The US felt the full impact of Super Storm Sandy, but it was a warning for Asia. The combination of coastal development, climate change and storm patterns has reached a point where the UN calculates that the Asia-Pacific region now “experiences more than 85% of global economic exposure to tropical cyclones.” And the world could be in for a devastating increase of about eight degrees Fahrenheit by 2100, say the latest climate report, resulting in drastically higher seas, disappearing coastlines and more severe droughts, floods and other destructive weather. Read More

By Michael Richardson in The Straits Times (5 November 2012):

As Hurricane Sandy, with its devastating winds, rain, and ocean surges battered New York and other areas along the US Atlantic coast last week, another fierce tropical storm was sweeping through the South China Sea, hitting the Philippines, Vietnam and China.

Meanwhile, a cyclone churned across the Bay of Bengal, veering away from Sri Lanka at the last minute before striking southeast India, causing extensive damage.

Although much smaller in strength and size than Hurricane Sandy, Typhoon Son-tinh that smashed into the northern Philippines, Vietnam and southern China killed as many as 30 people, forced more than 176,000 to leave their homes, and caused an estimated US$145 million in economic damage as electricity supplies, floods, and landslides disrupted normal life.

It was a reminder that cyclonic storms, drawing their destructive power from warming tropical waters and the moisture-laden atmosphere, are more of a menace in the Asia-Pacific region than anywhere else in the world.

Known as hurricanes in the Caribbean Sea and near the Atlantic Ocean coast of North America, and cyclones or typhoons in the South China Sea, Bay of Bengal, Indian Ocean and the South Pacific, these periodic storms are posing a major economic and social challenge to the Asia-Pacific region, according to a recent United Nations report.

Presented to a ministerial conference in Indonesia last month (23 October) on disaster risk reduction, the report warned that as regional growth and urbanisation have exploded in the past few decades, the number of people living in cyclone-prone areas has nearly doubled, to about 121 million.

Most new development in the region has been along coastlines and in floodplains, locations highly exposed to sea level rise, storm surges and inundation.

Sea levels are slowly rising from thermal expansion as the water warms and from the melting of land-based ice, particularly at the polar caps.

The combination of coastal development, climate change and storm patterns has reached a point where the UN calculates that the Asia-Pacific region now “experiences more than 85 per cent of global economic exposure to tropical cyclones.”

The Asia-Pacific Disaster Report 2012 was published by the Bangkok-based UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) and the UN’s Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNISDR). It received little attention in the media at the time.

But many climate scientists have warned in the wake of Hurricane Sandy that climate change and global warming caused by increasing global greenhouse gas emissions, mainly from burning fossil fuels and clearing tropical forests, are intensifying extreme weather, including tropical storms.

Kevin Trenberth, Distinguished Senior Scientist at the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research in the US, put it this way:

“The sea surface temperatures along the Atlantic coast (of the US) have been running at over 3 degrees Celsius above normal for a region extending 800 kilometres offshore all the way from Florida to Canada. Global warming contributes 0.6 C to this.

“With every degree C, the water holding of the atmosphere goes up 7 per cent, and the moisture provides the fuel for the tropical storm, increases its intensity, and magnifies the rainfall by double that amount compared to normalconditions.”

Summarising recent scientific research, the UN report said that the effects of climate extremes and variation suggest that while the number of tropical cyclones are not increasing in number, more of them are stronger.

With more than one third of the 305 Asia-Pacific cities in coastal areas, this makes the region more susceptible to ever greater potential losses from severe storms.

“Our shared challenge in Asia and the Pacific is to control both the growing rate of exposure and rising vulnerability,” said Singaporean NoeleenHeyzer, ESCAP’s executive secretary, when the UN report was released.

“Exposure to hazards has multiplied as urban centres grow and people and economic activities expand into increasingly exposed and hazard-prone land,” she added.

Some Asia-Pacific countries that have been hit hard by cyclones in the past have taken steps to better protect their coastal populations and economic assets.

For example, Bangladesh has invested over US$10 billion in coastal management and flood control, resulting in lower disaster losses.

However, many Asia-Pacific coastal cities are expanding chaotically, with many slums and little effective urban planning.

The lesson for the region from Hurricane Sandy must be to improve coastal urban planning, storm protection, and relief and recovery when disaster strikes.

This is expensive and will take time. But with so much economic growth at stake, tropical storm mitigation measures are an essential investment in Asia’s future.

The writer is a visiting senior research fellow at the Institute of South East Asian Studies.

SOURCE: www.iseas.edu.sg

By Brian Vastag in Washington Post (9 November 2012):

Climate scientists agree the Earth will be hotter by the end of the century, but their simulations don’t agree on how much. Now a study suggests the gloomier predictions may be closer to the mark.

“Warming is likely to be on the high side of the projections,” said John Fasullo of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo., a co-author of the report, which was based on satellite measurements of the atmosphere.

That means the world could be in for a devastating increase of about eight degrees Fahrenheit by 2100, resulting in drastically higher seas, disappearing coastlines and more severe droughts, floods and other destructive weather.

Such an increase would substantially overshoot what the world’s leaders have identified as the threshold for triggering catastrophic consequences. In 2009, heads of state agreed to try to limit warming to 3.6 degrees, and many countries want a tighter limit.

Climate scientists around the world use supercomputers to simulate the Earth’s atmosphere and oceans. Sophisticated programs attempt to predict how climate will change as society continues burning coal, oil and gas, the main sources of heat-trapping gases such as carbon dioxide.

But these simulations spit out a wide range of warming estimates. All foresee an overheated planet in 2100, but some predict just three degrees of warming while others estimate eight or more degrees of extra heat.

“This problem has been around for 30 years,” Fasullo said. “As long as climate models have existed, there’s been this spread in projections of the future.”

One source of uncertainty involves the impact of cloud cover, especially clouds that form in the tropical and subtropical regions between about 30 degrees north and south of the equator.

“Tropical clouds are so important to climate,” Fasullo said. “Small changes in clouds near the equator have a big effect on where you end up” for temperature predictions.

As sunlight pours onto the tropics, clouds bounce some of that heat back into space. Fewer clouds open up the atmosphere “like an iris,” Fasullo said, allowing more heat to beam onto Earth’s surface.

No supercomputer is powerful enough to predict cloud cover decades into the future, so Fasullo and colleague Kevin Trenberth struck on another method to test which of the many climate simulations most accurately predicted clouds: They looked at relative humidity. When humidity rises, clouds form; drier air produces fewer clouds. That makes humidity a good proxy for cloud cover.

Looking back at 10 years of atmospheric humidity data from NASA satellites, the pair examined two dozen of the world’s most sophisticated climate simulations. They found the simulations that most closely matched humidity measurements were also the ones that predicted the most extreme global warming.

In other words, by using real data, the scientists picked simulation winners and losers.

“The models at the higher end of temperature predictions uniformly did a better job,” Fasullo said. The simulations that fared worse — the ones predicting smaller temperature rises — “should be outright discounted,” he said.

