Good morning, everyone. It's Wednesday, June 17th, just after 10. This is meeting a Senate natural resources and energy. And we are going to be revisiting our amendment from yesterday because although we had finished our work, the Economic Development Committee had not yet processed, you know, the changes we were recommending the sections of theirs that we review. So with that, I met last evening actually with Senator Sorotkin to go through changes and try to find a consensus position. I think we've achieved that, but I leave it to individual because we're all offering this as individual senators want to make sure we go through it and let anyone who is currently on the amendment decide, you know, no longer for me or they're fine with it or their parent if you looked at it and said, Oh, I, I like it better than I thought you could get on still so any, any way. I just want to make sure we slow down enough for everyone to see it. My understanding is that we may not be offering this amendment till the end of the week in order to provide more time for more colleagues to look at it. I'm not sure if that schedule has been set. And anyway, I wanted us on our side to be already as a committee and understand what was there. So with that preamble, like to turn to Mr. Chakowsky once again. And if you could help the committee by walking through the revisions to the amendment, as a result of the conversation with economic development, please. Sure. I conveniently already have the documents open, I believe. Nice. So, good morning. I sent a Jude this morning draft 7.1 of the amendment as well as a summary document of the amendment. And it is on your website. So draft 7.1 does not have any new language in it. However, language was deleted from yesterday so the amendment is slightly restructured. The first tiny caveat, the number of co-sponsors is changing. So this says Senators Bray Campion of McDonald, but I have some names to add to the list. So that will change slightly. But the primary change to this bill is that the first instance of amendment is now different. The first instance of amendment yesterday, the first instance of amendment was striking section to be. That is no longer in this amendment, which means that the language in to be in the underlying Senate economic development. Recommendation is going to move forward. So. I'll offer an explanation for why. So, you know, I think our concern was we said, can we, can we aim for a performance metric of something like density, a density metric for the town. And there, there actually is discussion of that kind of in this bill still and more broadly in the community. So between the fact that that discussion is going to be happening and I think the biggest thing is, there is an off ramp from any provision that hardwires in the eighth of an acre. That was frankly of concern to me, but because of that off ramp, and because it doesn't make a, which exists through 2023. There's ample time for people to evaluate whether or not this is the best solution. But it does assert that we should move towards greater density. There'll be, I think there will be future legislative sessions I imagine are going to be talking about the same thing again. So, given all the room and the off ramp. I receded from that part of our original amendment. So, so Mr chair what, what did we propose that was not fully embraced in the sense or two. The sort of hardwired provisions around inclusivity in section to be or another my short hand of saying this is too narrow there's more much more nuance to it but it said, you know, thou shalt have a minimum of size of one eighth of an acre. And if you, if you're not going to do that you can you need to say why you're not going to do that. You can get out of that quite easily by filing a report back to a CCD anytime in the next three years. Okay, that provides a an exit. It's acceptable if that was that that was a deal breaker for economic development to not include that provision. Not because I think Senator Sirotkin said he has been working towards trying to get that kind of density requirement move forward for years, and so to get this close and give up on it yet again was unacceptable, I'd say. Okay, well, there's an out for towns that don't want to do it. I don't want to follow my sword over that. We have plenty of other work in here. Thank you. The long two sentences. So yeah, it picks, it picks back up where, where, so you take that out, and you drop right in where we were managing the extinguishment of permits. So Mr. Kawasaki maybe you can resume the tour, unless there are any other committee questions. Okay, great. Thank you. Great so as I mentioned. The reason I changed from yesterday was getting rid of the, the strike. And so I do want to just flag a tiny issue that because this is all happened so rapidly, the, I need to adjust the effective date slightly for the reason you just mentioned about the three year window. So I've left it out of this is the draft 7.1. So I need to just add that three year window back. So that's a small change that needs to be made. But otherwise, yeah, you. I think it's dropped in as another section or is it go just in effective dates. It's just going to go into the effective dates, right, because to to be. Yeah. It doesn't go into effect for three years. Okay, right. Thank you. So what we see will that basically make it a just so I make sure that at some point in the future I'll be checking in and what people are looking at. It's going to be a 7.2 version. Is that how this we can, we can call it that yes if you'd like. I'm happy to call whatever you like I just want to make sure I know what number I'm going to be looking for. It's, it's a small clerical error so I will send it right as soon as moments after we adjourn I will send it. Just to clarify, Senator Bray, sometimes when we put things on the website, if it does have a slightly different number, it's more useful than it's the, it's the same number. Sure. Yeah, so we can call it, we can call it 8.1. Great. Okay. Yeah, thanks. Obvious to people. Thank you. I like it to be or not quite to be. Yes, we had fun with that last night in the meeting. It was as much fun as you can have negotiating a bill at the nighttime. Okay. So, and with that, that's it for changes, correct. Yep. So, I will say that I, the only other thing that it that looks different is that the, the numbers of instances are all different now so. Yeah, so the first instance of amendment is this changing extinguishment to the release from jurisdiction. And so the second amendment has that new language, right. The district commission way of implementing the district commission. Yep. And then the third instance of amendment is the language striking out subdivision. And the fourth instance of amendment has the waste water permit language. And then the fifth instance of amendment has all the new act to 50 language. From sections 24 to 27, which was the, the density requirements for neighborhood development areas. The four resonances per acre versus specifying a quarter acre. Correct. From sections 24 to 45 has all the active 50 language in it. Okay. Flipping pages. Man, I'm getting quite a library of copies of this. And so that's all that's changed. So with that, then I think because it has that substantive change upfront, we should as a committee review it and take a committee position on the new amendment. If there's not any more discussion about it, then I would ask for the clerk to make a motion all the role. The, are there sponsors simply moving to substitute what is being proposed for the previous amendment. Is that the Yes. Okay, which makes is the cleanest way and you don't have to explain both of them because the one that's gone no longer is being amended. So, okay. Right. And actually the one that we've reviewed yesterday, because of that pending meeting with economic development, I had had not sent that on to the Senate secretary yet. I didn't want to send on something that was So after change, so this would be, we would actually only be referring to the calendar. This version that we're looking at right now, eight one. So, Mr. Chair, so I'd like to make a motion to approve this new draft of the amendment to s 237. And this is draft 8.1. 8.1. Thank you. Thank you substitute for the one that we approved yesterday. So moved. Thank you. Thank you. Any discussion. Any further discussion. Okay. Then I'd ask, please, the clerk to call the roll. Senator McDonald's. Yes. Senator Rogers, Senator parent. So I want to just ask a clarifying question. I'll support these changes, but I don't still support the overall amendment. So just vote yes here and then that won't mean I support. Oh, it's a substitute amendment. Yeah. So we're going to substitute to all. I'll say no for now. Okay. Senator Campion. Yes, Senator Bray. Yes. Yes. So that's 311. Okay. Thank you very much everybody. Thank you. So, sorry. Senator McDonnell. Cory. Senator parent was asking. I think the appropriate question, which was to say. He was perhaps willing to support this amendment is being better than the proceeding one, but he did not intend to vote for, for it to add it to the. Okay. Is that, is that what? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. It's hard when it's a yes or no, but I'm wishing that would you say that the overall four, right, 01 or 311, which, which would he prefer. I think 311 I guess is fine. Okay. Thank you. Okay. So great. Thank you everyone. Well, we'll see. I was going to say that completes our work on that, but we're, we're not on the floor yet we haven't made it always a third reading so we'll see if anything more crops up along the way. But for now, I think we're settled and I thank people for their diligence and patience in hanging in there because it's never easy to get to the final version of things, especially this time of year. With that, so I wanted to, we'll put this aside, we're going to have a caucus at noon. We'll be talking about the underlying bill 237 as well as I'll wait to see what the signal is from the pro 10 but I think he wants me to go ahead and talk about the amendment now even if it's not going to be offered. My understanding is, I don't know, sir, you're set on this or not. The program was offering to delay, I think, offering the amendment till Friday, if the minority would be willing then to let us do all the work on. I can't speak to that piece but I know about the delay I Joe has to answer if we'll be willing to let it all go Friday I personally don't have a problem with it but okay, I'll leave that to leave that to leadership. I know the feeling. Okay, I'll be happy like the catcher I'm watching for signals as well. I should go the other way around the picture is gets the signals. Okay, enough baseball metaphors, which I'm not doing so well on. Got it backwards. Let's switch over to our other major piece of work for the end of session, which is the Global Solutions Act is with us. I didn't know if we were in the process of doing this amendment, if we were going to be spending 15 minutes on it, or 75 minutes. I think for now we'll have just a brief discussion about the balance of this week and work on GW essay. Well, a lawyer who played a significant role in the development passage, etc, and work on Global Solutions Act Massachusetts. Now the Dean of the law school at VLS, or Dean of the might be the environmental program at the law school. Jennifer rush out. She's going to be joining us tomorrow so I figured this is a chance to hear from the inside someone who went through the entire process as well as took it all the way through the court case that helped lead to his eventual implementation rules. It'll be a helpful thing for us to hear because I think I would characterize some of our own questions as centering around. How does this process work. Regardless of what you're thinking of the goals. How does the process work and are there any points at which we might want to look at making improvements. So for instance center McDonald pointed out that if if the chair of the clean of the energy planning group that he sorry about using the right name was not inclined to meet, they might never call a meeting and that would pretty stymie the work of the group. It would mean that roughly 18 months later and our would just go off and do