Here to Stay – 100 Not Out!

We’ve had a good innings – personally and professionally – and, to maintain the cricketing analogy, we’re not about to pull up the stumps, either. This issue, our 100th since we started in March 2008, continues to cover the issues and the people who matter. We invited a few of our important readers around the globe to expressly write something and we were overwhelmed with contributions. So much so that more will appear next week. This issue we have a profile on Graeme Woods and his remarkable contribution to the new Global Change Institute and an article by Nobel Prize winner Peter Doherty. Two Amercian communicators – Bob Henson and Anna Clark – give us some wise words of wisdom, while Tony Frost from South Africa and Flemming Bermann from the UK give us their views on matters large and small. Jeff Harding wings in from Italy with Ceramic Fuel Cells in tow, while Fiona Wain has mega clean vision to share. Jan Birkeland espouses ecologically positive development, as Joan and Richard Cassels call for better change management. Greg Bourne urges us to go beyond Earth Hour and enterprising Neil Christie tells us how Envirofriendly is cleaning up the world. There’s some important links to CSIRO announcements and ABC’s Environment portal for a Sara Phillips story. And the first will be last, as I take to the podium and the page to sound off about the Queensland’s first Sustainability Showcase for Minister Kate Jones. More runs on the board and more scores to keep!

Ken Hickson

Profile : Graeme Wood

The man who founded and managed the very successful online accommodation website Wotif.com is in the news for his latest contribution – a $15 million grant to kick start the Global Change Institute. at The new think tank’s focus will be a multidisciplinary approach to interconnected issues such as environment, population shifts, energy innovation, and water and food security. With a keen interest in sustainability, Graeme Wood is also the founder of Wild Mob, a not-for-profit organisation providing volunteers with the opportunity to assist with environmental conservation projects in remote and iconic locations across Australia.

Reported by QBR (11 March 2010):

Queensland businessman Graeme Wood is donating $15 million to a new University of Queensland (UQ) institute which will tackle problems linked to global-scale change.

Governor of Queensland Penelope Wensley last night announced the donation by Wood, a founder of Wotif.com, when she launched the Global Change Institute (GCI) in Brisbane last night.

Wood immediately called on other successful Australians to join him in supporting the GCI, which will pit leading researchers against the most complex global problems.

“If we want to make a genuine impact on global issues concerning the environment and the effects of rapid population growth, the investment has to be substantial,” he says.

“Every gift counts but in order to make a difference, substantial support is necessary.”

According to Wood, universities are the logical places to find solutions to the world’s problems and therefore places in which businesses should invest on behalf of future generations.

“I call upon the business community, government and individuals to assist the University in bringing together the best national and international thinkers and practices towards solving these complex and pressing global issues,” he says.

“Our generation can and must make a mark in history by espousing altruism and responsible business practices to leave the world a better place for our children and grandchildren.”

The impressive contribution will seed a $40 million building at UQ’s St Lucia Campus which will employ sustainable design, construction and operating practices, including Australia’s largest solar photo-voltaic grid electricity generator.

This will reduce the St Lucia Campus’s peak electricity consumption by 6 percent and carbon emissions by 1.14 kt CO2e per annum.

The GCI’s focus will not be limited to first-order environmental problems, but include a multidisciplinary approach to interconnected issues such as population shifts, energy innovation, and water and food security.

Rockhampton-born Wood co-founded the online accommodation booking company, Wotif.com in 2000.

With a keen interest in sustainability, he is also the founder of Wild Mob, a not-for-profit organisation providing volunteers with the opportunity to assist with environmental conservation work in projects in remote and iconic locations across Australia.

Source: www.qbr.com.au

Wild Mob is a not-for-profit, non-political organisation launched in 2008 and is a registered Deductable Gift Recipient.
Founder and Chief Executive, Graeme Wood, is an Executive Director of the online accommodation website Wotif.com, which he co-founded in 2000. He supports philanthropic projects in the arts, education and the environment, and was announced the Suncorp Queenslander of the Year in June 2008.
Source: www.wildmob.org

The Courier-Mail 11 March 2010

GOVERNOR Penelope Wensley last night delivered the first speech in the University of Queensland’s
Centenary Oration Series. This is an edited extract.

