Polluters throw tantrum over ETS

Well, I can’t say I’m surprised. The Business Council of Australia – who represent most of Australia’s biggest greenhouse gas emitters like Alcoa, Xstrata and ExxonMobil – has released a report saying that they won’t like it if the Rudd government makes them lower their emissions.

They paid researchers to write a report about the impact of an Emissions Trading Scheme on their businesses. The report claims that these emissions-intensive businesses won’t be able to pass on their increased costs to customers, that they won’t be able to reduce their emissions, and that if they’re forced to do so, they’ll take their business overseas.

It all seems like a temper tantrum to me. The increased costs of an ETS can be passed on to customers in the same way the increased costs of BAS statements were when the GST was introduced. And if they’re saying they can’t reduce their emissions, then they’re admitting they’re less innovative and hard-working than other polluters around the world who have already made cuts. Well, maybe that’s true, but it’s not something to be proud of.

As for taking their business overseas, most of these polluters are in the mining business: how are they going to dig up Australian resources if they go elsewhere? And do they really think that there are any countries who won’t have an ETS within the next decade? Anyone can tell you that this is junk economics. As Ross Gittens says in the Sydney Morning Herald, the BCA has just written a vote of no-confidence in itself.

All the players in the heavy-polluting industries saw the problems of climate-change coming years ago, and tried to confuse the issue with their own ‘research’ rather than deal with the situation. Like the cigarette companies in the 80s arguing that their products shouldn’t be subject to any regulation, the polluters now want to continue polluting with no consequences. They’ve seen that the Rudd government’s ETS is weak, and want to turn it into a joke that won’t solve the problem of GHG emissions at all. They smell the opportunity for even more loopholes and taxpayer-funded handouts to get themselves a free ride at the expense of smaller businesses and householders.

It’s pathetic, but it was also entirely predictable. Call me when one of the major polluters actually does something useful for a change…

Where’s the love for energy efficiency?

Whenever you see climate change mentioned in the media, or discussed over a few drinks, all the attention goes to renewables, or the nuclear debate, or whether or not clean coal can get going before it’s too late. No-one mentions energy efficiency unless they’re telling you about their CFL bulbs.

Energy efficiency is boring, and dull, and the kind of thing that accountants and people wearing ties would be into. But it’s still one of the most important ways Australians could be fighting climate change. It’s often easy to improve: it’s the low-hanging fruit of the environmental world, picked with little effort. And as long as energy costs money, reducing the energy it takes to do something will always be a money-saver.

So why does it get ignored?

• We assume we’ve already done the common-sense things. Why would anyone do anything inefficiently if they didn’t have to? That’s just silly, surely we’d have already taken action if it was so easy? Often we don’t even ask if a process could be changed a little to make it faster or less wasteful. For example, at my work we used to get our payslip data sent to a company for printing, the payslips were sent back, and then they got handed out to us every fortnight. That’s a lot of paper and driving around, every fortnight! Now the pay data is available on our company intranet – you can still get a printout if you need one, but hardly anyone wants another bit of paper to throw out. We could have done this years ago, since the data and the website was there all along; it just didn’t occur to anyone until now.
• We don’t want to look like we’re penny-pinching. Energy efficiency has a reputation as things you do when you can’t afford to do them the ‘normal’ way. Some people think a 5-star appliance or a smart-meter is what you get if you struggle to pay your electricity bills, instead of it just being a sensible option for everyone. We need to stop worrying about keeping up with the Joneses, and doing what’s right for us instead.
• We think it’s harder to become efficient than it really is. But energy efficiency is almost always one of those things that you can set up at the start and let it run without worrying about it later. If you build an energy efficient house, then you’ll be saving energy for decades without having to lift a finger. The same goes for well-designed suburbs with shops, doctors and parks all within walking distance – a bit of planning early on means much less driving for years to come.

If we can get the hang of energy efficiency on a personal level, the next step is to try it on a national level: compulsory building and manufacturing efficiency codes, the same as we do for safety requirements; better urban planning to make our cities less reliant on cars; take-back programs for everyday products to recover and re-use the materials that went into them. Have you got any ideas about how we could be more efficient overall?

What’s new?

So, just to round out the week, here’s a few links to green things going on that I thought were interesting:

ProQuo has their Top 10 Creative Responses to Junk Mail. I still think it’s better to cut it off at the source, but there’s always one advertiser who thinks their ads aren’t junk, and you have to get rid of it somehow

New York is having Summer Streets Saturdays, where a section of the city is closed to cars for a few hours and people are invited to come out and play! They say it’s “part bike tour, part block party, a great time for exercise, people watching, and just enjoying summer mornings.” Can we get something like this happening regularly in our capital cities too?

Clare at Ockham’s Razor pointed out the Greenpeace Energy Revolution website. It’s a petition you can sign, asking PM Rudd to commit to building renewable energy sources and phasing out dirty coal by 2030. Check out the video under the Blueprint for Change menu, it’s good stuff.

Gavin has a fun video up, where the amazing Eco-Boy shows us how to save electricity and water around the home. Thanks, Eco-boy, you’re my hero!

