A Spectacular Failure of Leadership
So wretched is Labor’s new climate change policy, it makes the CPRS, and its dog of an emissions trading scheme, look like a model of best practice. Bernard Keane says Julia Gillard’s “citizens’ assembly” has effectively outsourced responsibility for climate policy to “ordinary Australians”, on whose “skills, capacity, decency and plain common sense” the Government will rely to tell her about the community consensus on climate change.
Canberra correspondent for Crikey.com Bernard Keane writes
It’s hard to describe just how truly wretched Labor’s new climate change policy is. It makes the CPRS, and its dog of an emissions trading scheme, look like a model of best practice. It is a spectacular failure of leadership.
Julia Gillard’s “citizens’ assembly” has effectively outsourced responsibility for climate policy to “ordinary Australians”, on whose “skills, capacity, decency and plain common sense” Gillard will rely to tell her about the community consensus on climate change. In effect it institutionalises what is already apparent — this is a Government controlled by focus group reactions.
Labor has been playing politics with climate change for three years and it hasn’t stopped. But whereas for most of that time it used climate change to damage the Coalition, now it is having to defend itself against the issue. It will only be with the political cover afforded by this nonsensical Assembly that the Government will take any action on a carbon price.
Rarely has so much goodwill and political capital been wasted on such an important issue.
The consensus the Government insists it needs the protection of before acting already exists. It’s not just in the opinion polls, which show time and time again that the majority of voters want action on climate change and supported the Government’s CPRS. In 2007, let’s not forget, both sides of politics told Australians they were going to introduce an ETS. The 2007 election endorsed a community consensus on the need for action.
Instead, in 2010, neither party will commit to any sort of carbon price mechanism for at least three years. Instead, they’re offering excuses as to why they don’t want to take action. We’ve done anything but move forward on climate action.
Gillard’s interim actions are little better. The new emissions standard she proposes won’t even apply to four coal-fired power stations being built or brought back on line currently. They may not apply to two more, the massive Mt Piper and Bayswater projects in NSW, which will together add 4% to national CO2-equivalent emissions when they come on line. Holding the baseline for the CPRS at 2008 levels won’t give electricity generators any more investment certainty when it remains unclear whether there will ever be an emissions trading scheme in Australia. Nor does it change the simple fact that State Governments continue to drive Australia into a coal-fired future.
Labor’s craven pandering to key outer-suburban electorates in its population and asylum seeker policies was bad enough. But abdicating executive responsibility for action on climate change is a new low in cynical politics, beyond the depths even reached by NSW Labor. Politicians are elected to lead. Deferring every controversial issue back to the electorate is a clumsy variant of leadership by polling and focus groups.
So blatant is Labor’s refusal to lead that it raises serious questions about its fitness for government. The only problem is that the alternative is an economically-illiterate party whose leader doesn’t believe in climate change at all, but who insists on wasting $3b on the most expensive possible means of addressing it.
What a choice, two major parties incapable of leadership and unfit to govern.
Source: www.Crikey.com.au