ADVOCACY and awareness-raising may sound straightforward but, in my experience, having been involved with these matters throughout my working life as an Australian diplomat, it is a demanding task.
The aim is to seek to influence public perceptions and opinions, shape the decisions of decision-makers and, ultimately, to affect public debate and policy formulation. I am impressed and greatly pleased by the University of Queensland’s Global Change Institute’s high ambitions in this area.
We speak and hear constantly about the complexity of global change, about the urgency of addressing it, about the need to galvanise public opinion. We are committing resources, rightly, to research, building collaborative networks among experts within and between countries but where are the communicators?
Where are the articulate advocates, the persons capable of explaining complexity, the voices of clarity and integrity that can be heard and trusted – capable of cutting through the noise and confusion of debate and competing claims, the distortions, the scaremongering, the misinformation and the disinformation?
It is enormously important that we continue to invest in scientific investigation, that we work to position and secure the place and reputation of Australian institutions, including our own University of Queensland, at the cutting edge of scientific and academic inquiry.
But we must take that further step of moving knowledge into the public domain.
This university’s medical research institutions have led the way by building links between researchers and clinicians, connecting laboratory to patients and doctors, taking information from “benchtop to bedside” and getting not only better results but breakthroughs.
In the same way, we need to focus more deliberately on improving communication capacity and capability and building credibility in this vital domain of information if the practical and attitudinal change that is needed in our communities to address global change is to be achieved.
This would bring about that shift from ideas to action and generation of political will to drive decision-makers.
In this area, I hope this institute will break new ground.
I have referred earlier to the “science wars”. I know that this term has a very particular meaning for some and that there is a very vigorous debate going on within the international scientific community around this issue. Leaving that very specific battlefield aside, my concern is a broader one, highly relevant to our Australian situation, to this new Global Change Institute and its future.
Since becoming Governor, I have championed at every possible opportunity the role and importance of science and scientific research.
I have promoted the excellence of Australian science and, in particular, of what is happening on the Queensland scene.
I have spoken often of how vital an input it is to good policy formulation and our capacity to defend and protect our national interests internationally, to sustain our prosperity and contribute to the resolution of global problems.
I have drawn attention to dropping levels of investment in some areas, notably agricultural research, where R & D spending as a portion of the gross value of agricultural production has dropped substantially in recent years.
I am reminded how critical science is for the development of those innovative, technological solutions we are seeking in so many areas of activity.
For a country that has benefited so greatly from scientific research this might seem unnecessary, but I believe it is a cause that we must continue to champion, not least because there is an observable assault on the credibility of science under way at this time – focused on the science of climate change, but with implications, potentially, for all areas of research.
There are studies available that show this is causing not just confusion and uncertainty in the public mind, but a degree of disengagement from science by some younger people.
There are also studies that suggest that the level of public education on science generally is “shallow”. This is another reason why I welcome so warmly the creation of this Global Change Institute at this time.
With the wealth of expertise available to it, the extraordinary strength and richness of the scientific institutions functioning at such high levels within the University of Queensland to inform its work, even before that work gets under way, it is well positioned, I believe, to address these issues: to change public perception, to add depth to public debate and knowledge, to change those trends of disengagement into involvement, to animate and energise the national debate on critical national and international issues – and, in so doing, enhance Australia’s capacity to meet the challenge of global change.
I wish it well in this complex but vital endeavour and it is now with great pleasure that I launch officially the University of Queensland’s Global Change Institute
Source: www.couriermail.com.au

If the USA, UK, Europe, and increasingly China, see the low carbon and environmental goods and services sector as the basis of the world’s next great technology and economic era – why is Australia not yet planning to be among the leaders in creating new wealth and millions of new jobs by embracing transition to new markets served by new industries? The question is asked and the visionary answer supplied for abc carbon express by Fiona Wain, CEO of Environment Business Australia.

By 2030 Australia could be developing into a regional hub for minerals processing and heavy manufacturing at ‘mega clean energy parks’. That is the scale of green energy that solar thermal, geothermal, marine and wind energy could provide if supported by innovative policy at all three levels of Government.

With HVDC grids and smart connectors these mega parks could provide baseload electricity around the country – and even to Asia.

Drawing down the overload of atmospheric CO2 will be key in the shorter-term to tackling climate change and the converging threats of food and fuel security. A carbon biosequestration program using soils, crops, rangeland, native vegetation and forests to draw down legacy carbon in the atmosphere would help replenish soil carbon and nutrient levels while adding value to farmers and agricultural communities.

And the biofuel opportunities abound if we use waste CO2 from power plants as feedstock. Liquid fuels could be produced at industrial scale – synthesised by algae. This ‘next generation’ of biofuels would not compete with the food chain or further deplete soil nutrient levels.

‘Green cities’ should have all buildings at high energy efficiency standards. Public transport operating as an efficiency centre (and not an inefficient profit centre) would be complemented by an electric vehicle mobility system for private car use.

Energy to fuel the electric vehicles could increasingly come from local supply of renewable energy and co-generation systems or from the ‘mega parks’. Adding further value, the batteries on wheels could download renewable energy back into the grid at times of peak demand.

All these ideas and more are feasible and the technology already exists. The Catch 22 is scaling them up sufficiently to bring them down the cost curve – and of course scaling them up quickly enough to ensure that Australia is not left behind. This requires a new policy framework – institutional reform will be key to catalyse public and private sector investment. It is time for policy innovation to match technology’s evolution.

And the cost? Well how much do we plan on spending over the next 20 years on basic infrastructure, built environment, food supply, energy security, etc? Let’s make sure that spend is invested in desirable lifecycle outcomes by including – and comparing – capex investment; efficiencies generated by expenditure into operational improvements and avoiding collateral damage; new value-adding to current sectors of the economy; and most importantly, strategic planning to take advantage of new markets and new industries that are emerging the new jobs that will be created.

The lack of foresight shown by climate change sceptics, denialists and contrarians is chilling – that mainstream media outlets use it as fodder for ‘debate’ is absurd. We humans may be resilient but we rely entirely on eco-system services to support us. There is a speed of climate change we do not want to unleash, because there is no technology, no infrastructure, no amount of money that would be capable of replicating the way we live.

A true debate about how to make industrial and economic transition is welcome as we face converging threats of food security, desertification, fuel security and ocean acidification alongside climate change. Our efforts should focus on prosperity without collateral damage to communities, the environment, economies, and global security. “Balance” is not about trying to present a contrarian case as an equal voice, it is about harnessing vision to create the future we want – and avoid the outcomes we do not want.
Source: www.environmentbusiness.com.au

Scientists Might Not be Perfect But Don’t Shoot The Messenger
Nobel Prize winning scientist Peter Doherty – and author of the illuminating “A Light History of Hot Air” – has his say: “Scientists aren’t perfect. What keeps them honest is the constraint that their published data must be verifiable. Though there are numerous uncertainties in climate science and better data is needed in many areas, the fundamental physics of global warming have been understood for more than a century. Political spin, propaganda and bombastic media hype isn’t going to make this go away. Putting a realistic price on carbon makes sense and so does the idea of soil sequestration.” Here’s an article which first appeared in the Australian Financial Review last month.

