Elemental

These are my links for December 11th through December 17th:

• Is global warming unstoppable? – Another nutty theory or not?: "Garrett says his study's key finding "is that accumulated economic production over the course of history has been tied to the rate of energy consumption at a global level through a constant factor."
  That "constant" is 9.7 (plus or minus 0.3) milliwatts per inflation-adjusted 1990 dollar. So if you look at economic and energy production at any specific time in history, "each inflation-adjusted 1990 dollar would be supported by 9.7 milliwatts of primary energy consumption," Garrett says….
  "Economists think you need population and standard of living to estimate productivity," he says. "In my model, all you need to know is how fast energy consumption is rising. The reason why is because there is this link between the economy and rates of energy consumption, and it's just a constant factor.""
• Kevin McCloud is a Big Hit at TGR/RIBA Conference – "The challenge of combining sustainability and conservation issues were thoroughly debated at the conference with input from conservation officers, architects and engineers. Some questioned the need to debate this issue when there are ‘only’ 380,000 historic buildings in the UK – perhaps we should be concentrating on the many thousands of non-historic buildings that are below current standards of sustainability.
  Others wanted to discuss what should be tackled first and what makes most carbon sense. The contrast between the photovoltaic panels at the nearby Heelis project costing £450,000 and only contributing 10-15% of the building’s electrical needs and Kevin McCloud’s modest but effective eco-refurb of a terraced house in Manchester reducing carbon emissions by over 30% but only costing just over £2,000 could not have been sharper."
• ‘Sustainability’ is a dangerous mirage – Building Design – Owen's on top form: "It’s the very term “sustainability”, which has enabled even Dubai to present itself as if it is touching lightly upon the earth, that is at fault. What exactly is it that we want to “sustain”? Humanity? Nature? Capitalism? As a slogan it’s as awful as “save the planet”. The planet is safe, it’s we who are in danger.
  The problem with the rhetoric of sustainability is that, as a buzzword, it serves to fill the ethical void in the apocalyptic capitalism of the last 30 years. So, we get sustainable supermarkets, green-roofed car parks, carbon neutral desert cities, all of which are a kind of architectural offsetting as moronic as its economic equivalent. A hundred new industrial towns can have the mirage of Dongtan projected onto them. The recent demise of the British “eco-towns” is the pettier version of the same failure."
• Controlling dew point – 2009-11-19 10:00:00 | Consulting-Specifying Engineer – Excellent article (ASHRAE/US bias) which explains the principles of designing to dew point rather than relative humidity: "Not so long ago, HVAC designers did not have to be especially concerned with humidity. With plenty of cheap energy, the industry could afford to wallop the air with heavy-duty cooling to dry it, then fry it with reheat to keep it from freezing the occupants."
• Building4Change : European research gives blueprint for social sustainability – "Tools, instruments and metrics to foster sustainable communities are biased towards environmental sustainability, a European research project has found. The research, carried out by Oxford Institute for Sustainable Development, provides a blueprint for policymakers on incorporating social sustainability into European urban redevelopment initiatives.
  The report recommends greater integration of socially responsible investment and local authority indicators, alongside increased investment in data gathering to improve understanding of social sustainability. It highlights valuable monitoring systems such as the FootprintR sustainable investment policy, created by developer Igloo"
• Abu Dhabi to set school building eco standard – Building – "A new sustainable building standard is being developed for Abu Dhabi's schools.
  The system is being drawn up by Estidama, the organisation behind the emirate's local sustainability code for the the Abu Dhabi Education Council."
• Futerra Sustainability Communications – leading thinking – Another great guide to communicating sustainable futures from Futerra: "In this guide we argue that climate change is no longer a scientist's problem, it's now a salesman's problem. We call upon government spokespeople, climate campaigners and business advertisers to stop selling visions of hell. Instead we must all create and sell a new vision of a' low carbon heaven'.
  This guide is a new approach for us. Most of our previous thought leadership has been very practical – this is stronger, more opinioned and more controversial. There's still a lot of guidance and original research. But we're not pulling our punches."
  From the report: "Dates, percentages and figures come in action plans, not visions. A 20% cut by 2020 isn’t a vision, it’s a target. Put all the targets together and imagine what the world would be like if we met and exceeded them: that’s a vision."
• Land Securities chief executive accuses Government of lacking courage on sustainability – Modern Building Services – "On the need to dramatically improve the poor energy efficiency of the UK’s existing building stock, he said, ‘Unlike in the USA, the UK always seems to have a reluctance to use carrots and sticks in the tax system to drive behaviour and redirect capital investment. There is good evidence that tax allowances change investment decisions — and these allowances can be temporary.
  ‘I would certainly advocate a much higher level of Enhanced Capital Allowances for investment in energy-saving plant and building adaptations. However, I think the simplest route may be to use the property rates system to reward those who occupy energy-efficient buildings .’"
• Leeds given more power over regeneration – Building – "Rosie Winterton, minister for local government, has signed a programme to give Leeds and its regions more power over housing, planning and regeneration.
  The Leeds City Partnership pilot programme brings together 11 councils, regional partners and central government to create a devolved housing and regeneration board."
• Building4Change : New plant produces energy by mixing fresh water and sea water – "World's first osmotic plant opens, but commercial version will not be available for several years.
  European renewable energy producer Statkraft this month opened the world's first power plant generating energy by mixing fresh water and sea water in Norway.
  The energy is based on the natural phenomenon of osmosis, the transport of water through a semi-permeable membrane. When fresh water meets salt water, substantial amounts of energy are released, which can be used to generate power.
  At the osmotic power plant, fresh water and salt water are guided into separate chambers, divided by an artificial membrane. The salt molecules in the sea water pull the fresh water through the membrane, increasing the pressure on the sea water side. The pressure equals a 120 metre water column, or a significant waterfall, and can be used in a power generating turbine."
• Design Activism: Coming across chemicals: in plastics and in schools – "the main problem with the chemicals is that not enough of them have been properly tested for health effects, and the result is that we only regulate chemicals that we know about. A classic example is BPA, a chemical additive found in bottled water containers, baby bottles and the like. Last year mounting evidence about adverse health effects from BPA caused it to be withdrawn from the market.
  The long term solution to this problem is hatching in the Green Chemistry movement, which is aiming to put the burden of proof of safe chemicals on the manufacturers. Currently a chemical is innocent until proven guilty, however, there are simply too many chemicals and, based on the evidence we do have, no reason to assume their innocence. Proposed green chemistry policies also recognize that health problems might arise for interactive, multiple exposures."
• Ben Casnocha: The Blog: 10 Easily Implementable Life Problem-Solving Strategies – Some great thoughts on procrastination from Ben: ""Can I fail at this?" It's like Raymond Chandler said: there is no success without the possibility of failure. Therefore, something I can't fail at is also something I can't succeed at. I can fail at conducting an interview, writing an essay or making a video. I can't fail at meandering around the internet in search of "neat stuff to read." In a recent tweet, I defined procrastination "the temporary displacement of tasks at which it is possible to fail with tasks at which it is not possible to fail." I suspect I'm less far off the mark than ever, especially regarding why procrastination is not a productive tendency."
• ippr – Institute for Public Policy Research – Left foot forward – "Increased birth rates and an ageing population, coupled with a fall in net immigration into the UK means that natural change, births and deaths – is now responsible for a greater component of the UK’s population increase, rather than immigration.
  But what should a progressive UK population policy look like? It will have to deal with issues such as family size, retirement age, population distribution across the UK, as well as immigration control.
  Attempts to restrict immigration to a zero net immigration level… will have major economic consequences. At present younger immigrants make a greater fiscal contribution than do the older UK-born population. Big restrictions on labour immigration would result in higher taxes, among other outcomes. Fiscal deficits could be alleviated if everyone worked longer… Family impacts on population size, but how would British adults react to being told to stop at two children? What incentives could be offered to families who stop at two?"

