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Excellent article also published in the Guardian. Biofuels just get worse and worse.
Written last week but not posted as our internet connection has been down…
The ongoing pasta crisis in Italy is in the news again this week as price hikes prompted Italy’s four biggest consumer organisations to call a nationwide pasta strike yesterday (original post on this blog here). Like good citizens we did our bit and added our 2p to the national ire, but it’s unlikely the strike will have any real effect. Wheat farmers are replanting to take advantage of the exploding demand in biofuels – a situation only likely to get worse in the medium term.
And as if the pasta crisis weren’t enough to shake Italian culture to its foundations, this year is going to be particularly bad for olives, at least in this region. Locals are uneasy as the olive trees are mysteriously bearing very few fruits. None of the farmers I’ve spoken to has been able to point to a definite cause (though this year’s drought seems a likely culprit), preferring instead to fall back on the peasant’s super weapon: mystical stoicism – ah, there are good years and bad years. Life is sacrifices. But they’re now regretting selling off last year’s surplus and worrying about how to stretch their current supply. It’s going to be a lean year – so stock up now.
Last week Tessa, Henry, Mom, and I drove to Urbino in northern Marche. Urbino is the other cradle of the Renaissance, where in the 15th century Federico da Montefeltro attracted to his court some of the most outstanding scholars, architects, and artists of the period, creating an urban centre that UNESCO describes as the “pinnacle of Renaissance art and architecture.” And so last Thursday afternoon we piled into the metallic peat family truckster and hit the road.
(Spotted by Mel at Elemental) Cyril Sweett have published their research into the potential for improving energy performance of existing building stock. The importance of greening existing buildings is brought home by two facts:
- 44% of all CO2 emissions in the UK comes from energy use in buildings
- According to one of the report’s authors, in 2050 60% of Britain’s buildings will still pre-date the 2006 revisions to Part L
So we can look forward to the carbon reductions required by Part L being ratcheted up in future, but the overall effect will be modest, even in the long term. If we want to save carbon NOW then energy consumption in existing buildings is too important to ignore.
Predictably, the report’s top recommendation is for “brave decisions” by the government. But in a political climate where politicians would rather engage in creative accounting than be decisive on climate change, it’s hard to be hopeful.
What’s going on?
There’s been a fierce debate among energy bods this summer over the environmental effectiveness of combined heat and power (CHP) and CHP with cooling (CCHP) – a debate closely tied to assumptions about the carbon emissions associated with grid electricity in the UK.
What happened?
As noted in this blog in May, Arup associate director James Thonger opened up with a broadside aimed at the GLA policy of requiring CHP and CCHP on new developments. In particular he refuted LCCA claims that gas CHP saves 54% of carbon relative to grid electricity. The LCCA is headed up by Allan Jones, former green god of Woking and now darling of the London Mayor, who didn’t take the criticism lightly.
The stultifying heat has finally let up, so yesterday afternoon I strapped on the kneepads and laid clay tiles on the terrace. It got me thinking about how much time I’ve spent on the floor in the last year.
Even at the beginning of this restoration project, when there was still so much to be decided, we knew we wanted terra cotta floors. The price seemed reasonable, the clay is quarried and fired locally, and they look fantastic – nothing would be more appropriate to the house. But the reality was much more complex and it involved a hell of a lot more time, expense, and stress than we imagined.
What the hell is wrong with people? Here’s the mission statement from the website of a green consultancy in the States:
We leverage our core competencies in business strategy, environmental science, and marketing to design and deliver comprehensive, customized solutions for each client. Whether your company is a sustainability pioneer looking to extend and leverage its leadership or a newcomer just thinking about how to integrate sustainability, our disciplined, proven approach enables us to design a solution specifically tailored to blah blah blah.
Reading that, you can’t help but flashback to the early days of the dotcom boom where a new kind of bullshit was rife. It’s spooky how similar the nonsense from a bullshit generator sounds to these corporate mission statements. I had a look around for other generators and found a corporate one here and even a landscape urbanism one here. If your corporate blurb sounds like the paragraph above, it may be time for a rethink. Maybe something like this?
We provide expert consultancy in business strategy, environmental science, and marketing to a wide range of clients. Our services are individually tailored to our clients’ needs, whether they are new to sustainability or already have extensive experience with sustainability issues.
Too radical?
Following our recent blog conversation about the energy consumption of Portcullis House, Phil at the Sustainability Blog has pointed out the recently published consumption figures for another Hopkins scheme – this time the Gibbs Building owned by the Wellcome Trust. Like Portcullis House, it’s an office building kitted out with plenty of green gear. And like its cousin, the Gibbs Building is consuming more energy than predicted at design stage. So is the green office building just a myth?
An article in the Times over the weekend claims that walking to the shops emits more CO2 than driving. It’s a sensationalist claim (even if they can back it up with calcs) that doesn’t help anyone except Daily Mail readers desperate to shore up their view that anyone who thinks about energy or the environment is a commie pinko control freak determined to spoil everyone’s fun. Chris Goodall, the man behind the claim, should have known better and is clearly more interested in headlines than making a genuine difference.
Every little helps. But all things being equal, the fight to alleviate the effects of global warming isn’t going to be won between your house and the shops. It’s much more useful to keep your eye on the crucial issues rather than handing ammunition to the folks who like nothing better than a bit of obfuscation.
Back in the London office for the first time in over six months, this week I had both of my semi-annual reviews in one hit. At one point during the wide-ranging session, my boss pulled out an org chart showing the proposed new team structure. Before my review I’d been having niggling doubts about my status in the company and now I had them confirmed for me on a full-colour sheet of A3: in my absence I’d slipped a few rungs down the ladder.
Last autumn I was confident that a directorship was in the post – a few more months of hard work and it would be mine. Nevertheless we chose to drop everything and move to Italy to look for a better quality of life. When we decided to move we weren’t just choosing a new location, we were also stepping off the career path - an easy enough move if you’re near retirement but a riskier thing altogether if you’re 33 and one third of a young family.
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