The Juxtaposition of Old and New

The other day, Martin took Wei hong and me on a tour of West Cambridge, where new University buildings are located. This is where the famous Cavendish Laboratory, for example, has been relocated to.

When new buildings are built or when exsiting buildings have large retrofits, it is required that the building provides 10% of its energy needs through a renewable source. At first, the University was thinking about installing one large renewable energy fixture - such as a small wind farm, for example - but then decided against it for various reasons. Instead, buildings put up solar panels on hardscape where cars park or have biomass boilers. Below are just a couple of pictures of West Cambridge.



In the city centre, Cambridge University looks like it did 800 years ago. This is the side of Cambridge you see as a tourist when you come visit.

But as soon as you move out to the fringes, you see a whole other side:

This is a picture of a swale, a feature which allows storm water to slowly seep into the ground rather than run off immediately. Features such as these help buildings gain BREEAM certification.


This is one of the newest buildings, to which the swale belongs to. It's so new that it is actually still quite emtpy (lights are still on at night though...) One of its purposes is to provide spaces for new research to interface with start up companies to market new technologies.

This sign is for the building below:

The "LEED" equivalent here is BREEAM, which stands for: The Environmental Assessment Method for Buildings Around the World. I tried finding a plaque but couldn't...

These funny looking roofs are to cover the hundreds of parked bikes! On the West Cambridge site there are actually quite a few of these type of covered biking parking spots, but this is the largest we saw.

Transportation

by Irene

I am currently working on calculating CO2 emissions from air travel conducted by students/staff 2009-2010. The most difficult aspect of the task is settling down on a CO2 kg/km emission factor. Even among the UK Universities using the Carbon Trust Management Plan there are varying factors, let alone the large difference between the factor(s) used in UK and those in America. It seems in America the factor is higher because our calculators are accounting for radiative forcing. But Universities here typically accounting for uplift (this takes into account that sometimes flights take an indirect path from Point A to Point B, and also circling and delays) as well as assigning different emissions for short haul versus long haul trips (taking into account that the most fuel is burned for take off and landing).

That settled, I am interested what the data will show. I think for the purposes of the University, at this point, the most important data is figuring out number of miles traveled (long haul and short haul) and then multiplying them by the appropriate GHG emissions factor. But I think in terms of creating an action plan, I think it would also be useful to see when the most trips are taken (which months) and which departments. This is certainly not to point fingers at anyone or any time. But can perhaps lead to opening up more tele-conferencing rooms in those particular months or conducting a finer analysis of the types of trips being taken.

Sustainability UK

There are several general tidbits about Cambridge and the UK I've gathered throughout this week that I think are interesting. They don't relate exactly to the University, but here it goes anyway.

Getting Around:
It appears most locals have bicycles in Cambridge. When discussing with folks here who has the right of way, the general consensus is "bicyclists" (who drive like crazy things through these small windy roads). In attempting to join in on the bicycle culture, I will be renting a bicycle from Stationary Cycles. This is an interesting model, in which you put down a deposit, and pay for however long you'd like to have the bike - 1 week, 2, weeks, up to 7 weeks, I believe. I've never seen something like this in the states and find it an interesting way to accommodate visitors. Sure, you can rent a bike for a couple hours at the beach in Santa Monica....but never for weeks at a time at fairly reasonable prices.

Heathrow Airport
David Cameron announced the other day that long standing plans to build a third runway in Heathrow (there are currently only 2, which is rather astonishingly low, considering Heathrow is a sort of gate into Europe and the Middle East) are now canceled in order to cut air travel-related emissions in the UK and to fight a "flying binge." I don't have my own opinion on the matter, but definitely think it's interesting. No airport has ever decided not to expand due to greenhouse gas emission concerns, especially in an economic downturn, which the business sector says will be hurt by this action. Here's the full article: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/02/science/earth/02runway.html?_r=1&hpw

Eurostar
Looking into other modes of transportation, Eurostar, the fast speed rail which one can take from London into Paris, thus traversing the channel, has these friendly words written as it looks up travel times, "Eurostar journeys are now carbon neutral at no extra cost to you." Doing a rather cursory search I didn't find more details, but still, thought it was a rather interesting tid-bit.

Yokohama Renewable Energy Conference 2010

On Thursday, July 1, 2010, I was given the opportunity to go with Professor Hanaki to the 2010 Renewable Energy Conference in Yokohama, Japan. First, I listened to a couple of sessions on biofuels.

Then, I was able to listen about the sustainability programs in Australia National University (ANU is located in Canberra), ETH Zurich (located in Switzerland), Tongji University (located in Shanghai, China), and, of course, the University of Tokyo (UT aka Todai). It was a special workshop with a speaker panel following the short presentations about campus sustainability (what is about, what each university has to offer, what each university priorities, the philosophy behind each university).Thanks to this man who organized the whole conference in addition to organizing this special workshop on campus sustainability.

Here are some quick notes about the universities:
ETH Zurich: Focused on the campus called "Science City," introduced how design (design of buildings, design of areas..etc) makes a difference in bringing together people to create sustainable campus community
Tongji University: Talked about how they can monitor the energy consumption of over 300 campus buildings with up-to-date metering by the hour. They plan to expand this system over multiple (quite a few actually) campuses across China. Administrators just log on to the website and then they can see where energy is being consumed and how much is being consumed.
Australia National University: Talked about taking in sustainability with a holistic view, they also have paid student internships to ensure the turnover of students and student projects are less of an issue
University of Tokyo: the University of Tokyo owns forested area in northern Japan which is estimated to store up to half of Todai's carbon emissions yearly.

Can you imagine? They spent half a year working on installing the system that monitors the energy consumption of over 300 buildings. All analysis, graphs, and data can be collected and viewed online (via special username and password). Speaker Panel. Left to right: ANU, University of Tokyo, ANU, ETH Zurich, Tongji UniversityWhat a coincidence! From left to right: Joana Portugal from Portugal & University of Tokyo, Joanna Young from UC Berkeley, Joanne Dy from University of Tokyo Goodbye Yokohama!

I want to thank Professor Hanaki for that wonderful, enlightening day.