Giant leap - Forum for the Future

Transcription

greenfutures
No.85 July 2012
Giant leap
Where will small steps in
human engineering take us?
A catwalk to copy: cool models for future business
Toying with the future: the rise of green gamification
Supermarket surprise: making a shop a community hub
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Over the last 12,000 years or so, human society has evolved beyond
anything imaginable to our distant ancestors. We’ve developed agriculture,
industry, laptops and lattes, great cities, space travel and Wifi. But we’ve remained
resolutely unchanged in one respect: our bodies. They are still, to all intents and purposes,
those of hunter-gatherers, perfectly honed for chasing supper across the plain and
gathering nuts in May. The fact that we no longer have a hunter-gathering lifestyle, let alone
diet, explains why many of us aren’t exactly optimal examples of the form. But as we’re
reminded in ‘Food for the Future’, a Special Edition with this issue, trimming our insatiable
appetites is only part of the answer. We also need to produce more food where it’s needed.
However, some scientists are questioning whether we can’t make ourselves more fit
for (21st century) purpose. Can we design out those tiresome human frailties – like, say,
the need for regular sleep, warmth (but not too much), and significant quantities of food or
water? Imagine, in other words, a new body primed for a crowded, resource-constrained
world. And not just the body either: we could tinker with our brains so that altruism and
empathy become second nature. And if that all sounds far too Frankenstein-esque for
comfort, consider the fantastic advances which have enabled this summer’s Paralympian
athletes to shine (see ‘Beyond the Finish’, our second Special Edition). Most of us would at
least pause before we condemned those as unnatural. In ‘Humanity 2.0’ [p16], Carl Frankel
explores just what being human could be like in the age of the bioengineer.
Of course, in some respects our ancient bodies suit modern living rather well. The
opposable thumbs which evolved to grasp branches and tools are pretty handy with a
games controller, and we’d never have a chance of reaching Level 4 in Call of Duty without
those faculties that helped our hunting forebears ruthlessly pursue their quarry.
Just a pity they can’t be put to better use, you may think. In which case you’re
probably not up to speed with all the excitement around ‘gamification’ – the application
of gaming techniques to tackle everything from curing AIDS to designing green cities
[‘Everything to play for’, p20].
Gaming conjures up images of the solitary teenager, zapping away in his lonely
bedroom. But this is only part of the story. Increasingly, collaboration is at the heart of
gaming. For all our fears about techno-solitude, we’re doing more than ever together,
peer-to-peer. Small wonder, then, that some of the smartest new business ideas – ones
you’ve probably heard of, like Kickstarter and Airbnb, and ones you probably haven’t, but
will, such as Taskrabbit and Kiva – have peer-to-peer relationships at the heart of their
logic. And they may just prove to be more sustainable too – see ‘Next year’s model’ [p32].
Seeing how things fit with and depend on each other (the heart of systems thinking) is
a whole lot easier if they’re woven together through human interaction. So if models like
these take off, become the norm even, we may not have to be re-engineered for altruism
after all. We might be able, in Jeffrey Hollender’s words [p26], to “remap our minds”. We
could learn new ways of collaboration which work for individuals as well as the group, and
also for the ecosystems on which we all depend. Which, come to think of it, is more or less
what our hunter-gathering ancestors did.
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Editor in Chief
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1
Contents
9
00
Number 85, July 2012
24
15
36
12
31
21
43
33
Features
16 H
umanity 2.0
As bioengineers explore how to
design our way out of human limitations,
Carl Frankel asks if we’re poised on
the threshold of the ultimate upgrade.
20 E
verything to play for
Can games drive change for a
sustainable world? Sophie Curtis
toys with the future.
26 T
he Green Futures interview:
Anna Simpson meets Jeffrey
Hollender, America’s leading
sustainable business guru.
28 Retail revolutionary
Sue Wheat meets Kate Bull, founder
of The People’s Supermarket.
32 Next year’s model
Some of the coolest companies
on the planet are pioneering
dramatically new business models,
reports Martin Wright.
Briefings
Regulars
Partner viewpoints
The latest in green innovation, including:
4 The future in context
Peter Madden sees a future where
privacy is passé
30 River deep, mountain high
From Afghanistan to Wales,
sustainable energy hits the highs
Ashden Awards
42 T
reading air and water
Measuring the relationship between
footprints and facts
40 Plastic pioneers
Turning farm waste into forks
Ecover
43 C
atching practice
Tracking the truth of sustainable fish
Marine Stewardship Council
41 Open house
Can co-housing herald a new age
of considerism?
Triodos Bank
45 C
an the Lorax close the loop?
A blockbuster boost for
cartridge recycling
Hewlett-Packard
5H
ow the crowd sniffs
A handheld device to nose out pollution
8N
oah’s architecture
A home that floats above the floods
9G
host town of the future
A new city without people
10 T
he coolest light
LEDs break the efficiency barrier
12 R
oots revolution
Bringing biochar to market
13 H
ot flush
Paris apartments keep warm
with algaea
2
24 A thousand words
The metaphor of a million neurons
35 Forum update
Loo papers of the future; digital
dynamism springs out of Shoreditch;
and Sally Uren: why it’s time to
repurpose purpose
46 Feedback
Readers respond online and in print
48 Jonathon Porritt
What Isaac Newton could learn from
Jeremy Grantham
3
Peter Madden
Briefings
The future in context
Desktop detective
How the crowd sniffs
‘Air Quality Egg’ hatches people-powered pollution maps
Can citizen science clean up the air?
Maybe, if it’s using Air Quality Egg: a small
internet-enabled sensor designed to help
crowdsource pollution maps.
Final designs for the Egg are still being
tested, but it has already raised $120,000 on
crowdfunding site Kickstarter, and the first
production run is planned for the late summer.
It’s envisaged that an individual Egg will sell
for around $100, with DIY kits from $40.
The hardware is described as ‘open source’,
and uses off-the-shelf components to
keep costs down and encourage owners
to customise and improve upon it. Initial
designs suggest it will be, as its name
implies, a smooth egg shape, able to sit in
the hand or be placed on a shelf or desk.
When complete, a series of passive
sensors inside the Egg will analyse air as it
passes through the device. These will use
Privacy is passé
What will surveillance mean for
sustainability?
4
I think that more monitoring and data about
ecosystems and biodiversity will largely be a good
thing. Who wouldn’t want clearer information of
what’s happening in our oceans, with every ship
and ferry carrying a sampling device? Who would
disagree with better tracing, verification and policing
of commercial logging or fishing? Who would argue
against using remote sensing for improved disaster
prevention and response? Remember, the global
climate change frameworks will require robust
systems of verification for carbon markets to work.
Yet surveillance will also, inevitably, be directed
at individuals – particularly since much of it is done
under justification of the fight against terrorism.
Government and business will get much better at
correlating a lot of data from various sources in
order to profile people in much greater detail. Given
that it is, on the whole, our individual choices and
behaviours that lead to environmental damage, there
is a logical argument for using such data to encourage
different choices.
Governments will certainly make use of
surveillance – to maintain security and raise taxes,
as well as to implement environmental regulation.
Businesses will use it to guarantee their supply chains
or know their customers better. And civil society, too,
will draw on data to hold others to account.
Twenty-five years ago, in the US, the Toxics
Release Inventory showed that disclosing
information about chemical pollution could spur
communities to campaign and pressure for
improvements. Twenty-five years hence, citizens
across the world could be using data to compare
their environmental footprints, to interrogate
company supply chains or to monitor compliance
with global environmental agreements.
The data will certainly be there. The big question
is who will do the watching and who will control the
information?
Peter Madden is Chief Executive,
Forum for the Future.
enough to identify patterns in air quality,
and so help communities to challenge
local polluters.
“The point is that it’s exponentially
cheaper than scientific gear”, Borden says.
“Even [the average] non-internet connected
handheld sensor is six to seven times the
cost. Anything in the scientific range is tens
of thousands of dollars.”
Nick Hewitt, Professor of Atmospheric
Chemistry at the Lancaster Environment
Centre, agrees that the Egg should
uncover areas for further research. He
also thinks it could provide valuable data
about our homes.
“There are a lot of outdoor sensors,”
Hewitt says, “but most people spend a lot
of time indoors – a third of their lives in the
bedroom. We have very little data about that
to study.” – Adam Oxford
See-through sites
Can the internet nudge corporates towards transparency?
Photo: istock/thinkstock
In the future, don’t
expect any privacy.
Every move, every
purchase, even every
thought – as personality
profiling becomes more
sophisticated – will be observed, logged and analysed.
Big Brother will certainly be watching us.
We might expect our shopping and showering
behaviours to be tracked as part of our individual
carbon budgets. As you drive around a city, your
combined congestion and pollution charge could
vary depending on which route you take, on the
time of day, and on how much you add to local air
pollution. Globally, important conservation sites
might be guarded, not by fences or rangers, but by
remote sensors and cameras, monitored by teams of
volunteers on the other side of the planet.
On current trends, this surveillance society seems
bound to happen. In some ways, it is already with us.
The UK already has more CCTV cameras per capita
than any European country – an estimated 4 million in
total – and the Government recently announced plans
for radically increased internet surveillance in the
Queen’s Speech.
The cost of monitoring devices is tumbling, while
the amount of data generated is exploding. Many of us
carry location-aware devices around with us, leaving
a digital trail of our movements. And nobody seems
to care too much about the implications. While there
was a fierce argument in the UK about the introduction
of identity cards, most people seem happy to hand
data about their daily lives to Google and Facebook, to
transport authorities through travel cards like London’s
Oyster, or to retailers through loyalty schemes.
Given that more people want to catalogue the
minutiae of their personal lives online – that they
actively want to be watched – we may eventually see
the disappearance of privacy as a concept…
What does this mean for sustainability? Will this
monitoring capacity be used to improve stewardship
of natural resources? Or to prompt more responsible
lifestyle choices? Or will it result in a more passive
population, for whom daily decisions are made by
algorithms based on past personal preferences and
current resource efficiency?
a variety of electromagnetic, chemical and
optical techniques to detect concentrations
of carbon monoxide, nitrogen dioxide,
temperature and humidity, with optional extra
sensors for ozone, particulates and radiation.
Results are uploaded directly to data clearing
house Pachube (www.pachube.com), where
they can be viewed as an individual reading
or as part of an area map.
Project lead Ed Borden explains that the
Egg evolved during work with volunteers
in Japan, who mapped realtime radiation
levels following the Fukushima disaster. It’s
been criticised by some academics, who
say that the uncalibrated sensors won’t be
meaningfully accurate for serious scientific
research.
Borden acknowledges this, but is
confident that the volume of data generated
by many users over time will be accurate
Any forward-thinking brand wants to know
its customers better, but a new generation of
online tools is turning the trend on its head,
by helping consumers get under the skin of
their suppliers. Drawing on open sources of
data and familiar formats, such as Google
maps, these platforms collate information
that was previously obscure, and present it in
a more intuitive format. Of course, the most
innovative companies are stripping down
voluntarily.
Take the fashion label Rapanui, which
specialises in organic materials. It offers
an interactive online map which enables
customers to track the impact of an
appealing item from seed to shelf, taking
its carbon and water footprints, toxicity,
transport, and trade conditions into account.
Buy a shirt, and you don’t just pick the print.
You choose the one made with organic
cotton grown in the Aegean, then cut and
sewn in Izmir in a factory audited by Fair
Wear Foundation, which gets a share of its
energy from a photovoltaic array...
Rapanui is also offering less curious
customers a shortcut in the form of an
ecolabel, summarising the overall impact.
“This ability to make a quick informed choice
is something missing from, but entirely
compatible with, the high street”, co-founder
Mart Drake-Knight explains. “It’s fast, easy
and free – and it means that consumer
buying power works with sustainability.”
He’s not the only one with this vision.
Designer Bruno Pieters set up Honest by, a
luxury fashion store which reveals meticulous
details of the supply chain, from materials to
manufacturing to distribution, down to the
pricing structures [see GF84, p28].
But it’s not just fashion that’s going
see-through. Honest Buildings has created
a profile for every building with an address
in the US, with the aim of accelerating lowenergy, high-performance construction and
retrofit. It collates details of a building’s size,
efficiency ratings and LEED certification,
allowing buyers, tenants or developers to
make quick comparisons. It’s free to use,
with an upgrade option for agents or owners
wanting to promote particular innovations.
A quick search over Seattle tells you that
the 102,975ft2 Joseph Vance office building
on 3rd Avenue is Gold LEED certified,
and also part of the city’s 2030 District – a
public-private collaboration which has set out
to prove that high-performance, low-carbon
construction makes sense for investors.
Shame on any neighbours who aren’t on
board… Any questions? Honest Buildings
also puts prospective tenants, occupants,
service providers and the owners of a
building in touch, through an online network.
– Prina Shah
Revealing footprints
5
Battery come-back
Making old computers purr
Honda gets ‘world first’ mass production recycling scheme underway
Maverick server developers seek to break IT’s obsession with the new
the new facility, which was developed with
a significant subsidy from the Japanese
Government and sits alongside a smelter
owned by JMC in Oguni, a small settlement
north of Tokyo.
The name ‘rare earths’, used to describe
a grouping of 17 chemical elements including
scandium, cerium and lanthanum, is
something of a misnomer. Such metals are
not so much ‘rare’ as in scarce supply. JeanPaul Tognet, a global authority on rare earths,
says there are some 200 development
projects to mine these substances underway
around the world, but that it could take
several years to bring even the most
promising on stream.
For now, China remains far and away
the largest single supplier. Its recent cuts to
exports of rare earths have caused a price
spike and increased pressure to recycle
them.
Honda maintains that the supply crunch
is not the key driver behind the new plant.
Other organisations are well advanced in
developing competing rare earth extraction
technologies – notably Tognet’s long-time
employer Rhodia, the chemicals group.
Honda’s initiative is welcome, Tognet
says, because “it is important for all the
big car companies to show they are strong
actors in recycling systems for batteries of
electric cars”. – Virginia Marsh
A battery made from wood?
Lignin-based cathodes could boost prospects for wind and solar power
6
Milczarek from Poznan University of
Technology in Poland.
So, how come a plant-based material
can perform a function previously associated
with a metal? Essentially, the lignin
derivatives – which have insulating properties
– can be combined with a conductive
polymer called a polypyrole into a composite
which can hold an electric charge.
Professor Inganäs said that design work
was progressing, but he did not want to
speculate at this stage on precise timescales
and potential future usage of the technology.
“It’s too early to talk about these things”,
he said. “It has great potential but it needs
further extensive work and study. With this
kind of work, there is often a 15- to 20-year
period between discovery and application,
though it does not need to be that long.
Much of it will be about marketing and
beyond science.”
One of the main advantages of using
lignin lies in its ready availability. The metal
oxides which are used in traditional lithiumion batteries can be harder to get hold of,
and at least one, cobalt, is relatively rare.
– Andrew Collier
As far as whoever is using the machines is
concerned, they will behave like shiny new
ones – even if their looks aren’t exactly up
to date.
Another project with a complementary
goal is Lubuntu, a free alternative to
the Macintosh and Windows operating
systems that’s been tweaked to work well
on older machines.
Schemes such as these can make at
least a small dent in the 50 million tonnes
of e-waste – including toxic metals such
as cadmium – which is churned out each
year. And they could also cut down on the
IT sector’s chunky energy footprint. This is
often underestimated. According to some
calculations, the amount of energy used in
making a handful of computer chips is the
same as in making a car.
“I’ve thought for a while that if people
can develop a business model that extends
$257
billion
Waiting to charge:
timber shavings
“Will you still
need me?”
the life [of computers], then it’s certainly a
good thing”, comments Ted Smith, chair of
Electronics TakeBack Coalition, an industry
group that promotes responsible recycling.
Whether enough people will share his
enthusiasm in an industry that remains
resolutely obsessed with the latest model
remains to be seen. But for cash-strapped
IT departments looking to cut their capital
spend, making the old last is sure to have
some appeal. – John Eischeid
The total global investment in renewable power and
fuels in 2011, setting a new record, according to
UNEP. Growth slowed compared to the year before,
increasing by just 17%, compared to 37% in 2010.
Nonetheless, it was achieved at a time of falling
prices for renewable energy equipment, and severe
pressure on fiscal budgets in the developed world.
Zap it clean
Don’t recycle – just ‘unprint’ the ink
Photos: wavebreakmedia/thinkstock; photodisc/thinkstock
Design work is progressing on a
revolutionary new battery cathode which
could eventually lead to batteries produced
from a sustainable by-product of growing
plants. The devices are likely to be cheaper
than existing batteries because they will
no longer require the use of expensive and
non-renewable precious metals such as
cobalt, nickel, manganese and lithium.
The critical compound in the new
battery cathodes is lignin, which is a
natural substance found in plants. It is
already stripped out of wood as a waste
product during the process of making
paper, where it is taken off in a by-product
called brown liquor. This has long been
used as a combustible fuel by paper mills,
but now it might help make energy storage
increasingly affordable – a vital step in
boosting the potential of intermittent
sources of power like wind or solar.
The development work on converting
lignin into a cathode – the section of the
battery where the current flows out – is being
carried out by two European researchers.
They are Olle Inganäs from Linköping
University in Sweden and Grzegorz
Seen those ‘unboxing’ videos on
YouTube? Where a wide-eyed geek
breathlessly unwraps the very latest
laptop with unconcealed excitement?
Now imagine the wrapping coming off
to reveal something as insipid as a 2006
desktop PC in unfashionable matt grey.
Cue massive disappointment?
Not if Jonathan Hefner has his way.
He’s one of a number of IT developers
who’s unimpressed with the industry’s
neophilia, and is keen to keep older,
low-spec machines up and running.
“It really is wasteful to have to replace
a whole computer just to upgrade
performance”, says Hefter, founder of
Neverware, a New York-based start-up
that builds servers (under the brand name,
‘Juicebox’) specifically designed to keep
older networked machines purring at a
speed today’s users have come to expect.
Photos: Justin Sullivan/Getty; istockphoto/thinkstock
Honda is claiming one of metal recycling’s
cherished prizes. With a local partner, it has
begun extracting so-called rare earth metals
from used car batteries at a big new facility in
rural Japan.
The automaker says the plant is the
first in the world to establish an extraction
technology successful enough to support a
large-scale rare earths retrieval operation. It
believes it can recover some 80% of these
chemical elements from the nickel-metal
hydride batteries used in hybrid cars – and
with a purity equal to those that are newly
mined. As such, it is on track to re-use the
rare earths in new batteries, and hopefully in
other motor components too.
Details are sketchy. Honda has released
minimal information about the technology,
which is to be patented by its partner, Japan
Metals & Chemicals (JMC). Honda says
it has run trials on some 2,000 engines at
The future may be digital, but photocopying
and printing are still facts of office life.
However much we source recycled paper,
use both sides of the sheet and avoid
printing off every document, companies
still get through truckloads of A4 paper
every year.
One technique to ensure we get the
most out of every sheet – before it hits the
shredder – could be to erase the printed
word. A group of researchers at Cambridge
University recently proved the concept.
They used a laser with just enough energy
to vaporise the plastic polymer in toner,
when applied in short pulses, without
damaging the paper. The ‘unprinted’ paper
can be reused up to five times. The team is
now looking to develop a prototype printer,
suitable for office use.
The question is, would such a
product sell? Cost is the first barrier.
The researchers concede that buying
recycled paper would remain a more costeffective solution for most businesses,
until economies of scale are reached. But
team leader David Leal-Ayala points out
that there are significant savings – and
environmental benefits – in avoiding all the
electricity, water and chemicals that go into
recycling.
Richard Owers, Director of the print
solutions provider Pureprint Group, is
interested in principle, although he cautions
that “any new initiative has to take in all
resources involved. Paper isn’t the only
one”. But, he concludes, “anything that
improves resource efficiency is to be
welcomed”. – Sara Ver Bruggen
“I’ll put it back!”
7
Noah’s architecture
Solar cement
UK’s first amphibious house to rise above the floods
New technique could transform one of the world’s most carbon-intensive industries
The latest wave of floods to hit Britain
has again focused attention on the
vulnerability of homes in low-lying areas.
