By Jeff Hardy
On Thursday we witnessed the first budget from Alistair Darling. How did you feel about it? I don’t think anyone was expecting anything dramatic as there isn’t really the wriggle room for big spending and grand gestures. It was built up as a green budget, and there were certainly some announcements relating to sustainable energy within it that were interesting.
Transport featured quite heavily. Gas guzzling cars (greater than 255 gCO2 per km labelled band M) took a bit of a hammering. Vehicle Excise Duty will be raised to £425 in 2009 and in 2010 you will also have a pay a one off cost of £950 when you buy such a car. Additionally, fuel duty will be raised by 2p per litre in October this year.
Biofuels have come under the policy microscope and sensibly the Government is looking to prioritise the most sustainable biofuels – although I’m not convinced that a sustainable biofuel has yet been defined anywhere. I’m also a little dubious of the table on carbon dioxide savings of biofuels compared to fossil fuels (page 98 of budget document) in light of recent studies examining land-use changes.
The aviation sector didn’t escape and the new per flight tax (replacing the per passenger tax) is to be increased by 10% in the second year of operation from whenever it starts – it’s under consultation currently.
New homes are to be zero carbon by 2016 and non-domestic buildings by 2019 according to the budget and this seems a worthy ambition. What I didn’t see, and perhaps I missed it, is any mention of measures to improve the energy efficiency of the existing housing stock. Without a major demolition programme the majority of houses in the UK in 2050 are already built. I’ll come back to this briefly later.
The humble plastic bag is to be phased out! Well, actually the plan is to put a cost (tax) on it so that we stop using it. Whilst I don’t think that this will halt climate change I’m glad that it has finally happened as it has proven successful elsewhere (see for example the Republic of Ireland). One caveat to my enthusiasm is that it’s important that this doesn’t have undesirable knock-on effects such as a switch by supermarkets to paper bags or something else. The idea should really be to encourage people to bring the means to carry their shopping home with them.
I want to comment on the proposed increase in winter fuel duty. I think that everyone should enjoy an affordable and comfortable home in winter (and indeed all year round). Is paying winter fuel duty every year the best way to achieve this or are there other ways to approach this? One thought would be to radically improve the insulation and efficiency of the heating systems in the homes of those at risk of fuel poverty (and in an ideal world, all homes). As a one off cost this is more expensive in a given year, but surely it would significantly reduce heating bills and must be cost effective in the long run? Energy efficient homes require less heating meaning lower heating bills, lower carbon dioxide emissions and ultimately reduced fuel poverty.
What do all these measures mean in terms of carbon emissions reductions? In all honesty, I have no idea! The environmental impacts of the measures are listed on page 107 of the Budget document. I was hoping to add them all up and present it as a lump of carbon dioxide savings. Unfortunately it’s not quite that straight forward as the ways in which the data are reported is not terribly helpful. If it helps then I think that there will be some reduction in carbon dioxide by 2020. Hopefully the very recently formed Committee on Climate Change, including UKERCs own Professor Jim Skea, will be able to help Government present these figures in a clearer and more transparent way.
So was it a green budget – does it put us clearly on a path towards significant carbon dioxide emissions reductions? No, not really. With just 11 more budgets before the Climate Change Bill 2020 target of a 26% carbon dioxide reduction, based on 1990 levels, we’ll need to see a much greater effort coming through. I think that the Committee on Climate Change will have a vital role in this and wish them good luck.
Thursday 13 March 2008
Thursday 6 March 2008
Power dressing - Jeff Hardy
Is it just me or are there more and more unusual energy related technologies getting into the popular media in recent times? Perhaps it's just a function of my daily news trawl for the National Energy Research Network, but several things have surprised me recently.
It appears that scientists and engineers have been busily devising ways of usefully capturing some of the energy we expend whilst wandering around. The driving force, perhaps unsurprisingly, is the need to charge electronic devices away from the grid – I suspect particularly by the military.
In its simplest incarnation, the idea is to turn us into mobile solar power platforms. For example, backpacks fitted with solar photovoltaic cells and lithium ion batteries are already available. These mainly provide power for mobile phones and other small electronic devices on the move. PV cells are also being fitted to other things, including laptops and mobile phones.
Scientists in Canada and America have developed a knee brace that captures the kinetic energy of walking. The device works in a similar way to regenerative braking in hybrid electric and can generate around 5 watts of electricity at a typical walking pace. This is approximately enough to charge 10 mobile phones simultaneously. It looks like a rather sturdy knee support and currently weighs in at a rather hefty 1.6 kg; however it is a work in progress. The device could potentially be built into prosthetic knees, or other such implants, which could negate the need for further surgery to replace batteries that these devices require.
