this way. And, and I think that, uh, you know, with Pontus, we've, we've found a great way to do that.

David Evans: 35:05

Yeah, that's so many great and interesting points and something that Yeah, you're entirely right. We're so disconnected from where our food comes from these days. And oh, yeah, as we move more and more towards cities, if we can bring agriculture into those cities. In a form that people can understand people, people are more understanding, I feel like now of seeing maybe an aquaponics with LED lights or, and growing plants in that kind of way, because that's how people kind of grow plants in their third houses, there's very few people that are really connected to the land in a traditional farming sense, other than seeing it as driving by or something like that. So, yeah, I think this is, yeah, this is such a good move forward,

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 35:47

we put power back to the hands of the people, right, because you're looking at Africa, or places with unfavorable climates being able to produce their own food. So China doesn't have to import all their grain and all their food from Australia and the US. Whereas, you know, we don't have to import bananas from South America, for example. So that that's another big issue that we would have a hand in potentially fixing.

David Evans: 36:10

Exactly. Now, you guys are focused right now on water, lentils, I understand. It's mostly in the realm of making protein powder. And you guys mentioned water lentils as kind of lavender minor, which I know is as duckweed as being a biologist in so many wetlands around around Canada. I'm quite familiar with it. But I'm just curious, why water lentils? Why is that the starting crop of choice? And as Are there other crops that you're looking to expand to quickly?

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 36:39

Well, you know, the reason why we started with water, lentils first was mainly because of the fact of you know how crazy it is, with the plant protein space. Right now, there's a lot of people who are trying to trying to transition their diet over to being able to eat plant based food, because they do understand it's more, you know, it's healthier for them than eating so much animal meat and even red meat a lot of the time. So because of that, you know, when when we looked at all of the other products that were out in the plant based protein space, majority of them were pea and soy, and then those would range between, you know, eight and 12% protein. And if you look at most protein powders, it's just isolated protein. And really, that's the only real value that you get out of it. Were with water, lentils, there's two things that we love about it, Steve touched on one and how quickly they grow in Steve's in our system that doubles every 24 hours, and the nutrient side of things. So like Steve said, we can harvest 365 days a year. And when it comes to the nutrients of water, lentils, you know, depending on which strain that we're growing ranges between 42 and 50% protein, so that's significantly higher than any of the plants that are used in the majority of the products that people eat today. And then also as all 10 essential amino acids as to non essential. It has calcium, chlorophyll, iron, potassium, magnesium, a handful of things that that make it a superfood in its own. And it's not just good as a powder that we have tons of actual recipes that we've created out of it. So we actually have a burger that we've made out of it. We have. Yeah, absolutely. So a burger that we made out of it. We have a plant based pasa with protein in it. We have a pancake and waffle and muffin mix, depending on how much water you would add. And that would also have protein in it as well. We have a vegan cheesecake that we've created a handful of different products that we plan to get into. And this is just the start plus. And the fact is, is right now, like we mentioned before, we're only going to be going water lentils in this first facility. But our ideal situation would be to have enough facilities that we could actually produce every single vegetable we would need to produce every single one of our own recipes. So we know every single thing in those recipes is biosecurity grown.

David Evans: 38:42

That's incredible. That's so fascinating. Yeah, I had no idea water lentils were the the unsung superfood of the next little while so glad to get on the bandwagon early.

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 38:55

We're approaching water lentils is kind of like a soil alternative. Well, not kind of it is a soil term live. Whereas if you look at soy, it's applicable to many types of already eating foods like tofu, soy milk, and a lot of other products that they create with it. So we're trying to do the same thing. We've recreated auto at home recipes as such the burger the pasta so that people can try at home, and they know what to do with the powder. But as well as commercialization of a few of those products that we we have is that on? We think one of lentils is a very, very innovative and crucial piece of the puzzle in terms of having a complete source of protein and how can you be the best form possible? Yeah,

David Evans: 39:34

totally. I'm so curious. I have to ask, what does it actually taste like?

