On Tuesday I visited the Hargould Eco Showcase at Old Trafford Stadium to view a series of seminars about environment and sustainability in construction. It was a great opportunity to get an overview of the construction industry and try to gage the environmental feelings within the sector.

Arriving slightly late, after my sat-nav decided to stop giving me directions as soon as the stadium came into sight forcing me to spend the next twenty minutes negotiating myself down a series of side streets around the stadium. Finally I managed to locate where I was supposed to go, park up, register, collect my free cup of tea, say a quick hello to Eddie on the BuilderScrap stand and sit down in time for the first of the three seminars (resource efficiency in construction).

All three seminars followed a similar structure looking firstly at the issue, then the solution and finally the best practice. I was delighted that within the first seminar tackling resource consumption, BuilderScrap got a mention when discussing the practice of re-use and its growing importance to the industry, particularly pleasing with Eddie conveniently poised around the corner waiting for the seminar audience to filter past him ready to explain more about BuilderScrap.

Without going into too much detail about each seminar, the key points of the first seminar were to outline just how much perfectly good materials are being sent to landfill under the false pretence of being waste. Stats were provided demonstrating for example that 13 million tonnes of raw materials go to landfill which have never been used. It went on to explain how much money could potentially be saved each year with improved site management and planning to reduce and reuse as much as possible.

The second seminar discussed carbon management in construction, outlining the need to make carbon reductions in the industry through the use of good design, correct materials, best practice construction and also considering the long term operation of the building, will it be a big emitter of greenhouse gases (the period between construction and demolition). This was discussed with particular reference to BREEAM quality projects.

The final seminar looked into sustainable procurement in construction, this being the information about the products themselves. Where they are from? What they are made of? How have they been transported? And how they will be disposed of? It seems crazy to think that raw materials could be mined/farmed in one country, transported to be manufactured in the next, transported again to another country to be sold, and then end up never being used and ending on a landfill site after all that energy has been expended.

My main thoughts from the seminars were that whilst government in the UK is launching so many initiatives such as act on CO2 and halving waste to landfill, there needs to be more explanation why? It is not right to leave the construction sector feeling as if it is been persecuted by a series of laws without explanation,  why shouldn’t they carry on the way they have been, after all, many companies/individuals will have operated the same way for decades. If the time was taken to issue the relevant information in the industry it could show that sustainability is not that hard to build in to existing policy and with companies like BuilderScrap providing a platform to make it even easier to implement best practice then it can surprise how easy and cost effective a change in attitude can prove.

There is a need for constant reminders from the top down; you are not always going to get through to people first time, the saying is old habits are hard to break and teaching people to act differently can be tough. Having said that I think there is a willingness to change in the construction industry, maybe with les focus on the environment but certainly to save money and also to ensure that they are meeting their client’s expectations, ultimately if the client wants sustainable construction methods, the sector will move to accommodate, those that don’t will be left behind.

Overall I thought the seminars were excellent and would urge anyone within the industry to make an effort to attend in future, the presentations were very easy to follow and appealed to a wide audience. It did not try to be overambitious, there was an appreciation that you are not going to turn the construction industry into a band of eco-warriors overnight, it had a strong emphasis on monetary savings and client expectations, with the environmental message as an underlying theme throughout.

According to the BBC news website. Science has been damaged by the recent ‘Climategate’ accusations. Do you still trust our scientific advisor’s? We’d love to hear your thoughts about this and any other Environmental issues you feel strongly about.

Science damaged by climate row says NAS chief Cicerone By Victoria Gill Science reporter, BBC News,20 Feb 2010

Leading scientists say that the recent controversies surrounding climate research have damaged the image of science as a whole.

President of the US National Academy of Sciences, Ralph Cicerone, said scandals including the “climategate” e-mail row had eroded public trust in scientists. His comment came at the annual American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in San Diego. Dr Cicerone joined other renowned scientists on a panel at the event.

‘Distrust has spread’

He said that the controversial e-mail exchanges about climate change data had caused people to suspect that scientists “oppressed free speech”.

