Abstract
Gen Z-Backed Climate Change Strike Draws Millions
In what is believed to be the largest environmental protest in history, an estimated four million people worldwide informally went on strike September 20, 2019, to demand an immediate end to climate change. According to environmental activist group 350.org, participants—mostly led by teenagers or young college students—were drawn from 250 countries and every continent, including Antarctica. Employees took the day off from work, students skipped school, and small businesses shut down. The strikes were timed to coincide with a weeklong series of climate-oriented sessions at the United Nations. “If a child or a young person talks about these issues, it's more power in a way,” says Greta Thunberg, the 16-year-old Swedish activist who has become the face of climate awareness among Generation Z. “We are not the ones who have caused this crisis. We just happen to be born in a world where there was this big existential crisis.” The messages delivered ranged from simple and subtle. “There is no Planet B,” read one sign from a protester in New York City; others carried humor with a serious tone: “I'm the hottest—don't let the planet take my place,” or “I like my fries hot, not my planet.” People were displaying public actions, too. In Santiago, Chile, and Bangkok, Thailand, students played dead, lying down in the middle of a downtown intersection. In Seoul, Korea, teenagers used LED lights to create the Morse code symbol for S.O.S. “The Global Climate Strike shows that we have the people power we need to create a just world and end the era of fossil fuels,” notes a post on the Global Climate Strike website at https://globalclimatestrike.net/. “But it'll take everyone to secure a better future and avert the worst of the climate crisis. What happens next is up to us.”
Nearly four million people worldwide—from New York City to Antarctica—made known their opinions about the climate crisis during the Global Climate Strike in September.
Scientists Hope to Uncode Coral and Climate Change
The National Science Foundation (NSF) is challenging Florida International University (FIU) to discover how climate change is impacting the ocean coral's DNA—and the school is getting $3 million to do it. According to FIU, the university will collaborate with other U.S. research teams to study coral in Mo'orea, French Polynesia, to observe what happens when ocean life is exposed to higher temperatures for a specific length of time, and what epigenetic modifications are then passed down to their offspring. Epigenetic changes are not changes to the genetic code itself, only how genes are expressed, according to FIU researcher Jose Eirin-Lopez. “Pinpointing what these changes mean may hold the key to protecting coral,” Eirin-Lopez asserts. “We're the product of the environment in which we live and interact. Many living things may not be able to cope with such a fast-changing environment. Unless we have all of the information, we're not going to be able to effectively stop the loss of corals.” Researchers hope to pinpoint patterns and understand whether the offspring are better equipped to live in higher temperatures because of the experience of their parents. “It's this data that will be critical to informing future preservation for coral that extends past the short-term solution of ‘rescuing’ coral and safeguarding it in temperature-controlled tanks in labs and aquariums,” Eirin-Lopez adds. The collaborative team also includes researchers from the Shedd Aquarium (Chicago); University of Rhode Island (Kingston); University of Washington (Seattle); and University of California, Santa Barbara.
Future generations of coral may gain resistance to the environmental changes that are killing their parents.
Rock Imposters Take Shape on England's Beaches
Beachcombers along the southwestern English coastline have discovered a growing number of rocks that aren't rocks at all. Rather, they are made from pyroplastic—a new form of plastic pollution that was transformed by fire. According to researchers at the University of Plymouth (Plymouth, England), these pollutants could be hiding in plain sight worldwide. “Because they look geological, you could walk by hundreds of them and not notice,” says environmental researcher Andrew Turner. He first became aware of the “rock imposters” when volunteers from a local beach cleanup group brought in rocks that were light enough to float in water. In 2018, Turner and his team examined the plastics' chemical makeup using X-ray and infrared spectroscopy, and discovered they were made of polyethylene and polypropylene, and a variety of chemical additives, including lead. “If you can imagine a pebble being geologically altered, it'd take hundreds of thousands of years,” Turner explains. “I think we're seeing the same thing on these plastics but occurring much more quickly.” Where exactly the pyroplastics originated is still a mystery. Turner suspects sources could range from campfires as far as Hawaii to old landfill sites in the Caribbean. Their impact on the environment is also a question. “Pyroplastic stands as yet another indicator of plastic's ubiquity in the environment,” says Jan Zalasiewicz, a professor of paleobiology at the University of Leicester (Leicester, England). “Whatever fate ultimately befalls it, it's clear that plastics are becoming part of the geological cycle.” A research paper on the subject appears in the journal Science of the Total Environment.
