Is it time to move beyond the limits of ‘built environment’ thinking?

The constructed world around us provides the stage for our daily life. The term “built environment” is in the past tense, describing a scenario after the fact. What does it actually mean beyond the obvious connotation of buildings and parks?

Yet when we pay respect at a formal occasion to the traditional peoples of Australia it is generally referred to as Acknowledgement of Country. Here we acknowledge the environment (country) first and then the custodians of it.

Today we are at pains to integrate environmental concerns into our building efforts. We are discussing how to meet climate targets, reduce heat island effects and limit the impacts of the built environs, which have harmed our planet. The term built environment seem to come from a time when we felt the need to dominate nature; now we are desperately trying to work with it.

Viewed from a different perspective, the built environment is a constructed historical record of how societies developed and applied their technical skills to express the culture of their time. It is all the infrastructure, power grids, water pipelines, dams, refineries, cargo terminals and industrial manufacturing sites that enable our urban existence.

The term also speaks about the expertise of the various trades and the craftsmen involved. But not so much about the professions that negotiate the abstract world of policies, council guidelines, building codes and the laws – not only of physics but also of the legal framework of contracts and workers’ rights. Together it creates visible structures that allow for comfortable living, business activities and transport networks.

Looking beyond buildings

The term built environment in an academic setting describes a suite of disciplines engaged in studying and therefore aiming to improve it. The late architect Col James “made housing a verb”. He did so not only to reflect the human agency involved in the processes but to provide a more equitable and just living environment for people who don’t have the means to get their own architect to design a dream home for a cool US$2 billion.

The built environment looks like the material world conceived by planners, designed by architects and constructed by builders and labourers. Yet, if we look closer, we can see that these structures are only one part of the equation. These build things (buildings) on their own can not simply be populated by people. People would have nothing to do in these buildings were it not be for the fixtures, fittings, furnishings and products within them.

These elements enable and activate these environments and make them usable and productive for their intended purposes. If the products within them fail they can make buildings harmful.

These products are not so much built in the traditional sense, but are mass-produced high-volume items. From window frames to light switches, phones and furniture, these are products conceived, designed and specified by professionals like industrial designers. They form an integral part of the built environment.

Even buildings themselves are not built in the traditional sense anymore, but are more and more the result of complex manufacturing processes. Project managers and builders are orchestrating a vast range of pre-manufactured items, which they assemble skilfully into an environment fit for human use.

If we are at a hospital, train station or playground, these environments are populated with equipment that speaks explicitly to the use of the space. In hospitals we see kidney analysis machines, hospital beds and infusion stands. The station has signage, trains and turnstiles. And at the playground the equipment lets us play and have fun.

Without these things these places wouldn’t be what they are. They could not perform the function that is their reason for being. Therefore it is the things in these environments that give them their meaning and function, because they enable it.

Our environment is and always has been integrated with products that help us with access to the services and infrastructure available at the time.

If we look closely at these two words they tell a hidden story. We have built, which is made, created and manufactured, and environment, which can be either human-made or natural. The term links the made world with our natural world. It describes the world we made so far. But the two are separated.

The interesting thing is that the made world, the one we created, is mentioned first. The setting it creates or into which the buildings are placed comes second. There is a hierarchy here that relegates the environment to second place.

Originally Published by The Conversation, continue reading here.

How to Use Queensland’s New Container Recycling Scheme

There are doubts within the waste industry that Queensland’s new recycling scheme can be ready for launch at the start of next month.

From November 1, Queenslanders can claim a 10-cent refund for most plastic drink containers, beer bottles and aluminium cans at one of 232 collection points from Coen to Coolangatta.

The state’s first-ever container exchange refund scheme is run by a not-for-profit company called COEX (Container Exchange) and branded as Containers for Change.

Recycling companies see future recycling business from “cleaner” recycled glass, plastics and cardboard that comes in through the collection depots.

But some large waste lobby groups, represented by the Waste Management Association of Australia, doubt the scheme will be ready in time.

Chief executive officer Gayle Sloan said the rules setting up Queensland’s collection sites kept changing and software to provide the discounts was in dispute.

“To have 230 collection points up and running in 35 days is going to be quite challenging,” she said.

Some collection centres were yet to lodge development applications with local councils to begin operating, she said.

Alby Taylor, a 30-year  corporate executive and the man “working 20 hour days” for COEX on behalf of the Queensland Government, insists it will be ready.

He is the general manager of the Australian Beverages Council and is COEX’s first chairman.

“We are contracted to provide 232 collection points from November 1 and that increases to 306 by the next year,” he said.

How will it work?

Queenslanders can use a simple mobile phone app – Containers for Change – to have the refund credited to their account.