Against a background of news images of
householders baling out their homes, there
have been renewed calls to ban all building
of new houses in flood-prone districts.
But what if a house could simply rise
and fall with the waters? That’s the vision
of Baca Architects, designers of the UK’s
first ‘amphibious house’, which has just
received planning permission for a site
near Marlow, in Buckinghamshire, on the
banks of the Thames.
The lightweight, timber-framed
structure sits on a floating concrete base
that is built within a fixed ‘wet dock’
foundation. In the event of a flood, the
concrete base rises up as the dock fills
with water, ensuring the house floats safely
above the waves. The base effectively
acts as a free-floating pontoon, and
should have a lifetime of around 100 years
before needing renewal or
replacement.
Amphibious houses have already
made an appearance in the Netherlands,
where they’ve proven themselves
under fire, or rather, above water. Dutch
company Deltasync has even used their
success as a template for ambitious
designs for floating cities [see GF74, p9].
The Baca house is based on the same
principles as those of the Dutch, and will
be the largest amphibious home to date,
with building expected to commence later
this year.
At an estimated £1.5 million, this
(sizeable, prestige-style) house is 2025% more expensive to build than its
conventional equivalent. But this could
be just the start, as Baca Architects
have more amphibious designs up their
sleeve. Working with the Climate Adaptive
Neighbourhoods (CAN) Project, they’ve
been tasked to develop strategies for
Researchers at an American university have
developed a revolutionary way to make lime
cement which could both cut the cost of
production and release zero carbon dioxide.
Cement manufacture contributes around
5% of total greenhouse gas emissions:
the second single largest source after
coal-fuelled power plants. It produces
9kg of CO2 for every 10kg of cement – so
the consequences of a switch to this new
method of production could be huge.
building
flood-resilient
homes on a floodplain
in Norwich.
‘Climate proofing’ urban areas is a
growing area of focus for architects and
planners. Amphibious architecture looks
set to join rain gardens, green roofs and
permeable paving in the array of techniques
available. Will McBain, who specialises in
flood risk management at Arup, believes
it has “a definite place within the broad
spectrum of measures that can be taken
to increase community flood resilience”.
But he adds that the flood hazard in the
UK is different to that in the Netherlands.
“Rivers are smaller and ‘flashier’ in their
response to rainfall, and water level ranges
are frequently larger.” So, careful risk
assessment is essential. – Vi Nguyen
Cement in the lime light
Around one-third of the CO2 in
conventional manufacture results from using
fossil fuels to heat the limestone to melting
point (to produce lime); the remainder is from
the chemical reaction which ensues, where
limestone (CaCO3) breaks down into lime
(CaO) and CO2.
The process, which has been pioneered
by a team from George Washington
University in Virginia, harnesses concentrated
solar thermal power to avoid generating
the CO2 at both stages of the process. So,
solar energy provides the heat for melting
the limestone – and for a specially designed
process of high-temperature electrolysis.
This results in a different chemical breakdown
of the limestone: instead of separating into
lime and carbon dioxide, it splits into lime,
carbon monoxide (CO) and oxygen – thereby
avoiding CO2 emissions altogether.
Carbon monoxide has a number of
industrial applications – including in the
manufacture of bulk chemicals. This gives
Sustainable construction goes back to its roots
Deserted city in the desert to test out technologies
Not your typical
tree house
Forget the Shard: steel and glass may
not be the building material of the future.
Architects are rethinking the potential of
wood, thanks to innovations in structural
engineering. An open-source research
study, published by Michael Green of MGB
Architecture and Design, makes the case
for timber as “a safe, economical and
environmentally-friendly alternative for tall
building structure”.
8
It’s certainly not the first time beautiful
wooden high-rise has been proposed.
Japan boasts 19-storey pagodas, built
14 centuries ago and still standing,
despite the humid climate and sometimes
seismic conditions. But, says Green, new
approaches to engineered timber mean
that wood should now be considered a
viable material for buildings on a much
larger scale.
The study gives the full structural design
for a 30-storey skyscraper – a concept
called ‘Tall Wood’, intended for Vancouver
City. It’s based on three new mass timber
products: there’s cross-laminated timber,
which is made of layers of solid wood set at
90 degree angles; there’s laminated strand
lumber, made from a matrix of thin chips;
and finally there’s laminated veneer lumber,
made from thin laminations – a bit like
plywood but on a much larger scale. The
benefits of these products over light wood
frame techniques, the report claims, range
from stability and structural performance
to fire protection (thanks to a well-tested
laminate mix) and soundproofing.
These techniques have been tried and
tested on a smaller, though impressive,
scale by architect Andrew Waugh, in
London’s nine-story Stadthaus apartment
block. This is currently the tallest modern
timber structure in the world, and testimony
to the commercial competitiveness of
the material: its 29 properties sold in just
90 minutes.
But what of the environmental benefits?
Waugh estimates that the building’s wooden
structure will store over 186 tonnes of
carbon for its lifetime, and that a further
125 tonnes of CO2 equivalent were saved
during construction by avoiding traditional
concrete-based techniques. There are cost
benefits too, he claims. Although wood is
a little more expensive than concrete as a
raw material, it’s quicker to work with and
requires less foundation to be built.
Nigel Sagar, Senior Sustainability
Manager at Skanska, is positive about the
potential. “Wood ticks all the boxes from a
sustainable point of view… It is a renewable
resource, can have recycled or reused
content as a product, and can be reused or
recycled at the end of a building’s life. It also
has good product transparency, via chain of
custody schemes like FSC®, PEFC.”
“Our ability to harness the ingenuity of
a tree, and to do so with responsible forest
practices that encourage healthy forest
ecology, is the beginning of righting the ship
of modern building”, he said. – Laura Dixon
Photos: istockphoto/thinkstock; Pegasus Global Holdings
Ghost town of the future
Photo: MGB: Michael Green, Principal
Wood you believe it?
A science project of unprecedented
scale begins next month in the New
Mexico desert, as a technology firm
breaks ground for a model metropolis.
Washington-based Pegasus Global
Holdings will build a town replete with
schools, parks and an airport.
But the intended residents are not
people, but robots.
Scheduled to open in 2015, the Center
for Innovation, Testing and Evaluation, or
CITE, will be built across 20 square miles
to the scale of a mid-sized American
city. With housing and infrastructure
to accommodate 35,000 people, the
$1 billion plan features both old and new
elements of urban and suburban design,
from LEED-certified office buildings to
1980s-era ‘McMansions’.
The uninhabited city will serve as a
laboratory for universities, companies and
government agencies to test emerging
technologies, such as alternative energy
generation, intelligent traffic systems,
wireless communications and smart power
grids. The design, which is being finalised
in consultation with the architectural firm
Perkins and Will, includes an underground
warren of control rooms, where engineers
can simulate different conditions
throughout apartments, roads and
public spaces.
But is a city without people the best
laboratory for experimenting in urban
sustainability? TED fellow and green
architect Rachel Armstrong is sceptical.
“You can innovate”, she says. “But only
in a human context.”
CITE believes, however, that the
city can act as a vital test bed for taking
new technologies to market. Mimicking
it a market value of $550 a tonne, which
could help offset the cost of the solar
cement process. So far, the team has built
a prototype which proves the process can
work. The next stage is to take it to an
industrial scale.
So, what are its commercial prospects?
Martin Everett, materials advisor with
construction group Skanska, said the
process seemed to be “really good”. But he
cautioned that the localised nature of much
cement production, using local limestone
rocks, might not encourage its take-up.
Then there is the industry’s cautious
approach to new techniques. A number of
structures built using new materials and
processes introduced around 30 years ago
have been found to have developed some
worrying faults.
“The industry has the scars from
that, and will want to see if there are any
negative results from long term testing.”
– Andrew Collier
real-world conditions, CITE will allow
researchers to experiment with ideas
that in populated cities would be too
time-consuming, costly or risky – like
the driverless trucks planned for its
five-mile long freeway. “The goal”, says
CITE’s Alarie Ray Garcia, “is to overcome
barriers to product commercialisation,
and get new technologies out while
they’re still relevant and marketable.”
– Katherine Rowland
Testing, testing...
Can anyone hear me?
9
The coolest light
A plastic that heals itself
LEDs break the efficiency barrier
Mimicking human skin, new materials could rebond to fix cracks
3
they calculated, a fourfold drop in the input
power – but each time the photon output
fell only by half. Ultimately, they cut the
input to 30 picowatts of electricity – and
recorded an output of 69 picowatts of
light. How so? Because the diode was also
picking up and converting heat from its
immediate environment. In technical terms,
the light-emitting process causes the LED
to cool, but gives rise to vibrations in its
atomic lattice, due to entropy – and these
vibrations create the heat it is ‘stealing’.
All fascinating stuff, but how useful
in practice? Well, don’t try this at home:
you can’t see anything by a 69 picowatt
light. It’s conceivable that this research
could help with making ultra-low power
lights for specialist applications where it’s
crucial that they generate no heat. The
output levels are so tiny, however, that its
future may not lie even in lighting at all,
but perhaps in other ways of exploiting
the diode’s heat pump effect – such
as providing an instantly controllable
cooling effect in heat-sensitive solid-state
electronics. Either way, it’s an impressive
breakthrough, albeit one whose real-world
applications may take years to realise.
– Roger East
The factor by which UK investment in renewables grew during 2011,
from $3.3 billion in 2010 to $9.4 billion in 2011
Talking turbines
Nanotech paint will warn of cracks
10
highly aligned carbon nanotubes. With
electrodes passing a current across the
surface, these will show up any change
in their alignment as a result of cracks,
damage from pollutants or other sources
of stress. As Dr Mohamed Saafi of the
university’s civil engineering department
explains: “The paint is interfaced with
wireless communication nodes with
power harvesting and warning capability,
to remotely detect any unseen damage.”
In other words, it’s a self-powered,
Wifi-enabled solution.
The Strathclyde researchers have got
as far as successful testing of a prototype.
Software is being developed to draw a
map of the electrical conductivity of the
painted structure. It’s a novel application
of electrical impedance tomography, a
technique originally developed in medical
scanning. “We are hoping that we can now
demonstrate its effectiveness on a large
structure”, Dr Saafi says. – Roger East
red colouring to disappear – signalling
that the damage is fixed. This can be
done manually (by simply applying the
right wavelength light to the damage for
example) or even by natural effects, such
as sunlight or the temperature of the
plastic’s surroundings.
The developers hope the material
can be used in consumer goods such
as laptops, mobile phones and cars,
which would save money and resources,
and increase the quantity of recyclable
plastic. It’s the latest development in a
growing trend for self-healing materials,
which are already appearing in sectors
such as aerospace engineering or
architecture [see GF82, p16].
Further development is required
however, to ensure the plastic can be
used efficiently, says Sam Neuser, who
is specialising in the study of self-healing
materials at the École Polytechnique
Fédérale de Lausanne. “In many cases,
it will remain easier – and cheaper – to
replace a damaged part than invest in
a self-repairing version”, he says. “One
should also not forget the trade-off in
weight which comes with many self-repair
systems”. In other words, the more robust
the piece of kit, the heavier it will be.
He suggests that “self-healing
materials will first only be found in very
specific, high value applications”, but
adds that Urban’s research could help
accelerate their application to the broader
market. – Edwin Colyer
Doesn’t matter if she drops it
Material intelligence
‘Smart sand’ could be the shape of things to come
Photos: istockphoto/thinkstock; M. Scott Brauer / MIT
Your wind turbine could soon be able
to send you messages when it’s under
stress. All you’d need to do is give it a
spray-on coating of a new ‘smart paint’.
Researchers at Strathclyde University
in Scotland believe this innovation could
revolutionise the monitoring of structural
safety. What’s more, their paint is made
mainly from a cheap recyclate resource:
the fly ash waste from power stations. It’s
easy to apply and sets like cement, another
advantage in the harsh environments where
it’s likely to prove most useful.
Micro-cracks in a wind turbine’s
concrete foundation, or points of stress on
a bridge or down a mine, can herald huge
problems down the line. But checking for
tell-tale signs generally requires expensive
instruments, involves lots of wasted time,
and usually only examines particular parts
of a structure. A smart paint job could get
the whole thing covered in one go.
The smart part is the incorporation of
You’re late for the meeting, running up the
concrete stairs two steps at a time. Then
you slip, drop your new shiny laptop – and
look with horror at the hairline crack in
the lid. It’s almost impossible to get these
things repaired and you know IT won’t just
give you a new one…
Well, don’t worry. Just shine a light on
it and watch the crack disappear.
It’s a nice idea, isn’t it? The thought
that plastic could heal itself, just like a
person. Now, a new material has been
developed by Professor Marek Urban,
of the University of Southern Mississippi,
that does just that; mimicking skin by
‘healing’ its own surface.
It works like this. The plastic contains
long chains of small molecular bonds,
or ‘bridges,’ that are severed when the
material is damaged. Breaking certain
copolymer (a mixture of different monomer
units) bonds in these chains results in
changes that cause the affected area to
turn red or ‘bleed’, so that the defect can
be located.
When exposed to external stimuli
such as specific frequencies of light, or
a change in pH or temperature, there is
sufficient energy for the bonds to reform,
repairing the plastic and causing the
Photos: creative/Getty; University of Strathclyde
In lighting, we tend to see heat as the
enemy of efficiency – and LEDs as the
coolest (and most efficient) yet. But
researchers at MIT have seemingly taken
this way off the scale of possibility. Their
ultra-low-power diode emits more than
twice as much light energy, in photons, as it
consumes in electrons (of electrical power).
So, what’s the future for the 230% LED?
And, indeed, for the fundamental scientific
principle that efficiency ratios beyond 1:1
belong firmly in the realms of fiction…?
Second things first: the laws of
thermodynamics aren’t transgressed. What
Parthiban Santhanam and his colleagues
did was to push, to the extreme, a
phenomenon that is actually a real problem
for those who want bright LED lights –
namely that diodes convert electricity most
efficiently at very low power. (And we’re
talking really very low power here – the
amount you measure in picowatts, the
millionth part of a millionth of a watt.)
Their method involved repeatedly
halving the input voltage. This represented,
This goes way beyond recycling. The
ability to reshape things however you
want, by reprogramming the stuff they’re
made of, could revolutionise the efficiency
with which we use materials.
So far, ‘smart sand’ is still a lab
experiment. MIT Professor Daniela Rus and
her team have created a working model
of their new insights into granularity and
structure. Complex as it may sound, their
key breakthrough is developing algorithms
that radically simplify what each grain in
a box of ‘sand’ would need to ‘know’ to
assemble into a given shape.
Telling each grain all the coordinates of
its precise position would require ridiculous
levels of computation. Instead, Rus’s
smart grains just need to ‘talk’ to their
neighbours. When a small template object
is placed in the sandbox, those touching its
outer surface map its outline – like starting
a jigsaw with the edge pieces. Elsewhere
in the sandbox, other grains can echo
this shape. Those inside them can ‘know’
they’re filling in the structure – and others
just fall away to the floor.
Ultimately, the idea goes, you could
replicate any objects you put in your smart
sand box – on pretty much any scale:
keys or tools, for instance, of any size and
number required... After you’d finished
using them, you’d have the material resculpt itself to meet your next critical need.
Just think how this could cut the
payload of a space mission. Backpackers
might love it too – if they could ever afford
it. Ultimately, it’s a concept that could
change all sorts of equations in times of
increasing material scarcity, in much the
same way that 3D printing is revolutionising
our idea of manufacture.
This brave new world is still some
way off in practice – perhaps a decade
even at astronauts’ prices, suggests
Rus’s research student, Kyle Gilpin. The
current experimental ‘grains’ are more like
1cm3 ‘pebbles’ – big enough to hold the
electronics to define (and redefine) their
roles, plus switchable on-off magnets on
the sides so they stick to one another as
required. And Rus and Gilpin have only
really cracked the mechanics in 2D so far.
But, they believe, they’ve seen the future –
and it works. – Roger East
Crystal ball
11
Roots revolution
La Défense: waste
not, want not
Innovative soil replacement brings biochar to market
Biochar, a charcoal made from biomass
that is carbon negative and can double food
production, may finally be easily usable
for most home gardeners – providing a
compelling alternative to peat.
Biochar is made by partially burning
wood or other biomass; when mixed with soil
it ‘locks in’ the carbon absorbed by the plant
Just pour
and pot
during its growth, effectively sequestering
CO2 [see ‘Burn the trees to save the world’,
GF72, p26].
Now re:char, a social enterprise based
in Kenya and California, has created Black
Revolution, a yield-boosting replacement
for soil composed of biochar, coconut
coir (husk) and compost. This mix could
encourage the widespread adoption of
biochar, says re:char’s founder, Jason
Aramburu, because it can be used as a
simple soil replacement.
There are already a number of
biochar-based soil improvers on the
market. But Aramburu claims that a full
soil replacement product such as re:char
can be more effective. “Consumers are
used to just buying premixed and compost
products that you spread on and are ready
to go. Biochar isn’t like that. You have
to get it into the rhizosphere, the place
where the roots are. Unless you’re really an
experienced gardener it’s going to be tough
to use it right, so it’s not going to have the
same effect.” The soil replacement, he says,
“acts like a magnet for nutrients and water,
keeping them right where plants need them”.
Chris Goodall, author of ‘Ten
Technologies to Save the Planet’, believes
biochar has real potential. “My own
experiments have proved that you can
use biochar to [produce] much better root
growth in non-peat enriched soil”, he says.
The business is backed by investors
via peer-to-peer funding site Kickstarter,
and the first sales were made to them in
April 2012. The company is asking users to
record the height and yield of plants grown
in the mix, to help provide data for further
development. The current production
facility is based in San Francisco, and the
supplies of the coconut husk, compost
and biochar come from producers in
the local Bay Area and Mexico. “As new
areas of demand develop, we’ll set up
manufacturing hubs close by”, says
Aramburu. “It’s possible that if we get a
lot of demand, say, in New York, we end
up developing a product that uses waste
that’s more available there.” – Amy Kao
Water from thin air
Hot flush
A turbine to quench thirst in drylands
Paris project tests the algal route from effluent to warmth and purity
12
a 30kW turbine with a 13m diameter rotor.
It is self-contained and requires no
external power source or fuel, making it
ideal for areas devoid of infrastructure like
deserts and islands. The nacelle stands on a
24m-high mast, where the wind is stronger
and the air purer.
The company also has a variation on
the theme for places with negligible wind
but abundant sunshine. This one operates
at ground level and is powered by solar
panels. The environmental impact of either
installation (once in place) is virtually zero,
since the power source is wind or sunlight,
the raw material is air, and all that is
produced is water.
Depending on location, a single turbine
installation costs between €500,000
and €600,000, and produces water for
roughly $0.065 per litre over its expected
20-year lifetime.
Eole Water works in partnership with
prominent industry players including SPIE Oil
and Gas, Danfoss and Emerson. It’s backed
by the French venture capital company
Entrepreneur Venture. – John Fencer
Rapid algae growth in the wastewater
of a big block of flats in Paris might
sound to you like a nasty problem. But
to Los Angeles-based entrepreneur and
algae enthusiast Riggs Eckelberry, it’s
a three-way smart solution. Bred in flat
panel photobioreactors (PBRs – enclosed
containers to minimise contaminants)
on the roof and the sides of the building,
and nourished on the impurities from the
toilets, his beloved algae will turn the
waste back to pure water. They’ll soak up
carbon dioxide in the process too. And the
heat they’ll give off, as they multiply and
grow, will do just nicely for keeping the
residents warm.
Rainmaker,
without the rain
Photo: Photographer’s Choice/Getty
Like most clever inventions, this one is based
on a simple idea. All air contains moisture,
yet few technologies can extract it efficiently.
Eole Water, an innovative French company,
has invented a wind turbine that does just
that. It offers to revolutionise water supply in
drylands (areas with low amounts of water
in the soil, which make up about half of the
world’s land).
Of course, this isn’t the conventional
purpose of wind turbines – nor the standard
design. The nacelle behind its rotors houses
not just an electricity generator but also a
cooling compressor, a humidity condenser
(both powered by the generator) and a
heat exchanger. A fan draws air into the
nacelle, where it’s chilled so that its moisture
condenses into water. The water is piped
to the ground, mineralised and passed
through filters to make it suitable for
human consumption.