rulemaking without that. That climate plan. So, I think that's something we might consider addressing. I have had conversations with people over the month or so since we started where some people said have you is one of the largest emitters of greenhouse gases in the state is agriculture. Do you have anyone adequately representing agricultural interests on that panel. A similar question came up around manufacturing. We, we heard from Professor cash, who said one of the strengths in Massachusetts was that manufacturers were part of crafting the solution. So I thought we might want to look at the membership from to what degree have we adequately brought manufacturing in so on my short list is. Are those three things. Another thing was kind of who legally owns the plan does a legislature need in some way, even though we don't have an official way of saying this, does the legislature have a way of ratifying that doesn't. It is something other than writing a bill and going through the entire bill making process to sign off the quote unquote plan. Tomorrow I'd like to, I don't want to put Council on the spot since I didn't ask that question ahead of time but I don't know if if you can, Mr Mark Land look into. Are there formulations that constitute something like ratification that would not be overly burdensome and time consuming, which is a concern. I think many people have center McDonald. One of the things is to put into the, into the bill that there shall be a ratification. The other way to do it is that the rules will not be promulgated or started until a specific amount of time after the, the plan has been adopted. And that gives the legislature an opportunity to get in front of it and or modify it or, or revise statute. The shortcoming in that particular approach is the, the tendency of administrations to ignore the date by which plans are supposed to be completed. Yes. So, so noted center camp. So what's our plan, we have an hour and a half today to sort of get through most, you know, a lot of this, but I'm not, I'm a little confused by what exactly we're doing today on the bill. Yeah, so again, because I didn't know when we were to get Ellen, Ms Chicago back from economic development where she was right moments ago, how much change they were going to ask us to reconsider. I see. And how long it might take for us to look at it and discuss. I didn't want to have, I didn't want to have a collision. Yeah, so are we so I'm sorry so our have we finished our work for the day or is Mr. Martin here for something specific related to global warming Solutions Act. So we didn't add I did not ask him to prepare anything. He's, he's had so much work on this he probably can answer questions on the fly but so the things I had wanted to do was just pause say what's coming next. I just wanted to ask some questions around this notion of ratification center McDonald pointed out you could just have a rulemaking timeline that allowed for legislative intercession, because of when the rules would arrive. I didn't compare to their effective date. So there's that possibility, and I just wanted in case we have requests of Mr. Marlin. I don't know if people have ideas they would like to float out now so that he can be prepared for the balance of the week while he'll be joining us. Well, I, the only thing I would say is any questions that we have for tomorrow's witness I suspect, aside from a little bit of insight from Massachusetts, I suspect Mr. Marlin will be able to answer any legal questions. Right. Okay, so that's that's the. Mr. Marlin you want to say anything about the notion of what might constitute a pathway to protocol ratification. Other than a bill. Is there any tool we have that we, well, we may not have it yet. Is there a possibility of creating such a thing I was thinking about that later like, why do we have to stick to what we've always done. A way to craft sort of like protocol ratification step thing center McDonald has his, his, his hand up I don't know if you Mr. Chair. Excellent question before we try and answer that one is there. Have you summarized the things that are first option is to, is to, is to agree with the house. The other body there are there technical corrections that, that we have before us that are generally regarded as necessary on this bill, or have the questions you've been asking here in the last few minutes, the what we should be focusing on. I would ask counsel for to check me on this one. I'm not aware of any required technical corrections that have emerged since the bill came over from the house where someone sort of is catching an oops that we would need to address. There's one oops I caught I think it was numbering. So you could have an amendment to correct that it's, it's not substantive and we could even do it in. If you were going to concur with the house we could do it instead rev. But there's at least one oops that I'm aware of. Okay, but we wouldn't have to have a new version, it could be concurrence with a change by sense, we treat it as a scrivener's error or something like that. I believe so. You know that's if you're going to do that that's something I probably want to double check with secretary but I believe so. It's certainly not a substantive change. Okay, thank you. So, can you just pop me a note so I'll have that on my in basket of what that catch is please, or to the whole committee actually, certainly. I think Senator Campion was asking about scheduling and I completely leave this up to the committee. But if you wish we could discuss some of those issues or begin that discussion, or we could wait until tomorrow. So if we, we are in hurry up land these days so if if we can have a bit of meaningful discussion around it, I just because we hadn't had the chance to count on this. I didn't want to say oh well you should just be able to respond on the fly but if you're prepared to do that great. Well I appreciate that courtesy and I will do my best to begin to answer the questions and of course I want to check my notes and maybe flesh that out tomorrow. As background first of all very quickly a great that you're going to hear from the witness tomorrow. That was basically a writ of mandamus which is something we talked about in Massachusetts to require to use its executive branch to promulgate the rules to achieve the numerical greenhouse gas reductions. So we talked about that concept a little bit a couple weeks ago. I think she'll probably flesh that out tomorrow. As to the ratification of the plan or rules let's separate them a little bit in the discussion as to the ratification of the plan. I think that does raise some of the same concerns I discussed about separation of powers and it may not be a crystal clear it's a little bit of a gray area, but if you're asking a non legislative entity this council for example to come up with this plan to then say you're pulling it back and you need to approve it or ratify it. I think you perhaps could do that, but it does raise some of those same concerns that you're handing it off to another branch or another entity, and then you're pulling it back and saying you have to approve it before it becomes complete or reality. So it's just anything to think about. And I asked a quick question and I want. So in what way would that be different than we create working groups, you know, at the council, the commission on Act 250, although that had legislators on it but we asked we create working groups we say please report back. And then we use the report as the basis for either legislating or rulemaking. Very good question couple things number one this council is not legislative. It doesn't have at least doesn't have required legislators to be on it. It doesn't necessarily preclude that there's could be some experts in certain areas who who might be legislators but they're certainly not designated number of reps or centers that's number one. Number two, you're not just asking for a report. You're asking for a report that then in statute is the basis for rulemaking so it's a little different process wise. So it's something that you could consider doing I just think it raises some of these concerns about handing this duty off and then pulling it back and saying the report is in final or valid until you approve it in some manner. Certainly having them do a report that they provide to you for review, not a problem at all, but saying that you somehow have to somehow have to approve it, or rubber stamp it, that's a little different and I think it raises some of those potential concerns. Yeah, I agree. I think pulling it back for a rubber stamp doesn't doesn't make sense. Now the other issue was the legislature's rule so the comments I just made focus on the plan. And you approving the plan or something like that. The other issue was the rulemaking and whether the legislature could have a role in approving the rules before their final separate from Elkar. I had mentioned to you that you could not withstand the current administrative procedure act in Vermont or somehow add another layer, but that that even more so raised those separation of powers concerns to me. And I also talked to you about how I wasn't certain the mechanism or vehicle to do that, that a resolution does not have the force of law does not bind parties. So merely passing a resolution I didn't see how that really achieved that objective or at any force of law. And if you of course were passing a bill to approve rules, why not just pass a bill. And so I wasn't quite certain how that is different than simply passing a bill. Plus, once again it has those same concerns in my mind about the separation of powers and giving the executive branch. In this case would be a and R that authority, but then pulling it back and saying that you have to approve the exercise of that authority. Now, so these are things to flesh out. Sure. There are concerns. I don't think it's crystal clear. I think this is a little bit of a gray area in the law, but I do have those concerns are issues. There's one other issue I wanted to raise that I think I mentioned, I just want to make sure you folks are aware of it. Is that even if you concurred with this bill. Even if you agreed with what the house had done and you gave this rule making authority to an hour. There are certain things that they can't do that only the General Assembly can do imposing a new fee appropriating funds and any effort to address climate change may involve additional funding. Passing a tax, for example, if you're seeking to impose a fee or pass a tax that would guide consumer behavior, only the General Assembly can do that. And of course, under current law. There's many areas where what you're currently doing is dictated by statute. So any changes to those areas would also require statutory change. For example, earlier in the session you looked at a bill that would increase the requirements pursuant to the renewable energy standard. You can't change those requirements by a rule, because they're set in statute. So if you wanted to go to 100% under tier one, you'd have to pass a law to do that. If you wanted to increase distributed generation under tier two, you'd have to do that by a law. For various reasons, there's areas that the General Assembly would still have to be involved. And our position in Ledge Council is that includes joining TCI. And that's something that the executive branch may not fully agree with. But that's our position as your attorneys that the General Assembly has to give approval before this day can join TCI. Sorry, the Transportation and Climate Initiative, which would establish a cap and invest system for transportation related fuels. Okay. You brought up TCI so let me ask two questions start with that one. I know for the General Assembly, have, is there any activity underway on TCI. I mean, COVID is changed a lot of things. I don't know if it's affected the rule out of that but back in January or so we heard that we thought there might be a rule and a sign on period that would happen something like April, May. So you are in delay. So you are correct. Because of COVID they delay that I believe until the fall. Okay, so they've moved back their deadlines for the final rule and the window for states to decide whether they're joining the initiative or not I believe that's into the fall at