Discover CleanTech, Issue 02, April 2022

Paris the City of Light is turning green

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Discover CleanTech

Contents APRIL 2022 6

COVER FEATURE: Paris, the City of Light, is going green. We explore how the French capital is transforming everything from transport to gastronomy in its quest to become the world’s capital of sustainable tourism.

SPECIAL FEATURES: 18

Could China make it to net zero by 2050? Researchers think it is possible. Cleantech and technology reporter Jason Deign investigates what it would take.

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Meet Mater, the Danish design brand which has developed an innovative patented technology that enables it to produce stylish Scandinavian design classics from fibrous waste upcycled into a composite suitable for press-moulding.

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Despite the ongoing battle to fight climate change, some effects are already reality. Rising temperatures is one of them. Anna Turns investigates sustainable methods to prevent heat stress.

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For four decades, Danish wind giant Vestas has been cutting the world’s carbon emissions. This year, it was named the world’s most sustainable company. We explore the company’s continued quest to improve sustainability measures.

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SPECIAL THEME: Plastic, the Villain of the Century Thanks to environmental activists of all ages, plastic has become the villain of the century, but, some argue, it is vital to too many aspects of modern life to eliminate. We explore some of the nuances in the war on plastic.

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Circular&Co is one of the companies dedicated to circular design, recycling plastics into a range of everyday products, from reusable coffee cups to clocks and garden products.

REGULARS AND COLUMNS: 64 70 74 82 84 93 94 98

Investing in cleantech Cleantech Products of the Month News Book of the Month Cleantech Region of the Month Column – Anders Lorenzen Events Writers of the Month

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Dear Reader,

Discover CleanTech Issue 2, April 2022 Published 04.2022 ISSN 2051-7718 Published by Scan Magazine Ltd. Executive Editor Thomas Winther Creative Director Mads E. Petersen Editor Signe Hansen Copy-Editor Karl Batterbee Graphic Designer Mercedes Moulia

Linnea Dunne Anna Turns Helen Massy-Beresford Lena Hunter Nane Steinhoff Anders Lorenzen Cover Photo Istock Sales & Key Account Manager Vera Winther

For many technologies, the Achilles heel is scale and cost, and the remedy is investment and demand; something which, the report highlights, to a large extent requires new policies of incitement and legislative regulation.

Publisher: SCAN CLIENT PUBLISHING SCAN MAGAZINE LTD. The News Building, 3 London Bridge Street SE1 9SG, London

So while scientists all over the world broadly agree that the time for individual action has passed, now is the time to put your money and your vote behind the changes you want to see. That the technology can, if supported, win the battle is demonstrated in this issue’s uplifting feature on the potential of getting China to net-zero by 2050.

It is possible; if the political will is there, the technology can deliver.

Phone: +44 (0)870 933 0423 Fax: +44 (0)870 933 0421

But despite the urgency of climate action, it is, unfortunately, not the only area that requires our attention. In our big theme on reducing and recycling plastics, we investigate how serious a problem plastic pollution is. Is the answer to move away from plastic production or do we just need to sort and recycle more? Like with so many things in the cleantech sector, the answer is not simply either or.

Email: info@scanclientpublishing.com Contributors Jason Deign Mike Scott

As the attention of the global media is firmly fixed on the war in Ukraine, researchers behind the last instalment of the IPCC report are calling on the world to unite in what will be the greatest battle in the history of humans, the battle against time.

Because while it is clear, the report points out, that the cleantech market has, or is on the cusp of finishing, the solutions we need to enforce to get to net-zero, what is less clear is if we will get there in time. “We are at a crossroads. This is the time for action. We have the tools and know-how required to limit warming and secure a liveable future,” writes the IPCC Chair Dr. Hoesung Lee.

For further information please visit www.discovercleantech.com

One thing that is unfortunately clear, however, is that we can no longer escape some of the consequences of the climate crisis.

The temperature is rising, and the cleantech industry needs to not only prevent, but also mitigate the effects of these changes. In our special feature on heat stress, The Guardian writer Anna Turns looks at how traditional and new methods can be combined to create sustainable solutions.

All in all, despite the troubles of the world, this issue is full of hope and cleantech innovations that allow you to enjoy life while supporting a sustainable transformation. In our cover feature, you can read how Paris is leading the way in its quest to become the world’s sustainable tourism capital. It is spring after all, and what better place to enjoy it than Paris.*

© All rights reserved. Material contained in this publication may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior permission of Scan Group – a trading name of Scan Magazine Ltd.

Signe Hansen Editor

This magazine contains advertorials/promotional articles.

* In our next issue, you will be able to explore the developments in aviation biofuels, allowing you to support sustainable technologies even when travelling.

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Clean technology is complex.

But your story doesn’t need to be.

Use the power of strategic communications to commercialise your technology and scale your business.

From early-stage start-ups to established brands, we help cleantech companies expand globally, raise significant investment and achieve their vision.

BOOK A FREE CONSULTATION Talk with one of our communications experts to discuss the right approach for your business.

Europe’s leading cleantech communications agency. www.lifesizemedia.com

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Cleantech City of the Month: Paris

The City of Light is going green Often referred to as the world’s fashion capital, gastronomic capital or cultural capital, Paris now has big plans to become known as its sustainable tourism capital too. From more efficient and more accessible public transport to restaurants serving locally sourced food, the entire tourist sector – and beyond – is involved in working towards that ambitious green goal.

BY HELEN MASSY-BERESFORD

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Paris wants to become known as the world's sustainable tourism capital. Photo: Yann Audic

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As France works towards its long-term sustainability target of achieving carbon neutrality by 2050, the tourism sector of one of the world’s most visited cities – and the host city of the fast-approaching 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games – has an important and high-profile role to play. In 2019, before the pandemic turned the travel and tourism industry, not to mention the rest of the world, upside down, 29 million people visited the French capital: 13 times the city’s population.

But as environmental awareness grows, tourists in 2022 and beyond expect to be able to travel and discover their destinations in a responsible way. They want to have a positive, rather than a negative, impact on their surroundings, explains Corinne Menegaux, managing director of the French capital’s tourism authority, the Paris Convention and Visitors Bureau.

Station Felicita. Photo: Jelena Stajic

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Cleantech City of the Month: Paris

“Sustainability and responsible travel are becoming a real expectation of visitors.

There is also a wish to create a distance with mass tourism and to discover Paris differently, in alternative neighborhoods or with new activities – and focus on living a real experience rather than just checking the major sites off the list.”

To define its role as sustainable tourism capital, in summer 2021, the city held its first ever Assises du Tourisme Durable, or Sustainable Tourism Conference. The conference brought together more than 150 professionals, institutions, and associations from the public and private sectors to set out concrete proposals on how to promote tourism with a positive impact.

Frederic Hocquard, Deputy Mayor of Paris in charge of tourism and nightlife: “The challenge for Paris as a destination is to develop a resistant and resilient tourism

to face crises. The sector is beginning to know how to adapt and has already detected some benefits, which is really positive and encouraging.”

REDUCING THE ECOLOGICAL IMPRINT OF VISITORS IS A NECESSITY Green tourism can cover a multitude of initiatives and Paris authorities are making advances in many different areas. It is not just about promoting recycling or encouraging cycle tours – even if both have their role to play – sustainable tourism can also include making the city more accessible to visitors with disabilities, promoting nightlife and improving nighttime transport, revamping signage and encouraging links between local residents, businesses and visitors.

The 2021 conference mapped out several recommendations on how to make tourism in the city greener, ranging from the

Paris has seen a cycling boom with many new cycle lanes added in recent years. Photo: Mary Quincy

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The Canal Saint Martin: encouraging tourists to visit lesser-known sites is part of the sustainable tourism drive. Photo: Jacques Lebar

obvious, such as decarbonising transport fleets to the less so: encouraging longer stays for business travellers and finding ways to lure tourists off the beaten track and away from the big ‘must-sees’, such as Notre-Dame cathedral, which before it was seriously damaged by a fire in 2019, attracted 12 million visitors a year.

Paris’ sustainable tourism projects will make a noticeable difference to city life for visitors in the short-term – as well as benefitting Parisians too, Menegaux says.“Tourists will notice a city that is greener, quieter, more bike- and pedestrian-friendly, a city that is welcoming and easy to ex-

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plore in its every part, thanks to a new and more sustainable way to move to and in the city, more space for biking and walking, better signage, and a better promotion of the local art of living.”

In March 2020, when COVID-19 emptied the city’s streets overnight, leaving Paris’ 2,200 historical monuments suddenly silent, far from setting back the tourist board’s plans to improve sustainability, the unprecedented situation provided an opportunity for a clean break with the tourism of the past. “The pandemic did present the opportunity to rethink tourism in Paris,” Menegaux says, although sustainable

tourism was already high up the agenda of the Paris Visitors and Convention Bureau long before that, in particular since the Paris Climate summit in 2015. “The health crisis has accelerated the green transition trend in all levels of the industry,” she says, adding: “Sustainability and the reduction of ecological imprint of visitors is now an absolute necessity both in leisure and in business tourism.”

REDUCING CONGESTION AND POLLUTION Transportation is key to any initiative aimed at making urban spaces greener, and Paris is no exception. In the longer-term, the Seine river is destined to become a major

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transport axis under the city’s plans, with one possibility an electric vaporetto service that would transfer some tourist traffic from the city’s roads to the water – reducing congestion and pollution while also offering visitors a perfect view of many of the city’s most famous landmarks.

In the west of Paris, the ambitious Place de la Concorde/Champs Elysées project, which has been nominated for a Travel + Leisure Global Vision Award, aims to reduce the number of cars on the city’s – possibly the world’s – most famous avenue and replace traffic-clogged roads with greenery, exhibition spaces and outdoor

Photo: Getty Images

Before the pandemic, in 2019, 29 million people visited the French capital – 13 times the city’s population. Photo: Emilie Chaix

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Cleantech City of the Month: Paris

respectful of the local environment, such as walking tours, guided visits through lesser-known neighbourhoods or themed around a specific area such as gastronomy, local skills or history.

Photo: Marc Bertrand

Paris is one of the world’s densest cities, with a surface area of 105km2 (or 762km2 taking into account the inner suburbs), compared to the 1,572km2 of Greater London – so it is important to encourage tourists to broaden their horizons beyond the Eiffel Tower and the Louvre to visit overlooked sites and venture outside the 20 ‘arrondissements’ to discover what Greater Paris has to offer.

dining. Parts of the Place de la Concorde will be converted to pedestrian and bicycle zones and 360 new trees will be planted.

“The goal of this project is to focus on the experience of visitors and offer a huge green promenade area in this area so popular with tourists from all over the world,” Menegaux says. The Paris authorities behind the project also hope that the revamp of the Champs Elysées will lure back jaded Parisians, who make up just five per cent of pedestrians on the avenue, which is famously unloved by locals, according to PCA-Stream, the design bureau of Philippe Chiambaretta, the architect leading the project.

In the short-term, cycling is in focus, in an already bike-friendly city, with more and more cycle lanes being installed and a drive to encourage cycle-focused options for tourists such as bike tours.

The advantage of the city’s density is that walking is already a great way of discovering central Paris, an attribute already highlighted by the Paris mayor’s focus on becoming a “15-minute city” – one in which all needs – shops, schools, library, sports facilities, cafés – should be accessible within a 15-minute walk or bike ride.

A “15-MINUTE CITY” One major project, the RER V – Réseau Express Régional Vélo (Regional Express Cycle Network) will link points in central Paris with destinations outside the city, offering five new safe, efficient and easy cycle lanes from 2024/25 and four more by 2030.

Tour guides are also being encouraged to offer greener alternatives that are more

UNDERGROUND MUSHROOM FARMS When it comes to boosting the dense city’s green space, city authorities have had to get creative, with vegetable gardens crammed into tiny spaces, abandoned underground car parks transformed into mushroom farms and rooftop beehives – on top of the famous Opéra Garnier and Opéra Bastille buildings – just some of

Improving accessibility in public transport is also on the agenda. Photo: Daniel Thierry

Photo: Amélie Dupont

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Breakdancer Yamsonite.

Photo: Fred di Girolamo

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the urban agriculture projects that have been put in place in recent years, aimed at cutting emissions, slowing the decline in biodiversity in the city, getting Parisians closer to nature and creating jobs and social links.

“All the efforts and initiatives to make Paris greener are not only meant for tourists, but also for the residents in Paris and in the Greater Paris area, as the main aim is to improve the quality of life for everyone, with a deep respect for the local ecosystems and inhabitants, local professionals and local products,” Menegaux says, adding: “agriculture is indeed very important, even in urban cities like Paris!”

Paris On Foot … Or On Two Wheels In February 2022, Paris authorities announced plans to put in place a large traffic-limited zone in the central arrondissements of the city by early 2024, giving pedestrians and bicycles priority over cars.

The project covers the first, second, third and fourth arrondissements – taking in the city’s two islands, Notre-Dame cathedral, the Louvre, the Tuileries gardens and the Marais district – as well as parts of the fifth, sixth and seventh arrondissements on the left bank of the Seine, north of the Boulevard Saint-Germain.

Under the plans, pedestrians, cyclists and scooters will have priority, along with public transport while access for cars will be strictly limited – no transit traffic will be allowed, although taxis will be able to drop off passengers, and car journeys for deliveries or appointments in the zone, or for residents will be allowed.

The project would involve major works, particularly to transform the Boulevard Saint-Germain into a two-way street.

Paris authorities say limiting cars in a large part of the city centre will rebalance the city’s streets in favour of pedestrians, reduce the speed and noise of traffic and free up space to install benches, sports equipment or play areas.

If all goes to plan, the traffic-limited zone should be put in place by early 2024, just before Paris hosts the Olympic and Paralympic Games.

