I’ve decided to write this blog in a somewhat different format than usual. I thought I should share some of my observations in tracking energy use since I’ve been involved for a little while now in installing, analysing, presenting and monitoring ‘real time tracking systems’ (or ‘carbonrealtime’) as we refer to it.

I was actually really shocked to learn recently -when an environment officer at one of the councils posed the question to a small business audience, whether they knew how much power they used, how much their tariff rates were or how much their actual bills were- that most didn’t have a clue. Out of about 35 people only one knew. The rest had no idea! Even more surprising was the fact that a few of these audience members were accountants and financial advisors. They just automatically pay their bills both at home and for their businesses. How are you supposed to reduce your electricity use, cost and of course greenhouse emissions if you don’t even know (or care) how much you use and pay?

So there are a number of ways to overcome this problem of knowing your electricity use. Starting with the analysis of basic yearly use of the bi or three monthly bills you can get a bit of an idea what’s happening throughout the year. However, many of the larger sites already have interval electricity meters. These record power consumption every 15 minutes and eventually send some aggregated data to the suppliers. This information can be requested free of charge from the electricity retailer and we usually do this on our client’s behalf. Having access to at least a year’s worth of data is extremely useful. If you know how to compile the data and what to look out for one can get a really good idea of a site’s usage profile and how to save energy.

If your site doesn’t have interval metering another option is to install temporary electricity loggers on various distribution boards. Again the data obtained from this is very useful and we often do this for specific circuits at some of the sites. However, the latest revolution is in online tracking. We have developed an affordable real time tracking system that is extremely easy to install and then it’s plug and play. Once set up the device sends the data through the internet and can be accessed from anywhere. The user-friendly interface on the monitor presents all the data in an easy to understand language with graphs and images that don’t need a physics degree to understand. Some of our systems have everything incorporated such as water, gas, electricity consumption/generation and temperature. All these are highly valuable tools for any facilities or environment managers and even for educational purposes.

The ‘carbonrealtime’ systems are used in households and offices greatly reducing energy consumption but schools and council buildings have also installed them to keep an eye on their energy use. From some of these systems a few sites have already identified huge wastage that occur out of operating hours during the night or weekends. The findings from larger council site had effected changes in the HVAC BMS in relation to public holidays, starting and finishing times or discovering faulty equipment or in one instance double charging of electricity over 12 years! Lowering the base load is another useful outcome of using such a system. The tracking system can also be employed to overcome electricity apportioning disputes between tenants, which we often have to investigate for our clients.

With electricity prices going up constantly and with the emphasis on reducing greenhouse emissions; monitoring your electricity consumption is no doubt one of the most important steps towards averting huge electricity bills and the threats of climate change.

Contrary to what the terminology suggests ‘solar thermal energy’ is not a recent development and it is certainly not something that has just been invented as another answer to reduce greenhouse emissions. According to the Renewable Institute for Sustainable Research, the first solar powered engines were constructed back in the 1860s by a couple of French mathematicians. During the past 30 years a number of solar thermal plants have been built and operated around the world to produce guilt-free electricity. However, the technology has been rapidly evolving in recent years and Australia has perfected the technology to make it commercially more viable.

Unlike wind power or solar photovoltaic panels, which generate electricity directly, solar thermal power uses mirrors to concentrate the sun’s energy onto a receiver and create heat, which can then be used to produce steam to run a turbine and generate electricity, in the same way as a conventional coal-fired power station. The other advantage of solar thermal technology is that it can be stored very efficiently in large tanks of molten salt and then be dispatched to generate electricity at any time of the day or night, making it in effect base load solar power.

The way solar thermal energy plants work is by focusing the glare of the sun’s rays on a central location –usually on a tall solar tower- to create heat, which is then turned into electricity. The concentrated heat is extreme between 500-2000 C and it could easily melt metal. Due to various heat exchange processes involved –which were further advanced in Australia- the water eventually turns to steam, powering the turbines at the base.

Various methods exist to concentrate the solar radiation, including parabolic troughs, power towers with mirrors that track the sun (heliostats), parabolic dishes, and Fresnel reflectors (these consist of multiple flat mirrors). Each technology differs in the way that it concentrates the solar energy, but they all track the sun to maximise energy capture and produce heat, which is then converted to electricity.

