Announcer: 0:00

Programming is sponsored by Marc J. Bernstein. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of this station, its management, or Beastly Media Group. Entrepreneur, founder, author, and financial advisor Marc Bernstein helps high-performing business owners turn their visions into reality. Through his innovative work and the forward-focused form, Marc connects entrepreneurs to resources that fuel their success. Founders Forum is a radio show and podcast where entrepreneurs share their journeys, revealing the lessons they've learned and the stories behind their success. Join Marc and his guests for a mix of inspiration, valuable insights, and a little fun. Now, let's dive in.

Marc Bernstein: 0:40

Good morning, America, how are you? I've got to adjust my controls here. Good morning. We have Dr. V in the studio. We've got Grahame in the studio. Good morning to everybody.

Grahame Maisey: 0:49

Good morning.

Marc Bernstein: 0:50

And I always say, Good morning, America, how are you? It's a song, you know, it's from uh the train they call the city of New Orleans, and it's and it's a it's a TV show, and it sounds like good morning, Vietnam. But I really mean good how are you, America? How are you all doing out there? Because I'm concerned. Things are changing in such a rapid way. Some, if you were going to be subjective about it, good, some not so good, but things are changing rapidly. So there's I I'm just thinking a lot about how everyone's doing. So I wish we could talk about it in depth, but that's not really what the show's about. So we're although we we get into some of those subjects as we as we go along. Uh the the we always have a topic of the day, and mostly always have a topic of the day. And today it's sustainability, and you'll know why soon. But I want to just ask, and I'll ask you, Dr. V first, and then I'll ask our guest, uh Grahame, and what does sustainability mean to you when you think about that? Because I'm not sure everyone uses the word the same way.

Dr. Valecia Dunbar: 1:56

Yeah. Well well, thank you, Marc, for just thinking about us and s and asking us how we feel. I feel great today, so that counts for something. Um, sustainability is to me looking at um a higher level of consciousness around how we can manage, better manage um economic growth, innovation, and uh social causes.

Marc Bernstein: 2:20

So it's much broader than people think of climate and it's balancing out everything. It's all of that, yeah. So I like that. And Grahame, before I'll introduce you in a second, but what what do you what does it mean to you?

Grahame Maisey: 2:32

Um well as an engineer and and uh an air conditioning consultant for 40, 50 years.

Marc Bernstein: 2:38

Yeah, I don't have to do your introduction. Yeah, yeah.

Grahame Maisey: 2:42

Uh and uh sustainability to me means a building and a facility and a city that is sustainable energy-wise, and uh total zero energy, and um and also non-toxic. Uh we we've we've got enough plastic going around the world already. And I'm I'm gonna make more plastic, but um recyclable plastic.

Marc Bernstein: 3:07

So I I love that we got the literal translation of sustainability as it regards the climate and and the earth, and I love that we also got the holistic interpretation of it. I think you guys covered all the ground. I have nothing to add to that. So that's great.

Dr. Valecia Dunbar: 3:22

You agree.

Marc Bernstein: 3:22

So so so uh Grahame um is so Grahame is Grahame Maisey and Maisey or Maisey.

Grahame Maisey: 3:30

Uh depends on where you're from.

Marc Bernstein: 3:32

Okay. Grahame Maisey or Maisey is a highly trained British heating, ventilating, and air conditioning engineer who had 15 years experience in the UK and over well, 47 years experience in the U.S. in energy conversation conservation and conversation in buildings. Um he's conducted reviews and lectures at architects and engineers' offices, and he has LinkedIn articles. If you want to look him up, it's Maisey M-A-I-S-E-Y, and respond, and he responds to LinkedIn threads concerning H V A C and building performance. Um I'll just give you a little more background. When I first talked to Grahame, I said, you know, he's of re retirement age for most people, and he we were talking about his career, and it sounded to me like it was kind of over. And I said, Well, I don't know if there's a show here because we're always talking about the future. And he goes, Wait a second. And and the wait a second is what's having me uh do the show because I thought it was really fascinating. So I won't I won't give it away now, but we'll talk about it um when we get into his future vision. But let's let's just start a little bit about your experience and what you learned and how you got to where you are today, Grahame.