this point. Okay, thank you. And on the legislative approval of rules so yeah from serving with Senator McDonald on Elkar I would, I would seem like a bad idea to me that a rule, we would ask for a rule and then ask to have it approved to where we have the APA to take care of it. However, to Senator McDonald's point if if the timeline for the development of that rule, span the legislative session. And provide an opportunity for us to act if we saw something that seemed problematic. And I don't know if we have any kind of, I don't know that I remember a rule that said, for instance if you don't show up on time, like you bring your rule in June, which is generally right after we've left, if that we would ever provide a provision that would say then that rule. Is there any way to say that you can't wait for us to go home basically and then bring the rule forward. Well I think I think that's a valid idea which is modify the time periods to make sure that there's a sufficient window for the General Assembly to take action if you choose so you could definitely do that. And right now the time periods are really, really condensed and optimistic so you could stretch them out a little bit to make sure that you folks are in session. We have time to review the proposed rule and then have sufficient opportunity to take action if you choose to. I think you could definitely do that. You have a timeline document don't you I think so I've seen that. I do I'm not sure if I provided this committee but certainly Ken is one of the slides in fact I'm sorry I do have it. And I can email you what what PowerPoint to look at I don't think I can take out that slide but yes you could modify the time periods. Time period is what is anything. Is there a time period for when the rule comes back. Let me if you give me a second let me pull up my file and look at it. There are time periods right now set in the bill, but they're, as I mentioned to you, they're quite tight, they're quite optimistic. Senator McDonald you've been around this block on rule and timelines many times what's your advice to the committee. Well there, there are two examples that I that I have mentioned before but I will mention them again today because we're, we're thinking. I will mention them again today. Was the how we got rid of the 10 acre loophole for for septic. We directed the, the administration to come up with alternative septic rules so that they had to be in place regardless of the size of the plot. And we demanded that that in the statute we legislated that the proposed rules be available to the legislature on the 15th of January, but that they not be submitted. Put forth promulgated until sometime in June. The legislature's business was completed, and the, the rules were done on time the legislature went through the committee had hearings on them. There were arguments made, and the legislature did not interfere with change or diminish the proposed rules in any substantive fashion. When the legislature adjourned the rules were put forth as called for, and they took place. We mimicked that exact that experience in our rules about renewable energy and and that metering and directed the administration to come back in January and presents proposed rules for changes and that metering. And the administration did not do that. The legislation that we had in place said they should come back on the first of January, and they should not promulgate rules until after the legislature had had an opportunity to review those that those the rules that were being outlined and proposed, and we gave the authority after the legislature had done its review or made some changes we gave them the authority to implement the rules by order, so as to have them done in a timely fashion. And what happened was the administration failed to present the rules. They didn't present them on time didn't present them at any time during the legislative session. And then after we went home, they implemented new rules that had not been presented to the legislature in the statute, and they did it by order, and they said the authority gave them the authority. Elkar objected and said that this was not legal they had exceeded their authority, and our counsel and those of us in Elkar believed that the objection was was appropriate, and we, we objected. At that point. And then a couple months before the next legislature met, and when the next legislature met. The utilities all came running in and said we've changed our computers we've done this we've changed our building cycle the paperwork is already been printed. And if you if this order is overturned, it will cause us great problems and hassles etc etc etc, and the legislature. Either wisdom principle or cowardice. My editorial comment, Kate, and allowed the rules to go into place that had not gone through the, you know, the public hearing process that had not been presented to the legislature as called for, and that's what happened. So the one is an example of the legislature doing something in good faith. And the other perhaps was in administration didn't get their proposal stone on time to the legislature. But they use, you know, we, we in the legislature made a mistake and gave them an opportunity to do it by order. If after we reviewed it, and they did it by order without us having had a chance to review it so those are the pitfalls in the examples of how the system system has worked and how it failed to work. Our solutions were probably that's, it was a long explanation of the tribulations. I'm fine with concurring with the House bill, and then being, you know, like hounds behind the administration and if they don't move forward and say that and you know complain and wine and, and, and, you know, nip at their heels. So that's one way of thing we could do, or the other is to follow the example that worked and not give them the authority to initiate new rules by order if they haven't completed the, the committee has not provided its advisory opinion on what the rules ought to be. That's those are our choices. And show the deadlines, the time periods, if you wish, Mr chair, I had that slide up. Okay, and can you. Thanks for pulling that slide and we'll look at that. Do you have any comments on Senator McDonald's narratives there like it sounds like there's no question on legality like separation of powers that the fact that the legislature built in a creative schedule designed to let it have a look at rules move forward. Does that sound correct. There's no problem with constructing a timeline to ensure that you have an adequate opportunity to look at the proposed rules and take any action or give input, as your team appropriate. I do not think you can build in a requirement that a committee or the General Assembly both to approve those rules. I don't think you can do that, but you can build the timelines to give yourself an opportunity to weigh in, and you review as you think appropriate. Okay, or as they don't need to follow your suggestions. That's the other part of that. Center McDonald's story shows we're batting 500 I suppose using that approach. All star mature house please. Right first baseball 500 be pretty good. The legislator, I'm not so sure I don't like my bat 500. Jude, could you make me coho so I could share my screen please. If you want, I could just verbally read you those. Great, thank you. I've got it. Thank you very much. I'll just expand this. So can everyone see that okay. So it's effective on passage. The climate council is appointed. The council adopts the plan on or before December 1 2021. And our develops rules from roughly the time of adoption. Hopefully they'll have some advanced notice of what's in the plan until May. That the rules have to be submitted to the council at least 45 days before the filed with iCar, which begins a formal rule making process. So that'd be early to mid May of 2022. They have to be presented to various committees, including your committee, at least 30 days before they're filed with iCar that'd be late May to very beginning of June 2022. They then have to be filed with iCar by July 1. That process proceeds and once again that process is a very tight deadline under these current time periods. It's very optimistic. And they're supposed to be adopted the final rules by December 1 2022. And those rules would be targeted to meet the 2025 reduction, a greenhouse gas reduction targets. Any questions about that. But the notion that the rules to be written based on the plan that was put forth that they would be written in some of the legislature could look at them in May is is totally unworkable. And that just, you can't even, you, that's just unworkable. The rules have to be available in when the legislature meets in a given session. And as some folks, some senators and witnesses have said it's a pretty ambitious timeline but and I have to agree that's a pretty ambitious timeline. Mr. Marley and when you say ambitious. Is that because it is built on the statutory minimum time for each step in the overall process. It's I've said optimistic. Very tight. Yes, it gives the, what we calculated is, is really the minimum time period under the various statutes. I'll see these rules, or at least I assume these rules would be complex and there'd be lots of public input. And it doesn't really expand the time period to take account of that. So it is assuming that they can really keep to the statutory minimum time periods, and they're able to receive public input and do whatever they need to do in a very, very tight period of time. Mr. Chair. Who is the witness who whose testimony focused on the following point that just because if you were to pass such a bill. It is unrealistic that the legislature not to begin to pass some interim steps. Well before the rules are written to pass steps in statute to begin implementing implementing some of the foundations of any rules. I think, Senator. Mr. Martin mentioned things like particular saying I'm not recalling any particular witness saying that, but I know that that's been in our committee discussion. For instance, I know members of this. I don't know if my thing is saying my connection is unstable. Can people still hear me okay. Yes. The We as a committee, for instance, have had two years of work so far on phasing into an all fuels energy efficiency program, which if it were implemented, I would have a major impact on greenhouse gas emissions. So I would never expect us or any other committee to tap the brakes and say we need to wait for a rulemaking and a plan from another body to before we should go ahead with our own best work. So in fact, I think in in Massachusetts before rulemaking and was ever invoked, because it was delayed and then it had to go to court in order to force the hand of their Department of Environmental Conservation Arts counterpart to write rules. They'd already achieved 60% of their greenhouse gas productions prior to the rules being written. So, I think we're counting on more than leaning just on GWSA to make progress. The other thing is this program is aligned in the bill has a lengthy phase in and personally I would like to see us take much more assertive action that we know quite well what we can do far sooner. So, I don't know if it's a witness or just your chair, but or maybe Okay, I'm a word. I was pouring through some notes here and I just didn't find Mr chair the I will have gone a week without mentioning 1336, which is the number of days between Pearl Harbor and the Japan suing for peace. And this this bill doesn't, you know, is doesn't recognize that there were many activities that were initiated almost immediately, such as within two months the United States of America quit manufacturing automobiles in order to take on the challenge of World War two. And that was just two months. We ended the manufacture of one of the bills. This bill talks for a couple years and and plans and argues before anything concrete happens. So, it's just suggesting we might move up the, the timeline push it. Or, because I think your point you know your points a good one. In anticipation. Once you get the plan legislature does not on the timeline in the bill. When the legislature gets the plan in January of 2021, it, you know, Dan well needs to pass some laws to begin to implement the basic tenants of the plan, not