Episode 285 explores how one woman's personal wake-up call transformed into a mission to improve the air we breathe 🌿💨. After witnessing her father's early-onset dementia and recognizing the hidden impact of environmental toxins, former environmental lawyer Sue Blanchet founded Origen Air 🌎✨.

The conversation dives into innovative plant-based technology that helps remove harmful toxins from indoor air, the connection between toxic load and chronic illness 🧠❤️ and how following a bold vision can create meaningful change. From cleaner air to educating children in Cambodia 📚🌟, this episode is a powerful reminder that purpose-driven action can improve lives on a global scale.

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Introduction video about Girls Matter: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1R3-xqzJLZW14om1PhFClcU_oRSZ8zgip/view

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Episode Summary:

Founder's Journey & Motivation

• Background: Blanchet, a former environmental lawyer, felt the legal system was too slow to address air quality issues.
• Catalyst: Her father's early-onset dementia, linked to his work in toxic environments (e.g., aluminum smelters), highlighted the health disconnect between conscious intake (water) and unconscious intake (air).
• Inspiration: A CBC report on University of Washington research into genetically modified plants provided a non-legal path to make a direct impact.
• Action: Blanchet secured an initial co-exclusive license for North America, then later the exclusive global license, and founded Origen Air in 2019.

Origen Air: Technology & Impact

• Core Technology: Genetically modified pothos plants containing the P450-2E1 liver enzyme.
• Lab Results: Removed up to 99% of common toxins (benzene, chloroform, acrolein).
• Field Results: NRC IRAP-funded tests showed ~50% VOC removal, with higher rates in new, sealed buildings.
• Note: Standard pothos plants showed zero VOC removal in tests.
• Product Design:
• Aesthetics: Designed to be elegant and placed near users, not hidden in a corner.
• Sustainability: Units use wood, glass, and recycled plastic.
• Ease of Use: Hydroponic system with water and filter sensors.
• Health Connection:
• Mechanism: The liver stores toxins in fat when overloaded.
• Impact: This storage is linked to rising rates of chronic illness (dementia, breast cancer).
• Solution: Reducing airborne toxins lowers the body's overall toxic load, enabling it to heal more effectively.

Philanthropy & "Wake-Up Call"

• Origen Air's Mission: A B Corp donating 2% of revenue to provide clean air to vulnerable groups (e.g., care homes).
• New Dream Cambodian Children School:
• Origin: Founded after a trip to Cambodia following her father's death.
• Goal: Provide English education to create economic opportunities and protect children from exploitation.
• Growth: Started with land purchased for $25k USD; now serves over 600 students.
• "Wake-Up Call" Philosophy:
• Definition: The urge to follow one's passion for meaningful work.
• Action: Act boldly and trust the universe will provide.
• Benefit: Leads to spiritual and emotional wealth, even if financially challenging.

About the Guest:

Sue is a B Corp CEO, Founder, lawyer, and international speaker with a deep commitment to uplifting and empowering the underrepresented. Her efforts have been recognized by the industry, with several accolades to her name, including being named a finalist for WBE Excellence Awards' Top Rising Star, second in TiE Women, top 30 in Canada for Herstory by The 51 and Alberta Innovates, semi-finalist KPMG Tech Titans, WE Empower United Nations SDG Challenge Awardee for NA and Europe, Stevie Awards Women Thought Leader of the Year and UVIC President's Distinguished Alumni Award.

Her team's commitment to innovation and excellence has led Origen Air to receive the Natural Products Canada Game Changer Award 2023, Victoria Chamber Innovation Award and Douglas Magazine Ten to Watch Award 2022. Her determination to expand internationally has taken her on numerous trade missions, including Japan, India, Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan, Thailand, South Korea and to the top ten Women in Cleantech in Palo Alto.