At some counters in major cities and towns they will receive cash across the counter at a collection depot, or choose to receive a refund as a grocery shopping voucher discount.

But there will be variations across the state, which will be divided into 14 different regions.

In addition to getting cash for containers, consumers will be able to choose to donate to a charity.

Sporting groups, community groups, schools and surf lifesaving associations who contract to companies who have won tenders to operate container refund points across the 14 regions will receive the 10 cent deposit.

“They will also receive a portion of the 6 cent handling fee for each container as a fundraising vehicle,” Mr Taylor said.

“Better still, where a sporting or community groups contracts directly with COEX in their own right, they will then receive the 10 cent deposit, plus the full 6 cents from every container.”

According to COEX, more than 500 groups and associations have signed on to join this fundraising phase.

The company is exploring an option where people will be able to join specific fundraising groups using a six-digit code as a way to directly donate to their charity of choice.

This article was originally published by the Sydney Morning Herald. Click here to read entire article.

Want to share your innovative ideas on sustainability?

Abstracts are now open for the 2019 National Sustainability Conference, held from 1-2 April at Hotel Grand Chancellor, Brisbane.

Submit your 300 word abstract for your chance to become a presenter and place yourself before an audience of engaged industry professionals eager to hear your thoughts.

Find out more here.

Opera House Goes Carbon Neutral Five Years Ahead of Schedule

The Sydney Opera House was notoriously behind schedule on most things during the 14 years it took to build but will be five years ahead of schedule when it meets its target to reduce emissions and become carbon neutral.

This move puts it up there with New York’s Empire State building and Paris’s Eiffel Tower as global architectural icons which are actively working to become world symbols of energy efficiency, its Environmental Sustainability Manager Emma Bombonato said.

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Officials at the Sydney Opera House have been working to increase its energy efficiency and decrease its waste for the past decade. In 2014 it replaced incandescent bulbs in the Concert Hall with custom LED lights to achieve a 75 per cent reduction in the venue’s electricity consumption. In 2017 it introduced a new building management control system to monitor energy and water use and manage climate control. It also optimised the heating and cooling of the building by replacing chiller units connected to the Opera House’s pioneering seawater cooling system in that same year, resulting in a 9 per cent energy reduction.

“One of the biggest benefits of changing the incandescent bulbs to LEDs, means that instead of changing them in the Concert Hall once a year, now it is needed only once every nine years,” she said.

By becoming more energy efficient and streamlining day-to-day operations, it reduced its carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, and offset its remaining emissions for the year 2017-2018 with help from its major partner EnergyAustralia. To reduce its carbon footprint, Australia’s most recognisable building invested in renewables, tree planting and biodiversity projects to offset its greenhouse emissions. The 2015 Paris Agreement set a goal of limiting a rise in world surface temperatures, and last month the mayors of 19 cities, including Sydney, put in place regulations requiring all new buildings to be carbon neutral by 2030 and all existing ones to reach the same goal by 2050.

Each year the Sydney Opera House hosts 1800 events, serves 2.6 million food and beverage orders – producing 5000 cubic metres of waste and uses electricity equivalent to 2500 households (16 gigawatts). A new waste management program, including the introduction of new recycling streams and transferring food waste that would have otherwise gone to landfill to an organics facility to be turned into energy last year, improved the waste recycling rate from 25 per cent to 60 per cent. An educational program on waste management for staff and contractors also helped reduce waste.

This article was originally published by the Sydney Morning Herald. Click here to continue reading entire article.

Share your expertise in sustainability

Abstract submissions are now open for the 2019 National Sustainability in Business Conference, held from 1-2 April in Brisbane.

Submit for your chance to present your research or experience to an audience of like-minded professionals dedicated to creating strong and sustainable communities, businesses and futures.

Find out more here.

Antarctica’s ‘moss forests’ are drying and dying

The lush moss beds that grow near East Antarctica’s coast are among the only plants that can withstand life on the frozen continent. But our new research shows that these slow-growing plants are changing at a far faster rate than anticipated.

We began monitoring plant ecosystems 18 years ago, near Australia’s Casey Station in the Windmill Islands, East Antarctica. As we report in Nature Climate Change today, within just 13 years we observed significant changes in the composition and health of these moss beds, due to the drying effects of weather changes prompted by damage to the ozone layer.

Living on the edge

Visitors to Antarctica expect to see a stark landscape of white and blue: ice, water, and sky. But in some places summer brings a surprisingly verdant green, as lush mosses emerge from under their winter snow blanket.

Because it contains the best moss beds on continental Antarctica, Casey Station is dubbed the Daintree of the Antarctic. Individual plants have been growing here for at least 100 years; fertilised by ancient penguin poo.

