ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Topher White - Conservation technologist
Through his startup Rainforest Connection, Topher White transforms used cell phones into guardians of the rainforest.

Why you should listen

In 2012, Topher White founded Rainforest Connection, a startup which converts recycled cell-phones into solar-powered listening devices to monitor and protect remote areas of the rainforest. Now an established NGO, Rainforest Connection has helped stop illegal logging and poaching operations in Sumatra, and the system is being expanded to three more rainforest reserves in Indonesia, the Amazon and Africa.

With a background in physics and engineering, White worked as web chief of ITER and co-founded Enthuse, a sports engagement and mobile rewards platform. For Rainforest Connection, he’s fashioned a simple device made of discarded cell phones and solar panels that detects and sends alerts when it picks up the sound of chainsaws in protected rainforests, allowing for intervention in real time.

More profile about the speaker
Topher White | Speaker | TED.com
TEDxCERN

Topher White: What can save the rainforest? Your used cell phone

Topher White: O que pode salvar as florestas tropicais? Seu telefone celular usado.

Filmed:
1,377,242 views

Os sons das florestas tropicais incluem: o chilrear dos pássaros, o zumbido das cigarras, as brincadeiras dos gibões. Mas ao fundo está quase sempre presente o som da motosserra, dos desmatadores ilegais. O engenheiro Topher White compartilha um jeito simples, escalável, de interromper este brutal desflorestamento -- isto começa com o seu velho telefone celular.
- Conservation technologist
Through his startup Rainforest Connection, Topher White transforms used cell phones into guardians of the rainforest. Full bio

Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.