Climategate and shooting the messenger, by Peter Doherty
Back in November 2009, just before the Copenhagen Climate Congress, we suddenly saw the release of about 1,000 e-mails pirated from a server used by the Climate Research Unit (CRU) of Britain’s University of East Anglia. The police are still investigating, but what was in a few of these e-mails has been exploited to discredit both the integrity of the climate science community and the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Leading CRU investigators and their correspondents were among the thousands of scientists who contributed to the fourth (and latest) IPCC report that summarizes what is happening globally with this enormously complex and difficult situation and speculates about possible outcomes.
Did “climategate”, as the affair has come to be called, reveal a fatal flaw? The currently stood–down CRU Director, Phil Jones, refers to a “trick” in presenting results for a peer reviewed journal article. The “trick” turned out to be a technique for combining two types of data that’s generally considered to be legitimate. They clearly regarded some of the outliers in their field as a waste of time, were reluctant to provide them with data and wanted to keep their conclusions out of the upcoming IPCC report. Then they were contemptuous of the journal “Climate Research”. The data exclusion story was concerning as information generated using public funds should be open access. But it turns out that much of the problem is with the constraints imposed by national governments. The scientists don’t own the data. Then, if the “conspirators” indeed meant to exclude some sets of findings from the IPCC report, that was ineffectual as the information appeared anyway.
These guys were naïve to put such reflections and “heat of the moment” thoughts in writing but, collaborating from different continents, e-mail is their conversation. How would you look if selected excerpts from your private, in-house, strategy or editorial discussions were published? Busy, committed people don’t suffer fools and crooks gladly. Active climate scientists who promote a more skeptical view are taken seriously, but every field has its lightweights. All disciplines have one or other peer-reviewed journal that’s at the bottom of the pile. Most don’t have to contend with well-funded, public disinformation campaigns. Scientists aren’t perfect. What keeps them honest is the constraint that their published data must be verifiable. From what I’ve read to date, those who’ve looked objectively and in depth at the “climategate” e-mails have concluded that there’s no real case to answer.
Just when it looked as though “climategate” had pretty much run its media course, we were faced with the information that the IPCC report is basically flawed as it contains a prediction that the Himalayan Glaciers could disappear completely by 2035. That surprised me, both because I didn’t recall seeing it in the politically important Climate Change 2007 Synthesis Report for Policy Makers that’s closely scrutinized and signed off on by the 193 participating governments. Also, it didn’t fit with anything I’d read in the scientific literature. It turns out that the 2035 mistake is in the somewhat speculative WGII section of the 1600 page IPCC report. This bit is not subject to the constraint that it should only discuss peer-reviewed, published data, and also considers “gray” material from NGOs, environmental organizations and the like. It now seems there are other such “errors” and that there’s a good case for overhauling aspects of the IPCC process. In the end analysis, however, neither “climategate” nor the flaws in some of the more speculative sections discredit the basic IPCC case that we need to take action on anthropogenic climate change now. The “message” may resemble a frayed and blood stained battle flag but it’s still proudly flying. “Shooting the messenger” makes no sense.
Though there are numerous uncertainties in climate science and better data is needed in many areas, the fundamental physics of global warming have been understood for more than a century. If you want a brief summary of the current situation look at the US Government National Oceanographic Administration website http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/indicators/. Rising greenhouse gas levels that result largely from the massive dumping of fossil fuel combustion products into the atmosphere cause the progressive trapping of energy radiated by the earth. While atmospheric CO2 levels of 280 ppm stop our planet becoming an ice block, we’re now heading rapidly towards 450 ppm, a concentration that hasn’t been seen for at least 650,000 and maybe a couple of million years. Doubling greenhouse gas levels could increase global mean temperatures from the current 15C to 18C (±1.5C), with a rise of 4.5C or more being a possibility. Political spin, propaganda and bombastic media hype isn’t going to make this go away. Putting a realistic price on carbon makes sense and so does the idea of soil sequestration. The first necessity is to get legislation in place so that the markets can function to facilitate the necessary process of change and renewal. Action provides opportunity!
Peter Charles Doherty is also professor of biomedical research and chair of the Immunology Department at St Jude Children’s Research Hospital, Tennessee. He is distinguished for his study of major histocompatibility antigens’ role in immune recognition, particularly in virus-infected cells. He shared the 1996 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine with Rolf Zinkernagel.
Source: www.unimelb.edu.au

Eight Steps to Overcome Barriers To Sustainability Home and Away

When Anna Clark started her journey into sustainability, it came after “the sickening revelation” that her household consumed five planets worth of resources. Now she has a sustainability consulting practice, has moved to a platinum-level LEED certified home, planted a garden, and adjusted her consumer habits considerably. Her ecological footprint measure says she’s now down to three planets. In this article, Anna comes up with an all-American eight step personal sustainability plan, which now goes global.

Overcoming the Barriers to a Sustainable America by Anna Clark

Can five percent of the earth’s people consume one quarter of its energy? America is proof the answer is yes. This leaves some thinking, “How can one country go on like this when two billion people live in energy poverty?” Our lopsided consumption is not limited to energy.