Grahame Maisey: 4:44

Well, it's been a long road. Um I was born just after the Second World War in Leicester, England. Uh the youngest of uh of five children.

Marc Bernstein: 4:53

Leicester spelled Leicester. Leicester. Right, but it's pronounced Leicester.

Grahame Maisey: 4:59

And uh I went to college there and got a degree in mechanical engineering, and then I went to Glasgow, Scotland at Strathclyde University to get a degree, one of the first actually, to get a degree in environmental control engineering, which was a fancy word for saying, fancy way for saying heating, ventilating and air conditioning and lighting. In other words, build building systems, energy building energy systems. So I I was one of the first to get a degree in that. Interesting. And then worked for many consultants in uh England and the Uh UK and and did work in Europe. And then Jimmy Carter brought me over here. 78, uh part of the energy conservation movement from the oil embargoes and crises. And uh we we we were just for so fortunate we instrument tested over 120 hospitals in Philadelphia, Cleveland, and Chicago. It was like a double PhD in how buildings work. It was amazing.

Marc Bernstein: 6:07

By the way, I need to say so. Jimmy Carter brought you brought you here, but what kept you here?

Grahame Maisey: 6:11

Um I'm a fly fisherman.

Marc Bernstein: 6:13

That's what I wanted to get.

Grahame Maisey: 6:15

And uh I was I came here uh in the middle of February, and in the middle of March, I went to Phoenixville Hospital Hospital, and near there was a hole in the wall fly shop. Um and I I walked in and said, Is there any fly fishing around here? And the guy sat me down and told me about the world-classifier fly fishing, trout fishing in Pennsylvania, and the huge carp in the Delaware River, and the big uh bass in in the Atlantic there and the coast. And I thought, well, this is a place to stay.

Marc Bernstein: 6:51

And you never left, right?

Grahame Maisey: 6:53

Uh I've I've never left. I actually started a little fly fishing business of my own, my hobby gone wrong, as I call it.

Marc Bernstein: 7:01

So Grahame is in the Philadelphia area now. Sankin Townway, yeah. And I'll just mention then you met Beverly, who's in the studio with us today.

Grahame Maisey: 7:09

Met my my wife, Beverly, uh, a northeast Philly girl. And uh we I we've raised three gorgeous children, and they're they're flownly nest, they're in the 30s, independent almost. Yep, which is great.

Marc Bernstein: 7:24

Yeah, I've mine too. Yeah. 30s, almost independent is the way I would call it. Almost.

Grahame Maisey: 7:31

Except when they need something.

Marc Bernstein: 7:33

Right.

Grahame Maisey: 7:33

Exactly.

Marc Bernstein: 7:34

Got it. So I understand that one. So um, so so you so you had a job when you came here, yeah. Um, and uh that evolved over time. Tell us about that.

Grahame Maisey: 7:45

Well, 1980 Reagan got into power, and that's when the energy conservation business took a dive. Um, I doubled down on it. I thought, you know, this this this is important. Um I've been following climate change since I started university in '67. So, you know, that this was this was something that was serious.

Marc Bernstein: 8:06

You knew the field wasn't going away.

Grahame Maisey: 8:08

It's not going away. Global warming, climate change is not going away. It's getting worse. And uh that's obviously proved true. So I I doubled down on it and uh I started my own company. My wife joined me. Uh we we my partner, we we did uh same old stuff. We did we did energy conservation studies and reports and then designs. I actually did the uh central chiller design for the old civic centre in in Philly, the one that's gone now. Uh I did the boiler design for the city uh prisons. I saved them over two million a year in in energy cost just by changing that so uh and then and we carried on. We we reinvented total quality commissioning, which was uh how how to select and size a correct system. And then um what changed our life in a real big way was we went to a hospital, uh 350,000 square foot hospital in Lancaster County, and they just had a facility master plan done, which is a 30-year plan. And they asked us to dovetail our report into that. So I did a 30-year plan where I replaced a lot of the systems and basically saved about 70% because they've got all new lighting systems, new energy systems.

