Posted in Energy

Energy – A Necessity for Sustainability

The 2018 National Sustainability in Business Conference will be held on Thursday 8 and Friday 9 March at the Hotel Grand Chancellor, Brisbane.

Mr Craig Froome, Vice President – Global Strategy & Business Development at Pathion Inc. joins us in March at the conference to discuss ‘Energy – A Necessity for Sustainability’.

Without a supportable supply of energy, businesses will not survive, let alone be sustainable into the future. Businesses cannot operate without electricity, the ability to ensure there is 100% uptime is the only way to future-proof operations. It is recognized that fossil fuels have a finite supply and to ensure resiliency they cannot rely solely on current networks to provide their energy needs.  Businesses are becoming increasingly aware of rising energy costs and the move in the pricing structure from a fixed cents/kWh to being predominately a demand charge model. Governments are looking at how they can introduce network solutions to control price increases, businesses are also looking at reducing their reliance on energy from traditional grid services.

Renewable energy is a solution, but to date, the Australian market has been divided between large-scale wind and residential solar. With the individual State Governments setting more aggressive renewable portfolio requirements than the Federal Government, there is now more interest in alternative energy storage options for the commercial and industrial sectors.

The first step for any business to become fully resilient is to identify the issues that may cause disruption to operations. Without identifying the issues it is not possible to establish the solutions.

To ensure resiliency within the business there are many options to be considered moving forward, but one of the key solutions will be the ability to be as self-sufficient as possible. In addition, the ability to internally control costs will be an important factor in operations, profitability and therefore resiliency.

For more information on the 2018 National Sustainability in Business Conference and to secure your spot today, please visit the conference website.

2018 Program Available for Download

The 2018 National Sustainability in Business Conference Program is now available online.

The 2018 National Sustainability in Business Conference will be held on Thursday 8 and Friday 9 March at the Hotel Grand Chancellor, Brisbane.  The sustainability topics that will be embraced include integration, politics, technology, automation, future of renewables, procurement, food security, sustainable construction and waste as a resource.

Featured Speakers for 2018 include:

  • Mr Lucas Cullen, Board Member, Blockchain Association of Australia
  • Dr Helen Lewis, Adjunct Professor, Institute for Sustainable Futures, University of Technology Sydney & Environmental Consultant, Helen Lewis Research
  • Mr Chris Nunn, Head of Sustainability, Real Estate, AMP Capital
  • Mr Tony Roberts, Deputy Director-General, Environmental Policy and Planning, Department of Environment and Heritage Protection
  • Ms Kate Wakeling, State Community Manager – Queensland, Bendigo and Adelaide Bank Limited
  • Ms Simone Looi-Britton, Sustainability & Public Policy General Manager, Veolia Australia and New Zealand
  • Mr Jon Westover, Managing Director – Global Operations, Jurlique International
  • Dr Kate Ringvall, Sustainability Manager, IKEA Australia
  • Ms Emma Herd, CEO, Investor Group for Climate Change

Click here to download the conference program.

Visit the 2018 National Sustainability in Business Conference website for further information and to register today!

In Australian first, two schools powered solely by green energy.

Two schools’ classrooms in NSW will be powered solely by renewable energy, taking them off the grid and teaching students about sustainability.

The Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) and federal government are providing $370,000 in funding to St Christopher’s Catholic Primary School in Holsworthy and Dapto High School to trial a 100 per cent renewable power and smart technology program in their new classrooms.

Known as the Hivve, the modular classrooms – which are fully air-conditioned – integrate solar photovoltaic panels and real-time energy and air quality monitoring to generate energy and control their own usage.

These classrooms will have a potential net energy generation of 7,600-kilowatts per year. Photo: Janie Barrett

According to ARENA, these classrooms will have a potential net energy generation of 7600-kilowatts per year,  producing enough to also power other classrooms.

The data from the classrooms, which will be collected from a range of meters and sensors installed in the rooms, allows the school to manage their own energy demand and usage via dashboards.

St Christopher’s Principal Tony Boyd said the school and the students are excited about the program.

“It’s an exciting prospect where schools can be a generator of electricity,” Mr Boyd told Fairfax Media.

“We hope it’s self-sustaining in its power usage and an effective learning space, more so, we hope to use it to tie-in with the kid’s science education and learning about sustainability.”