The most accurate climate simulations were run by the United Kingdom’s Met Office, a consortium in Japan and a facility at the National Center for Atmospheric Research.

“The biggest benefit of this study is really just a reminder to go back” and see how well climate models match reality, said Jimmy Booth, a post-doctoral fellow at the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, who was not involved in the study. Booth works on a climate model called E2, and he said his team can now reexamine how well it simulates humidity in the tropics.

The study is part of a quickening trend to improve climate simulations. Over the past decade, these computer programs have become “tremendously more sophisticated,” said Stephen Lord of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. International groups collaborate on simulations even as available computing power soars.

The first climate models, about 30 years old, simulated only the Earth’s atmosphere. The latest generation add the effects of ocean currents, the dwindling planetary ice cover, and even how plants and animals take up and release carbon.

“As you make those improvements,” Lord said, “the ability to simulate long-term climate gets better.”

Scientists not involved in the research said the report, funded by NASA and scheduled for publication Friday in the journal Science, could improve the predictions made by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in its next comprehensive report, due in 2013. The panel is a world body organized by the United Nations to guide policymakers as they struggle to curb and adapt to climate change. The world has warmed by about 1.4 degrees Fahrenheit since 1880, a rise scientists nearly uniformly attribute to carbon pollution from fossil fuels.

Source: www.washingtonpost.com

As we are confronted, almost on a daily basis, with news of environmental degradation and destruction, and information on ways to rectify and prevent them, isn’t it surprising that real actions by corporate leaders are few and far between. Some of the best examples of corporate sustainability, transformation and change management comes from “a moment of epiphany” – an experience of awakening to the impacts business operations have on the environment. To trigger this experience, business leaders will have to be immersed in the environment of their creation to fully realise the extent of their actions and cultivate a sense of empathy with those afflicted. Read more

An ‘inner journey’ lies behind many business leaders finding their sustainability voice – it’s time to better foster the conditions in which this can happen

By Jo Confino in Guardian Professional (9 November 2012):

It is often a moment of ‘seeing the light’, that drives corporate leaders to change direction.

All the science in all the world will not have the same impact without that one moment of revelation.

There is constant questioning in sustainability circles about why the very clear data on our parasitic impacts on Mother Earth is not leading to a drastic change in our behaviour.

But if you delve into the triggers for transformation among business leaders, it is often an epiphany rather than greater knowledge that leads to the raising of consciousness as well as concrete action.

Part of the reason for this is that the experience is often so deep that it momentarily knocks the ego out of the way; what shines through is a sense of knowing in which ambivalence has no shelter.

In this place, the relentless drive of short-term profits at the expense of the long-term health of the planet and the wellbeing of humanity shows itself to be hollow at best.

This is in no way to deride the importance of science and knowledge, both of which are absolutely critical in building a foundation for change. But intellectual awareness does not necessarily lead to courageous action.

I was speaking the other day to Sir Brian Hoskins, director of the respected Grantham Institute for Climate Change at Imperial College London, who recognises that scientific knowledge in isolation from inspiration is not going to bring the scale of change that is needed in the world.

Hoskins, one of the UK’s most respected climate scientists, said of “that moment of epiphany”: “Often what we do is provide the landscape in which St Paul can have his moment. I don’t believe these come from nowhere; they come from all the information around and then it clicks for someone. We are creating the ether in which people can have that illumination.”

The reason we don’t often hear about these Damascene moments in the business world is because they fall outside of what is considered to be the acceptable lexicon. It’s just not the sort of thing you discuss around the water cooler. They also tend to be highly personal and also difficult to describe in a way that does not demean them.

My own move, more than a decade ago, into the world of business and sustainability – both as a journalist and practitioner – was inspired by a moment of illumination, but I am careful with whom I discuss this.

One of the reasons I have personal respect for Jochen Zeitz, the chairman of Puma, is because he is prepared to talk about how his experience in a Benedictine monastery inspired his campaign for businesses to value nature through the creation of environmental profit and loss accounting.

Of course, epiphanies do not have to have a spiritual overtone and often are triggered by something very ordinary. Paul Polman, chief executive of Unilever, told me recently that his inspiration came from looking into his childrens’ eyes and recognising he would be failing them if he did not do all he could to ensure their future wellbeing.

The importance of inner experience

Someone who has been exploring this territory is Lynda Grattan, professor of management practice at the London Business School and chair of the World Economics Forum on leadership. She has been carrying out in-depth research into 60 companies and almost invariably finds their sustainability programmes have developed as a result of an individual’s inner experience.

“So much of my thinking about corporations is that it’s actually the people themselves that make a real difference,” Grattan tells me. “Almost always there’s somebody who has stood up and sometimes they are at the top of the organisation and sometimes they’re in the middle of the company, but almost always our stories begin with one person saying I absolutely believe in this and I want this to happen.”

So what has she discovered about these individuals? “When I look at those leaders, they are people who I would say have taken both an outer journey and an inner journey. Business schools and corporations are very good at the outer journey. We’re very good at training people in business strategy and how they do accounts and so on – and that, by the way, is really important because if a leader can’t do that then you don’t have a corporation.

“The inner journey is really about how the leader has found their voice, their courage, their authenticity, and what we’ve found is that inner journey seems to be really important for people who have been prepared to stand up. When I’ve talked to leaders who I think are making a difference, they almost always tell me about their own personal journey and very often that journey includes what we might call crucible experiences, things have happened to them that have given them the courage to now stand up and say ‘I’m prepared to do that’.”

Fostering the right conditions

Now, of course, you cannot buy epiphanies off the shelf and they tend to come at the most unexpected of times. But it is possible to create the conditions in which they occur and companies would do well to build these into leadership programmes.

The UK’s Business in the Community has for many years been running a Seeing is Believing programme which takes business leaders to poor areas of the UK to see first-hand the challenges that marginalised groups face.

I have been on several of these and while they are to be commended in principle, these half-day visits more often than not fail to lead to long-term change; the executives are not immersed in the experience for nearly long enough. They also focus on social injustice and do not expose business leaders to the environmental degradation that their companies could be complicit in.

Executives get a very different experience at India’s Hindustan Unilever: “One of the problems with some of the smartest people is that they’re not really grounded at all in the day-to-day issues of living in India, the day-to-day issues of poverty,” says Grattan. “So one of the things that Hindustan Unilever has done for years is take its young highest-potential graduates and put them into rural villages in India – some of which are very, very poor – and leave them there for up to one year.

“When I ask people in their fifties and sixties ‘why are you doing anything about poverty?’, it’s often because they say to me ‘I remember when I was 25 in that village and seeing that the kids didn’t have any shoes and didn’t have any hope’.”

So it seems pretty clear that if business leaders are to have a hope of transforming their companies, they need to come out of their ivory towers and get up close and personal to issues they are normally protected from.

As Grattan points out: “If a high-potential person spends all their time driving around in a limousine, they never really bring the outside in. They never really understand and empathise with what it’s like to be a mother bringing up a bunch of kids in a northern village in India where you are worried about where the next meal is going to come from.

