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Monthly archives: August 2009

Sweden’s second city aims for congestion charges

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Gothenburg's main avenue is already a restricted area for private cars.
Gothenburg’s main avenue is already a restricted area for private cars. Photo: Göran Assner.

The politicians of Gothenburg has now said yes to introducing congestion charges. Cleaner air and less traffic in the centre are two reasons for this, but what seems to be the main motive is to provide capital for big infrastructural projects in the region. For example several tunnels for both trains and cars are planned.

In the web edition of the Gothenburg newspaper Göteborgs-Posten, discussions are heated. Some people are overjoyed, others see it as a infringement on their personal freedom, or wonder if today’s public transport will be able to swallow more passengers. The debate is also strong over if it’s right to use the money from a congestion charge to finance road projects.

Now the process starts in order to apply for state funds to pay for the congestion charges. But even if these policies are worked on at lightning speed by political standards, it will still take some time before congestion charges can be reality for people in Göteborg. In 2011 they can come into force, at the earliest.

In Stockholm, congestion charges were introduced in 2007. Also here environmentalists have been criticizing local politicians for using the revenues from the charges mostly to finance new road projects instead of investing the money in sustainable means of transport.

Sara Jeswani - Sustainability

August 28, 2009

Rainfall energy gives water prize

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Stockholm Water Week young prize winners
Happy prize winners. Ceren Burçak Dag in the middle. Photo: SIWI.

Every year at the World Water Week, the Stockholm Water Prize attracts great attention. The award winner this year is  Bindeshwar Pathak from India, who has developed a toilet system which is improving sanitation and converting the waste into energy . (Read more about it here).
But there is also a competition for young scientists from all over the world. This year 18-year-old Ceren Burçak Dag from Nisantasi in Turkey won the prize for her idea to generate energy through piezoelectric pulses from falling rain drops.
Personally, I had never heard about piezoelectricity before, but according to an explanation I found it is “ ability of some materials to generate an electric potential when mechanical stress – such as the impact of a raindrop – is applied”. What Ceren Burçak Dag has done is using a “smart” material that transfers the kinetic energy of raindrops into electrical energy.

Reducing CO2 emissions

The prize jury says in its statement that it is pleased to see young people take action to identify technical solutions to reduce CO2 emissions.
– I hope that my work will contribute to the development of the next generation of energy panels where rain, sun, and wind are combined, says Ceren Burçak Dag.

Other meetings

During the World Water Week there are also many other meetings and side events going on, where the situation of developing countries is brought up. For example, The Association of European Parliamentarians for Africa is meeting to highlight African countries, climate change and its links with development.
The association’s general secretary Pär Granstedt says in a comment before the meeting that Africa has contributed least to the emissions that is causing the climate change, but is hardest hit by their effects.
- We need to develop common strategies to cope with the impact of climate change both in Europe and Africa, and we should learn from each other. However, we should under no circumstances accept that new burdens are loaded
on Africa. Europe has a responsibility to help Africa to cope with the climate change.

Sara Jeswani - Sustainability

August 24, 2009

Commuters go climate book clubbing

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Reading on the train
Why not read together? Photo: Kasper Dudzik

At the time when I started working as a journalist, getting a job as a reporter in Gothenburg (where I used to live then) wasn’t easy. During more than a year I ended up commuting 100 kilometres every morning to get to a provincial newspaper in Vänersborg. And then 100 kilometres back again.

Waking up at crazy hours, staggering off to the train wasn’t always very fun, and a lot of the time I just slept my way to Vänersborg. But there are actually things about that time that I can miss. For example, I don’t think I’ve ever had so much time to read. For example, I actually have those hours on the rails to thank for first getting a grip of Spanish.

Stop glancing

Someone who has chosen to see commuting hours as a time to be used is Michiel van Noord from The Swedish Society for Nature Conservation, who has commuted between Stockholm and Uppsala during three years.
– A lot of people use their travelling time to read. Sometimes they glance at what the neighbour is reading, but most of the time the interchange doesn’t get much further than that, he says in an interview with the Swedish online magazine Current Environment.

To change this and make people start discussing what they have read, Michiel van Noord decided to start a climate book club on the commuter train. The first book of the club will be ”Makten över klimatet” (The power over the climate) by climate professor Christian Azar, who writes in a popular way about global warming and ways of limiting it.

Just show up 

One funny thing abut the book club is that you cannot register to participate – those who want to join simply show up on the 08.39 train from Stockholm to Uppsala on a specific day and sit down in the front of the train.
Nice idea, isn’t it?

Sara Jeswani - Sustainability

August 24, 2009

It’s all about water

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water
Photo: Frédéric Dupont/Flickr.

Yesterday the World Water Week, which is organized by the Stockholm International Water Institute once a year, started here. During the coming seven days around 2 000 scientists, organisations,  politicians and others working with water- and sanitation from 130 countries will gather to discuss issues like food, trade and water, disasters, climate change impacts on water and water footprint.
The last-mentioned is something quite interesting. Your water footprint is a measurement of the water used to produce all of the goods and services you consume every day. And the figure it sums up to is far from the litres you use for taking a shower or make a cup of tea. To produce just one A4 sheet of paper it takes 10 litres of water, for example, and to produce one kilo of rice 3 400 litres are needed. The worst water culprit here is beef meat, which has a water footprint of 16 000 litres per kilo.

Parallelly to the World Water Week, River Basin District Authorities from the EU countries will gather to discuss water issues. One of the questions that they will discuss and share experiences of is how climate change affects water.
In some parts of Europe droughts causes water shortage which also affects agriculture. In other parts a warmer climate will lead to increased precipitation and floods, which can also contaminate and threaten the access to safe drinking water.

Sara Jeswani - Sustainability

August 17, 2009

Energy saving in Swedish

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energy-advice-bureau
Energy and climate adviser Karin Fant showing energy consumption in a concrete way.

Imagine three sets of electric devices: an electric kettle, which is being used once a day, an ordinary  light bulb which is switched on eight hours a day or a few mobile phone chargers idly connected to the socket. If asked which one will consume the most energy during a year, which one would you pick? Well, the answer are the chargers. Without even having a mobile connected to it, one charger still consumes around 40 kilowatt hours a year.

This presentation was made to me yesterday when I was strolling aroung waiting for a meeting to begin. The person behind the table is Karin Fant, one of the advisers of the energy advice bureau, Energirådgivningen, which is a service set up by 27 Swedish municipalities. To the service phone people call to ask about how the ban of old fashion light bulbs in the European Union will proceed, what to think about when they build a new house and how the new direct-measuring power meters work.

Disconnecting the mobile charger when it’s not in use is only one of their good advice. Even if it’s in Swedish, maybe you can figure out what the general ideas presented on the dishcloth below are? (A clue, and a quick course in Swedish: “mindre” means less, “mera” means more)

advice-dishcloth

Sara Jeswani - Sustainability

August 13, 2009