While one third of Americans struggle with their weight, 800 million suffer from hunger. Convenient and over-simplistic explanations include apathy, consumerism, and good old-fashioned greed. However, only some of the fault lies with human (and not uniquely American) foibles. The greater truth is more complicated.

The most insidious reasons for the unfair distribution of life’s vital resources are systemic. Cheap, abundant energy, a car-based culture, and a business-friendly financial system are a few of the reasons why sustainable development hasn’t taken root. This is changing, albeit slowly, because the very notion of conservation runs counter to a consumer-based economy.

As countries like India and China adopt our ways, the scope of the problem goes global. If America is to blame for overconsumption, then we might call developing countries that manufacture our products our accomplices. But condemnation is unproductive in a world so desperate for solutions.

Fortunately, the steps to a sustainable America are simpler than we think, and the positive ripples have the potential to span the globe. Here are eight simple actions that will cost us little while fostering a sustainable future and restoring us to a position of leadership for the long haul:

1. Promote energy efficiency. According to a McKinsey report, the U.S. economy has the potential to reduce annual non-transportation energy consumption by roughly 23 percent by 2020, eliminating more than $1.2 trillion in waste – well beyond the $520 billion upfront investment that would be required. The reduction in energy use would result in the abatement of 1.1 gigatons of greenhouse gas emissions annually – the equivalent of taking the entire U.S. fleet of passenger vehicles and light trucks off the roads.

2. Conserve. Too many of us have confused the pursuit of happiness with the pursuit of stuff. The proliferation of cheap goods makes hyper-consumerism too easy. Product sales keep our economy churning. They also create waste and pollution while exacerbating the offshoring of American manufacturing. The Center for the New American Dream provides tools that help use live well with less and enjoy life more.

3. Pursue conscious capitalism. The land of opportunity can be a profound lever of social change when we apply American ingenuity and entrepreneurial spirit to solving the world’s most pressing problems. Businesses like TOMS, which purchase a pair of shoes for impoverished villagers for every pair it sells, prove that having a mission can drive success, not hinder it.

4. Learn. Claiming you don’t know the law isn’t enough to avoid a traffic violation. The same should go for being a global citizen. Awareness is part of functioning as a member of 21st century society. For example, did you know that if Americans reduced their meat consumption by just 10%, we could have enough grain left over to feed 60 million people? There is empowerment in recognizing our individual roles, however small, in mitigating issues from world hunger to water scarcity.

5. Teach. You don’t need a world stage to teach sustainability. A small garden patch will do. If you have a child and a recycling bin, or a next-door neighbor and a backyard, you have an audience and a platform large enough to make a difference.

6. Vote with your dollars. We exercise our voice for a better planet with every product we buy, or decide not to buy. Purchasing organic produce is good; growing your own is even better. Shopping is a reality, but we can spend more consciously by learning labels and researching the sustainability programs of our favorite companies.

7. Forget partisan politics. George Washington warned us of the dangers of the two-party system. It’s a good thing our forefathers didn’t live to see us mired in this political divide. Sustainability, with its economic and health benefits, is one value that we can all share. Green is the glue that can pull us back together.

8. Take responsibility. Sustainability is not a policy decision to be left to institutions like government or business. It’s a personal expression of respect for our fellow man. We need to get sustainability out of our heads and into our hearts. To get radical, think of “green” as the Golden Rule: treat your (global) neighbor as yourself.

When I started my journey into sustainability, it was following the sickening revelation that my household consumed five planets worth of resources. Since that time, I’ve launched a sustainability consulting practice, moved to a platinum-level LEED certified home, planted a garden, and adjusted my consumer habits considerably. I recently recalculated our ecological footprint to gauge how well I’m doing. Now we’re down to three planets. Disappointing, but progress nevertheless. My point? Natural living doesn’t come naturally for most Americans, no matter how hard we may try. It requires change – that’s the real inconvenient truth.
The good news is that easy incremental changes on all our parts can improve matters considerably. The economic opportunities inherent in these simple solutions easily compensates for the cost in addressing the problems. Sustainable living also strengthens our familial bonds and our bolsters community ties. Sustainable development is a feasible resolution to volatile energy prices; water scarcity; toxins in our air, food and water; and climate change. Sustainability gives consumers healthier products and companies a competitive advantage. More than a good idea, sustainability might even be our best change to preserve the American way of life in a rapidly changing world.

Anna Clark is president of EarthPeople, LLC and the author of Green, American Style. She writes on sustainability and leadership.
Anna Clark is president of EarthPeople, a consulting and communications firm that helps clients of all sizes save money and bolster their brands through profitable green strategies.
Her ideas for greening small business have appeared in USA Today and on Greenbiz.com, FOX Business.com and Entrepreneur Radio. Her first book Green, American Style, is scheduled for release in April 2010.
Anna lives in Dallas with her husband and two preschoolers in one of Texas’ first residences to earn a platinum LEED-certified rating from the US Green Building Council. She writes and speaks on topics ranging from green living to leadership.

Source: www.earthpeopleco.com

Natural Gas Can Generate Electricity For The Home

By the time electricity from coal fired power stations gets to where it is used, the efficiency has dropped to less than 25%, meaning three quarters of the energy has been wasted. Clean energy guru Jeff Harding points this out. Just as mainframe computers gave way to personal computers, the energy system needs to move from a ‘centralised’ model towards a ‘distributed’ or ‘embedded’ model, where thousands of mini power stations are installed in homes and other buildings, just where the power is needed. Ceramic Fuel Cells can supplement renewable generation to reduce carbon emissions

Think Beyond Renewables to Cut Carbon Emissions
By Jeff Harding, Chairman Ceramic Fuel Cells.