Marc Bernstein: 9:40

70% of energy costs.

Grahame Maisey: 9:42

70%, but that wasn't the the story that it needed. So I afterwards I took it on myself to actually start developing the system, and uh that was in 92, but by 95, 1995, we developed our energy master plan, which is which we start by developing uh the process which was backcasting. So you start with the end result, what you need, and and that's where you work towards with what you have. And that that was a key, key thing. Uh everybody uses it that is successful, no matter what they do, uh whether it's energy, politics, or whatever. If you start with your end goals and work towards them, you'll get there.

Dr. Valecia Dunbar: 10:28

So so for your work, is it has it been you independently, or is has there been a team or a group working with you?

Grahame Maisey: 10:36

It's been basically me. Um that's amazing. Uh well, we've got a lot of experience. I mean, had a lot of experience in in England. I got so much experience uh instrument testing all these hospitals and universities. I mean, I knew HVAC systems and lighting systems inside out, uh, better than the manufacturers, better than the maintenance staff, because I knew what was working and what he wanted because I tested it. So it was it was it was different. So we had the ability to do this. Um but the the the big thing with the energy master plan was the HVAC system. That that was a huge roadblock in the way to going to zero energy. So that that moved us along, and uh that started our search for a zero energy HVAC system, which is your vision for the future.

Marc Bernstein: 11:29

That's zero net net energy. I want to say not net energy. Zero energy. Zero energy. So explain that. How how do you get to zero energy?

Grahame Maisey: 11:37

Well, you you get to zero energy by uh using uh elect uh developing electricity, generating electricity more than you actually use, so you can sell it back to the grid.

Marc Bernstein: 11:50

Well that's what that's what I meant by net energy. You're still using energy, but your your costs are zero ultimately, right? Is what you're saying.

Grahame Maisey: 11:58

You're actually making money. You're selling electricity right to the grid because you're producing more than you use. That electricity amount needs to cover what I consider uh the the rest of the energy of the building, which is the transport energy of the occupants, the food energy of the occupants, if there is any. And that is what you need to generate to sell back. And that would pay repay what the energy uses.

Marc Bernstein: 12:27

So it's a like a version of so I live in the first part-time in Florida, in the first solar powered community in America. Okay. And that's essentially what they're doing. They're they've got over eight hundred thousand solar panels, yeah. And they're selling all the excess energy back to Florida, power and light. Right. And so it's the same concept, but you're doing this without solar power. Oh, there's solar power. Oh, it is solar. Oh, yeah, yeah.

Grahame Maisey: 12:51

You need to generate the electricity from something. But what what you need to do first is minimize the electricity use. Right. And that's where the air conditioning systems are the problem. They they they use an awful amount of electricity, and they have the peak electricity in the summer causing brownouts and blackouts. And then you have the peak fuel, uh fossil fuel use in the winter if it's not electric. So that's what you've got to stop. You've got to stop that use.

Marc Bernstein: 13:18

So the appeal to business obviously is zero zero cost. Um but the but the other side effect of that and sustainability is a clean air conditioning, correct?

Grahame Maisey: 13:30

Clean renewables. All clean renewables. Yeah. So so you actually building owner is actually make not make well making money really from from the clean renewables of invested in. So you but the important thing is to minimize the use for a start. And you can we've saved 90% of what the electrical use would be.

Dr. Valecia Dunbar: 13:55

And so that would translate into the homeowner as well, saving those cars.

Grahame Maisey: 13:59

Oh yes. The same thing for the homeowner. You you you can put a uh 20 kilowatt uh array in, and and that and you'll be selling most of it back to the uh grid rather than using it. Uh and that would pay for your car, your electric car, it would pay for the food.