that to whether it's fees or income or something. It's going to have to pass something in order to have any chance that rules will the rules will be meaningful in any time period. So, we're going to that would we the legislature would be faced with that dilemma, whether we gave the legislature time to review the rules or whether we simply concurred with the bill if we don't act during that. That session, then another year is lost. Well, based on the timeline and my experience around rulemaking maybe yours, I always think of it as taking a year, which would mean instead of having rules coming out in the summer of 21. They would be more like coming back and you know maybe January of 22. At which point then there would be a legislative sessions just starting and you'd have an opportunity to work. But I think, you know what you're pointing out to me is the other possibility is not only having that the rules coming along as helpful. But the plan that's been passed to an hour. That's going to go to drive rulemaking would also be a useful document to the legislature in and of itself and we need not wait for rules, just take it and run maybe that's what you're saying take the plan. If the legislature. Last session, we considered a bill from the house to raise some money with a tax on on heating oils, heating fuels, motor fuels, and it was a tepid narrow tax that didn't do much, and we were hog tied on whether or not to pass it, or to make it a to raise some monies that actually provided money to actually do something. And we, we rejected the proposal from the other body, and we here mark some of our electric efficiency money in the interim to train a host of people to be ready to insulate and work on on thermal heating. That's what we dedicated some money to, so that this legislative session the one that we're in now would have come up with the way to begin to put those people to work. Actually, making progress and reducing the heat loss in the state and putting money into Vermonters pockets, etc, etc, etc. And we haven't done that. We simply haven't done that we've been diverted on other things. So that's the way the legislature have many many excuses, not to tackle what needs to be done, and my final editorial comment would be as we struggle with the COVID response. This is another example of we were told what we was coming and we didn't do much until April. And right now we're debating whether we've done too much or what we ought to do next. So that's that's our nature. Thank you, Mr. Chair. One reminder for us I think is on what we did last year on, I regret along with you that we did not increase that excise tax and move to help create a more robust program. You said hog tide, I'd say beat about the head and shoulders, whatever it was, we didn't move forward on it and the program, I'd say it's been limited ever since by it's relatively low level funding. We did do in 337 this year. There is that $2 million that helps get us ready for next year which I hope is maybe a far more robust program. So yeah, 2 million here and there is not an adequate response. That slow timeline, which has us working through the PUC for the all fuels energy efficiency utility is a direct result of the legislature. I would say needing to have independent expert outside analysis to help buck us up to do what much analysis has already showed would be I think a good idea environmentally and economically. That's, that's the painful nature of a legislative body sometimes slower than we would like. And you know, I'm one quick note, I'll editorialize on COVID. I'd say one bright note to me is that when we see something worth doing, we actually have been able to respond surprisingly quickly. And then when people say we can't afford things, the fact that we can mobilize more money than I've ever seen laying in Vermont when it's coming. It's our money directed from the feds, but I'm just afraid that I agree with the concept that you know that yes if the feds wanted to give us those those dollars to deal with climate would be would be great. Right. So, I'll go back on to topic anyway. So with that, it's 11 I don't know if there's any more comments we any more discussions that it's helpful to see the timeline. So looking forward to tomorrow I think the witness sounds great. And I appreciate you reaching out to her I think it'd be good to hear some on the ground experiences. So the our witness tomorrow is also the author with another partner on an article that examines this whole history and issues that came up. The article's name is behind the curtain insiders view of developing and enforcing state climate change laws by Sue Reed and Jennifer rush while it appears an environmental law reporter, I have a copy of the article and I'll send it to and ask you to distribute it to the committee. If you have the time and interest I think I'm planning actually reading it tonight I haven't read it yet but be an interesting back bit of background reading before tomorrow's testimony. And if you have questions. If you think may take some research or thinking before her appearance. Please send them to me by the end of the day and I'm going to send her a couple questions I'll try to get as much as I can to her so that she knows the kind of things were apt to ask questions about before coming in tomorrow. So if there's nothing more thank you for jumping in Mr Martin to help us get a running start back into the world of global warming Solutions Act. And committee just so the people I have a sense of pace. If we have relatively minor adjustments. Then I would think in order to keep pace with the current Senate calendar. We should be aiming to vote a bill out by the end of this week. The very latest beginning of next, but perhaps as soon as big here. So, we're in time. Friday works for me. Okay. Next week. Cory, are you in on Friday. I'll be here Friday. I won't be here tomorrow. Okay. So, all goes well with your family event. And if there's nothing more any committee members have anything else you'd like to add. All right. There's nothing else then we are adjourned for today. Thanks very much everybody.


Hello Zwifters welcome to another episode of how to run on Zwift. Today we're going to be looking specifically at the pairing screen. How do you pair your foot pod? How do you pair your heart rate monitor in Zwift? Well it's fairly straightforward when you log in to Zwift you will be presented with this screen. This screen shows you the devices that you need to pair in Zwift in order to get heart rate and speed and cadence within Zwift. What you need to do is you need to click where it says run speed click on pair there you click search and that will bring up any devices that are broadcasting on the correct technology in this case we're using ant plus and it will show you the device that you need you click the one you want I'm going to choose my my my stride foot pod not my Garmin and click okay same for cadence now you can choose a different device for cadence but it makes sense to me to choose the same one unless you've got a specific reason why you want to choose a different one so we click search again choose the same foot pod for cadence and then on the left there you see heart rate click search your heart rate strap should show up make sure it is the right technology so ant plus in this case click okay and there it is and you will be into your run now if during your run you find that the heart rate monitor or the foot pod cuts out or you just want to change foot pods maybe the batteries gone click menu go over there to the right hand side and click pair and you're back in the pairing screen and that's it guys that's all you need to do to pair your devices in Zwift that's it take care we'll see you for another episode of how to run on Zwift in the very near future take care bye bye


You're not stuck because you can't.  That's from the movie The Shack, which if you've seen it or read the book, you know, it does a pretty good job of exploring this impossible interplay that we're all in between consensus reality and the impossible to understand extended reality that seems to pop up now and then. It's a topic that I explored with the extraordinary astral traveler Jürgen Ziva. Here are a couple of clips. I was at that time painting taught by a Vienna serialist, and so that went on really well. But then one night I had extreme experience, like a poltergeist thing.  And not only that, but an astray which was next to it was catapulted across the room. And at that time, I just didn't believe in anything supernatural and anything like that. It was totally out of my realm. I stood at the shore of an ocean and the waves crushing in towards me were made out of light. And each light, each wave that came to me was a revelation, was offering a higher state of consciousness. And when I thought, oh, and all the time this was happening, I was in a state of total ecstasy. And every time a new wave came crushing in on me, there was another revelation, not just a revelation, but an even higher state of consciousness. Welcome to Skeptico where we explore controversial science and spirituality with leading researchers, thinkers and their critics. As you know, this show is primarily about consciousness and what I like to call extended consciousness. That is all that strange but impossible to deny stuff that seems to be happening beyond space and time in these metaphysical realms. And I'm really keen on people who are kind of undaunted in their effort to enter into those realms and try and bring them back and bring them down to a level of, if not science, at least a pre-scientific deeper understanding of them. And that's one thing that I've always thought is so super impressive about the work of today's guest, Juergen Ziva. And Juergen was on the show a couple of years ago and then I've begun this kind of intensive investigation into evil, not for evil's sake, but maybe as this lends to maybe giving us a different understanding of these extended consciousness realms.  He has the most extensive and well documented exploration through his out-of-body experiences into these realms and has really tried to catalog them. And I was like, hit on myself on the head. I'm like, of course, this guy really has the good. So a couple more things about Juergen that you're going to want to know. He has some amazing books out, Multidimensional Man, Vistas of Infinity, The Ten-Minute Moment. Please go and check those out. They are amazing. He also has an incredible website, Multidimensional Man, where he features all sorts of interviews that he's done in the past and other amazing stuff. And then as I was talking to Juergen before this interview, and I was, he kind of saw some of the questions in the places I was going, he alerted me to the fact that he has this really great and I hate to just kind of be pumping all this stuff up, but it's fantastic. I haven't even had a chance to watch all of these because it's been a super busy week for me, but I'm going to watch every single one of them in this multi-part series of afterlife answers. And again, it's Juergen sharing what he's learned from these extended realms. So this is a real trait. This is truly one of the pioneers and one of the most, I think, important explorers. I want to say researchers because in so many ways he is, but will reserve that word for a careful scientific kind of way, but explorers and documenters of extended consciousness, which is really where all the action is. Juergen, sorry for going on and on. Thank you so much for coming on and joining me. Yeah, thank you. It's nice to see you again, Alex. It's good to talk to you.  