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Encouraging more cycling is an important part of the French capital's sustainable tourism strategy. Photo: Sarah Sergent

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URBAN AGRICULTURE In a city synonymous with gastronomy, it’s no surprise that green tourism initiatives go hand in hand with eating well – putting Parisian honey, herbs or vegetables on the menu is a way for Parisian restaurants, shops and markets to highlight the city’s eco-efforts: The Paris authorities have even created a dedicated “Fabriqué à Paris” quality label, which in 2020/21 was applied to 331 food and other products.

In November 2022, the second edition of the ParisLocal event will showcase Parisian skills and talents and promote responsible local consumption of souvenirs, design items, fashion, and, of course food.

“Restaurants play a big part in making the city greener, choosing local products and obtaining eco-labels and certifications, creating a gastronomy with local, sus-

Green wall at rue d’Aboukir.

Photo: Marc Bertrand

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tainable food, using organic farming and reliable traceability, and even creative vegetarian options,” Menegaux says.

Local links between residents, small businesses and tourists are also important and the tourist board’s plans involve organizing more events like ParisLocal to strengthen those links.

The French capital’s tourism professionals have got behind the need to become greener, embracing new initiatives after a traumatic two COVID-dominated years.

“Tourism professionals see sustainable tourism not only as an opportunity but as a necessity as well,” Menegaux says.

grams for professionals to implement new initiatives and to navigate the various different certification schemes. “Green initiatives can sometimes be complex to implement, but we all move forward together, in a collaborative spirit,” Menegaux says.

As the French capital works towards its long-term aim of becoming a sustainable tourism champion, a once-in-a-century chance to show off its progress is fast approaching.

“The 2024 Olympic and Paralympics Games will be a milestone for sustainable tourism,” Menegaux says. “These major events are drivers for infrastructure improvement and modernisation, new openings…”

A COLLABORATIVE SPIRIT The Paris Visitors and Convention bureau is offering concrete help and coaching pro-

Issues such as mobility and accessibility are in the spotlight as part of the prepa-

Cleantech City of the Month: Paris

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INFOGRAPHIC: PARIS TOURISM IN NUMBERS (Source: 2021 Sustainable Tourism Conference white paper)

Paris’ top five tourist sites by visitor numbers

29 million visitors came to Paris in 2019 – 13 times the city’s population

Hotel capacity in 2019 (by numbers of rooms)

• Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris: 12,000,000 (2018) *

38 million visitors came to Greater Paris in 2019 – six times the population of Paris and the four other departments that make up Greater Paris

• Greater London – 159,000

• Basilique du Sacré-Cœur:11,000,000 (2019) • Musée du Louvre: 9,600,000 (2019) • Tour Eiffel: 6,172,000 (2019) • Musée d’Orsay: 3,651,616 (2019) *Notre-Dame figures are for 2018 as it was closed after the fire in april 2019 In 2019, 15 Parisian sites had more than 1 million visitors

(both statistics count all types of accommodation eg hotels, Airbnbs etc) Paris has an area of 105km2 (or 762km2 for Greater Paris) compared to 789km2 for New York and its five boroughs or Greater London at 1,572km2.

• New York – 122,700 • Greater Paris – 122,000 • Dubai – 101,000 • Rome – 51,000 In Greater Paris, hotels have an average of 59 rooms and 65 per cent are independent (not belonging to a chain or group) – this is because of Paris’s long history as a tourist destination.

rations for the games, last held in Paris in 1924. Importantly, investment in new sporting infrastructure for the games will allow Paris to direct visitors to lesser-known areas of the Greater Paris region, with new transport links allowing visitors to discover the changes and investment taking place in the city’s formerly overlooked suburbs.

While Paris officials are taking inspiration for green tourism innovations in other major cities around the world, the French capital also has the ambition of becoming a leader in that field.

Photo: Amélie Dupont

“As one of the most visited tourist destinations in the world, Paris must set an example and become a reference as a capital of sustainable tourism, and we are keen to use all tools and inspirations at our disposal,” Menegaux says.

The Deputy Mayor Frédéric Hocquard agrees, the only way forward is to make Paris, the city that is already number one in so many other aspects, the top destination when it comes to sustainable tourism. “Between now and 2024, within Olympic Games perspective, our objective is to make Paris the first environmentally responsible and sustainable destination, inclusive and accessible to all.”

Marché Montparnasse.

Photo: Studio TTG

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China Technologies

The technologies that could get China to net zero by 2050 China has set a target of net-zero emissions by 2060, a decade after scientists say we need to cut carbon to levels that avoid the worst effects of climate change. But experts believe China could reach net zero ahead of time if it scales up the right mix of technologies.

BY JASON DEIGN

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The 27th Conference of Parties (COP27) climate talks in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, this year will focus attention on national pledges to cut carbon pollution. And one of the countries that will face the greatest scrutiny is China, which is responsible for 30 per cent of global emissions. China has already pledged to cut its net emissions to zero by 2060, which is a decade after the point scientists say it is needed to avert the worst effects of climate change.

But experts say the country, which currently gets most of its energy from coal, could potentially cut almost all fossil fuels from its energy system by 2050, giving China room to increase its climate ambition at COP27 – and changing the outlook for global decarbonisation. The key to speeding up China’s energy transition is simple, according to researchers from the Harvard-China Project, a collaboration between Harvard University, Tsinghua University and Huazhong University of Science and Technology.

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“There are many uncertainties about pathways to mid-century carbon neutrality in China,” said Harvard University last year in a press release announcing a major study into the subject. “But one fundamental aspect is certain: they will require massive expansions of wind and solar power to displace coal- and gas-fired power.”

SCALING UP IS NOT A PROBLEM The problem, said researchers, “is not the cost and feasibility of sufficient renewable generation, but rather the challenges it introduces into the grid because of its variability: the wind doesn’t always blow, and the sun doesn’t always shine.”

Using a high-resolution model to find the most cost-effective way for China’s power system to become carbon neutral by 2050, the experts found a pathway that was not only feasible, but need not necessarily cost more than relying on fossil fuels. Step one is to scale up wind and solar power. This is the easy part: China has vast areas in which to build renewable energy plants and is also the world’s number-one producer of solar panels. In 2020, seven of the top ten wind turbine manufacturers were Chinese companies.

The problem is that increasing wind and solar power on its own will likely make China’s energy problems worse rather than better. Solar power is only available in daytime – and might not be available very much if it is cloudy – and wind energy is inherently unpredictable. This means China could find itself with masses of power available at some points in time and virtually none at others.

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A COMPREHENSIVE STRATEGY Some of this variability can be handled using grid technologies such as battery storage, but for an energy system as huge as China’s, it will be necessary to consider how electricity is used across sectors such as transport and heavy industry. The

modelling done by the Harvard-China Project shows that if China were to rely on conventional grid integration alone – that is, just by increasing the amount of renewable energy and storage on the electricity network – it would cost an extra $27 per tonne of carbon.

China Technologies

Given that China emitted roughly 10 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide in 2019, such a strategy would be hard to do on a financial basis. However, when the Harvard-China Project researchers built a model that included ultra-high-voltage transmission, national grid interconnection, green hydrogen

and slow-charging electric vehicle fleets in the mix, things changed dramatically.

Instead of costing more, getting rid of a tonne of carbon dioxide would actually save $25 compared to carrying on with business as usual, the model showed.

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This comprehensive integration strategy would allow China to get rid of up to 80 per cent of its carbon emissions. And the savings would allow the remaining 20 per cent to be dealt with using costly carbon capture and storage, “and still achieve a carbon-neutral power sector in 2050 at no April 2022

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With its vast unused areas and shallow waters, scaling up solar and wind power in China is not a problem, say experts.

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net cost,” according to the Harvard-China Project.

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hubs are near the coast, so the electricity produced by offshore wind does not have to travel far to get to major load centres.

CHALLENGING BUT FEASIBLE This does not mean it is easy, however.

Getting China to net zero by 2050 “is challenging,” says Michael McElroy, Gilbert Butler professor of environmental studies at Harvard University. “It requires a national plan and a serious attempt to mobilise electricity and distribute it nationally,” he says. But “there would be a return on investment, because wind and solar are the primary sources, and once you pay the capital cost, the wind and sun are free.”

Another bonus that emerged from the modelling is that China might be able to produce green hydrogen, from the electrolysis of water using renewable energy, “at a cost that is competitive with industrial sources on a relatively short timescale,” McElroy says.

This hydrogen could power industrial processes and be used in turbines to create electricity for the grid at times of low solar and wind availability. Plus, it could be exported to Japan, which is keen to develop a hydrogen-based energy system. Japan is looking to source hydrogen from markets as far afield as Australia. “Our paper makes the argument that China is right beside Japan and is the cheapest source [of green hydrogen] we can imagine,” says McElroy.

OFFSHORE WIND IS KEY Another key ingredient in the technology mix would be offshore wind. China already has the world’s largest offshore wind market, with figures from the country’s National Energy Administration suggesting it installed more capacity in 2021 than the rest of the world has in the past half decade.

Offshore wind can continue to boom in China because the country is surrounded by shallow seas where it is easy to install turbines. The technology is a natural fit for the country’s energy needs because most of China’s population, cities and industrial

McElroy says China’s government is likely to have taken note of the Harvard-China Project study and could be poised to adopt its recommendations, with one of the lead Chinese authors being well connected to the country’s administration.

“This is a moving target,” says the professor. “What they have said is that they are going to get to net zero by 2060 or earlier. I don’t think they are wedded to 2060.

This is why we looked at a more challenging opportunity, like 2050.”

A VITAL MISSION Enabling decarbonisation in China is important not just because of the proportion of global emissions that the nation is responsible for, but also because of the scale of manufacturing that goes on in the country. In effect, if China can get to net zero emissions, then it will cut the levels of embodied carbon in millions of products used around the world.

“China’s energy needs and uses are shifting fast as part of a global grand transition, which includes the rise of digital economy, a next industrial revolution and the emergence of ecological civilisation,” says World Energy Council secretary general Angela Wilkinson. “How China builds, maintains, repurposes and decommissions energy systems to meet heat, power, fuel and energy storage needs at home and abroad will reshape the global energy outlook.”

China already has more wind capacity than the United States and sees the technology as “a key part of its drive towards a decarbonised, self-sufficient future, where there will be no space for new coal,” Wilkinson adds. “It appears open to multiple pathways for delivering more sustainable and climate-neutral energy services, recognising that the renewables revolution will need other clean, affordable and reliable energy friends to get to scale.”

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The Danish furniture brand revolutionising circular design Danish design company Mater’s game-changing cleantech invention is set out to revolutionise circular design.

Discover Cleantech design expert, Lena Hunter, investigates how the furniture brand has rethought the design and production of furniture to minimise environmental impact.

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When Henrik Marstrand founded Danish furniture brand Mater in 2006 on the principles of circular production, the term ‘cleantech’ existed only in specialist circles and sustainability was still an emerging trend.

Mater turns old fishing nets into stylish furniture.

Now, after years of research into green production of furniture, lighting and objects, Mater has built partnerships for change with universities, cult-design houses, manufacturing facilities and private businesses that all support the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

“Mater means ‘mother’ in Latin. The name is the daily reminder of our small contribution to preventing the challenges Mother Earth faces. Design influences how we live our lives; it shapes values, culture and society. As a manufacturer, we can rethink dubious practices and create ethical and sustainable design that minimises adverse social and environmental impacts,” says Marstrand AN INDUSTRY-WIDE ISSUE “The overarching problem in the furniture sector is that it’s based on virgin materials,” says marketing director Trine Mark Egeberg. “Timber is a major culprit, but new metals and plastics are also constantly being produced. We’re draining nature’s resources.”

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Disposal is another burden: according to the European Federation of Furniture Manufacturers (UEA), furniture accounted for more than four per cent of all solid municipal waste in the EU in 2020.

The process sees coffee-shell fibres left over from the roasting process, or waste sawdust from furniture production, mixed with a binder of upcycled plastic from the production of insulin pens, or buttons.

Mater attacks the problem from both ends. “Our furniture is made from recycled materials and waste. Plenty of materials have already been produced, so we reuse what we have,” says Mark Egeberg.

“It’s a new type of material – its own category. Just as wood and plastic have their own sub-types, so too does MCM depending on which waste stream it’s based on,” explains Mark Egeberg.

And at the core of their circular-economic approach is a ground-breaking green technology process, dubbed MCM.

“It’s had a very strong reception – particularly amongst architects. The texture is novel – similar to stone or marble, but extremely malleable. MCM opens the door to a new realm of design possibilities.”

BREAKING THE MOULD WITH MATER CIRCULAR MATERIAL Mater Circular Material (MCM) is a patented cleantech production in which fibrous waste is upcycled into a unique composite suitable for press-moulding.

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“We saw huge potential from the start, and MCM is the product of three years of trial and error. This is a completely new technology on the market and we’ve only

scratched the surface of what it can do for us.”

TIMELESS DESIGN ICONS, RETHOUGHT The first of Mater’s MCM products was the Earth Stool, designed by Danish architect Eva Harlou and made from coffee-shells and upcycled plastic pellets. Production was based at the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) in Copenhagen – a forerunning European institution in cleantech.

Since upscaling to more industrial facilities, a slew of new MCM products have followed. The Eternity Sidechair by interior-design studio Space Copenhagen is a simplified nod to the hallowed Arne Jacobsen egg-chair.

Beside innovating in the industrial sphere, Mater is pushing the boundaries of Scandinavian design tradition. When they

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Mater Profile

launched the iconic Conscious Chair by Børge Mogensen & Esben Klint, it was the first time a Børge Mogensen design had been produced in a different material to the original.

