How we intend to take the 10:10 challenge and cut our carbon emissions by 10% in 2010
Jo Confino and Claire Buckley
The Guardian, Tuesday 1 September 2009
The Guardian often criticises politicians and business leaders for failing to do enough to combat climate change, but in recent years we have found that reducing our own carbon footprint is no easy task.
While we are justly proud of our new low-carbon offices in King's Cross, London, behind the scenes we remain largely dependent on old-style heavy industry, and do not yet fully understand the impact of our increasing digital presence. We rely on trees being cut down and energy-intensive factories to turn wood pulp into paper. We use large-scale print sites to create our newspapers and magazines, and the road network to distribute our products.
Paper is by far our biggest concern, both in terms of the carbon footprint of its manufacture and ensuring we do not buy from unsustainable sources. In fact, 96% of the paper used in the Guardian and the Observer main sections is recycled, while 82.7% of the virgin fibre used in our magazines is certified as coming from sustainable sources. We also measure the carbon footprint of each of our paper suppliers, and use this to help inform our purchasing decisions.
Measures we are taking in other areas include reducing the amount of plastic in the polywrap used to hold together our multi-sectioned weekend papers (having failed to find a suitable biodegradable alternative), and improving the efficiency of our newspaper distribution network by increasing the number of shared routes with competitor titles.
Given that we have already taken steps to reduce our carbon emissions, reducing them by another 10% next year is going to be challenging. Our main concentration will be on our two newspaper print sites in Manchester and London, given that they accounted for nearly 60% of the 14,567 tonnes of CO2 we generated last year through energy use and travel. Next on our list is our head office, which accounts for the second largest slice of last year's carbon emissions. Given that our new building has been awarded a B-rated energy performance certificate, further improvements are going to be tough. Another difficulty is that the building is multi-tenanted, so we will have to put our heads together with the building management and other tenants to see what more can be done.
In our own part of the building, we are reviewing the lighting systems and encouraging staff to be more conscious of the impact of their behaviour – although there are limits here too, as lighting and temperatures are all centrally controlled. In addition, given that we are increasingly a digitally based business, we are now looking to measure the footprint of our ICT infrastructure, including computers, servers and printers. We have also put in place a system for measuring our UK and overseas travel, and have greatly improved video- and audio-conferencing facilities over the last year, with plans to develop and promote use of these facilities.
It's also worth making the point that while there will always be a cost to the planet of producing newspapers and websites, we can and do make a significant difference by informing and influencing our millions of readers, with this special issue of G2 just one example. Key to our editorial ambitions is the aim of creating the world's leading environmental website, supported by what we believe is already the strongest specialist team of environmentally focused writers in any English-language media organisation.
As the Guardian's editor-in-chief Alan Rusbridger says: "The role of government is infinitely harder in this area unless you have an informed citizenry, because politicians are not prepared to risk giving us unpopular and uncomfortable messages. At the same time, there is a role for individuals to put pressure on governments because they sometimes find it more comfortable not to act decisively. One of the roles of the media is to boil down intensely complex subjects and make them comprehensible. If these issues are not aired and placed on the public agenda and debated with facts that are reliable, then it lets everyone off the hook."
For more details, go to our independently audited website guardian.co.uk/sustainability. For a free copy of the 2009 Living Our Values sustainability report, please email sustainability@guardian.co.uk with your name and postal address
Tuesday, 1 September 2009
10:10: What's it all about?
What is the 10:10 campaign and why are 10% emission cuts in 2010 important?
Ian Katz
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 1 September 2009 00.05 BST
What is 10:10?
10:10 is an empowering climate change campaign with the aim of getting individuals, companies and institutions to reduce their carbon footprints by 10% during 2010.
Why 10% in 2010?
Although politicians argue about targets for 2050 and 2030, the scientists say world emissions must peak and begin to fall within the next few years. That means we need deep cuts in the developed world as quickly as possible. The longer we leave it, the smaller our chance of avoiding disastrous warming.
What does signing up entail?
For individuals it means what it says on the tin: pledging to cut your emissions by 10% by the end of 2010. We'll be offering lots of advice on how to do it and 10:10 has teamed up with the major energy companies who will help by showing customers how much energy they are saving on their bills.
What about companies?
The pledge for companies is slightly more flexible to allow firms that have made deep cuts over the last few years to join. They will commit to getting as close to the 10% target as possible – and to encouraging customers, staff and suppliers to sign up too. There are also specially designed targets for schools and other institutions.
Who is backing it?
The campaign is backed by a broad coalition ranging from the Guardian and several major NGOs to major companies, leading political figures and the Carbon Trust.
Who has signed up so far?
A number of high-profile figures including artists, writers, chefs and sportsmen have agreed to sign up and support the campaign and we are in the process of recruiting more. Among the organisations that have already signed up are a Premiership football club, a major museum and several NHS trusts.
Will 10:10 have any effect on government policy?
The aim is to sign up a large number of individuals, companies and institutions as quickly as possible, and then challenge the government to match their commitment.
But isn't getting a deal in Copenhagen the really important thing this year?
It's crucial, but no one believes that any deal struck at the UN climate talks in Copenhagen in December will set targets to cut as many emissions as the scientists say are needed. We need to start cutting our emissions regardless. And those involved in negotiating the Copenhagen deal say the chances of getting developing countries to sign will be increased if they see the rich world leading by example.
Does signing up require a major change in your lifestyle?
No. Unless you've already slashed your emissions, the first 10% is the easiest. It's all about saving energy at home and cutting down on unnecessary journeys. It will save you money.
Aren't individual efforts just a pointless drop in the ocean?
Not if they're part of a mass movement. 10:10 makes the efforts of individuals meaningful by ensuring that lots of people will be pledging to make the same cuts.
What's the point of just getting people in the UK to sign up when the country accounts for only 2% of world emissions?
10:10 is being launched as a UK campaign but the scientists say it is the right target for the whole developed world. The hope is that the campaign will be cloned in other countries and we'll be making it as easy as possible for that to happen.
Will there be a symbol like the Make Poverty History wristband?
10:10 is producing metal tags that can be worn around the wrist or neck (or anywhere else). They are made from scrap metal salvaged from old airliners. They will be on sale for £1.
Who is running 10:10?
It is the brainchild of Franny Armstrong, director of the Age of Stupid. It is being run by Franny's team with help from the Guardian, Comic Relief and Freud Communications.
How is 10:10 different from other climate campaigns?
10:10 is unique because it asks people to take a simple but meaningful action that everyone can understand and contribute to. As a result, it is already receiving unparalleled support from media, business, NGOs and the public sector.
How will people sign up?
On 1 September there will be a mass sign-up event at Tate Modern in London. But individuals and organisations will be able to sign up on the 10:10 website at any time.
Ian Katz
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 1 September 2009 00.05 BST
What is 10:10?
10:10 is an empowering climate change campaign with the aim of getting individuals, companies and institutions to reduce their carbon footprints by 10% during 2010.
Why 10% in 2010?
Although politicians argue about targets for 2050 and 2030, the scientists say world emissions must peak and begin to fall within the next few years. That means we need deep cuts in the developed world as quickly as possible. The longer we leave it, the smaller our chance of avoiding disastrous warming.
What does signing up entail?
For individuals it means what it says on the tin: pledging to cut your emissions by 10% by the end of 2010. We'll be offering lots of advice on how to do it and 10:10 has teamed up with the major energy companies who will help by showing customers how much energy they are saving on their bills.
What about companies?
The pledge for companies is slightly more flexible to allow firms that have made deep cuts over the last few years to join. They will commit to getting as close to the 10% target as possible – and to encouraging customers, staff and suppliers to sign up too. There are also specially designed targets for schools and other institutions.
Who is backing it?
The campaign is backed by a broad coalition ranging from the Guardian and several major NGOs to major companies, leading political figures and the Carbon Trust.
Who has signed up so far?
A number of high-profile figures including artists, writers, chefs and sportsmen have agreed to sign up and support the campaign and we are in the process of recruiting more. Among the organisations that have already signed up are a Premiership football club, a major museum and several NHS trusts.
Will 10:10 have any effect on government policy?
The aim is to sign up a large number of individuals, companies and institutions as quickly as possible, and then challenge the government to match their commitment.
But isn't getting a deal in Copenhagen the really important thing this year?
It's crucial, but no one believes that any deal struck at the UN climate talks in Copenhagen in December will set targets to cut as many emissions as the scientists say are needed. We need to start cutting our emissions regardless. And those involved in negotiating the Copenhagen deal say the chances of getting developing countries to sign will be increased if they see the rich world leading by example.
Does signing up require a major change in your lifestyle?
No. Unless you've already slashed your emissions, the first 10% is the easiest. It's all about saving energy at home and cutting down on unnecessary journeys. It will save you money.
Aren't individual efforts just a pointless drop in the ocean?
