Insights · 26 essays

Notes from the build — IMPT, Ireland Quantum, AI Brain Workshops.

Long-form technical essays from Mike English — Creator & CTO of IMPT.io, building Ireland's first sovereign quantum facility for Q2 2027, and running the AI Brain Workshops in Clonmel.

Essay · Mike English

Shadow-mode rollout — the 90-day pattern that earns AI the right to act

Most AI failures in regulated work are not model failures. They are deployment failures. Someone wired a language model to a live tool — a refund button, a cont

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Tool-layer authorisation for legal AI — read everything, sign nothing

A legal AI agent that can read every document in a firm's matter management system is useful. A legal AI agent that can also file motions, sign engagement

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Seven legal-AI workflows that pay for themselves — and the auditor that signs every output

Most partners I talk to have already bought a legal AI tool. It sits in the corner of the practice, used by two associates and ignored by the rest. The bill arr

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Multi-agent governance for regulated industries — planner, worker, auditor, and the audit trail

A single large language model behind a chat box is a demo. A swarm of agents acting on customer data inside a regulated business is a different beast, and the r

Read →
Essay · Mike English

AI Brain Workshops in Clonmel — what gets built over a weekend

Most Irish businesses already have an AI problem they haven't named yet. Staff are pasting client data into ChatGPT on personal accounts. The marketing int

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Funding the Ireland Quantum build — capex, opex, and the grant stack

Anyone who has tried to build hard infrastructure in Ireland knows that the engineering is the easy part. The hard part is the cash. Quantum compute is no diffe

Read →
Essay · Mike English

The three workloads that pay for Ireland's first quantum machine

Every sovereign compute project lives or dies on the same question: who pays the electricity bill on the Tuesday after the ribbon is cut. A quantum facility is

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Ireland's post-quantum migration runway — what to do in 2026

Q-Day is the day a cryptographically relevant quantum computer can break the public-key cryptography that holds the modern internet together. Nobody knows the d

Read →
Essay · Mike English

The cryogenics stack for a sovereign Irish quantum facility

The cold problem nobody puts on the slide deck The first thing you learn when you start costing a quantum compute build is that the qubits are the easy part. T

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Twelve months to live — the Ireland Quantum delivery plan, month by month

A delivery plan is a promise with dates on it. Ireland Quantum is committed for Q2 2027, which means the work I am writing about here has to be done, gated, and

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Why IMPT runs two domains — impthotels.com and impttravel.com, explained

Most travel sites try to do two jobs at once. They want to rank for "best eco-hotels in Galway" and they want to convert someone who already knows the

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Validator topology and gas economics for sustained climate burns

Every booking on IMPT.io triggers a tonne of CO₂ being retired on-chain. That sounds clean as a sentence. As an engineering problem it is anything but. A retire

Read →
Essay · Mike English

1.7 million hotels, kept fresh — the inventory engine behind a global green marketplace

Most people who book a hotel online never think about what happens behind the search box. They type a city, pick a date, see a list, click. The list feels like

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Why we pay for the tonne, not you — the unit economics of climate-default booking

Every climate product I've used as a consumer has, at some point, asked me to be the hero. There's a checkbox at the end of the basket. A small extra

Read →
Essay · Mike English

The IMPT token from first principles — utility, not speculation

Most token writeups start at the wrong end. They open with the price chart, then work backwards to a use case, then dress the use case in mission language. I wa

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Opt-in is the failure mode: how the next decade of carbon markets has to work

Most of the carbon you emitted this year was bought from someone who never asked you a single question about it. Your electricity, your groceries, your last sho

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Blockchain Solar Energy: Transforming the Future of Clean Power

As the world moves toward sustainable energy solutions, solar energy continues to be at the forefront of the renewable energy revolution. However, despite its v

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Web3 Energy: Decentralizing the Future of Clean Energy

As the world moves toward a sustainable and decentralized future, Web3 technology is emerging as a critical enabler in the transition to clean energy. Web3, the

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Blockchain and Sustainability: Green Tech for the Future

Introduction The conversation about sustainability is no longer limited to environmentalists—it’s now at the heart of global business, government policy, and in

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Blockchain Carbon Credits: Transparency, Trust, and Climate Impact

The carbon credit market is meant to be a cornerstone of global climate action. In theory, it allows companies, governments, and individuals to offset their gre

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Green Blockchain Networks: Building a Sustainable Digital Future

Blockchain technology has often been criticized for its energy consumption, especially with proof-of-work (PoW) systems like Bitcoin. Yet, a new wave of green b

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Blockchain Supply Chain Sustainability: Building Transparent, Ethical, and Resilient Commerce

Supply chains are the backbone of the global economy, but they are also one of the biggest contributors to environmental damage, labor exploitation, and ineffic

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Blockchain Smart Cities: Building Greener, Smarter, and More Transparent Urban Futures

Urban areas are home to over 55% of the world’s population, and this number is expected to rise to 68% by 2050 (UN). As cities grow, they face mounting challeng

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Blockchain ESG Reporting: The Future of Transparent and Accountable Sustainability Data

Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) reporting has become a cornerstone of corporate accountability. Investors, regulators, and consumers demand proof—no

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Blockchain Renewable Energy: Decentralizing Power for a Cleaner Future

The global energy transition is in full swing. With rising adoption of solar, wind, and other renewable sources, the challenge isn’t just generating clean energ

Read →
Essay · Mike English

Blockchain Carbon Footprint: Reducing Emissions with Decentralized Technology

The global push for net-zero emissions by 2050 has brought climate change to the forefront of both business and policy agendas. But despite increasing awareness

Read →

Also writing on michaelenglish.eu

Same subjects, more analytical voice — the editorial archive.

Visit michaelenglish.eu →