Labor’s Lost Love: Lamenting a State of Limbo
The lack of policy signals to encourage major investments in lower emissions plants and technologies has again been lamented, this time by Elaine Prior, the climate change and carbon specialist at Citigroup. “Regulatory limbo appears the only certainty” is the title of her analysis of the policy proposals of the two mainstream political parties and the Greens in the current election campaign. Giles Parkinson reports in Climate Spectator.
Giles Parkinson in Climate Spectator (28 July 2010)
Lamenting ETS limbo
The lack of policy signals to encourage major investments in lower emissions plants and technologies has again been lamented, this time by Elaine Prior, the climate change and carbon specialist at Citigroup. “Regulatory limbo appears the only certainty” is the title of her analysis of the policy proposals of the two mainstream political parties and the Greens in the current election campaign. “The only certainty post the August election is uncertainty about a carbon price,” she writes.
Prior is dismissive of the Labor policy that allows for early action. “We doubt that major investments in lower emissions plants and technologies will occur without confidence in a long term carbon price signal. The policy leaves industry in limbo,” says Prior. “It seems risky to build high emissions plant given the likelihood of future carbon costs, but it may be risky to over-invest in low emissions technologies. Prior says the Coalition policy is heavily contingent on substantial reductions via soil carbon at $8-10/tonne, a concept she thinks is unlikely to be achieved. “The proposal does not allow the potential for emissions reductions to be sourced at “lowest cost” via a carbon market, including via access to international markets.”
America’s other windy city
Construction began this week on what is currently expected to be the world’s largest wind energy project, the Alta Wind Energy Centre in central California. The brainchild of the now collapsed Australian finance group Allco, the 1,550MW complex will have a similar capacity to many large-scale coal and gas fired generators, and comprise nearly 600 turbines on completion in 2016, although it may ultimately have a capacity of 3000MW. The Alta project was bought by Terra-Gen, a company backed by New York energy investment group Arclight Capital after the collapse of Allco in 2008. Last week, it secured a $US1.2 billion financing deal that included a leaseback arrangement with Citibank, the first such deal of its type in the wind industry, and one that could unlock further financing initiatives for the US wind industry.
King of the hill
In New Zealand, the state-owned utility Genesis Energy has announced plans for a 600MW wind energy farm near Castle Hill on the north Island. The announcement is part of an anticipated rapid build-up of wind capacity, at least partly driven by the introduction of its emissions trading scheme on July 1. Castle Hill, which had an original capacity target of 400MW, is one of three large-scale wind energy farms planned for New Zealand, each of which is bigger than the country’s entire installed capacity to date. Meridian Energy is proposing a 630MW project in central Otago and Contact Energy’s is planning a 540MW wind farm on the coast north of Raglan.
Fair-weather worries
The unpredictable nature of renewable energy supplies was underlined by the UK-based Scottish and Southern Energy, which this week revealed that output from its renewable energy projects – consisting largely of wind, biomass and hyrdro-electric – had fallen 30 per cent over the last three months compared with the same period a year earlier. SSE said in an interim statement that output had been cut to 700GWh in the three months since April 1, 2010 from 1,000MWh. Unusually, mild weather was to blame. The company is currently building more than 500MW of onshore wind capacity and more than 850MW of offshore wind facilities.
Down on coal
Ratings agency Standard & Poor’s has cut the credit rating of the Loy Yang B brown coal power station to BBB minus – just one notch above junk bond – and given it a negative outlook. The downgrade was based on S&P’s concerns about rising refinancing costs – it needs to renegotiate some $1.1 billion by 2012 – and uncertainty about legislation on greenhouse emissions. Loy Yan B is majority owned by the IK-based International Power, which also owns the Hazelwood brown coal power station, currently the target of the Victorian state government as part of its plans to cut 4 million tonnes of emissions a year from its stationary energy sector.
More hot rocks
Hot Rock Ltd has announced that its geothermal resource in Victoria’s Otway Basin has increased by 170 per cent following the addition of two new hot sedimentary aquifer reservoirs near the town of Casterton, in the south-west of the state. Hot Rock says this takes its total Inferred and Indicated geothermal resources to 180,000 petajoules from around 66,000PJ. The company says 6,700PJ would be enough to provide energy for up to 50,000 households. The company expects to start drilling its first production appraisal well early next year.
– Giles Parkinson
Source: www.climatespectator.com.au

Hotter Than Ever But is it Caused by Climate Change?
The first six months of 2010 brought a string of warmest-ever global temperatures, but connecting these dots to long-term climate change patterns remains frustratingly difficult, experts say. Not only was last month the hottest June ever recorded, it was the fourth consecutive month in which the standing high mark was topped, according to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
AFP reports in Sydney Morning Herald July 20, 2010
The first six months of 2010 brought a string of warmest-ever global temperatures, but connecting these dots to long-term climate change patterns remains frustratingly difficult, experts say.
Not only was last month the hottest June ever recorded, it was the fourth consecutive month in which the standing high mark was topped, according to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
Indeed, 2010 has already surpassed 1998 for the most record-breaking months in a calendar year.
As a block, the January-to-June period registered the warmest combined global land and ocean surface temperatures since 1880, when reliable temperature readings began, NOAA said.
Arctic ice cover – another critical yardstick of global warming – had also retreated more than ever before by July 1, putting it on track to shrink beyond its smallest area to date, in 2007.
On the face of it, these numbers would seem to be alarming confirmation of climate models that put earth on a path towards potentially catastrophic impacts.
Without steep cuts in greenhouse gas emissions, the global thermometer could rise by 6 degrees compared with pre-industrial levels, making large swathes of the planet unlivable, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has warned.
Voluntary national pledges made after the Copenhagen climate summit in December would most likely cap that increase at 3.5 to 4 degrees, still far short of the 2 degree limit that most scientists agree is the threshold for dangerous warming.
But making a direct link between year-on-year variations in the weather and changes in climate – best measured in centuries – is simply not possible, scientists say.
“When we are looking at the scale of a season or a few months, we can’t talk about trends related to climate change,” Herve le Treut, head of France’s Laboratory of Dynamical Meteorology, said.
“The problem is knowing whether these numbers fit into a long-term evolution, and that only becomes apparent over at least two or three decades.”
For scientists, he said, it would be like trying to figure out which way the tide is moving by watching only a few waves lapping at the shoreline.
A hotter-than-average 2010 is due at least in part to the influence of periodic El Ninos, which disrupt weather patterns in the equatorial Pacific, le Treut and other experts point out.
“We now know that the year following an El Nino will be globally unusually warm,” said Andrew Watson, a professor at the University of East Anglia in Britain.
“1998 was such a year. It’s clear that 2010 will be very close to 1998 and quite possibly it will beat it,” he said.
At the same time the long-term trend of warming is unmistakable, and at least one figure from last month can be said to add to the mounting evidence that climate change is firmly upon us.
June was the 304th consecutive month with a global surface temperature above the 20th-century average, the NOAA reported.
The most recent month to dip below that average was February 1985, more than a quarter century ago.
“Taken in isolation these figures say nothing about climate change,” said Barry Gromett, spokesman for Britain’s national weather and climate centre, the Met Office.
“But if taken in the context of 2000-2010 being the warmest decade on record, and this set be another near record or record warm year, then this is further evidence that the climate is warming,” he said.
The Met Office uses different methods than the NOAA to calculate climate trends, and has not yet calculated data for June, he explained.
The 10 warmest average annual global temperatures recorded since the end of the 19th century have occurred in the past 15 years.
Source: www.smh.com.au