“It’s impossible for us in the west to understand that unless we’ve actually got very close to it. So I think how organisations socialise high-potential people into issues like poverty and sustainability is really important.”

The full filmed interview with Lynda Grattan will appear on Guardian Sustainable Business in the coming weeks as part of a new video series

This content is brought to you by Guardian Professional. Become a GSB member to get more stories like this direct to your inbox

Source: www.guardian.co.uk

Like the proverbial chicken and egg, climate change and sustainability are inextricably linked; it is impossible to decide which comes first, but urgent solutions are needed. Ken Hickson delivers a timely lesson on the four E’s of Sustainability—energy, environment, economics and ethics. Read more

Climate change is generally accepted by over 90 per cent of the world’s scientists as being human induced. Like road accidents or nuclear disasters, it is definitely not an act of God as we still label various “natural” disasters such as earthquakes, tsunamis and floods.

Remarkably, we are seeing scientific evidence today that points the finger at climate change as the trigger for major geological events. Rising sea levels, dramatically reduced arctic ice and melting glaciers—and perhaps even the extraction of oil, gas and minerals out of the earth—can set off a geological chain reaction leading to earthquakes and tsunamis.

If that is stretching our faith in climate scientists – and prompting a storm of protest from the climate deniers and sceptics—let’s just settle for all the other evidence we have that our climate is changing and that the result is an increase in extreme weather events, rising sea levels, higher average temperatures, more out of control bush fires, and the prospect of climate refugees displaced by any of these events.

We have to accept there’s a nexus here. Climate and its consequential impact can no longer to be separated from all the other essential resources we need: Water, food, energy.

Start of Sustainability

So here’s where sustainability comes in.

Man has long exploited the planet’s natural resources, but the exploitation, especially in the burning of fossil fuels, really started in earnest with coal and the Industrial Revolution (between 1750 and 1850 in Europe). But our natural resources are finite. The usage at current levels cannot go on. It is not sustainable, especially when there is a preponderance of evidence linking the effects of our energy consumption with climate change.

Arguably, the first person to really put two and two together was Swedish chemist Svante Arrhenius.  In a paper he presented in 1895, he came up with the theory of the importance to climate of carbon dioxide (CO2) content in the atmosphere, which he labelled “the greenhouse effect.”

First, he determined how much cooling might result from halving the earth’s CO2 content during a long period without volcanic activity. Then he turned the equation around to demonstrate what would happen if industrial emissions grew enough to double the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. He predicted a warming of about 5 degrees Celsius, which at the time he believed might take another 2000 years to happen.

The Nobel Prize winner for chemistry could not possibly have predicted the rate of industrialisation – or the hell-bent extraction and burning of fossil fuels—which has taken climate change and temperature rise to the brink in 200, not 2000, years.

We need to be clear about what sustainability means.

There may be as many definitions of sustainability and sustainable development as there are groups trying to define it,  but all have to do with:

•Living within the limits

•Understanding the interconnections among economy, society, and environment

•Equitable distribution of resources and opportunities

Some quotable quotes on sustainability:

•             “Sustainability is the next transformational business megatrend…” – David Lubin from the Sustainability Network and Daniel Esty from Yale University.

•             “Sustainability is the biggest issue facing business in the 21st century…”  – Bill Ford, chairman of Ford Motor Company.

•             “Fortune 1000 Executives are aware of their own company’s green efforts, but join the general public in ongoing skepticism of corporate America’s commitment to sustainability.” – Gibbs & Soell Sense & Sustainability Survey 2011.

•             “Sustainable development is…meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs…” – The UN-commissioned Brundtland Report in 1987.

•             ”93% of 766 CEOs surveyed believe that sustainability will be ‘important’ or ‘very important’ to the future success of their company…” – Accenture and the UN Global Compact.

There is an argument that sustainability is about at least three critical components—people, profit and planet or the “triple bottom line,” which was coined by the leading proponent of sustainability, John Elkington.  But in my view, sustainability is achieved through four, not three, components. There has to be a balance of four E’s: energy, environmental, ethical and economic factors.

Why Energy?

It is not sustainable for a company or a country to be totally reliant on the burning of fossil fuels to provide the energy it needs.  Burning fossil fuels is damaging the planet through pollution and excess greenhouse gases. We are rapidly depleting the earth’s resources, and there must be a more sustainable alternative.

Switching to cleaner, greener and renewable energy, like wind, solar, geothermal, hydro, tidal, wave and biofuels is a must.

Energy efficiency is also a viable and attractive option. In 2007, Google launched a Renewable Energy Cheaper than Coal (RE<C) initiative as an effort to drive down the cost of renewable energy. Google.org’s Clean Energy 2030 Plan proposes shifting the global economy from one that depends on fossil fuels to one that is based on clean energy.

GE’s Ecomagination  project puts billions into clean energy investments around the world. In October last year, it announced an expansion of its footprint in India to connect with one of the country’s fastest growing clean energy developers. The GE unit will invest US$50 million – its first renewable energy investment in India – to support the development of 500 megawatts of wind projects. It is a small part of GE’s US$6 billion portfolio of renewable energy investments worldwide.

Why Environment?

We need to sustain life on earth. Human life depends on nature. We need biodiversity. Plants absorb CO2. Clean water and productive land for food are reliant on a healthy environment.

According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, nature is the unseen dimension of the nexus of energy, water and food, “With its functions integral to the three securities and their inter-dependence, nature is part of the infrastructure needed to manage the nexus and its resilience. Nature helps mediate the nexus links….without healthy ecosystems in well-functioning watersheds, the infrastructure built for irrigation, hydropower or municipal water supply does not function sustainably, and is unlikely to achieve the economic returns necessary to justify investments.”

There is an obvious nexus between the environment and energy, water and food – just as there is a strong connection between sustainability and climate change.

It is simply not sustainable on any level to continue to use up the earth’s resources – oil, coal, gas – as they are not replaceable or renewable.

Interface, which is the world leader in the design, production and sale of environmentally responsible modular carpet, has issued a call to action for other companies, large and small, to set bold goals in the pursuit of sustainability.  Its “Mission Zero” is a commitment to eliminate negative environmental impact by 2020; the company pledges to obtain third-party validated environmental product declarations on all InterfaceFLOR carpet tiles globally by this year.

Why Economic?

Look at the economies that are out of shape and unsustainable: Greece, Italy, and Spain. There’s a need to have a balanced budget. Money might make the world go around, but when it gets out of hand – through overspending or mismanagement, even greed—things come crashing down.

Sustainable development means meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.

We can no longer pursue profit at all costs. Or growth at all costs. Economic factors—for business, for communities, for countries—must be in balance with the other three.

Launched in 1999, the Dow Jones Sustainability Index  tracks the financial performance of the leading sustainability-driven companies worldwide. Top of the list in different sectors are Adidas, BMW, Coca Cola, Intel, Philips, Samsung (Technology), Siemens, Swiss Re and Westpac, while Singaporean businesses include CDL and Keppel Land.

