Concrete = 7% global CO2 emissions - global warming impact

Cement production responsible for 7% global co2 emissions, 1 ton of concrete uses 1 ton of carbon, impact of real estate construction industry on global warming. Development of property, energy saving, life expectancy of buildings. Longevity extensions. Making buildings last longer before demolition. Lifetime energy consumption. Building regulations and government action to reduce global warming. Building offices, factories, high rise tower blocks, commercial real estate, schools, colleges, hosptals and homes, apartments and flats. Alternatives to concrete. E-crete polymer concrete. Expect widespread use in future of geoplymers such as E-crete, a product using power station waste, developed by Jannie Van Deventer, a chemical engineer at the University of Melbourne, and founder of Zeobond. If we replaced half the world's concrete production with e-crete it would save a billion tons of carbon dioxide in the next decade alone. E-crete is just one of thousands of examples of new innovation we can expect over the next five to ten years.... representing tens of thousands of new business opportunities, and billions of dollars of new revenues. Video by keynote conference speaker Dr Patrick Dixon, Futurist and author of 12 books on global trends including Futurewise and Building a Better Business.
Concrete, e-crete, energy saving, construction industry, global warming, carbon emissions, energy consumption, lifetime energy, demolition, polymer, ash, power station waste, real estate development, precast, reinforced

Global warming and construction industry / real estate

Global Warming Threat: Construction industry in Australia is wasteful and needs to change radically

Despite efforts to be more efficient, Australia’s emissions of carbon dioxide have risen at almost twice the world average rate over the last 20 years - to more than 100 million tons a year. That’s 5 tons for every person. With only 0.32% of world population, Australia produces 1.43% of global emissions.

While huge savings can be made by generating electricity from carbon more efficiently, or by using alternative power sources, there is also urgent need to cut energy use – and to reduce peak demand.

A key target for energy saving has to be the construction industry. 40% of Australia’s energy is used to heat, light or cool buildings, build them or knock them down. Most buildings in Australia were designed for a different era where electricity, coal, oil and water were cheap, and the greatest challenge is going to be refitting them for the third millennium.

Many of the most inefficient buildings are offices and factories. The lazy option is to pull them down and start again but this is really costly for the environment. If a building only survives 30 years before demolition, up to 40% of all the energy used in its lifetime will be spent building it, destroying it and carrying away the rubble.

That’s why we can expect huge efforts to retrofit older buildings - but we need to take great care to get it right, or more refits will be needed every decade as regulations and needs change. Compliance with today’s standards is a fast way to waste billions of dollars. You’ll have to upgrade again tomorrow, and the week after.

That’s why we need bold, radical, long term vision. We need to get ready for a future where energy is twice as expensive as today when carbon taxes are added. A world where energy saving has become a global obsession.

Retrofitting old commercial buildings can be an expensive nightmare – particularly as many of them are near the end of their original design life. It is a wasteful scandal that most office blocks built in the last 30 years were only intended to be lived in for three decades.

We need a radical change in mindset of architects, planners, developers, builders and property investors. New commercial buildings should be designed with at least 50 years in mind. That will require government action: big changes in building regulations and far stricter planning standards. Without these things there will always be a temptation to cut building costs and go for the short term.

You cannot imagine such short-sightedness when building private homes. Who wants to buy a new family house that is almost guaranteed to auto-destruct by 2040? Developers who try to build such trash for the domestic market will land up in prison – but in the commercial sector they are regarded as heroes: fast build, low cost and who cares about the future.

We have a moral duty to build for the longer term. Not just to save carbon emissions. There are huge numbers of other environmental benefits in terms of reduced demand for steel, copper, wood, reduced landfill and many manufactured items that can be conserved.

This is not just about more efficient air conditioning, better insulation, saving water or making buildings more intelligent. Such steps are only a small part of the answer. Expect nothing less than a total rethink about the kind of world we want future people to live in.

We are literally building the future: of communities, neighbourhoods, working places, leisure and home environments, places of learning and of healing. Great buildings pass on a legacy for many generations, and should last hundreds of years.