It is now well recognised that the world’s energy system requires a transformation. Energy use is rising, particularly summer peak demand for electricity, and the monopoly electricity network companies are spending billions to upgrade ageing infrastructure, which is passed on to the consumer through increased power bills.

And yet there is bi-partisan agreement that Australia must cut its greenhouse gas emissions, especially from power generation.

The problem is particularly severe in Australia, which burns coal to generate most of its electricity. These generators have an efficiency of less than 30 percent. By the time the power gets to where it is used, the efficiency has dropped to less than 25 percent, meaning three quarters of the energy has been wasted.

Burning coal is the most polluting way of generating electricity. Australia’s per capita carbon emissions are the highest in the world – about 23 tonnes per person, per year.

The current model of building large, inefficient power stations, a long way from where the power is needed, is no longer good enough. We need new thinking to transform our energy system.

Just as mainframe computers gave way to personal computers, the energy system is moving from a ‘centralised’ model towards a ‘distributed’ or ‘embedded’ model, where thousands of mini power stations are installed in homes and other buildings, just where the power is needed.

Renewable energy such as solar, wave, wind and geothermal are absolutely necessary but cannot provide the whole answer. Nuclear energy is environmentally preferable to coal but has long lead times and other well known issues.

Fuel cells using natural gas can provide low emission baseload power, with significant benefits to the environment and the energy network – and significant cost savings.

Ceramic Fuel Cells Limited, based in Melbourne, has launched a gas to electricity generator called “BlueGen”. The unit operates constantly, all-year round – complementing solar and wind which are intermittent and not controllable. One BlueGen operating constantly at 1.5kW will generate about 12,000 kilowatt hours of electricity per year – twice the annual requirement of the average home in Victoria. The excess is sold back to the grid. BlueGen also makes enough heat for provide 200 litres of hot water per day – enough for the average family home.

About the size of a home dishwasher, BlueGen units can be installed without additional infrastructure costs, and with significant environmental benefits. It delivers electricity at about 60% efficiency, with an additional 25% of the energy being collected as heat which goes into the hot water system.

A home with a BlueGen unit can actually offset more carbon than a home with a typical solar PV system. For example, in Sydney a 2kW solar PV system will generate about 3,500 kilowatt hours of electricity per year and offset about 3.7 tonnes of carbon. A BlueGen unit in the same house could generate more than 12,000 kilowatt hours of electricity and save about 9 tonnes of carbon per year. Even though the BlueGen uses natural gas, the carbon savings are much higher because over the year it provides all the power the home needs – and more. A home with a solar PV unit still relies on higher emission grid power.

Ceramic Fuel Cells has received orders for 13 BlueGen units from leading energy companies in Europe, plus VicUrban in Melbourne and Energy Australia in Sydney. Many large markets provide incentives for these units to be installed – including Germany, France, UK, USA, Japan and Korea. No incentives are currently available in Australia.

To achieve the world’s carbon reduction goals requires open thinking: a product using natural gas – with very high efficiency – can supplement renewable generation to reduce carbon emissions, quickly and cheaply.

Source: www.cfcl.com.au

Climate Leadership Means Better Change Management

Copenhagen was not a failure to manage climate, it was a failure to manage change. ‘Green’ politicians and the green movement had got ahead of themselves and their communities. Global leaders failed to anticipate or cope with the complexity of the international change required. In Australia the Government failed to manage the required community change. These messages could be reinforced by promoting real and practical solutions (like those featured in the abc carbon express!).Because change is all about people, the best illustrations will always be personal stories. This from Richard and Joan Cassels of Climate Leadership. Read More

After Copenhagen: the case for resolve.

By Richard and Joan Cassels, Climate Leadership. 11 March 2010.

The Copenhagen Climate Conference has been widely portrayed as a “failure”. Accordingly the political landscape of environmental politics in Australia changed overnight. Before the conference, leaders spoke of great challenges for humanity. After the conference, Kevin Rudd hardly mentioned climate change. China, although unequivocally accepting the reality of global warming and its human causes, undid possible consensus by refusing to accept limits to its growth. It seemed to be back to square one, with everyone looking after themselves.

An article in the Queensland Courier Mail claimed jubilantly that, “once again, coal is king”. Some climate change deniers claimed vindication. It was a sign of the times when a well-respected scientist could be labelled “un-objective” because he was an ‘environmentalist’. Climate-fatigue set in among the media and the public. The zeitgeist had changed.

All this was despite the reality of what actually happened in Copenhagen. The case for human induced global warming was actually strengthened by the latest studies and never seriously questioned by any of the players. International agreement was obtained on the need to limit warming to no more than 2oC, with an ideal target of 1.5oC. More countries were involved than ever before. Good progress was made on R.E.D.D. (avoided deforestation) and a real cash commitment was made to help poor countries adapt. This was all achieved despite the unrealistic expectations and the cumbersome consensus formula of the conference; and despite the history and depth of the problems underlying human induced climate change- international inequity, over-population and over-consumption.

Copenhagen was not a failure to manage climate, it was a failure to manage change. ‘Green’ politicians and the green movement had got ahead of themselves and their communities. Global leaders failed to anticipate or cope with the complexity of the international change required. In Australia the Government failed to manage the required community change.