Why Ethics?

Usually, we connect with ethics under a kindlier term—social or people factors—but ethical behaviour is as essential for business as it is for nations. That means transparency, compliance, corporate governance and corporate social responsibility.

Ethics impacts on labour policies and trade practices. It means running the business in a way that benefits all stakeholders, not just shareholders.

Nike got into big trouble a few years back when it was revealed that their foreign manufacturing plants used child labour to make its running shoes and soccer balls. After initially denying it, Nike had to back-track under pressure from consumer groups and NGOs like Oxfam, who produced evidence from around the world.

Being Clear about Sustainability

The Dow Jones Sustainability Index (DJSI) defines sustainability “a business approach that creates long-term shareholder value by embracing opportunities and managing risks deriving from economic, environmental and social developments”. The definition is observed by many of the companies listed in the index.

According to the DJSI, corporate sustainability leaders achieve long-term shareholder value by gearing their strategies and management towards harnessing the market’s potential for sustainably produced products and services, while at the same time successfully reducing and avoiding sustainability costs and risks.

It makes perfectly good commercial sense too.  Sense and sustainability go together. Of course, there will be plenty who will scoff and suggest sustainability is just another costly exercise dreamt up by “greenies” masquerading as management consultants. But being responsible goes beyond being green. Ethical and environmental, as well as economic factors and energy also figure in the equation.

If companies are smart about the way they produce and distribute their products, they can actually save money – as well as energy, water, waste and other resources – and make more money for themselves and society. A great example of this, WalMart’s supply chain management, is now being taken notice of by many other businesses, including its competitors.

Ken Hickson’s 12 Steps Towards Sustainability in Business:

1.            Commit to the sustainability journey – this must come from top management who must set principles and plans, set targets and appoint teams.

2.            Get good advice – there are good consultants around to advise and assist. The Singapore Compact for Corporate Social Responsibility and the Singapore Business Federation can point you in the right direction.

3.            Get certified – Start with a Green Biz Check or an Eco Office certification. You can aim for an ISO standard, in particular the ISO 14001 for Environment Management or the latest ISO 50001 for Energy Management. Go for gold on the Global Reporting Initiative, the UN Compact or the DJSI.

4.            Engage an energy auditor – call on one of the 17 Energy Services Companies accredited by the National Environment Agency (NEA).

5.            Become energy efficient – look into all the ways you could become more energy efficient as an organisation. Look at your utility bills and install effective meters to measure your energy. Look to introduce enterprise sustainability platform into your business.

6.            Find the bottom line benefits – it won’t take long to discover that becoming sustainable can save and make money for the business. You can get really sophisticated and explore the marginal abatement cost curve developed by McKinsey.

7.            Commit to water and waste management – there’s money to be made by saving water, reducing waste and recycling too. The Public Utilities Board and the NEA can help you.

8.              Set high ethical standards – be transparent, practise good corporate governance, and be    ethical in all your business dealings whether at home or abroad. Take all these areas into   account for ethical behaviour: Cultural, personal, professional, political, religious, racial,  trade, business, legal, financial, environmental and social.

9.            Corporate Social Responsibility – also called Corporate Sustainability & Responsibility by Dr Wayne Visser, CSR helps an organisation bring together all the necessary and good business practices.

10.          Embark on sustainability reporting– Guidelines have been produced by the Singapore Stock Exchange to help listed companies produce reports on sustainability in the same way they would financial reporting.

11.          Communicate effectively with all stakeholders – it is essential to communicate within and outside the organisation to demonstrate that you mean business and to showcase your goals and achievements.

12.          Commit to environment and community projects – becoming a good corporate citizen is part and parcel of your sustainability journey.

Walmart states quite clearly what it stands for: “To be supplied 100 percent by renewable energy; to create zero waste; to sell products that sustain people and the environment.” Not content to do all it can for itself, it also leads the business world by getting its supply chain on board the sustainability process.

That’s real sustainability in action.

Along with sense and sustainability should be success and sustainability. It can work and it does work. We just have to wake up to the issues as well as the opportunities presented by climate change and sustainability.

 Ken Hickson is Chairman and CEO of the Singapore-based consultancy Sustain Ability Showcase Asia which he set up in 2010.He first came to Singapore in 1983 as a consultant to Singapore Airlines and remained here for 17 years. He spent ten years in Australia (end 2000-2010) lecturing in communication studies at the University of the Sunshine Coast, where he was associate professor adjunct. He is the author of the highly-regarded 2009 reference work, “The ABC of Carbon”, about the issues and opportunities related to climate change.  kenhickson@abccarbon.com

For a pdf version of the article go to:

http://www.lcsi.smu.edu.sg/downloads/SocialSpace2012-KenHickson.pdf

Maybe it’s because I have been indulging in Serious Games – or more correctly helping promote games for good – as “gaming” goes beyond gambling and time-wasting pursuits. Maybe it is because the US Presidential election is happening right now and there are very serious issues – and opportunities – at stake. Maybe it is because of Sandy – the storm that literally took America by storm and might even have helped change attitudes to climate change’s impact on us all. Maybe it is just because sometimes we make light of things and it is time to take matters seriously. By the time you read this the US could have a new President or it could return Obama. If the latter – and it is one we openly hope for – maybe it will embolden the man to stand up for what we know he believes in and do more to move America – and the rest of the world – to a low carbon future that we can live with. We have it all in this issue. More important issues. More people who matter. And more thought provoking articles and ideas. Maybe we are on the right track. Seriously! – Ken Hickson

A paradigm shift is needed in the way we define and measure sustainability – this according to Janis Birkeland, one of the 100 Global Sustain Ability Leaders. In a world where sustainability is often seen as an economic conundrum, she presents a radical departure in the way we view our roles in creating an environment conducive to our lives, work, play and economy. Read more

By Tina Perinotto (12 October 2012):

Author and academic Janis Birkeland is quietly spoken, calm and with a soft delivery. It’s your brain that registers the shock, as the meaning of her words starts to rattle your preconceptions.

The message is astoundingly simple, as the best revolutionary ideas tend to be.

Birkeland is gentle at first and confirms something we all instinctively must have known – that the design of the built environment has the power to change the world.

But just in case we might feel a creeping sense of hubris, she soon adds: “Any social problems you have you can trace back to the design of cities and buildings.”

And many other problems besides.

In fact, “the only thing not made worse by the built environment are meteorites and volcanoes,” Birkeland says.

More provocatively, she points out that we should not fool ourselves – economic efficiency belongs in the economic bottom line, not the ecological.

And social sustainability that eventually pays for itself is another economic gain.

According to Birkeland sustainability has been corralled by everything that created the problem in the first place: payback periods, costs, a paradigm focused on negatives, and that the best we can do is to minimise these by concepts such as zero carbon.

“You can’t fix the thing by using the system that broke it in the first place”, Birkeland says.

