Bertrand Piccard

About

Born into a family of scientific explorers, Bertrand Piccard has made history by completing two round-the-world flights: non-stop in a balloon and more recently without any fuel in the Solar Impulse airplane. With this last achievement, Bertrand’s goal was to demonstrate how clean technologies and renewable energy can achieve the impossible. As a second phase of his vision, and with the Solar Impulse Foundation, he launched the challenge of selecting 1’000 profitable solutions that protect the environment in order to encourage decision-makers to adopt more ambitious environmental targets and energy policies. One of the first to envision ecology through the lens of profitability, he urges for the uptake of clean and efficient technologies because they are logical rather than just ecological. Even if climate change didn’t exist, they would make sense, as they represent the biggest industrial market of the century. According to him, innovation and pioneering spirit are key to solve the most pressing challenge of our times: ensuring the quality of life on Earth.