“A unit has been operating in the Abu
Dhabi desert since November 2011, where
it produces, on average, 62 litres per hour”,
says Eole Water’s Thibault Janin. Janin is
talking about the WMS1000 unit, powered by
This is more than a heat transfer
system to recover the existing heat from
wastewater. It’s a more sophisticated
process than capturing biogas, too. The
most innovative bit is harvesting the heat
directly from the PBRs. That’s the beauty
of the “urban algal farm”, as Eckelberry
calls this project: you use, rather than
lose, the high heat-to-power ratio of
harvesting algae for energy (the baseline
business of his company, OriginOil, a
pioneer in algal biofuels). You get from
one-and-a-half to four times as many units
of heat as you get of power, he says.
The technology is unlikely to be
practical on a small scale, but this scheme
seeks to substantiate his bold belief
that it’s a viable aid to heating a large
apartment complex. OriginOil calculates
that fitting flat-panel PBRs, rather than
solar thermal arrays, to big buildings
should become competitive once you
have an area of at least 4,000 square
metres exposed to the light.
And why try this out in Paris? The
pilot project at La Défense, with OriginOil’s
joint venture partner Ennesys, is neatly
attuned to the French Government’s
requirement that all new buildings should
both be net producers of energy and
purify their own water naturally by 2020.
– Roger East
“There are already 25 wars raging today that
have their roots in commodity scarcity.
We as the global commuity need to be solving this problem.”
Dambisa Moyo, economist and author: ‘Winner Takes All: China’s Race For Resources and What It Means For Us’
13
Salt content
Space race
Expanding: the world’s first
prototype osmotic
power plant
Osmosis enters the clean energy mix
Could the attraction of salt for freshwater
molecules become a significant source
of power? This is the question a
forthcoming pilot plant for osmotic
power – sometimes referred to as
‘blue energy’ – aims to answer.
Osmosis describes the movement of
solvent molecules from water with a low
salt content towards more saline climes,
equalling out the salinity levels. But it’s not
the tiny amounts of kinetic energy which
are captured. Rather, it’s the difference in
pressure created by this influx of molecules
through a semi-permeable membrane
which can be used to drive a turbine.
It’s a promising technology, but an
expensive one at present. The new plant
will act as a test bed for innovations to
bring down the cost, as part of a threeyear collaboration between Europe’s
largest hydropower producer Statkraft and
Canadian water utility Hydro-Québec. The
1-2MW plant will be an expansion of the
world’s first prototype plant, built in 2009 at
Tofte on the Oslofjord, Norway, which has
a capacity of just 4kW. Construction will
begin in 2013, and the plant should come
on-stream by 2018.
Sun trap
NASA backs solar power satellite
One focus for the pilot project is how
best to treat the freshwater, protecting the
membranes from silt and natural organic
matter. Membranes in an osmotic plant
should last for seven to ten years, and
it’s important to keep maintenance and
repair costs to a minimum if this source
of power is going to be cost-effective at
scale. Statkraft is working with commercial
partners in its search for solutions. One of
these is Hydranautics, a subsidiary of the
Japanese chemicals and plastics company
Nitto Denko, which is looking to supply the
osmotic power market in future.
For Statkraft, the achievement of a
successful pilot plant is the first major
milestone towards the commercialisation of
osmotic power. The company has further
ambitions to build a 25MW demonstration
plant before 2030 – but this will only be
possible if cost-effective technology and a
suitable regulatory framework, with support
mechanisms built in, come together.
Statkraft’s prototype facility enjoys
easy access to sources of both seawater
and freshwater – but osmotic power is
not confined to coastal areas. In fact, it’s
possible to run an osmotic power plant
A Californian technology consultancy
has joined the race to launch a solar
power satellite [SPS] designed to generate
solar energy in space and beam it down
to earth.
Artemis Innovation Management
Solutions has recruited former NASA
engineer John Mankins to develop a
prototype, with seed funding from NASA.
Mankins has already come up with the
concept, called SPS-ALPHA, for ‘Solar
Power Satellite via Arbitrarily Large
Phase Array’. Which, very basically,
means building huge platforms in space
comprising concentrated photovoltaic
[PV] panels and systems for wireless
power transmission.
Mankins is confident about the
technology; it’s the cost that worries him.
Of course, it all depends on the scale. Even
a small prototype, say 10-20kW, will cost
a few tens of millions of dollars to build,
but could be done in just two to three
years. With increasing size, the cost per
kW reduces – but the total bill would still be
sizeable, says Mankins. He estimates the
cost of a large pilot plant, in the region of
10-20MW (a thousand times larger than the
without any salt in the mix – as long as
you have two different water types, one
with a higher solute concentration than
the other. And – unlike wind, which is an
intermittent source of renewable energy
– osmotic power generates a stable base
load of electricity.
With as much coastline as a piece
of string, it’s no great surprise that Japan
is taking an interest. Its Osmotic Power
Research Centre opened in 2010 at
the Tokyo Institute of Technology.
– Sara Ver Bruggen
prototype) could be 100 times more than
the smaller version.
The total surface area of a full-size
SPS plant will be vast. A 1MW system,
about 25% efficient over the surface as a
whole, would entail a total area of almost
3 million square metres. Building something
of this scale brings with it additional
challenges, such as in-space transportation,
and in-space assembly and construction –
and would take eight to 10 years.
But the economics are beginning
to look more promising, Mankins says,
with progress in the efficiency of critical
components, such as PV and other solid
state electronics. Multi-junction solar cells,
which have been finding their feet – here
on Earth – in concentrated PV systems,
are made by several companies, most
of whom have roadmaps for pushing up
their efficiencies from 30-40% today to as
much as 50% in the next few years. Further
progress in computing, materials and
robotics mean SPS concepts by Artemis
and others could be feasible in the next
10 years.
The race is on. Already, Californian
start-up Solaren has a contract under
Scientists use yeast to synthesise a potential new ‘diesel’
A porous material that can’t get enough CO2
Microorganisms engineered to produce
a new type of biofuel, bisabolane, have
the potential to produce transport fuels
without putting large swathes of land
under energy crops.
Common liquid biofuels such as
bioethanol compete with food production
and are energy intensive to produce. But
scientists at the Joint BioEnergy Institute, a
US Department of Energy research centre,
believe the new technique could provide
an environmentally benign solution which
could be used in existing diesel engines
as part of a fuel mix, in the same way that
bioethanol is commonly mixed with petrol.
Bisabolane is a terpene, a class of
chemicals traditionally used as fragrances
and flavours. Plants are the natural source
of terpenes, but Dr Teak Soon Lee and his
team are using yeast as an efficient way
Good for something
14
to produce bisabolene, a closely related
compound to bisabolane.
The bisabolene must then be
chemically converted to bisabolane so
it can be used in a normal diesel engine,
and this is currently a sticking point. The
ultimate goal is the complete microbial
production of the fuel, reducing the
environmental impact of the production
process and driving down the costs.
Microbes such as yeast need a
food source, and currently sugarcane
and corn are used – which means there
are still the same issues of land use as
with conventional biofuels. But Dr Lee
anticipates that eventually cellulosic
biomass – which can be sourced from crop
and forest residues – could serve as the
feedstock instead.
While the technology is some way
from commercial viability, it holds out the
long-term prospect of harvesting surplus
biomass to produce a cost-efficient,
relatively environmentally benign fuel.
– Rebecca Nesbit
Photo: hemera/thinkstock
Sponge down
Photos: Damian Heinisch / Statkraft; comstock/thinkstock
A greener biofuel?
Scientists in the UK have developed
a metallic sponge with a vast internal
surface area which can absorb and
retain carbon dioxide, according to a
report published in Nature Materials.
The development comes out of a
collaborative research project into gas
storage solutions, by the Universities of
Nottingham and Newcastle. The team
hopes it will play a key role in reducing
global emissions through carbon capture.
The ‘sponge’, named NOTT-202a,
belongs to a class of materials called
metal-organic frameworks [MOFs]. These
are lattices of organic compounds and
metal atoms, giving an internal surface area
so vast that a single gram could cover half
a football field.
MOFs were first developed 15 years
ago, and since then government agencies
have funded research into their potential to
reduce the emissions of power plants and
store natural gas in vehicles. “The potential
scope of the research is enormous”, says
carbon capture specialist Hongcai (‘Joe’)
negotiation with Pacific Gas and Electric
to deliver 200MW of power for at least
15 years, starting in 2016 [see GF73,
p17]. And Japan Aerospace Exploration
Agency [JAXA] is also working with the
private sector to launch a test version of its
SPS in 2020, a project that will cost over
$20 billion.
Once a pilot plant has been
demonstrated, the next challenge is
industrial scale-up of SPS manufacturing
and launch. Mankins suggests it will take
perhaps 40 years for SPS to make a
significant contribution to global energy
needs. “This is exactly the same type of
timeline that wind and [terrestrial] solar
power have followed, looking back some
30 years to the early development of these
technologies”, he says. – Sara Ver Bruggen
Ready for a good scrub
Zhou of Texas A&M University.
To date, MOFs have been limited by
their lack of selectivity: their inability to
discriminate between the various gases
they might absorb. This is what makes
NOTT-202a stand out: it is the first that
preferentially captures CO2, while releasing
other gases. How? The secret’s in the
structure: two different frameworks slot
together incompletely, leaving tiny gaps
that are precisely suited to gathering its
particular molecules.
This selectivity has the potential to
reduce the high costs of carbon capture.
“When regulators decide it’s no longer
acceptable to release unlimited CO2, this
may provide a low-cost, low-energy way to
gather it”, says chemist Jeffrey Long of the
University of California-Berkeley.
But, it may be a few years before MOFs
line industrial flues. “That’s the ultimate
goal”, says Long. “But right now scientists
are making these materials in grams. We
need to test how they work in tonnes.” –
Katherine Rowland
15
Humanity 2.0?
As bioengineers explore how to design our way
out of human limitations, Carl Frankel asks if we’re
poised on the threshold of the ultimate upgrade –
to humanity itself.
Hugh Herr lost both his legs below the knee
as a teenager when a rock-climbing trip went
awry. If you’re thinking “Poor man, how does he
manage?”, you might want to let go of that. Herr
gets along just fine.
The director of a bionics research group at
the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Herr
develops high-tech prosthetic devices that level the
playing field for amputees. Or even tilts it their way.
He amasses legs the way most people buy shoes.
He has one set of prosthetics for walking, a longer
set for jogging and multiple pairs of climbing legs,
including one that stretches him to over seven feet
tall and another with built-in aluminum claws for
Spiderman-like gripping. “I’m able to climb at a more
advanced level with artificial limbs. I view [them] as
an opportunity, a palette from which to create,” he
told a TED audience before closing his speech with
some zesty Irish dancing.
And then there’s the stunning Aimee Mullins, a
gifted athlete and model (oh, and double amputee)
who walked the London runway in 1999 for fashion
designer Alexander McQueen wearing hand-carved
wooden prosthetic legs with integrated boots.
Herr and Mullins aren’t just extraordinary people:
they’re walking, climbing, sashaying provocations
to conventional notions about disability. They
invite us to imagine a time, not far away, when
high technology and the physical body are married
in ways that endow people with entirely new
capabilities. Super-abilities, really – the stuff dreams
and comic books are made of.
With their elegant artificial appendages, Herr
and Mullins dramatically embody the emergence
of what Steve Fuller, a professor at the University
of Warwick, calls Humanity 2.0: “an understanding
of the human condition that no longer takes the
‘normal human body’ as given.” The performance
We are very
much a meat,
metal and
software
system now
16
Photos: Photographer’s Choice/Getty (opposite page); Jerod Harris/Getty; Marc Stamas / Getty
Photos: xxxxx
Designed beyond their
limitations: Hugh Herr
and Aimee Mullins
17
18
Photo: Tomas Rodriguez/Corbis
The winning
team used
mind power
to hoist a
Volkswagen off
the ground
artist Stelarc puts it this way: “We can no longer
think of the body as simplistically bound by its skin
and containing a single self… We are very much a
meat, metal and software system now.” In his work
he makes this point dramatically, for instance with a
cell-cultivated ear, surgically implanted onto his left
arm, that for a time had a built-in microphone and
transmitted what it ‘heard’ wirelessly to the Internet.
People as discrete flesh-sacks of bones and
body organs? That’s so … yesterday. Already,
human augmentation is crossing over into
sci-fi territory. What the imagination can conceive,
technology is increasingly able to deliver.
So: want to have Superman-like strength? The
military is developing exoskeletons that strap onto
soldier’s bodies and do the heavy lifting, literally.
Soldiers in the field typically tote upwards of 100
pounds on their backs. Strap-on exoskeletons could
make this vastly less stressful while also reducing
the back injuries that are endemic in the army. Want
to stave off the cognitive deficits caused by too
little sleep? Or how about getting by on four hours
a night? Something called transcranial magnetic
stimulation can help you do that. Or maybe you’d
like to move objects using only the power of your
mind? It’s possible – and you don’t have to be Uri
Geller. In 2011, the Guinness Book of World Records
issued an award to the NeuroSky MindWave, a
brainwave reader, for the “heaviest machine moved
using a brain control interface.” The award-winning
Photo: EAR ON ARM; London, Los Angeles, Melbourne 2006; Photographer: Nina Sellars; STELARC
Listen to the future:
performance artist
Stelarc lends an
extra ear
team used such a method to steer an industrial
crane that hoisted a Volkswagen off the ground.
This is seriously mind-bending stuff – and other
organs are getting involved, too. Soon to come, from
the same company that brought you the MindWave:
an electrocardiogram chip that lets you control your
electronic devices using your heart energy. That’s
right, your mobile will feel the love.
And this is just the beginning. As progress
accelerates across materials science, robotics,
neuroscience, biology, artificial intelligence,
genomics and a host of other disciplines, human
capabilities can be expected to emerge that seem
utterly fantastical today.
Meanwhile, back on centre stage, there’s this
thing called the sustainability crisis that urgently
needs our attention. To date, two broad solution
paths have been pursued. The first is resource
efficiency. You know the drill: reduce, re-use,
recycle, lay off the carbon. The second – which
we may come to in any case if the first fails – is
geoengineering: manipulating the planet’s natural
systems to remove carbon dioxide, or deflect solar
radiation, on a grand scale [see GF Special Edition,
‘Under new management’].
People like Herr, Mullins and Stelarc point toward
a third way. Instead of re-engineering the planet,
let’s try re-engineering the human! Worried about the
size of the human footprint? Then shrink it – literally.
This isn’t just wordplay. In an article scheduled for
publication in the journal Ethics, Policy and the
Environment, academics S. Matthew Liao, Anders
Sandberg and Rebecca Roache propose that we
consider addressing climate change by building a
smaller human. “We need a certain amount of food
and nutrients to maintain each kilogram of body
mass … Larger people also consume energy in less
obvious ways. For example, a car uses more fuel per
mile to carry a heavy person than a lighter person;
more fabric is needed to clothe large people than
smaller people” – and so on.
The authors provide a short list of ways to do
this, including lowering human growth hormone
levels. Speaking to The Atlantic, Liao acknowledged
that “People might resist this idea because they
think there is some sort of optimal – the average
height in a given society, say. But, I think it’s worth
remembering how fluid human traits like height are.
A hundred years ago people were much shorter on
average, and there was nothing wrong with them
medically.”
Indeed, we rose to our present height in part
by consuming so successfully: the same aptitudes
which have, arguably, placed unprecedented
pressure on natural resources.
Still, if a ‘shrink to fit’ approach is too fantastic or
dubious a vision, there are other human engineering
possibilities cited by the authors, too. These include
chemically-induced meat intolerance to reduce beef
consumption, lowering birth rates through cognitive
improvement (“there seems to be a link between
cognition itself and lower birth rates”, say Liao
and co), and the pharmacological enhancement of
altruism and empathy.
And then there are the possibilities they don’t
mention. What about heat-resistant humans? Or
digestively enhanced ones who get more energy per
calorie of food consumed? Both are being actively
researched by the US military, not to save the planet
but to build a better soldier. And why stop here?
What if brain-computer interfaces enabled people
to have a fully immersive nature experience without
ever leaving their living rooms? It might give the real
thing a chance of staying in a pristine state – not to
mention cutting down on all those air miles.
Bioengineering a sustainable human footprint
may not be technically achievable yet, but it’s far
from an unachievable fantasy. It’s as conceivable
today as putting a man on the moon was in the
1950s – and we all know how that one turned
out. What’s required at this point is cultural
buy-in – and the conversation has now started.
Many people, of course, are horrified at the
prospect. When The Atlantic published its interview
with New York University professor Liao about his
forthcoming article, the Twitter-verse erupted in a
paroxysm of outrage. There’s a case to be made
for this approach, though, starting with the fact
that the current approaches plainly aren’t working.
There’s also the fact that bioengineering the natural
environment is immensely risky, arguably a strategy
of last resort. For all we know, human augmentation
might be safer. (It’s better to have mutant people
than a mutant planet...).
Nor is it all as distressingly newfangled as some
assume. We’ve been doing human augmentation for
centuries – that’s what eye glasses do, after all – and
it’s been ramping up dramatically in recent decades.
Want to improve your athletic, academic or sexual
performance? Here, take these. Knees worn out? Try
our titanium models, fit for another 30 years. Human
augmentation is increasingly enabling formerly
disabled people to become fully or even superabled. About a quarter of a million people worldwide
now have cochlear implants, which restore sound by
directly triggering the auditory nerves with surgically
implanted electrodes. South African athlete Oscar
Pistorius has run Olympic-qualifying times on
prosthetic legs. And so it goes on…
There’s also an operational justification. As
Anders Sandberg, one of the authors of the
controversial article, points out: “Climate change
and many other problems have upstream and
downstream solutions. For example: 1) human
consumption leads to 2) a demand for production
and energy, which leads to 3) industry, which
leads to 4) greenhouse gas emissions, which
lead to 5) planetary heating, which leads to 6)
bad consequences.” The most effective point of
intervention is as far upstream as possible, with
consumption—and that’s exactly where human
bioengineering comes in.
And then there’s the divine justice argument.
Humanity created the crisis: we should take total
responsibility for resolving it, up to and including
altering our own bodies. It’s corporeal karma.
But not necessarily good karma. Take resource
consumption. History is littered with examples
where efforts to curb problems here led to new
ones elsewhere. Take, for example, ozone-busting
CFCs, originally designed as a clean alternative
to toxic refrigerants. There’s always the possibility
that a technological enhancement will create
an environmental burden that outweighs any
eco-benefits. This would be the case, for instance, if
large amounts of a scarce precious metal were used
to upgrade broad swathes of humanity. Or if such
a move simply triggered a notorious version of the
rebound effect – resources saved here free up the
opportunity to consume more there.
Two of the biggest question marks, of course,
are those of governance and equity. Will human
bioengineering be a perquisite of the rich? Will those
unable to access it become members of a new,
resentful underclass in a world designed for perfect
specimens? Who will determine what technologies
get permitted and how the goodies are distributed?
It will take some mighty works of governance to
even begin to unravel that little lot.
As Liao points out, we are a species in constant
flux. Forget about fixed points, end stages, or any
perfected anything. Humanity is a work-in-progress,
and so, as it happens, is sustainability.
We tend to view challenges as items on a
checklist. We solve something, stick it in the ‘done’
file and move on to the next problem. That’s not how
things work with sustainability, though. We make
headway and then new challenges surface. Any
progress is iterative. Says futurist Jamais Cascio,
“Transformative visions and big technology may
get rid of the sustainability problems we face right
now, but will very likely lead to new sustainability
dilemmas. Sustainability isn’t an end point, it’s a
fragile dynamic.”
Human bioengineering could possibly save the
day: it could also deliver unintended undesirable
outcomes. Most likely, it would solve some problems
while creating new ones—and on we would go,
muddling down time’s highway.
Sustainability is a story, and now it’s got a new
character and plot line. Humanity 2.0: hero or villain?
Read on, Matilda.