A lot is known about change management. Key principles are that people must be listened to and their fears addressed..They must be given some choices and some opportunities to control the impact of the change on them. Communications must be continuous and open. Different people react differently to change. Obstruction of change is often due to factors completely unrelated to the issue at hand. Change often involves a loss and this loss must be addressed openly. Expectations must be realistic. And, perhaps most critically, the champion of change must be resolute, and change management must be treated as a project, thought through and resourced.

In Australia, much of this did not happen. The Rudd government negotiated with the Opposition but ignored the voters. There was no comprehensive communication and change management program. The change management team seems now to have been taken off the project and diverted to other issues like health. The change champion, the Prime Minister, appears to be hesitating. These are all well known classic mistakes of an unsuccessful change management.

Communication must be much better. The concept of an emissions trading scheme is quite straightforward. “Cap, trade and transition” mean to set a limit on emissions and slowly reduce it; use, rather than fight, the profit motive; and give transition help to those most affected. We do not need to know every detail. We drive cars everyday without understanding the workings of the internal combustion engine.

The Abbott “Great Big Tax” campaign could be countered by a “Very Good Investment” campaign, with messages such as: someone will inevitably pay for climate disruption and the huge (as yet unbudgeted!) costs of adaptation, and it will be the taxpayer unless we act proactively; acting now will cost much less than acting later; the choice is not “no tax”, it is a little tax now or a lot of tax later. These messages could be reinforced by promoting real and practical solutions (like those featured in the ABC Carbon Express!).Because change is all about people, the best illustrations will always be personal stories.

The rationale for the change is not just global warming. We need to move from fossil fuels to a low carbon economy for many other reasons, not least the short and finite life of oil, coal and gas reserves, the acidification of the oceans, air pollution and the diversion of human energies, resources and innovation away from creating the long-term energy sources of the future.

It is also clear that alarming people is unproductive. The “litany of disasters” has been too much to handle and people have reacted by psychological withdrawal. A 6- metre sea level rise or a 5oC temperature rise are realistic and serious risks, but are, right now, beyond people’s coping capacity. What they want is cool-headed and determined leaders, who show the way forward and solve practical problems.

The need for a practical approach is illustrated in a recent national survey by researchers at Yale and George Mason universities in the U.S.A. (see ABC of carbon newsletter 10-2-2010) which found that, despite a sharp drop in public concern over global warming, Americans—regardless of political affiliation—support the passage of practical federal climate and energy policies.
The survey found support for the following practical measures:
• Funding more research on renewable energy, such as solar and wind power (85 percent)
• Tax rebates for people buying fuel-efficient vehicles or solar panels (82 percent)
• Establishing programs to teach Americans how to save energy (72 percent)
• Regulating carbon dioxide as a pollutant (71 percent)
• School curricula to teach children about the causes, consequences and potential solutions to global warming (70 percent)
• Signing an international treaty that requires the United States to cut emissions of carbon dioxide 90 percent by the year 2050 (61 percent)
• Establishing programs to teach Americans about global warming (60 percent).
It seems very likely that attitudes in Australia will be similar.
There is no going back on ‘clean and green’, let alone on climate. The green movement, including action on climate change, is now universal and unstoppable. Green buildings, green infrastructure, sustainable enterprise, sustainable development, carbon trading, wildlife conservation, marine conservation, sustainable cities, sustainable transport, sustainable agriculture, renewable energy, low-carbon technologies and environmental lawyers are all guided by the principle that we can and must act now to prevent and then reduce environmental degradation and climate disruption.

To retain credibility, the Government must see through what it started. If Kevin Rudd does not stick to his guns and become a serious change manager with a properly planned and resourced change management program for climate change, he will lose the voters’ respect and the next election. He will set back the movement for a safer, more sustainable and more equitable world by at least a decade- the decade when we actually still have time to make a real difference.

Source: www.climateleadership.org

Carbon’s The Name & The Message Remains The Same

As many of us ponder fresh ways to get the messages across, it’s good to keep the basics in mind, and those basics begin with carbon. There is no serious debate about the meticulous records kept at Mauna Loa and elsewhere showing the inexorable increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide. Even if geo-engineers come up with an appealing and diplomatically tractable way to shield and cool the planet, the oceans will continue to soak up more carbon dioxide, and the chain of marine life will be increasingly at risk. Bob Henson is a science communicator, who knows a lot about meteorology, psychology and journalism. He’s author of “The Rough Guide to Climate Change”. Read More

By Bob Henson

The name of this newsletter includes two critical syllables that often get omitted when discussing climate change. The carbon that lies beneath our feet is entering the atmosphere at a stunningly fast pace in geologic terms. Regardless of what twists and turns the weather may take, there is no denying the changing chemistry of the atmosphere.

In the United States, we’ve just endured a winter of discontent in many ways. The East Coast has been slammed with some of the worst winter weather ever seen, including the snowiest season on record in Washington, D.C.; Baltimore, Maryland; and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In my hometown of Boulder, Colorado, this past February was the first month in at least 60 years in which the temperature failed to reach 10°C at least once. It hasn’t been a brutally cold winter—just a consistently cold one.

The chilly, snowy conditions across much of the nation coincided with the reverberations of the University of East Anglia e-mail hack and the emergence of several errors amid the vast amount of material in the 2007 assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. These events appear to have teamed with a political climate of increased skepticism toward experts and elites of all stripes. The result: a significant turn in U.S. public opinion. A Gallup Poll released just last week shows that 48 percent of Americans now think the seriousness of global warming is exaggerated, versus 41 percent just last year and 35 percent the year before that. Almost as many people attribute the last century of warming to natural causes (46 percent) as to human activity (50 percent). The latter figure has dropped almost ten percentage points in the last two years.