A MULTITUDE OF SUSTAINABLE RESOURCES Mater’s repertoire of green materials additionally includes spent grain, energy saving LEDs, upcycled aluminium and FSC-certified wood. Mango wood, saved from burning at the end of the tree’s natural fruiting life, is transformed into the elegant, best-selling Bowl Table.

of CO2 emissions compared to virgin equivalents.

ed in novel solutions to dealing with their waste,” explains Mark Egeberg.

“We’re producing Nanna Ditzel’s 1954 wooden garden range in recycled plastic from fishing nets. We were the first to use fishing nets in furniture four years ago,” says Mark Egeberg.

“For example, we took Carlsberg’s plastic beer kegs and turned them into furnishings based on Ditzel’s designs, which they can use in their offices. It’s a unique way to create a different waste stream for big businesses.”

In fact, the reimagined Ditzels are part of Mater’s largest and most impactful circular-economic project: collecting the waste of large businesses and returning it as upcycled furniture.

But the story doesn’t end there: furnishings made from MCM can be recast again and again. “If, in ten years, they no longer need chairs, but they need a table, we can reshape them into something new.”

LARGE-SCALE CIRCULAR ECONOMY Mater’s projects support both land and sea. A single Ocean Chair seat uses 960g of plastic waste, saving up to 82 per cent 28 |

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Mater’s major waste-recycling partners include Carlsberg, Novo Nordisk and BKI Coffee. “Many businesses are interest-

“In the world we live in, we must think of circularity as key when inventing new materials.” - Henrik Marstrand, Founder

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“WE’LL ALWAYS BE FIRST MOVERS” Mater has transformed in the past ten years. “We’ve gone from being a pure design company to being innovators in clean technology and material development,” says Mark Egeberg.

Now, Mater is focused on scaling their sustainable profile – and there are a multitude of avenues for growth. “We’re looking into recycling textiles from the fashion industry. We’ve just launched our mango-wood Bowl Table in MCM, so we’re always striving to make our own production even more sustainable,” says Mark Egeberg.

“That’s the journey we’re on – to always be first movers in developing new technology and production methods.”

“Design influences how we live our lives; it shapes values, culture and society,” says the founder of Mater, Henrik Marstrand.

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Plastic, the Villain of the Century

Plastics – reduce, reuse or recycle?

When Boris Johnson told a group of children that recycling plastics doesn’t work, it was dubbed unhelpful and brushed off by many as a soundbite typical of the British Prime Minister. But with studies repeatedly showing that large numbers of Britons fear that their recycling is going to landfill, the question is – was he speaking the truth or does plastics just have a “really bad PR problem”?

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PET bottles are among the products easily recycled. In more than 40 countries globally, the bottles are part of highly efficient container deposit schemes, which see consumers pay a deposit for containers which are then deposited and reused through supermarkets.

BY LINNEA DUNNE

It is perhaps no wonder that consumers are concerned, with photos circulating widely of piles of plastic rubbish being burnt or floating out to sea. And with more than 300 tonnes of plastic being produced every year, around half of it for single use, the issue of waste management has taken on mammoth proportions.

“There’s an ongoing trope about the waste management industry that recycling doesn’t happen. People tend to have a negative perception of it,” says Owen George, Divisional Commercial & Resource Strategy Manager at Grundon Waste Management in Oxfordshire, UK. “Boris saying what he said really just

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feeds that underlying perception. What he’s likely trying to get across is that the focus should be on reusing and reducing materials, but the reality is that the UK and global recycling market is really strong.

There’s huge demand for recycled plastic materials, so those comments really undermine a buoyant global economy.”

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Plastics recycling is a growing industry, but to increase recycling rates through new technologies, the industry needs more support in the form of investment and legislative incentives for producers to use greater shares of recycled plastics.

Lucy Danger, Chief Executive of EMERGE Recycling in Manchester, agrees that, taken out of context, the PM’s comments seem inflammatory. “But when you look at the bigger picture, there’s a waste hierarchy – and it’s meant to start with reduction. Reduce, reuse – and then recycle,” she says.

“PLASTICS HAS A MASSIVE PR PROBLEM” You could easily get stuck in black-andwhite debates between plastic enthusiasts and its greatest critics, but the crux, it seems, is in the nuance. “Plastic is a by-product of the oil industry, and we’re very lucky to have this incredible material that can be applied to so many different uses, but it’s a finite resource. We’re not going to have it forever. If we use it in a

careless way, we’ll run out more quickly.

And we’re polluting our oceans with – it’s a bit horrifying, really,” Danger reflects.

With somewhere between 60 and 80 per cent of the litter found in the oceans being plastic, there is no doubt she is right.

Moreover, plastic bags covering plots of land contribute to increased ammonium levels, and when left across marshlands, they lead to lower oxygen levels and fewer organisms. During the 2017 drought in Kenya, 40 per cent of the cattle that died had ingested plastic bags. Plastic may have its strengths, but its devastating impact on our planet cannot be denied.

At the same time, warns George, in the search for better, greener alternatives, we

“By 2050, if we don’t take radical action, there’ll be more plastic in the ocean than fish...”

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risk losing sight of the strengths of the existing systems. “Plastics has a massive PR problem,” he says. “Everyone wants to stop using it, but we need to be aware of the unintended consequences of stopping using it. There’s been a huge move to using bioplastics, for instance, which looks great in your corporate report, but there’s only one facility in the UK that can handle those materials, and unless it’s perfectly clean, it can’t be recycled.”

THE CHALLENGES OF THE RECYCLING INDUSTRY Recycling cynics often point out that if it costs more to recycle something than it does to dispose of it as rubbish, then we are in big trouble. But George’s point is exactly that: that existing recycling infrastructure is doing work that makes a lot of financial sense. “HDPE is worth around £400 a tonne at the moment, and there’s huge global demand. Then you see press statements from supermarkets announc-

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ing that they’re stopping using normal plastic bottles in favour of Tetra Pak, but they’re not widely recycled.”

Corporate sustainability reports are all well and good, then, but at the end of the day, responsibility is a huge issue. For as long as there was huge demand from China throughout the ‘90s and ‘00s, the drive across Europe to increase recycling rates was unproblematic enough, as everything would be shipped off. But as China shut the door on rubbish from the West, the issue started moving closer to home, and illegal dumping has been a growing problem.

In part as a result of the Chinese hunger for rubbish from the West, western countries were never incentivised to sort things properly. The sorting was done by hand once it arrived, often by poor people. What happens now, if you ask environmental activists and recycling critics, is that networks of brokers and agents mean that nobody knows where the waste is ending up. Recycling is collected and

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Reducing and Recycling Plastic Waste

Keeping plastics out of water bodies and natural environments is one of the main motivations behind new legislations and technologies.

sent out to waste contractors, and people make money along the way – but no one can be sure what ends up being dumped.

SO WHAT HAPPENS NOW? “We don’t have sufficient infrastructure to address all plastic waste streams. We have to stop the over-production of waste – but we also have to think about advanced sorting streams to improve the infrastructure,” says Piotr Barczak, Senior Policy Officer of Circular Economy and Waste at the European Environmental Bureau, adding that when it comes to the shipment of waste, it’s a big problem that is, thankfully, being addressed through a number of initiatives.

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The revised Waste Shipment Regulation, he explains, will ban the shipment of residual waste, while grades of plastic that can be shipped will need to be traced. “They’ll have to know what’s happened to the waste later. They can’t just send it off and wash their hands of it.”

Similarly, the new UN treaty on plastic pollution is cause for hope, thinks Barczak.

“We have to get it ratified, and then it needs to be imposed – that’s another battle,” he says. “But at least there’ll be a tool to take countries to court if they’re not delivering on their promises. It won’t happen quickly, but it’s very important.”

And despite the challenges, we need to recycle more, Barczak stresses: “So far, an average of around nine per cent of plastic is recycled, or around 40 per cent in some contexts – but even then, that’s 60 per cent that’s not recycled. Recycling is over-advertised, and it’s not the solution, but it’s much better than disposal or incineration.”

WHY REDUCING PLASTIC WASTE IS SO HARD Reduction, however, is crucial, Barczak says, and goes on to talk about the devastating effects of plastic pollution: the impact on health for people across the globe,

Plastic, the Villain of the Century

be really discerning about what you buy,” admits Danger, listing items that make it incredibly tricky to avoid plastic: toothpaste, deodorant, pens. “And dishwasher tablets – you either buy the ones with film that’s dissolvable, and the plastic goes into the water stream, or you get the ones with wrappers you take off and bin. What’s better?”

The recycling of plastic can be hugely effective, she stresses, especially when it comes to big volumes of bottles made of PET, for instance. It’s the great amount of different types of plastics in circulation and the subsequent need for sorting that becomes a barrier. “It goes back to source separation. Successful recycling relies on clean material, but once you start mixing in other things, it messes with the reprocessing of the plastic, and the resulting material can’t be applied to a whole lot of products in the end. Worst case, it causes such problems that the entire batch is thrown away.”

NEW TECHNOLOGIES, NEW HOPE New technologies offer up some hope, however. AI and real-time imaging are proving helpful in plastic recycling plants, helping with sorting in order to create 100 per cent clean food grade plastic, explains

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George, and the past decade has seen huge investment going into chemical recycling. “When industry leaders across the world get together, it’s going to mean more investment into recycling infrastructure, as well as the right pressures placed on manufacturers in terms of the materials they use,” he says, welcoming the new plastic pollution treaty, as well as initiatives such as the UK Resources and Waste Strategy which, among other things, will bring about a plastic packaging tax on any piece of packaging imported to or manufactured in the UK with less than 30 per cent recycled materials. “This will mean an increased demand for recycled materials, which will encourage more investment into new plants and the sector as a whole,” says George.

In addition, the reformed Packaging Producer Responsibility regulations will make all producers responsible for the cost of the disposing of all packaging they bring to market, all the way through to creation of a new raw material, with the rates being favourable for more widely recyclable plastic. “With the right type of packaging, we’ve got a really strong recycling infrastructure already, which will be able to expand even further,” says George.

the pollution of the oceans. “By 2050, if we don’t take radical action, there’ll be more plastic in the ocean than fish. Especially micro plastics, which enter the rivers and the oceans. There are no borders. That’s why this treaty is so important: to reduce plastic consumption when it’s not necessary. And it’s not; we all agree it’s a useful material, among other things in the medical field, but we really overuse it. We’ve been brainwashed into thinking that plastic is necessary to reduce food waste, but food doesn’t need to be wrapped in plastic.”

It’s a minefield that can be tricky for consumers to navigate, though. “You have to

Plastic waste must be reduced, but as a consumer, avoiding plastics can seem impossible.

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Can 70 per cent of plastics be recycled in 2025?

RECycling of Used Plastics Limited (RECOUP), a charity and leading authority on plastics recycling, investigates what it will take to make the UK’s 2025 goal of 70 per cent of plastics to be recycled.

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The coming years are critical if the 2025 goal of 70 per cent of plastics to be recycled are to be realised. It will take time to achieve the desired circularity at scale within the plastic material chains. A key challenge facing the UK is the infrastructure and associated capacities to sort and recycle plastics without relying heavily on export markets.

The need for the UK to have infrastructure to handle its own waste, in terms of both capacity and achieving the required quality, is becoming increasingly important. In recent years, the UK has seen around 60 per cent of its plastic packaging waste exported for recycling. However, with policy and legislative changes in the UK, EU and individual countries (including the historically larger export markets of China and Turkey), it is now more important than ever that sufficient capacity is available for the UK to manage its own volumes of waste.

In the last two years in particular, a multitude of policy and legislative changes have been proposed and consulted on through the UK Government and devolved administrations. Whilst each of these addresses specific environmental and recycling aims, with different timescales and dynamics, there is a growing sense of importance that they work together and settle to help direct the future capability of the UK to manage our waste.

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Primary discussion points for the UK include focus on: • HMRC’s UK Plastic Packaging Tax; requiring plastic packaging to contain 30 per cent recycled content or be subject to a £200 per tonne tax.

• Defra’s proposed reform of the UK’s Packaging Producer Responsibility System, otherwise known as Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR).

• Defra’s consultation on Consistency in Household and Business Recycling in England.

• Consultations on the use of Single-Use Plastic Packaging in England (Defra), Scotland (Scottish Government), Wales (Welsh Government), and Northern Ireland (DAERA).

• Defra’s consultation on Deposit Return Schemes in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland.

• Scottish Government’s consultation on a Deposit Return Scheme in Scotland.

• Competition and Markets Authority guidance on Environmental Claims on Goods & Services.

RECOUP has responded to each of these consultations, amongst others, and will continue to do so as they progress.

Furthermore, policy and regulation are being consulted on by both the European Commission and the Basel Convention.

These are particularly relevant as the UK is now classed as an Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) country by the European Union.

Changes include: • Revisions being made to the European Waste Shipment Regulations impact the quality and contamination thresholds for material that is imported and exported from and to European Union Member States and the European Economic Area (EEA).

• European regulations around the use of recycled plastics in food-contact materials impact what products manufactured in the UK can be sold in the EU • Revisions to the Basel Convention on the export of plastic waste, particularly relating to Green List waste and exports to non-OECD countries.

In addition to policy changes and consultations taking place, there are several areas of plastics-focused research being examined across the UK. These include: • The collection and recycling of plastic film in various environments, including post-consumer flexible packaging and retailer front-of-store collections. This work is taking place ahead of consistent collection legislation coming into force which will mandate the collection of plastic film via kerbside schemes.

Reducing and Recycling Plastic Waste

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Producer Responsibility Systems, holding corporations responsible for the collection and recycling of specified volumes of their plastic products, must be fair and deliver change at speed.