His fellow panel members, including Lord Martin Rees, president of the UK’s Royal Society, agreed that scientists needed to be more open about their findings.

“There is some evidence that the distrust has spread,” Dr Cicerone told BBC News. “There is a feeling that scientists are suppressing dissent, stifling their competitors through conspiracies.”

Recent polls, including one carried out by the BBC, have suggested that climate scepticism is on the rise. Dr Cicerone linked this shift in public feeling to the hacked e-mails and to recently publicised mistakes made by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in one of its key reports.

‘More transparency’

He said he was convinced that these events had had a wider knock-on effect. “Public opinion polls are showing that the answers to questions like: ‘how much do you respect scientists?’ or ‘are they behaving in disinterested ways?’, have deteriorated in the last few months.” He said that this crisis of public confidence should be a wake-up call for researchers, and that the world had now “entered an era in which people expected more transparency”. “People expect us to do things more in the public light and we just have to get used to that,” he said. “Just as science itself improves and self-corrects, I think our processes have to improve and self-correct.”

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8525879.stm

We’re always looking for fantastic posts and this from Suzanne Goldenberg, Guardian, February 18th was no exception.

Circuit boards from trashed computers in Belgium recycled to provide tiny amounts of metal to make winter olympic medals

The gold, silver and bronze medallions slung around winning athletes’ necks as they step on to the winners’ podium at the Vancouver Winter Olympic Games could well be made from the guts of an old Belgian computer.

The manufacturer of medals for this Olympics is for the first time incorporating token amounts of recycled material into the medals. Medals historically have been made of freshly mines ores.

The innovation – though largely symbolic – was directed by an Olympic organising committee which had vowed to put on the greenest games ever, raising the bar for London in 2012.

Organisers aimed to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 15% from business as usual. The nine new buildings constructed for the games set a new green standard for any complex of buildings in North America, drawing heat from the ocean and exhaust systems, incorporating green roofs and solar panels. The village for the athletes will be converted into housing when the games are over.

However, efforts to put on a green games were undermined by unseasonably warm conditions, which forced organisers to fly and truck in snow for the freestyle skiiing and snowboarding venue.

Teck, the Canadian-based mining and metallurgical company charged with making the medals, said on its website that it had developed a process to recover metals from unwanted cathode ray tube glass, computer circuit and keyboards, cables and other e-waste.

“The process involves shredding, separating and heating of the various electronic components to recover a variety of metals,” the company said. It said the gold, silver and copper used in the medals was recovered from trashed circuit boards collected and processed in Belgium.

The company has touted the innovation as a means of avoiding some of the hundreds of thousands of tons of e-waste that would otherwise end up in landfills – although not all that much, even by Teck’s own admission.

Third-place finishers will get a medal that has just 1.11% recycled material when they go home with a bronze. Silver medals contain barely 0.12% recycled material. And for the gold, which is gold plate, the figure is 1.52%.

guardian.co.uk/environment/recycling

Last week, I took a quick look at the Copenhagen Summit and briefly discussed its failings; today I wanted to find out a little more about the US commitments to carbon, partly as research, but also to highlight the importance of the US developing an ambitious carbon reduction policy.

In the run up to the Copenhagen conference, President Obama declared that the US targets would be a reduction of Greenhouse gas emissions by 17% on 2005 levels by 2020. This compares to targets from the EU of 20% which could rise to 30%. Also the 2005 baseline is very misleading with the international standard baseline being 1990, this would only equate to a 4% reduction using this baseline if the US achieved their targets. Whilst it could be considered a breakthrough that the US is trying to implement some environmental targets and policies, it is disappointing that these are not more ambitious in attempt to set a benchmark for others.

Why is the US involvement so important? The US is no longer the biggest polluter in the world since China surpassed them in either 2006 or 2007 depending on which reports are believed.  However, the US is still by far and away the biggest polluter per capita than any other nation. With approximately 5% of the world’s population it accounts for more than 30% of the worlds emissions (http://www.seiu.org). Most of the world is looking at China and the US to lead the way in creating a deal as the two largest polluters with many seeing a deal as pointless if both are not involved. With China pledging to match the 17% levels set by the US though it seems unlikely that other countries will follow with greater targets.