Not if they're part of a mass movement. 10:10 makes the efforts of individuals meaningful by ensuring that lots of people will be pledging to make the same cuts.
What's the point of just getting people in the UK to sign up when the country accounts for only 2% of world emissions?
10:10 is being launched as a UK campaign but the scientists say it is the right target for the whole developed world. The hope is that the campaign will be cloned in other countries and we'll be making it as easy as possible for that to happen.
Will there be a symbol like the Make Poverty History wristband?
10:10 is producing metal tags that can be worn around the wrist or neck (or anywhere else). They are made from scrap metal salvaged from old airliners. They will be on sale for £1.
Who is running 10:10?
It is the brainchild of Franny Armstrong, director of the Age of Stupid. It is being run by Franny's team with help from the Guardian, Comic Relief and Freud Communications.
How is 10:10 different from other climate campaigns?
10:10 is unique because it asks people to take a simple but meaningful action that everyone can understand and contribute to. As a result, it is already receiving unparalleled support from media, business, NGOs and the public sector.
How will people sign up?
On 1 September there will be a mass sign-up event at Tate Modern in London. But individuals and organisations will be able to sign up on the 10:10 website at any time.
Public figures and business sign up to 10:10 climate campaign
David Adam, environment correspondent
The Guardian, Tuesday 1 September 2009
An unprecedented coalition of scientists, companies, celebrities and organisations spanning the cultural and political spectrum will today commit to slashing their carbon emissions as part of an ambitious campaign to tackle global warming.
The 10:10 campaign, which will be launched at London's Tate Modern this afternoon, aims to bolster grassroots support for tough action against global warming ahead of the key global summit in Copenhagen in December.
Those signing up for the campaign, which is supported by the Guardian, pledge to make efforts to reduce their carbon footprints by 10% during the year 2010.
Groups committed to the 10:10 cause range from Tottenham Hotspur football club, online grocer Ocado, the Tate galleries and the Women's Institute to dozens of schools, universities and NHS trusts. Four of the major energy companies, British Gas owner Centrica, E.ON, EDF and Scottish and Southern, have promised to help customers hit their 10:10 targets by providing information on how their energy use compares with past consumption.
The campaign is backed by public figures ranging from the climate change expert Lord Stern to Radio 1 DJ Sara Cox, chefs Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and Delia Smith, screenwriter Richard Curtis, directors Richard Eyre and Mike Figgis, designers Nicole Farhi and Vivienne Westwood, TV presenter Kevin McCloud and actors including Samantha Morton, Jason Isaacs, Pete Postlethwaite, Colin Firth and Tamsin Greig.
A clutch of Britain's most eminent artists including Anish Kapoor, who has produced a special cover for today's G2, Anthony Gormley and Gillian Wearing, have pledged to cut their emissions as have several literary heavyweights including Ian McEwan, Sarah Waters, Irvine Welsh, Anthony Horowitz, Antony Beevor, Ali Smith, Carol Ann Duffy and Andrew Motion.
The campaign organisers, led by Franny Armstrong, the film-maker behind The Age of Stupid, hope 10:10 could replicate the way the 2005 Make Poverty History (MPH) movement captured the public imagination and helped to drive political change on debt relief. The 10:10 campaigners will distribute signature metal tags made from melted-down aircraft.
Armstrong said: "After every screening of The Age of Stupid people came up to me and asked what they could do. I was saying very generic stuff and I thought we needed a better 'here's what you can do'. Hence 10:10."
She said the campaign aimed to convince Ed Miliband, the energy and climate change secretary, to take the significant step of committing Britain to slash its emissions by as close to 10% as possible by the end of next year. The campaign will be officially launched with a massive sign-up event and free concert at the Tate Modern gallery in London.
Armstrong said: "Once we've got a critical mass of support we will go to the government and say the people of Britain are ready to cut by 10%, now we need you to move. If Ed Miliband could go to Copenhagen and say Britain is going to step forward and start cutting as quickly as the science demands, that could potentially break the deadlock in the international negotiations."
The December talks in Copenhagen aim to agree a successor to the Kyoto protocol and are widely viewed as the last chance for humanity to get to grips with soaring greenhouse gas emissions. Scientists warn that temperatures could soar across the globe by a catastrophic 6C or more by the end of the century.
Kevin Anderson, the head of the Tyndall Centre on Climate Change Research, one of the leading scientists backing the campaign said: "A widespread acknowledgment of the scale of the challenge coupled with meaningful actions will provide a political mandate for effective low-carbon polices that it is difficult for decision-makers to ignore."
Chris Rapley, the head of the Science Museum in London, said: "What's unprecedented about this is that it's an attempt at an harmonious coalition between people, politicians and organisations. We know Copenhagen is going to be really, really tough and we can't leave this all to the politicians."
Some experts warned it was not realistic for Britain to aim for a 10% emissions cut by 2010.
Brian Hoskins, the head of the Grantham Institute for Climate Change, who sits on the government's climate change committee, said: "This is a good idea for individuals, but 10% cuts by next year would be very difficult for Britain and could be problematic. It could encourage short-term measures rather than proper long-term planning."
Alan Rusbridger, the editor of the Guardian, said: "The Guardian is backing 10:10 because it offers us a way to take small actions that together add up to something meaningful and significant."
The Guardian, Tuesday 1 September 2009
An unprecedented coalition of scientists, companies, celebrities and organisations spanning the cultural and political spectrum will today commit to slashing their carbon emissions as part of an ambitious campaign to tackle global warming.
The 10:10 campaign, which will be launched at London's Tate Modern this afternoon, aims to bolster grassroots support for tough action against global warming ahead of the key global summit in Copenhagen in December.
Those signing up for the campaign, which is supported by the Guardian, pledge to make efforts to reduce their carbon footprints by 10% during the year 2010.
Groups committed to the 10:10 cause range from Tottenham Hotspur football club, online grocer Ocado, the Tate galleries and the Women's Institute to dozens of schools, universities and NHS trusts. Four of the major energy companies, British Gas owner Centrica, E.ON, EDF and Scottish and Southern, have promised to help customers hit their 10:10 targets by providing information on how their energy use compares with past consumption.
The campaign is backed by public figures ranging from the climate change expert Lord Stern to Radio 1 DJ Sara Cox, chefs Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and Delia Smith, screenwriter Richard Curtis, directors Richard Eyre and Mike Figgis, designers Nicole Farhi and Vivienne Westwood, TV presenter Kevin McCloud and actors including Samantha Morton, Jason Isaacs, Pete Postlethwaite, Colin Firth and Tamsin Greig.
A clutch of Britain's most eminent artists including Anish Kapoor, who has produced a special cover for today's G2, Anthony Gormley and Gillian Wearing, have pledged to cut their emissions as have several literary heavyweights including Ian McEwan, Sarah Waters, Irvine Welsh, Anthony Horowitz, Antony Beevor, Ali Smith, Carol Ann Duffy and Andrew Motion.
The campaign organisers, led by Franny Armstrong, the film-maker behind The Age of Stupid, hope 10:10 could replicate the way the 2005 Make Poverty History (MPH) movement captured the public imagination and helped to drive political change on debt relief. The 10:10 campaigners will distribute signature metal tags made from melted-down aircraft.
Armstrong said: "After every screening of The Age of Stupid people came up to me and asked what they could do. I was saying very generic stuff and I thought we needed a better 'here's what you can do'. Hence 10:10."
She said the campaign aimed to convince Ed Miliband, the energy and climate change secretary, to take the significant step of committing Britain to slash its emissions by as close to 10% as possible by the end of next year. The campaign will be officially launched with a massive sign-up event and free concert at the Tate Modern gallery in London.
Armstrong said: "Once we've got a critical mass of support we will go to the government and say the people of Britain are ready to cut by 10%, now we need you to move. If Ed Miliband could go to Copenhagen and say Britain is going to step forward and start cutting as quickly as the science demands, that could potentially break the deadlock in the international negotiations."
The December talks in Copenhagen aim to agree a successor to the Kyoto protocol and are widely viewed as the last chance for humanity to get to grips with soaring greenhouse gas emissions. Scientists warn that temperatures could soar across the globe by a catastrophic 6C or more by the end of the century.
Kevin Anderson, the head of the Tyndall Centre on Climate Change Research, one of the leading scientists backing the campaign said: "A widespread acknowledgment of the scale of the challenge coupled with meaningful actions will provide a political mandate for effective low-carbon polices that it is difficult for decision-makers to ignore."
Chris Rapley, the head of the Science Museum in London, said: "What's unprecedented about this is that it's an attempt at an harmonious coalition between people, politicians and organisations. We know Copenhagen is going to be really, really tough and we can't leave this all to the politicians."
Some experts warned it was not realistic for Britain to aim for a 10% emissions cut by 2010.
Brian Hoskins, the head of the Grantham Institute for Climate Change, who sits on the government's climate change committee, said: "This is a good idea for individuals, but 10% cuts by next year would be very difficult for Britain and could be problematic. It could encourage short-term measures rather than proper long-term planning."