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These are my links for September 25th through October 1st:

• "Passive" Heating and Cooling Is a Misnomer. It’s Active. : TreeHugger – "there are 36 Billion square feet of non-residential buildings from the 50s through the 80s that need to be retrofitted and greened. It ain't going to be easy."
• AIArchitect This Week | Buildings Brought to Life: The First Project to Meet the Living Building Challenge Is Only Months Away – "For a building to meet the Living Building Challenge it must consume net-zero energy and water. It must produce net-zero waste. It must choose an ecologically responsible site and maintain it. Inherently unsustainable materials (like lead, mercury, and formaldehyde) are not allowed, and there’s a limited radius from which materials can be transported to the building site during construction. Indoor air quality must be maintained, and, among many other requirements, all of these sustainability features must be featured in educational materials and programs at the building. Since the challenge was formulated in 2006, no building has met it."
• Don’t Underestimate the Power of Information in Pursuing Sustainability | GreenerBuildings.com – "The Energy Passport is a related idea that could be implemented much more easily. Conceived in the early '90s by Dr. Yuri Matrosov of the Moscow Center for Energy Efficiency (CENEf), Energy Passport programs were first adopted in Moscow, then in Germany, which is now pushing for it to be implemented in the EU as a whole.
  The initial Energy Passport is based on modeled energy use and then actual energy use is compared each year with predicted use, which then could be accessed by tenants and others. Clearly, comparing actual energy use with predicted energy use, as well as consumption trends over time, would give designers and developers an incentive to get the prediction right in the first place (parenthetical note, without clear modeling rules it is shockingly easy to game the results of energy models), as well as provide a clear benchmark for operators to manage their buildings more closely."
• Glass Industry Raises Concerns Over ASHRAE 90.1 Revisions That Could Reduce the Use of Glass in Nonresidential Buildings – Impact of potential changes to prescriptive route for ASHRAE 90.1 (similar to old elemental method for Part L) for glazing: "The proposal does not recognize or accommodate the need for different glazing solutions across climate zones. It is a "one size fits all" approach and will limit the glazing choice to a small range of high transmission, clear low-E glazings. They are not the appropriate products in all climate zones, especially the Southern cooling-dominated climates because of the sunlight intensity. Use of such high transmission glass in those climate zones will likely result in greater use of blinds resulting in increasing lighting energy usage.
  …There is only limited possibility for saving energy in buildings unless the space also includes automatic daylighting controls. Even with recent proposals, daylighting controls are only required in rooms where the "primary side-lighted area" is less than 1,000 square feet. …"
• How to keep your mouth shut « Scott Berkun – Oh, I have been here many times. Like Scott, I'm recovering ;o). Read the whole post: "But then later on, in a new job at Microsoft in a group known as MSTE, I discovered a world of dysfunction, despair and passive/aggression. No one spoke their mind in public. Few people worked hard or asked tough questions. Quality of work, and morale, was low. So I soon felt obligated to mention these facts as often and as loudly as possible to leadership. I even expected to be rewarded for telling people how bad things were. Why wouldn’t they want to hear this? I thought.
  Before I knew it, I was that guy. The guy who always complains."
• 500 Internal Server Error – 500 Internal Server Error
• Constructing Excellence in the Built Environment » Blog Archive » Ethics and the Built Environment (by Jon de Souza) – If consultants only get involved at the Jus in Bello stage, is it ethical to build immoral buildings? Waiting avidly for part 2: "At present, the discussions about ethical behaviours in construction largely consider what happens after a decision has been taken to construct – the Jus In Buildo stage if you will. (Told you). What is missing is consideration of that former stage – the question asked is “can we build it”, but not “should we”. This seems to chime with our view of the world – that there are some things that simply shouldn’t be built. I mean, can any of us really morally defend snow domes in Dubai?"
• UK notches strong gains in renewable capacity in 2008 – Politics – Renewable energy news – Recharge – wind, solar, biofuels, wave/tidal/hydro and geothermal – "The UK’s installed renewable generation capacity surged 19% in 2008, thanks largely to a 727 megawatt (MW) increase in onshore wind capacity and a 192MW boost in offshore wind, according to new government statistics.
  At the same time, the amount of electricity produced from renewables in the UK rose a more modest 10%, to 21.6 gigawatt hours (GWh)."

