How A Near-Death Experience Led To Reimagining Our Plastic & Energy Consumption with Hakan Bulgurlu

This episode is brought to you by Cozy Earth, Rupa Health, and Mitopure.

Near-death experiences aren’t that uncommon for the world’s most technical mountaineers. Summiting Mt. Everest is sure to leave anyone feeling truly awe-inspired. Completing the climb and getting home safely after nearly dying creates a whole different level of reflection. Today on The Doctor’s Farmacy, I talk to Hakan Bulgurlu about turning his near-death experience into a force for positive change in his personal life, the climate crisis, business leadership, and more. 

Hakan is a global business leader and a climate activist. As the CEO of Arçelik, a home appliances manufacturer that operates in 150 countries, he is a thought leader on sustainable and purpose-driven business. In a bid to raise awareness of the climate crisis, Hakan climbed Everest in 2019. He wrote A Mountain to Climb; a retelling of his journey to Everest, accompanied by his research into the possible solutions to the climate crisis.

This episode is brought to you by Cozy Earth, Rupa Health, and Mitopure.

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Here are more details from our interview (audio version / Apple Subscriber version): 

• How Hakan’s preparation for climbing Mt. Everest led to business solutions to the climate crisis (6:26 / 3:45) 
• Hakan’s “aha” moment that shifted his approach to business (11:25 / 8:42) 
• A profitable business solution to the issue of microplastics in the oceans (13:50 / 11:43) 
• The two types of CEOs (20:09 / 17:35) 
• Improving the energy efficiency of refrigerators (20:50 / 18:10) 
• Hakan’s early influential life experiences (26:27 / 22:07) 
• Hakan’s Mt. Everest climb, his near-death experiences, and how they affected him (29:20 / 24:55) 
• Building the price of climate issues into the market cost (41:22 / 35:14)  
• Humans’ relationship to nature (48:49 / 44:08) 
• Responding to our depression about the state of the climate (50:55 / / 46:20) 

Get your copy of Hakan’s book, A Mountain to Climb: The Climate Crisis: A Summit Beyond Everest, here.