Do Nothing When The Heat is on Washington
Washington has just endured its hottest June since records began in 1872. Yet US senators and their aides seemed to be on the verge of deciding to do approximately nothing, says David Leonhardt. The most efficient way to begin attacking the global swelter is no mystery. It involves raising the price of carbon emissions, which are warming the planet, and then letting the private sector find innovative ways to use less dirty energy.
By David Leonhardt in the International Herald Tribune( 22 July 2010):

Washington – This city just endured its hottest June since records began in 1872, according to the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. So did Miami. Atlanta suffered its second-hottest June, and Dallas had its third hottest.
In New York, the weather was relatively pleasant: only the fourth-hottest June since 1872. Then again, New York is on pace for its hottest July on record.
Yet U.S. senators and their aides seemed to be on the verge of deciding to do approximately nothing about global warming before they were set to convene for a vote Wednesday on climate legislation. The needed 60 votes did not seem to be there, at least before the main event.
Harry Reid, the Senate majority leader, and President Barack Obama had to find a way to cobble together the votes, as they did on health care and financial regulation, by somehow persuading moderate Republicans to support a market-based limit on power plant emissions or getting Democrats to support a less ambitious set of rules.
Either way, most Senate watchers, inside and out, thought the odds of passing a major climate bill were not great. And if this White House and this Congress, controlled by Democrats, could not pass one, you had to wonder what the future of climate policy looked like.
All the while, the risks and costs of climate change grow. Sea levels are rising faster than scientists predicted just a few years ago. Himalayan glaciers are melting. In the American West, pine beetles (which struggle to survive the cold) are multiplying and killing trees.
According to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, 2010 is on course to be the planet’s hottest year since records started in 1880. The current top 10, in descending order, are: 2005, 2007, 2009, 1998, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2004, 2001 and 2008.
The most efficient way to begin attacking the global swelter is no mystery. It involves raising the price of carbon emissions, which are warming the planet, and then letting the private sector find innovative ways to use less dirty energy. Conservative economists, like N. Gregory Mankiw of Harvard University in Massachusetts, support this approach. So do liberals, like Joseph E. Stiglitz of Columbia University in New York. But taxing carbon has never had much of a political chance. It is too honest. It acknowledges that the best way to reduce the use of a product is to increase its price. We all prefer a free lunch.
So Congress has been laboring to disguise a price increase in a more palatable package.
In June 2009, the House passed a cap-and-trade bill. It set a national cap on carbon emissions and required companies to have permits for such emissions. To keep emitting as much as they had been, companies would have to buy permits from more efficient companies.
Republican leaders, though, were only too happy to cast cap and trade as ”cap and tax.” In the process, they helped scare away senators who had long supported this very idea, like Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina. The sad paradox is that cap and trade – which trusts in the efficiency of markets – was originally a Republican policy, signed by President George H.W. Bush to reduce acid rain, and disliked at the time by many liberals.
With a comprehensive cap off the table, Senate leaders began talking about a narrower version that would apply only to power plants, not to emissions from vehicles or factories. This utility-only cap has two advantages.
One, it goes after the emissions that energy experts think will be among the cheapest to reduce. Two, it involves another layer of political disguise. The cap would apply to unlovable utilities, not to American families and businesses.
Of course, the cap would ultimately raise utility rates. That is the point. As long as dirty energy remains inexpensive, people are going to use huge amounts of it.
But some policy makers have not been willing to acknowledge this. They continue to look for a solution without downsides. For them, a tempting option is a series of new rules requiring people to use cleaner energy. In a few cases, such rules really are a free lunch, in that they require people to take steps – like home insulation – that save money. But most rules increase costs. They push people away from the energy sources they are now using.
The classic example is the U.S. fuel economy rules from the 1970s that required car companies to make fewer gas guzzlers.
The newly imposed scarcity of guzzlers, in turn, increased their price. But the relationship was not obvious. Americans do not think of fuel economy rules as a tax on large vehicles.
This explains why the rule-based approach seems to be the best bet for winning Republican votes. Senator Richard Lugar, Republican of Indiana, has proposed new rules not only for vehicles but also for appliances, building codes and power plants.
If these regulations were tough enough, they could make a difference, as the fuel economy rules have. So some Democrats and environmentalists see this approach as their best remaining chance.
On the other hand, such rules would require government regulators to make all kinds of decisions – about which dishwashers qualified as efficient, about which alternative energies power plants had to use and the like. Businesses and consumers could not look simply for the cheapest solution, as they could if Congress put a price on carbon. They would have to comply with specific provisions.
The result would almost certainly be higher, albeit better disguised, costs than with a carbon cap or tax. Even many advocates admit that new rules would not do enough, on their own, to reduce emissions and slow warming. Only a cap or a tax can accomplish that at a reasonable cost.
Thus the opposition among other Democrats and environmentalists to accepting the Lugar approach as a compromise.
Whether anything is done will be decided in the next few weeks, before the Senate breaks for its August recess, or in September, before the midterm election campaign takes over. Meanwhile, the temperature in Washington this week is supposed to hit 99 degrees Fahrenheit (37 Celsius).
www.elp.com