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These are my links for July 14th through July 16th:

• Sustainable Homes – This could open the doors for more LA's to impose CSH (and BREEAM?) levels for planning conditions: "Chelmsford Borough Council requires that Code for Sustainable Homes Level 3 is achieved as a planning condition for new buildings. The developer appealed against this condition but following consideration by the Planning Inspectorate the condition was held as "reasonable and necessary"."
• House 2.0: On triple glazing – Mark Brinkley warming to the idea of Passivhaus: "comfort underlies the PassivHaus take on triple glazing. I have been a voice arguing that triple glazing is “overkill” in the UK climate and that the energy used in making these units would probably never be repaid by the energy saved over their lifetime. However, the main reason for using triple glazing is not to save energy but to provide more comfort, as the internal temperatures remain more even.
  Feist produced a table showing what the temperature differences were close to different forms of glazing when the internal temperature is designed to maintain at around 21°C and the external temperature drops to —5°C.
  • next to a single glazed window, the adjacent temperature is around 1°C
  • next to a double glazed window (2000 vintage), the adjacent temperature is around 11°C
  • next to a triple glazed window, with a centre pane U value of just 0.65, the temperature is 18°C."
• Portland Architecture: A man struggling: Guy Battle comes to Portland – Guy stands up for engineers: "Do engineers deserve more credit?
  Yes, I think so. Engineering is the hidden hand. They have an enormous amount to contribute to architecture, but too often their contribution is gently put to one side. I think it’s something that should be celebrated. You look at someone like Peter Rice or Neil Thomas, Chris Wise, Guy Nordenson, and a host of other fantastic engineers, and they don’t really get the recognition they deserve."
• Ashden Awards (Jonathon Porritt) – Kirklees (again): "Kirklees Metropolitan Borough Council – one of the unsung heroes of local government who have been doing their "sustainability bit" for the last 20 years. But their current home insulation initiative has really made people sit up and listen as it has succeeded in achieving real scale – where so many of the current measures are just picking around at the edges. Here’s what the Award citation said:
  "In 2007, Kirklees Council committed £10 million to providing free loft and cavity-wall insulation for every home in the borough where it can be used. The scheme targets one council ward at a time, using the local Councillor and local advertising, then individual home visits by assessors. By May 2009, 66,000 out of the 172,000 households in the borough had been assessed, 54,000 referred for surveys, 26,000 surveys had been completed, and 21,000 had insulation installed. This avoids an estimated 18,000 tonnes a year of CO2. 140 jobs have been created by the scheme.""
• Cutting carbon with smart finance | Forum For The Future – Innovative financing examples: "For instance, Kirklees’ Re-Charge scheme loans householders money to install low-carbon technologies in their property, such as solar panels to heat water. It is successful because there are no interest charges and the money does not have to be repaid until the property is sold. The council only has to subsidise the interest on the loans and this costs around three times less per home than using a grant scheme."
• FT.com / Weekend columnists / Tim Harford – Carbon footprinting: time to pick up the pace – The ever lucid Tim Harford:"The carbon-footprinting process often produces surprises. An environmentally conscious consumer in the crisps aisle of the supermarket will probably be thinking about packaging or “food miles”. The Carbon Trust reckons that about 1 per cent of the climate impact of a packet of crisps is from moving potatoes around. The largest single culprit is the production of the nitrogen fertiliser, and half of the climate impact in general takes place at the agricultural stage. The point is not that agriculture is always the problem, but that it is very hard for a well-meaning consumer to work out what the green purchasing decision actually is. For this reason, the Carbon Trust has a carbon labelling scheme. The trouble is that many consumers simply do not care enough to pay more or choose a less enjoyable product simply because of the low carbon label."
• Ground Control | PD Smith | Kafka’s mouse – Minton's book duly added to my wishlist. Review: "Sections of our city centres are being sold off to private developers to create shopping monocultures such as Westfield London or "malls without walls" like Stratford City, which is being built for the 2012 Olympics and is one of the largest retail-led developments in Europe. It is, says Minton, "a private city within a city" and represents a return to the early 19th century when aristocrats owned great swathes of London, fortifying their estates of up-market housing with gates and private security forces.
  Now, “land and property which has been in public hands for 150 years or more is moving back into private hands”. Minton argues that today’s privatised city centres and gated communities are fostering "a new culture of authoritarianism and control"."
• Market Research Strategies – Excellent article on generating leads in a down turn market. Primarily aimed at US architects, but easily relatable to UK and engineers/consultants.

