Protecting Our Planet with Robert Downey Jr.

Actor, producer and entrepreneur Robert Downey Jr. is deploying "fast grants” in an effort to expedite the way early scientific research receives funding. Downey joins Washington Post Live to discuss his company, FootPrint Coalition, and its work scaling technology to combat climate change.

Highlights

“All these spaces now… become so crowded that it’s really hard to differentiate which team is strong enough to really compete… It’s kind of like casting… You want someone to think that you’re the guy or gal, individual for the job, but really you’re looking for this kind of perfect fit…Sometimes if you look at an outmoded, horrible, obvious problem, you still need to find the companies that can access a solution that is really not just work on paper… Sometimes people that aren’t quite prepared to… scale businesses wind up getting a lot of support.” – Robert Downey Jr. (Video: Washington Post Live)

“This is supposed to be fun. It’s supposed to be hard work, it’s supposed to feel stressful because the clock is ticking, but how do we retain the enthusiasm?... We need to really walk around inside these technologies and embrace them fully and I think… you really get a buzz from it… Like it or lump it, whether I’m having a good day or a bad day, I’m going to do something about it.” – Robert Downey Jr. (Video: Washington Post Live)

“When I imagine how to break through… to the population… I think part of it is making it feel… like something people would just want to do anyway, not like they’d be doing it out of guilt… And this is really to the individual… Whether its how you want to make your home more efficient, how you want to adapt your diet without feeling like you’re punishing yourself… It should feel like a really nice multiple choice test rather than the SATs. ” – Robert Downey Jr. (Video: Washington Post Live)

“The course of the day for me now, as I’m getting back in the workplace a little more is, I’m realizing I am so committed to the coalition, I’m still kind of figuring out how to best serve it, and to have it serve the planet… I never want to have so many ideas that I can’t execute on any of them well. If anything, the way things have changed, it’s become simpler. Sometime when you have too many options in life, you won’t be satisfied with whatever choice you make so I’m in a period of time, and I would imagine many of us are, where we’re just trying to clear our psychological desk and makes things… a little simpler to combat these trying times.” – Robert Downey Jr. (Video: Washington Post Live)

Robert Downey Jr.

Actor, Producer & Founder, FootPrint Coalition