China is Leading By Example with Carbon Trading Plan
China is set to begin domestic carbon trading programs during its 12th Five-Year Plan period (2011-2015) to help it meet its 2020 carbon intensity target. In addition, the country’s top 1,000 energy consumers have signed contracts with the central government to improve their energy efficiency.
By Li Jing in China Daily (22 July 2010):
BEIJING – The country is set to begin domestic carbon trading programs during its 12th Five-Year Plan period (2011-2015) to help it meet its 2020 carbon intensity target.
The decision was made at a closed-door meeting chaired by Xie Zhenhua, deputy director of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), and attended by officials from related ministries, enterprises, environmental exchanges and think tanks, a participant told China Daily on Wednesday on condition of anonymity.
“The consensus that a domestic carbon-trading scheme is essential was reached, but a debate is still ongoing among experts and industries regarding what approach should be adopted,” the source said.
The meeting concluded that such efforts are self-imposed and should be strictly separated from ongoing international negotiations for a successor to the Kyoto Protocol to fight global warming, the source said.
As a developing country, China does not shoulder legally binding responsibilities to reduce carbon emissions, according to the basic principle set by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.
Putting a price on carbon is a crucial step for the country to employ the market to reduce its carbon emissions and genuinely shift to a low-carbon economy, industry analysts said.
China has mostly relied on administrative tools to realize its 20 percent energy intensity reduction target between 2006 to 2010. To that effect, the country’s top 1,000 energy consumers have signed contracts with the central government to improve their energy efficiency.
But with rising domestic energy demand, administrative measures are too expensive for the country to meet its future energy conservation targets – something that was also agreed at the meeting, said Tang Renhu from the low-carbon center at China Datang Corporation who also joined the discussion.
Although China has refuted the International Energy Agency’s label of being the world’s top energy consumer, its energy consumption for 2009 stood at 2.132 billion tons of oil equivalent, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.
“The market-based carbon-trading schemes will be a cost-effective supplement to administrative means,” said Yu Jie, an independent policy observer who previously worked for several international climate-related institutes.
Tang also said the differences are centered on whether the pilot carbon trade projects should start from a selected industry, or a certain area.
Possible sectors for piloting carbon trade projects include carbon-intensive industries such as coal-fired power generation, Tang said.
One of the proposals include setting an absolute cap on carbon dioxide emissions in a certain area or industry. Others argue that the country’s carbon intensity target can be converted to some carbon-related allowances for trading schemes.
China has pledged to cut its carbon emissions per unit of economic growth by 40 to 45 percent by 2020 from 2005 levels.
Yu said it would be very complicated to work out a trading scheme that allocates the carbon-related emission permits among the enterprises in an open and fair manner.
“My suggestion is that the number of participating enterprises should be limited, as the goal of pilot trading is to try out the rules and establish a mechanism especially suitable for China,” Yu said.
China has been testing the waters with voluntary carbon trade, aimed at developing the necessary financial systems and policy tools.
The country’s first voluntary carbon trade was sealed last August, with a Shanghai-based auto insurance company buying more than 8,000 tons of carbon credits generated through a green commuting campaign during the Beijing Olympics. The trade was carried out through the China Beijing Environment Exchange.
Sun Cuihua, an official from the NDRC’s climate change department, earlier said the government is also working out rules to guide voluntary carbon trade projects in China.
Source: www.chinadaily.com.cn