Alan Rusbridger, the editor of the Guardian, said: "The Guardian is backing 10:10 because it offers us a way to take small actions that together add up to something meaningful and significant."
Masterclass in carbon-cutting construction
Published Date: 01 September 2009
By JOHN ROSS
A PIONEERING school in a remote part of the Highlands could give lessons to other areas in developing energy-efficient classes, it has been claimed.
Education secretary Fiona Hyslop visited Acharacle in Ardnamurchan to see Scotland's first wholly sustainable school, which accommodates 48 English-speaking and Gaelic-speaking medium primary school pupils and 14 in the nursery.The school is so well insulated and draught-proofed that the heat from the children, staff and computers is enough to warm the building. All internal materials are natural, including untreated timber, linoleum, clay plaster and vegetable-based paints. Most of the school is made from wood and there is a wind turbine on the hill behind the school to provide hot water. Rainwater is collected from the copper roofs to flush the toilets. Electricity consumption is cut through the use of large, triple-glazed windows to increase daylight, and by using very energy-efficient appliances.Ms Hyslop said: "It is important that we have a low-carbon school estate, both for the environment and also to help authorities reduce rising fuel costs. "I am in no doubt that what we are seeing here at Acharacle is the future of school construction. It is important we learn lessons from this school for the rest of Scotland."The community waited 22 years for a new school and it finally arrived in kit form on the back of a lorry from Austria last year. It replaced a building described by parents as "dreadful", which included a "temporary" classroom that was used for 20 years.
By JOHN ROSS
A PIONEERING school in a remote part of the Highlands could give lessons to other areas in developing energy-efficient classes, it has been claimed.
Education secretary Fiona Hyslop visited Acharacle in Ardnamurchan to see Scotland's first wholly sustainable school, which accommodates 48 English-speaking and Gaelic-speaking medium primary school pupils and 14 in the nursery.The school is so well insulated and draught-proofed that the heat from the children, staff and computers is enough to warm the building. All internal materials are natural, including untreated timber, linoleum, clay plaster and vegetable-based paints. Most of the school is made from wood and there is a wind turbine on the hill behind the school to provide hot water. Rainwater is collected from the copper roofs to flush the toilets. Electricity consumption is cut through the use of large, triple-glazed windows to increase daylight, and by using very energy-efficient appliances.Ms Hyslop said: "It is important that we have a low-carbon school estate, both for the environment and also to help authorities reduce rising fuel costs. "I am in no doubt that what we are seeing here at Acharacle is the future of school construction. It is important we learn lessons from this school for the rest of Scotland."The community waited 22 years for a new school and it finally arrived in kit form on the back of a lorry from Austria last year. It replaced a building described by parents as "dreadful", which included a "temporary" classroom that was used for 20 years.
Hot Job: Calculating Products' Pollution
Until a few years ago, Nuno da Silva's arcane occupation -- professional pollution calculator -- was of little utility to the corporate world.
But in these days of global-warming worries and greener-than-thou marketing, companies suddenly can't get enough of his services. Revenue at the division he manages exploded 150% in 2008 and continues to expand this year, despite the recession. Since the beginning of 2008, he has added 13 people to his staff, bringing the number of employees to 16.
"We used to be the environmental geeks," said Mr. da Silva, who oversees the U.S. division of a German environmental consulting company, PE International. "Now we're mainstream."
Concerns about greenhouse gases and other environmental hazards have spurred governments and companies to try to reduce the environmental impact of everything from auto fuels to water bottles. The first step in doing that is to assess the pollution those products impose on the Earth.
Wal-Mart Stores Inc.'s most recent environmental effort -- a bid to tag all of its products with information about their environmental impact -- will force hundreds of its suppliers to inventory their pollution, which many expect will create a boom for the pollution-counting profession.
Enter the growing class of "pollution counters" like Mr. da Silva. Using computer models, they process information about the energy and resources consumed by making, using and disposing of a product. At each stage, a product's effects on the soil, water and air are tracked to come up with what is known as a life-cycle assessment.
At chemical maker DuPont Co., the in-house group that does life-cycle assessments has grown from three members to 10 in the past six years.
At New Balance, a Boston-based maker of sneakers and athletic clothing, a "green team" has begun calculating the environmental cost of the plastic soles used in the company's shoes as well as the impact of shipping from New Balance's Asian factories. What the team has found so far suggests that the materials that go into the shoes, rather than the trip from overseas, take the bigger toll on the environment.
Although life-cycle assessments have been around since the 1970s and are fairly common in Europe, the practice has taken off in the U.S. only in the past few years, industry experts say.
But the profession can be lucrative. Calculating the life-cycle impact of a single product can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, and Mr. da Silva said that starting salaries in his field average about $60,000. The first step in doing a life-cycle assessment is collecting data on the environmental impact of the different processes involved, from extracting raw materials to transforming them in a factory. Sometimes that means measuring emissions from a smokestack or a tailpipe, but the statistical information often comes from databases compiled by companies like PE International.
Most serious counters abide by guidelines from the Geneva-based International Organization for Standardization. It is up to the assessor to determine precisely what in a product's production to count and what to leave out.
But no clear rules govern the assessments, whose conclusions can vary sharply. While several organizations are trying to come up with standards, they don't agree, and there are no enforcement mechanisms. There is also nothing to stop companies from looking around for a pollution assessment that will favor their products or points of view.
The American Christmas Tree Association, which represents companies that produce artificial holiday trees, says it did its best to make accurate a life-cycle assessment that compared its products to natural Christmas trees. The assessment, which is still being reviewed, found that an artificial tree was slightly more environmentally friendly, mainly because the biggest source of pollution for either type of tree was consumers driving to get it, and consumers tend to reuse artificial trees.
But the National Christmas Tree Association, which represents tree growers, disputes the findings. "It is patently absurd to think that using a nonbiodegradable, nonrenewable product from a factory is somehow more environmentally friendly than buying a real tree," said spokesman Rick Dungey.
He pointed to a 2009 Christmas tree life-cycle assessment by a different pollution counter that found that natural trees are better for the environment unless an artificial tree is reused for at least 20 years.
Robin Jenkins does assessments for DuPont. To evaluate a potential project to make ethanol out of corn stalks, she talked to farmers, auto makers and regulators. Her recommendations included leaving half of the stalks on the field to prevent soil erosion, a practice the company plans to adopt at a pilot plant it is building in Tennessee.
But sometimes pollution counters find that just doing a calculation has little effect. For example, a life-cycle assessment done for the consumer-products giant Unilever found that smaller bottles of more-concentrated laundry detergent would save water, reduce packaging material and cut greenhouse-gas emissions from transportation.
But consumers continued to choose bigger bottles, which they assumed were a better value, said Gavin Neath, senior vice president of global communications and sustainability at Unilever.
Only after Wal-Mart banned nonconcentrated detergents from its shelves did Unilever make inroads with its pollution-counter-approved product.
Write to Ana Campoy at ana.campoy@dowjones.com
But in these days of global-warming worries and greener-than-thou marketing, companies suddenly can't get enough of his services. Revenue at the division he manages exploded 150% in 2008 and continues to expand this year, despite the recession. Since the beginning of 2008, he has added 13 people to his staff, bringing the number of employees to 16.
"We used to be the environmental geeks," said Mr. da Silva, who oversees the U.S. division of a German environmental consulting company, PE International. "Now we're mainstream."
Concerns about greenhouse gases and other environmental hazards have spurred governments and companies to try to reduce the environmental impact of everything from auto fuels to water bottles. The first step in doing that is to assess the pollution those products impose on the Earth.
Wal-Mart Stores Inc.'s most recent environmental effort -- a bid to tag all of its products with information about their environmental impact -- will force hundreds of its suppliers to inventory their pollution, which many expect will create a boom for the pollution-counting profession.
Enter the growing class of "pollution counters" like Mr. da Silva. Using computer models, they process information about the energy and resources consumed by making, using and disposing of a product. At each stage, a product's effects on the soil, water and air are tracked to come up with what is known as a life-cycle assessment.
At chemical maker DuPont Co., the in-house group that does life-cycle assessments has grown from three members to 10 in the past six years.
At New Balance, a Boston-based maker of sneakers and athletic clothing, a "green team" has begun calculating the environmental cost of the plastic soles used in the company's shoes as well as the impact of shipping from New Balance's Asian factories. What the team has found so far suggests that the materials that go into the shoes, rather than the trip from overseas, take the bigger toll on the environment.
Although life-cycle assessments have been around since the 1970s and are fairly common in Europe, the practice has taken off in the U.S. only in the past few years, industry experts say.
But the profession can be lucrative. Calculating the life-cycle impact of a single product can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, and Mr. da Silva said that starting salaries in his field average about $60,000. The first step in doing a life-cycle assessment is collecting data on the environmental impact of the different processes involved, from extracting raw materials to transforming them in a factory. Sometimes that means measuring emissions from a smokestack or a tailpipe, but the statistical information often comes from databases compiled by companies like PE International.
