A green future where you can borrow cars and drink rainwater

Alok Jha
The Guardian, Saturday 28 March 2009

A low-carbon economy will be the culmination of thousands of decisions by governments, businesses and individuals about how we choose to balance environment and economy. There isn't one correct future but many, with each detail in each country dependent on the will of its people.
One thing is certain, though. Anyone concerned about having to give up their modern lifestyle for an austere existence can rest easy. The big differences between now and the low-carbon future will not be the way the world looks or what we will be able to do in it, but how it is arranged.
The biggest hurdle is electricity. Three-quarters of our global electricity needs come from burning fossil fuels. The low-carbon future will demand that none of that electricity emits carbon dioxide. So every gas or coal-fired power plant, of which there will be many in China and India, will have carbon-capture technology to trap and store CO2 underground. Renewable sources including wind, tide, wave and sun will, through investment in basic research in the coming decades, be commercially viable. Far from being forbidding installations belching out carbon dioxide, renewable power stations will be smaller, emit no CO2 and tap into near-limitless supplies of free fuel.
Clean electricity will have a knock-on effect on the other modern carbon nasty - transport. When electricity is cheap and clean, there is no reason not to use its power as much as possible. Electric cars, buses, lorries and high-speed trains will move us and our goods, yet make no contribution to global warming. Though mass public transport will be the travel mode of choice, personal cars will remain. You might not own one yourself, instead borrowing from clubs when needed. By planning towns around pedestrians and investing in cycle lanes, local councils will encourage travel under two miles to be under your own steam or by hydrogen buses.
Flying will be a problem. Improved aerodynamics, lighter aircraft and mixing biofuels into jet fuel will bring down the carbon cost of air miles. Carbon reductions in energy production and road transport will mitigate some of the rise in emissions from the growth in flights in China and India, but environmental campaigners will not be satisfied. Expect punishing taxes on plane tickets, tied to their carbon cost, to discourage flying unless there really is no alternative. In these situations, a personal carbon-rationing system, linked to national CO2 emissions targets, will allow individuals to emit a certain amount of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.
But the number of long journeys, particularly for work, will drop dramatically as high-speed internet connections enable high-quality video conferences and easy communications for people on different sides of the world. Many people will stop commuting to their offices or factories, preferring to work from home.
Homes might look the same, for nostalgic reasons, but will be fundamentally different. Bricks coated with solar paint will be held together with cement that soaks up CO2 from the air around it. Triple-glazed windows will reduce the need for heating in winter and cooling in summer.
Only the most energy-efficient fridges and washing machines will be available to buy while LEDs in lamps and displays will turn electricity into light efficiently instead of wasting most of it as heat. Automatic controls will warm rooms only when needed and switch appliances and lights off when they're not needed.
Our throwaway culture will disappear. By encouraging people to re-use as much as possible, less waste will end up in landfill and the carbon in our possessions (the stuff emitted to make our clothes, toys or furniture) wil not be wasted. Products will be made to last and, when they come to the end of their useful life, be repaired rather than thrown away. Packaging will be virtually nonexistent and, where it exists, will be recyclable or compostable.
People will use water more carefully. Rain will be collected from home and office rooftops and filtered using carbon-free electricity so that it is drinkable. Any water drained away in a building will be recycled and treated locally to wash clothes or flush toilets. Bottled water will be banned.
Food will come from local farms or factories to reduce the carbon cost of transport. Meat lovers, because of their high-carbon diets, will have to use up their personal carbon rations whenever they bite into a steak or else make sure their food comes from local, sustainable farms that produce meat artificially.
Locally-produced electricity will also play a big part in keeping homes carbon free. Solar thermal panels, community-based combined heat and power plants running on carbon-neutral wood chips, micro wind turbines and ground source heat pumps mean that local districts won't need all their power from today's centralised power stations. Local heat and power networks could even feed into the national grid during times of great demand.
This is one of many visions for a low-carbon world in 2050. It seems a long way off and whether we get there depends on decisions made over the next few years.