Catchment Detox is the project for National Science Week this year. It’s an online game where you have to manage a catchment while balancing the needs of the environment, the economy and the people. There are great prizes for individuals and for school teams, including books and dvds from the ABC Shops, and a trip to the Kimberley.

Don’t just buy something, share it

Have you ever stood dithering in the shops, wondering if you really *need* the whatchamacallit you’re about to buy? You want to use it, but you don’t have any particular desire to own it. But there’s no other way to get one of these whatchamacallits, so you take it to the counter and put your money down.

This is where product service systems could come in handy. Product service system is a fancier way of saying “let’s all share stuff we don’t need to own”. Some examples you’re already familiar with are libraries, taxis, laundromats, and gyms. They’re great for getting hold of things like treadmills or the complete works of Shakespeare, things you don’t have room for, or don’t need every day.

The environmental benefits are clear: far less energy and time going into producing goods that will only get used once, then either be kept to gather dust, or sent to landfill to rot away slowly. Sharing one rarely-used item among many people is so much more efficient than everyone having one. And a product service system can be a profitable yet sustainable business.

This Worldchanging article Product Service Scenarios for the Bright Green City, mentions a few examples that environmentalists have come up with, like a tool-sharing service (how often do you use an angle-grinder?) or the imaginative handbag-rental business (use the bag once for a special occasion, then send it right back). There are car-sharing services popping up around Australia, like GoGet, GWhiz or Nexus, for the times when a taxi would be too expensive. Toy libraries have been around for years, so parents can rotate through a variety of toys for their kids at a fraction of the cost of owning all of them. It doesn’t even have to be a registered business: it might just be neighbours borrowing a lawn-mower, or car-pooling into the city centre.

My favourite product service system right now is Quickflix. I love to watch movies, but don’t want to buy them unless i know I’m going to watch them more than once, and I don’t know that until after I’ve seen it once already. The local video store worked well for me for years, and is a PSS most people would be familiar with. However, there’s still the driving to and from the store, multiplied by the number of people there, plus the trips to return the movie later. Also, I’m then tempted to buy lollies or chocolates! Quickflix uses Australia Post to send and receive the dvds; your postie was making a trip around your suburb anyway, so getting him or her to take another batch of envelopes is much more efficient than everyone driving to and from a store.

What other product service systems do you already use, or wish were available to you?

New phone

On the weekend I got a new phone. My previous phone was a lemon. I’m not going to name the brand or model, because several of my friends had the same type with no problems at all, so I think mine was just a bit of bad luck. However, in spite of it being sent for repairs twice and having frequent cut-off issues, I made it last as long as I could. Now that it’s finally dead, I’ve got an Apple iPhone instead.

Obviously, any electronic device has an environmental impact that should be considered, so I tried to take that into account. Apple has an ok reputation on environmental issues, and seem more forward thinking than many other competing phone companies. You can see their eco-credentials at their website. In general, they’re very good at energy efficiency and reducing packaging, ok on recycling, and not so good on the manufacturing side of things.

My last phone came in a huge box with styrofoam and some other spongy foam things, 3 booklets and a manual I’ve never looked at. The iPhone came in a small box with no foam, just folded cardboard and two tiny pamphlets telling you how to get started, and how you can use the phone to read the manual online or download it to your computer. Except for 3 tiny bits of plastic, it’s all recyclable. In future I’d like to see it made from recycled materials, but Apple is definitely better than average in this regard.

You can recycle your old computer with them if you buy a new one from them, but they don’t offer a phone recycling service yet. I’m recycling my old phone through the Mobile Muster group, which has a drop-off point at my local Optus store. Mobile Muster is a nationwide program that’s been very successful so far, recycling over 525 tonnes of handsets as of March this year. You can sign up your business or school to be a collection point too, if you want to get involved.

Last year Greenpeace issued a report criticising Apple for the hazardous materials in their products, and started a website for a campaign called Green My Apple. Their criticisms were fair, and because of the pressure they applied, Steve Jobs came out with a response and a plan for future improvements. Greenpeace thought this was pretty good, but is still urging them to make further improvements.

I think it’s a good tactic to pressure the leading company rather than smaller or less popular ones. If you can get the market leader to meet your requirements, then they become the gold standard by which other companies are judged. I like to spend my money on the product with the best environmental record, but that often means that I’m spending my money with the same companies I’m complaining about, because they’re the ones most susceptible to pressure! Still, I think a complaint or request for action is more likely to be noticed if it comes from a customer than from a random person, so hopefully it’s a good tactic.

Bonus: One of the features of an iPhone has a small environmental impact too – it’s seriously cutting back on the amount of paper I use everyday. Because the iPhone has a large and useful screen, I’m replacing my calendar, diary, to-do lists, shopping lists, birthday lists and the usual half-dozen sticky notes I use to keep track of my life. My previous phone had a teeny-tiny calendar and a task list that felt like SMS, so the iPhone is much more usable in that respect. It feels good to clear out all that paper from my handbag, and into the recycling bin!