Most serious counters abide by guidelines from the Geneva-based International Organization for Standardization. It is up to the assessor to determine precisely what in a product's production to count and what to leave out.
But no clear rules govern the assessments, whose conclusions can vary sharply. While several organizations are trying to come up with standards, they don't agree, and there are no enforcement mechanisms. There is also nothing to stop companies from looking around for a pollution assessment that will favor their products or points of view.
The American Christmas Tree Association, which represents companies that produce artificial holiday trees, says it did its best to make accurate a life-cycle assessment that compared its products to natural Christmas trees. The assessment, which is still being reviewed, found that an artificial tree was slightly more environmentally friendly, mainly because the biggest source of pollution for either type of tree was consumers driving to get it, and consumers tend to reuse artificial trees.
But the National Christmas Tree Association, which represents tree growers, disputes the findings. "It is patently absurd to think that using a nonbiodegradable, nonrenewable product from a factory is somehow more environmentally friendly than buying a real tree," said spokesman Rick Dungey.
He pointed to a 2009 Christmas tree life-cycle assessment by a different pollution counter that found that natural trees are better for the environment unless an artificial tree is reused for at least 20 years.
Robin Jenkins does assessments for DuPont. To evaluate a potential project to make ethanol out of corn stalks, she talked to farmers, auto makers and regulators. Her recommendations included leaving half of the stalks on the field to prevent soil erosion, a practice the company plans to adopt at a pilot plant it is building in Tennessee.
But sometimes pollution counters find that just doing a calculation has little effect. For example, a life-cycle assessment done for the consumer-products giant Unilever found that smaller bottles of more-concentrated laundry detergent would save water, reduce packaging material and cut greenhouse-gas emissions from transportation.
But consumers continued to choose bigger bottles, which they assumed were a better value, said Gavin Neath, senior vice president of global communications and sustainability at Unilever.
Only after Wal-Mart banned nonconcentrated detergents from its shelves did Unilever make inroads with its pollution-counter-approved product.
Write to Ana Campoy at ana.campoy@dowjones.com
How Spurs, Delia and Tate Modern are facing up to the 10:10 challenge
New floodlights for Tottenham Hotspur, long johns for Delia Smith and Thames riverwater for the Tate
Interviews by Alok Jha, Leo Hickman and David Adam
The Guardian, Tuesday 1 September 2009
Compared with other working days at the White Hart Lane stadium, match days are in another league of energy use. Which makes things a bit tricky for Tottenham Hotspur as it tries to work out whether it will make its 10:10 target. While executive director Donna-Maria Cullen is keen to make her club a green beacon, she's also keeping her fingers crossed for a run of FA Cup matches this season. In football, success can be a real hindrance to being green.
But Cullen has already got the club working on cutting its carbon footprint. One of the most energy-hungry parts of a stadium is its lighting: sun lamps must be trained on the pitch all winter to keep the grass in pristine condition and, for evening matches, floodlights are a necessity. Last year the club spent more than £100,000 replacing the 136 floodlamps, each 2KW, with more efficient 1.5KW lamps.
The carbon footprint of fans on match days has also been reduced by dissuading them from arriving in cars (around a quarter now arrive by car, down from a peak of 36%). For 10:10, Cullen wants to focus on the day-to-day business side: everything from making sure kettles are not over-filled in the offices to turning down temperatures in the constantly-running laundry at the training ground.
And the players? Will any give up their Land Rovers and Jaguars? "We'll be asking them to buy into it and do their bit," says Cullen. The team captain, Ledley King, is due to make an appearance at the 10:10 launch, and Cullen is confident he won't be the only player there.
She says the club signed up to 10:10 because it's a climate campaign that can really achieve something. "We have millions of supporters so, apart from addressing our own footprint, we're an excellent conduit for getting the message out. Any business that isn't taking cognisance of the fact that this is probably the biggest challenge facing us all is being very short-sighted."
Delia Smith
Last year Delia Smith, the cookery writer and broadcaster, decided to conduct a little experiment. She popped down to her local Marks & Spencer, bought herself some long johns and thermal vests, then headed back home to her cottage set deep in the Suffolk countryside. Smith was intrigued to see how much energy – and money — she could save by wearing extra layers of clothing.
"We pay our electricity bills via direct debit so the same amount goes out each month," she says. "So I was really pleased when my electricity company sent me a cheque for £300 this spring because I'd managed to cut down so much on our energy use."
Despite the success of this experiment, Smith is frustrated by the lack of information on offer for people wanting to reduce their carbon footprint. "I've bought several books and I'll look up, say, smokeless coal versus conventional coal in terms of carbon emissions and it won't tell me anything. I'm trying to do my best, but I know there's lots more I could do."
Smith's house has no central heating; it relies on electric heaters, a fireplace in the sitting room, underfloor heating in the conservatory and an oil-fired Aga in the kitchen. "I know there are questions over the efficiency of Agas," she says. "But, again, where do we get this information? I'm totally willing to not have the Aga if someone educates me about its impact."
For heating hot water, Smith and her husband, the publisher Michael Wynn-Jones, have an electric immersion heater. As a complete package, it's among the most inefficient ways to heat space and water in a home. Huge savings in emissions could be achieved by installing a modern condensing gas-fired boiler. Or better still, a boiler fired on wood pellets.
Smith has already improved the insulation of their six-room cottage. "I've been trying very hard since last year. Everything is insulated now – as much as you can with an old cottage. We've got double glazing and a thatched roof, which is fantastic: cool in the summer and warm in winter. We have more to do but, because we're both over 60, we can now get it done for free."
Smith is particularly proud of what they have done outside, including a pond given over to wildlife and the planting of 300 trees. But it's the two cars parked outside the cottage that leads to my next line of inquiry. Smith has a Renault Clio "to pop down to the local shops"; Wynn-Jones has a Jaguar.
"We're not on a bus route so we have to use the car," she says. "When it's time for me to change, though, I will get a greener one. And although I'd be happy not to have the Jaguar, we've both found we are able to work in it – you can read and write comfortably. So it's for longer distances."
As directors of Norwich football club, Smith and Wynn-Jones travel to all the team's away matches. It is here that perhaps their greatest emissions vice is revealed: "We go to away matches on an eight-seater propellor plane. But how," she asks, "does that compare, in terms of emissions, to four cars going with two people in each?" Smith promises to find out the model of the aircraft so I can make that calculation.
She also admits to taking around two flights a year on holiday. "We don't actually like flying for holidays. We hate the whole airport experience, and have recently had several holidays in the car, going through the tunnel or on the ferry into Europe."
But it is over food, as you might expect, that Smith displays the greatest passion. She quickly interrupts my suggestion that meat and dairy both carry a significant emission burden. "If you put Britain under siege conditions, it wouldn't be able to feed itself without meat because we are mostly hill country. Yes I'd like to have less intensively reared meat, but there is a lot of meat that isn't and it's the same with dairy."
Instead, Smith steers the blame on to processed foods. "I don't know how many emissions are produced making a million and one different types of chocolate bar – it's totally superfluous to what we need. I'm not a killjoy, but people are knocking meat and dairy and not talking about all the processed junk food."
Smith accepts there are many areas of her life where impressive reductions could be made to her carbon footprint, and says she's ready and keen to take up the 10:10 challenge. But what, I wonder, will she find hardest to cut back on? "I could easily do without ever going to an airport again. That would probably be the easiest thing to give up if I had to."
The Tate group
The giant turbine hall at Tate Modern in central London hums with electricity. In its former life this hall was a cathedral to fossil fuels; now it is the centrepiece of the 10:10 campaign that aims to undo some of the damage those fuels have caused to the atmosphere. The campaign's official launch party is hosted here tonight.
The turbine hall looks like it should have a gigantic carbon footprint. Just how much must it cost to heat this cavernous space? Not a penny, as it turns out: the hall is left unheated in winter and uncooled in summer. Staff on duty in the colder months work shorter shifts and are encouraged to wrap up.
But sensitive paintings in the rest of the museum must be kept under precisely controlled conditions, and this is where the building's carbon footprint starts to mount. The relative humidity is kept within 40% and 60%, and the temperature must not exceed 24C. The same goes for the rest of the Tate galleries around the country. Judith Nesbitt, chief curator at Tate Britain, says: "Our biggest energy load is electricity for climate control of the galleries, and we are looking at how to reduce that burden."
Outside Tate Modern, at the top of the long ramp leading from the turbine hall, an industrial looking pipe has been crudely wedged into the ground, as part of an experiment into whether water from the Thames gravel beds below could be used to help cool the museum's sensitive artworks. Museum experts are also looking so see if waste heat from the transformer next door could be tapped. The trials aren't just about improving the energy efficiency of the iconic building; the museum plans to build a £215m extension next door for 2012, which it says will use 54% less energy and emit 44% less carbon than building regulations demand.