00:12
(Rainforest noises)
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(Sons de floresta)
No verão de 2011, como turista,
00:21
In the summer of 2011,
as a tourist,
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00:25
I visited the rainforests of Borneo
for the very first time,
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visitei a floresta tropical de Bornéu,
pela primeira vez.
00:29
and as you might imagine,
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E como você pode imaginar,
foram os impressionantes sons da floresta
o que mais me marcou.
00:31
it was the overwhelming sounds
of the forest that struck me the most.
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Há essa constante cacofonia de ruídos.
00:36
There's this constant cacophony of noise.
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00:39
Some things actually do stick out.
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Algumas coisas chamam a atenção.
Por exemplo, esse aqui é de um pássaro
enorme, um calau-rinoceronte.
00:42
For example, this here is a big bird,
a rhinoceros hornbill.
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Este zumbido é de uma cigarra.
00:46
This buzzing is a cicada.
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Esta é uma família de gibões.
00:51
This is a family of gibbons.
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Eles estão na verdade cantando entre eles,
a uma grande distância.
00:54
It's actually singing to each other
over a great distance.
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Isto foi gravado numa reserva de gibões,
00:59
The place where this was recorded
was in fact a gibbon reserve,
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o que explica você poder
ouvir tantos deles.
01:02
which is why you can hear so many of them,
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01:04
but in fact the most important noise that
was coming out of the forest that time
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Mas o som mais importante
que vinha da floresta naquele momento
era um que eu não havia notado,
01:09
was one that I didn't notice,
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e na verdade, ninguém ali havia
notado realmente.
01:10
and in fact nobody there
had actually noticed it.
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01:14
So, as I said, this was a gibbon reserve.
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Como eu disse, esta era uma
reserva de gibões.
01:16
They spend most of their time
rehabilitating gibbons,
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Eles passam a maior parte do tempo
reabilitando gibões,
01:19
but they also have
to spend a lot of their time
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mas ele também usam grande parte do tempo
protegendo a área do desmatamento ilegal
que ocorre próximo deste local.
01:21
protecting their area from illegal logging
that takes place on the side.
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Tirando os sons dos gibões,
dos insetos, e do resto, ao fundo,
01:25
And so if we take the sound of the forest
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01:27
and we actually turn down the gibbons,
the insects, and the rest,
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01:31
in the background, the entire time,
in recordings you heard,
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por todo o tempo,
nas gravações que vocês escutaram,
seria ouvido o som de uma serra elétrica
a uma grande distância.
01:34
was the sound of a chainsaw
at great distance.
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Três guardas, em tempo integral,
postavam-se em torno do santuário
01:38
They had three full-time guards
who were posted around this sanctuary
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para protegê-lo
contra o desmatamento ilegal.
01:42
whose job was in fact
to guard against illegal logging,
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Um dia, caminhávamos
como turistas, dentro da floresta,
01:46
and one day, we went walking,
again as tourists, out into the forest,
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e após cinco minutos de caminhada,
01:50
and within five minutes' walk,
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nos demos de cara com alguém
que estava derrubando uma árvore,
01:52
we stumbled upon somebody
who was just sawing a tree down,
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Cinco minutos de caminhada,
a poucas centenas de metros do posto,
01:55
five minutes' walk, a few hundred meters
from the ranger station.
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Eles não conseguiam ouvir as motosserras,
01:58
They hadn't been able
to hear the chainsaws,
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02:01
because as you heard,
the forest is very, very loud.
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porque a floresta é muito barulhenta.
Pareceu-me bastante inaceitável
que nestes tempos modernos,
02:04
It struck me as quite unacceptable
that in this modern time,
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a poucas centenas de metros
de um posto lorestal,
02:08
just a few hundred meters away
from a ranger station in a sanctuary,
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que ninguém pudese ouvir
o som de uma motosserra
02:13
that in fact nobody could hear it when
someone who has a chainsaw gets fired up.
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de dentro de um santuário
02:17
It sounds impossible,
but in fact, it was quite true.
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Soa impossível, mas na verdade
é bem real.
02:21
So how do we stop illegal logging?
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Então, como parar
o desmatamento ilegal?
02:23
It's really tempting, as an engineer,
always to come up with a high-tech,
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Como engenheiro, sempre fico tentado
a adotar uma solução "high tech"
02:26
super-crazy high-tech solution,
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super maluca,
mas, você está numa floresta.
02:28
but in fact, you're in the rainforest.
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Tem que ser simples,
tem que ser adaptável,
02:30
It has to be simple,
it has to be scalable,
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e então, também percebemos,
enquanto estávamos lá,
02:33
and so what we also noticed
while were there was that
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que já tinhamos tudo o que precisávamos.
02:36
everything we needed was already there.
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Poderíamos construir um sistema
que impedisse o desmatamento
02:38
We could build a system
that would allow us to stop this
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02:41
using what's already there.
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usando o que já estava lá.
02:43
Who was there? What was
already in the forest?
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Quem estava lá?
O que já havia na floresta?
02:45
Well, we had people.
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Bem, tínhamos pessoas.
02:46
We had this group there that was
dedicated, three full-time guards,
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Tínhamos um grupo de três guardas
dedicados em tempo integral
a impedir a devastação.
02:50
that was dedicated to go and stop it,
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02:51
but they just needed to know
what was happening out in the forest.
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Eles somente precisavam saber
