What is a runtime environment if not just another word for "framework?" If this guy wants to move away from the clunk and junk of web frameworks, how about actually building from scratch using pure HTML and CSS?
Frameworks and runtimes though very similar technically, are different conceptually. Frameworks dictate a structure (a framwork) for how code is written (think React components) whereas runtimes are more concerned with letting you run the code and interface with the underlying platform (think libc).