The organisation is taking other steps to curb electricity use. Away from the public spaces, lights have been made motion sensitive, and the gallery lights at Tate Britain now switch off automatically in the evening. But Nesbitt says they are less able to tackle the group's emissions from air travel. "We borrow and lend each others' works. This is what we do."
Helen Beeckmans, head of communications at Tate, says the group was already working to reduce its environmental impact before it got involved in 10:10. "Part of the reason we are participating is that we want to communicate outside the museum sector on this subject. The cultural sector has seen enormous growth over recent years, bringing it a high profile – and with that, the responsibility to take a lead in wider issues of society."
Interviews by Alok Jha, Leo Hickman and David Adam
The Guardian, Tuesday 1 September 2009
Compared with other working days at the White Hart Lane stadium, match days are in another league of energy use. Which makes things a bit tricky for Tottenham Hotspur as it tries to work out whether it will make its 10:10 target. While executive director Donna-Maria Cullen is keen to make her club a green beacon, she's also keeping her fingers crossed for a run of FA Cup matches this season. In football, success can be a real hindrance to being green.
But Cullen has already got the club working on cutting its carbon footprint. One of the most energy-hungry parts of a stadium is its lighting: sun lamps must be trained on the pitch all winter to keep the grass in pristine condition and, for evening matches, floodlights are a necessity. Last year the club spent more than £100,000 replacing the 136 floodlamps, each 2KW, with more efficient 1.5KW lamps.
The carbon footprint of fans on match days has also been reduced by dissuading them from arriving in cars (around a quarter now arrive by car, down from a peak of 36%). For 10:10, Cullen wants to focus on the day-to-day business side: everything from making sure kettles are not over-filled in the offices to turning down temperatures in the constantly-running laundry at the training ground.
And the players? Will any give up their Land Rovers and Jaguars? "We'll be asking them to buy into it and do their bit," says Cullen. The team captain, Ledley King, is due to make an appearance at the 10:10 launch, and Cullen is confident he won't be the only player there.
She says the club signed up to 10:10 because it's a climate campaign that can really achieve something. "We have millions of supporters so, apart from addressing our own footprint, we're an excellent conduit for getting the message out. Any business that isn't taking cognisance of the fact that this is probably the biggest challenge facing us all is being very short-sighted."
Delia Smith
Last year Delia Smith, the cookery writer and broadcaster, decided to conduct a little experiment. She popped down to her local Marks & Spencer, bought herself some long johns and thermal vests, then headed back home to her cottage set deep in the Suffolk countryside. Smith was intrigued to see how much energy – and money — she could save by wearing extra layers of clothing.
"We pay our electricity bills via direct debit so the same amount goes out each month," she says. "So I was really pleased when my electricity company sent me a cheque for £300 this spring because I'd managed to cut down so much on our energy use."
Despite the success of this experiment, Smith is frustrated by the lack of information on offer for people wanting to reduce their carbon footprint. "I've bought several books and I'll look up, say, smokeless coal versus conventional coal in terms of carbon emissions and it won't tell me anything. I'm trying to do my best, but I know there's lots more I could do."
Smith's house has no central heating; it relies on electric heaters, a fireplace in the sitting room, underfloor heating in the conservatory and an oil-fired Aga in the kitchen. "I know there are questions over the efficiency of Agas," she says. "But, again, where do we get this information? I'm totally willing to not have the Aga if someone educates me about its impact."
For heating hot water, Smith and her husband, the publisher Michael Wynn-Jones, have an electric immersion heater. As a complete package, it's among the most inefficient ways to heat space and water in a home. Huge savings in emissions could be achieved by installing a modern condensing gas-fired boiler. Or better still, a boiler fired on wood pellets.
Smith has already improved the insulation of their six-room cottage. "I've been trying very hard since last year. Everything is insulated now – as much as you can with an old cottage. We've got double glazing and a thatched roof, which is fantastic: cool in the summer and warm in winter. We have more to do but, because we're both over 60, we can now get it done for free."
Smith is particularly proud of what they have done outside, including a pond given over to wildlife and the planting of 300 trees. But it's the two cars parked outside the cottage that leads to my next line of inquiry. Smith has a Renault Clio "to pop down to the local shops"; Wynn-Jones has a Jaguar.
"We're not on a bus route so we have to use the car," she says. "When it's time for me to change, though, I will get a greener one. And although I'd be happy not to have the Jaguar, we've both found we are able to work in it – you can read and write comfortably. So it's for longer distances."
As directors of Norwich football club, Smith and Wynn-Jones travel to all the team's away matches. It is here that perhaps their greatest emissions vice is revealed: "We go to away matches on an eight-seater propellor plane. But how," she asks, "does that compare, in terms of emissions, to four cars going with two people in each?" Smith promises to find out the model of the aircraft so I can make that calculation.
She also admits to taking around two flights a year on holiday. "We don't actually like flying for holidays. We hate the whole airport experience, and have recently had several holidays in the car, going through the tunnel or on the ferry into Europe."
But it is over food, as you might expect, that Smith displays the greatest passion. She quickly interrupts my suggestion that meat and dairy both carry a significant emission burden. "If you put Britain under siege conditions, it wouldn't be able to feed itself without meat because we are mostly hill country. Yes I'd like to have less intensively reared meat, but there is a lot of meat that isn't and it's the same with dairy."
Instead, Smith steers the blame on to processed foods. "I don't know how many emissions are produced making a million and one different types of chocolate bar – it's totally superfluous to what we need. I'm not a killjoy, but people are knocking meat and dairy and not talking about all the processed junk food."
Smith accepts there are many areas of her life where impressive reductions could be made to her carbon footprint, and says she's ready and keen to take up the 10:10 challenge. But what, I wonder, will she find hardest to cut back on? "I could easily do without ever going to an airport again. That would probably be the easiest thing to give up if I had to."
The Tate group
The giant turbine hall at Tate Modern in central London hums with electricity. In its former life this hall was a cathedral to fossil fuels; now it is the centrepiece of the 10:10 campaign that aims to undo some of the damage those fuels have caused to the atmosphere. The campaign's official launch party is hosted here tonight.
The turbine hall looks like it should have a gigantic carbon footprint. Just how much must it cost to heat this cavernous space? Not a penny, as it turns out: the hall is left unheated in winter and uncooled in summer. Staff on duty in the colder months work shorter shifts and are encouraged to wrap up.
But sensitive paintings in the rest of the museum must be kept under precisely controlled conditions, and this is where the building's carbon footprint starts to mount. The relative humidity is kept within 40% and 60%, and the temperature must not exceed 24C. The same goes for the rest of the Tate galleries around the country. Judith Nesbitt, chief curator at Tate Britain, says: "Our biggest energy load is electricity for climate control of the galleries, and we are looking at how to reduce that burden."
Outside Tate Modern, at the top of the long ramp leading from the turbine hall, an industrial looking pipe has been crudely wedged into the ground, as part of an experiment into whether water from the Thames gravel beds below could be used to help cool the museum's sensitive artworks. Museum experts are also looking so see if waste heat from the transformer next door could be tapped. The trials aren't just about improving the energy efficiency of the iconic building; the museum plans to build a £215m extension next door for 2012, which it says will use 54% less energy and emit 44% less carbon than building regulations demand.
The organisation is taking other steps to curb electricity use. Away from the public spaces, lights have been made motion sensitive, and the gallery lights at Tate Britain now switch off automatically in the evening. But Nesbitt says they are less able to tackle the group's emissions from air travel. "We borrow and lend each others' works. This is what we do."
Helen Beeckmans, head of communications at Tate, says the group was already working to reduce its environmental impact before it got involved in 10:10. "Part of the reason we are participating is that we want to communicate outside the museum sector on this subject. The cultural sector has seen enormous growth over recent years, bringing it a high profile – and with that, the responsibility to take a lead in wider issues of society."
Monday, 31 August 2009
Wind Farms Set Wall Street Aflutter
By RUSSELL GOLD
Associated Press
A new program offering cash rebates on renewable energy investments is sparking interest in wind farms. A worker atop a windmill in Maine.
After nearly a six-month lull, Wall Street is getting back into the business of financing new wind farms.
Morgan Stanley and Citigroup Inc. have invested $100 million each to finance separate wind farms this month, taking advantage of a brand-new federal program that is paying substantial cash grants to help cover the cost of renewable energy investments.
Bankers say this is the beginning of an active pipeline of new wind-farm financing, as well as investment in large solar installations and geothermal facilities. Project developers and Wall Street appear to be viewing the federal cash grant program as such a good deal, industry experts say, it may grow much larger than its Washington creators expected.
"The money is coming back," says Ethan Zindler, head of North American research at consultant New Energy Finance Ltd.
Under the program, the government will give a cash rebate for 30% of the cost of building a renewable-energy facility, awarded 60 days after an application is approved. Investors are also given valuable accelerated depreciation deductions, which help offset taxes.