For the first time in history, a vehicle completely dependent on the sun for power will travel for over 13,000 km without a human in the driver’s seat. During the course of the 3-month drive, each VIAC vehicle will be equipped with specially-designed Smartphones that monitor CO2 levels, providing a live stream of environmental data throughout the journey, as well as identify quickly how pollution levels vary across continents.
Solar-Powered Robot Car Will Trek From Italy to China
For the first time in history, a vehicle completely dependent on the sun for power will travel for over 13,000 km without a human in the driver’s seat.
To showcase the benefit of green transportation, unmanned vans will drive through nine different countries as part of The VisLab Intercontinental Autonomous Challenge (VIAC), an epic 13,000km journey from Parma, Italy to Shanghai, China.
Not only are the vehicles are controlled by robots, but they run on electrical power and the whole electronic pilot is powered by solar energy, making this trip unique in history: goods packed in Italy will be brought to Shanghai on an intercontinental route with no human intervention and without using traditional fuel for the first time in history (VIAC).
Learning As You Go
During the course of the 3-month drive, each VIAC vehicle will be equipped with specially-designed Smartphones that monitor CO2 levels, providing a live stream of environmental data to the web via Twitter, @greenhaviour, throughout the journey.
“Visualising the data will enable us to identify quickly how pollution levels vary across continents. We will use IBM analytical tools to discover trends such as a correlation between certain illnesses and the quality of the air,” said Ed Jellard, consultant from IBM Hursley Development Lab.
Robot On-Board
If successful, the challenge will have accomplished two important goals: 1) it helps support the argument that electric vehicles can have all the power and stamina of the current gas or diesel powered options, and, 2) autonomous pilot can be installed without altering engine performance and without any requirement on additional power, being self-sustained.
With no need for human drivers, who can fall asleep at the wheel, or drive while under the influence, one might wonder if robotic transportation systems are safer as well as more efficient.
Source: www.care2.com
News from VisLab, Italy
The vehicles
Two electric vehicles will perform a 13,000 km trip mainly powered by solar energy, with no driver; two backup vehicles will be part of the trip as well. As a support, 4 Overland trucks will follow the expedition to provide a mechanic shop, storage, and accommodation; finally two additional trucks will be used for media coverage and will be equipped for live satellite broadcasting.
The first vehicle will drive autonomously in selected sections of the trip and will conduct experimental tests on sensing, decision, and control subsystems, and will continuously collect data. Although limited, human interventions will be needed to define the route and intervene in critical situations.
The second vehicle will automatically follow the route defined by the preceding vehicle, requiring no human intervention (100% autonomous). This will be regarded as a readily exploitable vehicle, able to move on predefined routes; at the end of the trip, its technology will be transferred to a set of vehicles to move in the inner part of Rome in the close future.
In case the first vehicle is in line of sight, the second will follow using primarily vision; in case the first vehicle is not visible (cut off by another vehc,e behind a curve, far ahead), the the second vehicle will use GPS info broadcasted by the first vehicle to determine a rough indication of the route. In any case, local sensing will be the primary means of avoiding obstacles, locating the road and the path (when driving off-road), locating other traffic, and -in general- understand the environment.
During the trip, demonstrations will be performed in specific hot spots; autonomous vehicles will follow given routes, negotiating traffic, avoiding obstacles, and stopping when required. The first demonstration was held in Rome at the EUR district on October 29, 2009, when Rome’s Major, Gianni Alemanno, officially presented this challenge.
If you want to witness the greatest challenge so far in the field of mobility, see how the vehicles move autonomously, interact with the engineers that will be following the vehicles, discuss about the great potential of this technology, please refer to this web page and stay tuned at vislab.it: a specific website (www.IntercontinentalChallenge.eu) is now online with news, feeds, video streaming from the vehicles while driving to Shanghai!
Source: www.vislab.it

Singapore in Space Race For Zero Emissions
Aerospace firm European Aeronautic Defence and Space (EADS) is considering a space-plane demonstration in Singapore, its executive adviser said on the eve of the National Sustainability Conference 29/30 July. The aerospace giant is developing its space plane as a precursor to a zero-emissions aircraft that can travel faster than sound and use hydrogen fuel.
Singapore may be site for ‘green’ space-plane demo
Grace Chua Straits Times 27 Jul 10;

Aerospace firm European Aeronautic Defence and Space (EADS) is considering a space-plane demonstration in Singapore, its executive adviser said at a climate change conference this week.

The aerospace giant is developing its space plane as a precursor to a zero-emissions aircraft that can travel faster than sound, explained Mr Marvyn Lim.

The company announced at the Berlin Air Show last month that it would be starting a three-year study on the hypersonic plane. It is touted to use zero-emissions hydrogen fuel and can travel much faster than normal planes and at a much higher altitude.

He was speaking at a conference on European Union and Asian policy responses to climate change and energy security. The two-day conference, which continues today, is organised by the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, the Energy Studies Institute (ESI), and the EU Centre in Singapore.

The conference comes five months ahead of the United Nations’ climate change meeting in Cancun, Mexico, at the end of this year, which aims to hammer out international agreements to cope with climate change.

Mr Lim, a Singaporean, explained why the country was a good pick for a space-plane demonstration: ‘I believe that Singapore has the entrepreneurship and technology culture to appreciate such an animal.’

The aerospace company is also working with Singapore institutions such as the Agency for Science, Technology and Research’s Institute of Chemical and Engineering Sciences on projects such as algal biofuels. Other biofuels such as palm oil, however, came under scrutiny at the conference, which featured presentations from academics and industry players across Asia.

Dr Hooman Peimani, ESI’s head of energy security and geopolitics, cautioned that biofuel production could hasten environmental destruction if not done sustainably. ‘The way we produce biofuels today is highly pollutive, resource- and water-intensive, and takes fertiliser,’ he said, citing palm oil in Indonesia and Malaysia as an example of biofuel production contributing to deforestation.

In Indonesia, for instance, 3.8 million ha of land were used for oil palm between 1996 and last year. That included palm oil for food, fuel and other use.

Biofuels and a diverse range of energy sources, however, are necessary for energy security and to ensure that developing countries have enough energy to grow, Dr Peimani and other speakers said.

Meanwhile, Mr Tan Yong Soon, permanent secretary of the National Climate Change Secretariat, said Singapore would work to secure a global agreement on climate change, and stick to its plans to increase energy efficiency and reduce emissions.

