Green Power: Achieving Energy Independence, Protecting the Environment, and Saving Lives

Could Agave (the plant that’s used to make Tequila) be the key to energy independence? And what about wastewater as a source of electricity?

In a recent round-up of some of the most compelling advances made in the field of chemistry in the past year (See: Cutting Edge Chemistry in 2011), one particular area of research caught my attention. As it turns out, there is evidence to suggest that nature – and in particular, the leaf (artificial or otherwise), may have a great deal to teach us about how to effectively harness energy from water.

In fact, there are a number of approaches that chemists are presently exploring as a means of generating power from alternative energy sources, as noted in the article:

• At the Spring ACS meeting in Anaheim, US, Dan Nocera from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, US, presented his artificial leaf that splits water when exposed to UV light. Crucially, while Nocera's device produces less energy than other options, it costs less than $50 (£31) to manufacture compared with around $12,000 for current commercial devices, making it the 'fast food of energy production', he says.

• Nocera's leaf can apparently work with human waste water, but what about other approaches? A team led by Ioannis Ieropoulos and John Greenman at the Bristol Robotics Laboratory in the UK have developed microbial fuel cells that use bacteria to break down urine and produce electricity.

• The agave plant is well known as the plant that makes tequila, but David King's team at the University of Oxford's Low Carbon Mobility Centre, UK, has shown that it can also be used as a feedstock to make bioethanol23. Crucially, unlike other feedstock plants agave thrives in arid conditions and would not need arable farmland to be given over to its production.

What’s worth noting here, I think, is that as far-fetched as some of these ideas may seem, it is just such innovation that the alternative energy sector (and their colleagues among forward-thinking manufacturers) requires to produce a significant shift away from dependence on sources of energy that require the use of fossil fuels. And while many may still debate the value of exploring such alternative forms of energy, one very clear danger of not exploring safer, less environmentally-toxic, alternative energy options is the potential threat that a fossil-fuel driven lifestyle poses not only to our economic security, but to our environment and, ultimately, to our health.

Indeed, the link between cancer in humans and our growing level of exposure to environmental toxins, is becoming increasingly evident. One of the biggest culprits, according to ecologist and cancer survivor, Sandra Steingraber, PhD (author of Living Downstream and Raising Elijah), is the release of toxic chemicals from the extraction and use of fossil fuels such as oil, coal and natural gas. Most recently, Steingraber and her peers have been focused on raising awareness about the potentially tragic consequences of employing fracking techniques to extract natural gas, a practice which has proven especially dangerous and all too common in recent years. 

Translated? Green energy may not only help us to save the environment – it could well prove to save lives.

See also:

Living Downstream

Cutting Edge Chemistry in 2011

2012 Megatrend: Green Supply Chains Driving Global Economic Growth

In a recent article, Bill Roth – sustainability advocate, green business coach and author of “The Secret Green Sauce,” cites five megatrends that promise to contribute to a trillion dollar global sustainable economy in 2012.  One of the key mega-trends that he references is the greening of supply chains – and the impact that this will have on the global economy. 

As noted in the article, Roth explains:

Green supply chains are driving global economic growth.

• Corporations, not governments, are now driving the push toward sustainability as they harvest increasingly significant profit growth through design and process innovations that cut production, delivery, packaging and disposal costs while also reducing a company’s/product’s environmental footprint. This is a global trend led by international companies like Walmart, GE and Coca Cola. 
• Its commercial impact is now evident in the increasing scale of Request For Proposal bid questions on sustainability metrics and performance results documentation. This global mega-trend is creating new revenue growth opportunities for smaller businesses that can offer price competitive lower environmental footprint products and solutions. 
• It is also decentralizing decision-making as large corporations gain success using Green Teams to find and implement ideas that reduce costs and a company’s environmental footprint. 
• Where CFOs once questioned the ROI of producing a corporate CSR report, the importance of these documents is now clear. CSR reports have an increasingly important role as a source document used by third parties that communicate to consumers and equity investors on the sustainability of a company and its products, which has an implicit impact on the bottom line. The combined impacts of the greening of the supply chain have now made this process the economic engine of the global sustainable economy.

In my estimation, what is most noteworthy here – is that green supply chains are, by definition, driving support for sustainability not just at the corporate level but at the product level, as well. And this has significant implications for providers of sustainable product design tools and technologies. Such tools promise to grow in popularity as both downstream and upstream supply chain requirements increasingly demand that more sustainable products be produced and more sustainable materials be used in the production process.

Such sustainability strategies enable companies to reduce their environmental footprint AND achieve significant profit growth through design and process innovations that cut production, delivery, packaging and disposals costs, according to Roth -- an observation which I whole-heartedly agree with. 

Sustainability metrics are also increasingly becoming a required “line item” on RFPs, according to Roth, and the formation of Green Teams to find and implement ideas that reduce costs and improve environmental footprint ratings, are on the rise. This trend, too, is one that I have witnessed, and that I expect we will continue to see more of.

Moreover, investors are paying more attention to the sustainability of a company and its products, according to Roth. And that, ultimately, promises to be one of the greatest contributors to the adoption of sustainability practices among many companies – but especially among those that may not prove to be motivated by the need to “do good” unless such good is rewarded financially. 

Increasingly, it seems, doing the right thing is being paired with financial gain, as well. This is a topic that we will continue to explore further in the coming months.

See also:

Five Megatrends Creating 2012’s Trillion Dollar Global Sustainable Economy