Just three years ago, I had the pleasure of meeting one of the smartest and most interesting people on the planet--Nathan Myhrvold, Microsoft's former chief technology officer and director of research. He's unassuming and approachable with a quiet confidence that hides the fact that he is a very wealthy man.  In 1999 when he left Microsoft, he was on the Forbes list of the 400 richest Americans.  He could have simply retired, enjoying his wealth; but having money is not that important to Nathan--in fact, he's notoriously frugal.  Money's only value lies in what he can do with it to solve some of the world's biggest problems.

So, in 2000 he founded Intellectual Ventures (IV) with his partner Edward Jung, a biophysicist who was Microsoft's chief software architect.  Together they wanted to find cheap and simple solutions to big, complex problems.  Already they have launched satellites to the moon, helped defend the U.S. against missile attacks, and have even developed a mosquito zapping laser to combat malaria.

It's not surprising then, that they have also looked at the issue of global warming.  Surrounded by highly respected scientists like Lowell Wood and Ken Caldeira, Nathan is studying ways to solve our energy problems more cheaply and effectively than all the trillion dollar solutions posed by the climate change activists.  For example, IV has already shown that we could cool the planet through a variety of means such as the "garden-hose-to-the-sky" (pumping stratospheric sulfur 18 miles into the sky, essentially repurposing existing pollution to cool the earth, much like Mt Pinatubo did when it erupted in 1991 in the Philippines), or creating man-made clouds.  We know that the contrails from jets can cool the ground temperature by nearly 2 degrees.  What if you could create puffy white clouds on a regular basis?  Any one of IV's many solutions could solve the problem for less than $250 million, in some cases significantly less.  

Inventor entrepreneurs like Nathan Myrvhold have always been the solution to the big problems we face.  They can do what government can't - innovate more simply and for a lot less money.  And in these times, that's a good thing!