These technologies are at different stages of development and each has its own advantages and disadvantages. It is fair to say that parabolic troughs are the most mature, having first been installed at utility scale in the 1980s; although the other types may ultimately prove cheaper due to their inherent design advantages. These technologies have been successfully used in the USA and Spain since the 1980s. But the Australian National University has re-designed the dish for optimisation for manufacturing and mass production with mirror panels that should be able to concentrate the sun at least 2,000 times.

Solar Thermal Uptake in Australia

Australia has large areas of high solar intensity and little rain, where large concentrations of renewable energy power stations could be developed. In fact the Australian continent has the highest average amount of solar radiation per square meter per year of any continent on the planet ranging from 1500 to 1900 kWh/m2/year. In other words Australia is better-suited to this technology than any other country in the world, including Spain who is expecting to operate 60 solar thermal plants by 2013.

Peter Meurs (Managing Director of WorleyParsons-EcoNomics) has said that establishing advanced solar thermal centres could allow Australia to exceed the 20 per cent renewable energy target by:

• Facilitating the commercialisation of developing renewable energy technologies.
• Triggering the development of domestic solar thermal component manufacturing.
• Enabling Australia to become a world leader in these technologies.
• Allowing the construction of larger scale solar thermal power stations over time.

Wizard Power is also part of the same consortium who has been trying to commercialise big dish technology in Australia for the past five years. Their unique technology was developed by the Australian National University’s solar thermal group over the past 40 years who have perfected ‘the big dish’ and they’ve also figured how to best store the sun’s energy thermo-chemically. It appears that Wizard Power may be getting some support from the federal government in the form of $60 million towards a $230 million solar plant it’s building in South Australia. Wizard Power suggested Whyalla in South Australia as an ideal place to establish large scale solar facilities, because of the climate and the number of large scale resource projects requiring power. Australia’s very first solar oasis in Whyalla is going to provide enough electricity to power the town of Whyalla and also to provide power to the neighbouring steel works. In total it’s capable of powering approximately 9000 average homes or replacing something in the order of 17000 motor vehicles on the road each year in terms of carbon emissions.

There is no reason why Australia couldn’t match the Spanish government’s commitment who is expecting to cover 12 percent of its primary energy from renewable sources by the end of this year. Spain is the fourth largest manufacturer in the world of solar power technology and exports 80 percent of its production to Germany. Australia cannot quite export electricity to other countries but we could export our expertise in this technology to build solar thermal plants in other countries. At the same time there is no reason why 30 solar thermal plants could not provide 40 per cent of Australia’s renewable energy needs by 2020-according to WorleyParsons. But to achieve this goal, action must be taken today.

References:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=13826548)
http://www.abc.net.au/insidebusiness/content/2010/s2925759.htm
http://ecogeneration.com.au/news/advancing_solar_thermal/002019/
http://ecolocalizer.com/2008/04/12/mega-solar-the-worlds-13-biggest-solar-thermal-energy-projects/
K. Lovergrove and M. Dennis Solar Thermal Energy Systems in Australia 2006 International Journal of Environmental Studies (www.tandf.co.uk/journals)

Last week I had the pleasure of interviewing Christopher Ong, Vice President Business Development, First Choice & GoGreen for DHL Asia Pacific , Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa. The express division has cut its emissions by 19%, an impressive achievement given the large size of DHL. Globally DHL employs around half a million people.

How has it achieved these savings?

Firstly the chairman identified that it was important for the company to reduce its emissions, as part of being a good corporate citizen.
Secondly, it set a carbon reduction target, of globally reducing emissions by 30% per kg delivered, by 2015.

Third it put in place a measurement and tracking system. Unlike many organisations which centralise their data collection for the purpose of tracking emissions, DHL developed a system where the data entry is decentralised system.

Fourth it got staff using the system. Initially it was hard to motivate staff to do this. However with strong management support, monthly data entry into the system is now the norm. Each month each facility fills in a on-line questionnaire, entering in information such as the litres of diesel used. This only takes a few minutes.

Fifth, graphs and reports from the system are printed out at each facility, and put on the facility noticeboard where they are prominent to staff and drivers.

Sixth, it has fostered competition, encouraged ideas that reduced energy consumption, and empowered staff to take actions to reduce their energy use. For example, in their facilities in Singapore DHL now practices “lights off at lunchtime”, an idea suggested by a staff member.

Chris highlighted the fact that saving energy saves money, and that the Global Financial Crisis has actually accelerated their savings.  He said that their total savings to date of 19,000,000 kgs have come from lots of people each saving a few kgs each day. Financial savings so far total ten million euros. His advice to other organisations:

1. Be able to measure your emissions accurately.
2. Give power to the people on the ground. Give them the information they need – what their emissions are now, what they were, how much they have saved. The results can be very immediate, and this reinforces what more can be done.