Marc Bernstein: 14:20

So this is actually a perfect jumping-off point for a quick commercial for one minute, and we'll be right back on Founders Forum.

Announcer: 14:27

Tired of high electric bills from your air conditioning? Fed-up with extortionate maintenance bills? Longing for better comfort conditions? NEMCO LDAC cuts both your air conditioning electric and maintenance costs by 90%!” “We also optimize your comfort and supply sterilized air to make you the most comfortable, very healthy and at last safe in your building Traditional systems have power-hungry electric compressors, but NEMCO LDAC delivers better comfort without them. Our case studies show savings of over $3,500 a year for a 2,000 square foot home! and $500,000 a year for a 150,000 square foot hospital! NEMCO LDAC doesn’t just save lots of money—it creates the very best indoor environmental quality air for your home or building. Our system eliminates 99.95% of airborne pathogens, germs and allergens, sterilizing the air, while maintaining perfect humidity and temperature levels year-round. Whether it’s dry winters, humid summers, or year-round allergies, NEMCO LDAC’s patented technologies create the healthiest and safest indoor environment—and spectacularly cut your energy and maintenance bills.

Announcer: 14:27

Ready to revolutionize your climate control? Visit NEMCOLDAC.com to learn more and take control of your comfort and pocketbook!

Marc Bernstein: 15:46

We are back with Founders Forum, and um we're having a conversation offline, and let's continue it. Dr. V, you had a question for Grahame.

Dr. Valecia Dunbar: 15:54

Yes, so for the average everyday person who is a homeowner, what they want to know is how is this going to impact my electric bill? And so my question was, are you saying that the 90% savings will be a direct savings on my electric bill? Is that what the consumers should be should know? Yes. If they invest in this?

Grahame Maisey: 16:16

That that's that's what they should know. And and most uh people that would do this would put in, let's say, a 20 kilowatt solar power thing, and that would be mu much more than they need. So they'll have to be selling electricity back to the the grid, even though they're using it to for their electric cars. They could they could be charging their cars as well, but they could still be selling it back to the grid. The idea is to be zero, and that includes every form of energy.

Dr. Valecia Dunbar: 16:50

Did you say cars? Yeah, yeah, electric cars.

Grahame Maisey: 16:54

Oh, okay.

Marc Bernstein: 16:56

I have an electric car, so I plug it in at night to recharge. Yeah. But if my house is running on solar power, ultimately, it's solar power with with air conditioning system that is much more efficient than what I have today. Yeah, I'm plugging into that, my net energy bill is zero at the end of the day because of what I'm selling back, which means my car, which today I already pay about a third of what I would pay for gas, now I'm paying zero because I'm plugging into a system that's costing me nothing.

Grahame Maisey: 17:27

That's amazing. You're actually going to be producing more electricity than you use for your car because you it I I include food, I include construction energy, so that's another thing. So you're basically producing five to ten times what your building uses, so you can run your car and still uh sell more back to the to the grid.

Marc Bernstein: 17:51

By the way, a quick commercial because I neglected to introduce Dr. V. If you heard her show already, you know who she is. But let me just tell you, she's visiting from Jacksonville, Florida, and she's founder and CEO of the Center for Confidence and Full Confidence RX. Listen to her show and you'll know much more about her. So I just want to make sure we got that. And you have another question.

Dr. Valecia Dunbar: 18:10

Yes. So now that you have me, so I'm I'm ready to buy. So, what is the timeline for um you know building out this product and it being available to businesses and individuals to use?

Grahame Maisey: 18:23

We're launching the company in October. Uh that's uh plan right now. It might spread into early November. We're launching the company, getting all the lawyer stuff done.

Marc Bernstein: 18:34

And what is the name of the company?

Grahame Maisey: 18:36

Namco L D A C. Okay. That's that's Nature's Energy Machine Company.