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 39:38

You know what montra Potter tastes like? Yeah, it's really similar. Okay, like incredibly similar. We actually had one of the recipes that that we tried earlier on is Hey, could we make like a water lentil matcha tea of sorts and Olsen blended it with matcha and couldn't tell that water lentils are even there.

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 39:55

Wow. So as a very much light taste. If you have anything added to it, usually mess it up unless you're putting like a ridiculous like 3050 grams of water lentils in there. But if you're just using it as an ingredient to add a little bit of nutrients, add some nutrients or add a bit of flavor or texture. And we have a we have a culinary director that's been done a really good job with creating applicable recipes that our customers can try at home. That's so

David Evans: 40:18

fascinating. I'm so excited. to test it out, and try it in all these different recipes,

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 40:23

actually, just to flesh it out to our website. Then if you go to a Pontus water lentils.com slash recipes, you can see a bunch of the YouTube videos that our marketing team has put together and our chefs, he's showing them off in spectacular fraction. Awesome.

David Evans: 40:39

So excited to go check that out. So yeah, you're not only creating just a protein powder for like protein shakes or something like that this is something that can be used for multiple different recipes. It can be additive for everything. And it sounds like it's something that can be grown anywhere. So it can be grown in places that are prone to droughts, locusts, even areas that are in the north, where it's difficult to grow their own crop, I'm thinking of flying communities, the food production capacity in a lot of these places just is so low, and they have such low access to healthy foods because of the cost of shipping it to them. So this is such an awesome way to be able to create great value for them.

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 41:21

You got a pretty bang on what we're trying to accomplish here. And it is a very prevalent problems that we see today. So we've we take it as our mission to basically be like, Hey, you know, this is a very plausible way of how we can solve these major issues that we're facing.

David Evans: 41:35

So I'm curious to so it's not only the water, lentils or the crop that you're choosing, but you're also have fish as part of the system as well. So do you have plans for selling off the rainbow trout, or growing different types of fish?

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 41:49

Yeah, specifically, just the rainbow trout to start once we move on to a future facility, like we're going to be kind of dubbing it like Pontus Gigafactory. Something that will move. Well, we'll start experimenting with other types of fish. But rainbow trout is what we're locking in at first. And yeah, there's absolutely a revenue stream that comes from the fish. Our first facility should net us over 200 grand a year from fish. Wow. Yeah, there's also a handful of recipes that we have for the fish as well from like candied fish to fish dips, and all those different types of stuff. You know, Steve MacArthur's lovely, amazing girlfriend made this fish dip and it was just to die for. And we were there at the facility, she brought it and we ate like the whole thing in a matter of like an hour. who's really good. Yeah,

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 42:36

the big thing for the fish side is that we're this allows us to be able to produce food on a sustainable scale, and not compromise, which is what fish roaming has done with, it's essentially living his own waste, right and not in the best environment, as Steve can attest to this, that the fish are going to get everything they want their entire life, they're going to be fed, I think twice a day, and they're going to have clean water constantly, they're gonna have lots of room to swim. So there'll be happy fish. The farm fish that we see today, they're cramped up in really small spaces, because our most of our revenue doesn't have to rely completely on the fish. The focus for us is the water lentils. So we're not Diem for more production or fish equals more revenue, we're very focused on the plant side of things. So it also allows us or at least make a dent in the overfishing problem that we have today. Having all these countries fighting for the southeast China Sea, trying to collect as many regions as possible, but life is finite in the ocean, and we don't we don't want to overstep our place. And we want to have a sustainable way to produce the fish that consumers eat today, instead of having to destroy the unnatural environment that

David Evans: 43:42

we have. Yeah, and it's another way of connecting people with their food sources as well, if you have some way of being able to demonstrate it to people. And if you have facilities that are closer to population centers, then that also is just an added benefit to connecting people with their food and, and not just getting a fish on your plate that's come from 100 miles away somewhere out in the ocean or something like live completely inland or something like that. Yeah, that's that's, that's awesome. That's, that's really awesome. How much do you guys expect this to cost? So if I'm a consumer going into a grocery store, and I come across the Pontus products, is it? Is it going to be comparable? And do you know if there's other aquaponic products? Are you selling this already? Where can I Where can I get my hands on it?