o que acontecia na floresta.
02:54
The real surprise, this is the big one,
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A maior de todas as surpresas
foi haver conexão na floresta.
02:56
was that there was connectivity
out in the forest.
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Havia serviço de celular,
bem no meio do nada.
02:59
There was cell phone service
way out in the middle of nowhere.
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Estamos falando de centenas de quilômetros
da estrada mais próxima.
03:02
We're talking hundreds of kilometers
from the nearest road,
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03:05
there's certainly no electricity,
but they had very good cell phone service,
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Não havia eletricidade,
mas existia um ótimo serviço de celular.
Nas cidades, ficavam no Facebook
03:08
these people in the towns
were on Facebook all the time,
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o tempo todo e surfavam
a web em seus telefones
03:11
they're surfing the web on their phones,
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03:13
and this sort of got me thinking
that in fact it would be possible
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e isto me fez pensar
se não seria possível
03:16
to use the sounds of the forest,
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usar os sons da floresta,
extrair os sons das motosserras
programadamente,
03:18
pick up the sounds
of chainsaws programmatically,
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porque as pessoas
não podiam ouvi-las,
03:20
because people can't hear them,
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e enviar um alerta.
03:22
and send an alert.
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Mas você precisa ter um dispositivo
no topo das árvores, certo?
03:24
But you have to have a device
to go up in the trees.
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03:26
So if we can use some device
to listen to the sounds of the forest,
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Então se pudermos usar um dispositivo
que possa ouvir os sons da floresta,
03:30
connect to the cell phone
network that's there,
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conectá-lo à rede de celulares
e enviar um alerta às pessoas em terra,
03:32
and send an alert to people on the ground,
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talvez pudéssemos ter
uma solução para este problema.
03:34
perhaps we could have a solution
to this issue for them.
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Paremos por um instante,
para falar sobre salvar a floresta.
03:38
But let's take a moment
to talk about saving the rainforest,
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Todos nós já ouvimos falar disto.
03:41
because it's something that we've
definitely all heard about forever.
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03:45
People in my generation
have heard about saving the rainforest
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Minha geração ouviu falar disto
desde quando éramos crianças.
03:48
since we were kids,
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Parece que a mensagem nunca muda.
03:50
and it seems that the message
has never changed:
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"Salvemos as florestas tropicais,
isto é muito urgente,
03:52
We've got to save the rainforest,
it's super urgent,
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ontem destruiu-se o equivalente
a tantos campos de futebol."
03:54
this many football fields
have been destroyed yesterday.
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03:57
and yet here we are today,
about half of the rainforest remains,
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Entretanto, hoje resta
a metade das florestas tropicais
e há problemas potencialmente
brm mais urgentes,
04:00
and we have potentially more urgent
problems like climate change.
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como a mudança climática.
Eis um fato pouco conhecido
do qual eu não havia me dado conta:
04:05
But in fact, this is the little-known fact
that I didn't realize at the time:
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o desmatamento é responsável por
mais gases de efeito estufa
04:09
Deforestation accounts
for more greenhouse gas
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do que todos os aviões, trens, carros,
caminhões e navios do mundo juntos.
04:12
than all of the world's planes,
trains, cars, trucks and ships combined.
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Ele é também a segunda maior causa
da mudança climática.
04:16
It's the second highest contributor
to climate change.
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04:18
Also, according to Interpol,
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Ainda, de acordo com a Interpol,
90% do desmatamento
que ocorre nas florestas tropicais
04:21
as much as 90 percent of the logging
that takes place in the rainforest
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é desmatamento ilegal,
como aquele que flagramos.
04:25
is illegal logging,
like the illegal logging that we saw.
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Logo, se ajudarmos
as pessoas da floresta
04:29
So if we can help people in the forest
enforce the rules that are there,
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a aplicar as leis existentes,
enttão poderemos reduzir
drasticamente os 17%
04:33
then in fact we could eat heavily
into this 17 percent
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e potencialmente ter um
impacto maior, em curto prazo.
04:37
and potentially have a major impact
in the short term.
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Isto pode ser o meio mais barato e
rápido de combater a mudança climática.
04:39
It might just be the cheapest,
fastest way to fight climate change.
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Então, este é o sistema que imaginamos.
04:44
And so here's the system that we imagine.
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Parece super-"high tech".
04:46
It looks super high tech.
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No momento em que o som
de uma motosserra é ouvido na floresta
04:48
The moment a sound of a chainsaw
is heard in the forest,
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04:50
the device picks up the sound
of the chainsaw,
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o dispositivo identifica
o som da motosserra,
04:52
it sends an alert through the standard
GSM network that's already there
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envia uma alerta pela rede
GSM padrão que já existe ali
para o guarda lorestal no campo
04:56
to a ranger in the field
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que pode intervir em tempo real
e parar o desmatamento.
04:58
who can in fact show up in real time
and stop the logging.
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Não é mais necessário ir à procura
de uma árvore que tenha sido cortada.
05:01
It's no more about going out
and finding a tree that's been cut.
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Não se trata de ver, por satélite,
uma árvore em área devastada.
05:05
It's not about seeing
a tree from a satellite
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05:07
in an area that's been clear cut,
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Trata-se de intervenção em tempo real
05:09
it's about real-time intervention.
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Eu disse que este é o mais barato
e rápido meio de fazer isto,
05:11