Humanity
created the
crisis: we
should do
everything to
fix it, including
altering our
bodies
Carl Frankel has been covering issues related to
business and sustainability for over two decades.
Shrink to fit
19
Everything to
play for
Citizen science in
action: the Foldit app
crowdsources solutions
to medical conundrums
Can games drive change for a sustainable world?
Sophie Curtis toys with the future.
compare your progress with other players – and you
can even brag about it without sounding worthy. All
of these ‘game mechanics’ keep the player engaged,
often winning out over other demands on their time
and attention (“Hang on a minute, I just need to get
past this orc…”).
In recent years, an industry has built up around
the idea that game mechanics can be used to make
day-to-day tasks more fun and engaging – a concept
known as ‘gamification’. The buzzword may be
relatively new, but organisations have been deploying
these techniques for some time. Retailers that offer
loyalty cards, fitness programmes that provide
badges for achievement and companies that award
bonuses for hitting targets all use elements of gaming
to motivate participants. Some claim that Scientology,
with its use of challenges, levels and rewards along
the path to spiritual enlightenment, has even gamified
religion.
However, it’s only since internet access became
ubiquitous that gamification has yielded some truly
groundbreaking results. One of the most spectacular
success stories in gamification is an application called
Foldit, which allows players to create new shapes
of proteins by folding digital molecules on their
computer screens. There are lots of citizen science
projects, drawing on the spare time of the masses
to increase research capacity – but in 2011, Foldit
offered players points for producing a model of an
AIDS-causing monkey virus. The more accurate the
model, the more points they won. This challenge had
puzzled scientists for more than a decade, but it took
the online community just ten days to crack.
“By engaging enough people with the right
talents, researchers have moved a step closer to a
solution for HIV and AIDS,” said Brian Burke, analyst
at technology research firm Gartner.
Foldit has proved that the power of online games
should not be underestimated. Within a few decades,
the people ruling the world will be “digital natives” –
those that are using the Net like we use water or air –
making them more receptive to game mechanics than
any previous generation.
By applying the principles of gaming in new
ways, and making imaginative use of the technology
available, gamification could be an invaluable tool in
the quest for a greener world.
Photo: brand X pictures/thinkstock
“Now for level 4, dude:
saving the world”
What if saving the world was as fun as
creating a warrior troll as your avatar? You’d
embark on quests with various monsters to defeat,
like in the online multiplayer computer game World of
Warcraft... And imagine if the energy and effort that
goes into creating such games, and playing them,
could be channelled to win a better future for the real
world?
According to game designer and researcher
Jane McGonigal, the average young person racks up
10,000 hours of gaming by the age of 21 – roughly
equivalent to the amount of time they spend in
secondary school. With half a billion people around
the world playing games today, this presents an
extraordinary opportunity for environmentalists.
The thing games offer, that real life challenges
don’t necessarily, is frequent feedback on your
progress. As you play you can earn points, gain
powers, move up a level (cue congratulatory jingle),
20
Giving worthiness wings
One thing games can do is take some of the intangible
or delayed benefits of more sustainable lifestyle
choices, and translate them into instant rewards.
Some rewards might be material; others might be
purely ‘social’, or as simple as a personal best. The
key is that they’re achieved via a game process.
We all know that we should be travelling less,
recycling more, using less energy, and so on. But
sometimes these things seem like more hassle than
they’re worth. Walking to work instead of taking the
car may shave some grams off your carbon footprint,
and save you some cash – but it’s not like you’ll be
awarded winged heels to take you there at supersonic
speed. Then again, what if you were…? Ultimately,
the sort of reward a game offers may mean very little
to our bank balance or the wellbeing of the world, but
may yet have more power to push us onto the more
sustainable path.
Some may shirk the idea that the rather vacuous
glory of doing well at a game is more motivating than
a proven benefit to our community or environment.
But proponents of gamification argue that that there
are also intrinsic benefits to playing games. As
McGonigal claims in her book ‘Reality is Broken’,
games – with their instant rewards and the challenge
of an epic win – actually make us “happier, more
creative, more resilient, and better able to lead others
in world-changing efforts”. Essential qualities for an
eco-warrior! The practical implication is that a game
which gets you to cut your car commuting will actually
improve your wellbeing, in addition to the physical
benefits of a swift stroll down the street.
However, if what we really want is to get people
thinking more sustainably in the long term, observes
Rosalyn Foreman, Data Services Manager at the
Energy Saving Trust, then games also need to help
people understand the reasons for environmental
action. Otherwise, a counter-movement of highcarbon, anti-social games could be just as effective…
“It’s [also] important that the rewards don’t undermine
the actions by creating more carbon emissions or
using more energy,” Foreman adds – by prompting
players to trade in their points for high-impact
Games make
us happier,
more creative,
resilient and
better able
to lead
21
Greening the dash: the
Leaf’s drivers compete
with each other to drive
with a lighter touch
Traditional
approaches
are often
preachy and
hectoring.
Gently nudging
through games
can be much
more effective
22
consumer boons. “This relates to the rebound effect,
whereby people may install insulation, for example,
and then go and book a flight with the money they
will save.”
The educational power of ‘fun and games’ has
been tried and tested over generations – but for Paula
Owen, an energy consultant and creator of the card
game, Eco Action Trumps, “it has yet to be harnessed
as a very effective tool to educate and create
behaviour change. Whether the games are digital
or more ‘retro’ board or card games, people seem
to relate to them strongly”, she says. “Traditional
approaches to behaviour change have often been
preachy in tone and hectoring in manner, turning
swathes of the population off. Gently nudging people
through games with environmental messages built in
seems much more effective for a wider audience.”
So how can games strike the right balance
between social progress and play? Some are making
a science of their appeal. Richard Bartle – who’s best
known for creating the first multiplayer real-time virtual
world – describes four types of player: achievers
(who play to win), explorers (who like to discover and
create), socialisers (who enjoy interaction), and killers
(who thrive on conflict). A successful game has to
have qualities that appeal to all four types of player,
Bartle argues – because the most attractive thing
about any game is the presence of opponents.
One company already using game mechanics
to drive sustainable behaviour is Recyclebank. The
company awards points to individuals when they
make greener choices, like recycling or walking to
work. Crucially, users can then check their scores
online to see where they rank on a score board. When
they have collected enough points, they are rewarded
with discounts and deals from local and national
retailers and service providers.
Meanwhile, the web-based motivation tool
Practically Green is combining game mechanics with
the personalised feedback offered by social media.
The basic idea is that members earn points through
actions like using a non-toxic paint (75 points) or
reducing their computer’s power consumption (50
points), which shape their personal profile. To keep
members engaged, the site encourages them to track
their progress in a public arena, post status updates
(‘Fabian is switching to organic turkey burgers’), and
compare their profile with that of friends and others.
A window on what friends, neighbours and
colleagues are doing is an extremely effective
source of motivation, argues the founder and CEO
of Practically Green, Susan Hunt Stevens. People
are more likely to change when their social norms
change, she claims – a conclusion other specialists
in behavioural patterns have also reached [see
‘The persuaders’, GF80, p26]. For Burke, too, the
combination of social media and games seems a
winner. “Social media is an amplifier of gamification”,
he explains. “It offers people bragging rights when
they have achieved something.”
Even traditional industries, like car manufacture,
are cottoning on to the potential of gamification. After
all, it’s not such a great step from the dash board.
Now, in addition to speed dials and mile counters,
the Nissan Leaf monitors speed and fuel efficiency.
Achievements are represented by tree symbols on
a digital display behind the steering wheel, making
driving more efficiently seem like a game. Users can
even compete with other drivers online – meaning
that, for a change, the winner in a road race will have
a lighter foot on the gas.
Office games
Green gamification is already more than just a
consumer-facing movement. Businesses have
begun to spot the potential of game mechanics to
engage staff – driving changes in the workplace
and taking internal management to a whole new
level. Gartner predicts that, by 2015, as much as
half of all business processes will be gamified.
These applications could be particularly useful
for companies facing the prospect of carbon taxes.
Although software systems can automatically
control heating and lighting in buildings, there is a
limit to the effectiveness of these measures. The
next step is to tackle the behaviour of employees.
“People often think they’re quite green, but it’s
not until you give them a baseline that they start
to appreciate that they could actually change their
behaviour,” explains Peter Grant, Chief Executive
of CloudApps, a provider of sustainability reporting
software. It now offers a mobile application called
SuMo (for ‘Sustainability Momentum’), developed
in collaboration with Global Action Plan, which uses
challenges to engage employees with corporate
visions and goals.
Players are prompted to opt for video
conferencing instead of travel, or to recycle ink
cartridges, or switch computers off in the evening.
Gamers move up through various levels and gain
badges for their virtual trophy cabinet. They can
also compare their progress with that of colleagues
and see where they rank on a leaderboard.
Organisations can choose how to reward
employees that hit their targets – for example, they
might offer a bonus, an extra day off, or name them
employee of the month.
Grant said that, for a 20,000-strong company
that spends £35 million a year on travel and
expenses, an improvement of just 10-20% can
make a huge difference to its bank balance, as well
as its carbon footprint.
The next level
These savings could just be the start. If gamification
can help shape a workforce into carbon-cutting
warriors, then what might the potential be for creating
and implementing shared visions across whole
sectors, and even cities? Applications will only become
more advanced in years to come, with the rise of 3D
imaging, augmented reality (in which day-to-day vision
is overlaid with information), and ever more powerful
social media platforms.
The key to effecting serious change, according to
Grant, is to engage people while they’re young. After
all, we’re raising a generation of ‘digital natives’: can we
bring them up as a force for change, too? CloudApps
is already working on an adapted version of SuMo to
be used in primary schools throughout the UK.
“There are 2.6 million children going through those
schools at the moment. You could create a schools
national challenge with the government,” he says,
tackling anything from carbon emissions to support for
the elderly.
Perhaps games could even drive a new era of
political engagement and active citizenship. Are we in
for Democracy 2.0? Councils could effectively crowdsource blueprints for sustainable cities, using SimCitystyle games where players compete to design the
most energy-efficient models. A ‘World of Water’ game
could simulate local resource levels and challenge
gamers to keep drought or famine at bay. Towns, cities
and utilities might even start challenging each other
to become more sustainable, with entire countries
conceivably competing against one another…
Unsurprisingly, perhaps, the people looking
to gamify civic engagement aren’t councils, but
independent entrepreneurs. Toby Beresford is
founder of Leaderboarded, an online tool which
groups can use to create their own dynamic
scoreboard. In his blog, he describes an online game
which would allow each community group to build
a virtual reality representing its own situation – its
demographics, natural resources, urban facilities
and so on – and to give it a name and branding.
The community could then name its goal (a safer
neighbourhood, a healthier population, more jobs)
and begin its quest...
One question begs. If we can design the real
world in a way that brings out the intrinsic rewards
of sustainability – by making it quicker and
cheaper to take public transport than the car, for
instance, or installing intelligent lighting and heating
systems that pick up on your presence and your
needs – then surely the big neon carrot of games
will be redundant? As Hugh Knowles, a specialist
in sustainable innovation at Forum for the Future,
succinctly puts it: “Gamification? Isn’t that just the
absence of good design?”
Perhaps. But unfortunately, we’re not there yet.
It is still more convenient to throw out all the rubbish
in one go rather than recycle; video conferencing
is still not comparable to face-to-face meetings;
and driving to work is often faster and cheaper than
taking public transport. Could green living become
the world’s most played game? Who’s in?
Sophie Curtis is Deputy Editor of TechWorld.
Gamification?
Isn’t that just
the absence of
good design?
Cultivating care for the
future in a SimCity garden
23
Mind maps
Do you ever wonder what goes on in your head? This spectacular map
reveals the complex interconnections of nerve cells travelling between
different regions of the brain. The paths of whole arrays of neurons
have been picked out by scientists at Harvard University, who used
fluorescent proteins to identify individual nodes and wires, tracking
their course.
Play for a moment with this mind map, and let it be a metaphor for
the potential – in each one of us – for joined-up thinking. Surely some
comfort, as economists, business leaders and politicians try to untangle
the knots of our failing systems and find healthier ways for them to
channel our resources…
24
Photos: xxxxx
Photos: xxxxx
Image: Digital photomicrograph by Jean Livet, Joshua R Sanes and
Jeff Lichtman, Lichtman Lab, Harvard University
25
“We have to
remap our minds”
a group of for-profit companies – in solar energy,
urban food and laundry – which aim to bring wealth
into the community. Each company is owned by its
employees, and this cooperative structure prevents
assets leaking away to a concentrated group of
wealthy individuals and businesses. The employees
can choose to up and leave, but they can’t take
their shares away with them. The group was set up
in 2010 by the grant-making Cleveland Foundation,
the City Government, and ‘anchor’ institutions,
including hospitals and universities. Local initiatives
like this one make me feel most optimistic now. It’s
much easier to remain aware of the negative – and
positive – impacts of anything you do when they
show up in the community where you work!
Jeffrey Hollender tells Anna Simpson why sustainable
solution number one has to be a new way of thinking.
So the Evergreen Cooperatives do good by
generating local wealth. But to what extent is
wealth something to aim for?
Growth is critical. But we live in societies that
have become obsessive, wealth-concentrating
machines. The more wealth is in the hands of a few
people, the worse the overall impact on society.
The very idea of individual wealth – as opposed to
a wealth of shared resources – is dangerous, not
just for the planet, but for business and for our very
social fabric. I don’t separate my concern for the
planet from my concern for economic inequality,
because they’re both part of the same system. But
we have compartmentalised responsibility. We feel
we can fulfil our responsibility by writing a cheque
to a charity. The rest of our impact is literally out of
our consciousness, certainly out of our view. It’s not
a holistic perspective.
understanding to be a positive force. Of course, if it
were that easy, we’d be making better progress. So, in
a recent conversation, I asked him what’s getting in the
way, and what we should do about it.
Corporates have led the way on sustainable
solutions, investing in research and innovation. But
in your sixth book, ‘The Responsibility Revolution’,
you say that this isn’t enough. Why?
26
It’s an attractive idea: a world in which businesses
actively boost our societies and ecosystems. Are
there any examples out there?
The example I keep coming back to is the
Evergreen Cooperatives of Cleveland, Ohio. It’s
So what we really want is healthy systems, with
wealth generated to support them. Forum for the
Future is bringing organisations together to rethink
systems we depend on, but which you could
say are broken – finance, food and energy. How
important is it for us to understand these systems?
Photo: Rose Murphy
We have to
do things that
are good,
and not merely
less bad
Jeffrey Hollender has pioneered sustainable
business in the US, racking up awards and
appointments – most recently, Distinguished
Fellow in Leadership and Ethics at the NYU
Stern School of Business. Born in New York, he
made his name in the 80s as co-founder of Seventh
Generation – a multi-million dollar non-toxic cleaning
products company, recently named “the seventh most
responsible brand in America” by an independent
study. He went on to found the American Sustainable
Business Council, a coalition of more than 200,000
business leaders, entrepreneurs and investors
“committed to public policies that support a vibrant,
just, and sustainable economy”.
Today, Hollender sits on the board of directors
for ASBC – as well as for Greenpeace USA, the
labour rights non-profit Verite, and the Environmental
Health Fund. If anyone is well-placed to point out the
way forward for sustainable business, in the US and
globally, this man is. His vision for a better world is set
out in six books. A lot of words for a message which
is alarming simple: that we must try to understand
how everything in life is connected, and use this
When you look at the health of the planet – from
fish stocks to water shortages – it’s clear that all
the positive changes we are making haven’t turned
around the trajectory of resource depletion. They have
simply bought us more time. So, now there are two
things we can do. We can prepare for the negative
consequences. Or, we can shift our thinking towards
regeneration and resilience. We have to do things that
are good, and not merely less bad.
But first, we need to know what doing good looks
like. Unfortunately, we have mental frameworks which
prompt us to look at individual attributes (fair trade,
organic and so on) as opposed to seeing a more
holistic picture. And we have created entire systems
that incentivise progress in one area, without asking
how it will bring us closer to wider goals.
Take ethanol, for example. Thankfully, we are
ending ethanol subsidies in the US, but we approached
it as if anything you make from vegetables is good! We
didn’t look at the energy it takes to produce ethanol, or
at food prices. We set about promoting a technology
with large negative impacts. Government regulations
are designed around specific attributes and concerns,
instead of wider strategies and visions. Of course,
there are sophisticated ways of looking at impact in
the round, such as life cycle analysis. But these don’t
govern the way consumers think, the way businesses
operate, or the way governments makes decisions.
[So] we have to start a new conversation. We have to
ask how we can do things that are net positive.
I think understanding systems should be an integral
part of our education system. Once you learn the
endless connection between all things, it makes it
really hard for you to behave in a way that ignores
the implications. And going back to your old way
of seeing things would feel like such a fundamental
distortion of reality. If you can’t teach kids systems
thinking in first grade, you have to catch people
wherever you can – and certainly in the workplace.
At Seventh Generation, we taught every employee
systems thinking – for very pragmatic business
reasons! If employees don’t understand how their
work relates to their colleagues’, you find you have
two departments with separate goals that have a
hard time functioning as part of a whole.
But it can at times feel deeply challenging to
subject your decisions to a completely systemic,
holistic framework. When I’m walking down the
aisle of a supermarket, I’m not able to make a
systemic evaluation of everything I’m going to
put in my shopping cart: it’s just overwhelmingly
complicated to do so. I say you have to understand
the three places in your life where 50-70% of your
impact is: the car you drive, your diet, for example.
You have to be strategic so that you don’t make
yourself crazy about decisions like taking a plastic
or paper bag at the grocery store.
But for many people, ‘systems thinking’ is a new
concept, and a bit of an obscure one. Where should
they start?
There’s a wonderful book by Donella Meadows
‘Thinking in Systems’: that’s probably the single best
place for anyone to start. But, for me, there’s just one
thing which is absolutely critical, and that’s the need to
work together. Many of the forces (NGOs, businesses,
researchers) trying to solve the problems we face are
competing with each other, rather than collaborating.
Think what could happen if the two million non-profits
had collaboration as their number one objective,
instead of each finding the 100th way to solve a
problem! We need to spend more time on what unites
us, and what actions help all of us move forward, even
if it means going beyond our own personal priorities.
Think what
could happen if
the two million
non-profits
really started
to collaborate
Does political polarisation get in the way of
collaboration in the US?
Yes. It’s deeply disturbing and saddening to see how
polarised our conversation in the US has become. It’s
so polarised that it makes progress at times totally
impossible, because we’re unable to find a middle
ground. A big part of the problem is the way in which
we allow businesses to put money into politics. When
businesses do this they disenfranchise individuals:
there’s no point in them trying to make their voices
heard if big business can just write a big cheque.
Another problem is that businesses are
encouraged to externalise their costs. Take General
Electric. GE employs aggressive strategies – all ‘legal’ –
to reduce the amount it has to pay in taxes. One would
think it would be shameful for a large corporation not
to contribute to our education and our defence. It’s a
cultural problem, combined with a systemic problem,
which is really worrisome to me. We have to find a way
for companies in the US to see how they can work
with society, not against it. Some European companies
(Unilever, M&S, Novo Nordisk) have achieved this
understanding, with the help of Forum for the Future.
But there are greater disincentives [over] here, which
the Forum will no doubt face as it builds on its work
with American businesses!
Changing this culture – in particular the sense
that money can buy exemption from shared
responsibilities – will obviously be a huge challenge.
What do you see happening today, that might help
to shift things in the right direction?
I am a believer in radical transparency. We can’t solve
the problems we face if we’re not willing to recognise,
in public, the problems we have in the first place. It is a
problem that, in the business world, people want to talk
about their successes but not about their failures. Most
businesses are stuck in this difficult mindset that if they
talk about the good, the bad and the ugly, no one will
like them. But we learn just as much, if not more, from
failures as we do from successes.
Anna Simpson is Managing Editor, Green Futures.
27
Retail revolutionary
Sue Wheat meets Kate Bull, the CEO of
The People’s Supermarket.