For those of us who spend much of our time communicating about climate change, it’s been a difficult few months. Is it something we’re saying—or not saying? If we have a scorching summer, will the new skepticism remain? Is it simply asking too much of people to shrug off the natural variability of weather—the fact that some winters will still be rough—and recognize that small changes in an average can produce big impacts over time?

Many of us are pondering fresh ways to get the messages across. But perhaps it’s good to keep the basics in mind, and those basics begin with carbon.

There is no serious debate about the meticulous records kept at Mauna Loa and elsewhere showing the inexorable increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide.
The gradual acidification of our oceans due to that increase is something that often falls by the wayside when climate change is discussed.

Even if geoengineers come up with an appealing and diplomatically tractable way to shield and cool the planet, the oceans will continue to soak up more carbon dioxide, and the chain of marine life will be increasingly at risk.

Carbon is at the center of life. The ways in which we think about and use carbon tell us much about how life will evolve in the coming decades and centuries.

Bob Henson edits the UCAR Magazine and Highlights, the magazine-style summary of UCAR/NCAR/UOP research and support activities. He writes news releases and assist with media inquiries, particularly those involving severe weather (tornadoes, hurricanes, etc.).

He was born in the Great Plains metropolis of Oklahoma City, his hometown through high school. Surrounded by wild weather, he grew up fascinated by it. His bachelor’s degree at Rice University featured an interdisciplinary major in meteorology and psychology. He went to graduate school in both meteorology and journalism at the University of Oklahoma. For his MA thesis in journalism, he studied the broadcasting of severe weather warnings on local television.

He’s been at UCAR since 1989, covering the wide range of research and related activities conducted by NCAR, UOP, and UCAR’s members and affiliates.

He enjoys freelance writing on a variety of topics. He’s contributing editor of Weatherwise magazine and was a frequent correspondent for the The Weather Notebook radio show. He’s written Television Weathercasting: A History (McFarland, 1990), The Rough Guide to Weather (Penguin, 2002), The Rough Guide to Climate Change (Penguin, 2006), and Weather on the Air: A History of Broadcast Meteorology (American Meteorological Society, summer 2010).

Other interests? Bicycling: He’s done several tours of 200-800 miles and spend a lot of transportation time on two wheels.

Storm photography: Over the past 25 years, while on research experiments and personal travel, he’s seen around 30 tornadoes and a vast array of severe thunderstorms.

Source: www.ucar.edu

Retrofit Urban Areas With Ecologically Positive Development

A system of development that does not pay its own way over its life cycle is no longer morally acceptable. We have already exceeded the Earth’s ecological, not to mention carbon, carrying capacity. Therefore, cities need to increase ecological carrying capacity just to support existing bioregions and populations equitably. Architecture professor Janis Birkeland has an answer or two up her sleeve and in her books “Design for Sustainabilty” and “Positive Development”. Read More

by Janis Birkeland

A system of development that does not pay its own way over its life cycle is no longer morally acceptable. We have already exceeded the Earth’s ecological, not to mention carbon, carrying capacity. Therefore, cities need to increase ecological carrying capacity just to support existing bioregions and populations equitably.

The good news is that we can retrofit urban areas to increase natural and social capital. Arguably, the design concepts and eco-technologies to do so already exist. Many fossil fuelled building and environmental services could be replaced by natural systems that provide surplus ecosystem goods and services in urban areas. They only need to be retrofitted into the urban environment. Eco-retrofitting pays for itself in resource savings and productivity gains, and can be performed profitably at no cost to the building owner.
Why aren’t we employing design solutions?
Current leading-edge ecological designers call for buildings that work like ecosystems (eg like a tree). However, this still replaces natural ecosystems with artificial replicas that are high in embodied energy and materials. Many green buildings, for example, increase the urban heat island effect, urban weather extremes and biodiversity loss.
Buildings can produce clean energy, water, soil, air, and food, as well as sequester carbon. This is called restorative or regenerative design. Even this is not enough. Buildings must also reverse the impacts of previous development and expand indigenous ecosystems in absolute terms – called net ‘Positive Development’. Given we are in ecological deficit, we must learn to design for nature, not just ‘with’ or ‘like’ nature – called ‘design for eco-services’.
So why the resistance to eco-positive retrofitting solutions?
The sustainability movement has always called for improving life quality for everyone within the limits of nature’s carrying capacity (too late… we now need to expand nature’s size and resilience). The problem is that the professions have tried to marry sustainability goals with preconceived ideas about development that were based upon negative premises and metrics.
Perhaps foremost among these premises is the idea that the built environment can only have negative ecological impacts, because nature and civilisation are in some sort of opposition. As a result, our decision making methods and tools are designed for making tradeoffs, or offsetting ecological losses with short term social gains.
Why? We excel at measuring problems but not simply fixing things. In our haste to substitute action with displacement activity, we often fail to ask what we should measure.
What do our metrics need to do?
Be relevant to life forms: ‘Resources’ have been represented by numbers, but living things have fallen through the reductionist sieve and are under-represented in current design and assessment tools. This means designers focus on energy and water, but forget about living things. Hence in some ‘green’ buildings, plants need to be taken back and forth to nurseries.
Be relevant to design: Life cycle assessments do not count many of the negative ecological and social impacts caused by design. For example, we seldom weigh in the opportunity cost of the ecological values of land, the demolition waste caused replacing old buildings, or the transfers of public space resources to private use and control. Once the basic decisions are made, design can only mitigate negative impacts.
Be relevant to ecological gains: Because we measure from 1 or -1 to 0, we do not measure net positive contributions (beyond pre-settlement conditions). For example, we only measure how much less carbon a building produces, not how much it could sequester. Since life cycle assessments do not yet count positive ecological impacts, we do not design for life support system.
What is required to fix this?
Positive Development is a new approach to built environment design. It aims to expand both the ecological base (life support system), and increase the public estate (equitable access to means of survival) relative to pre-settlement conditions. However, Positive Development is not just about eco-positive design.
Positive Development is also a new approach to environmental management. It means a system-wide paradigm shift from (negative) ‘managerialist’ approaches to a (positive) ‘design’ approach: a new framework, new methods, and new metrics. Work is proceeding at QUT in these areas.