Just an amazing artist, commercial artist, but now moved into doing other just fantastic works that anyone can look at and say, wow, that's really great stuff. So please fill in the bio there. Juergen, tell people what you're about, how this came to be, and what is going on in your collective body work. Yeah, I've got, it started off really when I was in my early 20s, when I went to art school in Hamburg, and I experimented, there was in the early 70s, late 60s. As you do, when you're an art student, you experiment with all kinds of substances, one of them was LSD. At that time, it was still legal. So there was no fear attached to it. But the thing was... Other than the normal fear that was... Yeah, it's just a normal fear that comes as an experience. But that was really an event which catapulted me after about a year or so into a deep state of depression. So in order to get out of it, somebody suggested to take up meditation. So I enrolled on a course of TM, and of course, the depression went almost magically after about three months. And then I became very curiously interested in the phenomena of meditation. I started reading up all the books that were written about it. And so I started embarking on this, which was a very fashionable pursuit in those days. It was a hippie movement going to India. And I embarked on this adventure of meditation. And then I really wanted to know the essence of it. So I even meditated for about five, six hours a day at one stage. And nothing really happened, except I got into some quite dark areas to the point that I started painting very dark pictures. So what happened, I tapped into my unconscious and out came these demonic creatures. I was at that time painting taught by a Vienna surrealist. And so that went on really well. But then one night, I had to sort of cut extreme experience, like a poltergeist thing.  And not only that, but an ashtray, which was next to it, was catapulted across the room. And at that time, I just didn't believe in anything supernatural and anything like that was totally out of my realm. But I was totally fearful. And so I thought I'd give this whole thing up. It's not getting me anywhere. And it's negative. And I don't like it. So I just returned to normal life. But then six months later or so, time later, I had a spontaneous peak experience. And that was when I was having breakfast, eating a sandwich, I lost my connection with my hands and my breakfast. And before long, I was in a completely different state of consciousness. I wrote about in my first book. And I've reported about it, but this totally changed my life. Not only did I experience for the first time in my life that I wasn't the body. But I also noticed that there's no such thing as me, as I understood myself. For about three weeks, I was walking around in a space which was myself. And then gradually, I returned. But my life wasn't the same. On top of that, something was triggered. I had a few months later, I started having lucid dreams. And then I had full blown out of body experiences. Again, if anybody would have talked to me about it before, I would have just told them they're sort of superstitious or lunatics. So I didn't know what had happened. And then I started investigating into it. And I found out, yes, it's such a phenomenon of out of body experiences. And so it started from there. I then became curious and followed it up. And what followed after that was some 40, nearly 50 years of inner experiences, which unfolded as I kept meditating, as I got deeper into it. And it's still unfolding. I mean, when I wrote my book, The 10 Minute Moment in 2013, that for me was another breakthrough experience. Because at that time, I was in a monastery, in a sort of solitary retreat in the Scottish mountains. I was experiencing what I can only describe as a unity consciousness. And after that, I couldn't go back to my old sort of narrow self again. It was almost, the way I describe it, it was as if by cage made out of frosted glass had fallen to pieces. And I couldn't put it back together again to see the things the way they were. So after that, I wrote my book, Multidimensional Man, which was basically chronicling all my out of body experiences I had right from the beginning. And I just wanted to keep a record of it and make sense. And then the book came out purely by chance, because my daughter found the manuscripts, my diaries, and she became curious. She wanted to read them. And I said, and she said, well, you can't read your writing. Can you type it all out for me? And I was curious, because I hadn't looked at them for a long time. So I started typing them out. And and sure enough, out of it came a book. And that was the beginning. And then in 2013, I wrote 10 Minute Moment. And in 2015, I wrote the second out of body book, Visus of Infinity. Now that followed on from 2008 to 2015, seven years of very, very intense experiences. Altogether, I was about, if I add up all the time in the house, I spent 60 hours in alternative reality, 60 hours, which is longer than most people would spend when they have near death experience or so. So I had plenty of opportunity to actually do in-depth investigation and research. And that was all combined in this, you know, Visus of Infinity. There's so many interesting parts of that story. Just have a million questions right there. But let me start with a couple of those. One is we're chatting about just a second before I hit the record button. I think the kind of intersection of you as a visual artist, and then as an experiencer of this extended out of body realm kind of thing, is super interesting. You mentioned as we began to roll tape that you're really interested in virtual reality right now. And you kind of have the green screen image, but you're kind of immersing yourself in different technological realities, which is something, we'll leave that to maybe the end to talk about. But I'm interested in what you understand to be, to me, kind of a strange intersection between visual artist and the way that you chronicled this, like an accountant or like a, you know, like a bookkeeper to go in and make these intensely detailed records and anyone who's tried to keep even a dream journal, you know, those that that's a hard process to stay on top of. And you did this for years and years. Have you given any thought to kind of what drove you and how that relates to this kind of visual artist sensibility that you have? Is there anything there that's interesting to you? Yeah, the thing is, of course, I've been always very highly visual, you know, person. I mean, I see, when I connect to events or, you know, thoughts, you know, I see them in a highly visual way. I mean, right from when I was a child, you know, and when I started learning to read and write, I started writing little stories about the things I actually experienced inside, inside myself. And I remember traveling through space, you know, and visiting other planets. And of course, the visual stimulus was absolutely overwhelming. And I was sort of fortunate enough that I could draw, you know. So initially, when I first started trying to document these experiences visually, I couldn't really think of how we can possibly represent this. So I thought watercolour is probably the best medium because watercolour is has a luminosity, which you can easily represent the atmosphere like the lights, you know. So I was drawn to watercolour and for a long period, I tried to paint in watercolour, but they were mostly abstract. Because there was no way I could reproduce the visual abundance, which I experienced just as a few brush strokes. But out of the watercolour, you emerged a few shapes and things. So I focused in on these. And then I started doing improvisational paintings, basically being in the moment and doing abstract work. And occasionally, out of the abstract paintings, I did visions emerged, triggered by the colour and the energy, you know. And I suddenly was drawn into a completely different state of consciousness, which was aided by the fact that the improvisational paintings happen totally in the here and now. So there was no agenda, no plan of doing that. And this here now gateway opened me up to enter into completely different kinds of realities. And then one painting in particular in 1980, when I got up in the morning to meditate, I looked at a painting I did the previous, previous day, which was completely abstract. But suddenly my vision was drawn behind the brush strokes. And I closed my eyes and I had probably one of the most intensive out of body experiences, which probably lasted a couple of hours.  And you have to bear in mind, I never had a teacher, you know, as in meditation, I never sort of went on this route. But I had this Chinese master who sort of gave me these incredible riddles to solve. And, and at one stage, he would communicate with me via symbols. And he would give me the symbols. And the symbols had the effect of raising my awareness and taking me into a different state of consciousness. It's very difficult to describe, but I sometimes think of crop circuits. You know, what do they mean? You know, I think there's something from a higher dimensional level, which cannot be communicated in human language in words. And the effect of the symbols was that they made a direct link to a state of consciousness which went beyond the human mind. This is how I, I saw it. And then, and then after when I looked at this painting I was doing, I close my eyes and meditate. I had the most tremendous out of body experience. And in this out of body experience, I went to all the different levels of consciousness through the astral level, the lower, the lower mind, right through the higher mind. I saw things which absolutely I've never experienced and never seen before. I could, I could see thoughts, had shapes, had form, had sound, had animation, abstract thoughts. They're no longer abstract. They were incredible, fascinating shapes which are difficult to describe. But the moment I looked at these thoughts, I could understand a whole philosophy which was behind these thoughts, which would have taken days to unravel. So these, so the symbols which this Chinese master sent me was a gateway into this super dimensional level, which allowed me to expand into a way of spirit, or thinking, or no state of mind, which went totally beyond our human limited way of reasoning. And this, this was, this was an absolute revelation I wrote about in multi-dimensional man, but this was not the end. Then my master sort of came to me again, and then he took me beyond this dimension of, of the mind, into when you say your master came to you in this extended realm, master, or yes. Yes, he was, the thing was, he was only a presence. He didn't have a physical, but I could hear him. I could be communicated by our thoughts. He had a presence and he also communicated this sort of sense of humor as we were exploring. And then he, then I went into this state of, I suppose, samadhi, you know, I suddenly found, I found myself in a, the way I described it was, I stood at the shore of an ocean, and the waves crashing in towards me were made out of light. And each light, each wave that came to me was a, was a revelation, was offering a higher state of consciousness. And when I thought, oh, and all the time this was happening, I was in a state of total ecstasy. And every time a new wave came crashing in on me, there was another revelation, not just a revelation, but an even higher state of consciousness. And this went on and on. And, and the ecstasy in itself was, was not just a feeling, the ecstasy in itself was a revelation of a different kind. You know, so, so this is so difficult to describe, because it's not something that can be easily processed through the mind, because it's totally beyond, you know, what, what one can normally sort of make sense of. But the thing was, I came out of this, and I think I only had about three experiences like this in my whole life, which were of the same sort of intensity. The first one I mentioned earlier, you know, after having my sandwich, the second one in 2018, the third one in, in Scotland, when I was on the retreat.  