Speaking to an audience at Customs House in Sydney last Thursday morning, Birkeland, who is professor of Architecture at Queensland University of Technology and professor of sustainable architecture at University of Auckland, had teamed with Caroline Pidcock, interim chair of the Living Futures Institute Australia, presenting on the theme of the positive development at an event organised by Mark Thomson for the Australian Green Development Forum.

In Birkeland’s view the topic is spot on. We need to rethink the sustainability agenda. The paradigm of sustainability is an impediment to sustainability.

Let’s not think of the built environment as a series of negatives we need to minimise, Birkeland says, let’s think of it for its potential to be a “positive contribution to our ecology”. Which, after all, is the thing that sustains our lives, our work, play and economy.

In Birkeland’s view the Brundtland Commission had the best of intentions, but strategically “it put us back into the economic paradigm”.

The problem is that after Brundtland everyone applied traditional tools and metrics to sustainability.

What tends to happen is that we allow things to happen because it’s under the economic efficiency line.

The solution, says Birkeland, is in design, which is too often seen as decoration, but is in fact a decision system.

“Design has caused a lot of our economic problems and it can create a lot of the economic solution.

“Everything traces back to systems design.”

The other answer is to measure the positive impact on the eco system. It’s possible and Birkeland has the model.

We hope to hear more from this radical thinker.

Source: www.thefifthestate.com.au

The recent hurricane Sandy that devastated north-east United States may be an indicator of what is to be expected in the new global climate norm. Coupled with the rising sea levels, coastal areas are facing an unprecedented threat, requiring extensive and expensive flood mitigation systems. Recognition of climate change and policies aimed at its mitigation will have to be at the front and centre of the incoming US administration. Read more

How Cities Plan to Keep the Sea at Bay in an Age of Climate Change

By Christopher F. Schuetze for New York Times (5 November 2012):

Hurricane Sandy was bad. Now imagine a near-future that is markedly worst, where storms are not only more vicious and more frequent, but ocean levels are higher too.

According to a team of experts in New York, coastal waters there are expected to rise some six inches per decade, rising at least two feet by the middle of the century, according to a report by my colleagues David W. Chen and Mireya Navarro.

Andrew C. Revkin extensively discusses on his Dot Earth blog how climate change affects heavy storm systems. He suggests that not only gradually and permanently rising seas are in our future, but more flooding caused by violent storms like Sandy.

On Tuesday, after New York City felt the full brunt of superstorm Sandy, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo announced that the state was considering a system of surge barriers and levee systems, David and Mireya report.

“We are only a few feet above sea level,” said Mr. Cuomo, pointing out that once water breaches the city’s defenses, subway tunnels, building foundations and underground infrastructure like parking garages are immediately faced with flooding — as thousands of New Yorkers who lost power, public transportation, basements and their cars experienced just the last week.

With the immediacy of a systemic, long-term threat far more apparent in the wake of the so-called Frankenstorm, New York officials — who had already discussed the threat posed by rising sea levels before Sandy — are joining a long list of experts and administrators who are seeking to protect their cities from the high waters associated with climate change.

This weekend, my colleague Alan Feuer reported on several flood-control plans for various parts of New York.

The physical barriers to the sea are estimated to cost around $10 billion.

If the city builds them, New York (once known as New Amsterdam) would be following in the footsteps of old Amsterdam, where parts of the city are up to 6.5 meters (21 feet) lower than the North Sea, thanks to an intricate and very expensive system of levees, polders and dams.

Taking the model of physical flood protection one step further, Venice, which for centuries has suffered the effects of Acqua Alta (high water), will inaugurate the Mose system in 2015. Named after the prophet Moses (Mose in Italian) who parted the seas, the €5.5-billion movable floodgate rises from the ocean floor with the help of compressed air when storm waters threaten

In his excellent article, Alan also cites a project for Lower Manhattan by Stephen Cassell and his firm, Architecture Research Office, that would not rely on physical barriers but would flood-proof the area, so that high water would do less damage.

Such a model is currently under discussion in Durban, South Africa, where the money to build expensive infrastructure to keep the sea at bay is much harder to come by than in comparatively wealthy New York.

As part of its plan for protection against increasing flooding, Durban is redrawing city districts and keeping city infrastructure away from areas that are at risk of flooding.

Mr. Cassell and Kate Orff, a landscape designer who has proposed a plan to protect the low-lying Red Hook and Gowanus neighborhoods in Brooklyn, also advocate natural biomass in the fight against rising seas. From marches and artificial islands to oysters, natural and active biomass has great potential to mitigate floods. Both New Orleans and Durban (among many other cities) are betting on nature to act as a natural sponge.

And while global models will be more attentively studied after last week’s disaster, some more ready solutions have been proposed. Home Land Security has developed, in conjunction with West Virginia University, ILC Dover and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, gigantic plugs that can, when filled with 35,000 gallons of water, plug subway tunnels to prevent flooding of the system.

Source: www.rendezvous.blogs.nytimes.com

Post-storm, climate change skeptics denying reality, say lawmakers, activists

By Dylan Stableford in Yahoo! News | The Lookout (31 October 2012):

Climate change doubters looking for proof of global warming can stop looking. That, at least, is what many lawmakers and activists are saying after last week’s deadly storm.

“There has been a series of extreme weather incidents,” New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said on Tuesday after assessing the catastrophic damage left in the superstorm’s wake. “That is not a political statement—that is a factual statement. Anyone who says there’s not a dramatic change in weather patterns, I think, is denying reality.

“There’s no such thing as a 100-year flood,” he continued. “We have a 100-year flood every two years now.”

Speaking on “Current TV,” former Vice President Al Gore said, “The storms are getting … stronger. The stronger storms are getting more frequent.”

Critical of members of Congress continuing to deny climate change, Gore said, “The temptation to create an alternative reality completely divorced from the facts is greater when money dominate politics and they convince themselves.”

Gore’s former boss, Bill Clinton, blasted former Gov. Mitt Romney on Tuesday for the Republican nominee’s criticism of President Barack Obama’s position on climate change at the GOP convention.

“He ridiculed the president for his efforts to fight global warming in economically beneficial ways,” former President Clinton said at an Obama campaign rally in Minnesota. “He said, ‘Oh, you’re going to turn back the seas.’ In my part of America, we would like it if someone could’ve done that yesterday.”

Oliver Stone, the outspoken filmmaker, suggested the deadly storm was “punishment” for both Obama and Romney not addressing climate change during the presidential debates.

Sandy is “kind of a weird statement coming right after” the debates, Stone said in a video interview with the Huffington Post. “This is a punishment—Mother Nature cannot be ignored.”

The Times of India, the world’s largest-circulation English-language daily, wrote that Sandy would serve as a sobering reminder of climate change:

The eastern seaboard of the United States is under attack. Not from Iran, Cuba, North Korea, Venezuela, Libya or any of the usual suspects. The offender assaulting the world’s only superpower is a hurricane, bearing the innocuous name Sandy.