The US still will be unable to pass this as legislation until it has been approved by the Senate however, and it will now be considered. But if the bill is passed what incentives/punishments can the US put in place to help? Suggestions have been for Carbon Taxes to be phased in for businesses and households; in turn these could be used to pay for research for more efficient energy schemes and to be used to assist developing countries to cope with climate change.

It is crucial that the highest polluting countries and businesses take the initiative. The need for polluters to take responsibility is imperative; it is the actions of the big polluters that directly impact on other countries. We need to create a similar feel to that of smoking in the UK where we appreciate that it not only damaging to the smoker but the actions are detrimental to others, a taboo has successfully been created whereby smokers are frowned upon for their actions. Similarly high polluters must appreciate that they have a responsibility to the developing countries that are struggling with the effects of climate change and act accordingly to reduce emissions. We need to reach a situation where it is no longer acceptable to be a country or company that is not tackling the problems of high emissions and these are condemned by others both socially and politically; this needs to be done globally, and I believe for this to happen it is the China and the US who will need to take the lead. Others will feel that their own contributions are negligible against the big polluters unless this occurs; ultimately action is needed by all.

BuilderScrap recently beat internationally renowned entrants to win The Rushlight Award for Waste Management.
The Rushlight Awards celebrate the leading energy, resource and environmental technologies of Britain and Ireland, and were held this year at the Grand Connaught Rooms in London on Thursday 28th January.

The awards were presented to businesses that excelled in the environmental and clean technology fields. BuilderScrap won the award for waste management, which was accepted by Eddie McGee, Les Owens and Brendon Kenny (Pictured).

BuilderScrap is an innovative new business, which aims to lower the amount of constructions waste being sent unnecessarily to landfill. Using web 2.0 technology, member of this free service are able to ‘post’ details of their surplus materials to the web. Other member can then enquire about these products.

As well as member of the construction industry, other sectors using the website include charities, schools and community groups.

The not for profit business benefits not only the environment through less waste going to landfill and fewer carbon emulsions to ‘remake’ new material, but also the person passing on material through lower disposal cost and the receiver of goals through lost cost free product procurement.

As well as the prestigious Rushlight Award, BuilderScrap has been short listed in the Sustain Magazine Awards, to be presented in early March, and BuilderScrap Apprentice Paul Jones has been nominated for an All Stars Award, to be presented on Friday 5th February.

Managing Director, Les Owens, said ‘I am extremely proud of everyone involved in the project. Since launching less than 16 months ago, we have seen a great take up and this is growing on a daily basis. We have also had a lot of interest from abroad, and I have been invited to present the product to the Massachusetts Department of Environment Protection in March.’

BuilderScrap.com is completely free to use, and is supported by BRE, O2, Salford University and the Centre for Construction Innovation.

A little different than the usual stuff on BuilderScrap but an important issue that has arisen from man made influences on the environment.

 I was saddened today to read a report in the Guardian concerning the plight of the worlds primates. The report complied by a coalition of conservation groups and  primatolgists has stated that nearly half of all primate species face imminent risk of exticntion. Species such as the Orang Utan (above left) and the Golden Headed Langur (above right) have dwindled in numbers leaving these species under a very real threat of dissapearence.

The Golden Headed Langur could be down to as few as 60 individuals, simiraly species of Lemur and Gibbons have also been reported to be as low as 100 remaining individuals. In total there are 634 primate species, of which 48% are categorised by the IUCN as “red list” species. These are the species which are under greatest threat as the impacts of logging, hunting and smuggling take there toll upon them.

So how have humans allowed and initiated the decline of some of our closest living relatives? All over the world we have seen widespread deforestation and the destruction of primate habitat, often these areas have suffered as countries have struggled for economic growth, leading to the clearance of these lands for increased levels of agriculture. Pressures have also come from hunters and smugglers, for example in China primate hearts have been used in traditional medicines.
 
Due to the very low numbers  of individuals within certain species the threat of extinction is now very high for some primates, an event such as a cyclone or an outbreak of disease could spell the end for an entire species. With such fragile populations, the ease at which these species could fail is increasing, any disaster or event such as the above could have massive ramifications and the loss of these species forever.