And of course, along the way, there are different, different things that happened, you know, little jumps along the way, where you sort of opening yourself up to other insights, you know. And I think my, my focus on my, in a life, my artistic focus going back to what you just said, it's very much to do with going beyond traditional reasoning, thinking, it's just going beyond that, where language is no longer the appropriate means of embracing the experience, you know. And I think that's where the two things joined. Oh, that's, that's really, really fascinating on so many levels. You know, the, the one question I guess I, or area I wanted to dig into a little bit is this idea of mapping, which you've really tried to do as well, like mapping these extended realms. And the way you do that is really important because we need that. And then the second is the meaning part. And it seems to me like you're careful about separating those two to a certain extent, as opposed to people who jump into the meaning part, you know, like a lot of my investigation up to this point has been in the near-death experience. And one of the reasons I like the near-death experience is we can ground ourselves in some science there. In some respects, we have to say it's very faulty science because it's a science based on the idea that consciousness doesn't even exist. But even in falsifying that premise, falsifying that paradigm is a huge step forward. So what the near-death experience does is it follows it from a just boots up or bottom-up way of saying, okay, what is, what were the vitals of that person before they had their cardiac arrest? How did we measure it afterwards? And then what were they able to retrieve and chronicle? I like the science of that. And I would even suggest that in the last 10 years, almost more than anything I can think of, that science has changed the dialogue in some fundamental ways that we don't even realize around consciousness. The materialistic consciousnesses and illusion stuff, it just doesn't hold up. And even the people who are spinning it out there, you can see they're kind of like, no, that it isn't going to work. And I kind of think, I shouldn't say I think, I'm wondering, and I'm hopeful, that we can make just that similar kind of step with these extended consciousness realms. And I think you have such a key role to play in that. So it's not a matter of, I want to immediately, as everybody does, ask you what it means. What did that demon mean? And why did it fly off the thing? And is that real? Are we co-creators of reality? What about solpas and all the rest of that kind of stuff? But I want to take a step back and say, how would we begin to, in the best way possible, just start mapping these realms in a way that might be understandable and useful to us? Does that make sense? What I'm saying? Yeah, I'm fascinated by science. You know, I'm a real bit of a science addict. And right from the beginning, I thought the best way to deal with these experiences is to be as factual as I possibly can, and just record it. And ever since I saw myself as a reporter, rather than a theoretician or somebody who can make sense of it, because there are a lot more people better qualified to evaluate the data, I see what I'm producing is basically data reports. And there were some people who have taken it as such, and there were scientists and looking at it purely from the evidential, the reporting aspect of it. I try to, in my books, I try to find some sense or come to some explanation in it, but it never really quite worked, because I'm an artist. I did meet Tom Campbell. He has built his own model of reality. He's much better equipped to do that. But when I look at all these models, in the end, it comes always back to, we just want to have a narrative. We want to make sense of it. Okay, and we want the explanation. We have always done that. We went, like the Greeks, they invented their gods to make sense of reality. And we just still want to do that. But the difficulty is, the moment we dress it into this duality of words, we inevitably leave an aspect out which is beyond it, which cannot be easily explained. And the moment we do that, we start limiting these. And I found reality is a very dynamic process. The moment you try to catch it, it's like herding cats. The moment you think, I've got it all under control now, that is how it is. A religion is born. So one possible explanation for that, in very simple terms, is that we are in the wrong dimension to do that. So when we hit you, I kind of set up that I wasn't going to do this, but I am going to do this, kind of just ask you the question. And then, based on your experience, what do you think? Do you think this is, because this is like so commonly expressed, right? What you just said. So take your experience, which is an out-of-body experience, which is different than a near-death experience. We don't know in what way it's different, but we accept going in that it's different because you weren't dead at the very least from a physiological standpoint. And then we start seeing these similarities, like what you're over and over again is a near-death experience will come back. And these are people who are truly dead. I always mention this because people get hung up on this and they go, you don't realize they weren't really dead. It's like, really good talk to Dr. Samparni of the leading resuscitation expert in the world and also a near-death experiencer. And he'll tell you, no, these people were more dead than most accounts we have because we had them in a hospital and we know they're the physical condition they were in. But I digress only slightly. People come back from their near-death experience and they say, essentially what you just said, Jurgen, they say, I knew everything. No sooner would a question enter my mind that I knew it and I knew it more completely than I could have even asked it. But don't ask me to express it now because from this realm, this dimension, I can't. And is that a hint that we're always going to be kind of handicapped, maybe severely, in trying to explore that from this dimension? Do you have any thoughts on that? Yes, I think that is a really big problem. That's why I'm very keen to use technology, really, to create, to find a stimulus for people to have their own experience, really. The thing is, for example, you need to have the experience because even skeptics who had a near-death experience, you know, they would never have believed it before what they experienced. And there are a number of near-death experiences who were skeptics and they were then changed people. And a lot of the things which I have experienced are very similar to near-death experiences. But I think because I've been able to focus on different strata of consciousness deliberately rather than being catapulted into an out-of-body state like a near-death experience, I was able to focus my awareness quite deliberately, knowing exactly what has happened to me. I could go into higher states of consciousness and I could go down into the lowest state of consciousness and map everything out without being fearful that I have died or not, you know. And so there's a big difference in that. But there are a lot of similarities, you know. So yeah, I mean, from a science point of view, it's so difficult. So what I was thinking now, I was hoping I can use virtual reality to create a tool which may allow people to trigger an outer state of consciousness, you know. And I was encouraged when I first came across virtual reality in 2014, I created a kind of tunnel experience which is very often reported. And I tried to combine the tunnel experience with sounds, which were also going into a certain place within the body, which creates a certain stimulus, and then being surrounded in this virtual experience rather than seeing it on a flat screen or just listening to it. This extensive bombardment of stimuli hopefully creates a trigger to an inner sympathetic reality. Now the interesting thing was after I released the first app of this tunnel experience, I was on a developer's group where all the techies hung out to work with virtual reality. Nobody was interested in any spiritual experiences or anything. So I released this in the tech group and soon enough, I think there were about 3,000 downloads in the end. And I had some interesting comments. Some people said it felt like a near-death experience, although they felt that is how it must feel if you die, you know. People said, oh, I lost total sense of time, you know, because the experience is such it takes you out of the linear time string. You have no bearings. You don't know what's beyond it. You're just in a tunnel, literally in a tunnel vision. And so I've taken this on. And this morning I completed the second experience, which of course is based on everything I've done before. And I played it to my daughter who is a yoga teacher. Okay. I wanted to have a first sort of impression. And she actually reported there were certain things happening inside her body, especially in the heart chakra. She knows all about these different energy centers. And she said she felt a very powerful connection, which was like a forgotten memory, you know. She didn't even know she had. And she connected to an archetype. And I think that is really important. If we can create tools which allow us to create a connection to our archetypes, and the archetypes become activated and take over, then we have an experience. And if we can make this experience, you know, independent of, let's say drugs or any other sort of methods, then we can possibly give a large enough number of people the tools to report on these experiences they have and find a consensus where scientists can say our statistically 75% have reported such and such by using this tool, which opened their consciousness. And amongst these people, so and so many people experience the light phenomena and other things. So we have got a much broader base to create a science based on science on which is based on statistics. And these statistics is like a lot of people reporting the same phenomenon in nature. When enough people report the same phenomenon, then science will accept it as a given, you know. And they rule out delusions and things like that. Yeah, that's terrific. And what an interesting place to imagine that we might get. Very encouraging. Let me take this in a kind of another direction. And I kind of tipped my hand at the beginning of where I'm going.  No one quite gets it. They're always kind of they want they get stuck on evil. And that's like, it's not I'm not talking about evil. I don't care about evil. I'm all about the opposite of evil. Without without without having to define it. But what I think it does is it is a lens, another lens into this extended realm, that if we are going to do the kind of mapping that you're talking about in the broadest sense, and I love the way you brought science into it, where, you know, I get the sense that you have gained knowledge that informs your life on a daily basis. And I can see like you're a family person and the love I can see in your face when you talk about your daughter, you know, that is what you're about. It just comes through. So I go to evil just because I think we have to go there. Like one of the interviews I have in my book is with a woman named Anika Lucas. And I connected with Anika because she's into yoga. I'm super into yoga, like your daughter have been for the longest time. And Anika is a very cool yoga teacher who's used it to really transform her life after some unbelievable trauma when she was a young child. And that trauma was that at six years old in Belgium, she was sold by her mother into a systemic ritual abuse cult. And this is the cult that I always mention this, you know, if you're interested or want to fact check this, look in the 90s. This cult was all over the news in Belgium because it went to the highest levels of government throughout Europe. And they were going to, you know, drain the swamp, get these guys and all the rest of it. And what they were doing to for purposes of our discussion, they were doing the worst of the worst. But what they were doing was trying to mess with these kids consciousness, trying to destroy their consciousness in a way that I later learned the reason why they do try and promote Dissociative Identity Disorder and why they did it in the MK Ultra program. And I talked to a clinical psychologist named Dr. Tom Zinser who's worked with patients for a long time and he's found a similar result in his communications with the extended realm. And here's what's very dark but needs to be put on the table is these folks are trying to connect with extended realms. We can only assume from what you're saying that these are very dark low realms. But that is part of this game. Apparently this is part of this terrain. And I just, I want to know if you have any insights into that part of it. I don't want to stare into the abyss. I don't want to dwell on it or talk about these horrific crimes, which we all know exist. I want to try and understand it from an extended consciousness realm that you've explored. Do you have any thoughts on that? Yes, I have had my own sort of encounters with what can only be described as real evil, you know, during these out of body experiences. But I always found it is identification gone wrong. People who identify, first of all, there's no way that you can go into a higher dimensional levels if you are holding onto an identification, you know, or to a kind of selfishness or self interest, you know, because that just doesn't work because it's like going into a hot air balloon, which is still tied to the ground, you just cannot get out of this level of consciousness. My encounter with evil came when I, you know, after these atrocities happened, 9 11 and the suicide bombing, I was dead, dead keen to find out how do these people believe they can go into paradise when they commit these unspeakable crimes. And so one day I was taken, I was an out of body experience, and I was taken into a very dark realm. And it looked like a sort of Victorian industrial wasteland. It was very dark. The ground was covered in soot and debris and the horizon, the sky was black with red flashes of lighting, big smoke billowing.  