So I said it was the cheapest
and fastest way to do it,
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05:14
but in fact, actually, as you saw,
they weren't able to do it,
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mas como vocês viram,
eles não conseguiram fazê-lo.
Logo, talvez não seja tão barato e rápido.
05:17
so it may not be so cheap and fast.
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05:19
But if the devices in the trees
were actually cell phones,
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Mas e se os dispositivos nas árvores
fossem, na verdade, celulares,
05:22
it could be pretty cheap.
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poderia ser muito barato.
Centenas de milhões de telefones celulares
São descartados todos os anos,
05:24
Cell phones are thrown away
by the hundreds of millions every year,
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centenas de milhões somente nos EUA,
05:28
hundreds of millions in the U.S. alone,
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sem contar todo o resto do mundo,
o que é claro, nós deveríamos fazer,
05:30
not counting the rest of the world,
which of course we should do,
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Na verdade, os celulares são ótimos.
05:33
but in fact, cell phones are great.
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Eles são cheios de sensores.
05:36
They're full of sensors.
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Eles podem ouvir os sons da floresta.
05:37
They can listen
to the sounds of the forest.
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Nós temos que protegê-los.
05:39
We do have to protect them.
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Colocá-los nesta caixa,
que vocês veem aqui,
05:41
We have to put them in this box
that you see here,
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e temos que alimentá-los de energia.
05:43
and we do have to power them.
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05:45
Powering them is one of the greater
engineering challenges
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Energizá-los é um dos grandes
desafios de engenharia
com o qual tivemos de lidar.
05:47
that we had to deal with,
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05:49
because powering a cell phone
under a tree canopy,
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Alimentar um celular,
sob a copa de uma árvore,
com qualquer fonte de energia solar,
05:51
any sort of solar power
under a tree canopy,
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era um problema ainda sem solução.
05:54
was an as-yet-unsolved problem,
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05:56
and that's this unique
solar panel design that you see here,
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O design original de painéis
solares que se vê aqui,
05:58
which in fact is built also from recycled
byproducts of an industrial process.
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na verdade foi construído com produtos
reciclados de um processo industrial.
06:03
These are strips that are cut down.
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Estas são as faixas que foram cortadas.
06:05
So this is me putting it all together
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Então... este sou montando tudo
na garagem dos meus pais.
06:09
in my parents' garage, actually.
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Muito obrigado a eles por
me permitirem fazer isto.
06:11
Thanks very much to them
for allowing me to do that.
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Como você pode ver, esse é um dispositivo
no alto de uma árvore.
06:13
As you can see,
this is a device up in a tree.
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06:18
What you can see from here, perhaps,
is that they are pretty well obscured
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Daqui pode-se ver
que estão bem escondidos
lá no alto da árvore, à distância.
06:21
up in the tree canopy at a distance.
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Isto é importante,
pois embora possam captar
06:23
That's important, because although
they are able to hear chainsaw noises
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o som das motoserras num raio
de cerca de1 quilômetro
06:27
up to a kilometer in the distance,
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e podem cobrir
uns 3 quilômetros quadrados,
06:28
allowing them to cover
about three square kilometers,
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se alguém os pegasse,
a área ficaria desprotegida.
06:31
if someone were to take them,
it would make the area unprotected.
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Será que isto realmente funciona?
06:35
So does it actually work?
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Bem, para testar isso,
voltamos à Indonésia,
06:38
Well, to test it,
we took it back to Indonesia,
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06:41
not the same place, but another place,
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em outro local,
em uma outra reserva de gibões,
06:43
to another gibbon reserve
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06:44
that was threatened daily
by illegal logging.
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que era ameaçada diariamente
pelo desmatamento ilegal.
Logo no segundo dia, o sistema detectou
06:48
On the very second day, it picked up
illegal chainsaw noises.
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ruídos de motosserras.
06:52
We were able to get a real-time alert.
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Fomos capazes de receber
um alerta em tempo real.
06:54
I got an email on my phone.
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Recebi um e-mail em meu telefone.
06:55
Actually, we had just climbed the tree.
Everyone had just gotten back down.
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Havíamos subido em uma árvore.
Todos tinham acabado de descer...
Todos umavam cigarros,
06:59
All these guys are smoking cigarettes,
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e então eu recebi um e-mail,
todos eles ficaram silenciosos
07:01
and then I get an email,
and they all quiet down,
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07:04
and in fact you can hear the chainsaw
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e foi possível ouvir a motoserra
muito, muito baixinho, ao fundo,
07:06
really, really faint in the background,
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mas ninguém a havia notado
até aquele momento.
07:08
but no one had noticed it
until that moment.
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E então partimos dali
para interromper os desmatadores.
07:11
And so then we took off
to actually stop these loggers.
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Eu estava realmente nervoso.
07:14
I was pretty nervous.
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Era o momento em que chegamos
perto de onde os desmatadores estavam.
07:15
This is the moment where we've actually
arrived close to where the loggers are.
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07:20
This is the moment where you can see
where I'm actually regretting
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É o momento em que se pode ver
que eu estava realmente arrependido
07:23
perhaps the entire endeavor.
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talvez de todo o empreendimento.
07:25
I'm not really sure what's on
the other side of this hill.
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Não sabia o que esperar
além do morro.