Building long term means it really matters what the construction looks like. Tomorrow’s world will expect many more landmarks of quality, which endure not only in their materials, but in the affections of those who use them. The Sydney Opera House is a wonderful example of design, harmony in location, and emotional attachment. We don’t build Opera Houses to knock them down a couple of decades later – so why do we tolerate such short-termism and poor quality elsewhere?

The technologies we need are already available for next generation buildings. Take geothermal heating and cooling. These systems use up to 50% less energy than alternative systems. 45% of new homes in New Zealand have them, 70% in Sweden and 30% in Switzerland. They work like refrigerator pumps, heating or cooling pipes laid a metre below ground. Systems pay for themselves in 15 years. The global market for geothermal installations could be more than US $40bn a year.

The gold standard will be zero emission buildings: where on-site power generation from solar, wind or other sources is more than enough to meet all heat, light and cooling needs. We are already seeing demands in Europe by governments that builders create carbon-neutral homes. It’s just the beginning. We can expect zero-emission new buildings to be forced on the industry in many parts of the world over the next decade. And as that happens, the gap will grow even wider between new and old building efficiencies.

Government regulations and subsidies can set up national industries to seize these new markets. Look what’s happened in Germany where government action has resulted in the country buying 70% of all solar cells made in the world every month – and German solar cell manufacturers are dominating globally.

So we can expect aggressive and radical changes in the way buildings run. But we can also expect a major rethink about how much energy is used in actually building them in the first place.

A key target for attack will be the concrete industry which is responsible for 5-7% of all global carbon emissions. Concrete is a bulky, low value, two-thousand-year-old commodity which uses massive amounts of energy in a wasteful way. We urgently need an alternative – and there is one.

Expect widespread use in future of geoplymers such as E-crete, a product using power station waste, developed by Jannie Van Deventer, a chemical engineer at the University of Melbourne, and founder of Zeobond. If we replaced half the world’s concrete production with e-crete it would save a billion tons of carbon dioxide in the next decade alone.

E-crete is just one of thousands of examples of new innovation we can expect over the next five to ten years.... representing tens of thousands of new business opportunities, and billions of dollars of new revenues.

But the transformations we need will only happen as the construction industry pulls in a younger generation of highly talented, innovative and creative business leaders, designers, architects, engineers, surveyors and developers. It is often hard for these sectors to compete with more glamorous and well paid careers in industries such as banking, marketing, computing or telecommunications. So how will it happen?

The best talent will only be drawn into the construction industry when a younger generation see huge, exciting opportunities for new highly-profitable business innovation and creative action, and a chance quite literally to help build a better future, driven not just by commercial pressures but also a mission to help save the world.

* Dr Patrick Dixon is a leading authority on global trends, author of 12 books including Futurewise and Building a Better Business. He works with many of the world’s largest multinationals. Over 10 million different people have used his website or watched his videos on the future. www.globalchange.com

Global warming and sustainability - carbon and energy

Impact of global warming. Facts about global warming science. Controversy and arguments against global warming. Rising sea levels. Sustainability, environment, climate change, sea levels, carbon dioxide levels. Business and corporate responsibility. Reducing carbon footprint. Carbon offsetting and carbon sequestration capture technology for energy industry. Cleaner power generation and energy saving. Solar power, wind power, wave power, geothermal power. Impact on manufacturing, chemical industry, banking, transport, travel, tourism. Conference keynote speaker and Futurist Dr Patrick Dixon.

Trees cannot solve global warming

Old carbon dioxide needs to be stored underground. Carbon capture technology and carbon sequestration. Carbon offsetting and carbon trading. Balancing carbon footprint. Developed world and emerging economies carbon revolution. Carbon saving attention move to investment in solar, wind, wave energy generation. Nuclear fission and fusion. Lessons from scientific research. Conference keynote speaker and Futurist Dr Patrick Dixon.