And I said, God, where have I been landed here? Now you have to bear in mind that I'm always in in this here now consciousness. Okay, I'm not identified in the sense. So so I still have the objective aspect viewing these things. And I've encountered some very dark things without losing an ounce of my integrity or my connection to to my higher self, you know, but then I was led into this pit where there were piles of human bodies. And out of these piles, there was a guy which I instantly identified as a suicide bomber was trying to disentangle himself from these materialized thought forms of his victims. And whenever he tried to pray to Allah to relieve him of this pain he was in, and it was it was a real physical pain and a mental pain, he he was confronted with the reality of his situation that he cannot undo what he has done. So his he was in a feedback loop. Okay, and this was a situation he couldn't get out of. And then I saw the rather places like that. And then this guy came to me a Muslim guy was a turban. And he was quite dirty from all the sort. And he said, please, please help these people, you know, he was trying to help them. But he was as he was trying to help them, he was attacked by other people were roaming around in this area. And I think what what is happening inevitably with evil is an absence of awareness. And because of this absence of awareness, the focus is on things they can identify with and make sense of. So they're continuously looking for some form of gratification, which enhances their identification with which was whatever they have grown fond of. So they're forever trapped in this realm of identification. And also, there's no end to it.  And it's almost as if it's part of our consciousness itself, part of consciousness, wanting to explore wanting to find out, you know, and at any cost, almost. And I think the problem is that people instead of finding out the string that connects them to the core consciousness to their core identity, they're entangled with strings of identity focused on other things which provide temporary gratification.  This is kind of another model. But what you were just saying there in the strings thing kind of ties this, we just bounce it off you see what you think. We are beings of light beings of connection with this infinite divine intelligence. Forgive me if those words kind of trigger people one way or another. Let's just say that's the model. And what we're really identifying with when we think of evil, and when we think of addictive behavior, or when we think of really unhealthy behavior is a blockage of that energy. And sometimes when that energy becomes blocked, we just need we so intensely want to get it out that we will take any path of getting it out. And sometimes we connect that with energy from other places that are benevolent and dark and are stuck in that same pattern and actually identify with that pattern of blockage that we have. And this is not my model or my personal experience. I'm trying to I guess recap and condense what I've heard from a couple of the different people. But in particular, what I heard from Dr. Tom Zinser, who is this clinical psychologist, which for 15 years, we worked with people in deep, deep hypnotherapy under a psychologically rigorous clinical model. But he'll be the first one to tell you he went completely off reservation, and that he had the assistance of a spirit guide who was instructing him in how to help these people. And the diagnosis was that kind of like you were talking about them, the sandbags on the air balloon, the ego states that they had created sometimes very innocently as a child, you know, afraid, and then, you know, develop that little kind of wrinkle in the consciousness that kind of becomes a little bit of this traumatized individual. And then in sometimes for some people, it's a lot worse. Or it's just a mild, I need to be of the protector, I need, you know, all these different shadows to put it in kind of young in terms, you know, all these different ego states that we create that we haven't fully resolved become blockages of energy. And but here's the key thing that he said that I guess I want to get your opinion on just straight away. He suggested a certain science to that in that those ego states, if they become developed, and if they are connected to a negative energy field, can actually be entry points for entities that are stuck on these lower levels that want to connect with this level. And that can create a lot of, you know, pretty unhealthy bad stuff for people. And we could go in and chronicle that.  I'm just talking about this as being widely widely reported. And I think misunderstood in terms of the role that might these other entities that we don't fully even understand might be playing. Does any of that, does any of that fit at all with what you, your understanding of things? Yes, very much so.  If you don't have any of these spots, they're totally helpless. For example, when I went into this darker realm by suicide, almost where there were also some ISIS fighters, people with machine guns and things, you know, running around looking for enemies, finding them in the form of their thought forms, you know, and they looked very real to them.  But as soon as they trained the machine gun on me, the bullets sort of plopped out of the nozzle and fell to the ground. There was nothing they could hang on to. And that is the thing. So they continuously looking for a victim who has got these sort of dark aspects within them, or compatriots, you know, they can identify as an enemy. So they're keeping themselves to themselves very much. And I had some interesting experiences for, there was a woman who I reported in my book, she died of a heroin overdose. And before she died, she had a very, very negative life. She was in a dependency situation. She was really badly treated. And she was in a very dark place. And when I saw her, she looked like a zombie. You know, she was diseased on this low astrolabe, was very dark. And she, I could immediately see where she came from, because when I'm in this state, I have, I've got access to, to the people, you know, to the knowledge what is sort of combined, is I immediately get a sort of information, download what had happened to her. Anyway, I then, I felt really sorry for her. So I went up to her and I asked her whether she knew that she was dead. And she thought she was just in a bad dream.  So I put my arm around her and I started talking to her. And we gradually walked, kept walking. And as we, as I was talking, her skin sort of cleared up. She became better. The atmosphere became lighter. It was like morning. And then we ended up in a park, this green grass and trees, and she was completely restored to her normal self by the time we arrived there. So, so once this sort of identification is broken, we can get, we can step out of this role playing we have adopted or this, this habit we have entered into, you know, or we have been conditioned into. And when that happens, of course, it becomes very quickly, very clear that we are in a much better, more powerful state, you know, and inevitably the people I met on the lower levels, they were in a very narrow, narrow bandwidths of, of their mind. And they felt, they may have felt very powerful, because there's a lot of people under their control of that realm. But they were in a very narrow bandwidths of freedom, you know, they were very limited. And, and the moment this is pierced, the moment they show a sign of a need of wanting to break out, that can be used as an anchor for anybody who is sort of coming along, and gradually string them out of it. And I gave an example in my book, Business of Infinity, of one of these rescue missions, you know. So I don't know whether that answers any, any of your points you, you just made earlier. It does. It was incredibly powerful. Hey, a couple of big picture questions. I think we can assume the answer here, but I don't want to assume, I want to hear your take. Hierarchy of consciousness. Again, you know, it's just baffling to me that we live in this super scientific age where biological robot meaningless universe meme still carries the day. If you're in academia, they completely deny it. But let's get past that because we are past that. And then let's even embrace the idea as we have in this interview that there are these extended consciousness realms. If we draw a big circle around all that, does there seem to be a hierarchy to it? And the trigger word that we don't want to say is God, but because if there is a hierarchy, that kind of suggests that. Or is it just kind of this blob of consciousness that doesn't really have, we couldn't really attach any kind of hierarchy, hierarchical kind of structure to it? Yeah, I have to say, I never really found a word for my experiences of higher consciousness. You know, even when I was sort of faced, this is incredible light as I stood on the ocean. The thought never occurred to me to use the word God. I had an experience when I wrote the 10 minute moment where I meditated and I suddenly was gripped by an intense fear.  And I felt, if I go one step further, there will be God, you know. And whatever this is, it will just obliterate me. So this fear started developing within me. And that was the only time I felt, oh, yeah, there must be God. But the funny thing was, I spent the rest of the day hunting for my ego, trying to find some form of identity I could feel comfortable with. I didn't want to go anywhere near. I spent all my life looking for this big thing and looking for God. And now he's sort of waiting in a wing and I get scared and run amide. The interesting thing was, of course, it was all in my mind, you know. And the thing was the next day, I went to sleep. I finally calmed down. I went to sleep. I had some illuminating dreams. And the next morning I woke up and I was, I had this sort of 10 minute moment experience, you know. Again, there was no way I could find a word for it. But the idea of the hierarchy has always, the feeling of a hierarchy has always evaded me because there's only being. And that's all I can come up with. It's just pure and simple being. There's an itchness and I can't find a name for it other than the reality that I am. And it's everywhere. I can look at this glass of water and it's just confirmation that it is. And there's ever how far I ever got to that. Hey, that's awesome. I don't want to pull you into saying stuff beyond that. I will share with you a story that from a recent interview I had that gets at this same thing a different way. And I was entering this really wonderful guy, English guy, David Ditchfield. And he had this incredible, he's also an artist, which is part of his story. He has this incredible near death experience where he's pulled under a commuter train.  And he's dragged under this train and he dies and he has this incredible experience since then. No artistic talent before that. Now he draws these huge, huge, large scale paintings. But that's kind of a side story because David comes back and he understands his experience as being a very Christian experience in seeing Jesus and seeing Jesus creating universes and stuff like that. And I said, David, I'm totally fine that you had an experience with Christ consciousness. He goes, No, no, don't say Christ consciousness.  