So what is being done to save these primates? Deforestation is a key element to any deal to tackle climate change, not only in saving these fantastic animals but also due to the importance of rainforest areas in locking in carbon and preventing more greenhouse gases from entering the environment. Plans for developed countries to give money to developing countries to maintain their areas of forest and take action against illegal logging. In terms of the conservation of primate species conservation work is been undertaken by  a number of zoos and scientists to try to bolster the numbers of these animals. A list of the top 25 list has also been documented in order to create greater public awareness and also to try to encourage governments to become more active in conservation measures.

It seems so deeply saddening that the human race has nearly driven so many of its closest relatives to near extinction. It seems strange how this situation has been allowed to reach such dramatic levels with nearly 50% of all primate species as endangered. Surely the plight of primates has, at least to some extent, been known for a considerable length of time, even if the full extent was unknown. The real situation is however if there is no action now it will be too late and these creatures will become little more than a lifeless image in a book for future generations.

Again, not our usual subject of discussion, but I hope you enjoyed reading, please let us at BuilderScrap know if you have any comments.

More from BuilderScrap.com on Biodiversity and Recycling in the UK.

Those who claimed to have given a least ‘a little’ thought to biodiversity loss in the UK were asked what they thought might affect it. Rather than asking respondents to come up with their own answers they were presented with a list of twelve options and asked to select the ones which best applied. Respondents were also given the option of selecting an ‘other’ answer code and providing their answer verbatim.

The most common responses to this question were: climate change or global warming (42% of respondents said this was a factor), air pollution (35%), house building (28%) and water pollution (27%). A summary of the results from this question is provided in Table 39 (showing all responses selected by 5% of more of respondents).

Table

Todays BuilderScrap.com post does not explain about our Builders Exchange. We have chosen to focus on our concern for the environment and people attitudes towards biodiversity.

The research included a number of attitude statements related specifically to biodiversity. Respondents were asked how much they agreed or disagreed with each. Three of the statements were new to the 2009 survey so trend data are only available for some of the measures.

The results show that the vast majority report being concerned about the loss of biodiversity in the world with 85% agreeing that ‘I do worry about the loss of species of animals and plants in the world’ (54% of these agreeing strongly).The vast majority also agreed that there were many natural places that they may never visit but they were glad they existed (91%, with 65% agreeing strongly).

The majority were also concerned about biodiversity on a domestic level – eight in ten (80%) agreed that they worried about changes to the countryside in the UK and loss of native animals and plants (with 41% agreeing strongly). Two-thirds (66%) agreed that we should subsidise farming in hilly and mountainous areas to maintain the landscape for recreation and wildlife. Two thirds (67%) agreed that they actively encouraged wildlife in their garden although the results indicated that not all of these people equated this with protecting biodiversity per se as a lower percentage (45%) of all respondents disagreed there was nothing they could do personally to help to protect the UK’s biodiversity while 26% agreed with this statement.

The majority (63%) of respondents agreed that climate change did have a direct impact on biodiversity and very few people disagreed with this statement. 13% said they did not know if climate change had a direct impact and nearly one in five said they neither agreed nor disagreed with this statement.

There had been no change in levels of agreement with the statement ‘I do worry about the changes to the countryside in the UK and loss of native animals and plants’ since the 2007 Defra survey (see Table 38). However, there had been a slight increase in the proportion of respondents agreeing that there is nothing they could do personally to help protect the UK‟s biodiversity, from 22% in 2007 to 26% in 2009. The proportion who disagreed with this had decreased from 51% to 45%.

The proportion who agreed that they actively encouraged wildlife in their garden appears to have decreased slightly since 2007 (from 74% to 67%). However, in 2007, this question was asked only of those who had a garden, whereas in 2009 this was asked of all respondents.

Another post from the newest member of the BuilderScrap Team – Mike Close.  This blog looks at the effects of vegetarianism on the planet!  