The Energy and Treasury departments have said they expect to spend $3 billion on the program, which started July 31 and runs through the end of 2010, and was part of the stimulus bill. But a government spokesman says requests for $800 million in grants were submitted during the first four weeks.
Some Wall Street bankers say they expect applications to grow to $10 billion, based on projected wind-power installations.
"We see opportunities and we are pursuing them pretty actively," says Kevin Walsh, managing director of General Electric Co.'s GE Energy Financial Services division, which was a major financier of wind deals in the past.
The strong interest echoes the $3 billion cash-for-clunkers program that provided incentives to trade in older, lower-gas mileage cars, and which was quickly overwhelmed by demand. "We are concerned that this may evolve into a cash-for-clunkers version 2.0," says a spokesman for Rep. Darrell Issa, a California Republican.
But unlike the popular cash-for-clunkers programs, there is no spending cap on the renewable energy grants, and the government has committed to spending as much as is needed to keep renewable-energy investments flowing.
Under an earlier renewable energy program, the government gave companies tax credits over 10 years, which were attractive as long as financial firms believed they would be generating taxable profits for years to come. When Wall Street imploded last year, profits turned to losses and appetite for these investments disappeared quickly. Some of the companies most active in these deals -- including Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and American International Group Inc. -- were hobbled or destroyed by the turmoil.
But the new cash grants are offering the potential for attractive returns. Several bankers interviewed said they expected deals to provide an annual return of anywhere from 9% to 15%.
Most of the investments are expected to go to wind projects, because the industry is more mature and in a better position to capture limited funds. "I would not be surprised if the program is ridiculously successful and spurs a huge amount of development," says Liz Salerno, director of industry analysis for the American Wind Energy Association.
Even capital-constrained financial giant Citigroup has been drawn to wind power. In August, it made a $120 million investment in a large wind farm under construction in the rolling hills of northern Pennsylvania. The project, called Armenia Mountain by developer AES Corp., will deliver about 100.5 megawatts of power-generation capacity from 67 turbines, each the size of a 20-story building.
The quick returns provided by the cash grant "made it an attractive investment option," said Sandip Sen, Citi's global head of alternative energy.
It's not just Wall Street banks that are attracted. Iberdrola SA, a Spanish company that is the world leader in renewable energy by capacity installed, said in July that it expects to tap $500 million in cash grants for U.S. wind projects. "We've been in contact with the Treasury Department and we think the $3 billion is a minimum-type number," said Ralph Curry, chief executive of Iberdrola's U.S. business unit.
The Treasury Department didn't return calls seeking comment.
Additional financing from the grants would potentially benefit major wind-farm developers such as Florida utility FPL Group Inc. and large-scale solar developer Edison International. It could also give a boost to manufacturers who make the turbine blades and solar panels, such as Vestas Wind Systems A/S and First Solar Inc.
Morgan Stanley recently made a $120 million investment in a Montana-based wind farm developed by Grupo Naturener SA. "The cash grants are a good deal for both developers and financial backers," says Martin Torres, a Morgan Stanley vice president who worked on the deal.
"If we have a quick recovery and we're going like gangbusters again, you could easily get to $10 billion in two years," says Kevin Book, managing director of ClearView Energy Partners LLC, a Washington consultant.
Write to Russell Gold at russell.gold@wsj.com
Climate Camp finally swings into action
Five days in and the campers admit things are a little boring – there are no more toilets to put up and the police have vanished. But a plan for direct action should put the zip back into things
The weather can't make up its mind, and the campers can't either. One minute the Climate Campers are convinced that this is the best climate camp ever, most welcoming, chilled-out and up-for-it atmosphere, and the next they're admitting that perhaps it feels a little flat and even – God forbid – a little bit boring.
Five days in and there are no more toilets to put up, no more drainage systems to figure out, no more marquees to erect. The camp neighbourhoods all have their kitchens working, the rotas are full, the water hasn't run out and no one has set fire to anything.
As for the police, they have been pretty much invisible, going so far as to reject the idea of training a light on the camp at night in case it's seen as "invasive". On Thursday there was a mobile police station parked 40 or so metres from the perimeter of the Climate Camp fence. By Sunday even that has gone. The police have vanished, gone to confiscate some drugs at the Notting Hill carnival or practise their handbrake turns on the M25.
And the campers admit that, actually, it feels a bit odd without them. After all, much though they may deny this, the police have actually been incredibly useful to Climate Camp – uniting the campers in the face of the common enemy, and keeping them in the headlines in the months between camps. Now members of the legal team are wandering around like lost souls. The hay-bale barricades erected around the gate earlier in the week have been dismantled and turned into comfy seats.
However, there is now a plan for some direct action which should put the zip back into things. Firstly, there will be a flash mob tomorrow at midday at City Airport. And then on Tuesday morning, campers who want to take part in an action will be split into groups for the Rambling Raffle of Resistance.
Before Climate Camp got going, the organisers published a list of their targets which included BP, the Bank of England, E.ON, and various government departments. Now all these targets will be put into a hat, and the campers will fan out to target them.
Given that the full title of the camp is the "camp for climate action", it will be a relief to supporters of the camp to see that the camp is not just going to be about "movement building" and "educational workshops" this year. The police may even be hoving into sight again too. And just as it looked as if things were all getting a bit dull …
The weather can't make up its mind, and the campers can't either. One minute the Climate Campers are convinced that this is the best climate camp ever, most welcoming, chilled-out and up-for-it atmosphere, and the next they're admitting that perhaps it feels a little flat and even – God forbid – a little bit boring.
Five days in and there are no more toilets to put up, no more drainage systems to figure out, no more marquees to erect. The camp neighbourhoods all have their kitchens working, the rotas are full, the water hasn't run out and no one has set fire to anything.
As for the police, they have been pretty much invisible, going so far as to reject the idea of training a light on the camp at night in case it's seen as "invasive". On Thursday there was a mobile police station parked 40 or so metres from the perimeter of the Climate Camp fence. By Sunday even that has gone. The police have vanished, gone to confiscate some drugs at the Notting Hill carnival or practise their handbrake turns on the M25.
And the campers admit that, actually, it feels a bit odd without them. After all, much though they may deny this, the police have actually been incredibly useful to Climate Camp – uniting the campers in the face of the common enemy, and keeping them in the headlines in the months between camps. Now members of the legal team are wandering around like lost souls. The hay-bale barricades erected around the gate earlier in the week have been dismantled and turned into comfy seats.
However, there is now a plan for some direct action which should put the zip back into things. Firstly, there will be a flash mob tomorrow at midday at City Airport. And then on Tuesday morning, campers who want to take part in an action will be split into groups for the Rambling Raffle of Resistance.
Before Climate Camp got going, the organisers published a list of their targets which included BP, the Bank of England, E.ON, and various government departments. Now all these targets will be put into a hat, and the campers will fan out to target them.
Given that the full title of the camp is the "camp for climate action", it will be a relief to supporters of the camp to see that the camp is not just going to be about "movement building" and "educational workshops" this year. The police may even be hoving into sight again too. And just as it looked as if things were all getting a bit dull …
Technology Can Fight Global Warming
By BJøRN LOMBORG
We have precious little to show for nearly 20 years of efforts to prevent global warming. Promises in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 to cut carbon emissions went unfulfilled. Stronger pledges in Kyoto five years later failed to keep emissions in check. The only possible lesson is that agreements to reduce carbon emissions are costly, politically arduous and ultimately ineffective.
But this is a lesson many are hell-bent on ignoring, as politicians plan to gather again—this time in Copenhagen, Denmark, in December—to negotiate a new carbon-emissions treaty. Even if they manage to bridge their differences and sign a deal, there is a strong likelihood that tomorrow's politicians will fail to deliver.
Global warming does not just require action; it requires effective action. Otherwise we are just squandering time.
To inform the debate, the Copenhagen Consensus Center has commissioned research looking at the costs and benefits of all the policy options. For example, internationally renowned climate economist Richard Tol of Ireland's Economic and Social Research Institute finds that a low carbon tax of $2 a metric ton is the only carbon reduction policy that would make economic sense. But his research demonstrates the futility of trying to use carbon cuts to keep temperature increases under two degrees Celsius, which many argue would avoid the worst of climate change's impacts.
Some economic models find that target impossible to reach without drastic action, like cutting the world population by a third. Other models show that achieving the target by a high CO2 tax would reduce world GDP a staggering 12.9% in 2100—the equivalent of $40 trillion a year.
Some may claim that global warming will be so terrible that a 12.9% reduction in GDP is a small price to pay. But consider that the majority of economic models show that unconstrained global warming would cost rich nations around 2% of GDP and poor countries around 5% by 2100.