As a business
model, TPS is
definitely one
of a kind
28
Kate Bull is aptly named. She is, in the nicest
possible way – bullish: determined, opinionated
and single-minded. Which, when you’re challenging
the status quo of one of the largest industries in the
country, is undoubtedly the best way to be.
After a career in conventional retail, including
spells at Marks and Spencer and running her own
consultancy, Bull was determined to do things
differently. In early 2010, she hooked up with two
sympathisers, celebrity eco-chef Arthur Potts Dawson
and regeneration specialist David Barrie, and The
People’s Supermarket [TPS] was born.
Her retail savvy shows in TPS’s choice of site. It
sits in London’s smartly bohemian Lamb’s Conduit
Street, well placed to draw passing trade from Great
Ormond Street hospital staff, lawyers from nearby
Chancery Lane and Gray’s Inn, lunchtime shoppers
exploring the various vintage shops and wine bars,
and the area’s large student population.
I meet her in the basement lounge-office
surrounded by sample products, papers and
stock. Bull sports her branded TPS yellow t-shirt
and offers me croissants with nectarine compote.
These have been made by TPS’s People’s Kitchen
chefs, who cook up beautifully-smelling food on the
shop floor, with compote courtesy of one of their
many local cottage-industry suppliers. There’s a
deliberately neighbourly feel to the place, reflecting
Bull’s optimistic vision of a new form of community
co-op which brings shoppers, traders and local
food producers together in a style more akin to a
community centre than a supermarket. As if on cue,
a mum and her daughters arrive and register eagerly
in the weekend’s bake-off competition – a fundraiser
for Amnesty International, suggested by Bull’s
14-year-old daughter for their second anniversary.
As a business model, TPS is definitely one of a
kind. Neither traditional co-op, nor typical wholefood
store, it was quite a leap of faith opening on the back
of just £50,000 in start-up capital – compared to
around £500,000-£750,000 minimum for a ‘normal’
store. This was boosted by a £130,000 loan from Wall
to Wall TV, which made a documentary about the first
year of the store, to secure the lease. A grant from the
Esmee Fairbairn Foundation (£55,000 a year for two
years) covered Bull’s salary, although she reinvested
most of this in the business.
Everything else required – materials, furniture,
legal advice and, above all, labour, together
amounting to around £600,000 worth – was donated
free of charge. At the heart of the business model
is the membership scheme – currently 750-strong.
Members pay £25 a year for the privilege of putting in
four hours work a month, receiving a 20% discount
on their purchases in return – along with some
training. Membership conveys “rights, roles and
responsibilities”, Bull explains, including the right to
vote “on everything – salaries, suppliers, products,
management.” There are no individual liquid returns.
But the combination of job skills and a sense of
enthusiastic community seem more than enough by
compensation.
Indeed, members recently voted to change their
legal structure from a traditional co-op to a Community
Benefit Society, which ensures that any dividends
will be returned to community projects chosen by
members themselves. “There will be no fat cats!” says
Bull. Instead, “we could buy a greenhouse for the
nearby Calthorpe gardening project which supplies us
with our salads, to help extend their season.”
A huge pool of voluntary workers keeps staff
overheads to a minimum. There are just 17 on the
payroll, all of whom are paid the minimum wage.
That’s an awful lot of free, or at the very least cheap,
labour. But Bell counters accusations of exploitation
by insisting that TPS is helping people transform
their lives with the skills they’ve learnt. It’s certainly
no picnic working with members who are largely
untrained in retail, change shifts every four hours
and are juggling all sorts of other responsibilities.
On the day I visited, members working included
an international student, a High Court judge and
someone who is long-term unemployed.
If the business model is distinctive, so is the store
itself. It’s part normal shop, part eco-store (so Fairy
washing-up liquid and tins of Whiskas stand sideby-side with Ecover and organic cat food). ”We don’t
judge”, says Bull, “but we do give choices.
“I personally may believe Coca-Cola, for instance,
is one of the most dangerous products out there”,
says Bull. “But it’s one of our top 10 lines. If we didn’t
sell it, we wouldn’t have a business. But we always
offer an alternative – we also sell Ubuntu [Fairtrade]
cola. There’s actually nothing we won’t sell except
cheap beer and alcopops. But cheap beer has no
profit margin anyway, so why would we?”
They discriminate in favour of locally grown,
seasonal fruit and veg, but will import if they have to.
“We try to give customers a choice of three – a cheap
option, a recognised brand and what we call a ‘brand
with values’”. This might be something organic, or
locally produced, or having fewer additives. With
honey, for instance, you could buy a jar of ‘Frank’s
Honey’, which a member brings in from his garden in
the suburbs.
They do, however, trumpet their success at
turning any wilting fruit and veg into tasty meals
in their People’s Kitchen, which are then sold in
the shop. “We also get vegetables donated from
New Covent Garden [wholesale market] that might
otherwise be dumped – it happened this week with
three large boxes of perfect green tomatoes from
Mexico that were no longer wanted. We made them
into lasagne and chutneys in recycled jars. What a
saving of all those global resources!” This year they
calculate they saved three tonnes of waste from
landfill and created 20,000 meals using surplus fruit
and veg.
So is it a standard bearer of a retail revolution?
Innovations charity NESTA seems to think so. Mark
Griffiths from its Public Services Lab applauds its
“moral purpose with commercial acumen”, and
highlights its “new forms of volunteering, new ways
of organising, new ways of minimising the wastage
of food…”
Retail analyst Neil Saunders of agency Conlumino
agrees: “There is a backlash against the Big Four
supermarkets, and this is a community-based,
sustainable way of addressing the issues people don’t
like.” But, he cautions that “it does occupy a distinct
niche. It has limited scope in terms of rolling out as a
mainstream proposition. It’s not everyone’s cup of tea
and doesn’t fit the image of a supermarket that many
people are used to.”
Talking to Bull on the supermarket’s second
birthday, she agrees it’s been a roller coaster ride. The
lowest point was when she talked Camden Council’s
bailiffs out of closing them down, when they couldn’t
pay their business rates this February. She negotiated
staged payments over a cup of tea on their donated
leather sofas and kept the doors open.
It sounds precarious, but TPS’s distinct appeal
helped it raise £7,000 in a week’s worth of digital
fundraising – with donations coming in from across
the globe. Even so, it took The Fredericks Foundation
to step up up with a £20,000 loan hours before the
supermarket was going to shut.
It was a close call which helped focus members’
minds on choosing products that increase footfall or
have larger profit margins. One result was a recent
vote to start selling cigarettes, which Bull describes as
“the most heated argument members have ever had”.
Other plans include starting an external caterers and
setting up local market stalls, both as extra income
streams and to promote the shop.
There is a clear sense from everyone involved that
failure is not an option. Sales, at least, are pointing the
right way. In the year 2011/12, takings rose by 53%.
And as Bull points out, “In two years we’ve created
a business with £1.2 million turnover from zero, with
gross profits of £368,000. We started with no cash
and we’ve never had an overdraft… This year we have
a loss of £92,000 after overheads, but I think next year
we’ll make a surplus.”
And the story does seem to have struck a chord.
Fourteen groups in the UK are interested in setting up
their own version, and Bull hopes to see them take
root as franchises “on an open source model” – using
the TPS’s name and values, but without the original
shop benefiting financially.
She may have time to help realise this after
she stands down as CEO this August – “this is a
community, not a vehicle for any one person’s ego”,
she says, although the chances are she will be offered
the position of Chair.
Can she ever imagine going back to mainstream
retail? I don’t expect her to say yes, but she does.
“Possibly. I love it. But only if they allowed me to
challenge things. I didn’t like the way retail was going
and I could have spent my life moaning. But [if you
want change], sometimes you just have to get on and
do it.”
The most
heated
argument
was over the
decision to
sell cigarettes
Sue Wheat is a freelance journalist.
29
River deep,
mountain high
particularly women, who in this very conservative
society can feel isolated. “Now they gather at each
other’s houses to watch their favourite shows with their
‘TV friends’”. (‘Afghan Star’, the national equivalent
of ‘X-Factor’, is particularly popular.) And local health
clinics have the power, literally, to save lives which
could otherwise have been lost.
The hydro has been a boon to local artisans,
too. Mohammed Amir, a carpenter in the village of
Farghambowl, told me that where it once took him
five days to make a door, it now takes just one, thanks
to a new set of power tools. Variations on his story
are repeated up and down the street of this and other
village bazaars: small businesses which were once
struggling – millers, tailors, blacksmiths – are now
prospering. Young people who left their homes to look
for work as far away as Kabul are returning to set up
shop, bringing urban skills such as computer training
to their villages.
The power carries with it another plus, too: in
return for the wires coming over the hill, farmers
have to agree to stop growing opium poppies.
Such is the appeal of electricity that this condition
seems to be widely observed. Daoula Mohammed,
the governor of Jurm district, summed it up: “Ask
people here what is the single most important
project for them – they will always say electricity.
One night there was a flood; some sediment had
blocked the channel [taking water to the hydro
plant]. And the next day, 100 people came from the
bazaar with shovels to clear it [to make sure the
power came back]… If there’s a security problem,
people can live with it. If there’s a problem with
water, they can live with it. But if people find they
don’t have power for just one night, they all come
hammering on my door!”
Turning water and sunshine into power for the
poor is at the heart of this year’s Ashden Awards.
Martin Wright reports from Afghanistan.
30
This year sees a new Ashden Award
category, for Sustainable Travel, which is
open to entrants from the UK, Belgium and
France. The winners are:
• The Belgian City of Ghent, which pioneered
a range of initiatives, including a car-free
city centre, to “make cycling normal” –
resulting in one-fifth of all journeys to work
or school being made on two wheels
• The UK’s Liftshare scheme, which helps car
users fill up their vehicles to share capacity,
so cutting out 100,000 journeys every day.
When other planned plants come onstream,
including one solar PV farm, over 90,000 people
in the area will enjoy the fruits of clean, round-theclock power and light. And this could be just the
start. Whole swathes of the country have huge
potential for plants on this kind of scale, whether
driven by water, wind or sun.
No one knows just what will happen in Afghanistan
when the international forces pull out in 2014. But by
rooting such schemes in local communities, ESRA
is hoping that they have the resilience to withstand
whatever turbulent times lie ahead.
Martin Wright is Editor in Chief of Green Futures
and a visiting judge on the Ashden Awards.
Ashden is a Forum for the Future partner.
www.ashden.org
Energy for all
2012 is the UN’s ‘International Year of Sustainable Energy for
All’. These Ashden Award winners help bring that phrase to life.
Photo: Andrew Aitchison/Ashden
Afghan Ministry of Energy and Water and the German
overseas development body GIZ, with the support
of the consultancy Integration. Together with Afghan
colleagues, their staff spent three years crisscrossing
Badakhshan, staying in villages, surviving an ‘IED’
bomb attack and, slowly, cup of tea after cup of tea,
winning over local leaders to the scheme. It was
painstaking but essential work. Everyone needs to
be on board for the schemes to succeed: the district
governors, imams and the local ‘commanders’
(former mujahidin leaders who still wield considerable
clout). Even though the province is not a hotbed of
Taliban activity, it’s seen its share of attacks, and
there is little doubt that the plants would be tempting
targets had they not won such overwhelming local
support. As it is, none has ever been hit.
While the capital costs were met with donor
funding, running and repair expenses are covered
by the electricity bills. At around five afghanis (£0.06)
per unit, hydro power is more than competitive with
kerosene or diesel – assuming the latter is even
available. Local people are trained to operate and
manage the plants as independent businesses, under
the umbrella of the Ministry.
The effects on everyday life have been dramatic.
Householders love the clean, bright electric light,
compared to the smoky and highly flammable
kerosene lanterns. Electric water heaters mean there’s
no need to light a fire – using scarce brushwood
gathered from the bare hillsides – every time you want
a cup of tea. Schoolteachers told me how children can
study in the evening, and “don’t hide away at home
because they’re scared that the teacher will tell them
off for not doing their homework”. Television makes
everyone feel more connected to the outside world,
Photo: Martin Wright
The GIZ/Integration
micro-hydro programme
is one of the winners of
the 2012 Ashden Awards,
which reward projects
that cut carbon, protect
the environment, reduce
poverty and improve
people’s lives. For more
information, including
films of the winners, visit
www.ashden.org
Say the word ‘Afghanistan’ and you’ll conjure
up a number of associations in your listener’s
mind. It’s a safe bet that none of them will include
‘promising haven of renewable energy’. But that’s
a pretty fair description of what’s underway in the
mountainous north eastern province of Badakhshan,
“the least developed part of the least developed
country in the world”.
The province may lack development in the
conventional sense of the word. Even major roads
are rough, rutted mud tracks, impassable for much of
the winter. It can take hours to make a journey of 30
miles, and you emerge from the jeep feeling as though
you’ve been flung around inside a tumble drier. But
Badakhshan doesn’t lack resources. If peace ever
returns, its spectacular landscape will be a magnet
for tourism: snowy peaks looming over richly fertile
valleys bright with apricot blossom and spring wheat,
watered by fast flowing rivers.
And it’s these which provide a ready resource of
a different kind. Here, among the last outliers of the
Hindu Kush, local Afghan communities are working
with German engineers and development experts to
install run-of-the-river hydro plants. Six are in place to
date, with a total capacity of 1.3MW. They bring light
and power to 63,000 people in homes and businesses
who previously had to rely on smoky kerosene
lanterns or pricey, unreliable diesel generators. The
plants are a small triumph of engineering: in an area
with few roads even a jeep can manage, many parts
have to be carried on mule back – no small task when
canals have to be carved out of the mountainsides
and electricity poles erected on remote hilltops.
The six plants are part of a wider programme,
Energy Supply for Rural Areas (ESRA), run by the
Travelling light
Waters of life
Afghanistan isn’t the only country bursting
with hydro potential. In Indonesia, nonprofit IBEKA is helping local communities
run their own small-scale hydro schemes,
bringing electricity to 54,000 people. In
many parts of the world, making water
safe to drink means using scarce firewood
for boiling. But in Cambodia, the social
enterprise Hydrologic, set up by the
international development organisation
iDE, has developed ceramic water filters
to offer a safe and effective alternative.
Sun’s up
Making solar power affordable is at the
heart of two of this year’s winners. Across
Africa, Barefoot Power has sold around
350,000 solar lanterns and lighting kits
to homes, schools and clinics without
mains electricity – and is now expanding
into Asia and Latin America, too. And in
the southern Indian state of Karnataka,
local not-for-profit SKDRDP – which won
the Ashden International Gold Award – is
helping farmers install solar power and
biogas plants in their homes, thanks to
an innovative and highly effective microcredit scheme. Community financing also
plays a part in the Energy for All wind
power scheme based in Cumbria, in the
UK, whose 7,700 members collectively
own over 20MW worth of capacity.
More with less
Four of this year’s winners have proved
it’s possible to make dramatic energy
savings over surprisingly short timescales.
In Wales, the National Trust has cut power
use by 41% in just two years – proving
that conserving ancient buildings can
go hand in hand with efficiency. The
University Hospital of South Manchester
has worked with patients and staff to cut
electricity and gas use by over 35% in the
last five years, saving the health service
£390,000 on fuel bills, while the Student
Switch Off campaign has achieved cuts
in electricity consumption of 7% last
year alone across 40 UK universities.
Meanwhile, London’s Parity Projects has
helped housing associations managing
240,000 homes carry out green retrofits,
and trained 500 people in how to do so.
31
Next year’s model
32
highly effective way of stripping out a whole layer
of resource use. Instead of making new kit to sell,
just maximise the use of stuff already out there. Or,
indeed, the people out there... Taskrabbit matches
those with time (and in some cases, skills) on their
hands with those needing help – whether it’s running
an errand or assembling flatpack furniture.
And then there’s idle money, too. It may be
stretching a point to describe the likes of Zopa, Kiva
and Kickstarter – which allow individuals to make
small loans or investments for specific people or
causes – as harvesting unused assets. After all, the
money would presumably otherwise be in a bank,
where, in theory at least, it will be put to good use.
But it wouldn’t necessarily be doing what you wanted
it to. Hence the appeal of making direct contributions
to entrepreneurs who are acting on your own
enthusiasms.
As with Whipcar or Airbnb, such schemes reflect
the Facebook generation’s yen for doing business
peer-to-peer. There’s not much fun to be had trailing
round a DIY store or staying in an anonymous hotel.
But borrow someone’s drill or kip on their futon, and
you might find a friendly face to brighten your day…
Many disruptive innovators succeed by being
both (much) cheaper than the mainstream, and more
sustainable, too. So, Skype and Spotify have brought
the cost of communications and music down to a
fraction of the price of international phone calls and
CDs. It’s a combination which can strike fear into
incumbents – and even bring them crashing to the
ground. EMI was, arguably, doomed when it failed to
Photo: Kiva/John Briggs
Harvesting
idle assets is
at the heart
of many new
models
Question: what do these companies have
in common?
Skype, Spotify, Marks and Spencer, Whipcar,
Zopa, Zilok, Kiva, Patagonia, Kickstarter, Café Direct,
Taskrabbit, Buzzcar and InterfaceFLOR.
Answer: they’re all pioneering dramatically new
approaches to doing business.
Some are household names making healthy
profits; others are start-ups yet to post a surplus. But
they are all living, breathing examples of what’s fast
becoming a 21st century cliché: disruptive innovation.
And more than this, they’re each in different ways
giving the lie to the old idea that success in business
means burning more energy to churn out more stuff to
sell to more people.
So, how do they do it? Some, like Skype and
Spotify, strip out a whole chunk of resources once
seen as essential – like a plane to get you to a
face-to-face meeting, or a bunch of CDs to listen
to music. Others, like InterfaceFLOR, are adept at
re-using resources which would otherwise lie idle – or
worse, go to waste: in this case by recovering and
remanufacturing flooring. Whipcar and its French
equivalent, Buzzcar, allow people to rent their own
cars out to others when not in use. Zilok extends
the model to everything from drills to homes,
baby buggies to fondue sets. Then there’s Airbnb,
which allows anyone with spare space to rent out
accommodation to sofa surfers and guest house
seekers alike.
“Harvesting idle assets”, as digital entrepreneur
and venture capitalist Julie Meyer calls it, can be a
Photo: Zipcar
Some of the coolest companies on the planet are
pioneering new business models which could just be the
secret of a sustainable future. Martin Wright reports.
take the digital music revolution seriously – as, when it
came to pictures, was Kodak.
Others, though, prosper by making a virtue of
paying the price of sustainability. Take Fairtrade
superstar Cafédirect, which has achieved a remarkably
hefty slice of the market for something which started
out as deeply, quirkily fringe. It’s done so by combining
catchy, personal stories: the farmers pictured on the
jar really are the ones who grow the coffee, and they
have names and life histories which people can relate
to. But crucially, it tastes as good as its traditional
rivals too – a far cry from the days of ‘drink nasty
coffee for Nicaragua’.
Disruptive innovation isn’t always sustainable, of
course – far from it. When Gillette persuaded men to
swap old reliable razors for cheap disposable ones,
it sent sustainability back a step. And sophisticated
computer printers can only be sold for the price of a
posh dinner because we’re locked into paying a small
fortune for proprietary ink cartridges every few months.
Even innovations which start off as more
sustainable don’t necessarily stay that way. With
server farms on track to overtake aviation as a
source of greenhouse gases, there’s no room for
complacency. And yet it’s easier to have a sustainable
server – powered and cooled by renewable energy –
than a sustainable plane.
Not every incumbent is sitting on their heels
waiting to be knocked over by a rush of disruptors.
Some are experimenting with their own innovations.
Marks and Spencer took inspiration from the clothesswap craze, ‘swishing’, to launch its own version,
‘Schwopping’, which encourages customers to bring
an old item of clothing for resale or donation to Oxfam.
Whether it increases footfall and market share remains
to be seen, but it fits neatly with the company’s
celebrated Plan A sustainability strategy, so at the very
least, it can be seen as smart reputation management.
Outdoor clothes specialists Patagonia, meanwhile,
went as far as running adverts headed “Don’t buy this
jacket” – value what you have, was the message, and
only come to us when you really need a (by implication
high quality and high priced) replacement. If it works, it
could lead to Patagonia making more profits while net
consumption of resources overall is reduced.