Dr. Valecia Dunbar: 18:43

I love that.

Grahame Maisey: 18:44

Liquid desiccant air conditioning.

Dr. Valecia Dunbar: 18:46

I love that.

Grahame Maisey: 18:47

So I I like yeah, Nature's Energy Machine. That's because we're working with nature rather than applying brute force against it. Okay.

Dr. Valecia Dunbar: 18:54

So we're we're weeks out of having this company formed and the products available for to Well, the products will be available in the spring.

Grahame Maisey: 19:03

So we we're going to manufacturers, we're establishing manufacturers all over the world straight away because residences, residential people want that in their house desperately.

Marc Bernstein: 19:17

Well, I know you want to buy the system, but we need to finish the business story so we could talk more offline where you'll be able to buy it. But we um so it so just a little background, when I first talked to Grahame, uh and he's told me a story about his career and he had this vision for the future, but it sounded like that was the end of the story, and I was like, I don't know if that's right for our show. So Grahame doesn't mind me saying he's 78 years old, but he's just getting going in a lot of ways. So because he's got this vision, right? And let's talk about how you're going to execute that, which involves family members as well.

Grahame Maisey: 19:51

Yeah, well, my my son-in-law and daughter in Germany are both engineers, both professional engineers. And my son-in-law in particular, he he was an air conditioning consultant in Egypt. And he he designed uh ground source heat pumps uh as an air conditioning consultant, which is our direct competition. And uh so he saw what we were doing and said, Whew, he wants to be part of it, he wants to sell these, and he's a better salesman than I am.

Marc Bernstein: 20:19

So he that they'll be handling Europe. Oh, that's where the sales comes in. We're talking about gotcha.

Grahame Maisey: 20:24

They'll be handling Europe and the Middle East uh from Germany.

Marc Bernstein: 20:28

So this is a perfect time to ask you about your future vision because that's why you're here, because you have a future vision. So if we're this is August of 2025, if we're looking in, we're talking in August of 28 and looking back on the last three years, what would have to happen, Grahame, in your vision in your life? It could be anything you want, but obviously a lot of this is around this new business. What does that look like? Well what will have happened?

Grahame Maisey: 20:52

Previous uh companies have have moved to get 25% of the business within three years when it's been a huge jump like this. So if we get that uh in three years uh globally, we'll be doing anywhere between twenty to a hundred billion dollars a year, our manufacturers. We we expect to be getting a very small percentage of that for licensing our licensing the technology. Yeah, we're licensing the technology to uh probably uh maybe a hundred manufacturers throughout the world. And they'll be uh they'll they'll be doing the manufacturing. We'll have the uh experienced engineers that go around and uh supervise quality control, make sure the quality's still there, because it's still uh we still have a responsibility, although it'd be theirs. We have a responsibility to make sure the manufacturers are doing the job they're gonna be.

Marc Bernstein: 21:52

So the version is to have licensed to to a hundred or so active manufacturers worldwide. of which collectively they'll be doing twenty to a hundred billion dollars of business, which tells you what a what a large opportunity and industry that is.

Grahame Maisey: 22:14

Sixty years.

Marc Bernstein: 22:14

I wanted to ask you about that. We were talking offline about how old the technology is that's out there. Tell us about that for a second.

Grahame Maisey: 22:20

Well I actually worked for the chap that did the first ground source heat pump, Bob Worden. He's in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania. He worked for York Air Conditioning during during the Second World War and afterwards. And he put in ground source heat pumps then. I worked for him and uh he's called Mr. Heat Pump and I did a research project for Oak Region National Laboratory comparing heat pumps with an annual cycle energy system. So I I'm very well aware of how they work. And and they're problems. And the problems is they don't provide the comfort that you need they don't provide sterilized air which is a topic on its own. We need sterilised air.

Marc Bernstein: 23:03

My first home by the way was a heat pump system and they were they said this is the greatest thing since sliced bread and in in terms of efficiency even I didn't even see it as that at the time but you know it it's very efficient.

