EcoWarriorMe

On noticing that this would be EcoWarriorMe's 100th post, I thought it would be a good opportunity to review what we set out to do and how the blog has developed over the past two years and to highlight some of the most popular posts and personal favourites. The blog was born of a frustration at the general apathy and lack of progress towards a more sustainable society including climate change, pollution, wasteful squandering of precious resources and the relentless despoiling of our natural environment.  I aimed to highlight things that we can do to reduce our negative impact and demystify some of the competing arguments for and against particular courses of action.  I knew that I didn't have all of the answers and I still don't. I don't even know all the questions although I'm working on that. I enjoy learning and am interested in the science and engineering on which our modern society is based but I expected to probe a bit deeper rather then taking things at fa...

I received the following e-mail from Greenpeace on a very important topic: the UK's commitment to reducing greenhouse has emissions in electricity generation. The draft Energy Bill does not yet have such a commitment so read on to find how you can help ensure it makes it into the final bill and please spread the word:

We must find alternatives to fossil fuels for our energy. We must also tackle the huge amount of waste we send to landfill. Waste that is packed with energy. An obvious solution would be to extract energy from the waste but it is never that simple.  Energy can be extracted using different technologies such as anaerobic digestion used in some material recovery facilities or direct combustion (incineration) of the waste. EcoWarriorMe has previously commented  on anaerobic digestion which produces methane gas that can be burned to produce heat, generate electricity or, in the case of CHP, both. The main criticism of this technology is that it generates demand for waste, particularly organic waste such as food. Incineration is probably the most controversial of the technologies due to the toxins which can be emitted from the plant.  In the 1980s, controversy surrounded the waste incineration plant at Bonnybridge near Falkirk which was blamed for illness in livestock w...

Following the recent attack on wind farms by MPS, I wanted to look at the cost of wind energy in fairly broad terms.  The latest attack on wind farm development is by a list of over 100 hundred Members of Parliament from across the political spectrum (I counted 2 Labour, 2 Lib-dems, one DUP, with the remainder being conservative) who wrote an open letter to the Prime Minister calling for a ban on any subsidies and tightening planning controls to make it easier for people to block developments. This coming from a government that wants to reform planning to include "presumption in favour of sustainable development".  They appear to rate wind farms as unsustainable while new housing on greenbelt is perfectly sustainable; we have so much green space that we can build on it now without limiting future generations ability to build on it too!

I took my 6 year old daughter Christmas shopping the other week. We went to Lush , the hand made cosmetics company, looking for a gift for her mother. She was in heaven: the bright colours, the smells, the glitter and the pretty shapes of the soaps and bath bombs. There was no difficulty in choosing a gift for mother (especially one she might share), the only problem was deciding to stop!

Are wind farms a blot on the landscape? What are those white things over there? Oh, they're sheep.

Earlier this week EdF Energy announced the preferred bidder for the £100 million contract for site preparation works at one of the first sites for a new nuclear power station: Hinkley Point C in Somerset. The work is subject to satisfying planning conditions but includes site preparation, excavation and installation of construction site infrastructure to allow main construction to begin. They also announced an agreement with AREVA in relation to the early design work for the main reactor systems, which will allow AREVA to begin the work in January. The following day they welcomed decisions by the Office of Nuclear Regulation (ONR) to issue an Interim Design Acceptance Confirmation, and the Environment Agency to issue an Interim Statement of Design Acceptability, for the EPR Pressurised Water Reactor. This is the same basic reactor design that has proven problematic at Flamanville in France.The new reactor at Flamanville is estimated to be about 4 years late and almost double the o...

There has been a lot of discussion recently about rising domestic energy prices and competition failures in the market, most recently the figures published by Ofgem on the profit made per customer by the big six energy suppliers. While these snapshot figures may not be particularly helpful in telling the whole story, they certainly reveal enough to raise the issue to the top of the agenda. The market is poorly functioning and there is too much complexity, lengthy tie-ins on the best deals and better deals for new customers.  This is an inevitable consequence of different suppliers selling essentially an identical product, with price being the only comparison.  The lights aren't brighter with electricity from one supplier compared with another, only cheaper or dearer.

Despite the austerity measures we currently face, the government has miraculously found £250 million to encourage local authorities to reinstate weekly refuse collections in England. There is, apparently, a huge public outcry about the change to fortnightly collections. Certain parts of the press have been stirring up scare stories about rubbish piling up on our streets for weeks, giving off bad smells and attracting vermin. Not only is a concern, it is also an election issue according to the Daily Mail. Many years ago, our council changed from twice weekly collections to weekly collections and similar stories were spun but were never realised. At that time the bins were changed from small metal bins that the bin men carried to the truck and emptied to larger bins with single use removable liners, starting a trend of producing plastic bags with a single use-putting it in the bin. I don't know the details of individual fortnightly bin collections around England, but the new f...