Beach visitors in England are finding rocks made of plastic that look just like the real thing—and their environmental impact remains largely unknown.
Green Power Gets Hot, but Climate Change Still Hotter
Renewable energy capacity quadrupled worldwide over the past 10 years, with an estimated $2.6 trillion invested in its growth, according to a report from the United Nations Environment Programme. But the speed of that growth still falls far short of what researchers say is needed to keep global warming in check. In 2016, the Paris Agreement set a goal of keeping the average global temperature rise to under 1.5 degrees Celsius by the end of the century. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) notes that although progress has been made, the world actually needs to invest an average of $3 trillion to $3.5 trillion annually through 2050. “There is certainly a global shift,” says Kathy Hipple, an analyst with the Institute for Energy, Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA). “The question is, Is it moving fast enough from a climate perspective? And arguably it's not.” But this finding and others outlined in the report, Global Trends in Renewable Energy Investment 2019, gives some hope that the climate can be salvaged, according to Richard Cleetus, policy director for the climate and energy program at the Union of Concerned Scientists. “There's lots to be optimistic about,” he asserts. “But at the same time we need more.” The report is available at https://bit.ly/2o5P8Xo.
Renewable energy is increasing, but there is still a long way to go to meet the Paris Agreement's goal of keeping the average global temperature rise to less than 1.5 degrees Celsius by 2100.
Schumer Unveils $454B Proposal to Pump Up EV Sales
U.S. Senator Charles Schumer (NY) has proposed a $454 billion, 10-year plan to boost the sale of electric vehicles and reduce the number of gasoline-powered cars. His proposal would offer rebates averaging $3,000 each to entice Americans to trade in their internal combustion engine car for a car that runs on hybrid, electric, or hydrogen fuel cells. That would help transition 25 percent of the U.S. fleet, or 63 million vehicles, into alternative-powered cars within 10 years, according to an article by Reuters. Subsidies would go to owners of gasoline-powered vehicles that are at least eight years old and in driving condition, who then trade them in for some form of EV. The old vehicles would be scrapped. “The goal of the plan, which also aims to spur a transformation in American manufacturing, is that by 2040 all vehicles on the road should be clean,” Schumer says. “Second, the plan would make electric vehicles—and the necessary battery-charging infrastructure—accessible to all Americans, regardless of where they live and work.” The proposal has received support from environmental groups such as the Sierra Club and Natural Resources Defense Council, and the League of Conservation Voters. Automobile manufacturers Ford and General Motors also expressed interest.
A LEED Platinum AMLI building in Atlanta, Georgia.
Multifamily Housing Dwellers Take Aim at Climate Change
Apartment residents are increasingly interested in finding ways to combat climate change and other environmental issues, according to a report by sustainable multifamily properties developer AMLI Residential. The company's third annual Sustainable Living Index projects how apartment dwellers' opinions on environmentalism and green initiatives impact their choices about where to live. The 2019 survey results reveal that nearly 89 percent of AMLI residents are concerned about climate change. More than 70 percent said their desire to find solutions to environmental issues has increased over the last five years. More Millennials reported feeling particularly concerned about climate change and expressed a heightened desire for solutions to environmental issues, followed by Gen X, Gen Z, and, lastly, Baby Boomers. Millennials were also the generation most-inclined to pay more for green features, again followed by Gen X, Gen Z, then Baby Boomers. Overall, more than 61 percent of residents responded that they would be willing to pay more to live in a sustainable community. “This year's survey demonstrates that AMLI's residents are increasingly concerned about climate change and the long-term effects of environmental issues,” says AMLI Residential President Phil Tague. “Our residents are conscious of how their lifestyle at our communities affects the environment and their health.” The survey was conducted in July at properties in AMLI's nine regions—Atlanta, Austin, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Houston, Seattle, Southern California, and Southeast Florida. More information can be found at www.amli.com/.