‘I believe we can, and must, succeed in balancing our fight against climate change and in ensuring a high standard of living with good jobs for all,’ he said. ‘Singapore has always taken a balanced approach to growth and sustainability and we have been reaping the fruits of our on-going efforts as a reference site for other countries and cities.’
Source: www.wildsingaporenews.blogspot.com
The National Sustainabilty Conference is on at the Amara Hotel, Singapore 29/30 July. For more information go to www.nationalsustainabilityconference.com

Hot Where it Matters, Cool When its Needed
Colin Maidment at London South Bank University is leading a research effort to investigate more environmentally friendly air-conditioning and refrigeration systems. One option, ironically, is to use carbon dioxide to replace the synthetic HFC refrigerants used in such systems and using the heat generated by CO2-based air-conditioning systems and fridges in supermarkets, for example, to provide hot water for nearby homes.
By Helen Knight in New Scientist (27 July 2010):
Green machine is our weekly column on the latest advances in environmental technologies
Will people’s environmental intentions wither in a heatwave? With much of the US, eastern Europe and Asia sweltering, it may be tempting to crank up the air conditioning to make homes and offices more tolerable.
That would be bad news for the planet, with aircon playing a significant role in the greenhouse-gas emissions produced by residential and commercial property – roughly 10 per cent of the world’s total emissions, says Graeme Maidment at London South Bank University.
“With global warming that will tend to increase even further, because people will use more air conditioning, while existing systems will have to work harder,” he says.
Rebirth of the cool
Maidment is leading a research effort, funded by the UK’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, to investigate more environmentally friendly air-conditioning and refrigeration systems. One option, ironically, is to use carbon dioxide to replace the synthetic HFC refrigerants used in such systems, he says: such gases can have around 4000 times the global warming potential of CO2. Around 2 per cent of the UK’s greenhouse gas emissions are attributed to them, says Maidment.
In conventional vapour-compression systems used by aircon units, the refrigerant is compressed and condensed and then expanded and evaporated to cool the room. The heat generated in the compression phase is normally radiated into the air outside the building.
Compressing CO2 generates much higher temperatures than HFCs – around 150 °C compared with around 60 °C. So Maidment and colleagues are investigating the idea of using the heat generated by CO2-based air-conditioning systems and fridges in supermarkets, for example, to provide hot water for nearby homes.
Cool sounds
Meanwhile, Matt Poese and colleagues at Pennsylvania State University in University Park are developing an HFC-free air conditioning system based on sound.
The team uses a linear motor to move a loudspeaker-type plate back and forwards, generating a sound wave in helium gas – which doesn’t add to the greenhouse effect. The sound waves create areas of compression and expansion within the gas, causing it to alternately heat up and cool down, says Poese. “It’s like a sponge – the gas sucks up heat in one location and then gets transported by the sound wave to another location where the heat gets squeezed out of the gas,” he says.
The team have previously built a fridge for ice-cream maker Ben & Jerry’s based on this so-called thermoacoustic technology. They say they can scale it up for use in air conditioning, and aim to build 3.5-kilowatt devices – equivalent to a basic home model – which could be dotted around buildings. Having several units could reduce the energy used by air-conditioning systems by only cooling those rooms currently in use, says Poese.
Water work
Others are also looking at refrigerants that don’t warm the atmosphere. One of these is a mixture of ammonia and water. Srinivas Garimella at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta is developing a system in which external heat is used to boil off ammonia vapour from a solution. The ammonia circulates through a condenser and then an evaporator, where it provides the cooling, before being reabsorbed by the water.
Known as absorption refrigeration, the technology was invented before today’s vapour compression systems, but it is bulky, requiring multiple heat exchangers, and so has mostly been used to cool only large buildings such as hospitals and universities.
Garimella has got around this problem by developing micro-scale heat exchangers, in which the solution flows through channels only 0.5 millimetres in diameter, taking advantage of the high heat-transfer efficiencies at this scale. His team have so far developed a book-sized prototype that generates the equivalent cooling to a 300 watts system, and plan to increase the cooling power of the device further with funding from the US Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy.
Since the process is driven by heat rather than electricity, it could reduce greenhouse-gas emissions even further by using energy-efficient sources of heat. Air conditioning could be combined with solar power – which has one obvious advantage, says Maidment. “When the sun shines, you need air conditioning.”
Source: www.newscientist.com

Sugar to Sweeten Up the Bitter Energy Supply Pill
Victoria’s “exceedingly ambitious” white paper recognises that owners of power stations must be compensated if they are forced to close early, but it’s no substitute for a trading scheme and is silent on a range of crucial issues, according to Energy Supply Association of Australia CEO Brad Page. Meanwhile, Queensland University of Technology scientist Dr Slade Lee says sugar cane production methods could hold the key to making ethanol cheaper.
CE Daily (28 July 2010)
Victoria’s “exceedingly ambitious” white paper recognises that owners of power stations must be compensated if they are forced to close early, but it’s no substitute for a trading scheme and is silent on a range of crucial issues, according to Energy Supply Association of Australia CEO Brad Page.

The paper offers no details on how much abatement each element will deliver and at what carbon price, he told CE Daily.

Reducing emissions to 20% below 2000 levels by 2020 (a 40% cut in per capita terms) “means an enormous change in our energy supply mix in Victoria,” he said.

“When 66-odd% of the electricity is still going to come from brown coal I do wonder if just the other 34% coming from gas and renewables can actually get you to the target that is being asked,” he said.