Steve McArthur, Pontus Proteins: 44:28

So yeah, short answer is that there are companies already selling all component products, not necessarily water, lentils, as far as I know. And I'd be happy to be proven wrong. We're the only company in Canada that's growing water, lentils on a commercial scale. The other companies that are out there in the aquaponic space are doing all sorts of things. It's a really innovative field. You have a lot of entrepreneurial, you know, experimental types of people that are doing just all sorts of fun things. Yeah, we're in a unique, unique space in the sense that we're trying to commercialize it, you know, is always a challenge, no matter what crop you're doing. You have to be really cognizant of, of the entire economics of everything is short answer on the where you can get the product is from us. Eventually, once this new facility is done, by all means, come check us out and we We'll be selling our product online, as well as some of the retailers that Olson and Connor can speak to.

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 45:24

Yeah, so our facility is expected to be up sometime June or early summer. We have we're in the permitting phase right now. So the balls in the government's court to prove our building permits. As soon as that's done, Steve is getting the equipment on the way and we'll be setting it up quickly involve the builder for a little bit, but in terms of cost will be comparable to a lot of the products out there. Currently. However, we do have a very niche market where it's, it's honestly, it's like organic to the next level, we're not trying to be ridiculous here, it will be at a point where people feel comfortable in terms of our price, because we want to make sure that everybody has a chance to try the food of the future and contribute to the cause of saving the environment, having sustainable source of food and supporting the cause of the parties and trying to fix.

David Evans: 46:06

Awesome, just to kind of wrap this up, I guess. Can you guys tell me a bit about your own career path? I mean, we talked a bit about how you guys got the ball rolling on Pontus. But what led you guys to get to the positions where you could really bring this to life, because this is a huge project. And, and it's really impressive. But I mean, I wouldn't know where to start with planning a facility like this. So yeah, if you guys don't mind just touching on that, that'd be awesome. Well,

Unknown: 46:31

we all came about it different ways. I kind of came at it from more of like, how do we feed the world kind of mindset? How do we how did we meet a mutual friend really actually, just like, yeah, it was just one of those like, Hey, this is really cool. Can we do it together kind of concepts. And I can touch that a little bit, Steve. So I actually a few years ago, and I've always been kind of like interested in starting businesses a bit of a serial entrepreneur, me and Olson, I think it was four and a half years ago now started a small venture capital fund together. And we were looking for really the next project that we wanted to be a part of, you know, we were heavily involved in cannabis and blockchain before. But you know, those markets weren't doing necessarily as well. And we wanted to make sure that moving into, you know, the new world in 2019, we thought there was going to be a recession, we didn't realize it was gonna be COVID-19 a lot of the problems, but we were looking for something that we knew would do well, regardless as to whether or not people you know, had money to buy weed or they were had money to buy bitcoin, but people always had to eat. And we figured that, you know, there was only so long before people started towards the towards the plant based protein space, and really was already there's already starting to happen. But it just it really the highway opened up for us in a huge way after we've made that commitment to happen. And I was introduced to Steve through actually a bit of a mastermind group that I built here in Vancouver handful years ago, that was just a young motivated guys who are entrepreneurial. And you know, every month we would have a meeting and come together and share different opportunities. And one of the guys that I was really good friends with introduced me to Steve MacArthur and then do that I've known Alston since he was 16 years old. So we're basically like brothers, and we've worked on so many things together. And then we came together and we found our aquaponic brother, Steve.

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 48:21

So so we have a good variety of experience, Connor been in the direct sales and e commerce space. I worked as a marketing consultant helping companies build brands, websites, advertisements, videos, and then me and Connor also ventured into finance. So we learned a lot with the capital markets, as you can see, because we managed to take POTUS public and Steve himself being the engineering is and then the brains behind the project and making sure that the lights turned on and everything works as it's supposed to. I think we got some good grounds covered here. We're really good friends. So I feel like that's something that you don't see in some companies, I feel I got something really important because knowing how hard a business is to build if you're not friends, it's gonna be a hard, hard journey.