São muito mais
corajosos que eu.
07:27
That guy's much braver than I am.
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Mas eles foram.
07:29
But he went, so I had to go, walking up,
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Logo, eu tinha que ir, subindo.
Eles ultrapassaram o morro
07:34
and in fact, he made it over the hill,
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07:36
and interrupted the loggers in the act.
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e interromperam os desmatadores no ato.
07:39
For them, it was such a surprise --
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Para eles aquilo foi uma surpresa,
pois nunca haviam sido interrompidos
07:41
they had never, ever
been interrupted before --
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ficaram muito impressionados
07:43
that it was such an impressive
event for them,
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e nossos compaheiros contaram
que eles nunaca mais voltaram.
07:45
that we've heard from our partners
they have not been back since.
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Eram ótimos caras e nos contaram
como a operação funciona.
07:48
They were, in fact, great guys.
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1492
07:50
They showed us how
the entire operation works,
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2180
E eles nos convenceram no local
que agir em tempo real
07:52
and what they really convinced us
on the spot was that
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460522
2574
07:55
if you can show up
in real time and stop people,
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2245
é o suficiente para impedir
os desmatadores
07:57
it's enough of a deterrent
they won't come back.
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4182
e que eles não voltarão.
08:01
So --
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Então...
Obrigado.
(aplausos)
08:03
Thank you. (Applause)
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As notícias se espalharam
08:09
Word of this spread, possibly
because we told a lot of people,
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3854
talvez porque contamos
para muitas pessoas.
E algo fantástico
começou a acontecer.
08:13
and in fact, then some really
amazing stuff started to happen.
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3437
Pessoas de todo o mundo
08:16
People from around the world
started to send us emails, phone calls.
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3669
começaram a mandar
e-mails, telefonemas.
Vimos pessoas por toda a Ásia
08:20
What we saw was that people
throughout Asia,
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2089
por toda a África,
08:22
people throughout Africa,
people throughout South America,
169
490635
2742
por toda a América do Sul,
dizendo que poderiam fazer o mesmo.
08:25
they told us that they could use it too,
170
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1911
08:27
and what's most important,
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1280
O mais importante:
08:28
what we'd found that
we thought might be exceptional,
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496568
2498
o que julgávamos ser incomum,
um bom serviço de celulares na floresta,
08:31
in the forest there was
pretty good cell phone service.
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2582
08:33
That was not exceptional, we were told,
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501648
1877
não é excepcional,
particularmente na periferia
das florestas que estão mais ameaçadas.
08:35
and that particularly is on the periphery
of the forests that are most under threat.
175
503525
3943
E então algo fantástico aconteceu.
08:39
And then something
really amazing happened,
176
507468
2300
Pessoas começaram a nos enviar
08:41
which was that people started sending us
their own old cell phones.
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509768
3483
seus celulares velhos.
Portanto, agora temos um sistema
08:45
So in fact what we have now is a system
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513251
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em que podemos usar pessoas no local,
08:47
where we can use people on the ground,
people who are already there,
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515201
3343
pessoas que já estão lá,
que podem usar e melhorar
a conectividade existente.
08:50
who can both improve
and use the existing connectivity,
180
518544
3065
E nós estamos usando celulares velhos
08:53
and we're using old cell phones
that are being sent to us
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521609
2677
enviados por pessoas de todo o mundo
08:56
by people from around the world
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524286
1493
que desejam dar nova utilidade a eles,
uma espécie de sobrevida.
08:57
that want their phones to be doing
something else in their afterlife,
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3293
09:01
so to speak.
184
529072
754
E se o resto do dispositivo
09:01
And if the rest of the device
can be completely recycled,
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2929
puder ser completamente reciclado,
09:04
then we believe it's
an entirely upcycled device.
186
532755
2716
então será 100% reaproveitável.
Portanto, mais uma vez, isto não veio
09:07
So again, this didn't come
because of any sort of high-tech solution.
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3654
por causa de uma solução "high tech".
09:11
It just came from using
what's already there,
188
539125
2313
Isto veio pelo uso do que já existia.
09:13
and I'm thoroughly convinced
that if it's not phones,
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2856
E estou plenamente convencido
de que se não forem os celulares,
09:16
that there's always
going to be enough there
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2369
sempre abundantes,
podem-se construir soluções similares
09:18
that you can build similar solutions
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1811
que podem ser eficientes
09:20
that can be very effective
in new contexts.
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2066
em novos contextos.
09:22
Thank you very much.
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Muito obrigado.
(Aplausos)
09:24
(Applause)
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Translated by Joao Paulo Laudares
Reviewed by Andrea Carrer

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ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Topher White - Conservation technologist
Through his startup Rainforest Connection, Topher White transforms used cell phones into guardians of the rainforest.

Why you should listen

In 2012, Topher White founded Rainforest Connection, a startup which converts recycled cell-phones into solar-powered listening devices to monitor and protect remote areas of the rainforest. Now an established NGO, Rainforest Connection has helped stop illegal logging and poaching operations in Sumatra, and the system is being expanded to three more rainforest reserves in Indonesia, the Amazon and Africa.

With a background in physics and engineering, White worked as web chief of ITER and co-founded Enthuse, a sports engagement and mobile rewards platform. For Rainforest Connection, he’s fashioned a simple device made of discarded cell phones and solar panels that detects and sends alerts when it picks up the sound of chainsaws in protected rainforests, allowing for intervention in real time.

More profile about the speaker
Topher White | Speaker | TED.com

Data provided by TED.

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