Even those figures are an overstatement. A group of climate economists at the University of Venice led by Carlo Carraro looked closely at how people will adapt to climate change. Their research for the Copenhagen Consensus Center showed that farmers in areas with less water for agriculture could use more drip irrigation, for example, while those with more water will grow more crops.
Taking a variety of natural, so-called market adaptations into account, the Carraro research shows we will acclimatize to the negative impacts of global warming and exploit the positive changes, actually creating 0.1% increase in GDP in 2100 among the member countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. In poor countries, market adaptation will reduce climate change-related losses to 2.9% of GDP. This remains a significant, negative effect. The real challenge of global warming lies in tackling its impact on the Third World. Yet adaptation has other benefits. If we prepare societies for more ferocious hurricanes in the future, we also help them to cope better with today's extreme weather.
This does not mean, however, that we should ignore rising greenhouse-gas emissions. Research for the Copenhagen Consensus Center by Claudia Kemfert of German Institute for Economic Research in Berlin shows that in terms of reducing climate damage, reducing methane emissions is cheaper than reducing C02 emissions, and—because methane is a much shorter-lived gas—its mitigation could do a lot to prevent some of the worst of short-term warming. Other research papers highlight the advantages of planting more trees and protecting the forests we have to absorb C02 and cut greenhouse gases.
Other more speculative approaches deserve consideration. In groundbreaking research, J. Eric Bickel, an economist and engineer at the University of Texas, and Lee Lane, a researcher at the American Enterprise Institute, study the costs and benefits of climate engineering. One proposal would have boats spray seawater droplets into clouds above the sea to make them reflect more sunlight back into space—augmenting the natural process where evaporating ocean sea salt helps to provide tiny particles for clouds to form around.
Remarkably, Mr. Bickel finds that about $9 billion spent developing this so-called marine cloud whitening technology might be able to cancel out this century's global warming. The benefits—from preventing the temperature increase—would add up to about $20 trillion.
Climate engineering raises ethical concerns. But if we care most about avoiding warmer temperatures, we cannot avoid considering a simple, cost-effective approach that shows so much promise.
Nothing short of a technological revolution is required to end our reliance on fossil fuel—and we are not even close to getting this revolution started. Economists Chris Green and Isabel Galiana from McGill University point out that nonfossil sources like nuclear, wind, solar and geothermal energy will—based on today's availability—get us less than halfway toward a path of stable carbon emissions by 2050, and only a tiny fraction of the way towards stabilization by 2100.
A high carbon tax will simply hurt growth if alternative technology is not ready, making us all worse off. Mr. Green proposes that policy makers abandon carbon-reduction negotiations and make agreements to seriously invest in research and development. Mr. Green's research suggests that investing about $100 billion annually in non-carbon-based-energy research could result in essentially stopping global warming within a century or so.
A technology-led effort would have a much greater chance of actually tackling climate change. It would also have a much greater chance of political success, since countries that fear signing on to costly emission targets are more likely to embrace the cheaper, smarter path of innovation.
Cutting emissions of greenhouse gases is not the only answer to global warming. This week, a group of Nobel Laureate economists will gather at Georgetown University to consider all of the new research and identify the solutions that are most effective. Hopefully, their results will influence debate and help shift decision makers away from a narrow focus on one, deeply flawed response to global warming.
Our generation will not be judged on the brilliance of our rhetoric about global warming, or on the depth of our concern. We will be judged on whether or not we stop the suffering that global warming will cause. Politicians need to stop promising the moon, and start looking at the most effective ways to help planet Earth.—Mr. Lomborg teaches at the Copenhagen Business School and is director of the Copenhagen Consensus Center. He is the author of "Cool It: The Skeptical Environmentalist's Guide to Global Warming."Printed in The Wall Street Journal Europe, page 14
We have precious little to show for nearly 20 years of efforts to prevent global warming. Promises in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 to cut carbon emissions went unfulfilled. Stronger pledges in Kyoto five years later failed to keep emissions in check. The only possible lesson is that agreements to reduce carbon emissions are costly, politically arduous and ultimately ineffective.
But this is a lesson many are hell-bent on ignoring, as politicians plan to gather again—this time in Copenhagen, Denmark, in December—to negotiate a new carbon-emissions treaty. Even if they manage to bridge their differences and sign a deal, there is a strong likelihood that tomorrow's politicians will fail to deliver.
Global warming does not just require action; it requires effective action. Otherwise we are just squandering time.
To inform the debate, the Copenhagen Consensus Center has commissioned research looking at the costs and benefits of all the policy options. For example, internationally renowned climate economist Richard Tol of Ireland's Economic and Social Research Institute finds that a low carbon tax of $2 a metric ton is the only carbon reduction policy that would make economic sense. But his research demonstrates the futility of trying to use carbon cuts to keep temperature increases under two degrees Celsius, which many argue would avoid the worst of climate change's impacts.
Some economic models find that target impossible to reach without drastic action, like cutting the world population by a third. Other models show that achieving the target by a high CO2 tax would reduce world GDP a staggering 12.9% in 2100—the equivalent of $40 trillion a year.
Some may claim that global warming will be so terrible that a 12.9% reduction in GDP is a small price to pay. But consider that the majority of economic models show that unconstrained global warming would cost rich nations around 2% of GDP and poor countries around 5% by 2100.
Even those figures are an overstatement. A group of climate economists at the University of Venice led by Carlo Carraro looked closely at how people will adapt to climate change. Their research for the Copenhagen Consensus Center showed that farmers in areas with less water for agriculture could use more drip irrigation, for example, while those with more water will grow more crops.
Taking a variety of natural, so-called market adaptations into account, the Carraro research shows we will acclimatize to the negative impacts of global warming and exploit the positive changes, actually creating 0.1% increase in GDP in 2100 among the member countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. In poor countries, market adaptation will reduce climate change-related losses to 2.9% of GDP. This remains a significant, negative effect. The real challenge of global warming lies in tackling its impact on the Third World. Yet adaptation has other benefits. If we prepare societies for more ferocious hurricanes in the future, we also help them to cope better with today's extreme weather.
This does not mean, however, that we should ignore rising greenhouse-gas emissions. Research for the Copenhagen Consensus Center by Claudia Kemfert of German Institute for Economic Research in Berlin shows that in terms of reducing climate damage, reducing methane emissions is cheaper than reducing C02 emissions, and—because methane is a much shorter-lived gas—its mitigation could do a lot to prevent some of the worst of short-term warming. Other research papers highlight the advantages of planting more trees and protecting the forests we have to absorb C02 and cut greenhouse gases.
Other more speculative approaches deserve consideration. In groundbreaking research, J. Eric Bickel, an economist and engineer at the University of Texas, and Lee Lane, a researcher at the American Enterprise Institute, study the costs and benefits of climate engineering. One proposal would have boats spray seawater droplets into clouds above the sea to make them reflect more sunlight back into space—augmenting the natural process where evaporating ocean sea salt helps to provide tiny particles for clouds to form around.
Remarkably, Mr. Bickel finds that about $9 billion spent developing this so-called marine cloud whitening technology might be able to cancel out this century's global warming. The benefits—from preventing the temperature increase—would add up to about $20 trillion.
Climate engineering raises ethical concerns. But if we care most about avoiding warmer temperatures, we cannot avoid considering a simple, cost-effective approach that shows so much promise.
Nothing short of a technological revolution is required to end our reliance on fossil fuel—and we are not even close to getting this revolution started. Economists Chris Green and Isabel Galiana from McGill University point out that nonfossil sources like nuclear, wind, solar and geothermal energy will—based on today's availability—get us less than halfway toward a path of stable carbon emissions by 2050, and only a tiny fraction of the way towards stabilization by 2100.
A high carbon tax will simply hurt growth if alternative technology is not ready, making us all worse off. Mr. Green proposes that policy makers abandon carbon-reduction negotiations and make agreements to seriously invest in research and development. Mr. Green's research suggests that investing about $100 billion annually in non-carbon-based-energy research could result in essentially stopping global warming within a century or so.
A technology-led effort would have a much greater chance of actually tackling climate change. It would also have a much greater chance of political success, since countries that fear signing on to costly emission targets are more likely to embrace the cheaper, smarter path of innovation.
Cutting emissions of greenhouse gases is not the only answer to global warming. This week, a group of Nobel Laureate economists will gather at Georgetown University to consider all of the new research and identify the solutions that are most effective. Hopefully, their results will influence debate and help shift decision makers away from a narrow focus on one, deeply flawed response to global warming.
Our generation will not be judged on the brilliance of our rhetoric about global warming, or on the depth of our concern. We will be judged on whether or not we stop the suffering that global warming will cause. Politicians need to stop promising the moon, and start looking at the most effective ways to help planet Earth.—Mr. Lomborg teaches at the Copenhagen Business School and is director of the Copenhagen Consensus Center. He is the author of "Cool It: The Skeptical Environmentalist's Guide to Global Warming."Printed in The Wall Street Journal Europe, page 14
How green socialism can save the UK
Britain is ideally placed to lead the world on renewable energy. But a free market lacks the nerve to avert climate change crisis
Neal Lawson
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 30 August 2009 09.00 BST
It may be a crisis that is too good to waste but we have to move fast to define and win support for a progressive response to the failures of the market. But a new socialism can only be built on the politics of sustainability.