Unknown: 49:01

And just to piggyback on that also mentioned that we did take the company public and ticker symbol is Hulk, h u l. k, for green protein.

David Evans: 49:10

I love that so much. That's so great. Yeah, Hulk.

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 49:16

We're trading on the Toronto Stock Exchange venture. We started trading about a week ago and we we've grown an audience, I can say, I can see that a lot of people see the problems that we're trying to address. They see the issues that we tackle and the problems that we're trying. And we think you asked me and Connor from an investment point of view, why do we believe in Pontus, we believe the bigger the problem, the bigger the solution. And that's why we when we like the punches. It wasn't just plant protein. It was the entire way we thought about agriculture. And as we got to know Steve, more and more, we learned more and more projects, it felt like better things were coming up like biosecurity automation, Ai, the things that make agriculture and take it to the next level and that's when we really put the gas on it. We were like this is it because this doesn't just stop and end with protein. We want to change the world for the better and, and shift the way we think about food.

David Evans: 50:05

Awesome. Well, thank you guys so much for for taking the time to chat with me today. I've learned so much and I am. Yeah, I'm all I'm all fired up about plant based protein. Let me tell you

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 50:18

converted

Unknown: 50:19

your Organic plant based protein

David Evans: 50:22

There we go. Yeah, organic plant based protein. Super organic as we were talking about before. I guess the last thing is if if the listeners to this podcast want to learn more about Pontus, where where should they go? Where should they go to find out more about boat all of the work that you guys are doing in this space? Awesome. Yeah, we

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 50:43

have a website Pontus, water lentils calm. We also have our Instagram which is Pontus underscore protein. for Instagram. We also have a Twitter handle. We also have Reddit. So it's Reddit slash are slash Pontus. So if you just Google us, we're everywhere. If you want us information, just type in Google Pontus, and I'm sure you'll see a lots of posts, third party posts, our own posts, so you can learn a little a lot more about our journey and where we've been and where we are now and where we plan to go.

Unknown: 51:12

Yeah, and the YouTube channel as well, for all the channel. Yeah,

Alson Niu, Pontus Proteins: 51:14

yeah. So you want to check out video content is we have stuff on YouTube, too. So we're pretty much got all the grounds covered. We're still building our media side of things, but we have a strong and interactive community. And we appreciate every one of you, you guys that are listening and joining us on this journey.

David Evans: 51:29

Awesome. Well, thanks so much, guys, and all the listeners out there. You remember it Hulk? Check it out on the Toronto Stock Exchange and check out Pontus online. They're doing some really cool stuff in this space. Thanks, guys. Awesome. appreciate this. Thank you so much for tuning in to this deep dive episode with Pontus proteins in the what are we doing podcast. Thanks so much to Connor Alston and Steve for taking part. I had such a great time chatting with you guys. And it's such a pleasure. And I'm so excited to watch Hulk go soaring up on the stock exchange. If you want to learn more about aquaponics go to their website. They have a lot of really cool information and a lot of really cool recipes where you can incorporate water, lentils and other aquaponic stuff into your diet. Thanks for listening to this episode. If you enjoyed this episode, please hit the subscribe button, so you don't miss any of our future episodes coming out sometime soon. I'm the host and producer David Evans. And I would just like to thank the rest of the team from the aquatic biosphere project, specifically to Paula Polman, Sophie cervera, and Anna Bettini Thanks for all of your help t learn more about the aquati biosphere project and what we'r doing here in Alberta tellin the story of water. Check us ou at aquatic biosphere.ca. And i you have any questions o comments about the show, we' love to hear them. Email us a conservation at aquarium Societ of alberta.ca. Please don' forget to like subscribe an leave us a review. It reall helps us out. Thanks and it' been a splas