• Marine and ocean bound plastics, in terms of both the data and prevalence of plastics in waterways around the UK and further afield, as well as the claims made in relation to recycled plastics from marine environments.

• Research into compostable and biodegradable packaging and its place in the UK collection structure.

• Collection and recycling of plastics from Household Waste Recycling Centres (HWRCs).

• Consumption, disposal, and recycling of packaging away from home • Use of agricultural plastics and recycling There is a lot of work to be done. It is necessary not only to overcome the technological and development challenges, but it is also key to remain focused on the envi-

ronmental impact of all solutions proposed.

Clearly it cannot be right to allow plastics to leak into the environment or for the resource to be lost, but neither is it acceptable to remove the opportunity to use plastics where it is often the most cost effective and carbon efficient material available.

Improved recycling, refill, re-use and reduction programmes will all have a part to play as the world works towards net zero and a sustainable future. There are challenges that must be met head on as we move forward. There is an urgent need to identify and enforce against illegal activities in the resources sector both in the UK and internationally.

Producer responsibility systems across all sectors must be fair, ambitious and deliver

change at speed. Everyone has a responsibility to question the details, look for the facts, and ensure environmental decisions are based on sound science, evidence and data. The potential for further infrastructure growth, innovation and job creation across all parts of the plastic resources and recycling chain remains, and the evolution has already begun. There is a genuine confidence that the whole plastics resource and recycling industry is stepping up to the challenge of a plastic circular economy.

As one of the most respected advisors on plastics recycling, RECOUP’s expertise continues to be based on evidence, research and facts with integrity. It provides a unique, independent and unbiased view of the value change to allow organisations to understand what is required to move forward collectively. Through leadership, policy, corporate governance and innovation we can ensure we are heading in the right direction to hit the 2025 targets.

RECycling of Used Plastics Limited (RECOUP) is a charity and leading authority providing expertise and guidance across the plastics recycling value chain. RECOUP is committed to securing sustainable, circular and practical solutions for plastic resources both in the UK and world-wide.

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Microplastics – it’s not just about the environment Microplastics are everywhere – in our waters, in our food and, new research shows, even in our blood.

The good news is, however, that if we stop polluting our environment with plastic waste, improvements could be seen within a lifetime.

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It is rare to find something that everyone can agree on, but that microplastics are bad is one such rarity. The result of fragmented larger plastic items and products such as plastic microbeads, microplastics have infiltrated every part of our environment. Recently, a study by scientists at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam in the Netherlands shocked the world by proving that even the blood from 17 out of 22 anonymous blood donors contained different kinds of plastic particles.

This comes as no great surprise to Win Cowger, an environmental scientist at the Moore Institute for Plastic Pollution Research, a non-profit organisation in California. Specialising in the transport and fate of trash in watersheds and river flow, Cowger has made it his cause to make data on microplastics more accessible through online hubs for plastic pollution research. “It is essential for us to understand the problem and be informed about the risk; if there is no data accessible, I don’t know if I am being exposed to mi38 |

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Due to decades of unmitigated plastic pollution, microplastics are, today, everywhere – in our waters, in our food and even in our blood.Photo: Istock

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Plastic, the Villain of the Century

Environmental scientist Win Cowger.

croplastics,” he stresses. “It is important to make sure that people are realising that they’re being exposed to this stuff too. Of course, we all think the fish in the ocean are important, we want to see the sea turtles thrive, but it is important to also be aware that we are not off the hook ourselves – when we are polluting the environment, we are polluting ourselves.”

Giovanna Laudisio, a researcher from the University of Bath in the UK and the CEO and co-founder of Naturbeads, agrees; microplastics are everywhere, also in

products we would never think of as containing plastic. Since starting Naturbeads, which has developed a biodegradable alternative to plastic microbeads, she has been contacted by manufacturers from all sectors. “Cosmetics are just a small part of the problem, plastic microbeads are used in everything – paint, coatings and products in oil and gas. We have been contacted by companies making all kinds of consumer products – leather bags may have a protective coating containing microbeads, even pillows can have microplastic in them.”

Photo: Istock

ASSESSING THE SIZE OF THE PROBLEM As part of the Moore Institute for Plastic Pollution Research, Cowger is working in a number of collaborations to assess microplastics exposure in water bodies. One of the projects he is excited about is the development of sensors to track the exposure in oceans and rivers. “There are a lot of people working in this space; it’s very challenging,” he explains. “You have to float water through a device and then you have 40 |

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100,000 of particles and have to identify and distinguish if it is plastic or not.” The sensors would allow researchers to save much time in the collection and analysis of samples and thus make it easier to scale up data collection to assess the scale of the problem. Furthermore, analysis can reveal the prevalence of different kinds of plastic and thus the risks posed to the health of humans and their environment.

“Some types of plastic are certainly more harmful than others; the polymers that plastic is made of are really diverse,” explains Cowger. “Some are made of things that are known to be toxic, such as polystyrene. Styrene is known to be toxic; they turn it into polystyrene and the idea is that it is then not toxic. But findings are contradicting this, and whenever you have fluorinated compounds, that is toxic; little molecular elements can break off when

drinking hot drinks, for instance. It is bad for you, and the environment too.”

THE GOOD NEWS While Cowger is enthusiastic about the research done in his field, when it comes to methods to remove microplastic from water bodies, he is less optimistic. “Once it is in water bodies, as far as I know, there are no methods developed to remove it.

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going to work with microplastics; they will just go straight around it,” he says. “Mostly, it will be in the sediment of the ocean and to clean that up you would have to extract the plastic, you would need to dredge the ocean! Obviously, that would be more harmful than the microplastics.”

There is, however, some good news. Because while plastic can last for centuries in perfect conditions, many natural environments will eventually break it down. “Over time, if we weren’t actively polluting at a high rate, the ocean would have the capacity to break down particles that are already there,” says Cowger. If we stopped tomorrow, when would we see a change?

I don’t know for sure, but in a lifetime. If we

Plastic, the Villain of the Century

stop polluting today, we would see some benefits in a single lifetime, just because the ocean is capable of degrading plastics and turning it into a state where it’s not harmful.”

Moreover, some types of plastic are much faster to degrade than others. PHA plastic, plastic made from polyhydroxyalkanoates, a naturally produced biopolymer, for instance, is likely to degrade in less than two years. “Even though it breaks into microplastics it is going to degrade really fast – the idea is that if we can get things to degrade within a year or two, then that is not of so much concern in terms of microplastics that accumulate in the environment,” explains Cowger.

However, there are still market obstacles to PHA plastic being used at a large scale; price and compatibility with existing production tools are among them.

REPLACING THE SOURCES OF MICROPLASTIC One of the best-known types of microplastics is perhaps the plastic microbeads used in many cosmetic products and from there washed straight out into our water bodies. While many nations have, by now, banned, or partially banned, the use of the beads and other primary microplastics (plastics that start up as microparticles), others, including the EU are still to enact legislation, and thousands of tonnes of microbeads are thus still entering the water

With properties matching those of plastic beads, Naturbeads, a natural and biodegradable microbead, can help solve the issue of microplastics pollution.

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Naturbeads is an award-winning spin-off company from the University of Bath.

bodies. “Many people ask – why not just remove the plastic beads from products, but these plastic microbeads form a function,” explains Laudisio of Naturbeads. “If you remove it, you have to replace it with something else and the problem is what to replace it with. It is easier with body scrubs where there are many products like crushed nuts or seeds that can replace it, but these are not spherical, and for things such as wrinkle cream or sunscreens, you cannot use them. You need something that provides a smooth texture, something perfectly spherical of very small dimensions, very narrow particle size.”

Made in biodegradable cellulose, Naturbeads is one such product. While the product is very stable in water, it will, when left in the environment where microorganisms will attack it, biodegrade in 28 days.

Now, the challenge remains for the university spin-off to scale up production to match the demand from the market. The company is hoping to secure investments that will allow them to build a demonstration plant that will bring production to 2025 tonnes per year by 2023.

Microplastics are solid plastic particles (typically smaller than 5mm) composed of mixtures of polymers and functional additives. They may also contain residual impurities.

Microplastics can be unintentionally formed when larger pieces of plastic, like car tyres or synthetic textiles, wear and tear. But they are also deliberately manufactured and added to products for specific purposes, such as exfoliating beads in facial or body scrubs. [source, ECHA European Chemical Agency].

To explore more of the work of the interviewees of this feature, visit: www.naturbeads.com www.openspecy.org

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Circular&Co’s long-lasting recycled cups are designed to last for up to ten years.

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Circular&Co’s UK cups are produced locally in Cornwall.

Helping to create a more circular economy UK company Circular&Co is showing how business success can be perfectly compatible with creating a more sustainable society.

Millions flock to Cornwall in southwest England every year, drawn by pristine beaches and rugged landscape. The county’s deep association with nature makes it an ideal location for a small UK company that is working to create a more sustainable future. Circular&Co, based in the scenic resort town of Perranporth, has as its mission “to inspire and educate everyone about circular design and why we must all welcome circularity into our everyday lives”.

The company uses waste materials to create reusable cups and bottles, plus plant pots, house signs, tide clocks and ba-

rometers, as well as other homeware and garden products. On top of selling these consumer products from its website, the company works with businesses to provide branded goods and returnable cup schemes. Each Circular&Co cup is designed to last up to ten years and can be recycled at the end of its life.

Circular&Co is the brainchild of Dan Dicker, a product design expert who had previously worked at Dyson, the innovative consumer goods manufacturer best known for upending the vacuum cleaner market in the 1990s. Dicker founded a business called AShortWalk in a garden shed in 2003, after

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becoming disillusioned with the amount of waste created by manufacturing and consumption at the time. AShortWalk rebranded as Circular&Co in 2020.

ENAMOURED OF CIRCULAR DESIGN “We all genuinely believe that circular design solves three of the huge issues we are facing,” says Ashleigh Smith, Circular&Co’s product designer. “It solves over-consumption; it solves carbon emissions, and it solves pollution and waste.”

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Smith. “The circular economy is one that stands the test of time from an economics perspective,” she says.

That does not mean that switching to a circular economy approach is all plain sailing.

A case in point: each Circular&Co cup contains up to 40 per cent recycled content, but that amount is not due to some technical limitation. Instead, it is down to food safety standards that force certain parts of the cup that come into contact with the drink being made from virgin materials.

WORKING TO CHANGE THE SYSTEM Dicker is working with industry to tackle this problem, and it is hoped that by the end of 2022 they, together with Nextloop (a partnership of 50 other global companies), will have developed a 100 per cent recycled plastic that is food safe. Another issue is that it is not enough to make sure circular economy products can be recycled.

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recent years, from ten kilogrammes per person per year in 2009 to almost 15 kilogrammes in 2019, the amount of waste produced has risen to an even greater extent. Partly, this is because of deficiencies in waste collection, separation and processing, and partly it is because it does not make financial sense to recycle some types of plastic.

Hence, a key design attribute for Circular&Co is that its products should be recyclable under real-life conditions, and not just in theory. Despite these challenges, Circular&Co is going from strength to strength thanks to growing corporate and consumer awareness of the value of circular design.

BUSINESSES WANT TO CHANGE Up to around 80 per cent of the company’s revenues are from businesses that want to contribute to a cleaner, greener planet. Sustainable thinking “is endemic in business now, it’s not the additional luxury that it once was,” says Smith.

Plastic, the Villain of the Century

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Each Circular&Co cup has up to 40 per cent material from single-use plastic cups, and the plan is to get to 100 per cent.

A Circular&Co deposit return scheme is aiming to reduce the use of single-use plastic in cafes and other hospitality outlets.

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Up to 80 per cent of Circular&Co’s revenues come from businesses keen to address sustainability.

Although greenwashing still exists, in the business-to-business world “you’re speaking a more friendly language,” she says. “People do understand the need for this. They are all actively looking at how they can build circularity into their business models.”

It is these businesses that Circular&Co is targeting with an innovative deposit return scheme. The idea is that cafes, coffee shops and others can sell their drinks in a branded returnable Circular&Co cup rather than single-use plastic cups. The retailer charges a deposit with each sale and that money gets returned if the customer brings the cup back. Alternatively, the customer can keep the long-lasting Circular&Co cup for their own use. Importantly, the cup will be fully circular, so made from waste material, designed to last and then fully recyclable.

PULLING THE PLUG ON SINGLE-USE PLASTIC The cups designed for the deposit return scheme are easy to stack and can withstand more than 500 commercial wash cycles, equal to around five years of use.

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Co product line because “the vast bulk of our business is in those cups and they have the potential to make a big difference because single-use plastic is such a big problem,” Smith says.

Circular&Co gets raw material – essentially, processed single-use cup plastic – from a supplier in Wales. The cups themselves are manufactured by Polymermedics of St Austell in Cornwall.

“It allows big campuses, like universities, to pull the plug on single-use stuff. It fits into this approach to looking at systems in the world that we live in, and how we can make them better.”

Other products, such as bottles, are initially made in China, then once the product has a proven market, they look to bring production closer to come. The company carefully weighs up such choices on environmental grounds and collaborates with the University of Exeter on life-cycle analyses of its products. You have to judge a product’s environmental impact not just across its own lifecycle, but its total lifecycle within your range.

Drawing on his experience at Dyson, Dicker is careful to make sure Circular&Co’s products look great as well as being functional.

This immediately changes the nature of the product, says Smith. “A £10 note is plastic, but you would never throw that away” she says. “By the switch to a circular economy, you’re putting value on waste.”

SERVING A GLOBAL CUSTOMER BASE

“We’re actively making decisions not necessarily because it’s better for the company but because it’s the right thing to do,” Smith says.