This Coca-Cola-Made Home Is the Real Thing—Sort Of
Two Nova Scotian builders have created a prefab home that resists mold and mildew, can withstand hurricane-force winds, and gives a new use for an environmentally deadly product: plastic. Dubbed “The Recycle House,” the structure consists of 612,000 recycled plastic bottles that were processed into gas-injected, hardened foam and sandwiched between fiberglass skins to create lightweight composite panels. It is the first such known use of Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET) foam, according to a report in Dwell. Joel German—who, with partner David Saulnier, cofounded JD Composites to fund construction of the beach house—explains they wanted a way to start a business while helping the environment. The Recycle House is also exceptionally strong—testing showed that its 8-foot-by-8-foot panels can withstand 326-mile-per-hour winds, forces twice as strong as that of a category 5 hurricane. The home exterior is also clad with aluminum and vinyl siding for looks. “Our intent is to further develop the technology so it can be licensed and built all around the world, and we would continue to try different things to bring to various builders,” German told Dwell. “Many hurricane-prone areas need this product, and we plan on delivering.” Though, don't expect to see homes of this type popping up too soon, he adds. “The building codes need to adapt,” German says. “It will take some time for them to adjust and learn our technology through testing.”
This prefab home and more than 600,000 bottles of your favorite soda have a lot in common: All of those plastic bottles were recycled to make the living structure.
Trump Flips the Off Switch on Incandescent Bulb Ban
The Trump Administration is rolling back energy efficiency standards for light bulbs that would have kept millions of tons of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere, a move that will “ensure that the choice of how to light homes and businesses is left to the American people, not the federal government,” according to U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Press Secretary Shaylyn Hynes. DOE's action reverses a requirement initiated in 2017 that recessed candle-shaped and round bulbs switch from incandescent to more energy-efficient LED varieties. The requirement would have taken effect in January 2020 and would have impacted bulbs that are already in 2.7 billion sockets, nearly half of all bulbs nationwide, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC).The DOE also will not update standards for bulbs such as the common pear-shaped variety still included in an efficiency regulation signed by President George W. Bush in 2007. Together, the two decisions will increase U.S. energy bills by $14 billion annually through 2025 and consume at least 25 power plants worth of energy every year, the NRDC calculated. NRDC alleges that the rollback is illegal because it violates an “anti-backsliding” provision in the original law that prevents the DOE from weakening standards once they are put in place. But Hynes says the 2007 regulation only mandated that the department issue standards when “economically justified.” She maintains that the reversed standards are not.
Certain incandescent light bulbs, once scheduled to be on the way out by 2020, will instead remain in circulation following action by the Trump Administration.
Ocean Cleanup Founder Turns Attention to Rivers
The Dutch inventor of the Ocean Cleanup now has found a way to stop plastic pollution in the inland waterways. Boyan Slat, known for his ongoing plan to build a barrier to capture trash from the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, recently unveiled the Interceptor, a floating, solar-powered unit designed to capture trash from rivers before it reaches the ocean. Slat's ocean cleanup tool, in place in the Pacific for more than a year, has proven successful. But the 25-year-old had taken criticism for only going after garbage at sea. The Interceptor was his response. “We need to close the tap, which means preventing more plastic from reaching the ocean in the first place,” Slat told the Associated Press. “Rivers are the arteries that carry the trash from land to sea.” To function, an Interceptor is anchored to a riverbed, out of the path of passing boats. A floating barrier directs trash into the system; a second Interceptor farther downstream catches any garbage that makes it past the first one. A conveyor belt pulls the trash out of the water, which is then transferred into dumpsters on a separate barge, ready to be taken to a recycler when full. An Interceptor can collect approximately 110,000 pounds daily, for a yearly total of approximately 20,000 tons. Slat believes roughly 1,000 rivers are responsible for 80 percent of plastic pouring into the world's oceans and he wants to tackle them all in the next five years. Thus far, units have been sent to Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam, and the Dominican Republic, and they are doing well, he says. “This is not going to be easy, but imagine if we do get this done,” Slat notes. “We could truly make our oceans clean again.”
The Ocean Cleanup team has started an effort to catch trash in rivers—before it enters the seas.
Displaced Families Could Find Home in Refugee Cities
Refugee cities are being proposed as a way to address the world's displacement crisis. According to Christian H. Kaelin, founder and chair of the Switzerland-based nonprofit Andan Foundation, refugee cities offer a more-sensible, long-term and humanitarian option to refugee camps. “The core idea is a simple one: to expand opportunities for displaced people by creating secure, self-governing communities in which they can settle and build a future,” Kaelin states. “They can engage in work, start businesses, gain independence, and rebuild their lives.” In contrast, although an occupant typically stays for about 17 years in a refugee camp, the resident is frequently relocated during that time, which “creates [a] sense of hopelessness,” Kaelin notes. An estimated 70 million people worldwide are refugees, and that total will only increase over the next 10 years. Refugee cities also go beyond the concept of charter cities or special economic zones: In a public–private partnership, these special jurisdictions can attract the necessary investment to replace camps with thriving communities that benefit their host countries. “With the right support, there is no reason that refugee cities that are granted extensive self-governance status would not thrive,” Kaelin asserts. “They can become a replicable model for the future that equally benefits the people settling there as well as the countries enabling them.” As a bonus, the stand-alone cities may have a greater emphasis on sustainability because they have to start from scratch as they're constructed, researchers note.