Sandy though is an overgrown progenitor of Mother Nature, who no one messes with; not even a superpower. As if to remind US presidential candidates that it is not a good idea to put global warming—or human aggravated climate change—on the back burner (as both President Obama and his Republican challenger Mitt Romney have done in this election campaign), Mother Nature appears to have let loose Sandy to deliver a kick in the American gut. By Monday noon, the US was on its knees.

The Los Angeles Times noted that Sandy’s “devastating intrusion into the final days of the presidential race would have at least one positive result if it inspired President Obama and Mitt Romney to finally address a huge issue they have ignored throughout the long campaign: climate change”:

After the firestorms that swept the West amid a merciless drought and the killer tornadoes and freak storms that battered the Midwest, South and East Coast, Sandy is just 2012′s latest screaming reminder that our weather is becoming a much more destructive force.

While the rest of the world long ago moved beyond asking if climate change is real to accepting it as a fact, the United States has stalled in a ridiculous debate. Romney leads a party in which a majority believes that climate change is a hoax and the rest—including Romney—avoid talking about the issue, lest they be seen as anti-capitalist, bug-loving granola eaters.

Even in the storm’s wake, climate change is a partisan issue. Just look, for example, at how the liberal Huffington Post and “liberal bias-correcting” Fox News interpreted the same Associated Press story on the scientific connection between global warming and the superstorm:

“It is, at this point, impossible to say what it will take for American politics to catch up to the reality of North American climate change,” Elizabeth Kolbert wrote in the New Yorker. “More super-storms, more heat waves, more multi-billion-dollar ‘weather-related loss events’? The one thing that can be said is that, whether or not our elected officials choose to acknowledge the obvious, we can expect, ‘with a high degree of confidence,’ that all of these are coming.”

Source: www.news.yahoo.com/

With the United States going to the polls today, spotlight has been cast on the track records of the candidates on addressing the threat of climate change, especially in the light of the recent Superstorm Sandy. In this regard, the incumbent President Obama has been tipped by New York Mayor Bloomberg to retain his presidency for the steps taken to reduce carbon emissions, while candidate Romney has backtracked on his earlier positions to mitigate climate change. Read more

Bloomberg endorses Obama for a second term, climate change a focus

Chicago Tribune (1 November 2012):

(Reuters) – New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg on Thursday endorsed President Barack Obama for a second term, citing the importance of his record on climate change, particularly in the aftermath of the devastating blow dealt to the New York area by storm Sandy.

Bloomberg said Obama has taken significant steps to reduce carbon consumption, whereas Republican challenger Mitt Romney has backtracked on earlier positions he had taken as governor of Massachusetts to battle climate change.

“Our climate is changing,” Bloomberg wrote in an opinion article for Bloomberg View, a section of Bloomberg News.

“And while the increase in extreme weather we have experienced in New York City and around the world may or may not be the result of it, the risk that it might be – given this week’s devastation – should compel all elected leaders to take immediate action.”

Obama is locked in a neck-and-neck battle with Romney, and the endorsement came just five days before Tuesday’s election.

The nod from Bloomberg, a Republican turned independent, comes after Obama won praise from New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, a Republican, for his quick reaction to the storm.

“I’m honored to have Mayor Bloomberg’s endorsement,” Obama said in a statement. “I deeply respect him for his leadership in business, philanthropy and government, and appreciate the extraordinary job he’s doing right now, leading New York City through these difficult days.”

Bloomberg, who has flirted with runs for the White House in the past, did not endorse a candidate in 2008.

While a welcome boost to the Obama campaign, Bloomberg’s was hardly ringing endorsement.

Bloomberg said in his endorsement that although Obama campaigned in 2008 as a postpartisan candidate, he “devoted little time and effort to developing and sustaining a coalition of centrists, which doomed hope for any real progress on illegal guns, immigration, tax reform, job creation and deficit reduction.”

“And rather than uniting the country around a message of shared sacrifice, he engaged in partisan attacks and has embraced a divisive populist agenda focused more on redistributing income than creating it,” Bloomberg said of the president.

Still, the mayor concluded, on a number of issues dear to him, Obama stands closer to him than Romney. The mayor chastised him for changing some of his positions, specifically on climate change, between his time as governor of Massachusetts and his 2012 presidential run.

Bloomberg said of Romney, “In the past he has taken sensible positions on immigration, illegal guns, abortion rights and health care – but he has reversed course on all of them, and is even running against the very health care model he signed into law in Massachusetts.”

“If the 1994 or 2003 version of Mitt Romney were running for president, I may well have voted for him because, like so many other independents, I have found the past four years to be, in a word, disappointing,” Bloomberg said.

Source: www.articles.chicagotribune.com

Reports from PricewaterhouseCoopers show that climate change is expected to have detrimental effects on supply chains, assets and infrastructures, and the ability of companies to plan for potential weather disasters is a competitive advantage. This is especially so in a world experiencing a six degrees rise in temperature, according to another finding. Companies should plan for the long term with a more pessimistic view in order to stay afloat. Read more

Environmental leader (5 November 2012):

PwC: Supply Chains Threatened by Six-Degree Global Warming

Some 85 percent of companies have more complex supply chains as a result of globalization, and adjusted climate forecasts mean businesses should expect climate change to have an even more destructive effect than previously assumed on supply chains, assets and infrastructure, according to two reports from PricewaterhouseCoopers.

The first PwC report, 10 Minutes – Risk ready: New approaches to environmental and social change, says many companies now view preparation for climate change as not only an indicator of resilience, but also as a competitive advantage.

The report, published as the northeast begins recovering from Hurricane Sandy, says the ability to anticipate — and plan for — potential weather disasters is vital. Companies should embed sustainability practices into their business models to mitigate the risks associated with these major weather events.

One way to build resilience is to increase buffers — the margins that provide short-term space needed to absorb shock after a disaster. PwC uses PG&E as an example of how to put these buffers in place.

Because California’s temperatures rise between May and October, which means higher electricity demand, the utility implemented a voluntary program for small commercial and residential customers who agree to shift their power use in exchange for discounts. PwC reports there are 25,000 PG&E customers participating, resulting in a 16 percent reduction on high-load days.

Natural disasters are costly, PwC says, and only 33 percent of $380 billion lost in 2011 to natural disasters was covered by insurance. Natural resources like water and energy continue to be strained, and working closely with suppliers can help pinpoint issues.

PwC’s warnings are playing out in real time, with companies from Amazon to railroad firm CSX telling customers to expect delays on shipments as Hurricane Sandy continues to back up supply chains and slow deliveries leading into the holiday season. Some economists say Sandy’s total impact on the US economy could total up to $45 billion in damage and lost production, with the losses from closed businesses and drops in consumption possibly outweighing the cost of physical damage.

Looking ahead, companies need to address the early environmental warning signs and identify areas of risk, the report says.

Meanwhile, a separate PwC report says the world is heading for a six-degree rise in temperature by the end of the century. The PwC’s Low Carbon Economy Index 2012 says that governments’ ambitions to limit warming to 2 degrees Celsius appear highly unrealistic. Companies can no longer assume the 2 degree increase as a default scenario, and investments in long-term assets and infrastructure, particularly in coastal and low-lying areas, need to address a more pessimistic outlook.