Published by The Sydney Morning Herald, continue reading here.

New Tech Could Turn Windows Into Solar Panels

See-through solar cells have been created which could turn windows into small-scale power plants.

Researchers at Michigan State University have developed thin, transparent, plastic-like material that can act as an energy-generating coating on windows, and provide additional power when coupled with a rooftop solar installation.

New Tech Could Turn Windows Into Solar Panels

Photo: article supplied

While the technology has existed in its early stages since 2015, it is only now developed enough for projects of scale.

The technology works by utilising organic molecules within the transparent film that absorb ultraviolet and infrared lightwaves – which are invisible to the human eye – and converts them into electricity by directing these lightwaves to small photovoltaic cells at the edge of the screen, while letting visible light through.

The film itself is less than one-thousandth of a millimetre thick.

Currently, the technology is recording energy efficiencies of more than 10 per cent, while traditional solar panels are between 15 and 18 per cent efficient.

“Highly transparent solar cells represent the wave of the future for new solar applications,” Michigan State University professor of chemical engineering and materials science and developer, Richard Lunt, said.

“We analysed their potential and show that by harvesting only invisible light, these devices can provide a similar electricity-generation potential as rooftop solar while providing additional functionality to enhance the efficiency of buildings, automobiles and mobile electronics.”

The technology can be used to improve existing solar panels efficiency levels by creating an additional layer of energy collection without interfering with conventional photovoltaic cell operation.

The application of the solar film exists for small-scale electronics, such as mobile phones, e-readers and wearables, and has been put forth as a way to extend battery life.

“That is what we are working towards,” Mr Lunt said.

“Traditional solar applications have been actively researched for over five decades, yet we have only been working on these highly transparent solar cells for about five years.

“Ultimately, this technology offers a promising route to inexpensive, widespread solar adoption on small and large surfaces that were previously inaccessible.”

This was originally published by the Sydney Morning Herald.

Click here to read the entire article.

The 2018 National Sustainability in Business Conference will be held on Thursday 8 and Friday 9 March 2018 at Hotel Grand Chancellor, Brisbane.  The 2nd annual conference will explore sustainability best practice within organisations, creating resilience in business and ways to implement change.

Conference speakers and partners will provide insight into how  they are interweaving sustainability practices within their organisations, navigating change and the differences they are making within national and  multinational companies and small business.

Register to secure your spot today!

Community Energy Opportunities in Regional Australia

In 2016 the ACT government committed to a target of 100% renewable energy by 2020, moving the target forward and reflecting a growing commitment by sub-national and local governments, and city administrations to changing their energy dependencies and the energy mix, and decentralising the energy production process (reference – Paris Council of the Parties on Climate Change in 2015).

Governments are recognising the growing interest in renewable energy in their constituencies, and in fact the public is arguably leading the political agenda.

Dr Kate Auty

The regional Victorian experience in relation to community energy is instructive.

Daylesford began a conversation about two community owned wind turbines a decade ago.  That community is now held up as an example of change. They engaged in a massive amount of community discussion, forged a new way of funding the proposal, built constructive relationships with government, and then built two turbines which now produce the energy for the township. Recently they celebrated their success.  Soren Hermansen, the Danish community energy advocate from the island of Samso, a world energy transition leader embraced their work. Regional small towns Newstead and Yackandandah are working towards a 100% commitment.

Seymour and Euroa have formed a community alliance and been afforded a small grant to conduct a pre-feasibility study for pumped hydro energy storage in respect of three dams in the Strathbogie Ranges and the Trawool reservoir above the Goulburn River.  Recent scholarship recognises this as a significant component of any energy future. Changing conditions in the energy market, networks with experts and community determination made this submission possible.

Beyond the engineering, academic expertise and commitment to changing infrastructure, however, there are compelling social and cultural reasons why a submission such as this comes together.

Communities which start where they are, in the places they know and care about, will always be capable of and interested in driving change. Baseline knowledge – social, economic, cultural and political – is already available. Communities want to see the co-benefits. In regional settings communities also understand the need to organise, share and take responsibility to attain outcomes.

The final attribute in a regional theory of change should always be a desire to show what has been done. It is important to provide demonstration sites for innovation, illustrating successes and reflecting on mistakes.

Author: Dr Kate Auty, Commissioner for Sustainability and the Environment