Grahame Maisey: 23:16

Ground source heat pumps are very efficient, especially in this area because we've got very good we've got 55 degree Fahrenheit soil. Okay. So it's perfect for cooling and warming. We've got perfect efficient but not as efficient as we need. They've still got a compressor and they've still got uh filters that block the uh air and uh so they've got big fans, big pumps, uh compressors. Our system has tiny fans and and and tiny pumps and and no compressor.

Marc Bernstein: 23:51

So we we use how do you because that's all I know in air conditioning you have compressors how do you what do you use in in place of the compressor well we're using a uh a liquid desiccant it which is a brine so the way you you the way you condition the air is you concentrate the brine you put it into the air across it and it sucks the moisture out of the air and and you get twice as much moisture removal as you do with a normal air conditioning system.

Grahame Maisey: 24:19

So it controls the humidity directly by its concentration.

Marc Bernstein: 24:24

How do you make the brine? It's just real quick.

Grahame Maisey: 24:27

It's just a assault that you make and that and that lasts forever you just recycle it so I'm I'm curious I'm trying to put this in layman's terms mentally.

Dr. Valecia Dunbar: 24:36

So if I were to compare this to to sell telephone technology so we have cell phones now we came from landline phones. How would that compare to the technology for air conditioning units.

Grahame Maisey: 24:50

This compares with a a circular dial up to an a the latest Apple right um we've so we've we've only got a couple minutes left guys um couple things because you um so we we we've got so we've got we've got notes going around in the studio so yeah we're we're comparing it to lightning on our side lighting light I'm sorry lighting I wouldn't compare to lighting technology yeah that's true lighting technology has really changed over the last sixty years from incandescent to fluorescent to LED so they've reduced the electrical use by 90% they've increased the life cycle by 50 times and they've made higher quality lighting systems.

Marc Bernstein: 25:40

So we're in comparison we're going really from the equivalent of incandescent to the LED that's what we've done with our it shows that air conditioning is pretty behind lighting at this point.

Grahame Maisey: 25:52

It's 125 year old technology carrier started it in 1903.

Marc Bernstein: 25:56

Amazing we only have uh less than two minutes left did you have a quick one no okay I'm I'm stumped on the time it's okay okay we have we're gonna the air conditioning technology is so far behind I'm James that you're just you're just the air conditioning technology is so crude synopsis. Quick quick question for you because what you're doing is major work it's it's gonna change the world. Oh yeah um if if you given that and looking back if you could speak to your younger self this is a question you wanted to be asked what what advice would you give you what would you do what would you have done differently be more brave.

Grahame Maisey: 26:36

I I was uh not as a brave person as you should have been uh I have my wife to thank for that she said you could do it and until she said that I thought I'm just an engineer she said no you're not an engineer you're a really good engineer you're a great engineer and uh Beverly's been quiet but I knew she would I knew she was the power behind the Steel she's the woman behind the man that's for sure.

Dr. Valecia Dunbar: 27:02

Absolutely gotcha yeah you're talking about confidence and it and and the courage that comes with that. So she gave you um you know what you needed for that talk to us a little bit about the synopsis um that you have behind this technology. Well that yeah we're just about out of time so I'm not even sure we have time for that so they can yeah they can get more information.

Marc Bernstein: 27:23

Turn over to you Marc so look up Grahame Maisey how will they find you as if you could find um I'm on email my email is all messed up right now for the corporations but um my direct email is Grahamemazey at gmail.com there you go contact Grahame directly so those thanks again we'll uh bring our music back really quick and uh thank you all for being here today on Founders Forum and uh wish you a great week and we'll look forward to talking to you again next week on Founders Forum. Have a great day.

Announcer: 27:53

Thank you Marty have a great day thank you we hope you enjoyed your time with Founders Forum and that you found value to take with you throughout your day. Join us again next week for another episode of Founders Forum on WXKB 1039832