2009 Eco Trends Explained (continued)

Continuing our 2009 trend explanations we’ll cover the following for trends today; Vertical Agriculture, Bio-Fuel Backlash, Declining Water Quality, and Peak Landfill.

Without further ado…

Vertical Agriculture

The Good – Vertical Agriculture is a pretty simple, yet revolutionary concept.  Take a skyscraper in the middle of an urban population, turn the whole tower into a green house, and grow food there.  Presto, a way to feed the extra 3 billion people projected to be in the world by 2050.  Plus “Getting product to market is one of the most expensive parts of traditional agriculture, but with a vertical farm, your retailers are just down the block.” And we can better use some of the 70 percent of the world’s fresh water that is used for farming according to circleofblue.org.

The Bad – In a word, cost.  In addition to the $84 million estimated that such a skyscraper would cost up front, and the $5 million a year in operating costs, which would include high energy bills, the cost of the food grown in this type of vertical farm would probably demand a premium price.  Yet, Dickson Despommier seems to think that at upscale Manhattan deli prices such a venture would be sustainable with profits around $18 million a year.

The Ugly – The only down side I can think of is the Wal-mart effect that this could have on small-scale farmers, I guess we’ll see what the farm lobbyist have to say in 2009.

My Take – I figure we have to learn how to farm indoors before moving to mars anyway right?  So why not start now.

Bio-Fuel Backlash

The Good – The Bio-fuel Backlash is the name we have given the response to the fact that the rich are now essentially competing against the poor for farm land. We are deciding to use grains to produce fuel instead of food.  In 2008 we saw rallies against Bio-Fuel such as the riots in Mexico.  If you’re hungry and poor, then the backlash is the good part.

The Bad – From one extreme to the other, Bio-Fuel was supposed to solve our oil dependency, but is seems we’ve only made things worse.  Congress this year decided to increase Bio-Fuel production by five times, a decision they should be taking another look at.

The Ugly – There is still the question of “Are Bio-Fuels really more green then gasoline?” It seems the discussion is still on going on whether they are good for the planet or not.

My Take – I think that reactionary decision can get you in a lot of trouble.  Similar to the clean coal issue, if we use enough Bio-Fuel to diversify our energy usage, then I believe this is a good thing, use to much though, and we start causing other problems.  The question is how do we find the balance?  Unless we just move all the real farming to vertical farms…

Declining Water Quality

The Good – Not really good at all, except for the fact that we are talking about it.  As with the rest of our infrastructure our sewer systems and water distributions systems are in disrepair.  I guess if Obama can make his investment in infrastructure work, that might be some good news for water quality, at least in the US.

The Bad – I think water in general is going to become more and more of a problem, but again with a declining supply and ever increasing population this is really an issue we need to take serious.

The Ugly – The worst part it seems is not only the fact that the issue is not getting enough attention, but that we are concerned with wrong things.  Pollution is bad, but the real problem is infectious diseases.  According to the linked article over 80 percent of such diseases in the US may be waterborne.

My Take – Add it to the list of things to fix in 2009, before the roads, right after the economy.

 Peak Landfill

The Good – Again, not really much good about it. There is some debate to whether or not we are actually running out of room in our landfills, people who own landfills say we could just build more, although local laws often forbid it.  Laws can be changed though. Most estimates give an average of about 10 more years to a large number of landfills.  We could however start using them more to produce power.

The Bad – The list of negative side effects of landfills is pretty long. From polluting air and water to lowering property value, the list goes on, but we have to put this stuff somewhere.

The Ugly – The fact is that we live in a throwaway society, everything is disposable.

My Take – As an optimist I think that things have been getting better.  Almost every grocery store I go to now sell and encourage using reusable bags, some have even started charging for plastic and paper bags to give you even more of an incentive to bring your own. I think that producing less trash is a step in the right direction.

That’s all for today folks, but check back before the New Year for that last installment of Eco Trends explained.

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Nathan Shetterley (nathan.shetterley@gmail.com)
EVO New Media Director

del.icio.us Tags: eco trends,vertical agriculture,bio-fuel backlash,declining water supply,peak landfill

M&V at CCGT

BNet has a detailed summary of the Measurement and Verification (M & V) approach used in the study conducted for the Chicago Center of Green Technology Building in Chicago, IL, referred to as CCGT.

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Nathan Shetterley (nathan.shetterley@gmail.com)
EVO New Media Director

del.icio.us Tags: M&V

2009 Eco Trends explained

In my meandering on twitter this morning I found a fun trend map for 2009 (Thanks for the retweet @afrognthevalley, I wasn’t following @mariansalzman, but I am now.)  I have a few friends that are getting more and more into the environmental side of business and I thought that an explanation of the trends/buzzwords on the map would be interesting to everyone.  So here goes.

You can find the original trend map on flickr, and the people that made it at nowandnext.com. There is much more information on the trend map then I am going to talk about today, maybe someone else will define the non-environmental tentacles.

So here is the whole enviromental list, I'll tackle 4 issues a post for the next few posts until we've got them all done.