Syrian refugees resting on the floor of Keleti railway station during the refugee crisis in Budapest, Hungary, September 2015.
San Jose Blazes Path for Electric Buildings, Vehicles
San Jose, California, home to more than one million people, is now the largest U.S. city to pass building codes encouraging all-electric construction. The building code, passed unanimously by the bipartisan city council, will slash climate pollution from new construction and deliver significant health benefits to residents, according to Mayor Sam Liccardo. The ordinance, which takes effect in January 2020, also calls for new multifamily buildings to include 70 percent of electric vehicle (EV)-capable spaces, at least 20 percent of EV-ready spaces, and at least 10 percent of full EV service equipment spaces. Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) senior scientist Pierre Delforge notes that the growing interest in electrification of buildings and transportation is a sign local governments are reacting to a lack of action at the federal level. “We do expect this is the kind of climate action that cities can own,” said Delforge. “At a time when the federal government is trying to repeal climate polices, cities are stepping up and doing their own thing.”
San Jose, California's third-largest city, is the nation's largest when it comes to requiring electric vehicle compatibility in all new construction.
Bluewater Helping Rock Fans Clean Up Plastic Bottle Act
Attending music gigs can be thirsty work, but Swedish water technology developer Bluewater is helping to keep live music events from becoming parched ones for fans. The Stockholm company's now-iconic hydration stations and mobile water trailers are popping up at one festival after another worldwide to serve chilled still and sparkling water direct from the tap. They also help keep single-use plastic bottles out of landfills and the oceans, where they break down into microplastics. “Mega rock-n-roll gigs can have an enormous impact on educating the thousands of music fans about the way single-use plastic bottles are ocean enemy No. 1,” Bluewater founder and CEO Bengt Rittri says. “We are showing there are now ways to create sustainable music festivals and help visitors to stay hydrated without further damaging our land and sea environments.” Rittri adds that the hydration stations have successfully ended the use of single-use plastic bottles at events such as The Open golf tournament, the Volvo Ocean Race, and Formula E races.
Bottled water is giving way to hydration stations—such as this one from Bluewater—as consumers continue to move toward having less waste plastic in the environment.
Environmental Issues Are (Kind of) a Big Deal
A growing number of Americans believe environmental problems are an important issue but are not important enough to make change and action a priority, according to a research report from Living Standard and the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC). According to Mahesh Ramanujam, president and CEO of USGBC, 82 percent of survey respondents indicated that they believe environmental problems are “very” or “somewhat important,” an increase of 8 percentage points in the six months since USGBC began conducting this research. However, if just those that said “very important” are considered, the percentage drops to 49 percent, suggesting that this large majority are not all like-minded. The research indicates that the simplest way to connect with others on the importance of the environment is to frame the conversation around people and the health, safety, and well-being of their friends and families. “Sustainable spaces help reduce the immediate and direct health outcomes that environmental problems create, as well as provide important economic benefits for neighborhoods and cities,” Ramanujam notes. “But to make real progress, convince the public of the reality of climate-related threats, and increase demand for green buildings, we've got to empower and mobilize those beyond our community to get involved and take action.” The report is available at https://livingstandard.org/standard-issue.
Algae-Derived Carbon Fibers Could Be Construction Industry's Future
Researchers at Technical University in Munich (TUM) have developed a way to create a lightweight, industrial-grade fiber that is as strong as steel but made from algae. According to Professor Thomas Brück at TUM's Algae Cultivation Center, the process begins with algae, which can convert carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, whether from power plant emissions or steel processing exhaust, into algae oil. Initial analyses, according to TUM, show that the oil can then be used to economically produce carbon fibers, which can be ground up or even simply stored out of place, as desired. “When you make plastics from carbon dioxide, it is quickly returned to the atmosphere through waste incineration plants following a few years of use,” says Kolja Kuse, another researcher on the project. “With the final safe storage [as algae oil], we remove the carbon dioxide from the atmosphere for millennia. This also makes the process clearly superior to carbon capture and storage in the underground.” Brück notes that it will take quite a while to cultivate enough algae to launch such an industry. But when ready, “this new technology could create strong industrial materials that also benefit the climate,” he asserts.
