The Lightest Tread Podcast Episode 9: Thor Retzlaff
Reimagining human waste with the co-founder of Do Good Shit and Wasted.
Listen to this episode on your favorite podcast platform, here.
Paul speaks to Thor Retzlaff, a skier, mountaineer, adventurer and entrepreneur with a passion for changing the way we think about and deal with human waste, particularly in the outdoors.
Inspired by a trip to Everest base camp in 2018, Thor and his team decided to launch Do Good Shit, a not-for-profit on a mission to reduce the harmful impacts of human waste, by delivering dignified and sustainable sanitation systems to ecologically sensitive environments and their surrounding communities. He's since gone on to co-found a revolution in portable toilets called Wasted.
Paul and Thor discuss the golden rule of properly managing human waste in outdoor settings. They also talk about the hidden potential of urine and upcycling this liquid gold, as well as getting some insight into Thor's trip to build a toilet in the Himalayas and summit Ama Dablam.
The footbed that helped Thor return to hiking after foot surgery.
Thor wears a SOLE Performance Thin with Met Pad footbed in his mountaineering boots. Listeners can get 15% off site-wide by entering the code THOR15 at checkout.
Timestamps:
00:00 Introduction
01:00 Ski season chit chat
03:00 Paul's camping anecdote
08:07 The toilet tour moment of realization and motivation
10:30 Everest base camp experience and the founding of Do Good Shit
20:30 The toilet tour: learning all about human waste management
23:20 Why the separation of pee and poop is so important
30:42 The value of urine and the birth of Wasted porta-potties
36:33 Recycling urine to create fertilizer 39:05 African penguins and guano fertilizer
44:40 What sets Wasted porta-potties apart?
49:00 Replacing toxic blue sludge with natural enzymes
54:30 Expedition to Ama Dablam for Do Good Shit
58:53 Metatarsal Pad footbeds after foot surgery