DHL provide a inspiring example for other organisations to follow. This good news interview with Christopher Ong can be found at https://carbonetix.com.au/wwx/good-news-interviews.

Last month ABARE, the Australian Bureau of Agriculture and Resource Economics released its Australian energy projections to 2029-30.

The blow dried picture of a wind turbine on the front page is unfortunately very misleading.

The projections take into account the likely effects of the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (if it ever comes in), the Renewable Energy Target, and other measures designed to reduce Australia’s carbon footprint.

ABARE predicts that the amount of electricity generated in Australia will increase by nearly 50% on 2007-08 values, or a growth rate of 1.8 percent per year. That’s only just below our projected population growth rate of 2.1%.

Total energy consumption is projected to grow 35% (1.4% a year). Its expected that in 2029-30 coal and oil will still be supplying the bulk of Australia’s energy needs. Renewable energy is expected to supply just 8% of total energy in 2029-30.

Assuming that the emissions factors for coal, oil and natural gas are similar to what they are today (for example that 1 GJ of black coal still produces around 88.43 kg of GHG when combusted), a quick calculation shows that Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions from the use of fossil fuels are likely to be 21% higher in 2029-30 than they were in 2007-08.

The table below shows the maths, using the data in the ABARE report and emissions factors from the Department of Climate Change website.

Fossil fuel	2007-08 Consumption (PJ)	2029-30 Consumption (PJ)	Emissions factor (kg CO2-e/GJ)	2007-08 GHG (Mt CO2-e)	2029-30 GHG (Mt CO2-e)
Blackcoal	1514	1311	88.43	134	116
Browncoal	610	452	93.11	57	42
Oil (assumed to be crude oil)	2083	2787	69.16	144	193
Gas (assumed to be unprocessed natural gas)	1240	2575	51.33	64	132
TOTAL				398	483

I find this data deeply disturbing – it appears as though emissions from fossil fuels will increase from 398 million tonnes to 483 million tonnes. Climate change scientists say we need to reduce emissions. Yet Australia’s emissions from the use of fossil fuels appear to be set to increase, with measures such as the CPRS appearing tokenistic.

Which begs the questions, if the CPRS is supposed to reduce emissions by 5% by 2020, how come my calculations show that our emissions from the use of fossil fuels will be higher in 2030? Or is it expected that the emissions factors will lower for coal (for example via “clean coal” technologies)? Or will the emissions reduction come from international carbon trading? As a developed country with one of the highest per capita emissions in the world is this really the best we can do?

Energy conservation (choosing to waste less energy) and energy efficiency (using less energy to achieve the same outcome) have the potential to decrease our energy use if widely uptaken. The climate change science demands a step change in our ability to save energy if we are to avoid ABARE’s disturbing projections.

Commissioning is a quality-assurance process designed to increase the likelihood that a newly constructed building will meet client expectations. Commissioning stretches over the entire design and construction process. It should ideally begin at the design phase, with selection of a commissioning provider who helps ensure that the building owners and designers’ intent is written into the project documentation.

The design and construction of ‘green’ buildings pose problems similar to those found in conventional building design. This compromises the intent of the design to achieve a high level of energy efficiency in its function. A good sustainable design will include systems that are “right-sized” (rather than the typically oversized mechanical systems) for the building. Over sizing equipment has become a standard design practice, because—due to design, installation, and/or operation errors, systems rarely function at their intended capacity. These errors occur because of the fragmentation between design, construction and operation, resulting from a general lack of a systems approach in the building process. Commissioning can facilitate improved integration and communication between these phases and can also ensure that right-sized systems function as intended and as specified.

If a building is not properly commissioned, it will not perform according to its design intent and will therefore have a poor energy rating. A common reason for inadequate commissioning is the tendency for projects to go over time and budget and for the contractors to drastically pull back on resources to get started on new projects. For this reason, it is widely recognised that engagement in independent commissioning is best practice, as it is carried out objectively without any conflict of interest.

The cutting of costs and resources at the initial commissioning stage will end up costing the facility more money in the long run, as extensive maintenance issues will ensue. Also, the cost of retrofitting is always more financially intensive than implementation as part of the original build.

In conclusion, it is recommended to allow sufficient investment capital to employ independent commissioning at the construction stage, as it will save countless amounts of energy, money and time overall.