Dave over at the Carbon Coach brought my attention to an emotional shock response video from TED. Whilst you may not agree with all in the video, Venture Capitalist, John Doerr’s lucid presentation is indeed worth watching, it includes amongst other issues a view on what WalMart are planning for their stores globally, and the huge investments being made green innovation.
Comments I like from the video include “There is a time when panic is the appropriate response!”
A number of items in the news / other websites and blogs have given me cause for thought on construction transport.
And finally to do something positive, Change Your World is asking you to swap just one car trip from 1-7 July and choose something that’s better for the planet instead. Sign up and pledge at Change Your World. If we all give up just one car journey that week we’ll reduce car traffic by 10%, and importantly get an insight to the challenges construction travel and transport face.
And for a view of a future carbon free transport city – Dutch city Groningen. of 185,000 proves that bicycle transportation can reign supreme: people there make about 150,000 trips by bicycle every day.
Following the very successful Think conference and initiative, – Construction News is launching its Green Week – Summit and Awards programme – scheduled for September. Nominations for awards close soon though.
Recently the concept of sustainability has moved from being an ill-defined industry buzzword to become perhaps the single most important issue that will face the industry over the years to come. Concepts such as energy efficiency, carbon emissions and reduction of construction waste can no longer be ignored.
As reported over at Elemental – Using 8 criteria, universities have been ranked on Environmental performance.
Universities in the North West (Salford Lancaster UCLAN ) are all in the must try harder category, with Manchester in the fair, but could do better group
What is interesting is the % of energy that come from renewables, the % of waste recycling and the carbon emissions per head. UCLan for example score 0% on renewables, 8% of waste recyled but have a reaonably good 644kg CO2e per head.
The top green university was Leeds Met
Makes you think – when will we see a similar ranking of construction or FM organisations?
From Building News:
English Partnerships will ask six housing developers to submit zero carbon designs for a former hospital site near Bristol
The first site in English Partnerships’ competition to build zero carbon homes has gone out to tender.
All 150 homes on the site are expected to meet the top level of the Code for Sustainable Homes. The exact definition of a level 6 home is yet to be confirmed but EP said that zero carbon means that the amount of energy taken from the grid is less than or equal to the amount put back through renewable technologies.
English Partnerships Jayne Lomas said building zero carbon homes remained a real challenge. She said: “This effectively brings the zero carbon homes of the future a significant step closer to reality – a hugely important development in the fight against climate change”.
Do we have the knowledge, resources and technologies here. locally, in the north west to do this? Or would we see others from outside the NW bid and win any such projects
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World Environment Day, commemorated each year on 5 June, is one of the principal vehicles through which the United Nations stimulates worldwide awareness of the environment and enhances political attention and action.
The World Environment Day slogan selected for 2007 is Melting Ice – a Hot Topic?
For more information take a look at the UNEP site – and check out the posters and other material there.
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Traditional building designs and techniques will not cut it in the future and the industry needs to wake up to its dual role in helping people cope with the unavoidable effects of climate change whilst making more efficient buildings to aid efforts to prevent things getting worse.
Changes in the way we build, produce energy and make technology more efficient must go hand-in-hand with the changes in behaviour and life style needed if we are to not only survive climate change, but thrive.
Source: John Harman, chairman of the Environment Agency, speaking at London’s Ecobuild conference
Edie News
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The dust is still settling on yesterdays Energy White Paper, with Nuclear plans making the headlines, but the paper contained much more….
There will be plenty of commentaries on the Paper, but, apart from the huge infrastructure projects planned, the following , caught my interest as having the potential for a huge impact on our industry sector:
The Government’s stated target is to reduce UK carbon emissions by 60 per cent by 2050, and is introducing a climate
change Bill to make progress towards making it legally binding.
“For businesses, we’re giving the go-ahead to the world’s first mandatory carbon trading scheme aimed at large commercial and public sector organisations, such as banks, supermarkets and central government departments. The new Carbon Reduction Commitment will be a cost-effective scheme that will save over a million tonnes of carbon per year by 2020, while enabling businesses to continue to show real leadership in tackling climate change”. (David Milliband)
A requirement for new meters to come with a real-time display from 2008 and a short term offer of free displays from energy suppliers for households to 2010. In addition, the Government is encouraging the introduction of smart meters, also with displays, in the household sector and for small firms and expects everyone to have a smart meter within 10 years, whilst requiring smart meters for all but the smallest of businesses in the next five years.
Energy providers will be expected to supply the displays free of charge to any householder who wants one fitted to an existing meter. At the moment the units are only available to buy.
Community energy: Some of the biggest carbon savings can be secured by generating energy locally rather than have it supplied from distant large-scale power stations, which lose much of their efficiency in transmission. Energy decentralisation, or micro-generation, has dramatically shrunk the carbon footprint of some local authorities such as Woking in Surrey. The Government is to make licensing arrangements for this simpler and provide more opportunities for local generators to sell their surplus energy back to the National Grid. (Independent)
Reducing standby: Electrical appliances left on standby use about 7 per cent of all the electricity used in UK homes, Mr Darling said yesterday, which is the equivalent of the output of two 600 megawatt gas-fired power stations or more than 1,500 2MW wind turbines.
(This makes the Think 07 action of every home having a master off switch realistic? But is alarming to note we need 1500wind turbines just to satisfy the standby status of equipment!)
A Low Carbon Transport Innovation Strategy is published backed by funding of £20m for public procurement of low carbon vehicles, an up to £30m R&D ‘Innovation Platform’ and £5m additional funding for the Energy Technologies Institute.
And of course the Planning White Paper, published on Monday 21 May, has separately set out proposals for a new consent regime for nationally significant energy infrastructure. This will help reduce costs, delays and uncertainties incurred by the private sector while also providing an appropriate opportunity for the public to challenge development.
Sources: Guardian, Independent, DTI, GNN
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Toronto Mayor David Miller announced that his city would be using a tool, called Zerofootprint Toronto, to calculate carbon emissions for the city’s 50,000 employees this July.
While personal carbon calculators are all the favour across the web, the unveiling of Zerofootprint’s carbon counter at the C40 Climate Summit last week ushers in a new era of a large scale web-based data warehousing that can aggregate carbon emission information from city government, companies, universities, neighborhoods, groups or families.
Source: World Changing – Change Your Thinking
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Housing Construction that both heats it self and cools itself. An interesting innovation from the States can be found at Enertia House
Enertia Building System, named as the 2007 Modern Marvel of the Year is described as
innovative new homes of remarkable strength, economy, and beauty, brought to life by an elegant new architecture and the discovery of a new source of pollution-free energy.
with a built-in “biosphere,” in gradual but constant motion, draws energy from the sun, and geothermal stability from the ground, creating a temperate climate that buffers the primary living space.
The site provides plenty of science ‘background’ which is worth checking out.
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Fairsnape 