Susan is committed to providing clean air for all, and her patent-pending technology is making significant progress towards this goal. Using genetically enhanced golden pothos plants validated to metabolize volatile toxins in the air, premium MERV filters, and IoT sensors, Origen Air's self-sustaining chamber, the Pinnacle, represents one of several products set to drastically improve indoor air quality. Origen Air is currently bringing an affordable commercial desktop or home air purifier to market, which includes our genetically enhanced plant in a potted plant air purifier with indoor air quality (IAQ) sensors to report IAQ in real-time. Origen Air has Pinnacles installed in BC and Ontario, with plans to scale to the USA. R&D underway to scale the technology to integrate with building HVAC systems to deliver a circular economy of safe, clean air for building occupants. Susan has raised $4M+ in funding support.

Prior to founding Origen Air in 2019 Susan practiced as legal counsel for 14 years, ran a commercial real estate practice, a renovation company, and an elite soccer school as a provincially licensed coach. In 2018 after a volunteering trip to Cambodia, she donated and raised funds to purchase land and build an English school in Siem Reap.

Contact:

Website: https://origenair.com

Website: https://www.ndcco.org/ (To volunteer at the school in Cambodia)

Socials:

https://ca.linkedin.com/in/susanblanchet

https://www.instagram.com/sueblanchet

https://www.tiktok.com/@susanraeblanchet

https://origenair.com/

https://www.instagram.com/origenair

https://twitter.com/origenair

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCavbG_AcZp7VVfJamB4NXRA

https://www.linkedin.com/company/origen-air

https://facebook.com/origenairsystemsltd

https://www.tiktok.com/@origen.air

TOPICS:

Origen Air and genetically modified planters and my journey to get there - my dad/siem reap

About the Host:

Melissa is an Integrative Health Practitioner and a Board Designated Master Trainer of Hypnotherapy, Trainer of NLP, Time Line Therapy®, and NLP Results Coaching, helping people get to the root cause of their health issues and then get lasting results. Melissa neither diagnoses nor cures but helps bring your body back into balance by helping discover your “toxic load” and then removing the toxins. Melissa offers functional medicine lab testing that helps you “see inside” to know exactly what is going on, and then provides a personalized wellness protocol using natural herbs and supplements. Melissa’s business is 100% virtual – the lab tests are mailed directly to your home and she specializes in holding your hand and guiding the way to healing so that you don’t have to figure it all out on your own.

Melissa has launched Amplify Impact Academy, with business partner, Billie Aadmi and together they train other coaches, practitioners and counsellors in the 4 mind-body healing modalities mentioned above, giving them powerful tools to use with clients to get results with greater ease, speed and grace. These courses teach life skills and anyone can take them, if you want to be a better leader, parent, partner, be empowered in your own life, these courses are for you!

Melissa’s passion project is her non-profit, Girls Matter (www.girlsmatter.ca), breaking the poverty cycle 1 girl, 1 family, 1 village at a time. The mission is to keep girls in school and stop teenage marriages, because school isn’t free in over 50 countries around the world and when parents have to make the difficult choices of feeding their kids or paying for school, food wins. And when the girls hit their teen years, they will often be married off so that someone else becomes responsible to feed them. Keeping girls in school instead creates a generational ripple effect, because an educated girl is more than twice as likely to ensure her own children are educated. Educating girls also grows the GDP of countries, when they get into the workforce. This is how together, we can change the world. Guests on this podcast are invited to donate to this important cause. Learn more here in this short video: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1R3-xqzJLZW14om1PhFClcU_oRSZ8zgip/view?usp=share_link

Melissa is also the winner of the 2024 Women in Podcasting Awards in the “inspiration & motivation” category and the 2021 & 2022 Quality Care Award by Business From The Heart and is also the recipient of the Alignable “Local Business Person of the Year “Award 2022, 2023 & 2024 for Whistler.

Melissa has been featured at a number of Health & Wellness Summits, such as the Health, Wealth & Wisdom Summit, The Power To Profit Summit, The Feel Fan-freaking-tas-tic Summit, the Aim Higher Summit and many more! She has also guested on over 90 different podcasts teaching people about the importance of prioritizing our health and how to get started.

Linktree: https://linktr.ee/yourguidedhealthjourney

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