CarbonetiX

The three pre-requisites for sustainable carbon conservation

As I’ve observed organisations that are successful in reducing their carbon emissions in an on-going way I’ve noticed that they all have three things in place before they begin to significantly cut their carbon:

Leadership commitment. More often that not the most senior level managers will be on the environmental steering committee.
A system in place for accurately measuring and tracking their emissions. They measure what they treasure – in this case their carbon savings.
Wider commitment in their workplace to emissions reduction.

With these three pre-requisites in place these organisations are more likely to move forward to actually cut their carbon pollution.

Become A certified mirrorlux Installer or Sales Agent

Carbonetix has developed a website to assist its certified Mirrorlux installers and distributors with sales, marketing and installation activities. Mirorrlux provides an opportunity for Electrical Contracting and Facility Management businesses to build additional business by offering Delamping Services which can halve their customer’s lighting energy use.

The site has been developed to assist Mirrorlux distributors maximise the sales opportunities that exist to halve the lighting costs of their existing and prospective customers.

The resources included there are:

· Training videos and manuals to help you learn about Mirrorlux Reflectors.

· Promtional material to help you market and sell the Mirrorlux solution.

· A proposal generator and tracking system.

· Ordering and tracking system.

· A savings calculator.

· General news and updates.

If you would like to register to become a certified Mirrorlux installer/sales agent please go http://www.mirrorlux.com.au/ and click under the Distributor Login button.

What is a comfortable office temperature (2)

A comfortable office temperature doesn’t depend just on the temperature, there are other factors that come into play. These include the relative humidity, the temperature of surrounding surfaces and the speed of any air movements.

Craig Ryan of Johnson Controls has prompted this second posting with some good observations about humidity and comfort on my first posting on a comfortable office temperature.

The more humid it is, the higher the temperature feels. This is shown in the thermal comfort chart below.

thermal comfort diagram - humidity vs temperature

In climates which are always hot, or climates that are mostly cold, our bodies acclimatise somewhat to these conditions. The chart above is most appropriate for cooler rather than hot climates.

Moving air makes it feel colder. When its hot creating air movement (eg through fans) can mean that air conditioning systems can be set to provide higher temperatures than would otherwise be the case.

Radiant temperatures of nearby surfaces also make us feel warmer or colder. Because of this sitting next to a large window in winter may still feel cold even though the inside air temperature is 22 degrees Celcius.

By operating heating and cooling systems out to the limits of what is perceived to be a comfortable temperature significant energy and greenhouse gas savings can be achieved. Attention also needs to be paid to air movement and surface radiant temperatures.

Human development AND a stable climate – the challenge?

I received yesterday a powerpoint about food security and climate change from Dr. Julie Cliff, a friend of mine who has worked in tropical medicine in Mozambique for the last 30 years. Her powerpoint had a dramatic image of cassava plants grown in laboratory conditions at different atmospheric concentrations of CO2 (shown below). Cassava is a staple crop whose tubers are consumed across southern and central Africa. The plants grown at higher concentrations of CO2 produced tubers with less than half of the useful food of the plants grown at lower CO2 concentration.

Cassava tuber growth at different CO2 concentrations

Yesterday I also met an economist who showed me some modelling that predicted the effect a $50 per tonne carbon price would have on the cost of employment across a range of sectors, such as manufacturing, banking and insurance, etc. Typically the cost was around $2,000 per employee – or in other words the modelling was predicting that business expenses would increase by $2,000 per employee if we had a carbon price of $50 a tonne.

These two viewpoints clearly show the apparent climate change challenge – one which shows that the response to climate change could be expensive, the other that not acting could have dire consequences for food security in southern and central Africa. This is the classic argument that I referred to in my first blog post – the climate change challenge is framed in a way that we lose economically if we act to limit greenhouse gas emissions now – but if we don’t act we will lose in the future.

So what is my climate positive take on this? More in my next posting – and comments welcome.

Skylights slash our need for artificial lighting.

Last weekend six solar tube skylights were installed in our office, which occupies the top floor of a two storey building. The skylights have eliminated the need for artificial lighting in thirteen of our work spaces.

It was amazing watching the reaction of staff as they came in this morning, many couldn’t contain their excitement. “Its so much brighter.” “The quality of light is fantastic.” “We don’t need the lights on at all.”

The cost installed was $5,550. Our landlord agreed to pay half of the costs. As we were pretty frugal with our lighting to start with, and it was already efficient, the lighting energy cost savings won’t be large, in the order of $500 a year. We may have to run the air conditioner more in summer because of the heat gain from the skylights, but this may also cut heating energy use in winter. Assuming it balances out the payback for us as tenants will probably be around 5 to 6 years in terms of energy savings. However daylight also makes the workplace more attractive, and may improve productivity. So there will be other benefits in addition to the cost savings. And of course the greenhouse gas savings will reduce the amount of green-power we need to purchase. If we were buying black power the skylights would be expected to save us around 2.5 tonnes of greenhouse gas a year.