We must remember that it is not just banks that have failed. Two years into the worst economic crisis since the 1930s, with more than 2.4 million already without work, the official closure earlier this month of Britain's only wind turbine blade manufacturing plant, Vestas, is a sharp reminder of the failure of blind reliance on free markets to solve the economic and climate change crises. The plant's closure, with the loss of 400 jobs, was blamed on the slow pace of growth in the UK's wind turbine market and the drawn out local planning process to agree projects.
It has brought home the reality that the changes needed to protect us from catastrophic climate change are exactly the opportunities that can catalyse an upturn in our economy. Clean, fuel-free renewable energy is a huge international growth sector – allowing countries to achieve energy security, protect themselves against volatile fossil fuel prices and stimulate economic development without the consequence of dangerous carbon emissions that are the primary cause of climate change.
Worldwide in 2008, at $155bn (£95bn), more was invested in sustainable than conventional energy production. It is no coincidence that it is the world's most economically dynamic countries – such as Germany and China – that are shaping markets and driving investment to benefit from an almost exponential growth in renewable technologies.
Britain almost couldn't be better placed to profit from this emergent sector. We are one of the windiest countries anywhere in the world. We already have engineering expertise for offshore windfarms from exploiting our dwindling gas and oil reserves. The skill sets of our ailing car manufacturing industry, together with our aerospace industry, are easily transferable to wind turbine manufacturing. Research from the business advisory group the Carbon Trust shows that by 2020, the UK could capture 45% of the global offshore wind energy market, and that by 2050 our wind energy industry alone could be worth £65bn to the UK economy. Our badly hit construction sector is well placed to lead the energy efficiency revolution needed for our aged housing and public building stock. The UK wave and tidal power research and development industry is already a world leader.
We have a serious road map to deliver some of these economic and climate solutions set out by the energy and climate change secretary, Ed Miliband, in July's Low Carbon Transition Plan and Renewable Energy Strategy. The plan, which rhetorically at least has cross-party support, could create up to half a million more jobs in the UK. But, as a legacy of the free-market fundamentalist, non-strategic approach of previous energy ministers, the UK still languishes near the bottom of Europe's renewable energy league table. The sector in the UK has been hit hard by the slump in investment, including problems accessing finance.
What we need now is support for the scale of investment needed to jump start the industry, and confidence that the bumper crop of neo-Thatcherite Tory MPs heading for parliament next spring will let more than a tiny handful of wind turbines through the planning process. Figures from the Department of Energy and Climate Change show Conservative-run councils have been blocking three times as many windfarms as they approve. Unless David Cameron publicly commits to meeting the government's target to generate 15% of energy from renewable sources by 2020 – and sets out a convincing strategy for how this will be achieved – his blue-green agenda will look to the public and investors like nasty party brand decontamination rather than long-term commitment.
Bold Keynesian bailouts by Alistair Darling and Lord Mandelson of other parts of the economy, notably the finance sector and car industries, have saved them from catastrophe. Along with other major bailouts internationally, they have also ended the disastrous era where state intervention was taboo. But, only £405m was allocated in the budget for developing green industries – just £108m of which is for direct funding of renewable energy development. Even the failed RBS bankers reportedly won £775m for bonuses from the chancellor. This is still nowhere near the scale of support needed capitalise on the competitive advantage we could have in clean energy.
The passion of the protesting workers and the obvious synergy of economic and environmental interests has helped to make the campaign against the Vestas plant closure a cause celebre for both the trade union and environmental movements this summer. In other parts of Europe and the US the benefits to ordinary working people are already manifest – new skilled jobs, training, more comfortable insulated homes, measures to alleviate fuel poverty and protection from spikes in fossil fuel bills. These are the kind of benefits that can be achieved here too, but only with the kind of ambition and sustained, political commitment that will attract rapid investment and overcome a knee-jerk rejection of windfarm developments.
The stakes are too high to left to anonymous free market forces driven by fossil fuel and nuclear interests. The economic cost of inaction – laid out in the authoritative Stern Review report – is bleak. Stern estimated the cost to the world economy of unabated climate change would be around 5% to 20% of gross domestic product per year – a figure that would dwarf the cost of the banking crisis. An alliance of red and green politics would transform the landscape of Britain. The moment to do it is now.
Neal Lawson
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 30 August 2009 09.00 BST
It may be a crisis that is too good to waste but we have to move fast to define and win support for a progressive response to the failures of the market. But a new socialism can only be built on the politics of sustainability.
We must remember that it is not just banks that have failed. Two years into the worst economic crisis since the 1930s, with more than 2.4 million already without work, the official closure earlier this month of Britain's only wind turbine blade manufacturing plant, Vestas, is a sharp reminder of the failure of blind reliance on free markets to solve the economic and climate change crises. The plant's closure, with the loss of 400 jobs, was blamed on the slow pace of growth in the UK's wind turbine market and the drawn out local planning process to agree projects.
It has brought home the reality that the changes needed to protect us from catastrophic climate change are exactly the opportunities that can catalyse an upturn in our economy. Clean, fuel-free renewable energy is a huge international growth sector – allowing countries to achieve energy security, protect themselves against volatile fossil fuel prices and stimulate economic development without the consequence of dangerous carbon emissions that are the primary cause of climate change.
Worldwide in 2008, at $155bn (£95bn), more was invested in sustainable than conventional energy production. It is no coincidence that it is the world's most economically dynamic countries – such as Germany and China – that are shaping markets and driving investment to benefit from an almost exponential growth in renewable technologies.
Britain almost couldn't be better placed to profit from this emergent sector. We are one of the windiest countries anywhere in the world. We already have engineering expertise for offshore windfarms from exploiting our dwindling gas and oil reserves. The skill sets of our ailing car manufacturing industry, together with our aerospace industry, are easily transferable to wind turbine manufacturing. Research from the business advisory group the Carbon Trust shows that by 2020, the UK could capture 45% of the global offshore wind energy market, and that by 2050 our wind energy industry alone could be worth £65bn to the UK economy. Our badly hit construction sector is well placed to lead the energy efficiency revolution needed for our aged housing and public building stock. The UK wave and tidal power research and development industry is already a world leader.
We have a serious road map to deliver some of these economic and climate solutions set out by the energy and climate change secretary, Ed Miliband, in July's Low Carbon Transition Plan and Renewable Energy Strategy. The plan, which rhetorically at least has cross-party support, could create up to half a million more jobs in the UK. But, as a legacy of the free-market fundamentalist, non-strategic approach of previous energy ministers, the UK still languishes near the bottom of Europe's renewable energy league table. The sector in the UK has been hit hard by the slump in investment, including problems accessing finance.
What we need now is support for the scale of investment needed to jump start the industry, and confidence that the bumper crop of neo-Thatcherite Tory MPs heading for parliament next spring will let more than a tiny handful of wind turbines through the planning process. Figures from the Department of Energy and Climate Change show Conservative-run councils have been blocking three times as many windfarms as they approve. Unless David Cameron publicly commits to meeting the government's target to generate 15% of energy from renewable sources by 2020 – and sets out a convincing strategy for how this will be achieved – his blue-green agenda will look to the public and investors like nasty party brand decontamination rather than long-term commitment.
Bold Keynesian bailouts by Alistair Darling and Lord Mandelson of other parts of the economy, notably the finance sector and car industries, have saved them from catastrophe. Along with other major bailouts internationally, they have also ended the disastrous era where state intervention was taboo. But, only £405m was allocated in the budget for developing green industries – just £108m of which is for direct funding of renewable energy development. Even the failed RBS bankers reportedly won £775m for bonuses from the chancellor. This is still nowhere near the scale of support needed capitalise on the competitive advantage we could have in clean energy.
The passion of the protesting workers and the obvious synergy of economic and environmental interests has helped to make the campaign against the Vestas plant closure a cause celebre for both the trade union and environmental movements this summer. In other parts of Europe and the US the benefits to ordinary working people are already manifest – new skilled jobs, training, more comfortable insulated homes, measures to alleviate fuel poverty and protection from spikes in fossil fuel bills. These are the kind of benefits that can be achieved here too, but only with the kind of ambition and sustained, political commitment that will attract rapid investment and overcome a knee-jerk rejection of windfarm developments.
The stakes are too high to left to anonymous free market forces driven by fossil fuel and nuclear interests. The economic cost of inaction – laid out in the authoritative Stern Review report – is bleak. Stern estimated the cost to the world economy of unabated climate change would be around 5% to 20% of gross domestic product per year – a figure that would dwarf the cost of the banking crisis. An alliance of red and green politics would transform the landscape of Britain. The moment to do it is now.
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