Clean Coal

Wind Power

Nano-Solar

Eco-Cynics

Vertical Agriculture

Bio-Fuel Backlash

Declining Water Quality

Peak Landfill

Negawatts (my personal favorite)

Energy dashboards

Nuclear Power

Green Cities

Urbanisation

We’ll start with the least likely impact and move to the most likely impact.

Clean Coal

            The Good – Clean Coal is a concept that would in theory greatly reduce the emissions given off by coal burning power plants.  It involves removing impurities in the coal, treating the gases that are produced to remove sulfer dioxide, and capture and tore carbon dioxide.  America is the middle east of coal, so if we can find a cleaner way to use it, all the better.

The Bad – So far, there are zero clean coal plants in action in America, and many estimates predict that they won’t be for awhile because it’s not economically viable (what ever that means these days).  Greenpeace is major opponent to clean coal, I think have the commercial with someone giving a tour of a clean coal plant, in an empty field, basically denoting that it doesn’t exist.

The Ugly – It’s not the burning of coal that most opponents object to but the extraction of it, which clean coal does nothing to change for the moment.

My Take – We have a lot of coal plants in America right now, and with creative financing, like carbon trade, making these plants green seems like a good idea.  In the same breath, we have a lot of coal plants in America, let’s not build anymore, lets put that money to good use diversifying our energy production.

Wind Power

            The Good – I’m pretty sure everyone knows what wind power is these days.  No fuel costs, no emissions, no pollution in general. What’s not to love?

The Bad – Birds, bats, esthetics, and it’s hard to predict out put. Anything that flies and migrates is at risk, because when you fly you use the wind, and well guess where the wind turbines go...  It is also hard to predict the wind output, I seem to remember lots of brown outs in a Simcity because of trying to power the whole thing on wind, but I’m not sure.

The Ugly – Birds, and bats, are you kidding me?  Think how many animals are killed because of traffic.  And esthetics, I mean, now we are just being picky. 

My Take – I think the wind turbines look kinda cool.

Nano-Solar

            The Good – What I think they mean by “Nano-Solar” is light, cheap, easy to produce and easy to install solar panels.  The company Nanosolar has developed a method of printing solar cells on to something a kin to paper.  If there claims are true it could turn solar panels into a household item, taking a serious strain of the power plants at the peak production times.

            The Bad – It seams the company Nanosolar does not disclose a whole lot about their technology or their costs, so it’s hard to confirm their marketing.

The Ugly – Although we have made great breakthroughs recently, Nanosolar only claimed 19.9% efficiency and independent verifier only confirmed 14.6%.  We still have a long road a head of us in solar panel technology.

            My Take – Nanosolar also has some competitors; Global Solar, HelioVolt, Solyndra, and First Solar.  They don’t use the same technique, but the end goal is the same.  My favorite solar power story this year was the one about putting solar panels in space and then using a laser to send the energy back down to Earth, and I’m not even making this up

Eco-Cynics

            The Good – Eco-Cynics are people who are cynical toward the green movement and may interpret green incentives “cashing-in” or just ineffective.  Cynics are good in any arena though, they push the other side to prove things beyond any doubt, and ask the dirty questions that no one else will.

            The Bad – According to Millennium research reveals that over 50’s are generally eco-cynical, considering most taxes are paid by over 50’s and most political decisions are made by people over 50, this could be a real hurdle for the youngins .

            The Ugly – The Eco Attitudes Report showed that men are most likely to be eco-cynics. (Again most of the people making policy happen to be men.  More bad news?)

            My Take – When it come to eco policy I’d take a modified version of Pascal’s Wager to try and convince the cynics.  I mean, lets say global warming is a sham, is it really that bad to start living and doing business in a sustainable way?  On the other hand, if the doomsday proclaimers are right, then doing nothing could be the end of us.

Stay tuned, I’ll review the next 4 trends in the next post.

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Nathan Shetterley (nathan.shetterley@gmail.com)
EVO New Media Director

del.icio.us Tags: eco trends,clean coal,wind power,nano-solar,eco-cynics

What to do when your savings are not showing up

I found this interesting article that explains an all to common occurrence.  What to do when you are not seeing the saving you were expecting.  Mathiew Shields explains that sometimes the best M&V plan just doesn't explain everything.

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Nathan Shetterley (nathan.shetterley@gmail.com)
EVO New Media Director

del.icio.us Tags: m&v

M&V News flash, Dec 4th 2008

Smartcool Systems' Philippines distributor inks marketing deal ... MarketWatch - USA They will also work on the design, installation, measurement and verification of energy efficiency systems. This will allow both companies to provide a ...

EPRI Plugs Smart Grid for Energy Savings Greentech Media - Cambridge,MA,USA Other savings can come from "enhanced measurement and verification" of energy efficiency programs put in place by utilities and their customers – checking ...

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Nathan Shetterley (nathan.shetterley@gmail.com)
EVO New Media Director

del.icio.us Tags: m&v,smart grid