This idea has helped pull in customers from all over the world, allowing Circular&Co to grow from a one-man band to a busy enterprise with 18 members of staff. The company has also developed various partnerships to serve its growing customer base. For its cups, for example,

The best part of all is that Circular&Co is showing how business objectives need not clash with sustainability. “We’re not tree huggers,” says Smith. “We have a really beautiful brand that we are all really proud to be a part of.”

Reducing and Recycling Plastic Waste

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Heat Stress

Heat Stress

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Keeping cool As the world is heating up and most modern cooling solutions increase energy usage, Anna Turns investigates alternative methods to combat heat stress.

BY ANNA TURNS

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Extreme heat has a huge impact on health and wellbeing. Heat stress can result in chronic fatigue and sleep deprivation and loss of learning capacity; food spoils more easily, it is of serious concern for outdoor workers in the construction sector and can threaten wildlife too. On top of this, due to drastic reduction in productivity by the workforce, it has an economic impact.

Worryingly, by 2050, ‘record-shattering’ heat waves could become two to seven times more frequent than in the past 30 years, according to a study published in the journal Nature Climate Change in July 2021. Hoping to win the battle with time, scientists and entrepreneurs around the

world are thus hard at work to tackle the heat challenges with tailor-made solutions.

Dr Debbie Bartlett studies heat stress at the University of Greenwich, London. She explains that heat stress is actually less about air temperature and more about a standard measure of heat stress known as physiological equivalent temperature, or PET. “If you experience moderately hot weather with high humidity, heat stress will be worse than if you have the same temperature with low humidity – our measures of PET use small mobile weather stations to take lots of factors into account, such as wind speed, sunlight and humidity,”

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perience higher air temperatures than the surrounding countryside, especially at night. Synthetic surfaces such as tarmac roads or concrete buildings retain and reemit heat more than natural vegetation, plus human activities such as transport, power generation and air conditioners all add to the problem. Air flow is reduced in urban environments with narrow streets and tall buildings, so keeping heat away from the street level and from people living there is crucial. That might involve encouraging town planners to incorporate green roofs or painting rooftops bright white to reflect radiation away.

The goal is to develop a toolkit that allows town planners, developers and local authorities to prioritise and decide which interventions would be most suitable for a specific situation. Putting solutions in place needs funding, however, and heat stress is not as acute or tangible as flood risk or storm damage, so it has been somewhat overlooked.

INCLUSIVE DESIGN Debbie Bartlett [left] with mobile weather station.

says Bartlett who assesses the cooling effects of various interventions in urban environments.

INNOVATIVE INFRASTRUCTURE As part of the European-wide Cool Towns Project being piloted in places such as Margate in Kent, Breda in the Netherlands and Merelbeke in Belgium, Bartlett and her team are taking a practical approach. The team is producing heat maps that show which parts of an urban environment are most likely to suffer from heat stress, then integrating those with vulnerability mapping that indicates the location of people most likely to suffer from heat stress.

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drought protection, in addition to improving the ‘thermal comfort’ of the people living and working there. “By planting a tree in a public square to produce shade, you are modifying the microclimate and increasing thermal comfort of people able to get under the tree,” explains Bartlett.

At a larger scale, scientists take into account the urban heat island effect, the phenomenon whereby cities tend to ex-

Severe impacts of heat stress are already being felt and will only be exacerbated by the climate crisis. Expensive air conditioning is not a sustainable answer to indoor heat stress because it drives up energy usage which in turn makes the problem worse and makes people even hotter. Climate charity Ashden’s Fair Cooling Fund is helping to scale up cooling solutions that are accessible or affordable for people living in lower income communities in countries such as India and Egypt.

The success of Indian social enterprise cBalance hinges on participation from the

PET bottle installation.

Photo: Mangal Shinde

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The Cool Towns Project assesses measures such as textile canopies in urban areas. Photo: SIOEN INDUSTRIES

Large shaded areas in public spaces can help mitigate heat stress.

Photo: SIOEN INDUSTRIES

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community. With support from Ashden, student architects and engineers have been leading workshops in poorly ventilated, congested slums to create low-cost passive design solutions that use zero or almost no energy to reduce the amount of heat coming in from the tin rooftops.

“Even if the air temperature is 32°C, your roof can be 50°C,” explains Vivek Gilani, managing director of cBalance, who believes that collaboration is key: “It’s very important to develop solutions with communities rather than imposing solutions upon them.”

In the cities of Pune and Bangalore, cBalance works closely with women in low-income communities to design rooftop gardens or install roof coverings made of water-filled recycled plastic bottles, then measure the impact. According to Gilani, huge challenges remain, such as the lack of basic household-level data about the lives of communities most affected by heat stress, and the state of their homes. In the future, cBalance hopes that governments and authorities will adopt proven solutions to bring benefits to more homes, and Gilani is encouraging universities and colleges to embed sustainable and affordable cooling solutions in their curricula.

MATERIALS MATTER In Egypt, green architecture firm ECOnsult works with policymakers to build affordable, energy-efficient and climate-resilient homes to tackle the issue of indoor heat stress. Led by founder and architect Sarah El Battouty, ECOnsult has created a set of standards that individual building projects must reach, plus green guidelines that will be used nationally as part of Hayat Karima, a £24b Egyptian government project to transform more than 4,000 of the country’s rural settlements.

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things at a household level. To really listen to people, to understand their needs.

When people think at a smaller scale, then policy shifts happen.” This involves engaging deeply with diverse voices from within the communities, prioritising the issues that communities most want to see tackled, while offering solutions tailored to the local environment. El Battouty says: “Our ability to speak in different ‘languages’ to different audiences is a key quality of ECOnsult, and something that helps us bring people and organisations together around a common goal.”

Now, as global temperatures continue to rise, so too will the danger facing marginalised communities, in Egypt, India and closer to home in the UK. “Our bodies are not capable of coping with extreme heat for long amounts of time,” El Battouty says. She is trying to disrupt the idea that green buildings are expensive and that they require big cities. She goes on to say: “If you get out of cities in Egypt you find climate-resilient success models everywhere around you – we need to tap into the climate resilience of indigenous communities and take inspiration from what they’ve been doing – that includes mud brick houses with wooden ceilings that stay cool in summer and warm in winter.”

That choice of materials is very important, as are the use of shading, vegetation and building orientation to keep temperatures down. With foresight and long-term investment, our homes, workplaces and urban infrastructure can be transformed to minimise the effects of heat stress in an equitable way…if we act now.

For more information on this subject, you can visit: www.econsultarch.com www.ashden.org cooltowns.eu

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Photo: dreamstime.com

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Vestas

Vestas – a cleantech veteran still at the top of its game Named the most sustainable corporation in the world in 2022, the Danish wind turbine veteran, Vestas Wind Systems, is still at the top of its game. Mike Scott looks into the success of the company which has prevented more than 1.7 billion tonnes of carbon emissions over the past four decades.

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Initiated by a 22-year-old Danish blacksmith in 1898, Vestas began producing wind turbines in the 1970s.

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Vestas Wind Systems, the Danish wind turbine manufacturer, has had a great start to 2022. In January, it was named the world’s most sustainable corporation by Canadian magazine Corporate Knights, topping the publication’s prestigious G100 ranking. And then in March, it was found to be the world’s leading installer of turbines by two separate researchers, Bloomberg New Energy Finance and GlobalData.

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Amit Sharma, practice head of power at GlobalData, which said the company took almost 19 per cent of the market in 2021, praised the company’s strong product portfolio and added that “Vestas is diversifying its geographic footprint in offshore wind with new installations across the world, as well as significant growth in Europe and new markets in onshore wind.”

SUSTAINABILITY IN EVERYTHING WE DO

According to BNEF, Vestas installed 15.2GW of capacity in 2021, 3.2GW more than its nearest competitor, China’s Goldwind. In part, the company is riding a global trend for more renewable energy as the climate crisis drives a transition in the world’s energy systems that will continue for many years to come. Isabelle Edwards, senior analyst at BloombergNEF said that “as governments worldwide set net-zero ambitions targeting wind build several multiples higher than today, the wind industry has proved it can deliver sustained growth.”

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For Vestas, the two accolades – on business and sustainability performance – are closely linked. “We have mobilised our entire organisation around several key sustainability activities,” said CEO Henrik Andersen. The G100 award “is a testament to both our existing achievements, and our ongoing progress in ensuring sustainability in everything we do.”

“Through our solutions, Vestas supports the global energy system with avoiding millions of tonnes of carbon emissions

every year. Vestas has successfully helped our partners avoid more than 1.7 billion tonnes of carbon emissions over the past four decades,” he added.

“We are rapidly moving towards a future where leading sustainability performers

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like Vestas will drive more viable returns than their global corporate peers. This will form a strong foundation towards achieving a carbon-neutral economy in line with global climate goals”, said Toby Heaps, CEO of Corporate Knights.

Lisa Ekstrand, Vesta’s head of sustainability, added that “sustainability has been part of our DNA since we started. Our products are well established as a key solution to the fight against climate change.”

Key to the success has been a new ‘holistic’ sustainability strategy, launched in early 2020 under the title Sustainability in Everything We Do, which seeks to integrate sustainability across the entire value chain.

The strategy has four key strands to it – reducing the company’s carbon footprint, increasing circularity, people and enabling the energy transition.

THE RACE TO DECARBONISE STEEL To cut its carbon footprint, Vestas has committed to make its own operations carbon neutral by 2030 through internal actions – that is without using carbon offsets. The hotspots in these ‘Scope 1’ and ‘Scope 2’ emissions are focused on power, heat and transportation.

The company has a fleet of around 5,000 vans and by 2025, all new service vehicles will be either electric or use renewable fuels. And since last year, its entire electricity consumption has been from renewable sources. “Now we are addressing our

CEO Henrik Andersen.

factories, some of which are heated using gas,” Ekstrand explained. “We are phasing out gas heating and introducing electric heating or biomass boilers, whichever is the most suitable option for the particular location.”

However, most of the company’s emissions lie within the supply chain and Vestas has committed to reducing these ‘Scope 3’ emissions by at least 45 per cent by 2030.

More than half of supply chain emissions come from the steel the company uses, primarily in its turbine towers.

Steel is very carbon-intensive to produce, in part because the carbon in the coal that is often used is necessary to the pro-

duction process, rather than just there to provide heat. However, there are ways to produce lower carbon steel, either using electric arc furnaces (EAFs) powered by renewable energy or using green hydrogen (also produced using clean power) instead of coal.

“We are in discussion with suppliers about how we can work together to accelerate the decarbonisation of steel,” Ekstrand said. “Many producers have decarbonisation targets, but they are too long-term.

We need things to happen faster to meet our carbon reduction targets. Our products can be part of the solution by helping to create green hydrogen that can be provided to steel factories.”

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As well as talking to steel makers, the company is also carrying out a thorough mapping and investigation process to establish the key options for low-carbon steelmaking, and which players are best placed to help it meet its targets.

In part, this is driven by demand from customers. “We talk to our customers about how much they value this, when they would like to see green steel in our products and what they are willing to pay for that. Being frontrunners in this area is likely to come at a premium, but we see great interest from customers in buying lower-carbon products,” she pointed out.

ZERO-WASTE WIND TURBINES There is also more interest in more ‘circular’ products. Vestas has a ‘circularity road map’ and aims to be producing zero-waste wind turbines by 2040. About 85 to 90 per cent of a turbine is already recyclable with the remaining 10 to 15 per cent comprising the blades. “Recycling blades is really challenging because of the 60 |

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amount of composite materials they contain. We have a number of projects looking at how to recycle them. One is looking at how to develop circular blades from the start,” Ekstrand added.

The firm has a development project ongoing that will run for three years, examining how to separate the blades into their main component materials of carbon fibre and epoxy resin. “The aim is to process and recover the resin to make new blades. It would be quite significant because no-one else has managed to do it. It’s quite an exciting project.”

There are also ambitious targets to increase materials’ efficiency and reduce the waste from manufacturing turbines.

Much of this will come from the supply chain. “We have commitments from suppliers to reduce waste by 50 per cent by 2030,” she said.

“We have both carbon reduction and circularity ambitions to address the entire

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In 2022 Vestas Wind Systems topped the prestigious G100 ranking of the Canadian magazine Corporate Knights, winning the nomination as the world’s most sustainable corporation.

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value chain. That is at the core of our sustainability strategy.

“We have 50 key strategic suppliers that represent about 50 per cent of our spending. We have pretty detailed expectations including that they set their own carbon reduction targets and report on their emissions and waste. We also have a specific waste reduction expectation.”

ELECTRIFYING HEAT AND TRANSPORT When it comes to the energy transition, Vestas is taking an active role in the push for more electrification, particularly in sectors other than the provision of electricity.

“If the world is to meet its 1.5C target, we need to electrify beyond the power sector, particularly in transport and heat. We are ramping up our efforts in ‘power to X’ to be a part of that. Turbines are our core business, but we are always interested in

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the question of how they can help other sectors to decarbonise,” Ekstrand says.

“There is a lot more demand for lower-carbon products and for more waste reduction and circularity. That is one reason we have focused on this.”

Another key focus for Vestas is improving its diversity and inclusion, in particular increasing the number of women in leadership positions. The wind industry in general has few female employees and managers. “It’s an issue more generally in the industry and it’s an area where we can improve,” Ekstrand explained. “By 2025, we aim to have 25 per cent of women in leadership positions, rising to 30 per cent by 2030. To meet those targets, we will need to attract more women to the company. Just 14 per cent of our employee base is female at the moment, which is similar to the rest of the industry.”

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Investing in Cleantech

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Investing in the Cleantech Sector The climate crisis is calling for a whole range of cleantech solutions. Many of these also create opportunities for investors to help support the transition and bolster their portfolio. Mike Scott, a specialist in the business aspect of sustainability, takes a look at sectors to invest in.