Not to be outdone, nanotechnologists in America are proposing to make clothes from nanofibres that generate electricity from movement, literally opening the door for power dressing. The technology works through the piezoelectric effect, which converts mechanical energy to electrical energy. The electrical energy is generated when pairs of zinc oxide fibres (one of which has been coated in gold to act as an electrode) rub together. The inventors estimate that up to 80 milliwatts of electricity could be generated per square metre of fabric, which is about enough to power an iPod.
An idea struck me when I was writing this article. I use the gym frequently (although not as frequently as I should…) and I spent a lot of time rowing, cycling and running. Could I be putting all this kinetic energy to use by converting it into electrical energy? Unless you are a genius, then any idea that you have thought of will already have been explored (and then probably rubbished/exploited) by someone else. A quick internet trawl proved this to be the case. The answer to the question is a resounding "sort of". I'll not go into the full details as you can read them for yourself, but in essence, my 10 minute slog on the rowing machine equates very roughly to enough energy to run a light bulb for 30 minutes. I can assure you that it feels like more work than that.
This idea has actually been brought into reality in a Hong Kong gym. Here they reckon that the average person produces around 50 watts of electricity per hour of exercise. They harness this by placing a generator in the machine and storing the electrical energy generated in batteries. The electricity is used to contribute to the gyms lighting and apparently inspires the members to push themselves harder knowing that their efforts are not wasted.
So, will we see people plugging themselves into the grid to sell their daily harvest of electricity anytime soon? Probably not, but it's fascinating to see the ways in which scientists and engineers are approaching energy generation and also that that these inventions are being picked up by the popular press. Is this just a function of energy being such a media buzz word at present or is it an indication that more and more bright minded people are rising to the energy challenge in a variety of novel and unexpected ways?
It appears that scientists and engineers have been busily devising ways of usefully capturing some of the energy we expend whilst wandering around. The driving force, perhaps unsurprisingly, is the need to charge electronic devices away from the grid – I suspect particularly by the military.
In its simplest incarnation, the idea is to turn us into mobile solar power platforms. For example, backpacks fitted with solar photovoltaic cells and lithium ion batteries are already available. These mainly provide power for mobile phones and other small electronic devices on the move. PV cells are also being fitted to other things, including laptops and mobile phones.
Scientists in Canada and America have developed a knee brace that captures the kinetic energy of walking. The device works in a similar way to regenerative braking in hybrid electric and can generate around 5 watts of electricity at a typical walking pace. This is approximately enough to charge 10 mobile phones simultaneously. It looks like a rather sturdy knee support and currently weighs in at a rather hefty 1.6 kg; however it is a work in progress. The device could potentially be built into prosthetic knees, or other such implants, which could negate the need for further surgery to replace batteries that these devices require.
Not to be outdone, nanotechnologists in America are proposing to make clothes from nanofibres that generate electricity from movement, literally opening the door for power dressing. The technology works through the piezoelectric effect, which converts mechanical energy to electrical energy. The electrical energy is generated when pairs of zinc oxide fibres (one of which has been coated in gold to act as an electrode) rub together. The inventors estimate that up to 80 milliwatts of electricity could be generated per square metre of fabric, which is about enough to power an iPod.
An idea struck me when I was writing this article. I use the gym frequently (although not as frequently as I should…) and I spent a lot of time rowing, cycling and running. Could I be putting all this kinetic energy to use by converting it into electrical energy? Unless you are a genius, then any idea that you have thought of will already have been explored (and then probably rubbished/exploited) by someone else. A quick internet trawl proved this to be the case. The answer to the question is a resounding "sort of". I'll not go into the full details as you can read them for yourself, but in essence, my 10 minute slog on the rowing machine equates very roughly to enough energy to run a light bulb for 30 minutes. I can assure you that it feels like more work than that.
This idea has actually been brought into reality in a Hong Kong gym. Here they reckon that the average person produces around 50 watts of electricity per hour of exercise. They harness this by placing a generator in the machine and storing the electrical energy generated in batteries. The electricity is used to contribute to the gyms lighting and apparently inspires the members to push themselves harder knowing that their efforts are not wasted.
So, will we see people plugging themselves into the grid to sell their daily harvest of electricity anytime soon? Probably not, but it's fascinating to see the ways in which scientists and engineers are approaching energy generation and also that that these inventions are being picked up by the popular press. Is this just a function of energy being such a media buzz word at present or is it an indication that more and more bright minded people are rising to the energy challenge in a variety of novel and unexpected ways?
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