Oil prices and aviation industry trends

Future of aviation industry with higher oil prices. Operational efficiency and budget airlines, capacity, turnaround time, cost reduction, seat occupancy, load factor increase, fuel efficiency with new planes. Future of airline travel for business, leisure and tourism. Transport competition from road and rail. Total fuel element of travel cost small. Discounted air fares. Aviation industry profitability, crisis, mergers and acquisitions. Long haul flights and short haul flights. Carbon offset travel carbon dioxide emissions -- airlines. Air freight carbon offset for DHL, UPS and Fedex. Average cost per passenger seat. Dollar price of oil. Future oil price trends. Impact of higher oil prices on aviation. Use of biofuel and alternative fuels. Business class tickets, image and public relations. Alternatives to commercial travel for meetings.Video by keynote conference speaker Dr Patrick Dixon, Futurist and author of 12 books on global trends including Futurewise and Building a Better Business.

Electric cars future - global warming impact?

Future Electric Cars
Future electric cars. Held back by battery technology innovation. Lead acid and now nickel cadmium. Charging time, capacity, miles and energy efficiency. Global warming -- where does the electricity come from? Zero emissions in cities but same emissions maybe from power generator elsewhere. Tax savings on electric cars. Manufacturers and size of market for electric cars. Electric car taxation and running costs. Efficiency and impact on environment.
Electric cars, vehicles, lorries, vans, transport, transportation, battery, capacity, market. Dr Patrick Dixon, Futurist and author of 12 books on global trends including Futurewise and Building a Better Business.

Solar panels future, energy generation and global warming

Payback period of solar cells, next generation solar panel technology. Increasing solar panel efficiency. Energy generation comparison with wind power. Better insulation. Carbon emissions impact and global warming action. Government subsidies and grants, sell back to national grid, supply prices. Germany solar cell market sales future trends. Growth of solar cell manufacturing, innovation. Future of solar cells.Video by keynote conference speaker Dr Patrick Dixon, Futurist and author of 12 books on global trends including Futurewise and Building a Better Business.

Carbon offset trading fraud -- huge criminal activity

Carbon offsets and carbon offsetting fraud. Lack of carbon market regulation, verification and independent audit of carbon saving schemes. Need to prove genuine carbon reduction, proof of additionality. Government exaggeration of carbon use, false carbon credits. Kyoto compliance and global warming action, reducing emissions of carbon dioxide. Carbon capture, carbon sequestration, underground storage of carbon dioxide. Double counting. Subsidies and grants for no added value. False accounting for emissions and carbon saving. Inconsistent measures and public standards. Global carbon trading and caps on carbon emissions. Carbon swops between industries, corporations and governments. International standards for carbon trading. Profits from carbon markets and CO2 trades. Emission reduction and energy savings. Video by keynote conference speaker Dr Patrick Dixon, Futurist and author of 12 books on global trends including Futurewise and Building a Better Business. Carbon trading, caps, emissions, carbon dioxide, offset, offsetting, fraud, accounting, regulation, market, trade, marketing, capure, sequestration, storage, energy savings, government, global warming
Carbon trading, caps, emissions, carbon dioxide, offset, offsetting, fraud, accounting, regulation, market, trade, marketing, capure, sequestration, storage, energy savings, government, global warming

Limits to economic growth? Sustainability?

1 billion new consumers. Can economic growth continue indefinitely? What is the limit to resources? Limits on carbon, oil, gas, coal reservers. Potential impact of nuclear fusion technology. Commodities: aluminium, copper, steel, precious metals, water, farming land and food supplies, gold. Real challenges for future generations. Many problems are solveable if we can produce unlimited clean energy at relatively low cost with new technologies. Why meat production is so wasteful of resources. Conference keynote speaker and Futurist Dr Patrick Dixon.

Construction industry trends -- conference speaker

Lifetime use of carbon in buildings. Polymer concrete reduction in carbon use. Real estate development. Energy saving and construction of commercial offices, property development, factories and residential buildings. Commodity inflation. New materials, e-concrete and concrete polymers. Building techniques, architects, surveyors, planning approval and government regulations. Life expectancy of commercial buildings. Building techniques and intelligent buildings. Retro-fitting of commercial buildings. Built-in redundancy in construction industry. Patrick Dixon, conference keynote speaker and futurist.