BY MIKE SCOTT

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Investing in Cleantech

Investing in Cleantech

It can be hard to remember in the face of all the news about the Covid-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine, but the world is in the throes of an energy transition.

This transition is happening because we are in a climate crisis – but that crisis creates opportunities to invest in climate solutions across virtually all parts of the economy. The most obvious of these is renewable energy, where technologies such as solar panels and wind turbines – both onshore and offshore – have become commonplace and in a wide capacity are being installed all around the world.

Indeed, targets in many countries, particularly in Europe, are being strengthened in light of the Ukraine conflict and a newly-urgent desire to move away from reliance on Russian oil and gas, which is boosting the prospects of providers of renewable energy technologies wind and solar.

Offshore wind has developed enormously over the past decade, with costs having fallen rapidly as turbines grew in size, power and efficiency. An industry that was focused almost entirely on the North Sea has started to spread into new markets – in 2021, more than 80% of new offshore wind capacity was installed in China, making it, at a stroke, the largest offshore wind market in the world, overtaking the UK and Germany. Other markets such as South Korea and Australia are also starting to take off.

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One market that has been notable in its absence until now has been the US. This is in part because of political opposition and in part because around 60% of the US’ offshore wind potential is in waters too deep for turbines to be fixed to the seafloor. However, the US market is about to take off, with a more friendly policy regime and the imminent roll-out of new floating turbines that can be deployed in deeper waters.

Although there remains a huge amount to do, the renewables revolution is well under way. The next areas of focus in decarbonisation are transportation and heating/ cooling.

FOCUS ON HEATING AND TRANSPORT Electric vehicle sales are gathering pace, with prices falling as more models come onto the market, the cost of batteries comes down and range increases. Virtually every global carmaker is shifting out of internal combustion engines and into electric over the next decade. Electrification is also starting to happen in small aircraft and some ferries and other boats, which are also cutting fuel use by increasing the use of hydrofoils.

For larger forms of transport, electrification is trickier, although good progress is being made on electric trucks. However, there are alternatives – trucks can use hydrogen fuel cells, while cargo ships can switch to lower-carbon fuels such as gas, methanol, April 2022

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ammonia and hydrogen, or even tried and tested wind power.

In aviation, a number of companies are working on hydrogen aircraft as well as sustainable aviation fuels (SAFs) produced from biomass or industrial waste gases. And all forms of transportation are working on areas such as reducing drag, lightweighting materials and other methods to cut fuel use.

In heating, pressure is rising to replace gas boilers with heat pumps, which use less electrical energy than the heat energy they produce (and they run on electricity rather than gas). Air conditioners consume a huge amount of energy, which is only going to increase as temperatures rise, as well as using refrigerants with a huge global warming potential, so more efficient cooling options are crucial as well. These include less harmful refrigerants, such as, ironically, CO2, which in other circumstances is the gas whose emissions we are trying to re68 |

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duce. District heating and cooling can both significantly cut emissions. Companies that offer more efficient equipment to go into buildings – from LED light bulbs to refrigerators – are also well-placed.

All of the above technologies will require significant infrastructure back-up, including stronger grids and new connections, as well as significant amounts of batteries – to power EVs and act as stationary storage to help fill in the gaps when the wind isn’t blowing and the sun isn’t shining.

HYDROGEN HYPE One area that is set to see huge growth over the next few years is hydrogen. The gas is the potential answer to a number of decarbonisation challenges, including heavy transport such as trucking, shipping and even aviation, as well as heating and as a way to cut emissions from some of the hardest-to-abate industries such as the manufacture of steel, glass and cement.

Investing in Cleantech

There are two main ways to make clean hydrogen – by adding carbon capture equipment to the current method of stripping it out of methane (which is known as blue hydrogen) and by using renewable electricity and electrolysers to split the gas from water (green hydrogen). While many observers thought that blue hydrogen would be the first to make an impact until green hydrogen capacity caught up, the soaring price of gas and the rapid growth in electrolyser capacity suggest that green may leapfrog blue into the marketplace.

There are also less obvious decarbonisation plays that can be highly effective – reducing water use, which is an environmental imperative in its own right, also cuts energy use because water treatment is highly energy intensive. At the same time, treating sewage can produce useful heat and biogas that can displace fossil fuels.

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Indeed, reducing waste in all industries should be encouraged because it has significant carbon benefits and there are huge opportunities in sectors, from clothing to electronics to food, to implement circular economy principles that reduce waste, cut resource use, improve efficiency and reduce emissions, at the same time as cutting costs.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT One of the biggest contributors to climate change is agriculture – through deforestation, land clearance and emissions produced by livestock, principally cattle.

There are a number of opportunities here, including investing in regenerative agriculture, feed additives that reduce methane production from animals and vertical farms, which are much more resource efficient than traditional farming.

The big trend in this sector, though, has been the rise in meat and fish alternatives – plant-based products as well as synthetic, lab-grown meat and fish – and the market is set to see continued strong growth.

Overlaying all of these technology options is a range of digital tools that can make all parts of the economy more efficient, including artificial intelligence, machine learning and the internet of things. These technologies are becoming increasingly ubiquitous, helping to create smart cities, smart transport systems and smart energy networks.

A range of satellite and drone technologies are helping to identify problems that need tackling, too, from methane leaks that can be seen from space to crops that need irrigating or treating for disease.

The imperative to cut emissions has created endless opportunities to invest in low carbon technologies and companies, and the momentum will only accelerate in the years to come.

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Cleantech Products of the Month

Cleantech Products of the Month Cleantech can be many things – products specifically aimed at making your lifestyle or home more sustainable or innovations to make the products we must have more sustainable. Moreover, a product does not need to be ‘high-tech’ to be cleantech – it can be a simple idea that makes it possible to buy or do something we love in a more sustainable way. The products selected here, represent a bit of all of that. Clean, green and innovative, they can help you enjoy spring with a clean conscience.

BY SIGNE HANSEN

Photo: SunnyBag

SUNNYBAG As the spring sun is finally starting to make a convincing comeback, a bit of wholesome wilderness hiking may soon be in the cards. But, of course, you want to have the full outdoor experience without losing the connection or power to share those amazing landscape pictures with friends. Or maybe you are even planning on bringing along your laptop for a refreshing outdoor work session. Whatever the reason is, the award-winning Austrian SunnyBag will make sure you do not run out of power. With integrated solar panels that convert sunlight into electrical power,

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the bag lets you charge your mobile devices, mobile, camera, iPad etc. all day. The bag comes in different designs, but all feature the Sunpower solar cells which are, according to SunnyBag, 22.4 per cent more efficient than regular solar cells. For more flexibility the bag can be combined with a specifically designed powerbank to store energy.

From: €79.90 www.sunnybag.at

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BLUNT UMBRELLA As the weather is becoming ever more unpredictable and windy days are increasing in numbers and force, a high-quality umbrella that can withstand the strong gusts of spring is a must-have.

With the patented Blunt™ tips that open like miniature umbrellas within custom pockets and transfer the radial force evenly into the canopy creating an aerodynamic surface, the Blunt umbrella is just that. While stylish, sleek and available in multiple designs and colours, the umbrellas are made for use and have been wind tunnel tested to a Category 1 Hurricane (115km/h). Furthermore, with an ethos to escape the culture of “mass-produced umbrellas built to fail”, Blunt umbrellas are designed to last, and to prove its commitment “to repair rather than replace” the American company offers a two-year global manufacturer’s warranty and repairs all over the world.

From: $89 www.bluntumbrellas.com

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Cleantech Products of the Month

Photo: Cowboy

COWBOY ELECTRIC BIKE If you have been thinking about getting an electric bike but have not been quite sure if you could keep your cool on top of one, the Cowboy urban e-bike may be the answer. Designed by three Belgian entrepreneurs, one of the defining features of the beautiful, sleek and lightweight e-bike is that it does not look like one. The latest generation of Cowboys, the Cowboy 4 and Cowboy 4ST, was released earlier this year. Like previous models the bikes feature no buttons or gears, just an automatic transmission, providing simple acceleration and a characteristic smooth experience when cycling uphill.

Thanks to its removable 2.4kg battery with a range of up to 70km, the bicycle is easy to charge and sure to get you all the way through town. The new models also have a smartphone-based dashboard which gives you a host of possibilities, from navigation to controlling the lights and counting calories.

From: €2,790 www.cowboy.com Photo: Cowboy

Photo: Cowboy

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Photo: RAND Boats

RAND BOATS With its roots in Scandinavian design and Danish craftsmanship, RAND Boats has created an innovative, intuitive and socially orientated range of electric and sustainable boats. Guided by a respectful approach to nature and the environment, the foam kernel of RAND boats is made of recycled plastic bottles, and the deck and tables are made from sustainable forestry wood. Among the most popular of the RAND range is the stylish Picnic 18. Simple to operate and designed around a neat picnic-style table, the 18ft open day-cruiser is the perfect platform for plug-and-play social experiences on water. When lunch or drinks are over, the picnic table can be lowered, and the front part of the Picnic 18 converted into a comfy 200×180 cm sunbed, perfect for a relaxing nap on the sea.

From: €24,900 www.randboats.com

Photo: RAND Boats

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Shipping Feature

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UK government sets sights on a greener shipping industry The UK government has launched an ambitious plan to take shipping back in time by hundreds of years – but only in terms of emissions.

BY JASON DEIGN

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PHOTOS: ISTOCK

A new unit within the Department for Transport (DfT), called the UK Shipping Office for Reducing Emissions (UK SHORE), is looking to award £206 million in funding towards research into clean maritime technologies. The move is the first time the UK government has created an office purely dedicated to greening the maritime industry and is the single biggest investment in green shipping in the past hundred years, the DfT says.

Its aim is to improve the sustainability of the shipping sector and create skilled jobs across the UK. “I want UK SHORE to take the industry back to the future,” says UK Transport Secretary Grant Shapps.

“The age of the sail was the first green maritime age; new technology will bring us to a second green age.” Turning the tide for green shipping could create “thousands of new jobs,” he adds, “from masterful shipbuilding to the high-tech sailors of tomorrow.”

UK SHORE builds on the success of a Clean Maritime Demonstration Competition, launched in 2021. The government April 2022

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With £206 million going towards clean technologies, the UK Shipping Office for Reducing Emissions (UK SHORE) wants to take shipping back to the good old days – in terms of emissions.

unit will manage the competition from now on and will work in partnership with industry to design and build greener vessels, from tankers to leisure boats. Part of its remit will be to help the shipping industry transition to low-carbon propulsion systems such as those based on batteries and green hydrogen and ammonia.

AN ISLAND OF MARITIME PIONEERS Ammonia, batteries, ethane, hydrogen, iron powder, propane or liquified petroleum gas, methane or liquified natural gas (LNG), methanol, nuclear power and solid oxide fuel cells can all in theory be used to power the two-stroke, low-speed engines used in marine vessels. And all have come under scrutiny as the International Maritime Organisation looks to achieve a 76 |

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70 per cent reduction in the sector’s 2008 greenhouse gas emission levels by 2050, with plans to revise this target in 2023.

The shipping industry is focusing on LNG, methanol and ammonia as having the most potential for seafaring vessels. Engines for all three fuels are under development and fleet owners are making early bets on the technologies. The French container shipping giant CMA CGM, for example, expects to have a fleet of 44 LNG-powered vessels by 2024. The LNG will come in the form of liquified biomethane from European organic waste. “Guarantee-of-origin biomethane, coupled with CMA CGM’s dual-fuel gas-power technology, can reduce well-towake greenhouse gas emissions by at least 67 per cent,” says the company.

Moves such as this demonstrate the shipping industry’s willingness to get on board efforts to reduce carbon emissions and operate in a more sustainable way. The UK SHORE announcement shows Britain is keen to help the industry chart this course.

“We’ve always been an island of maritime pioneers, and this investment will ensure this will long continue, by helping the UK develop its role as a global centre for maritime decarbonisation,” says Ben Murray, CEO of Maritime UK, an industry body, and rounds off: “The establishment of UK SHORE and extension of the Clean Maritime Demonstration Competition can enable us to create the innovative green solutions at home and, in turn, export these across the world.”

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Australian firm promises to slash cost of green hydrogen An Australian company claims to have made a breakthrough that could slash the cost of green hydrogen, a wonder fuel of the future.

BY JASON DEIGN

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PHOTOS: HYSTATA

Green hydrogen – made from the electrolysis of water, using renewable energy – is totally carbon-free and could one day replace fossil fuels used in a range of applications, from steelmaking to marine transportation.

But today, the use of this low-carbon fuel is hampered by the fact that it is more expensive than fossil fuels and other forms of hydrogen, which are created using more carbon-intensive processes. Australian startup Hysata says it has overcome this problem.

The company this month said it had created a technology called a capillary-fed electrolysis cell that has 98% energy-to-hydrogen conversion efficiency.

That is enough to bring the cost of green hydrogen down to less than 1.50 USD a kilo once the technology scales up, Hysata claims. The price point is cheaper than any other form of hydrogen today, and comparable with fossil fuels such as diesel.

“Hysata’s ultra-high efficiency electrolyser will make green hydrogen competitive years earlier than generally assumed, accelerating global decarbonisation and increasing energy security,” says Hysata.

The next task for the company, a spinout from the University of Wollongong, which has financing from British investor IP Group and the Australian Clean Energy Finance Corporation, is to scale up the technology.

Hysata’s chief technology officer Gerry Swiegers (right) and chief executive Paul Barrett (left)

Chief executive Paul Barrett says the company could reach gigawatt-scale producApril 2022

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The Hysata Capillary-Fed Electrolysis (CFE) Cell

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Renewable electricity is passed through the cell.