For retailers this trend for making the most of
what’s already out there, rather than relying solely on
selling new stuff, could be high risk stuff. But as Mike
Barry, Head of Sustainable Business at M&S, points
out: “Sustainability demands disruption. It demands us
to radically rethink our business models. Not just how
we sell stuff in the future, but how we create value”.
David Bent, Deputy Director, Sustainable Business
at Forum for the Future, agrees. “Incremental progress
isn’t enough if we’re still locked into a model of ‘takemake-use-waste’.” So when it comes to achieving
seriously ambitious goals – such as Unilever’s aim
of doubling turnover while halving resource use –
companies will find they have no choice but to adopt
this sort of ‘breakthrough innovation’, characterised
by Bent as “a product or service to customers which
creates a new market or shifts an existing one to
create superior sustainability outcomes”.
It’s a message which is starting to be heard by
other mainstream players too. Forum for the Future’s
new Sustainable Business Model Group has already
attracted Unilever, along with Bupa, Kingfisher, B&Q,
O2 and TUI Travel, as well as M&S. Its ambitious aim:
to help at least three companies decouple financial
success from negative impacts. If it can do that, it
will achieve one of the green movement’s holy grails:
reconciling growth with sustainable development.
To achieve the scale of change needed, says
Bent, companies will have to do three things: “Have
a balanced portfolio of activities, with at least some
resources devoted to disruptive innovation for
sustainability; embed it in their culture (for instance, in
how staff are incentivised); and set up management
structures that protect disruptive ideas from the grind
of day-to-day [work].”
Julie Meyer adds that the major players should
keep an eye out for disruptive start-ups, and look for
ways to collaborate. Entrepreneurs who pick the right
disruptive model can go from niche to mainstream at
a bewildering speed – Facebook was only founded
in 2004 – so there can sometimes be a very small
window in which, as she puts it: “Goliath has to learn
to dance with David.”
“Every company has a business model with an
underlying logic, and a strategy to apply it to particular
markets”, says Bent. And, perhaps more than many
corporate leaders realise, he adds “that business
model constrains their freedom of action.” Which is
fine as long as the world out there stays the same, he
adds. “[But] the world is not likely to look the same
coming out of the recession as it did falling into it.
Which means the strategies and business models that
have been delivering success and wealth over the past
decades simply won’t stack up.”
Which means we can expect more casualties
on a scale of EMI or Kodak. But equally, many more
success stories on a Skype, Spotify or even Facebook
scale. Disruptive innovation may be a daunting
prospect, but get it right, says Bent, and “the rewards
can be disproportionately huge”.
Weaving her future:
Sophea Chum used
a $600 loan, crowdsourced through Kiva, to
purchase new materials
for her silk business near
Phnom Penh, Cambodia
Goliath has to
learn to dance
with David
Martin Wright is Editor in Chief, Green Futures.
33
Forumupdate
Bogrollogy
Meet your future wipe…
We will provide expert advice on:
Energy Efficiency, Waste & Recycling,
Travel, Food & Water, Health &
Well-being, Procurement,
Communications and Marketing.
www.7days2sustainability.com
“7-days to Sustainability is an
excellent way of helping SMEs
with that kind of very practical,
very hands on advice.”
Jonathon Porritt,
Founder and Director of Forum for the Future
It’s free, so register today at:
www.7days2sustainability.com
www.beplanetpositive.com
In association with
34
Photo: photodisc/thinkstock
Planet Positive is giving FREE sustainability
advice to all UK businesses
Loo rolls are gearing up to make their second
splash in sustainability. The first was in April,
when Andrex launched its Eco range, made from
90% recycled fibre and 10% bamboo. Why not
100% recycled fibre? Because, Tom Berry, Head of
Sustainability at parent company Kimberly-Clark,
explains, the mainstream consumers the brand is
targeting expect a certain softness that recycled
fibres alone aren’t yet able to provide. Bamboo isn’t
a bad choice, Berry insists. Importing it from China
has its impacts, he admits. But he goes on to explain
that bamboo is also one of the fastest growing
plants in the world, and so produces significantly
more fibre, on less land, requiring less water, than
the trees traditionally used to make tissue paper.
Currently, recycled toilet paper makes up just
3.5% of overall tissue sales. Kimberly-Clark intends
to grow the market, raising the quality bar to meet
consumers’ high expectations. Andrex Eco is also
Forest Stewardship Council-certified and cased
in 100% recycled and recyclable packaging, both
indicators of a more sustainable approach that are
increasingly looked for by consumers.
Getting recycled roll into some of the world’s
more luxurious lavatories is one ambition. But if you
delve into the impacts of our hygiene habits, you’ll
see a long stretch of pipe separating today’s tissue
from sustainability.
That’s what Kimberly-Clark did. It found that,
worldwide, the equivalent of almost 270,000 trees
is either flushed or dumped in landfills every day,
with roughly 10% of that attributable to toilet paper.
Habits vary, it seems. Industry figures show that
each Briton flushes 17.6kg away each year, almost
two and half times the European average.
That’s the consumer waste story. Kimberly-Clark
also looked closer to home, and found that the total
water use at its tissue mills is about 140 million cubic
metres a year – equivalent to 57,000 Olympic-sized
swimming pools. The same mills are also responsible
for an annual six million metric tonnes of greenhouse
gas emissions (direct and indirect).
So, what next? Instead of simply sitting on the
facts, the industry leaders approached Forum for the
Future, initiating a new collaborative project called
‘Bath tissue and beyond’. “They came to us full of
ambition on the back of their Andrex Eco launch,
wanting to be challenged and supported to go
further”, says Anna Warrington, an innovation expert
at the Forum. The project aims to come up with a
strategy for innovation in bathroom tissue, and to
ensure Kimberly-Clark stands out from the market
in the future, through its leadership and by shaping
sustainable consumer behaviour.
“We are generating some really exciting ideas”,
says Warrington. “It is great to be able to bring
together our expertise in futures and innovation with
real understanding of the industry.”
Martin Knight-Jones, European Marketing
Manager at Kimberly-Clark, adds: “Most of us are
good at solving the problems that today’s customers
can articulate, but Forum has helped us anticipate the
needs of tomorrow.”
Quite what shape future loo roll will take remains
to be seen. The question is, will consumers go as
mad for it as the puppy in the ad? – Anna Simpson
New to
the Forum
Network
Since the last issue
of Green Futures,
Jordans Ryvita
has joined Forum
for the Future as
a Partner, and
Azaria, Burberry,
Crest Nicholson,
eBay International,
Energydeck,
Geo Group,
Sustaination, Twin
and vento ludens
have joined Forum
for the Future as
Members. Longstanding Partners
Kingfisher and
O2 have become
Pioneer Partners.
35
Tomorrow’s leaders
SallyUren
Since 1996, Forum for the Future’s Masters in Leadership for Sustainable
Development has been training the sustainability leaders of the future.
Each issue, we track the career of a Forum alumnus.
Toby Radcliffe
Class of: 1999 – 2000
Currently: Professional ironman
triathlete and Director at
Rare Earth Consulting
Why I chose the MProf
I’d studied Natural Sciences at Cambridge
and, towards the end of my time there,
was deciding between a PhD or working
in international development. But then I
started thinking: I can’t go to other countries
and tell people what to do when we’re
getting it so wrong here! I read an article
about the Masters at Forum and it seemed
so interesting. It offered the chance to
explore sustainable development here in the
UK, across all sectors, looking at the whole
picture, and that really appealed to me.
What I learnt
You can be an agent of change wherever
you are. Even in the corporate sector,
when an organisation might not be ready
to change, you can still try! Anyone, in any
job, can and should be trying to make their
work more sustainable – because everything
you look at has an impact. If someone says
to me that sustainability isn’t important to
them, what they really mean is that they
don’t know what their impacts are.
Career to date
After the Masters, I went to work for the
Earth Centre – the biggest white elephant
after the Millennium Dome, back in the
day! [This ‘world centre for sustainable
development’, based in a disused colliery
in Yorkshire, opened in 1999 but closed
due to poor visitor numbers in 2004.] I was
so underwhelmed by the management
style of this NGO that I thought there must
be something to learn from the corporate
sector. I worked as a commodities trader
in the City for five years – which was
quite a change! But I was aware that I
needed some knowledge of economics if
I was going to be a rounded sustainability
professional. Learning from the horse’s
mouth in the workplace like that was
fascinating. In the long term, though, I
couldn’t face the soulless, corporate grind.
So, I left to finish a Masters in Financial
Economics, become a professional athlete,
and then set up my own sustainability
consultancy.
Time to
repurpose
purpose
What I plan to do next
I plan to carry on as a professional athlete,
with my consultancy business alongside it,
until I have kids. The peak age for ironman
competitors is 36, so I’ve got a few more
years in me. From there, I’ll grow the
consultancy, and use sporting events as
discrete projects to educate organisations
more broadly about sustainability
management. People find it easier to wrap
their heads around an achievable project,
like a sports event, as a starting point – and
then they can apply what they have learnt
to their organisation more widely.
There’s a lot of talk at the moment on the power of ‘Why?’.
We’re questioning anything from the prevailing status quo (look at
the potency of the Occupy movement) to a particular aspect of our
spluttering economy (see the work of Havas Media on Meaningful
Brands, for example).
There’s also quite a bit of chatter about ‘repurposing’. People
are asking how they might best use a particular object or entity,
whatever it was originally meant for. It’s a practice which is rapidly
gaining momentum in the fashion industry, where anything from
bags to shoes can be made from tired old fabric or industrial waste.
These two concepts recently collided head on for me. I realised
that in order to find new, practical ways of shifting from our current,
very unsustainable trajectory towards a sustainable and equitable
future, we should think about repurposing ‘purpose’ itself.
I have two things in mind in particular.
Advice for future leaders
Find out what sustainability means to you,
and what you’re passionate about, and use
that as your tool to face the world.
Hunger breeds new content
Digital dynamism for a sustainable world
with prizes for those whose activities
achieved the best ratings in a tailored
‘energy star’ scheme. Winning teams will
receive a share of £250,000 to develop
their ideas, with support from Forum.
– Anna Simpson
Photo: Pascal Broze/Onoky/Corbis
need for medication to help them sleep.
Bupa recently announced its Well World
commitment to keeping people well and
supporting a healthy planet, which includes
a carbon reduction target of 20% by 2015.
The international healthcare company
recognised that cutting carbon in a growing
business would require some “out of the
box” thinking, and so collaborated with
Forum for the Future to kick off the Spark!
challenge. Ten teams from across the world
attended research workshops run by Forum
for the Future, and then submitted ideas
to a panel of external experts and senior
Bupa leaders.
The panel was also impressed by
behaviour change incentives targeting staff.
Bupa Australia proposed a competition
among the 567 retail network employees,
Photo: zoonar/thinkstock
Competition sparks cooling solutions
36
Sally Uren is Deputy Chief Executive at Forum for the Future.
@sallyuren
Toby Radcliffe was in conversation with
Katie Shaw.
Mood lighting
Lighting designed to promote the
wellbeing of patients with dementia,
while saving energy and cutting
costs, is one solution to win funding
for development, through Bupa’s
Spark! Carbon Innovation Challenge.
A team of employees at Bupa Care
Services UK proposed the installation
of LED lighting, which can be tuned to a
warmer or cooler tone of white – in lounges
and day rooms, in response to a companywide competition for innovative, highimpact ways to cut carbon. Bupa calculates
that the potential carbon savings could be
six tonnes per care home lounge per year.
Research shows that artificial lighting
which mimics the dynamics of daylight has
a positive effect on residents, improving
their mood, and potentially reducing the
It’s high time we repurposed business models. Under today’s
rules, flawed as they may be, a business has a fiduciary duty to
maximise shareholder value. However, in order to merit this legal
act of trust, I would argue that its primary purpose shouldn’t be
to make money, but to meet society’s needs. Why? Because it’s
hard to imagine a business capable of long-term value creation
which is massively inefficient in its use of expensive and dwindling
natural resources, and which is pumping out products and services
that no-one needs. It’s no accident that visionary CEOs such as
Unilever’s Paul Polman are realigning their business models to meet
the needs of emerging economies – through nutrition, hygiene and
so on.
While we’re at it, we also need to repurpose the City of London
and Wall Street. I’m constantly amazed by the reluctance of the
finance sector to engage with sustainability, particularly given how
well things are going in this world. Not! The purpose of mainstream
investors, sell-side analysts and the coterie of people with
incomprehensible job titles should be to reward those businesses
that are investing in sustainability and planning for the long term.
Surely these are a better bet for our pensions?
I could go on. We also need to repurpose brands, which should
be there to help build social purpose, to provide solutions to
over-consumption, and not just to sell more and more stuff.
But there is something we can all do now. How about
repurposing our time? How might we make each of our small
actions count? Just imagine the change that would come from
millions of deliberate actions, all designed to nudge us towards
sustainability!
You know the feeling: it’s late,
you’ve had a few beers, and you’re
hungry. There seems to be only one
option: a takeaway selling food of
unknown and dubious provenance.
Wouldn’t it be great if an app could point
you to a more sustainable option – and
reward you for choosing it?
Or how about a spot of peer-to-peer
fridge surfing? You can browse your
neighbours’ unwanted extras online, then
pop round to pick it up.
These ideas were created and pitched
in just 90 minutes, during a workshop run
by Forum for the Future, O2 and Wayra
Academy UK, at the Digital Shoreditch
festival in East London. The session
presented a varied crowd (IT coders,
entrepreneurs, sustainability experts
and industry professionals) with a very
real challenge: ‘How can we use digital
to help Londoners make healthier, more
sustainable food choices?’
Meanwhile, over in Bristol, an
audience at the Big Green Week festival
was asked how it would spend a budget
of £5 million to help make the city a leader
in ICT-driven sustainable energy.
The aim of both events? To
demonstrate the pace of innovation in
the digital space, and ask how it can be
used to create a sustainable society. The
opportunities that ICT presents for the
future are set out in a new report by the
Forum, ‘Connect, Collaborate, Change’,
commissioned by O2.
If you feel you’ve missed out, don’t
fret. Forum for the Future will be running
more creative events as part of a new
network of entrepreneurs interested in
digital and sustainability. – Madeleine
Lewis
To join: [email protected]
37
Forum for the Future’s Network brings together business and government to
create a sustainable future; inspiring new thinking, building creative partnerships
and developing practical innovations to change our world. We aim to transform
the critical systems that we all depend on, such as food, energy and finance,
to make them fit for the challenges of the 21st century. For more information,
visit www.forumforthefuture.org
ABN AMRO
www.abnamro.com
David Lloyd Leisure
www.davidlloyd.co.uk
John Lewis Partnership
Moira Thomas, +44 (0)207 592 4413
RWE npower
Anita Longley, +44 (0)1793 892716
AECOM
Daniel Hobbs, [email protected]
www.aecom.com
Delhaize Group
Ben Davies, [email protected]
Johnson Matthey
Sean Axon, +44 (0)20 7269 8400
AkzoNobel
Elizabeth Stokes, +44 (0)1928 511695
Delphis Eco
Mark Jankovich, +44 (0)203 397 0096
www.delphisworld.com
The Jordans & Ryvita Company Ltd
David Webster
Direct: +44 (0)1767 319 415
Sainsbury’s Supermarkets Ltd
Stuart Wright
[email protected]
Alliance Boots Ltd
Richard Ellis, [email protected]
DSME
www.dsme.co.kr/en
Kingfisher
Becky Coffin, [email protected]
Skanska
Jennifer Clark,+44 (0)1923 776666
AMEC
Francesco Corsi, +44 (0)191 272 6128
eBay Inc
Lorin May, [email protected]
Kimberly-Clark Corporation
Tom Berry, [email protected]
Arjowiggins Graphic
Shannan Hodgson,
[email protected]
Ecover
Mick Bremans, +32 3 309 2500
Kraft Foods and Cadbury
David Oliver, [email protected]
Small World
Henry Rawson
+852 2799 3998
www.interiorsourcing.com
Arup
Will McBain, [email protected]
EDF Energy
Darren Towers,+44 (0)7875 110 289,
[email protected]
Kyocera Mita UK Ltd
Tracey Rawling-Church
[email protected]
Ashden
Jane Howarth, +44 (0)20 7410 7023
Ella’s Kitchen
Sarah Bright, [email protected]
Aviva Investors
Steve Waygood, +44 (0)20 7809 6000
EnergyDeck
Benjamin Kott
www.energydeck.com
Lafarge UK
Emma Hines
www.lafarge.co.uk
Azaria International
[email protected]
+91 2222856161, www.azaria.in
Balfour Beatty plc
www.balfourbeatty.com
Bank of America Merrill Lynch
Matt Hale, +44 (0)20 7996 2054
BASF
Geoff Mackey, [email protected]
www.basf.com
Benchmark Software
Simon Harvey, +44 (0)1458 444010
Birmingham City Council
Sandy Taylor, +44 (0)121 303 4026
BP Shipping
www.bp.com/shipping
Energy Saving Trust
+44 (0)20 7227 0398
www.energysavingtrust.org.uk
The Environment Agency
Brian Francis,
[email protected]
Fife City Council
www.fifedirect.org.uk
Finlays
Michael Pennant-Jones, +44 (0)20 7802 3239
Firmenich SA
Neil McFarlane, +41 227802435
FirstGroup plc
Terri Vogt, +44 (0)7748 118 343
Nicki Hunt, +44 (0)20 7420 7132
Leeds City Council
www.leeds.gov.uk/
Lloyd’s Register
www.lr.org
Marine Stewardship Council (MSC)
James Simpson, +44 (0)20 7811 3315
Marks & Spencer plc
Rowland Hill
[email protected]
Gearbulk
www.gearbulk.com
PepsiCo UK & Ireland
Andrew Slight, [email protected]
Bupa
Andrew Smith, +44 (0)20 7656 2343
The Geo Group UK Limited
Paul Starkey, [email protected]
Powys County Council
Heather Delonnette, +44 (0)1597 826165
Burberry Limited
Jocelyn Wilkinson, +44 (0)203 367 3100
GSH Group
Lee Price, +44 (0)1782 200 497
www.gshgroup.com
Pret A Manger ltd
Nicki Fisher, +44 (0)20 7827 8888
Heineken UK
Richard Heathcote, +44 (0)1432 345277
Tata Global Beverages
Ria Kearney
+44 (0)20 8338 4596
Tetra Pak International
Rupert Maitland-Titterton,
+44 (0)870 442 6000
Bunge
www.bunge.com
Pureprint Group
Richard Owers, +44 (0)1825 768811
...to integrate biodiversity into its operations?
...cooperate with environmental organisations?
...showcase its commitment to biodiversity?
Talk Talk
Simon Richards,
[email protected]
National Grid
Mike Elmer, [email protected]
Panasonic UK Ltd
Simon Eves, +44 (0)1344 853325
Would your company like...
Target (US)
www.target.com
Technology Will Save Us
www.technologywillsaveus.org
GallifordTry Infrastructure
Guy Wilson, [email protected]
Cafédirect
Robyn Kimber, +44 (0)207 033 6022
Swire – China Navigation Co
www.cnco.com.hk
Mars Drinks
www.marsdrinks.co.uk
Friends Life
Sandra Latner, +44 (0)8452 683135
BT plc
Richard Spencer, +44 (0)773 663 6882
[email protected]
Sustaination
Ed Dowding
[email protected]
Tesco Ltd
Helen Flemming,
+44 (0)1992 806 790
O2 plc
Simon Davis, [email protected]
Biodiversity
It’s Your Business!
Sony Europe
www.sony-europe.com
Maersk Line
www.maersk.com
Ogilvy Earth
Kathleen Enright, +44 (0)20 7309 1226
[email protected]
BSkyB
Daniella Vega, [email protected]
SC Johnson Ltd
Chris Lambert, +44 (0)1784 484100
Thames Water Utilities Ltd
Helen Newman
+44 (0)118 373 8343
Triodos Bank
William Ferguson
+44 (0)117 980 9770
Tsakos
www.tsakos.net
Fotolia/Irochka
TUI Travel plc
Jane Ashton, +44 (0)1293 645911
Fotolia/Galyna Andrushko
Fotolia/Rob Bouwman
Benefit from...