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These are my links for May 12th through May 15th:

• Blueprint for green stores | Forum For The Future – "Stephen Heal, the company’s director of climate change programmes, says that the Cheetham Hill store’s carbon emissions should be 70% less than those of an average store of its size in 2006. The sixth Tesco supermarket with the ‘eco-store’ tag, it boasts a natural refrigeration system, a combined heat and power (CHP) plant, a timber frame and cladding, rooflights to allow natural daylight inside – and a ‘very good’ rating for the building on the BRE Environmental Assessment Method (BREEAM) system. Investment costs were around 10% higher than a typical store – but fuel bills are predicted to be 48% lower."
• Burn the trees to save the world? | Forum For The Future – Great overview of biochar – pros and cons: "Today, many climatologists are as excited as agronomists about biochar. Professor Tim Lenton, from the UK’s Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, believes that, of all the large-scale solutions under discussion, biochar and reforestation stand out as the most viable options. Professor Johannes Lehmann, an eminent soil specialist from Cornell University, goes so far as to suggest that it is theoretically possible, by the end of this century, that we could capture 9.5 billion tonnes of carbon each year through biochar production in tropical agricultural systems. If we achieved that level of reduction, atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide would actually be falling. It’s no wonder that, in January, Gaia hypothesist James Lovelock told New Scientist that “There is one way we could save ourselves, and that is through the massive burial of charcoal”. "
• Objectives – www.cecop.org.uk – via Guy Battle:
  The Construction Emissions Community of Practice has the following objectives:
  1. To support the propagation of carbon emissions reporting in building procurement.
  2. To provide an accessible knowledge resource.
  3. To advance theoretical discussion in techniques and methodology.
  4. To support emissions prediction, monitoring and analysis for the reduction of emissions from the construction industry.
  5. To establish protocols for building whole life emissions reporting towards comparability of case studies.
  6. To utilise existing calculation tools, standards and widely available software wherever possible to support widespread adaptability of protocols within the construction industry.
  7. To identify and promote best practice in data collection.
  8. To accumulate and disseminate case studies to a broad construction audience
  9. To demonstrate improvements to sustainability achieved through case studies
• David MacKay, energy star: “How many light bulbs?” « lightbucket – Another great post from Lightbucket, this time analysing what SDC have to say about David McKay: "Trying to read between the lines, I guess Rebecca Willis was trying to make a case against nuclear energy, but somehow ended up arguing against arithmetic instead. David MacKay remarks in a BBC article that “I am not pro-wind or pro-nuclear: I am just pro-arithmetic.” [10]. If I had to speculate about what she’d meant to say, my guess is that Rebecca Willis set out to make an anti-nuclear case, but just came across as anti-arithmetic."
• Planning Portal – Draft single policy for economic growth published – Consultation closes 28 July 2009: "The new PPS will, in its final form, replace PPG 4, PPG 5, PPS 6, and PPS 7 in relation to economic development and paragraphs 53, 54 and Annex D of PPG 13."

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Thanks to whoever alerted me to this great, short TED video. The goal is to harness wind power at 1,000 – 15,000m in the troposhere (much above where wind turbines currently operate). Which reminds me, I must dig out the flexifoil now the evenings are brighter…

Saul Griffith: Inventing a super-kite to tap the energy of high-altitude wind

admin Diversions kite, renewables, Saul Griffith, TED, wind

These are my links for March 11th through March 15th:

• The Building Futures Game – Building Futures – The Building Futures Game is the outcome of 3 years research and development work carried out by the Building Futures team, CABE and architectural practice AOC. The toolkit emerged through a shared desire as to how one might enable communities to think about the future of their neighbourhood, while providing stakeholders with an interactive and alternative way of consulting with a wide variety of groups on their concerns and aspirations.
• Disney Aims for Zero Carbon Emissions, Zero Waste in New Environmental Goals | GreenerBuildings – "The corporate responsibility report lays out seven long-term environmental goals for the company:
  • Zero waste.
  • Zero net direct greenhouse gas emissions from fuels.
  • Reduce indirect greenhouse gas emissions from electricity consumption.
  • Net positive impact on ecosystems.
  • Minimize water use.
  • Minimize product footprint.
  • Inform, empower and activate positive action for the environment"
• T-Zero – "T-ZERO is a free internet tool that provides independent sustainable refurbishment advice to users, with the option of linking directly to the suppliers, manufacturers, and installers of any measures you choose. It is designed for those refurbishing their own homes, homes they manage, or the homes of clients, taking you through a series of simple steps."
• How to Grow Your Own Fresh Air – TED 2009 « GreenSpaces Blog – More 'healthy' plants (I'm slightly obsessed with the original NASA study – spider plants are *good*). Mother in Law's tongue for bedroom, and Areca Palm for living room.
• Welcome to YouCanPlan – via Be2Camp and then EcoBuild: "Our idea is based on the concept of ‘enabled self procurement’ or ESP to help build new sustainable communities. ESP is a process where future residents of communities are supported as the developers of their own homes, combining the choice of self build with the efficiency of speculative development."
• Green for go: sustainability in the JCT contract – Building – "Following an industry-wide consultation, it published Building a Sustainable Future Together, a guidance note which is principally concerned with how sustainability in design and construction is provided for in contract documents. It also includes new contract clauses that extend those currently in JCT contracts, such as the Framework Agreement. The two principal new clauses are:
  1) The contractor is encouraged to suggest economically viable amendments to the employer's requirements which, if instructed as
  a variation, may result in improvement in environmental performance in the carrying out of the works or of the completed works
  2) The contractor shall provide to the employer all the information that he reasonably requests regarding the environmental impact of the supply and use of materials and goods which the contractor selects."
• A second look at solar power on roofspace « lightbucket – Lightbucket doesn't blog often, but when he (she?) does, they're worth reading.
  "Averaged over the year, rooftop PV can exactly match England’s electricity sales, but there is a huge seasonal variation. During the summer, PV output is higher than the full-year average, but electricity demand is lower, so PV can supply more than twice the total demand. The situation reverses in midwinter. In December, the month of lowest insolation, rooftop solar PV can meet only 20% of electricity demand. Additional capacity will be needed to meet winter demand. Energy storage technologies can smooth out variations in output over a 24-hour timecale, and maybe longer, but certainly not over 6 months.
  If we had solar photovoltaics on all roofspace in England, we could comfortably meet England’s summertime electricity use, but only a fifth of wintertime electricity use."
• Ten things to manage in a recession: 4 – executive costs « pwcom 2.0 – Paul illustrates Charles Handy's 'Hollywood' model perfectly: "… some AEC professionals have already opted to work as freelances or as independent consultants, undertaking a succession of contracts of their own choice instead of working for an employer. Particularly in the consultancy sector, just as small firms might combine with others with complementary skills and/or resources, so experienced individual professionals could combine with other independent practitioners to compete for work and then form part of the multi-disciplinary team appointed to undertake the project. …. Being formed of a group of independent ‘e-lances’ or ‘tech-nomads’, the operational overheads of such a multi-disciplinary consortium are also likely to be lower, making their services more cost-effective – an advantage likely to be underlined if the team also uses low-cost collaboration technology to manage and share its data."
• You are the weakest link, goodbye – Joan has a list of funny/tragic redundancy stories.
• cityofsound: Work and The City, Frank Duffy (2008) – Good review of Duffy's book: "In particular, Work and the City convincingly details how this has led to a grossly inefficient under-utilisation of resources with damaging effects on individuals, corporations, and almost all aspects of urban ecosystem."
• Sustainability Consulting: What is it, and am I qualified? Part I « Bright Green Talent Musings (www.brightgreentalent.com) – And I count myself amongst those who say sustainability is NOT a discipline: "As individuals from all kinds of backgrounds and industries push into the field of sustainability consulting, it can become murky as to what that work even entails. This is especially true when considering the different perspectives and methodologies that are employed and adding even more complexity is the variability among clients and their needs. Thus, this quote sums up for me what sustainability consultants are trying to do – they help businesses address and redress the way in which they operate so that they will be better positioned for the market of the future a la decreasing their negative impact on the natural environment. Some argue that like the trends of international business and e-commerce, sustainability will at some point cease to be its own discipline and assume its rightful place within all of business practices."
• » Perpetual beta SuDoBE — Sustainable Design of the Built Environment – Chris makes a great point: "What would happen if we treated buildings as being in perpetual beta state? How would this change things in the construction industry? Perhaps developers and the design team would make a long term commitment to upgrading the building in line with occupants’ (and others’) experiences after the building’s initial release.
  Of course buildings, like most artefacts are in perpetual beta. There are always ‘bugs’ to iron out and features that don’t work. Many of our new low and zero carbon buildings will fail either from the outset or a few months or years down the line. It would be a real step forward if we could admit that now and put in place the mechanisms that will allow us to decide whether they are working as intended, to fix them when they aren’t and to pass on what we have learned to Carbon 2.0. Would the industry allow us to do that? Do we need to ask?"
• Robinson Low Francis to slash staff pay 12.5% – Building – I'm sure this is just the same as cutting salaries by 20-40% – surely they'll just end up doing a similar amount of work, in fewer (probably longer) days (was my experience of working part-time, anyway): "At engineer Scott Wilson, some senior staff have agreed to work three- or four-day weeks, according to Jerome Monro-Lafon, its UK managing director."
• Survey confirms building control officers enforce regs – Building – "The LABC’s survey looked at 2000 projects to see how many potential contraventions would have occurred if a building control officer hadn’t stepped in and enforced the regulations. It found Part A attracted the most enforcement action with building control officers asking for remedial action in 18% of projects followed by Part L at just over 16% and Part B at just under 16%. Part G which deals with hygiene attracted enforcement action in just 1.5% of the surveyed projects."
• Natural lighting and sustainability | Sustainable Building Blog – Building Sustainable Design – "The tightening regulatory allowances placed on artificial lighting are already beginning to push the limits of what lighting technology can deliver. Our regulatory framework must not become unworkable or breed dull, unhealthy and uninteresting visual environments. The lighting community must steer regulation through better government lobbying, but we should not forget the place natural light has in avoiding the need for regulation in the first place."
• Pursuing the Elusive Goal Of a Carbon-Neutral Building by Richard Conniff: Yale Environment 360 – "But Kroon is also a reminder of what even some of the best hearts and minds in the sustainable design movement cannot yet achieve. For a “green premium” unofficially estimated at about 5.7 percent of construction cost, the Kroon design team managed to reduce projected energy use and emissions by 61 percent below the levels for a comparable building of conventional design. The biggest savings came not from sexy new technologies but from figuring out how to make the design function like an old-fashioned cathedral, with a slender profile for maximum daylighting, an east-west orientation for greater solar gain on the long southern exposure, careful use of shading, and plenty of stone and concrete to store thermal energy. A solar photovoltaic array and geothermal wells will supply much of the remaining energy load. “We got damned close to carbon neutral,” boasted a construction manager…"
• Sustainable Cities – The most useful output I've seen from CABE – sustainable cities website. A feast of information and examples: "This website gives expert advice on planning, designing and managing a sustainable place. It cuts through the complexity with clear priorities for action. And it shows which places are getting it right."
• Constructing Excellence in the Built Environment » Blog Archive » Reverting to type (by Don Ward) – Don Ward has a great post: "The industry loves lowest price tendering – it invented it, and back in 1963 codified it in the NJCC’s code of practice for single stage tendering. Large parts of the industry have since conspired with clients over the years to continue with lowest price tendering – it is easy, and it means you don’t have to work too hard to deliver on value. But let’s face it, it usually knowingly sets the project up to fail. It’s a bizarre process – as a questioner said at a conference the other day put on by the Universities of Reading, Loughbrough and Salford, construction must be the only industry that competes to deliver the same thing for the client rather than something different? And is it the only industry that thinks it’s clever to make its money by screwing the client and/or the supply chain?"