(positive electrode)

Cathode

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O2

(negative electrode)

Bubble-free hydrogen production eliminates the separators usually needed in electrolysers to separate the hydrogen from the electrolyte.

This simplifies the system and reduces cost.

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Anode

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H2

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Electrolyte reservoir

Fresh water is added to the electrolyte reservoir. Unlike other electrolysers, there is no need to circulate large quantities of water. This further decreases energy use and reduces the system footprint.

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Cells are connected in series to form a ‘stack’.

Not to scale

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Thin, low-resistance membrane between the electrodes sucks up electrolyte from the reservoir like a sponge. Gases are produced by the electrodes without the bubbles formed in other electrolysers.

Together with the low-resistance membrane, this leads to ultra-high cell energy efficiency (98%) and system efficiency (95%)

Oxygen is also produced and can be used industrially, or simply released into the atmosphere.

The cell is housed in an injection-moulded plastic frame, which is low cost, light, and easy to massmanufacture and recycle

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The stack is housed in an inexpensive steel pipe, which can be pressurised to deliver high pressure hydrogen without additional costly compression.

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Electrolyser efficiency has a major impact on green hydrogen project economics Renewable energy capex savings for an indicative project producing 1 million tonnes of green hydrogen per year (500-800 projects this size will be needed to reach net zero globally)

With incumbent electrolysers

75% efficiency (52.5 kWh/kg)

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3

gigawatts of renewables needed

gigawatts of

With Hysata electrolysers

95% efficiency (41.5 kWh/kg)

tion by 2025, with plans already underway to build a pilot electrolyser plant and recruit “dozens of highly skilled specialists” this year.

“Hysata’s overall electrolyser system has been designed for ease of manufacturing, scaling and installation, delivering 95% overall system efficiency,” adds Gerry Swiegers, chief technology officer at Hysata.

This compares to 75% or less for existing electrolyser technologies. “For hydrogen producers, this will significantly reduce both the capital and operational costs to produce green hydrogen,” Swiegers says.

SAVINGS,

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or ~ USD 3 billion at projected 2030 costs

gigawatts of renewables needed

new energies for the Middle East and North Africa at the analyst firm Wood Mackenzie.

location for consistent renewable power has a significant impact on project values.”

“Based on our analysis, a more stable supply of clean energy results in lower project costs, as the requirements around energy and hydrogen storage can be optimised,” Mourey says.

Hysata says, UK-based think-tank the Energy Transitions Commission expected demand for green hydrogen to grow to up to 800 million tonnes a year by 2050, to meet demand from sectors such as steel, heavy transport and chemicals. The demand will create “a new multi-trillion-dollar industry,” Hysata says.

“With the entire green hydrogen value chain being nascent, getting access to the best

Hysata, an Australian start-up, says it has overcome problems that could slash the cost of green hydrogen.

Hysata’s breakthrough puts Australia at the forefront of the race to bring green hydrogen to market. As well as having leading electrolyser technology, the country is well placed to dominate the green hydrogen market thanks to its abundant renewable energy resources.

“Location determines the consistency of power generation, which is a major driver of green hydrogen economics,” says Claude Mourey, director of hydrogen and April 2022

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Oxera

Oxera shows how to support negative emissions tech in the UK

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Oxera

A new study has uncovered four ways the UK government could improve support for a class of technologies that could be key to decarbonisation.

The study, carried out on behalf of the energy company Drax by economics consultancy Oxera, describes options to help fund so-called negative emissions or greenhouse gas removals (GGR) technologies.

There could also be a separate market for GGR units, linked to the ETS and with a price cap for GGRs. A third option is that GGR units could participate directly in the ETS.

These provide ways of permanently removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, helping to reduce the impact of global warming.

And finally, emitters could be obliged not only to purchase an emission allowance but also to remove future emissions from the atmosphere, creating an incentive to invest in GGR technology.

Examples include bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS), direct air capture and storage (DACS), and socalled nature-based solutions, such as planting trees.

Negative emissions technologies are seen as vital for greenhouse gas reduction, particularly because industry sectors such as aviation and agriculture might not be able to stop using fossil fuels by mid-century.

In the UK, the government’s Net Zero Strategy predicts there will be a need to remove more than 70 million tonnes of carbon dioxide from the air by 2050.

The benefit of integrating GGR credits within the ETS market is that the costs of funding negative emissions technologies could be shared between government and industry, with the proportions changing over time, Oxera says.

In the first three options, the government could choose whether to fund negative emissions technologies itself, by auctioning emissions allowances, or allow indus-

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BY JASON DEIGN

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try to shoulder the cost by trading free allowances for GGR credits.

Under the fourth scenario, companies might be obliged to buy an increasing level of GGR units over time, so they eventually pay for removing as much carbon dioxide as they emit.

“The research that we have completed for Drax has developed practical and efficient market design options for integrating these [negative emissions] technologies within the ETS,” said Oxera partner Sahar Shamsi in a press release.

All of this assumes the UK government wants to provide public support for negative emissions technologies. Even if this is not the case, the technologies could still thrive as a component of voluntary carbon markets. Either way, the outlook for negative emissions technologies looks bright.

Carbon capture technologies could be vital to reaching net zero, but the sector needs legislative incentives to become economically sustainable.

But getting clean technologies such as BECCS and DACS into the mainstream is complicated, because unlike renewable energies, they do not produce an output that can be sold to markets.

A way around this is to issue GGR credits linked to the UK’s Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), which uses emissions allowances to gradually cut the greenhouse gas impact of businesses.

Negative emissions technologies would thus be able to earn credits that could be traded on or alongside the ETS. Oxera’s study found four ways that a market for GGR credits might work.

Firstly, the government could act as a broker, controlling the number of emissions allowances and GGR units in the market.

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Book of the Month

Book of the Month

Regenesis by George Monbiot In the newly published Regenesis, The Guardian columnist and environmental campaigner George Monbiot investigates how our food system could be reformed with new practices and new technology to prevent climate catastrophe.

BY ANDERS LORENZEN

Many following the climate change debate will be aware of Monbiot. His weekly column in The Guardian often paints a pessimistic view of how serious we are going about in tackling the climate crisis, and as an environmental activist, he is not afraid of putting himself on the frontline.

While not taking his eyes off the energy industry’s relationship to emissions, in recent years, Monbiot has focused more intensely on our food system and how it contributes to environmental and climate breakdown. He has been campaigning around the idea of rewilding, with his 2013 book Feral focusing on just that.

The Guardian columnist and environmental campaigner George Monbiot’s new book.

In Regenesis, (published in May 2022) Monbiot takes a deeper look at our food system and sets out how it could be reformed with new practices and new technology to prevent climate catastrophe and halt biodiversity loss.

Monbiot has long argued against mass farming procedures and their environmental impact, and so it is not a surprise that he opens Regenesis with a piece about communal farming, proudly describing an orchard he co-runs with several other families.

While Monbiot laying out the food system, he a language that

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spends extensive time problems with today’s does so factually and in is easy to understand -

backing it up with references to scientific reports. Furthermore, crucially, his book sets out a positive vision for how the food system can be transformed. Monbiot cites the advances which have been achieved in soil ecology and on that basis how that could allow us to grow more food while at the same time making farming less intense and wilder. He argues that this will not only benefit the environment but also humanity’s relationship to the planet.

Monbiot does not, of course, escape the huge trend and appetite for reduced meat consumption and the technological revolution in producing alternative protein products to meat. In Regenesis, he meets and interviews scientists, farmers and everyone else involved in the food revolution. Through the interviews he explores how to grow alternative protein to meat as well as how to increase yields while protecting the soil and the environment.

If you only know Monbiot from his The Guardian columns where a certain tone often tends to come across, reading Monbiot’s book is a whole different experience and is highly recommended. While his passion on this issue shines through, he explains the multiple aspects perfectly and always in a fact-based manner, while injecting a positive vision seldomly seen in his columns and one that the world is in dire need of.

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Linköping’s old town is well worth a visit.

Called ‘Gamla Linköping’, the old town lies a few kilometres away from the actual city centre. The reason? When the municipality decided that older buildings had to be replaced with more modern ones, instead of demolishing the old buildings, it picked them up and simply moved them across town.

Photo: Visit Linköping & Co

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Cleantech Region of the Month:

Östergötland Impressing all who see it with its exceptional natural beauty, Östergötland province in the south of Sweden has also been making a name for itself as one of the most important cleantech hubs. The region vividly shows how natural beauty and sustainable business interests can co-exist.

BY NANE STEINHOFF

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Cleantech Region of the Month: Östergötland

Norrköping’s industrial landscape is unique in Europe. In the city centre, it is dominated by the rushing water of the stream that is surrounded by stately factory buildings.

Photo: Norrköpings kommun

Bordering Småland, Västergötland, Närke, Södermanland and the Baltic Sea, Östergötland is a famous destination for those who seek tranquil country living, nature holidays and the traditional Swedish way of life. In recent years, the region has also been a driving force for sustainable development and environmental work and has made a name for itself as one of Sweden’s top cleantech hubs with cities like Linköping, the region’s capital, leading the way in sustainable development.

A SUSTAINABLE PAST According to Sara Malmgren, project manager at Cleantech Östergötland, this development is largely down to one thing: the region’s long-standing focus on sustainable development. “Östergötland has long been known for its agricultural landscape and large wood deposits which has led the paper industry and paper mills to choose the area. During the 18th century, 86 |

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the city of Norrköping was one of Sweden’s leading industrial centres. During the 19th century, the mechanical and textile industries came here, while the railroad became an important pillar that connected Östergötland to Stockholm in the north and Malmö in the south,” she explains.

“In 1909, the ‘statute of cleanliness’ was adopted, which meant that waste – both from households and latrines – was collected in a more organised way, translating into better living standards for citizens.

However, the waste was still collected at a landfill. This changed in 1958 when Linköping started waste incineration in a combined heat and power production plant. This was the first step towards regarding waste as a resource in the region.”

The incentive distributed the generated heat in district heating, a model used in many other places in Sweden today.

When the oil crisis hit in the 1970s, combined heat and power (or CHP) plants became even more important and Östergötland benefited from not relying on oil and coal as primary energy sources. In the 1980s, environmental issues and resource efficiency became more pressing still, and research, development and production of biogas from biological waste blossomed in Östergötland. It does so to this day.

During the 2000s, Linköping became the fastest growing Swedish city, mainly due to the increasing interest of highly technological industries, such as the defence industry, in the city. The university also played a major role. Malmgren explains: “Thanks to our young university which has a keen willingness to develop and invent, computer technology companies have blossomed in Östergötland.

A prominent environmental research hub from the University of Linköping is the

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university’s biogas research centre which aims to research and develop innovative biogas solutions. In addition, the university is working on industrial symbiosis and circular economy topics, as well as energy management. In this field, Professor Patrik Thollander seeks to explore how the industry can reduce energy costs and how policy instruments can be designed. This focus has turned him into one of the most sought-after educators in this field within the EU.” INDUSTRIAL SYMBIOSIS As of today, the biggest employers in Östergötland are Siemens Energy, Saab Ab, Holmen Paper, BillerudKorsnäs and Cloetta Fazer. They all benefit from Östergötland being a thriving, innovative area in a logistically prime location that has welcomed start-ups as well as established larger companies with open arms for years. Recently, it has also become a hub for new ‘cross-over’ companies that have developed in between the areas of computer technology, mechanics, visualisation and the environmental field. Most

Bikes in Norrköping, a city that showcases how industrial heritage can co-exist with nature. Photo: Simon Follin, Unsplash

The Kinda kanal is a canal area comprising around 80 kilometres of beautiful natural experiences, peace and quiet – perfect for hiking, cycling and more. Photo: Visit Linköping & Co

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The Idhult Nature Reserve is an older cultivated landscape with interesting hiking trails of around 1.5 kilometres. Photo: Visit Linköping & Co

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Östergötland

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Cleantech Region of the Month

of the companies strive to promote a more sustainable future for Sweden and beyond and, in this endeavor, cooperation plays an important role. “Cleantech companies in Östergötland work in many different fields. Many of them export their knowledge and/or solutions; some showcase how the technology really works,” Malmgren points out, and adds: “In an organisation called Smart City Sweden, Cleantech Östergötland works together with similar organisations all around Sweden. By working together, we can spread sustainable solutions around the globe at a faster pace than on our own.”

Furthermore, by setting strategies and contributing to development projects, Region Östergötland seeks to enable and grow development within the cleantech sector. Their current strategy focuses on four different areas: circular and biobased economy; sustainable cities with the focus on sustainable buildings; sustainable energy and sustainable transportation.

“The fact that we have well-established clusters of innovation and sustainability has made the region strong and well-coordinated. This, in turn, helps up-andcoming new cleantech businesses as well as well-established companies. We are used to working with and alongside the regional board and the municipality, as well as the university, and that translates into a powerful culture of innovation where we meet the challenges for society today,” says Malmgren.

This can also be seen in the creation of Händelö Eco Industrial Park in Norrköping. The park takes the region’s industrial symbiosis one step further with an innovative idea: by-products or waste from one industry are used as input or raw materials for neighbouring companies. By

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sharing resources, the approach benefits both sides financially and advances circular economy in the city.

The region’s innovative and collaborative spirit and environmental consciousness have led the number of official members of the Cleantech Östergötland organisation to grow from around 50 to 80 in the past two years. Some are cleantech companies that have developed from research at Linköping University, explains Malmgren: “A traditional cleantech company cleaned water and fumes, handled sludge and waste. From the early 2000s, however, the focus has shifted and cleantech can include anything from a biochar-producer, sustainability consultants and a fast-growing start-up company working to visualise energy consumption to a municipality.”