Twin
Liz Evers, Communications Manager
[email protected]
www.twin.org.uk
Specialised workshops and regional forums for the integration of biodiversity into your company’s management systems
Unilever UK & Ireland
Helen Fenwick, +44 (0)1372 945000
Hewlett-Packard
Nancy Keith Kelly
Quintain Estates and Development Plc
Louise Ellison, +44 (0)20 7478 3430
[email protected]
Carillion plc
Louise Perry, +44 (0)1902 316258
The Highways Agency
Dean Kerwick-Chrisp,
[email protected]
www.highways.gov.uk
RAC Foundation
Elizabeth Box
[email protected]
www.racfoundation.org
Carnival
www.carnival.com
HSH Group
Natalie Chan, www.hshgroup.com
Rail Safety and Standards Board
Shamit Gaiger, +44 (0)20 3142 5380
Certis Europe
www.certiseurope.co.uk
IGD
Dr James Northen, +44 (0)1923 851919
Chi Group
www.chigroup.co
IBM
John Rushton, [email protected]
Recyclebank
+44 (0)203 205 3980
[email protected]
www.recyclebank.com
City of London
Simon Mills, +44 (0)20 7332 1431
Ingersoll Rand
www.ingersollrand.com
Rexam Plc
[email protected]
www.rexam.com
The Co-operative Group
Chris Shearlock, www.co-operative.coop
Innovia Films
Lucy Cowton, +44 (0)1697 342281
Rio Tinto
www.marine.riotinto.com
Wessex Water plc
Dan Green, +44 (0)1225 526000
PricewaterhouseCoopers and B.A.U.M. e.V. contribute to the development of
The Converging World
Wendy Stephenson
[email protected]
InterfaceFLOR Europe Ltd
Ramon Arratia, +44 (0)20 7490 3960
Royal Dutch Shell plc
Elfrida Hughes, +31 610974798
Willmott Dixon Ltd
Rob Lambe , +44 (0)7814 003046
Biodiversity Checks of the European Business & Biodiversity Campaign in Germany.
Interserve Constuction Ltd
Chris Williams, [email protected]
Royal Mail Group
James Kokiet
[email protected]
Wm Morrison Supermarkets plc
Steven Butts
[email protected]
RSA Insurance plc
Paul Pritchard, +44 (0)20 7337 5712
WWF-UK
Dax Lovegrove, +44 (0)1483 412395
Cargill
Fiona Cubitt, +44 (0)1932 861916
Crest Nicholson Plc
Dr Elizabeth Ness, +44 (0)1932 580579
Danone
www.danone.com
38
Jaguar Land Rover
Fran Leedham,
[email protected]
United Utilities
Gary Adkins, [email protected]
Biodiversity-checks for determining and evaluating your company’s impact
on biodiversity
Veja
Aurélie Dumont, [email protected]
vento ludens
Vanessa Ravenscroft,
[email protected]
www.ventoludens.co.uk
Landscape auctions for unique land areas
Get involved with the
European Business and Biodiversity Campaign!
Volac
Andy Richardson, +44 (0)1223 208021
Warburtons
Sarah Miskell, +44 (0)1204 556600
www.business-biodiversity.eu
Wärtsilä
www.wartsila.com
Photos: xxxxx
Capgemini Ltd
James Robey, +44 (0)870 904 5761
Supporter:
Partners:
39
Can new refineries unlock the potential of
bioplastics in a post-oil age?
As cohousing takes off, Bevis Watts calls for a
new age of ‘considerism’.
Designers are
moulding a
future using
plastics from
waste
40
Plastics from petrochemicals transformed
design for consumer goods over the last 100
years – from the monobloc chair of the 1960s to
Zaha Hadid’s soft, supportive shoes for Brazilian
brand Melissa. Now, designers are moulding the
future using plastics from waste – and these new
‘bioplastics’ could soon be omnipresent.
By 2020, for instance, drinks industry giants
Pepsi and Coca-Cola aim to be selling all their stuff
in bottles made of agricultural waste. Others have
stepped forward as pioneers: Ecover’s cleaning
products have been marketed for the last year
in bottles from the world’s largest producer of
biopolymers, Braskem. This Brazilian company
uses ethanol from purpose-grown sugarcane as a
primary feedstock, but Effi Vandevoorde at Ecover
expects to see more plastics from waste in the
future, whether it’s crop and forestry residues,
discarded food or methane sourced in landfill sites.
A new generation of biorefinery is emerging,
says Vandevoorde, which will make the most of
local leftovers. A biorefining centre in Antwerp,
for instance, could ideally be based on the
transformation of organic post-consumer waste
from the food industries in this densely populated
part of Europe – or even on sewage. DuPont, on
the other hand, is looking into processes using
corn residues in the American mid-West. And
Malaysian firm Loji Pandu BioPlastik has been
working with researchers at MIT on a fermentation
process for converting palm oil waste, driven by
bacteria already present in the crop. It’s this sort of
synergy – between plastics producers, users and
local resources – that will really make investment in
this industry worthwhile, for both business and the
environment.
Vandevoorde is enthusiastic about the potential,
though she sounds a warning about how quickly
scale can be achieved. The drinks giants’ 2020
target for all-bio bottles sounds like a tough one
to her.
So what are the barriers to rolling bioplastics
out more widely? There’s demand, for a start.
The chemical processes are tried and tested,
but the petrochemical route is still the cheapest
way to make most plastics, and the source of the
overwhelming majority of our organic chemicals.
But that can’t continue to be the case, asserts
Vandevoorde. One answer, she says, is to drive
demand by developing more applications for these
new plastics, and demonstrating their advantages.
What can they be used for, then? The team
at MIT working with waste palm oil says the
resulting bioplastic is not only very strong, but also
biodegrades faster than any other type. There’s
a growing market for biodegradable plastics for
use in food and drink containers, cutlery and
other disposables, from tea bags to nappies to
toothbrushes.
Others are keen to make the most of the
unusual combination of strength, flexibility and low
mass. Toyota already uses bioplastics for some
internal trimmings in the Prius, such as the seat
cushions and scuff boards, and has expressed
interest in lightweight bioplastics that could be
used in a car’s body and frame.
Another potential barrier to wider development
of the industry, says Vandevoorde, is excessive
competition, with companies engaging in a sort
of race for patents. Scientists, governments and
corporations need to build partnerships with a
commitment to sharing knowledge, she argues.
Ecover is already working with universities on
questions identified by its Long Term Innovation
Programme, but well-directed public funding will
surely be vital, along with support for the right kind
of sustainable industrial development.
The biology, chemistry, engineering, investment
and innovation must all come together, in other
words. If they can do so, the days of plastics from
mineral oil could soon be over. – Roger East
Ecover is a Forum for the Future partner.
www.ecover.com
Photo: Lancaster CoHousing
Open house
Photo: Roger Ressmeyer/Corbis
Plastic pioneers
As a society, our focus on sustainability is
hugely biased towards environmental issues,
on developing new products and technologies
to address climate change. Yet the reality is,
these solutions will not be effective unless we are
all inspired as human beings to take more
responsibility for our everyday lives and the
decisions we make. At Triodos, we believe that a
sustainable society can only come about if we can
instigate a very different way of engaging with each
other – one that inspires that conscious choice.
I see it as a new age of ‘considerism’.
So what does considerism look like in action? One
emerging and inspiring example is cohousing. Most
conventional development focuses on the immediate
needs of individual households. Beyond perhaps some
shared outdoors space, there’s rarely any provision
for common ground – both literally, and between the
people who live there.
Cohousing comes at things from the opposite
direction. It sets out to create a community through
shared development of a living space, which includes
both communal and private areas. In the past,
cohousing communities were only open to those who
could afford to buy a share (or unit) in the development.
Now, housing associations are taking an interest, and
it’s possible to join some communities on a rental
basis. On top of this, residents pay a service charge
to cover maintenance of common facilities and utility
bills. It’s a way of combating the isolation many
people experience today, by recreating the neighbourly
support of a traditional village or urban neighbourhood.
Yes, it’s about providing homes, but there’s more to
sustainable societies than a room of one’s own...
Lancaster Cohousing is behind the country’s
second purpose-built cohousing project, at Forge
Bank near Halton in Lancashire. (The first was
Springhill, which opened in 2003 near Stroud
in Gloucestershire.) In 2005, a group build of
visionaries came together with the plan to create
an intergenerational community founded on
ecological values, trust, respect, friendship and
understanding, and which would live “at the
cutting edge of sustainable design”. It became a
not-for-profit company in April 2006 and, after five
years of planning, construction began in August
2011. Now, future residents are gearing up for their
big move, planned for September 2012.
In the Forge Bank development, financed by
Triodos Bank, each resident will have their own private
home, but also access to a common house, with a
shared kitchen and eating area, where residents will
regularly cook and share meals. Other communal
facilities include gardens, guest bedrooms, a children’s
playroom and a laundry. It is all being developed to
state-of-the-art ‘passivhaus’ standards, requiring
minimum lighting and heating, and the shared
facilities mean private houses can be smaller than
in conventional developments. A car pool scheme
– stipulated for occasional use only – will replace
personal vehicles.
Getting this far was no mean feat, acknowledges
Luke Mills, a founding member. With no prior
development experience, the nascent community
has had to overcome many practical challenges, from
refurbishing a large mill and installing a woodchip
boiler for hot water, to developing a 160KW hydroelectric power scheme (in conjunction with the wider
community in Halton).
“We have all gained the odd emotional bruise
and grey hair”, he says. “All decisions are made by
concensus, and the need to compromise can leave
people feeling sore”, he explains. But this hasn’t
diminished his desire for “greater connection” with his
neighbours – a need that “years of communting in and
around London had not met”.
To some degree, joining a cohousing project
requires a leap of faith. It’s not just about the
efficiency savings of shared resources. The whole
structure prompts those involved to become much
more conscious of the impact of their own lives on
the community they live in – and of their personal
contribution to its wellbeing. There’s a commitment to
actively participating with your neighbours – to a life
beyond your front door.
For some, it may be a commitment too far,
but those who are willing to make the leap get the
ultimate reward – being part of a genuinely cohesive
community. And perhaps, by focusing on something
more their own needs as an individual, they become an
inspiration to us all.
There’s more
to sustainable
societies
than a room
of your own
Bevis Watts is Head of Business Banking at Triodos.
Triodos Bank is a Forum for the Future partner.
www.triodos.co.uk
41
Treading air
and water
Catching practice
Andrew Kuyk asks how best to manage the tricky
relationship between footprints and facts.
If we want healthier marine environments,
we have to get better at tracking them.
42
Andrew Kuyk is Director, Sustainability and
Competitiveness Division, Food and Drink Federation.
Food and Drink Federation is a Forum for the
Future partner.
www.fdf.org.uk
Photo: Stockbyte/thinkstock
And that’s before you begin to ask how comparable
data could be provided for fresh produce, or for food
sold by caterers, restaurants and take-aways, where
portion size is another complicating factor...
Knowing how many grams of carbon went into
making a particular product does not necessarily
help consumers understand the significance of their
impact, or what they ought to do about it. They may
not be aware that they account for about a third of the
total footprint over that product’s lifecycle – by storing
it, cooking it, or simply discarding it as waste. These
‘usage’ emissions will almost certainly exceed those
of the manufacturing process – with the largest share
of all coming from the basic ingredients at the farm.
Water is even more difficult to measure, as its
impact depends critically on where it comes from
and how it might be used. A rain-fed crop will have a
different effect on local resources to one irrigated from
a bore-hole which might also supply drinking water.
Similarly, water used to grow a cash crop for export
can hardly be compared to water from the same
reserves used to provide sanitation or produce food
for local consumption. You can tot up the number of
litres involved, but this figure alone will tell us very little
about the real world impact on people or ecosystems.
Biodiversity is more difficult still. We don’t even
have agreement on how to measure it.
So, is it right to expect consumers to make sense
of all this at point of purchase? Or should we focus
our efforts, instead, on getting it right in our supply
chains? If we spend our time on this, rather than
adding to the mass of facts and figures already on
packs (ingredients, additives, nutrition, origin, use,
shelf-life, storage and recycling), we may find we
have some space to communicate better about what
sustainability really means.
Photo: istock/thinkstock
Before we
run away with
ourselves, let’s
ask where
we’re going
with all these
footprints
‘What gets measured gets managed’ is a
central dictum of modern business theory –
and for obvious reasons. Unless you know how
much of something you are using, it is difficult to
judge the consequences, or decide how much effort
to devote to using less. So, it’s no surprise that food
manufacturers are using footprints to measure their
greenhouse gas emissions, water use, and even the
impacts of their operations on biodiversity.
But before we run away with ourselves, let’s take
a moment to ask where we’re going with all these
footprints. Of course, anyone investing time and
money in measurements hopes to learn something
– but what will they do with the data? Package it
up neatly for consumers? Slot it into procurement
questionnaires? Or might they use it to take a fresh
look at the fundamentals of their work…?
Take carbon. It’s where most businesses first came
across footprinting, and it was a fairly self-evident
starting point. The direct relation of carbon emissions
to both climate change and energy costs made it easy
to demonstrate that good environmental practice
makes good business sense. It also helps that a tonne
of carbon in the atmosphere has roughly the same
effect whether it’s produced in the UK or China, and
can be measured in units familiar to consumers.
It was to help these figures find their use that
the Food and Drink Federation worked with the
Carbon Trust to pioneer the first recognised global
standard for product carbon footprinting: the
PAS2050. This work was an integral part of our
original Five-fold Environmental Ambition, launched
nearly five years ago to set food production on a
more sustainable footing.
The standard is now used by global brands such
as Coca-Cola, and retailer M&S. But what about
consumers? Any food picked off the shelf will vary
enormously in carbon emissions according to when,
where and how it was produced. For some products
this will change according to the price and availability
of raw materials and ingredients. Displaying this
information accurately on a pack
risks being enormously complex and expensive.
In a world where far too many fish have had
their chips, Marine Stewardship Council (MSC)
certification can reassure you that what’s on
the menu was sustainably sourced. But can you
be sure that the MSC is getting it right? Are fish stocks
getting any healthier through their work with fisheries?
The MSC was itself keen to have an answer to
this, and so it commissioned three marine science
consultancies to do a wide-ranging audit of the impact
of its certification programme on the environment.
Happily, the study the consultancies produced,
‘Researching the Environmental Impacts of the
MSC Certification Programme’, reached some
broadly positive conclusions. Both newcomers to
the programme and those pioneering fisheries with
certification already in place were making progressive
environmental improvements, the consultants found.
Progress was more marked when the MSC had
attached clear conditions to granting (or maintaining)
certified status. Fisheries that were already doing OK
had less apparent incentive to raise their game.
The report found improvements in target stock
status and in the ecosystem in which the fishery
operated reduced impacts on habitat. It also found
that, very often, low assessment scores reveal
uncertainty about the fisheries’ impacts, rather than
certainty the impacts are low. “We realise that fisheries
are complex systems, and quantitative data isn’t the
‘be all and end all’”, says David Agnew, the MSC’s
Director of Standards. “We have found that many
improvements that eventually lead to changes in
the impact that fisheries have on their environment
start with improved collaboration between fishers,
governments and stakeholders, new research and
improved management practices.”
The report is based on eight of the MSC
environmental indicators, and addresses two
questions. One relates to the population and
management of specific fish stock, whether it’s South
African hake or Gulf of Alaska pollock. This is where the
greatest improvements can be seen, partly because
this is the most closely monitored indicator, and
information is readily available.
The second question is whether the fisheries are
safeguarding habitats, ecosystems and endangered,
threatened or protected species. Reducing by-catch
is a priority – good news for Chinook salmon in the
Gulf of Alaska pollock fishery, and for birds sharing
the sea with South African hake or Patagonian
toothfish. Another success story in the toothfish fishery
is the elimination of hooks discarded in the water.
Sometimes, monitoring required to meet the MSC
standard throws up previously unknown problems
– such as the number of albatrosses being killed in
collisions with hake trawlers in South Africa. Measures
to reduce this mortality have been very successful.
But for Agnew, the real value in conducting such
a report is not to reveal amazing improvements being
achieved in every fishery, nor to give a conclusive
statement about MSC performance. Rather, he
wants to see it used as part of an ongoing process of
increasing good practice in fisheries across the globe.
This raises some tensions in the MSC’s approach,
he concedes. Not least, for some critics, there’s the
need to continually press the fisheries that join the
programme to do more and better. The fisheries
themselves may resist continual change, and so
holding them to the existing standard is easier. They
are currently re-scored on their performance every
five years, and monitored annually, facing suspension
if they fail to maintain their standard. Agnew cites
the recent suspension of the Portuguese sardine
fishery’s certification, when an annual surveillance audit
confirmed that stocks were falling fast, as an example
of rapid and effective action.
Even more important, for Agnew, is encouraging
other marine researchers to look long and hard at
what’s being done by the MSC and other fishery
management organisations around the world. A first
step would be to open up full access to the MSC’s
database. It’s a vital resource, he argues, and critical
inspection of it is going to be the best guide to more
effective action. – Roger East
The
Portuguese
sardine
fishery was
suspended
when it
became clear
stocks were
falling fast
The Marine Stewardship Council is a
Forum for the Future partner. www.msc.org
43
Can the Lorax
close the loop?
TRaNSFORm
yOUR BUSINESS
FOR ThE
FUTURE
Business makes a huge impact on the natural
world. But it’s vitally dependent on it too. As we
face the effects of diminishing natural resources,
only the smartest, most sustainable companies will
continue to thrive.
That’s why we use our knowledge and insight to
work with you to help your business drive real,
lasting change, that makes a positive contribution
to the natural world.
WWF.ORG.UK/BUSINESS
44
By working together we can explore the key
sustainability issues that affect your business
– now and in the future, whilst using our expertise
to inspire your staff, customers and investors
with engaging communications.
We can also share new thinking and ideas, working
with you to innovate – ultimately supporting your
development of strategies, models and services to
transform your business for the future.
To find out how WWF can help you explore,
inspire, innovate and transform, get in
touch on 01483 412395/4 or email
[email protected] or connect through
LinkedIn: wwf.org.uk/linkedinbusiness
Photos: xxxxx
As you know, WWF’s work stretches far beyond
wildlife. Right into the heart of the business world,
in fact.
A blockbuster boosts efforts to keep printer cartridges
out of landfill.
When it comes to making computer printers
more sustainable, ‘closed loop recycling’ is a
key concept. Sadly, it’s not the sexiest of phrases.
“Print like the Lorax!” on the other hand – now
there’s a slogan to win young hearts and minds.
Sponsoring this year’s blockbuster 3D animated
film, The Lorax – based on the story by Dr Seuss –
gave electronics giant HP the opportunity to mount
a campaign to promote sustainable printing. For 40
years, this wise forest-dwelling creature has urged
children to look after the environment, speaking up for
trees in particular. Now, says this campaign, the Lorax
would surely pick an ultra-low-energy printer and
smart print management software. He’d choose the
right paper, avoid wasteful printing, use both sides,
and recycle his used cartridges.
Jeff Waller, Director of Environmental Sustainability
and Social Innovation for HP’s printing business,
wants his customers to follow this example. Naturally,
the greenest print option is not to print at all. But, says
Waller, with these principles in place, people “can
justifiably feel that if they need to print, they should”.
That’s partly down to HP’s closed loop recycling
system – an industry first. The company has been
taking back used printer ink and toner cartridges for
over 20 years, and has manufactured over a billion
new ones from recycled materials in that time, while
the process has got ever more sophisticated.
Instead of shredding old cartridges, they’re
now disassembled. Their plastic is supplemented
with lower grade recyclate from used water bottles,
which is ‘upcycled’ with special additives to yield
suitable polyethylene terephthalate (RPET) resin for
making new ones. The process is so finely tuned, and
dependent on knowing exactly what’s in the mix, that
only the company’s own components can be allowed
back in. But there are HP cartridges out there whose
materials have been round the loop six, seven, even
eight times. And unlike the proverbial cat, nine’s not
the limit.