The carbon fiber reinforcement gives the granite plate an extremely high strength, enabling completely new, efficient construction and materials.
Improved Energy Efficiency Can Slash Gas Emissions by 2050
New research shows that energy efficiency can cut U.S. energy use and greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2050 and get the United States halfway toward its climate goals. Halfway There: Energy Efficiency Can Cut Energy Use and Greenhouse Gas Emissions in Half by 2050, by the nonprofit American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE), outlines ambitious but cost-effective and technically feasible measures that would avert emissions of nearly 2,500 million metric tons of heat-trapping carbon dioxide—equivalent to all emissions from cars, trucks, homes, and commercial buildings projected for 2050. The report identifies 11 categories and related policies to achieve the necessary savings. For example, transportation, which will see a transition to electric vehicles, would deliver 46 percent of the emissions reductions while buildings would deliver one-third and industry a fifth. For energy savings, buildings would deliver 40 percent of the total, followed by transportation (32 percent) and industry (27 percent). “Energy efficiency is an urgently needed climate solution,” says ACEEE executive director Steven Nadel, a report coauthor. “We already see the effects of intensifying climate change and the resulting increase in extreme weather events—from respiratory and other health problems to flooding, drought, heat waves, and wildfires.” Long-term strategies proposed by other researchers have called for reducing total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 80 to 100 percent by 2050. Prior studies, including those by the International Energy Agency (IEA) and the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), found that efficiency measures can produce nearly half of these reductions. Halfway There is available at https://aceee.org.
A more-categorized approach to improved energy efficiency could place the United States on track toward its greenhouse gas emissions goals by 2050.
EPA Awards $6M for Study of Environmental Waste Chemical
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has awarded $6 million for research by eight organizations to expand the understanding of the environmental risks posed by per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in waste streams, and to identify practical approaches to managing the potential impacts as PFAS enter the environment. According to EPA Regional Administrator Pete Lopez, the research grants will help expand the agency's knowledge about PFAS and ways to help states, tribes, and local communities make decisions about them. PFAS are a class of manufactured chemicals that have been used since the 1950s to make products that resist heat, stains, grease, and water. They have been found in solid waste, landfills, and surrounding environmental media such as soil and groundwater, leachates, landfill gas, wastewater effluents, and biosolids. However, current treatment options are limited, as many conventional treatment methods are ineffective, Lopez explains. “In funding these projects, EPA is specifically supporting research to identify or develop innovative methods to treat or manage PFAS before they enter the environment to minimize their risks to humans and ecosystems,” he says. The eight grant recipients are the New York State Department of Health–Health Research Inc., Menands, NY; North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC; University of Florida, Gainesville, FL; Clemson University, Clemson, SC; Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN; Texas A&M AgriLife Research, College Station, TX; Texas Tech University, Lubbock, TX; and University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, ND.
Processing Technique Could Mean Makeover for Waste Plastic
Researchers at the Polymer Processing Research Centre (PPRC) of Queen's University Belfast (Northern Ireland, U.K.) have discovered ways to convert single-use plastic waste into products such as storage tanks for water and fuel, and sporting goods such as kayaks and canoes—which could help solve global environmental problems. According to lead research Peter Martin, the world produces over 300 million tons of plastics every year, almost equivalent to the weight of the entire human population. “Much of this is single-use and not designed to be recycled, which creates a mountain of waste that enters the natural environment, such as plastic pollution in the oceans,” Martin says. PPRC's groundbreaking approach involves a manufacturing process called rotational molding, in which flakes of waste plastics are ground into fine powder and blended with a proportion of new polyethylene plastic. The mixture is then heated to more than 200°C (392°F), cooled in a mold, and transformed into the shape of a new item. “In one product of this kind waste plastic could replace around 30 percent of the new plastic required and use the equivalent of 1,000 old milk bottles in its manufacture,” Martin says. Fellow researcher Mark Kearns adds that such redesigned products will last years, keep waste out of the landfills and oceans, and “usher in a new and more sustainable era in the production of rotationally molded plastics.”
New polymer processing research has resulted in a way to recast waste plastic into long-term products such as storage tanks and canoes.