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Last Monday I attended Green Monday, a monthly networking event for corporate climate change leaders in London. I was first alerted to Green Monday by Phil back in September, but this month was the first time my calendar had conspired to allow me to attend.

The event kicked off with a panel discussion and then went on to round table discussions. I really enjoyed the panel discussion – some highlights of which I jotted down on the crackberry (I’d been very remiss and forgot pen and paper).

First up was Dr Peter White of Procter & Gamble who was keen to emphasis they exercise no trade-offs. Meaning that it should be possible to have both sustainability AND performance, rather than compromising with a sub-standard product. Coincidently, I am currently reading We-Think
by Charles Leadbetter and P&G are featured heavily in it in the chapter on We-Think business. According to the book P&G have set a goal of getting 50% of their new ideas from external sources and encourages open-innovation. All its patents will be released either 5 years after they are lodged or 3 years after a product is shipped. So the innovative new detergent which washes at 15ºC which Peter referenced, should in theory be in the public domain within 3 years – which can only be a good thing for climate change. This is a vast shift in IP strategy and something all companies should be thinking about, if not yet implementing. The models of business are changing.

Next up was Marie Louise Ter Boek of McDonalds. Colleagues had scoffed at the idea of McD’s having the audacity to sit on such a panel, but times have moved on. The “big bad corporates” are learning and evolving and we are all playing catch-up with each other. Last year’s greenwashers can turn out to be this year’s heroes. Anyway, Marie was heavily referencing DEFRA’s framework which was very timely as I had re-read the summaries that morning. Written by Futerra, there are two strategies  for positively communicating climate change: Rules of the Game (pdf) (relevant to changing attitudes) (long version available from DEFRA here (pdf, 48pages)) and New Rules:New Game (pdf) (relevant to behaviours). Recommended reading and hold an explanation as to why eco-bling such as urban wind turbines might act as a catalyst to further action – big socially visible actions can lead to smaller actions such as energy saving lightbulbs, so whilst we engineers lament the physical energy contribution, we are missing the social knock-on effects – something to ponder).

The third speaker was Alan Knight who was frustrated by our current language of doom and gloom. Do we talk ourselves down? He was keen to emphasis enthusiasm and ambition. What does the future world look like? Imagine a world of 20% of today’s carbon, no poverty, no obesity, diabetes etc. He was also keen to promote the business case for framing solutions in a positive way. As he said, there is no business case for famine (he was referring here to Lovelock’s prediction of 8 billion dying). There is an opportunity to reengineer today’s lifestyle to be 20% carbon but edit out bad choices. Again, no trade-offs. Requires an air of optimism – don’t talk ourself into defeat. Alan “blogs” here (no RSS and very few posts).

The final speaker was Jeremy Leggett of Solar Century. I had high hopes of fireworks given his voice over at CiS, but he was remarkably calm and calculated. He talked of the triple crunch of climate, financial and energy. Asset assessment is, in his opinion, systemically wrong (gas and oil). He was keen to promote The Oil Crunch Report authored by Arup, FirstGroup, Foster + Partners, Scottish and Southern Energy, Solarcentury, Stagecoach Group, Virgin Group, and Yahoo. I’ve not had a chance to read it yet, but the thrust is that a peak in cheap, easily available oil production is likely to hit by 2013, posing a grave risk to the UK and world economy. Other interesting tidbits from Jeremy included the fact that 18 of 27 european countries now have FIT (feed in tariffs). He was also keen to point out that there is no magic bullet – solar is one of maybe 50 families of alternative technologies.

The roundtable discussion afterwards was broken into different topics and I opted for commercial real estate. The table discussed the zero carbon consultation and experience varied from those who had read it several times to those who hadn’t heard of it at all. The majority of us however agreed that we had consultation fatigue. Then it was time to schmooze. Like any of these events, it takes a couple of attendances to build relationships, so no million pound deals were made, but I was pleased overall.

All in all, it was a good gig. I’ve applied for a space again next month. It’s a much more organised and less rowdy event than London Green Drinks (which is currently overrun in it’s current venue – making it a hot, sweaty and slightly unpleasant experience).

mel starrs Opinion business, Climate Change, London, renewables

These are my links for February 7th through February 27th:

• Why and how I blog « Robert Kyriakides’s Weblog – Great post from Robert explaining how he manages to blog so prolifically.
• Expedition’s blog » Think Up Mondays – Chris Wise et al are trying to create something useful out of the recession: "For one year, the employees of Expedition will be dedicating their Monday’s to thinking. Thinking about thinking, thinking about what we do, thinking about how we do it, and why. Think Up, the impetus behind this year of Mondays, is an educational company formed within the auspices of the Useful Simple Trust. The remit is large, but so is the ambition: to use the opportunity that the economic downturn has presented us with to think up a new raison d’etre, and modus operandi as engineers, and to train ourselves into shape."
• Study shows 30% above ASHRAE energy efficiency difficult to reach in buidlings, 50% unreachable- 2/24/2009 12:16:00 PM – Building Design & Construction – "Findings show that although significant energy efficiencies can be achieved (varying by climate zone), reaching a 30 percent reduction above the ASHRAE standard is not feasible using common design approaches and would exceed a 10-year payback. The study concluded that achieving a 50 percent reduction above the standard is not currently reachable. "
• buildoffsite – An industry-wide campaigning organisation that promotes greater uptake of offsite techniques by UK construction.
  Buildoffsite is an alliance of clients, developers, designers, contractors, manufacturers, suppliers, government, advisors and researchers.
  Goal – A ten-fold step-change by 2020 achieving a 100% increase by 2010
• Summary — ManuBuild – "The ManuBuild vision is of a future where customers will be able to purchase high quality, manufactured buildings having a high degree of design flexibility and at low cost compared to today. For the first time, inspirational unconstrained building design will be combined with highly efficient industrialised production.
  ManuBuild targets a radical breakthrough from the current "craft and resource-based construction" to "Open Building Manufacturing", combining ultra-efficient (ambient) manufacturing in factories and on sites with an open system for products and components offering diversity of supply in the market. "
• Passive design primer for offices – Building Sustainable Design – Excellent article from an ex-colleague, Doug King: "Finally, I’d like to introduce the idea of “passive survivability”. This is a concept that will become far more important as we start to feel the pinch of declining fossil fuel resources and over-stretched utility infrastructure. One of the first effects of energy demand exceeding supply will be rolling power cuts, as happened in London’s West End during July 2006. While some businesses may be able to operate with emergency generators, for many the impact could be catastrophic as deep plan buildings will be uninhabitable without artificial lighting and ventilation. Some buildings may have to shut down during the power cuts and for a business, having sent staff home, a whole day’s production may be lost. Passive buildings, on the other hand, should continue to be habitable, albeit with reduced comfort levels, and the backup power supply will only be required to maintain the office equipment."
• Le Corbusier – creator of the modern world – Times Online – Great article – I have an aversion to Le Corb after my history of architecture lectures at Leeds Uni, but I'll be pottering off to the Barbican with every other architect and engineer in the UK in the next few months…
• BREEAM: In USE – The successor to the old BREEAM M&O assessment (management and operation) – In Use, has been announced. No sight of the manual yet, so can't really comment. Looks like it will tie up with DEC's…
• What if Jane Jacobs had directed "Slumdog"? | Congress for the New Urbanism – "Despite their appearance of mess and squalor (and struggles with sewage and public health), the world's major ghettoes are in some ways quite green. Residents often live where they work, rolling up sleeping mats each morning and dispensing with petroleum-fueled commutes. Even garbage is picked clean of all reparable items or tradable commodities, making places like Dharavi the world's ultimate recyclers."
• Architecture: Stephen Bayley discerns the shape of things to come | Art and design | The Observer – "The UK's first Passive House, designed by Bere Architects, is now being built in Camden, North London. It will, perhaps, be a little bit like living on the Northern Line: what fresh air there may be is pre-heated through subterranean channels. Other problems? Ecological perfection will demand a quality of detailing hitherto unknown to our native builders. And there will be no flinging open the windows to greet the new green dawn. That way you squander your patiently retained heat."
• Wind turbines on Bahrain WTC start turning – "The BWTC's turbines are predicted to provide 11-15% of the power needed to operate the offices of the 50 storey twin towers."
• 5 Emerging trends from the recession | Penelope Trunk’s Brazen Careerist – "Generation X is the first generation in the US ever that will earn less than their parents. And Generation Y has an incredible amount of debt due to baby boomers pushing up college costs and housing costs while real wages went down."
• Meteonorm – Global Solar Radiation Database – What is it? – METEONORM 6.1 (Edition 2009) is a comprehensive meteorological reference, incorporating a catalogue of meteorological data and calculation procedures for solar applications and system design at any desired location in the world. It is based on over 23 years of experience in the development of meteorological databases for energy applications.
  METEONORM addresses engineers, architects, teachers, planners and anyone interested in solar energy and climatology.
• Imagine – "‘Imagine’ is a database which captures school design best practice from around the world.
  Architects and researchers from the School of Architecture at the University of Sheffield [BDR] have conducted a critical analysis of over 150 schools, highlighting excellence in design according to different themes. It considers integrated ICT, environmental design and flexibility for space and learning.
  This resource is aimed at providing inspiration for creating innovative teaching and learning environments called for by the Government’s Building Schools for the Future initiative. Research for this database is sponsored by Balfour Beatty Education and Partnerships for Schools. New research is conducted every three months to ensure the database is kept up-to-date and topical."
• Building Enclosure Technology and Environment Council (BETEC) – JBED: Journal of Building Enclosure Design – Free pdf's of back issues of this US/Canadian publication are available here. In Winter 2007 issue there is a good article on the UK experience of air tightness from Nigel Potter of BSRIA. Lots of good data scattered throughout the issues.
• Unversity funding will be linked to their carbon performance | Education | The Guardian – via lagavulin: "From 2011, Hefce will link the money it doles out for capital projects to universities' carbon performance. The smaller the reduction in carbon, the less funding they will get."

mel starrs News air, ashrae, Blogging, BREEAM, cities, construction_industry, consultants, data, database, design, efficiency, Engineering, gen_X, gen_Y, Jane_Jacobs, Le_Corbusier, manufacturing, MMC, offsite, passive, passive_survivability, passivhaus, payback, recession, renewables, Schools, slums, statistics, tightness, UK, weather, wind

These are my links for December 10th through December 15th:

• Monbiot.com » One Shot Left – "… if we are to give ourselves a roughly even chance of preventing more than two degrees of warming, global emissions from energy must peak by 2015 and decline by between six and eight per cent per year from 2020 to 2040, leading to a complete decarbonisation of the global economy soon after 2050. Even this programme would work only if some optimistic assumptions about the response of the biosphere hold true. Delivering a high chance of preventing two degrees of warming would mean cutting global emissions by over 8% a year.
  Is this possible? Is this acceptable? The Tyndall paper points out that annual emission reductions greater than one per cent have “been associated only with economic recession or upheaval.” When the Soviet Union collapsed, they fell by some 5% a year. But you can answer these questions only by considering the alternatives. The trajectory both Barack Obama and Gordon Brown have proposed – an 80% cut by 2050 – means reducing emissions by an average of 2% a year. "
• Monbiot.com » At Last, A Date – Peak oil prediction by IEA within next 20 years: “Although global oil production in total is not expected to peak before 2030, production of conventional oil … is projected to level off towards the end of the projection period.”(10) These bland words reveal a major shift. Never before has one of the IEA’s energy outlooks forecast the peaking or plateauing of the world’s conventional oil production (which is what we mean when we talk about peak oil).
• Blog | Yudelson Associates | Green Building Consulting – The town of Santa Coloma de Gramenet, near Barcelona, Spain, installed 462 solar panels on top of mausoleums in the town cemetery, after an extensive public relations campaign with the kin of the deceased, proving once again that there is space for solar just about in any town.
• The Natural Edge Project – Australian Sustainability Think Tank – "The Natural Edge Project (TNEP) is an independent Sustainability Think-Tank based in Australia. TNEP operates as a partnership for education, research and policy development on innovation for sustainable development.
  TNEP's mission is to contribute to and succinctly communicate leading research, case studies, tools and strategies for achieving sustainable development across government, business and civil society.
  Driven by a team of early career Australians, the non-profit Project receives mentoring and support from a range of experts and leading organisations in Australia and internationally, through a generational exchange model. "
• A Mortgage Banker In Amish Country : NPR – "When you lend to the Amish, you're making a loan that you're going to keep. You can't sell that loan to some other investor.
  That's because Amish loans can't be securitized — they can't be turned into a mortgage-backed security or a collateralized debt obligation — like all of those subprime loans that have caused so much trouble.
  You can't do that for an odd legal reason. Homes that don't have electric power don't qualify for securitization. Neither do homes without traditional insurance. Amish homes are unmodernized, and the Amish use their own kind of insurance. "
• Real Advice Hurts | 43 Folders – Merlin is back on top form. "We can’t get good at something solely by reading about it. And we’ll never make giant leaps in any endeavor by treating it like a snack food that we munch on whenever we’re getting bored. You get good at something by doing it repeatedly. And by listening to specific criticism from people who are already good at what you do. And by a dedication to getting better, even when it’s inconvenient and may not involve a handy bulleted list."
• Reject environmentally harmful work, says engineer Mark Whitby – Building Design – Glass houses and all that. Who among us is completely beyond reproach when it comes to a squeaky clean portfolio of work? Mark Whitby calls for a boycott – do they work? Tricky topic and something I've mulled over to no conclusion (yet).
• Prince looks to past for the future – Building Design – What should low energy housing look like? Prince's Foundation says veracular rules and it's what the public want. Is this true? Do the public want this or do they simply buy what is available? Have they any choice given the business model for house building in the UK? Interesting questions…
• London heating standards in pipeline – Building – The Greater London Authority (GLA) will develop a technical standard for district and combined heat and power (CHP) in the capital as well as rules to ensure customers get a “fair deal” for heat.
• Obama’s Green Building Agenda – BusinessWeek – As the President-Elect prepares to take office, The U.S. Green Building Council has put together an agenda of sustainable policies he should pursue
• Carbon-calculating data site Amee scores seven-figure investment | Media | guardian.co.uk – Two of my online worlds colliding – venture capital and low carbon: "Amee – the Avoiding Mass Extinction Engine – has built up a loyal following since it launched in 2005, its strategy of developing a "Wikipedia for carbon data" approach hitting a very distinct need among government and big business alike.
  The site, which has grown from 2.5 staff at the start to 12 today, has scored seven-figure funding from O'Reilly Alphatech Ventures, Tag Venture, and Union Square Ventures, one of the investors behind Twitter."
• Mark Brinkley on Whatever Happened to MMC? – So why does MMC work so well in other countries and why has it had such difficulties in establishing itself in Britain? Could it be that it’s actually nothing to do with British builders being backward and everything to do with the boom-bust nature of our property markets. There is little point investing heavily in manufacturing plant if, every twenty years or so, you get wiped out by a bust. Twenty years just isn’t a long enough timespan to make it all worthwhile. The countries where MMC prospers tend to be ones with very low rates of speculative housebuilding and, conversely, very high levels of custom home building, what we would call selfbuild.

mel starrs News advice, amee, amish, BRE, carbon_footprint, CHP, clients, construction_industry, csh4, ethics, foundation, MMC, Mortgage, princes, Procurement, renewables, Software, US, USGBC

These are my links for December 9th from 09:37 to 09:37:

• Toolkits. London Energy Partnership – "Low Carbon Designer"
  An electronic toolkit that allows developers, building design engineers and planners to assess the energy performance of a proposed development using the London Plan energy hierarchy. The software has been designed to encourage energy statements to be produced and assessed in a consistent manner.
  "London's Community Heating Database"
  A database of London's community heating, CHP and district heating schemes. The database is designed to assist those looking to safeguard, develop or connect to these schemes in line with London Plan policy 4.A.It is also designed to be 'future proof' – i.e. it will accommodate new schemes as they are approved and new connections between schemes as the planned expansion of decentralised energy networks materialises in London.

mel starrs News LEP, London, renewables, toolkits