The resource efficiency of the closed loop process
is key to the sustainable business case. Its carbon
footprint is now one third lower than using ‘virgin’
plastic, with a 62% saving on petroleum, and 89%
less water. Yes, it cost HP money in the investment
phase. But the running costs are now broadly
competitive – so, in a world of rising fossil fuel (and
carbon) prices, there’s every prospect of future cost
savings, boosting the economic bottom line too.
Some segments of the worldwide printer market
are more alert than others to the language of ‘closed
loop’. But the Lorax campaign is soon to spread
beyond North America, as the film is launched
worldwide. Already, the steps to make cartridge
take-back effortless for customers are in place in over
50 countries, coordinated by the company’s Planet
Partners programme. There are in-store collection
points, and cartridge packs come with freepost
envelopes inside to send the old one back at no cost.
Some HP partnership programmes will even give a
customer a direct reward for recycling – in the form of
Staples Reward Dollars to spend in that company’s
stores, for instance. And the yield? Nearly half a billion
cartridges recycled since 1991, and 39 million in 2011
alone – or about three quarters of its sales that year.
So what’s not to like? Would it be more
environmentally virtuous to re-use the cartridge
directly, rather than remanufacture it? Emphatically
not, says Waller. Although there are plenty of
companies out there who’ll take used cartridges
and re-fill them for resale, he explains, this isn’t how
they’re designed to work, and one in three will fail
when put to the test – a wasted effort, and wasting
ink. Worse, these companies don’t recycle
those they can’t re-use: they send them to
landfill. A carefully closed loop may seem
a round-about route, but it’s a far better
one, he says. – Roger East
Hewlett-Packard is
a Forum for the
Future partner.
www.hp.com
‘Closed loop recycling’
is hardly the sexiest
of phrases
45
Feedback
greengfutures
reenfutur
es
No.84 April 2012
Taste test
Taste test
What will technology
bring to the table?
No.84 Apr
il 2012
What wil
l technolo
gy
bring to
the table?
Laps of luxury: when our treats sit with our values
Land of milk and money: tackling dairy’s sacred cows
Solar, cheaper: what happens when PV costs the same as the mains
Laps of luxu
ry: when
our treats
Land of milk
sit with
and money:
Solar, che
tackling dair our values
aper: wha
y’s sacred
t happens
cows
when PV
costs the
same as
the mai
Join the debate
[email protected]
@GreenFutures
Comments may be edited for publication.
Lab-grown meat sounds very unappetising,
but there’s no denying the massive benefits
in land, water and energy usage. And it
really can’t be any worse than the cheap
processed meats that we buy at the
moment. – OfficeEd
Wow! I can’t decide whether this is a sign
of how horrifically out of whack things
have become – that we are seriously
talking about printing off GM burgers
like some Soylent Green nightmare –
or a brave new world where we can
solve hunger and distribution problems
and maybe even end resource wars.
Interesting times! – Ishmael
ns
Brave new world! We could have our
breakfast printed onto our newspaper and
lick it off as we read… – Cantaloop
Appetite for change?
One drawback of food produced through
nanotechnology [‘Taste test’, GF85, p20]
is uncertainty over safety. As Dr Sandy
Lawrie, Head of Novel Foods at the Food
Standards Agency, says: “Relatively little
is known about the way nanomaterials
behave when ingested as food.
Nano-forms of a given substance may
behave differently to other, larger forms of
the same thing.” Before products could
be marketed in the EU, they would have
to undergo a thorough safety assessment
on a case-by-case basis. But that means
more animal testing, I presume, and a lot
of money and effort. – nellief
Cool school
Well, we’re back to the future... and rightly
so! For centuries people knew and used
successfully food storage techniques that
were safe, efficient and relatively simple
[see ‘Fridge-free food’, GF84, p14]. These
methods required a bit of work and some
careful planning, however. The fridge, on
the other hand, became so ubiquitous
precisely because it requires little mental
or physical effort to be used. Many people,
including my wife, don’t know that some
fruits and vegetables such us tomatoes
and bananas do not tolerate sitting in
the fridge at all. My personal favourite is
watching hapless souls trying to butter
their toast with rock hard, frozen butter…
This article brings into focus, rather
nicely, the need and purpose to revise old
techniques. The results might just turn out
to be very useful. – A Kubski
In response to your briefing on food
storage, can I draw your attention to some
research WRAP did on this in 2007? The
study showed that, for most products,
refrigerated storage did help to reduce
waste. Also, most products benefited from
being stored in their original packaging or
in the loosely-tied perforated polyethylene
bags supplied free to consumers by
retailers. – Annemarie Taylor
Catching the current
Thermoelectric paint sounds fantastic,
but obviously it isn’t as simple as just
painting your roof, as your article ‘Lick
of light’ [GF84, p12] infers. Even I, who
know nothing about electricity, realise
that electric energy has not only got to be
generated, it has to be harnessed safely in
order for things to work, and this is where a
competent electrician comes in.
Silver ink researchers strike gold
An app a day
New technique could boost solar PV efficiency, cut costs
Status update
Social media prompts a clean energy shift
Facebook is making the switch to more
renewable energy sources. The change
comes after Greenpeace’s ‘Unfriend Coal’
campaign, a two-year push to get the social
media giant to use less electricity from
fossil fuels. The campaign broke the world
record for the most comments posted on
a single Facebook page in 24 hours, with
over 80,000 on 13 April 2011 – largely in
protest against the company’s 28MW coalpowered data centre, opened that month in
Primeville, Oregan.
By the end of the year, Facebook had
responded with plans for another data
centre, three times the size – but with
a difference. Situated by the Lule River
in Sweden, this centre – due to open in
2014 – will run primarily on hydroelectric
power, with diesel generator back-up. It
will consume 120MW, about 2.8% of the
total hydro-electric power generated in
the region. The site, in the Arctic Circle,
has another strategic advantage: the cold
climate, which will minimise the need for
energy to cool the servers.
In a joint statement with Greenpeace,
Facebook also announced a new goal “to
power all our operations with clean and
renewable energy”, including a specific
10
Green Futures April 2012
GF_Issue84.indd 10-11
46
commitment to work with its current
utility providers to increase the proportion
of clean energy in their mix. It gave no
timeline for the switch – but has since
hired Bill Weihl, who pioneered Google’s
investment in green energy [see GF77, p6].
The energy demands of our virtual
lives are massive. All those profiles,
pictures and pokes have to be stored
1) Gaming once meant hours on
computers and couches. Not anymore,
and Nexercise is one app to get you
moving. Every time you exercise it
tracks your progress and awards you
points. These can be traded for real
prizes, such as sports accessories and
energy bars. Co-founder Greg Coleman
believes the rewards can incentivise
more sustainable lifestyle choices –
walking or cycling to work, for instance,
instead of travelling by car.
2) Stats of the Union offers information
on the health of the US, state by state.
You can compare key factors, from
access to primary care, to death rates,
to green space and pollution. By joining
the dots between the quality of the
local environment, and the population’s
wellbeing, it could drive authorities
to treat the causes of public health
concerns – not just the symptoms.
3) The Urban Green Line app connects
people and communities in London to
green spaces by encouraging outdoor
activities, from sport to guerrilla
gardening. There’s no shortage of
research showing the mental and
physical value of time spent enjoying
natural surroundings – especially with
other people [see GF79, p41]. This
interactive app lets you tag green
spaces and what you do there, creating
communities online and outdoors.
somewhere. According to the Greenpeace
report, ‘Make IT Green’, the electricity
demand of the world’s data centres
and the telecommunications network is
623 billion kWh, or 2% of global use –
more than India, Germany or Canada. As
demand for digital storage grows, let’s
hope social media can spark a green
energy revolution. – John Eischeid
air pollution reading by measuring
airborne particulate matter. It works
by noting the location and time, and
then comparing the intensity of the
image with an established model of sky
luminance. This personal environmental
monitoring tool means people can
make informed decisions about where
they go – particularly useful for anyone
with respiratory issues.
5) Almost 90% of the world’s population
lives within range of a mobile phone
transmitter – and now they will be
in range of expert healthcare, too.
Developed at MIT, Sana provides a
platform that connects patients and
rural health workers to medical experts,
providing access to high-quality
healthcare for those in isolated and
developing regions. - Jasmine Kubski
Tagged for
relaxation
4) Take a picture of the sky and Visibility
will give you an immediate local
in the UK]. However, our manufacturing
industry is lost and most of them will be
imported. Why not look to wave power,
which is 1,000 times more powerful than
wind power, and is consistent? This could
be the best way of exploiting our coastline
for energy in the future. Unfortunately,
this myopic government is still sitting on
£42 million earmarked for marine turbine
research, and won’t release it. – John
A greater splash
I’m happy to see someone putting out
a little good news about ocean thermal
energy conversion (OTEC), but this article
[‘Ocean power’, GF84, p8] is really missing
the biggest news on the matter. Another
OTEC company has deals in place to build
the world’s first two commercial plants in
the Bahamas.
Plus, this article doesn’t mention
OTEC’s incredible by-product
opportunities, including the fact that every
system can produce millions of gallons
of clean drinking water. There’s more
information on how OTEC works, and the
people leading the world in its commercial
production, at The On Project.org.
– M Straub
Scaling the sun
The idea of lateral power working like an
‘energy internet’ is brilliant [see ‘Is solar the
new normal?’, GF84, p30]. However, how
are we going to manage and measure the
production and consumption of energy on
this sort of scale? The internet faced the
same problems before Tim Berners-Lee
created the concept of hypertext, which is
the foundation of sharing information over
the internet. Private energy production
needs a similar approach – but it will have
to overcome many more challenges from
established energy institutions. Although
it appears to provide us with a much more
sustainable future, will it ever work?
– Mike Bugle
Uncool offsets
I completely agree with Martin Wright in his
blog, ‘M&S: deeply uncool; deeply right’
[see www.greenfutures.org.uk/articles/
ms-deeply-uncool-deeply-right]. Offsetting
may not be fashionable, and it may have
its sceptics, but how else is M&S going to
reduce its footprint beyond all of its internal
efficiency measures? The unfortunate reality
is that people want food that comes from
overseas, and – for now, at least –transport
and energy use have emissions that are
unavoidable. By investing in projects that
prevent carbon emissions, they are doing a
damn lot more than almost any other retailer.
Plus, the offset projects M&S supports have
loads of benefits for their local communities.
[See www.plana.marksandspencer.com/
about/carbon-neutral/meru-and-nanyuki]
I think this is a great example of what
businesses can do, until low carbon fuels
become widely available. I hope more
retailers follow in M&S’ footsteps!
– Anonymous
a greenfutures Special Edition
Lend a hand
Thank you for the Special Edition ‘Shared
Future’ – a very inspiring read, featuring a
great mix of cooperatives and sectors. I
was, however, surprised and disappointed
to find no mention of Shared Interest, and
particularly so, given that the good article on
developing world co-operatives cited lack
of access to finance as a barrier. Shared
Interest is a UK co-operative founded in
1990, which provides loans and credit to
fair trade organisations around the world.
They have supported numerous fair trade
cooperatives in their time including Apicoop
[see ‘Shared Future’, p11]. Twenty years on,
it’s still the world’s only fair trade lender. It
has investments of £28 million, and lends
over £33 million a year across 36 countries.
– Tracy Mitchell
As usual you have all ‘done it again’ and
made me feel much more positive about
the world our children and grandchildren
will inherit. I particularly liked the feature
‘Springing the poverty trap’ [‘Shared
Future’, p8] and will certainly investigate
lendwithcare.org. – Myra Miller
The article ‘Revolution in the works’ [‘Shared
Future’, p4] goes to the heart of something
I have been writing about for 15 years now.
There is a persistent belief in business,
and in many trade unions, that employee
relations is a zero sum game: that the
worker can only gain at the expense of the
owner or manager. This is fundamentally
untrue, because the treatment of workers
affects performance. – Philip Whiteley
www.radical-shift.net
Published by
a greenfut
ures Speci
al Edition
Published
by
How co-operatives can reboot a sustainable economy
How co-ope
ratives can
reboot a sus
tainable eco
nomy
I read Jonathon Porritt’s preface to ‘Shared
Future’ [p3] with interest. Would it not be
wonderful if the Labour Party encouraged
and supported the development of
cooperative businesses as a core part of
a radical industrial strategy for the future?
– Howard Parker
Facebook gets cooler
Photos: Comstock / Thinkstock; Lifestize / Thinkstock
At the heart of all this debate about the
future of food is a smaller footprint. New
technology can allow us to produce more
food with less impact: 1% of the land
and 4% of the water… It means more
land that can be left for conservation
and wildlife – while providing for the
projected 9 billion humans on the planet.
If this can be brought about, then
brilliant. – FrankSW
Researchers at the University of Illinois
have claimed advances in silver ink
technology that can potentially both cut
the costs of solar photovoltaics, and
increase their efficiency by about 1%.
This is a significant jump, considering
it comes from just one small piece of
Mobile technology for sustainable health
Our health is closely linked to the
wellbeing of the natural resources we
draw on day-to-day: the air we breathe,
the water we drink, the food we eat… It’s
no big surprise, then, that lifestyle choices
that are good for the environment are
often good for our health, too. Commuting
by bike or on foot will cut carbon, local
air pollution and your waistline. Access
to vibrant green space will help keep
stress levels under check. Now, mobile
technology is offering a fast track to
sustainable health. Dedicated apps are
proving popular, with over 44 million
downloads in 2012 alone. Here are five
of our favourites.
and leading authority in this area, calls
the Lewis team’s approach “novel”. He
notes that the new silver ink also goes
through a necessary hardening process,
called annealing, at a relatively low
temperature, thereby reducing costs
and making possible the use of less
expensive substrates.
Both Xia and Lewis see the new
technology as a significant advance,
but something less than a breakthrough.
“For conductive ink, people are looking
to migrate from silver to less expensive
metals like copper and nickel. Now that
will be a breakthrough”, says Lewis.
Meanwhile though, a “significant
number” of corporations, including
major chemical and display companies,
have contacted the research team
about licensing the technology. The
new silver ink is breakthrough enough
for them, apparently. – Carl Frankel
Photo: iStockphoto / Thinkstock
Conventional breeding which can involve
irradiation and chemical mutagenesis is
totally acceptable to the public. But the
insertion and removal of genes freaks
them out to no end. Whether or not they
will accept lab-based meat is anyone’s
guess! – Msommerville
the solar panel puzzle. And what, you
may be wondering, is silver ink? It’s a
conductive material that’s used to print
high-performance electrical circuits
on flexible substrates. Among the
many applications: batteries, displays,
wearable electronic clothing and, yes,
solar panels.
The team led by Professor Jennifer
Lewis has developed a silver ink that,
unlike prior versions, has no particles in
its initial solution form. This is important
because particles can clog nozzles and
limit how small the patterned features
can be. Now nozzles as small as 100
nanometers can be used, yielding printed
features that are only 5 microns wide.
The result: much finer line widths and,
because silver blocks light, significantly
more efficient conversion of solar energy
to electricity.
Younan Xia, a Georgia Tech professor
I am quite prepared to believe in a paint
which can generate or conduct electricity.
After all, like many other people, I often
find I have generated enough static myself
for my hair to stand out when combed,
and to receive a small shock from certain
contacts. But I’ve never claimed to be able
to make use of it! – Anonymous
“Women’s strength, women’s industry,
women’s wisdom are humankind’s greatest
untapped resource. The challenge is to show
how this resource can be effectively tapped in
ways that benefit us all.”
Conquering the coast
Michelle Bachelet, Executive Director of UN Women, and former President of Chile
Green Futures April 2012
11
Installing wind turbines around the coast
is a good idea in principle [see ‘Floating
frontier’, GF84, p9] and they will make a
contribution [to a sustainable energy mix
3/21/12 7:10 PM
47
White Paper 07 ad Green Futures_Layout 1 29/06/2012 10:56 Page 1
JonathonPorritt
WHITE PAPERS
07/SUSTAINABILITY
NOW PUBLISHED
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THE FIRST FULL ANALYSIS OF THE IMPACT OF PART L LEGISLATION
More than half
the concrete
poured anywhere
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48
By any standards,
Isaac Newton was a
smart cookie. But he
wasn’t smart enough to
avoid getting caught up in
the South Sea Bubble in
the 18th century.
He put a bit of
money in to start with,
and then pulled out
when he’d made a lot.
As the Bubble grew,
his friends persuaded
him to put almost all
his money back in.
The Bubble burst, he
lost everything, and was poor for the rest of his
illustrious life.
I heard this sad story in a talk given by Jeremy
Grantham at this year’s Seminar for Senior
Executives for the Business and Sustainability
Programme. Jeremy is a rather extraordinary man.
Back in 1977, he founded GMO, a successful
investment management firm based in Boston.
Managing around $100 billion of assets, GMO has
built up a special reputation for understanding (and
making money out of) commodity markets, and that
includes understanding the way in which speculative
bubbles influence those markets. His investors
were particularly grateful to him for anticipating the
bursting of the sub-prime housing bubble in the US.
A few years ago, Grantham began to think
about commodity prices within a ‘Limits to Growth’
framework. And the conclusions he came to are
pretty gloomy: “I became a Malthusian when I
became an expert in bubbles”. There can’t be
that many self-confessed Malthusian bankers
out there today!
But it’s precisely because he’s also a successful
investment banker that more and more people
are listening to his words. He’s not actually saying
anything all that different from the original ‘Limits
to Growth’ – celebrating the 40th anniversary of its
publication later this year. But the basic thesis of
it is, in essence, a Malthusian one. It focuses on
the possibility (probability, even) that a continually
rising human population, demanding more and
more economically, will overwhelm the ability of the
natural world to meet that demand. And it has been
systematically ignored by pretty much every banker
over the course of history.
The trick, from an investment point of view, is
to be able to tell the difference between a bubble
and a paradigm change. In Grantham’s terms, that
means telling the difference between the sub-prime
mortgage meltdown (the one that nearly brought
down the entire global economy), and the dramatic
rise in commodity prices that has been going on
over the last two or three years. The first was the
culmination of a disaster that had long been waiting
to happen. The second was a significant change in
global demand and supply: “A paradigm shift which
changes everything”, as Grantham puts it.
For the last century, commodity prices have
been declining by, on average, 1.2% per annum,
with huge economic benefits for today’s wealthy
countries. But GMO’s analysts demonstrate that
almost all commodities are now on a rising cost
curve, with almost no prospect of prices getting
back to where they were even a few years ago. And
we all know the principal reason for this: surging
growth for countries like China, India and Brazil. For
instance, more than half of all the concrete poured
anywhere in the world in 2010, was poured in China.
The response of conventional economists is
predictable: prices rise and prices fall. If you’re
talking sustainability, higher prices are not
necessarily a bad thing. They encourage efficiency,
one might argue, which drives innovation, creating
new platforms for growth and value, which is good
for the economy! Business as usual, then?
Grantham had nothing but contempt for these
sustainability-illiterate economists. On commodities,
resources and energy, significant demand from a
new source means we have to get used to some
new baselines. Oil is never going back below $75 a
barrel, and high commodity prices are changing the
balance of power between rich and poor countries.
Keeping consumption within natural resource limits
has become a whole new ball game.
Jeremy Grantham’s quarterly briefings do not
make comfortable reading even for sustainability
activists – let alone investment bankers!
Interestingly, he focuses as much on the critical
indicators for sustainable agriculture (soil, nitrogen,
potassium, phosphates, crop yields, water,
biodiversity), as he does on climate change and
carbon. Given that we’re losing 1% of soil every
year to produce no more than 60% of the food
we’re going to need in 2030 to feed 8.25 billion
people, we might well be stuffed!
Which brings us back to Isaac Newton, who
could so easily have invested the early returns
from his South Sea speculation in other things.
He might have bought a lot of land, as the safest
possible ‘hedge’ against resource shortages and
price volatility… Which is exactly what Grantham
was recommending for worried investors in the
21st century.
Jonathon Porritt is Founder Director of Forum for
the Future. www.jonathonporritt.com
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Saturday, 15th September 2012
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Bishopsgate Institute,
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Speakers and artists include:
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Giant leap - Forum for the Future

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