“And I can’t answer that question because I can’t see all of the contributions from all of the policies.”
State action will ‘complicate’ national efforts
Instead of individual states introducing their own policies, “national answers are the way to go, with a properly constructed national emissions trading scheme”, Page said.

“It really is not a substitute for a national carbon management plan … to have individual states starting to try to fill the void,” he said.

“Because it would be our view that in the life of the next [Federal] Parliament there will be a much clearer plan, and a plan implemented, and that getting out there too fast as a state actually complicates matters very dramatically for both investors and for policymakers alike.”

Page said individual state measures would be of limited effectiveness, given the interconnected electricity market operating in eastern and southern states.

The actions of one state alone “don’t actually change the investment climate and for that matter, because we are in a competitive, interconnected market, don’t necessarily deliver the outcomes that that state government might think it is going to get”.
Recognition for power station owners
However, there is at least one aspect of the white paper that Page views very positively – the plan to obtain four million tonnes of lowest-cost abatement from the State’s brown coal-fired sector.

“We actually would applaud the initiative on the basis that, for probably the first time since the CPRS debate commenced, we have a sovereign government in Australia that openly recognises that you cannot arbitrarily close plants early either through taxation measures, or some other intervention, without properly recompensing the owners for the lost value,” he said.

The white paper suggests a tendering process to secure the abatement, but Premier John Brumby specified it would involve a “staged closure of Hazelwood [power station]“, involving two of its generating units closing by 2014, when launching the paper on Monday.
Brumby said that, instead of the strategy increasing household energy bills, energy efficiency improvements are likely to result in cuts to energy bills for “many households”.

The feed-in tariff to support large-scale solar power plants is likely to cost the average household between $5 and $15 a year, he added.
Source: www.cedaily.com.au

By Jessica Mawer ABC Online (27 July 2010):
Scientists say they may have found a cheaper way to produce ethanol.
Dr Slade Lee from the Queensland University of Technology has met farmers and industry leaders in far north Queensland to discuss the region’s biofuel prospects.
Dr Lee says cane could hold the key to making ethanol production cheaper.
He says the enzymes needed to make ethanol are currently being manufactured in large, expensive processing plants but there may be a cheaper way.
“We’ve struck on a novel approach to the problem and that is to get the plants, the sugarcane plants themselves, to produce the cellulose, our idea is to actually get the plants themselves to produce those enzymes,” he said.
Source: www.abc.net.au

Lucky Last
A Green School Made out of Bamboo in Bali

When one goes to Bali, you normally expect it to be for sun, sea and surf. But for someone as interested in arts and the environment as I am, there are much more fascinating diversions. So with the help of The Green Asia Group and its dedicated Bali organiser Carolyn Kenwrick, Ken Hickson uncovered the Green School, described as “one of the most amazing schools on earth” giving its students a relevant holistic and green education. Not only that, but the School buildings are made entirely of bamboo. Green School founder John Hardy says this:
“School chose bamboo in the spirit of plenty. With rapidly escalating world cement prices, not to mention the sheer amount of fossil fuel that cement consumes, we must look to alternative building materials. Frankly, it is hard to talk to students about sustainability while they are using the last piece of rainforest for their chair and their table.”
Green School is also becoming the home of the Bali Starling Project, helping to save one of the world’s most endangered bird species. More on that from Carolyn in a future issue.
For more on the Green School, read on.

I’ve been in Bali for a few days, by courtesy of The Green Asia Group, en route to Singapore for the National Sustainabilty Conference (29/30 July) at the Amara Hotel. And back in Brisbane in time for the Climate Change @ Work Conference at Southbank 4 August. See you in Singapore or Brisbane.