Concrete = 7% global CO2 emissions - global warming impact

Cement production responsible for 7% global co2 emissions, 1 ton of concrete uses 1 ton of carbon, impact of real estate construction industry on global warming. Development of property, energy saving, life expectancy of buildings. Longevity extensions. Making buildings last longer before demolition. Lifetime energy consumption. Building regulations and government action to reduce global warming. Building offices, factories, high rise tower blocks, commercial real estate, schools, colleges, hosptals and homes, apartments and flats. Alternatives to concrete. E-crete polymer concrete. Expect widespread use in future of geoplymers such as E-crete, a product using power station waste, developed by Jannie Van Deventer, a chemical engineer at the University of Melbourne, and founder of Zeobond. If we replaced half the world's concrete production with e-crete it would save a billion tons of carbon dioxide in the next decade alone. E-crete is just one of thousands of examples of new innovation we can expect over the next five to ten years.... representing tens of thousands of new business opportunities, and billions of dollars of new revenues. Video by keynote conference speaker Dr Patrick Dixon, Futurist and author of 12 books on global trends including Futurewise and Building a Better Business.
Concrete, e-crete, energy saving, construction industry, global warming, carbon emissions, energy consumption, lifetime energy, demolition, polymer, ash, power station waste, real estate development, precast, reinforced

Rising sea levels threat from global warming

Video by Dr Patrick Dixon on threat to Netherlands and Bangladesh from global warming and rise in sea levels.

Why planting trees won't save the world from global warming

Planting trees is a hopeless response to global warming - video comment.

Subscribers to this Web diary please note that most blog entries and video comments are being posted to all the other blogs linked to this main one. See links on this blog. Patrick

Becoming carbon neutral - buying carbon credits

Our family and my business Global Change Ltd have just taken a big step to become carbon neutral. We calculated the total amount of carbon we will use this year including all my business travel lecturing on global trends (a staggering 80 tons of carbon on air travel to conferences and corporate events). We have invested in a hydroelectric scheme outside the UK which would not otherwise be viable. By joining up with other organisations we have enabled the project to start generating electricity which will directly reduce local use of coal and gas, offsetting the carbon we will produce this year.

It is not the answer to global warming but is a small step which if replicated by every business and every household would make a big difference, balanced by other measures for energy efficiency.

China oil consumption - and global warming

Interesting fact: If China develops to the same level as South Korea (GDP per head), it could consume as much oil per day as 60% of the whole world at 2005 levels.

Expect the Chinese government to invest great efforts not only in securing their own oil supplies by buying significant stakes in oil companies around the world, but also to invest in alternative energy sources, especially coal.

New Scientist Special Report on Climate Change

New Scientist Special Report on Climate Change

Another useful link on global warming

Climate Change: Instant Expert | New Scientist

Climate Change: Instant Expert | New Scientist

I did a BBC Radio 5 Live interview on Global Warming last night. Interesting how the debate has moved on. Even if you take the most sceptical position, which is that maybe there is only a 5% risk that there is any link between human activity and global warming, that is still a very significant possibility.

Most of us insure our homes and other parts of our lives against much lower risks than 5%. However we don't have an insurance policy against global warming.

And most scientists think the risk is higher than 5% in any case.

That's why governments are right to be taking action now.

We cannot wait until the case is proven beyond all doubt.

One small step every family and business can take is to become carbon neutral in the longer term, by buying a tree in a new wood or forest to offset every 0.8 of a ton of carbon we use.

That's the equivalent of £20 on the cost of a transatlantic return flight or £160 on the annual costs of driving 12,000 miles.

An alternative to planting trees is to fund projects that reduce carbon emissions in places like India - for example a single 100 watt low-energy bulb will save over 10 years the equivalent in carbon of an entire mature tree being cut down (according to Future Forest). That is when you take into account the inneficiency of generating electricity and power losses on distribution.