 
It has long been thought that giving up meat and turning to a vegetarian diet is not only the key to a healthy lifestyle but also a great way of reducing your carbon footprint and helping your planet. New research from the Cranford University however, has suggested that vegetarian diets that include a large number of processed meat substitutes such as Tofu might in fact be worse for the environment than eating a “meat diet”.

Past reports have made some strong claims that a vegetarian diet drastically reduces the amount of greenhouse gases that go into the environment. Farming livestock are blamed for a quarter of “man made” methane emissions and 8 % of all UK emissions. According to the University of Chicago switching to a vegetarian diet can shrink your carbon footprint by up to 1.5 tonnes of carbon.

The new research has suggested though that the benefits are heavily reliant on the types of vegetarian foods consumed, Tofu and other processed meat substitutes containing soy, chickpeas and lentils may be resulting in a higher emissions output than eating locally sourced meat. These crops are being grown overseas and imported; this is resulting in higher transport emissions and increased destruction of forests due to a high demand for arable land.

This is a very convenient report for someone like me who enjoys a nice steak every now and then but generally considers himself to be fairly “environmentally friendly”, but of course it is a simplistic view. What if I eat imported meats, what about the increased water productions in meat production, what if I eat meat from a cow which has abnormal levels of flatulence, what if I import an individual lemur steak on a 1000 tonne steamboat powered on coal, mined by children in developing countries?

So what should I be eating to do “my bit”? Just vegetables, just locally sourced meat, or maybe grass cuttings from my garden? Well I am not going to cut out meat, or vegetables; maybe one day packaging will let me know how much carbon is used in the production of foods and “they” can monitor my carbon footprint accordingly. Maybe if I stay within my individual carbon targets I could be rewarded with nectar points (or the equivalent), if I do less well I am forced to scavenge through my next door neighbours potato peelings until the next “carbon year”.

I think until such times though I will try to maintain a healthy balanced diet (with the odd Chinese takeaway thrown in) and get locally sourced products where possible. There seems to be too much questionable data and dubious assumptions to create a clear indication of the best diet to be “green”.

The first blog post by our newest member of the BuilderScrap team – Michael Close.  Mike has been with us for two weeks now, and his first blog post looks at the Copenhagen Summit in December.

I am sure it will not have escaped most people’s attention that the Copenhagen summit recently came and went without any global agreement being reached. About 45,000 people descended on Copenhagen in December with the remit of producing a global agreement on climate change. So amongst all the protests and weeks of discussion why did the conference end without any legal agreement being reached?

The Deal which was to be set in place was a political policy named the Copenhagen Accord; this deal set out a number of key goals of which the primary focus was to set a ceiling on global temperature change of a maximum of 2 °C from pre-industrial times. Also in the accord are the need for developed countries to create commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and developing countries need to submit plans on how they are planning to curb their emissions. The accord though after many days of discussion was not adopted and the final outcome was that the accord finally voted to “take note” of it. This of course means that for all the discussions there is no legal deal and without countries adopting the policy or goals there is a grey area regarding what needs to be achieved and by who.

But what does the 2°C mean and how can this be achieved? Currently the mean global temperature increase stands at around 0.7°C and rising, but CO2 stays in the atmosphere for decades and many analysts believe that even at current levels this figure is set to rise to 1.5°C (BBC News).

So why the lack of agreement? Well that will depend on who you are and who you listen to.  It certainly has turned into a blame game since the treaty with the developing world blaming the developed world for not involving them; the developed countries have retaliated by blaming the developing countries for wasting time. China has been blamed by the UK and the US for trying to block any deal so as to not hinder their economic development. The US has been blamed by many for demanding concessions and going behind the UN’s back. The weather has been blamed for being too cold, protesters have been blamed for not protesting hard enough and the whole thing has ended with no treaty or legal agreement.

It seems that there are far too many agendas for a deal to be struck, I personally feel sorry for those countries that have a very real short term threat from rising sea levels as a result of global warming. It seems to be insulting that these nations appear to have nearly no voice on the global scale yet could face the most tragic outcomes. They must sit and wait for China and the US and the other leading nations to broker some sort of deal and hope that it comes soon enough.