What’s the Green School in Bali all about:
Delivering a generation of global citizens who are knowledgeable about and inspired to take responsibility for the sustainability of the world
Green School Bali, one of the most amazing schools on earth, is giving its students a relevant holistic and green education.
The students come from all corners of the world, many relocating with their parents just for the experience of attending. Amongst them, fully 20% are local Balinese kids funded by scholarships from generous donors, allowing them to benefit from an international education and facilitating the magic of Balinese culture to fully permeate the education. The curriculum for younger children is influenced by the work of Rudolf Steiner, who pioneered the idea of holistic education. Older students have the opportunity to study for Cambridge IGCSE’s and a planned IB diploma/certificate course will take them to graduation. Green Studies, which focus on sustainability, and a quality Creative Arts program complement the academic curriculum.
The campus is remarkable. Green School is striving to have the lowest carbon footprint of any international school anywhere, through use of bamboo and rammed earth for its buildings, growing its own food in its gardens, and plans to generate its own power from the river. The central building, “Heart of School”, is one of the largest bamboo structures in the world and has an architectural beauty usually witnessed only in cathedrals and opera houses.
Recent studies revealed that the most important component in student education is the quality of teachers. With this in mind Green School has on staff 21 teachers, including a certified Steiner teacher and a PHD. Seven hold Masters Degrees, one an MBA, four have postgraduate teaching qualifications and 17 Bachelor Degrees. All 21 are qualified educators who are also engineers, psychologists, environmentalists, scientists, film, arts and media people, who choose Green School because they are passionate about equipping children with the skills needed to face the challenges of the future.
Green School invites families from Bali and all other corners of the world to consider giving their children the gift of a Green School education. Young people are welcome for just a term or their entire education.
Why Green School: Why Bamboo?
This section from the website, why bamboo, was contributed by John Hardy, one of the schools co-founders.
Why is Green School where it is?
Green School is located in Sibang Kaja, a village that has been largely passed over by Bali’s tourist development. In developing a “green” school, we wanted the ability to work directly from and with the land – tourist-fuelled development would stand in the way of this relationship. Moreover, the relative scarcity of tourists allows for a fresh conversation between our school community and the local villagers, enabling a more conscious interaction. We are also lucky to have great support from the village leader, A.A. Watusila. Finally, the site is more or less equidistant between Ubud, Sanur, Denpasar, Canggu and Seminyak, all major Balinese urban centres.
Why is everything made out of bamboo?
Green School chose bamboo in the spirit of plenty. With rapidly escalating world cement prices, not to mention the sheer amount of fossil fuel that cement consumes, we must look to alternative building materials. Frankly, it is hard to talk to students about sustainability while they are using the last piece of rainforest for their chair and their table. It is the painful truth that they are going to have to stretch to get enough rain forest timber to build their homes.
Bamboo is available and plenty, and when it is treated with borax salt, it is rendered immune to the bugs that like to eat it, so it becomes a permanent material. Every student at Green School will have an opportunity to plant his or her own bamboo and, eventually, four to five years down the line, will have a chance to harvest, treat and build something with that bamboo.
If you need a lot of timber in the future, don’t look for wood, look for bamboo. It fixes a huge amount of carbon in the soil and this is a good solution in the world of ever escalating problems. It is a rapid solution to some of the problems that are facing us. Plant bamboo.
Why not build out of concrete?
Cement/concrete uses about 1/3 of the world’s oil, between digging it out of the ground, heating it, moving it, and destroying it when it’s no longer appropriate. This uses a huge amount of the world’s fossil fuel and creates huge amounts of carbon for the world.
Green School does use some cement, but the cement is primarily underground. A small percentage of the classroom floors is made from cement, but in general we want Green School to be really green – which means less cement. Representing cement as modern or high class or the future is really not very green. Cement has a very limited place and we need to keep it in its place.
Why are the fences made out of sticks?
The fences are an old Balinese system called “tiang hidup” which means living post. The Balinese discovered long, long ago that if they post a stick, the termites will eat it – unless the post is living, in which case it’s immune from termites. Moreover, the leaves that grow on the post are brought to the cows and goats, providing food with much-needed nutrients for these animals. The post also fixes nitrogen in the soil, which helps the garden flourish.
Why are the blackboards made from bamboo?
Our blackboards are made from bamboo slats, sanded down beautifully, coated in black propane and set in a bamboo frame. This stands in contrast to the “standard” classroom blackboard, generally made from large pieces of slate framed in rainforest plywood – not a very “green” material. Moreover, to acquire those kinds of pieces of slate would require transport across huge distances, forcing a large ecological footprint. When we looked at having a “green” school, we needed to have a “green” blackboard, so we committed ourselves to using local materials – including, of course, bamboo, the life source of the School. One little circle on each blackboard is left unpainted, reminding everyone who uses the board that this is a board unlike others: a truly “green” blackboard.
Why are the paths made of stones?
The walking paths at Green School are made from sandstone blocks carved out of the local river valley and gravel developed from encrusted stone. The advantage of such paths is twofold: first, these natural elements have much less impact on the planet than cement or asphalt road. And second, it lets Green School operate on a principle of adaptability: as people decide to walk when they feel most comfortable, we can easily move rocks and put them where people walk. Thus, the garden can easily become a path and the path can easily become a garden.
How long does a bamboo classroom last?
The classrooms are made from bamboo because it is a sustainable material – as long as it is sheltered from the elements, bamboo lasts forever. The classrooms will last as long as the grass roof is maintained.
My classroom does not have any walls, what’s going to happen when it rains?
The classrooms don’t have walls because it is important in a tropical place like Bali to catch every breeze that comes through – the breeze, combined with fans, is our air conditioning system. Our classrooms are designed to be like ships sailing across the earth, equipped with a “rig” and sails to keep the rain out and the wind in. This creates a further connection between students and the earth.
Is it dangerous having coconut trees on the campus?
When building Green School, we wanted to preserve the local terrain as much as possible – including the coconut trees. If you look closely at the coconuts hanging from Green School trees, you will see that they are in netted bags. This means that the tree can experience its natural cycle of producing coconuts – valuable in the world as a source of both coconut oil and nutrients – while the people below are protected from any mishaps from falling coconut or branches. This is a solution that preserves the environment, maintains safety in the classroom, and also helps in the kitchen.
The bathroom is made out of earth, isn’t that dirty?
Mud was chosen for the walls of the bathroom because it is a local and easily workable material. Although it does create a little dust, its impact on the world is very, very small. Tile, concrete and bricks all take a huge amount of energy to produce.
Source: www.greenschool.org