And I said, David, here's what I've learned studying near death experiences is that one when people study them across culture, across time, a lot of these religious figures go away, but more significantly from a meaning standpoint, David, when I talk to people that have had multiple near death experiences, they often tell me that in the first experience, they do experience Jesus and they experience all that wonderfulness of Christ consciousness. But in subsequent experiences, it goes deeper. It doesn't, it doesn't contradict their initial experience, but they get the sense that there is more beyond that. That there's deeper and higher forms of experience. Again, to me, that's a language, that's a hierarchical language. And David's response was to go, absolutely, I do feel that that is true. Though there's a slight contradiction in how he's thinking about it, but who am I to pick apart, you know, what, what his experiences. Yeah, it's a really interesting story. I can sympathize with that, because a friend of mine and I, we went in 2017 to Greece. We wanted to go on a kind of pilgrimage, you know, to revisit the ancient sites, the Delphi, Oracle, and we ended up in Mount Athos. And that is a story I could write a whole book about because I'm not a Christian, my father was an atheist, my mother was a Christian, but I wasn't brought up as a Christian in a kind of belief bubble. So, so we went into this monastery. We didn't have any bookings and it was a bit of an adventure home where we ended up. But I made friends with a monk.  And during the conversation, he said to me, why don't you come to one of these chapels? Normally people are not allowed into it. There's only four ordained monks. But I think I make an exception because we had such an interesting conversation. And I made quite clear to him that I'm not a Christian, that I've never been sort of taken to it. The only thing I like is the early Christian art. He said, come with me. I show you some of these icons. So he took me into this chapel. And this is absolutely true. He took me into this chapel. And it was quite dark.  I couldn't see it because it was too dark. He lit a candelabra. He lowered it down in front of this icon. And it was the Virgin Mary with a Jesus child. And before I knew, I was overcome with total emotion. And I had a breakdown. And I suddenly had this... I had an ecstatic experience. I felt an overwhelming love. And that you could have hit me with a feather. I just couldn't... There was no rational explanation to it. And I started crying. I was so overcome, I started crying. And then my friend, he went out and the monk went out to leave me on my own.  I said, yes, thank you. And I sort of didn't speak about it. And then to make matters worse, he said, well, it's quite interesting. I want to show you another icon. And then he led me into this other chapel, which had an icon of the saint Anastasia. She was tortured to death in the third century. And the picture and the same thing happened. The same thing happened again. I was overwhelmed by this incredible love. But the other thing that happened was I went back the next day. The monk wasn't there. The other monks totally forbid me to go anywhere near the chapel. I was not allowed in there. I said, I've got to go back in. I want to find out more about it. So then I saw a monk up on a balcony. He killed himself laughing because I was trying to explain to him what I wanted. So he then relented. He allowed me back in and I meditated in front of the same icon. And suddenly there was this woman standing right next to me. I couldn't see her physically with my eyes, but I felt her presence. And she said very clearly, I'm still alive. I'm still alive. And if that is the case, then people who have an out of body experience, I'm sure if they meet Jesus, they absolutely meet Jesus because there is no such thing as death. Now the interesting thing was this woman for six months, I only had to think of her. She was right beside me. And we had an exchange. And it was literally death is just a massive illusion. We are not able to go beyond our physical senses. Once you bridge the gap and you become familiar with expanded reality, then there is no mystery. It's all reality. And people are only a thought away. So when people record these, I mean, if you had told me that about 10, 20 years ago, I would say, yes, they're slightly crazy.  But I'm not so sure anymore. You know, so you're not so sure anymore, but you're not a Christian. No. So, I mean, I think, I don't know why I get into this. People think I'm a Christian pastor. And I'm not, I'm just always saying, I'm highly respectful of your Christ consciousness experience. And I'm not trying to limit that or pigeonhole that or say that that's somehow lesser. I'm just saying, isn't that, I mean, you didn't, you didn't meet Christ in that wouldn't make any sense to say you met Christ. So it was in this extended consciousness realm and you met Christ. I don't know exactly what that means, but I accept the reality to that. What I don't understand and what just seems like ridiculously obvious to me in the same way it seems absurd to think that science could continue to prop up this consciousness as an illusion thing. It's just like, there's something deeper going on there. That's more than just a mean. That is a conscious effort on some people to systematically control people because that's a better way to keep people afraid and scared and buying shit and not, you know, thinking too deeply about stuff. You know, that's my take on it. Where I wanted to really tie this back to was religion, because I'm thinking lately is that religion is similarly absurd in the sense that if we come to the understanding, like we're talking about here, that there is this extended realm and your, by all accounts, the highest purpose of your life is to connect with this super light love energy in whatever form. And you're doing, they're doing a VR to try and help people do it. And your daughter's doing yoga, classes trying to help her doing it. And these monks are trying to help people do it. But religion is kind of doing a little trick there. They're saying, Hey, we can help you do that. But by the way, we are going to limit how you, how we will be. I mean, this is always the case with religion. This is the cult part of it. We will be the soul keepers of your access to that. And we will say how you access it and how you don't access it. And we will similarly control and manipulate you in a way that seems completely unnecessary. That's why the important part of your story is you can have that experience and accept the Christian experience and say, but that doesn't make me a Christian. No, that's the thing. I mean, the main issue that is always gets lost is liberation is a freedom aspect in relation. There's always this sort of tendency of wanting to own people, you know, wanting to own something. Yeah, wanting to limit, limited, but at the end, the end result is liberation from all concepts, from all demarcations is total liberation. If that aspect is missing, then I'm afraid we are sort of not seeing the bigger picture, not fulfilling our whole potential. To me, there has always been the number one thing is a freedom. It grants us a freedom to go beyond our limitations, go beyond our identifications, and be able to dynamically experience a new world every moment, every day, okay, without, without any boundaries, without saying, oh, this is how it is, you know, this is what it is all about. No, we just sort of discovering it again and again, new because we are now part of that thing we are discovering, and in discovering it, we are discovering ourselves, which is it, okay. And there, when there lies the incredible liberation, and also there lies the ecstasy it brings, this ecstasy to be found in living every moment, because we are not tied up, we are not tied to one single thing to, to one belief, to one theory, to one model. We transcend that and we are opening ourselves up to be explorers, not knowing what is to come next, and it's beautiful, because we already know we are it, and we cannot get lost. Whatever we explore and discover is another level of our ecstasy, of our ecstatic living, and, and any beliefs which don't allow us this exploration of freedom, they're just limiting us, and that's why I'm not anti-religious, because they, they do explore, give people stepping stones, you know, but when you come to the last stepping stone, or they, let's say, they create a scaffolding, you know, which we, but once we've built the sculpture, we don't need the scaffolding, you know, we are, we are it, you know, that's the, that's the thing with religions, that's why I find, I find them always limiting, but, but religious people don't like to talk about freedom, you know, they don't like that work. You're gonna, I think that was absolutely wonderfully beautiful, so fantastic, and I can't think of a better way to wrap up this terrific conversation you've treated me to. Can you tell folks a little bit about what else is going on in your world, how they might keep track of what you're doing, and if I definitely want to point them to those YouTube videos you did that were fantastic, what else do they need to know about? Yes, I belong to a group of after-life researchers, which is very interesting, it's a very interesting beautiful group, because they explore the whole, whole territory of the afterlife, and I've been a member, and once in months I, the people gather questions, and, and I try to answer them from my sort of experience, and, and that is really interesting, because some of these questions allow me to bring out things which are not widely known, you know, and therefore there's always something new coming out. The other thing is, yeah, I mean, because I'm main, mainly an artist, and the virtual reality is what, what I'm really sort of at the moment exploring, and I had a lot of help people trying to make it possible for me to, to go into any depths, so hopefully I will be able to find some very practical and very illustrative ways of taking people into realities via documentation, which they can experience, and, and hopefully it will lead a bit further than that, you know, hopefully, I mean the ultimate goal would be to devise a tool which hopefully will trigger lucid dreams in people, that, that is the goal, so people can have their own experience, first of all by getting a much closer feeling of an alternate reality while maintaining wakefulness, okay, but I now tell it reality, and therefore making it easier to make the jump into the dream consciousness and then perhaps trigger lucid dream, and that's what I'm, I'm aiming for. Well that's just fantastic work, I mean anyone who isn't excited about all those things, I mean that could be truly culture changing, history changing, although we don't know what effects those kind of things have, but we have to go forth and try the best we can. Our guest again has been Juergen Ziva, it's terrific, terrific to connect with you, thanks again Juergen so much for joining me. Thanks Alex, it was a great pleasure talking to you, thank you. Thanks again to Juergen Ziva for joining me today on Skeptco, the one question I have to tee up and it's not, I guess so much of a question really, but what do you make of Juergen's experience of waves of love and knowledge? There's something there that I think is central to this whole thing that we're talking about, and Juergen is such an awesome embodiment of what he's talking about, isn't he? So what do we think of that? What do you think of that? Is that too light in love for you or how do you process that? Let me know your thoughts, I'd love for you to jump over to the Skeptico Forum and leave a comment there, leave a note there, really dig into it, but if you're not so inclined, find another way to telepathically send me a message and tell me what you're thinking. As always, thanks so much for joining me on this little journey that I'm on and for sharing it with others who you think need to hear it. Until next time, take care and bye for now.