Sectors dependent on food, water, energy or ecosystem services need to scrutinize the resilience and viability of their supply chains, while carbon-intensive sectors need to plan for more invasive regulation and the possibility of stranded assets, PwC says.

Drought, poor quality, flooding and other water-related challenges negatively affected 53 percent of the world’s largest listed companies in the past five years, up from 38 percent last year, yet there’s been no increase in the number of corporations providing water-related risk assessments to investors, according to an October report by the Carbon Disclosure Project.

In September, CDP’s 2012 Global 500 Climate Change report found 81 percent of reporting companies have identified physical risks from climate change, compared to 71 percent in 2011, with 37 percent perceiving these risks as a “real and present danger,” up from 30 percent in 2011 and 10 percent in 2010.

Source:  www.environmentalleader.com

The University of Coventry in the UK is taking the lead in building resilience in the face of global change. A focus on food security is aimed at managing this critical issue in a changing world. Other initiatives include sustainable transport and construction, by reaching out to local communities and businesses with technologies and know-hows to build a low carbon economy. Serious Games come into play, too. Read more

Serious business from the University of Coventry

By Ken Hickson

To be “sent to Coventry” was an English saying which supposedly originated in the 1600s. It meant:  “To be ignored or ostracised. This behaviour often takes the form of pretending that the shunned person, although conspicuously present, can’t be seen or heard.”

But these days, being sent to Coventry – particularly the University – could be a very good thing to happen to you. This place is becoming a global centre for research and development into the business of sustainability, low carbon/low impact living, cleaner transport and cites, and food security.

We came to get to know the University of Coventry through the business of Serious Games. It is a global leader in research and development in the creative and technical application of games for good. It set up the Serious Games Institute 7 years ago and now is taking on the world with Serious Games International (SGI) – in Europe, In the US and in Asia.

But when we heard Professor John Latham, the University’s Pro Vice Chancellor speak in Singapore at the first anniversary of SGI presence in Asia, we came to realise there’s more to this university city of Coventry than legends.

Coventry has inspired many things – from the motor industry and the jet engine to Lady Godiva. The city’s slogan, ‘Coventry Inspires’ – a play on the city’s famous three spires, was chosen by the people of Coventry to reflect the enthusiasm that they feel about their city’s past, present and future.

John told me that it the University is seriously investing in research and development into global issues of sustainability, climate change, clean tech and clean energy. It is not consumed with the past, but very much focussing on the future – of cities, transport, buildings – towards a low impact and low carbon tomorrow.

So we take a glimpse, through recent University reports of some of the things consuming the University.  First food!

Food security

A new Master’s degree has been launched by Coventry University to tackle the globally critical issues of food security and contribute to the development of food systems that will help countries feed their growing populations.

The MSc in Food Security Management, which begins in September, will equip students with a comprehensive insight into sustainable food production and management, agricultural systems, climate change and the environment, and law and governance. The course is being run by experts in the University’s Centre for Agroecology and Food Security, including the world-leading researchers behind the University’s Grand Challenge Initiative programme in Sustainable Agriculture and Food Security.

“It is generally accepted that we need to develop more sustainable agricultural systems that protect the natural resource base, reduce adverse effects of agriculture on the environment, and are conducive to the maintenance of biodiversity,” explained MSc in Food Security Management course leader Dr James Bennett.

Food for Thought

Encouraging people to grow more of their own food is not only beneficial to the environment but leads to improved health and wellbeing and creates stronger local communities, according to new Coventry University research released today.

In a study of the Master Gardeners programme run by the UK’s leading organic growing charity, Garden Organic, researchers in the University’s Centre for Agroecology and Food Security (CAFS) and Centre for Sustainable Regeneration (SURGE) found that those involved enjoyed an increased sense of community and improved life satisfaction, as well as having a significant impact on their food growing and consumption habits.

Through this new mentoring programme, Garden Organic recruited, trained and supported more than 400 volunteers in five areas – North London, South London, Lincolnshire, Norfolk and Warwickshire – to become Master Gardeners.

These volunteers, aged 16-81, then worked with their local community to encourage more people to grow food. As part of their commitment volunteers then recruit 10 households to mentor in horticulture for a year.

Low Carbon Transport

The annual celebration of Coventry’s automotive heritage will take place this bank holiday weekend at the city’s Festival of Motoring, and – for the first time – will feature a unique insight into the transport innovations of tomorrow.

Organised by Coventry University in partnership with the Coventry Transport Museum, the Future of Transport Expo will run throughout the whole weekend as part of the festival, and will give companies from the area an unprecedented opportunity to shout about what they do and illustrate the vibrancy of the region’s transport sector – particularly low carbon initiatives.

The expo will showcase the considerable range of transport innovations that are being developed and produced across the region today. Exhibitors over the weekend will include Jaguar Land Rover, Liberty Electric Cars, Mercedes, Nissan, Peugeot and Vauxhall – each of whom are expected to have a ‘green’ vehicle on display.

Local firm Travel de Courcey will also be showing off one of its new electric buses, which began running on service routes along Kenilworth Road and in the south of Coventry earlier this year.

Coventry University itself is set to exhibit a selection of low carbon vehicles at the expo, with highlights including:

• the H2EV hydrogen fuel cell vehicle created by University spin-out Microcab;

• a 100mph battery-powered go-kart created by a team of undergraduates to contest the prestigious Electric Vehicle Grand Prix at Indianapolis;

• student team Phoenix Racing’s single-seater racing car, built for this year’s Formula Student contest to defend the University’s ‘Most Fuel Efficient Car’ award from 2011;

• the University’s entry into the Shell Eco-marathon – a ‘soap-box’ style racer designed to go as far as possible on a litre of fuel.

Sustainable Construction

Coventry University greeted suppliers and clients from the sustainable construction sector last month as they met to discuss how small and medium sized enterprises in the West Midlands could be put on the map for supply to the industry.

The University is leading on the Sustainable Building Futures (SBF) project, which engages with eligible SMEs in the region for knowledge transfer, collaborative development and implementation of innovative environmental technology for use in sustainable construction.

Funded by Coventry University and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), the project provides fully funded support to West Midlands SMEs in the form of specialist advice and the development, testing and demonstration of new sustainable building technologies. It also offers access to state-of-the-art equipment in the University’s new Engineering and Computing building.

The ‘Get Ready to Supply’ event provided a platform for both suppliers’ and buyers’ views to be heard, and included one-to-one advice sessions with industry experts from Orbit, the Sustainable Housing Action Partnership (SHAP) and Coventry University’s Low Impact Buildings Centre.

Andrew Tonks, programme director for the SBF project, said:

“The event provided a fantastic opportunity for us to engage with local industry and to listen to their needs. We are now planning on how we can develop the support services that the SBF project offers so we can help local industry compete in these challenging yet exciting times.”