Janis Birkeland is professor of architecture at QUT. She has a transdisciplinary background concerned with built environment design including artist, advocacy planner, architect (registered), urban designer, city planner and attorney (registered) in San Francisco. She has developed many tertiary and professional development units on built environment and sustainability. She has written over 100 papers and over 100 talks on the subject, and initiated the concept of net Positive Development. Her books include: Design for Sustainability: A Sourcebook of Integrated Eco-Logical Solutions, and the new book, Positive Development: From Vicious Circles to Virtuous Cycles Through Built Environment Design.

Source: www.qut.edu.au

Let’s Focus On The Small Things Which Carry a Big Load

By focussing only the big things like climate change and the Big 5 (wildlife), we tend to lose perspective and the understanding we need to really appreciate the interconnectedness that is essential to life like we know it on our planet. It is in looking at the small things that helps to see these connections and the implications on a wider more pervasive scale of the importance of modifying our behaviour so that our planet has a chance of sustaining itself. This from Tony Frost, a leadership consultant in South Africa , former WWF CEO and author of “After the Rain”. Read More

By Tony Frost

I had just come back from one of the leadership trails that I take into the wilderness areas late last year. I got to thinking: While most people are desperately keen to see the Big 5 up close and personal (until it actually happens, of course!) it is increasingly the small things that are making a big impression on me and the way I think about the world and our role in it.

This is a particularly apposite discussion at that time given the global 350 campaign that took place all over the world– a campaign to make us all aware of the more rapid than expected accumulation of C02 in the atmosphere. There are many reasons for this faster than expected accumulation of C02.

Amongst the most important is the rapid disappearance of the polar ice-caps as a result of global warming. It is understandably difficult for those of us that live a long way away from either of the two Poles (and that means pretty much all 6,5 billion of us) to even begin to imagine why this should be important.

But here is the rub. As the permafrost melts in the far north and deep south it releases C02, that has been buried for centuries, into the atmosphere adding to the already growing quantity of C02 caused by our current consumption patterns.

It is the aggregation of C02 and other toxic gases like methane that prevents hot air from escaping our atmosphere thus causing our planet to grow hotter and hotter.

So why are the small things important?

By focussing only the big things like climate change and the Big 5, we tend to lose perspective and the understanding we need to really appreciate the interconnectedness that is essential to life like we know it on our planet.

It is in looking at the small things that helps to see these connections and the implications on a wider more pervasive scale of the importance of modifying our behaviour so that our planet has a chance of sustaining itself.

On our most recent trail it was the beauty of some of the tiny, exquisitely beautiful flowers, and the industry of a group of tiny ants that made these connections for me.

Many of the flowers, like many of the fynbos plants in the Boland, are found only in very specific spots. They depend on that eco-system for their continued survival, for their sustainability. For that to happen the eco-system needs to remain intact.

This is not a simple matter and we need to be very thankful for the many wonderful scientists that beaver away every day in and outside our national and provincial parks and academic institutions to help us understand what is required to conserve the eco-systems upon which we are totally dependent.

The amazing industry and determination of five small ants reminded me that although the task is big, by collective action and a single-minded determination almost anything can be achieved.

These ants came reconnoitring in the area where we had sat and eaten our simple lunch of bread, cheese, some meats, tomato and beetroot. They found a small piece of cheese which for them was huge – I estimate about 5 times their collective bodyweight.

They decided that they would take this back to their queen and proceeded to manoeuvre, push, pull, tug, carry, lift and transport their prize all of 15 metres across rough terrain!

A simple calculation suggest that this would be roughly equivalent to five of us carrying 5 times our bodyweight a distance of about 10 kilometres of hilly and tough terrain without rest, drink, or rest stops! There are some assumptions which can be questioned in here, I know, but I am sure you get the point.
If we consider the challenges that face us; if we can consider the exciting opportunity of massive collective action, then let us also consider the importance of working together for the generations to come that are depending upon us to do just this!

Tony Frost

Tony Frost, a fifth generation South African, is the founder of Sirocco Strategic Management, specializing in the design and implementation of leadership strategies with an emphasis on sustainability. Until 2007, Tony served as chief executive of the WWF in South Africa. His recent book entitled After the Rain, along with his columns and radio broadcasts in regional media, reflects his lifelong commitment to teaching people about conservation. He has just completed a period as Acting Chair of the South African National Biodiversity Institute, South Africa’s state agency tasked with the job of conserving our biodiversity and is the lead agency in respect of the country’s climate change initiatives.

Source: www.siroccostrategy.com