In a recent post to the renewable-energy Yahoo group, a post compared the production of aircraft during World War II with the manufacture of wind turbines in order to achieve 100% renewable energy in the US.  It is a fitting comparison since the threat from global warming is every bit as serious a threat to our way of life as Hitler was.  If only it was as visible as a line of tanks crushing everything before them as they trundled through Europe then the powers that be would be motivated to take action rather than talk around the issue.  The same media that denies global warming would support measures to tackle it for fear of being unpatriotic and thus motivate mass participation in carbon reduction programmes. Back to the original quote:

The West of Scotland has seen one of the wettest Mays on record, with over double the average rainfall , and June looks to be heading the same way. Not a good omen for hiking and camping in Argyll with children but we persevered. To a point. Our first ambition was to climb the second lowest Munros, Ben Vane, which at 915m just makes it onto the list of Scotland's 3000 ft mountains.  We started out from the National Park's Visitor Centre at Inveruglas and hiked up access track leading to the hydro electric dam at Loch Sloy before starting up the mountain itself.  After a total of two hours walking in persistently heavy rain, with little prospect of improvement or of a view at the top we had enough of nature and turned back. While the outcome for the day was disappointing, it did show why this is such a good place for a hydro-electric scheme.  It is no surprise that over a third of Scotland's renewable electricity comes from hydro schemes, some dating bac...

After a relaxing weekend by the seaside, away from television and internet, I have returned to find a busy News weekend and here is a round up of the stories catching my attention: BBC News - Global carbon emissions reach record, says IEA  - disappointing, but if the global economy is to grow using the established economic models, it is inevitable. This highlights the enormity of the changes that are required to decouple our economy and prosperity from carbon. BBC News - Germany: Nuclear power plants to close by 2022  - bold decision, but how will the industrial bedrock of Germany's economy cope with increasing reliance on renewable energy? The country has limited coastline for marine renewables so will be limited to wind energy, or solar in the south.  Will fossil fuel use increase as nuclear is phased out, or will the German grid simply import nuclear base load from France? BBC News - France expands nuclear power plans despite Fukushima  -...

I read a paper recently which examined the possible UK electricity generation  mix by 2030 and whether it could achieve the required carbon reduction targets.  The aim of the paper was to consider the extreme conditions faced by the electricity grid with different energy mixes. The target for carbon reduction for the UK is 80% of 1990 levels by 2050.  In order to meet this it is necessary to reduce carbon emissions arising from electricity generation from the current value of 560 gCO2/kWh (CCC, 2008) to 70 gCO2/kWh by 2030.   Two scenarios were modeled to assess whether this could be achieved: one with a high penetration of renewable energy, predominantly wind power, and the other with a high proportion of renewable energy, tidal energy from a Severn Barrage, Carbon Capture and Storage schemes on 80% of coal and gas power stations and an increase of approximately 20% in nuclear generation. The authors found that only the latter option cou...

Last week saw a stunning landslide victory for the Scottish National Party in elections to the Scottish Parliament, achieving an overall majority; the first party to do so since inception of the Parliament in 1999.  This removes a key barrier to implementing policies leaving no excuse for failure. The SNP election manifesto is big on environmental pledges, including promoting green heat, reducing fuel poverty, reducing waste and increasing renewable energy.  In fact, its ambition for renewable energy is one of the boldest I've seen: 100% of renewable electricity by 2020. An extract from the Manifesto is shown below: So, 100% of electricity from renewable sources within 9 years.  This requires a factor of 4 increase in generation from the current 25-30%, or perhaps more achievable a doubling of electricity generation combined  with a halving of consumption.  Even then it is ambitious, so how can it be achieved? The extra generation is anticipated to come fro...

There have been no fatalities yet as a result of the explosions and resulting radiation leaks at the Fukushima Nuclear Plant, although some of the heroic workers have been injured. Compare this with he death toll from the 11th March 2011 earthquake and tsunami which is sitting at over 14,000, with a further 13,000 still listed as missing; it is likely that the final death toll will exceed 25,000. Even so, this is only a tenth of the number killed in the earthquake and resulting tsunami that struck in the Indian Ocean on the 26th of December 2004. Why then are we so obsessed by the fate of the nuclear plant rather than about all those others who perished from a nasty trick of nature, or all those displaced and struggling to scratch an existence? On the 25th anniversary of the world’s worst nuclear disaster, in which 56 people died as a direct result of radiation exposure, the anti-nuclear lobby has hit fever pitch. Official estimates by the Chernobyl Forum, a group which includes ...

By switching off electrical appliances rather than putting them on standby could save the average British  household £37 per year, that is around 3-4% of the average annual domestic electricity consumption. But what is this in terms of overall energy consumption? The   average   electricity consumption is   4,800 kWh per household The  average  UK annual gas consumption is 16,000 kWh per household Carbon emissions for electricity are typically 0.55kg CO2/kWh giving 2640kg/year. Carbon emissions for gas are typically 0.185kg CO2/kWh giving 2960kg/year. Giving a total of 5600kg So a generous 4% saving on electricity (105kg) results in a total saving of 1.9%.  Domestic energy consumption accounts for around 30% of overall UK energy consumption therefore if EVERYONE makes this saving that will result in a total reduction in carbon emissions of around 0.5%.  In reality, many people will not take implement this change, more appliances will ...