Source: www.coventry.ac.uk

With 70% of the world’s surface covered by oceans and seas, it would make sense to utilise this expanse – something taken to mind by technology firm DNV with its newly unveiled floating solar array SUNdy.  Renewable energy solutions such as this are crucial in limiting global temperature rise to the targeted 2 degrees, according to a panel discussion at the recent Singapore International Energy Week. Read more

Editor: Here are two enlightened articles. There are many more innovations and energetic ideas and studies to come out of the recent Singapore International Energy Week (SIEW). More to come in future issues.

The sea’s the limit for solar

By Jenny Marusiak in Eco Business.com (5 November 2012):

Land-scarce coastal cities such as Singapore may soon be looking to the sea for their solar energy supply.

Global technology consulting and certification firm DNV unveiled a new floating solar array concept at the recent Singapore International Energy Week (SIEW) with an invitation to companies to develop the idea.

Called SUNdy, the concept consists of floating islands – each containing 4,200 solar panels that together generate 2 megawatts (MW) of power – connected into a network capable of providing at least 50 MW of electricity for about 30,000 people.

The solar islands, which are about the size of a football stadium, would come with flexible solar panels that are prewired to minimize installation. DNV designers used a spider web design to create a flexible but strong platform that could withstand ocean movement and send electricity to shore through underwater cables.

Off-shore solar is not appropriate for every location – it is best in calm waters of between 20 to 100 metres within five miles of the shore – but it would be good for many densely populated Southeast Asian cities near the coast, said DNV KEMA’s global director of renewable energy services Kevin Smith at the unveiling.

DNV KEMA is a DNV subsidiary covering energy and sustainability-related industries.

SUNdy would also be useful as a disaster relief tool because it could be installed quickly, added Mr Smith.

He noted that DNV chose thin film solar technology – as opposed to the more widely used rigid crystalline solar panels – for the project for its flexibility and because of expected cost reductions.

Thin film solar is cheaper to produce than crystalline solar, but is still less efficient despite recent improvements.

The entire project installed at current prices would cost about US$4.40 per watt, but could go down to $2.50 to $3 per watt based on solar industry predictions, said Mr Smith.

Managing director of DNV’s Clean Technology Centre in Singapore, Dr Sanjay Kuttan, told Eco-Business on the sidelines of the event that they were assembling a business coalition to develop the concept.

The firm already has expressions of interest from solar farm developers and infrastructure companies, although DNV could not yet divulge names, he added.

By keeping the technology openly sourced – meaning no intellectual property (IP) rights are associated with it – DNV hopes to avoid “wasting time on lawyers” and create a prototype in as little as 12 to 18 months, said Dr Kuttan. He explained that participating companies would sign an agreement, under which investors could own the IP at a later stage if they chose.

The idea of floating solar arrays is not new.

Singapore’s Economic Development Board announced last year that it would build an S$11 million 2MW system on one of its fresh water reservoirs. And other inland projects have been installed in reservoirs and industrial holding ponds in places like the United States and France.

For marine applications, last year United Kingdom-based inventor Phil Pauley launched his idea for a floating hybrid solar-wave technology – called Marine Solar Cells – that captures energy from both ocean movement and the sun.

However, coming up with the concept for off-shore solar innovations is only the first step, said DNV’s Dr Kuttan.

Source: www.eco-business.com

By Melissa Low and Yuen Kah Hung, Energy Analysts, Energy Studies Institute (23 October 2012):

Energy efficiency can be the “game changer” to mitigate climate change and reduce carbon emissions, agreed expert panellists discussing the social and environmental impact of climate change at the Singapore Energy Summit on Monday.

Nicholas Fang, Director of the Singapore Institute of International Affairs (SIIA), moderated the session, titled “Keeping the Door to 2°C Open”. He highlighted the urgency of the issue by pointing out the need for a new climate agreement as the Kyoto Protocol expires this year.

Toshihiko Fujii, Deputy Director General of the Global Energy Policy Agency for Natural Resources and Energy, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), Japan, highlighted Japan’s experience in the context of energy solutions to climate change. His view was that energy conservation and renewable energy are the keys to keeping the door to 2°C open – but that this required setting specific targets for conservation and adopting renewables.

In this context, Dr Fujii cited Japan’s post-Fukushima energy plan, explaining that Japan has set targets to triple power generation from renewable sources for its 2010 levels to 300 billion kWh by 2030. Of this, hydro power will account for 110 billion kWh. He said renewable energy capacity, excluding hydro power, is set to rise to 108,000MW by 2030, from 9,000MW in 2010.

“There needs to be continued improvement of existing feed-in-tariffs for renewable energy, but there also must be regulatory reform to introduce new energy technologies”, said Dr Fujii.  He explained that as renewable energy resources such as geothermal can be found within protected natural areas, regulatory changes are required for these resources to be tapped. This means that discussion among stakeholders is vital.

Dr Nawal Al Hosany, Director of Sustainability, Masdar, highlighted the need to find new sources of energy and said it was significant to see Middle East looking at unconventional sources of energy and renewables. She reasoned that there is a clear need to invest in a clean energy future so as to keep the door to 2°C open. She said the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has targeted 7 percent of electricity to be generated from renewable sources by 2020. Dubai has set a 5 percent target within the same time frame.

Yoshiyuki Miyabe, Managing Director and Member of the Board, Panasonic Corporation, emphasised that energy initiatives are needed throughout the residential, commercial and industrial sectors. Energy efficient appliances could be adopted to address the increasing trend of energy consumption in residential and commercial sectors.

Amidst the many proposals and rationales put forward for “keeping the door open”, there were expressions of concern about whether this was still achievable. Hon. Eileen Claussen, President of the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions, was of the view that “while governments have adapted to the 2°C trajectory, I am a realist. Chances are slim, but that doesn’t mean we should stop”.

A sensible way forward, she added, would be to change the ways in which we generate and use energy. Renewables, natural gas, coal with carbon capture and storage (CCS) are the means to move towards a low carbon society, she said, also emphasing the need to improve energy efficiency.

Jose Maria Figueres, President of the Carbon War Room and Former President of Costa Rica, was concerned that the door to 2°C has already closed. He asserts that 2°C is “no more a possibility under our present way of conducting our sales”. Citing the population in Bangladesh that will be displaced by floods and rising sea levels, Figueres said future climate change dialogue would also need to be anchored on values. For example, should countries accept climate refugees?

A major step in the fight against climate change requires partnership among governments, private sector and people, said Claussen. She observed that companies are leading the fight instead of governments. Collaboration between companies and individuals could kick-start governmental action, she suggested.

Taking a leaf from the banning of CFCs through the Montreal Protocol, Figueres was hopeful that stakeholders can take concerted action to fight climate change. He pointed out that shale gas is not a climate change panacea and additional measures are necessary.

Dr Al Hosany reasoned that widespread adoption of renewable energy will be dependent on economic conditions in each country. In spite of the challenges, she predicted a general shift to renewable energy. We are issuing an invitation to the industry to get this idea to reality,” he added.

Source: www.siew.sg