Antarctic mosses are extremophiles, the only plants that can survive the continent’s frigid winters. They live in a frozen desert where life-sustaining water is mostly locked up as ice, and they grow at a glacial pace – typically just 1 mm a year.

These mosses are home to tardigrades and other organisms, all of which survive harsh conditions by drying out and becoming dormant. When meltwater is available, mosses soak it up like a sponge and spring back to life.

The short summer growing season runs from December to March. Day temperatures finally rise above freezing, providing water from melting snow. Overnight temperatures drop below zero and mosses refreeze. Harsh, drying winds reach speeds of 200 km per hour. This is life on the edge.

Tough turf

When we first began monitoring the moss beds, they were dominated by Schistidium antarctici, a species found only in Antarctica. These areas were typically submerged through most of the summer, favouring the water-loving Schistidium. But as the area dries, two hardy, global species have encroached on Schistidium’s turf.

Like tree rings, mosses preserve a record of past climate in their shoots. From this we found nearly half of the mosses showed evidence of drying.

Healthy green moss has turned red or grey, indicating that plants are under stress and dying. This is due to the area drying because of colder summers and stronger winds. This increased desertification of East Antarctica is caused by both climate change and ozone depletion.

Since the 1970s, man-made substances have thinned Earth’s protective sunscreen, the ozone layer, creating a hole that appears directly over Antarctica during the southern spring (September–November). This has dramatically affected the southern hemisphere’s climate. Westerly winds have moved closer to Antarctica and strengthened, shielding much of continental East Antarctica from global warming.

Our study shows that these effects are contributing to drying of East Antarctica, which is in turn altering plant communities and affecting the health of some native plant species. East Antarctica’s mosses can be viewed as sentinels for a rapidly drying coastal climate.

But there is good news. The ozone layer is slowly recovering as pollutants are phased out thanks to the 1987 Montreal Protocol. What is likely to happen to Antarctic coastal climates when ozone levels recover fully by the middle of this century?

Originally Published by The Conversation, continue reading here.

 

Australia set to run on 100% renewable energy within 15 years

Australia is set to reach its target of 100% renewable energy by the early 2030’s, provided current uptake of renewable energy options in the residential and commercial sectors remains strong.

The Australian renewables energy industry will install more than 10 gigawatts of new solar and wind power before the end of 2019 and if that rate is maintained, Australia would reach 50% of its renewables target in 2025.

The reduction target, set under the famed Paris Agreement into global climate change, forms part of a commitment made by Australia in 2015 to cut carbon emissions nationwide by up to 28% of 2005 levels by the year 2030.

It represents reductions of around 52% in emissions per capita and around 65% in the emissions intensity of the economy between 2005 and 2030.

Homeowners and industry have embraced the renewables challenge so well that it now seems possible the nation will reach the equivalent of 100% renewables for its electricity supply well before then.

A report by the Energy Exchange Institute at Australian National University, says merely keeping up the current rate of renewable energy deployment – roughly divided between solar photovoltaics (PVs), wind farms and rooftop solar PVs – would meet the country’s entire emissions reduction task for the whole economy by 2025.

That doesn’t take into account recent announcements at State level to make solar a more attractive option to consumers.

 

Australia is on track to reach its Paris Agreement renewable energy target by 2025

Federal initiatives

In 2015, the Senate passed a Renewable Energy Target (RET) which aims to have more than 23.5% of Australia’s electricity derived from renewable sources by 2020.

The scheme is split into two areas – large-scale for the establishment and expansion of renewable energy power stations with a target of 33,000 gigawatt-hours of renewable electricity generation by 2020; and small-scale which includes financial incentives for households, small businesses and community groups to install systems such as solar hot water heaters, heat pumps and solar PV systems.

The RET is supported by the Australian Renewables Energy Agency, established in 2012 to promote and fund researchers, developers and businesses which demonstrate the feasibility and potential commercialisation of their renewables energy technologies and projects.

According to some reports, “surging numbers” of commercial and industrial projects are applying for accreditation under the RET.

By contrast, the Turnbull government’s National Energy Guarantee struggled to find favour with the states and the coalition from the moment it was proposed last year.

Under the proposal, power retailers would have been required to meet minimum reliability and pollution standards as part of efforts to cut Australia’s carbon emissions.

But WA and the Northern Territory – neither of which are connected to the national electricity market – rejected the National Energy Guarantee, and opposition snowballed from all corners until the idea was unceremoniously dumped last month, in much the same way that Turnbull was a short time later.

Originally Published by SmallCaps.com.au – read full article here.