PRIME LOCATION Östergötland’s close proximity to numerous big city regions, namely Stockholm, Gothenburg and Malmö, is a benefit to many companies. “Not only do we have great train links to these cities, but we don’t have the price point of larger cities. The land and energy in Östergötland are both cheaper and more available. As a bonus, there is direct access to competent personnel thanks to the university. Logistically, we’re in a prime location,” says Malmgren.

And the prime location will become even better with the Ostlänken, or East Link Project. It is a high-speed rail project that is intended to connect Södertälje in the south of Stockholm to Linköping in Östergötland.

The new train line would reach Linköping around 40 minutes quicker than the existing line, while adding additional stops along the way. “This project will last for many years and will create numerous jobs and opportunities. For example, we now have an interest group that investigates how to April 2022

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Östergötland

Linköping’s old town is well worth a visit. Called ‘Gamla Linköping’, the old town lies a few kilometres away from the actual city centre. The reason? When the municipality decided that older buildings had to be replaced with more modern ones, instead of demolishing the old buildings, it picked them up and simply moved them across town.

Photo: Visit Linköping & Co

create a circular handling of all the tonnes of surface material that this project will create,” explains Malmgren.

While Östergötland has a long history of producing fossil-free fuels such as HVO100, RME, Ethanol (ED95) and Biogas, the region is also known for a variety of innovative cleantech companies in other sectors. One example is Svensk Plaståtervinning, one of Europe’s biggest and most efficient plastic recycling plants.

With their new Site Zero project, they are planning to build an even bigger facility to handle recycled plastics from Swedish households. The plastic is sorted, resold and reused to create new products, thus creating a circular loop of plastic items that would otherwise end up in the landfill.

In the energy sector, the company Againity has made it its mission to reuse residual heat to produce electricity, while Biototal utilises residual sludge to supply agricul90 |

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ture with fertilisers from organic recycled material. Another example, Sundahus, provides a database of building projects evaluated from an environmental point of view simplifying sustainable construction.

NATURE AND CULTURE With something for everyone, Sweden’s second-largest county of Östergötland is guaranteed to impress even the pickiest of travellers. For those who enjoy an active

Linköping city wants to become a carbon-neutral city within a few years. The eco-friendly city therefore has a good public transportation system that helps commuters get around the city without the need for a car. Photo: Visit Linköping & Co

Cleantech Region of the Month: Östergötland

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Östergötland has long been known for its agricultural landscape and large wood deposits which has led the paper industry and paper mills to choose the region.

Photo: Visit Linköping & Co

Carl Johans Park in Norrköping, a city that vividly shows how industrial heritage can co-exist with nature. Photo: Norrköpings kommun

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holiday out and about, hiking along the Kinda Canal, island hopping in the Östgöta archipelago or biking along the iconic Göte Canal might be just the thing. Those with more of a cultural interest may enjoy the historic architecture in Linköping, embark on the 145-kilometre-long enchanting Birgittaleden pilgrimage route or visit Norrköping, a city that showcases how industrial heritage can co-exist with nature.

In the near future, the new Lalandia water park will be built in Motala and is estimated to attract 320,000 visitors annually.

“Together with Kolmården Zoo and Astrid Lindgrens Värld, there will be a new type of tourism in Östergötland,” says Malmgren. Östergötland – industrial symbiosis at its best.

Facts: Size: At 9,979 square kilometres, Östergötland is Sweden’s secondlargest county in terms of area.

Population: Just over 450,123 inhabitants live in the county.

Location: Östergötland is located in the the south of Sweden. It borders Småland, Västergötland, Närke, Södermanland and the Baltic Sea, and is conveniently located between Gothenburg, Malmö and Stockholm.

Cities: The county’s largest city is Linköping with around 165,000 inhabitants, followed by Norrköping with a population of 137,000.

Web: www.cleantechostergotland.se

Left: During the 2000s, Linköping became the fastest growing Swedish city, mainly due to the increasing interest of highly technological industries, such as the defence industry, in the city. Photo: Michael Odelberth, Unsplash Below: With 165,000 inhabitants, Linköping has a lot to offer, from numerous shopping opportunities to cultural events and more. Photo: Visit Linköping & Co

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The war in Ukraine could make or break the clean energy revolution Anders Lorenzen, the man behind A greener life, a greener world, a blog listed among Vuelio’s Top Ten Green Blogs in 2018, takes a look at the war in Ukraine’s effect on the energy transformation.

BY ANDERS LORENZEN

The outcome of the tragic and devastating war in Ukraine could have serious impacts on how the world moves away from hydrocarbons to sources of clean energy. Depending on who you listen to, the war should either make us speed up the transition to clean energy or could slow it down and increase fossil fuel production.

But one thing is clear, Russia’s decision to invade Ukraine has turned upside down the world’s energy policies as we have to phase out our reliance on Russian gas.

The ideal scenario would be if we could just turn off the Russian gas tap, but unfortunately, it is not that simple.

Take the UK’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson – less than half a year ago during COP26 in Glasgow, he was warning the world it must urgently phase out hydrocarbons. And it sounds as though he is adopting the same argument in relation to the war in Ukraine, saying the world must phase out Russian hydrocarbons. But what is to replace Russian oil and gas?

Behind the scenes, the UK is drawing up plans to re-route fossil fuel imports from Russia to Saudi Arabia.

The best thing that the 27-member block and its allies in Europe such as Norway and the UK could do is to massively invest in energy efficiency schemes including zero-carbon rules for all new buildings.

At the same time, we should continue to build new low-carbon energy capacities.

Countries like Germany, which is very dependent on Russian gas, should seriously consider reversing their nuclear shutdown programme for reactors where it is not too late and where power stations could easily be brought back online.

A ROADMAP AWAY FROM FOSSIL FUELS Last week the EU unveiled a roadmap that should cut Europe’s reliance on Russian gas by two-thirds within a year. It is clear that this is not possible without purchasing gas from elsewhere. But this should also be seen as an opportunity as a society to drastically reduce our reliance on gas.

And the war in Ukraine should not be used as an excuse to, for instance, open new oil fields in the North Sea (which some countries have discussed) or reverse the ban on fracking in the UK which some MPs are calling for.

But, as many clean energy advocates have argued, this should serve as a wakeup call to us all to lessen our reliance on fossil fuels overall and not just Russian fossil fuels.

SLOW DOWN OR SPEED UP? Politicians and campaigners who are either sceptical about climate and clean energy policies or who are clean energy enthusiasts are both using the war in Ukraine to argue their cases. The sceptics say we must halt the net-zero strategy while the enthusiasts say we must now rapidly speed up the clean energy transition.So what is it? What should the right strategy be?

It would be a serious mistake, and it would demonstrate dangerous ignorance of climate science, especially considering the sombre Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report released in March, if countries were to weaken climate and clean energy policies, targets and laws. Any additional fossil fuels we buy from other countries must be temporary.

Danish-born Anders is a passionate environmentalist and the founder of A greener life, a greener world. He has contributed to various outlets on the topics of climate change, energy and broad environmental issues. He is a keen runner and lives in London with his partner and young daughter.

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Events

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Reset Connect

Reset Connect – the UK’s leading sustainability and net-zero event Reset Connect, the UK’s largest sustainability and net-zero event for business, investors and start-ups, is bringing together all three sectors to discuss and collaborate on actionable steps to accelerate the pathway to net-zero.

BY SIGNE HANSEN

According to the UN, four to five trillion pounds will be needed to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030.

In the UK alone, existing infrastructure requires an average investment of £40 billion per year, over the next ten years, to reach net-zero. This means that financial resources are needed from both public and private investors.

Showcasing sustainability solutions for business, supporting new cleantech startups and bringing together leaders from across government, business and the finance communities, Reset Connect London 2022 aims to accelerate that process.

“We bridge the gap between sustainability change-makers, business leaders, gov94 |

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ernment and funding. This disruptive new event provides present and future net-zero business solutions and the financing to implement them,” say organisers.

Spanning two days in June, the event is a must-visit for businesses looking for sustainability solutions and providers to help achieve net-zero targets as well as investors and cleantech start-ups looking to showcase their sustainable products and services. Professional event organisers will also discover innovative solutions and changing business models that support sustainability objectives in the events industry.

Finally, policy makers and government leaders can, aside from meeting with current

and future solution providers, explore the right solutions to meet the Government’s minimum mandatory Government Buying Standards (GBS) for goods and services. It will also be an opportunity to get updated on the best practices in the field of sustainability reporting, and discover how to actively contribute to the Mayor’s office mission of aligning London with the Paris Climate Accord’s emission reduction goals.

The event will present 92 industry-leading speakers, including Rachael Everard, head of sustainability for Rolls-Royce, Sacha Sadan, director of ESG, Financial Conduct Authority, John Flint, CEO, UK Infrastructure Bank, Greg Clark, Connected Places Catapult chair, UK CCIC and

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Discover CleanTech

Bringing together business, start-ups, investors, and governmental leaders at the ExCEL London, Reset Connect London 2022 aims to accelerate the process to net zero.

Alice Williams, strategy and commercial excellence, Schneider Electric UK. The speakers will discuss how to achieve the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, opportunities in sustainable investment & green finance, plus methods for creating sustainable cities. www.reset-connect.com Event information: Date: 28 – 29 June 2022 at ExCeL London Use the code DcDc15 when registering.

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Cambrdige Cleantech Venture Event Day Events | Cleantech

Cleantech Venture Day in London Giving 24 cleantech companies the opportunity to pitch to investors, The Cleantech Venture Day is accelerating the race to net zero. Over the past 15 years, over 250 companies have pitched at the event, and more than 650 million euros have been invested as a result. This year’s event is to be held in London and online on 18 and 19 May 2022.

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PHOTOS: CLEANTECH VENTURE DAY

Hosted by Cambridge Cleantech and Oxfordshire Greentech, the two-day Cleantech Venture Day event will give cleantech businesses looking for funding the opportunity to pitch to over 60 investors. This event offers a valuable opportunity for cleantech SMEs and businesses seeking to secure seed, Series A or B funding, as well as for experienced fund managers, business angels and corporate investors eager to invest in disruptive climate positive technologies. Martin Garratt, CEO of Cambridge Cleantech says: 96 |

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“Investing in ESG is at an all-time high and the Cleantech Venture Day event helps the race to zero by offering investors a chance to discover 24 innovative business solutions in which to invest. Over the last five years we have helped the pitching companies secure £135 million of investment.”

Day one consists of a briefing event for investors, followed by an evening reception with some of the pitching SMEs as well as other innovative SMEs from Cambridge Cleantech’s network. Day two will be the pitching event where investors will hear from the top 24 investment-ready disruptive businesses.

Through pre-matched meetings between innovators and investors, the event brings participants the opportunity to build the right connections from London on the 18th and from the comfort of home on the 19th.

IMPRESSIVE SOLUTIONS AND OPPORTUNITIES The last pitching-and-investment event featured cleantech SMEs in specific areas, but this year the organisers have invited all

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Discover CleanTech

At The Cleantech Venture Day in London, cleantech start-ups get the chance to pitch to interested investors.

types of cleantech companies to apply, as long as they offer a solution to tackle the climate emergency. “The quality and range of investment opportunities showcased at CVD is always impressive,” said Mark Riminton, Business Development Manager, Clean Growth UK. ”As a partner in the project, we have found many opportunities to engage with innovative SMEs and support their journey to market. Events like CVD keep our hopes for a bright sustainable future alive and well!”

Over 100 cleantech ventures have applied to pitch at The Cleantech Venture Day. This year, the 24 pitching companies will be carefully selected by an external jury and will receive extensive expert pitch presentation training to maximise their chances of gaining funding.

“Cleantech Venture Day is an opportunity for the cleantech community to support

start-ups from various backgrounds and we strongly encourage female founders and entrepreneurs from underrepresented backgrounds to apply.” said Sylvie Russell, operations manager at Cambridge Cleantech.

If you are an investor and interested in meeting the top investment-ready cleantech SMEs, book a ticket via Eventbrite or the website. www.cleantechday.com/london

Cambridge Cleantech Founded in 2011 as a hub for Cambridge-based innovators, Cambridge Cleantech is today the UK’s largest cleantech member organisation. It is growing and expanding its reach well beyond Cambridge – in fact, it has welcomed international members over the years from countries such as Israel, India, North and South America and Japan. Through its events, resources, initiatives and networks, it connects innovators, corporates, academics, SMEs and investors, and runs a number of special interest groups around topics such as sustainable smart homes, low carbon vehicles, finance and circular economy.

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Writers of the Month

Writers of the Month This issue of Discover CleanTech includes special features by:

MIKE SCOTT Mike Scott has 30 years of experience as a journalist, including nine years at the Financial Times. In 2006, he became a freelance writer and has since contributed to a wide range of publications including the FT, The Guardian, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, Forbes, Fortune and Raconteur Media, whose reports appear in The Times and The Sunday Times. Scott specialises in the business and investment aspects of sustainability, the environment, climate change and other environmental, social and governance issues. Writing for corporate clients and think tanks as well as newspapers, he covers the entire spectrum of green issues, from the far reaches of nanotechnology to corporate sustainability.

Mike recently won the Contribution to Climate Change Journalism award at the 2021 Sustainability Media Awards. www.carboncopycommunications.com

JASON DEIGN Jason Deign is a Barcelona-based business writer, journalist, and author reporting on cleantech, energy, technology and the future. In 2020 he was ranked at number 42 on Tyto Tech’s 500 Power List of the most influential people in the UK technology sector, ranking second within cleantech. Deign runs Jason Deign Associates, a Barcelona-based editorial and copywriting services agency serving clients worldwide.

The agency also publishes the Energy Storage Report, the most up-to-date source of news and intelligence to do with the energy storage industry. www.jasondeign.com

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