Over in the US they will be staging Earth Day 2008 next week (on April 22, to be precise). The Earth Day Network is approaching its 40th birthday and was born out of a pressing need to raise awareness of the parlous state of the North American environment back in the early 1970s. Since that time, the organisation has mobilised to spread the environmental message worldwide through education, politics, events, and consumer activism.
The purpose of such organisations is to get people working in concert towards a worthy goal – a goal that is likely to involve a degree of self-sacrifice and changes of habits and attitudes. Of course, it’s a tall order - none of us wants to give up the trappings of modern 21st century life, particularly when we’re surrounded by others who demonstrably show no desire to join the party. Self-motivation is difficult when you get the impression your individual effort is a mere drop in the ocean – bit like voting for a lost cause; it’s a waste of time, isn’t it?
But we continue doggedly to chip away at the edges of the issue, lugging our bottles and cans to the recycling bay, placing bricks in our WC cisterns or even splashing out on a solar panel, a micro wind turbine, or a condensing boiler – and then realise we’ll be in our dotage by the time such investments start to pay back. But then that wasn’t the reason for doing it in the first place - was it?
Incentive is everything it seems. As we have observed many times in the pages of DPA, make a sound financial case for an energy-saving investment and you’ll persuade someone to remove a mechanical damper on a fan installation and replace it with a variable speed drive. It wasn’t the altruism of removing a source of energy wastage in order to reduce carbon dioxide emissions – it was the fact that it could be demonstrated that such an action would save money in the longer run. The carbon emissions reduction thing would be good PR for the company after the event!
That’s not a harsh judgement of the industry – just a statement of plain fact. Like the machine builder who has a tight budget to deliver: why incorporate energy saving devices into the design when they weren’t specified in the first place? Brave is the machine builder that suggests their client should spend a little more to incorporate them purely on environmental grounds. But factor in a possible penalty on the client in terms of carbon trading costs, better still an incentive like a tax break, and you’re no longer on a hiding to nothing.
Setting aside the cynicism for a moment, it’s refreshing to see how truly concerted action is gradually but surely changing attitudes and providing a platform for the development of innovative ideas and products. In a recent newsletter, I pulled up a few highlights from the automotive sector – arguably the most vibrant in terms of ‘engineering for the environment’ at the moment.
On a more modest scale, we have products like IDC’s brand new SolarStore system (www.idc.uk.com) which is set to provide a cheap source of domestic hot water – no gas or electricity required. Costing around £100, this system could pay for itself in just six months – rather better than conventional domestic solar hot water systems that cost in the region of £2,500 and take ten or more years to pay back (there’s that financial incentive raising its ugly head again).
Meanwhile, the Canadian company, Userful Corporation (www.userful.com/greenpc) is claiming that its software product, which enables up to ten people to work from one desktop simply by adding extra monitors, mice and keyboards, has saved 29,000 tons of carbon dioxide emissions in the past year – equivalent to taking 5,000 cars off the road. I’m not about to explain the basis of this calculation – just go to the company’s web site for enlightenment. Nevertheless, the concept demonstrates how quite a bit can be achieved across a small community with relatively modest means. It not only shrinks the carbon footprint of a computer-using community in terms of energy consumption, but also reduces the pile of end-of-life waste.
And then there’s that old chestnut – the ‘standby’ button on your television set. I’ve lost count of the numbers of power stations we could do without simply by pulling the plug on our sets, rather than pressing the standby button. A lot of hot air? Well, apparently so. In as little as ten years, the consumer electronics industry has made considerable strides to reduce the amount of power consumed by domestic electronics in standby mode.
According to Laurence Harrison, director of consumer electronics at the trade body, Intellect, the industry has been consistently improving the energy efficiency of its products. Between 1995 and 2006, television manufacturers have managed to reduce the energy consumption of the standby function by a staggering 94%, from around 30W in 1995 to just 1.8W today. We’re talking savings in terms of billions of kWh and millions of tonnes of CO2. Mr Harrison believes that an approach to energy efficiency that fosters competition and innovation does indeed work.
So, while we may still be required to make very significant changes in our lifestyles as the full import of global warming becomes apparent, there’s still a lot to be said for the ‘slowly, slowly catchy monkey’ approach. Small changes are easier to digest – and no matter how insignificant they may appear on the surface, they can serve a useful purpose. As that homely phrase, now hijacked by the advertising industry, so aptly puts it: every little helps!
Les Hunt
Editor