How a school can save $300 and 1.2 tonnes of CO2 this summer holidays

Schools waste a great deal of energy over the summer school holidays.

In 2005 CarbonetiX worked with the Victorian Department of Education and Training to produce a School Energy Shut Down Guide and then promoted its use to schools around Victoria, just before the summer holidays. When we followed up in February 2006, over forty schools sent their bills to us for analysis. How much had been saved? And the results were surprising, even to us.

Over the 6 week summer holiday period we calculated that improved switch off practices resulted in schools saving an average of $429 each!

Based on this experience I estimate that on average most Australian schools have the opportunity to save around $300 and 1.3 tonnes of greenhouse gas simply be getting better at turning things off before the summer holidays. This correlates to potential savings Australia wide of $2.8 million and 12,400 tonnes of greenhouse gas – equivalent to the annual emissions of 2,900 cars!

To make it easy for schools to realize these savings we have developed the online School Summer Energy Shut Down Blitz. It’s a simple, fast way to quickly come up with an action plan for your school, and shows you what you need to shut down before the holidays start. And it costs nothing to use.

You can access the blitz at www.blitz.schoolenergysavings.com.au.

High mains voltage is causing 15 millions of tonnes of un-necessary greenhouse gas pollution

In Australia electricity codes stipulate that the supply voltage of mains electricity should be 230 volts (phase to neutral).

For example in Victoria the Essential Services Commission has mandated in the Electricity Supply Code that the voltage of supply should be 230 volts plus 10%, minus 6%. Distribution businesses supplying electricity err on the high side.

Hazelwood power station produces 15 million tonnes of greenhouse pollution annually.

Lowering mains voltages could save the same amount of greenhouse gas as that produced by Hazelwood power station annually

Voltage measurements and voltage logging undertake across multiple sites by CarbonetiX show however that phase to neutral voltages are typically in the range of 240 to 250 volts. In fact we regularly see cases where the maximum voltage exceeds the maximum permissible 253 volts.

With the exception of three phase synchronous motors (eg motor typically used to power equipment such as pumps, fans, chillers, industrial machinery etc), the lower the voltage the lower the power consumption. If you remember your high school physics, you’ll know that for a resistive load Power = Volts x Current, and based on Ohms law Volts = Current x Resistance. Put the two togehter and for a resistive load (eg a halogen light bulb) power consumption is proportional to the square of voltage. So a 10% drop in voltage leads to a 19% energy saving! For single phase inductive loads such as fluorescent lighting there is also a power saving when the voltage drops.

The supply of voltage at well over the 230 volt standard means that electricity consumption, and thus greenhouse gas emissions in most buildings across Australia is higher than it would be were the voltage to be kept closer to the 230 volt standard.

I estimate that across the country a 5% electricity and greenhouse gas saving could be achieved if voltages were generally kept in the 225 to 235 volt range rather than the 240 to 250 volt range we typically see. This would translate into a greenhouse gas saving in the order of 15 million tonnes. To put this in context, that’s equivalent to the annual greenhouse gas emissions of Australia’s most climate unfriendly power station – Hazelwood – pictured above.

Distribution businesses may be supplying voltage on the high side to enable them to cope with periods of high demand, when the voltage drops in the distribution network are higher (eg on a hot summer afternoon). However these periods of high demand typically only account for around 50 to 100 of the 8760 hours in a year.

Some organisations are now installing their own voltage reduction devices to compensate for the overly high mains voltage supplied and to thus achieve cost and greenhouse gas savings.

Whilst perhaps politically challenging, there would be much greater benefit to the environment and to consumers if standards were established that kept supply voltages lower and closer to the 230 volt standard.

For example the standard could be ammended to stipulate:

For 90% of the year the voltage shall be kept at 230 volts plus 4% minus 6%.
For 10% of the year the voltage shall be allowed to vary between 230 volts plus 10% minus 6%.

Regulation such as this would allow distribution businesses sufficient buffer to take precautionary measures when they think demand may spike (eg based on the weather forecast) whilst still saving significant amounts of greenhouse gas.

I would encourage any organisation keen to see Australia reduce its greenhouse gas emissions take up this important issue of voltage standards with the relevant government organisations. And lets hope that as emissions trading comes in this is recognised as an opportunity for electricity generators and distribution businesses to collaborate together for significant greenhouse gas savings.

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