Today's Top 10 is a guest post from Carlos Chambers who is a member of, and spokesperson for, Generation Zero.
Generation Zero is an "organisation of young New Zealanders working to cut carbon pollution through smarter transport, liveable cities and independence from fossil fuels".
He is active on Twitter via @nzcach.
As always, we welcome your additions in the comments below or via email to david.chaston@interest.co.nz.
And if you're interested in contributing the occasional Top 10 yourself, contact gareth.vaughan@interest.co.nz.
See all previous Top 10s here.
1. Why cities are key to driving economic growth and fighting climate change.
Cities are where a large part of the struggle to solve climate change will play out.
The short video above (1:54) gives insight into why and how.
It’s been exciting and inspiring seeing the New Climate Economy getting the findings of its report out to the world’s audiences.
It shows how we can drive global economic growth and fight climate change.
To back the claim up they provided analysis on achieving this across key areas - from cities and land use to finance and economics. Theirs is an optimistic message grounded in solid research and rational thinking.
The call to action is clear - "we already know how to do this. What we need now, are better policy choices and decisive leadership".
By 2030 around 60% of the world’s populations will live in cities. Cities are already economic engines, accounting for 80% of all economic output. But, did you know, none of the world’s 50 most populated cities meet international air quality standards? Air pollution, which mostly comes from urban areas can cost as much as 11 percent of GDP. Urban sprawl costs the US economy an estimated $400 billion per year.
But designed right cities can be the foundation of low carbon economic growth. We can build better cities, cities that are connected, compact and coordinated. Cities that put people and their needs first. Where the air is cleaner, and getting around is faster and cheaper. And the best part, we already know how to do this.
Investing in smarter transport systems, utilities and energy networks could save us more than $3 trillion in the next 15 years. For instance, over 160 cities already have bus rapid transit systems. These can carry up to two million passengers per day at low cost, as BRT can be less than one fifth of the cost of a metro.
What we need now, are better policy choices and decisive leadership.
For years we’ve been told that we cannot pursue strong economic growth and combat climate change at the same time.
This is a false choice.
These are the findings from the New Climate Economy report.
Together, we can create a better, more prosperous future.
2. Europe’s going big - can it, will it deliver?
A landmark US-China announcement on binding emissions reductions targets and the global climate negotiations kicking off again in Lima mean climate change is getting international love again.
Beth Gardiner of the NY Times looks at European Union leaders’ updates of 40 percent reductions by 2030 on the road to achieving the continent’s long term goal of 80 to 95 percent by 2050.
The balanced piece interviews a number of experts from academics and researchers to climate change consultants.
Questions are raised around the feasibility of the 2030 goal and the tools to achieve it - the EU’s emissions trading scheme and strong climate policy are singled out.
3. What is this? A centre for ants?
Or a car for Auckland?
I think good rail like the City Rail Link, better buses such as Bus Rapid Transit network and improving cycling with separated cycleways present the real wins for Auckland’s transport problems.
That said, it’s great to see these two entrepreneurs having a crack with Microcarm. Auckland will need all the help it can get and private sectors initiatives like this may prove an important piece of the puzzle.
A plan to ease Auckland's traffic woes is on the road to becoming a reality.
Manurewa's Toa Greening wants to bring 50 electric microcars, called the A-Car, into the country by the end of next year.
The car has two seats and is 99cm wide and 259cm long, about the same size as a large motorcycle.
FUTURE PLANS: Toa Greening and Pete Mazany want to see their business, Microcarm, lead the way.
"I started the Microcar project back in 2012," Greening said.
"It came out of frustration with Auckland's traffic. I came to the conclusion that we can't build our way out of it."
After six months spent analysing traffic research, Greening concluded the most efficient way to solve the problem is with the microcar.
The research showed that Auckland's traffic would start moving freely if 15,000 of the little cars hit the roads.
But getting to that point will take time and around $500 million so the company is starting with a smaller goal in the short term.
4. The new Aussie dream.
Balmain, Canberra where the traditional, dare I say historical dream of owning a quarter acre section is being tipped upside down.
Anna Anderson points out that the space a house offered is becoming less important to people, whereas proximity and walkability are increasingly seen as crucial.
The trend to quality urban housing is hardly a surprise. It’s promising to see developers in Australia supply and the market quickly pick up quality housing solutions like the four examples outlined in this.
With rates of urbanisation steadily increasing the demand for the housing solutions outlined in the article will likely go the same way in Australia and other urbanising countries.
Enter the new Kiwi dream.
The traditional housing progression from flat-sharing to renting, then buying an apartment and eventually upgrading to a house is being turned on its head. Some buyers are skipping the steps between couch-surfing and ownership of the quarter-acre block - instead buying straight into the apartment market. It's fast becoming the new Australian dream.
For many, apartments are the ideal set-up. But for those wanting the space offered by a three- or four-bedroom home the options are few.
On the western foreshore of Balmain, a new development Harbourfront Balmain is drawing interest from a wide demographic including upgraders, downsizers and families. The developers, Toga Group, made the decision to include a range of three-bedroom terraces and apartments ranging in size from 116-198 square metres to the mix of one- and two-bedroom apartments.
"There's a growing trend for families wanting to live in apartments or terraces in accessible areas like Balmain," says Fabrizio Perilli, chief executive officer of Toga Development and Construction. "It's now an accepted way of living."
5. Germany keeps winning.
The German private sector is starting to catch onto Chancellor Angela Merkel’s inspiring leadership. A large fossil fuel power plant owner and operator EON will spin these assets off and move to renewables joining the country’s clean energy revolution.
The article gives some fascinating public opinion stats. Despite strong efforts from Merkel and her government to-date introducing taxpayer funded subsidies for renewable energy and closing the country's nuclear reactors the public want to see more. Measured earlier this year, 67 percent of people think the government is not doing enough to move to renewables
The focus is not just on electricity and energy generation - the piece also looks at Germany jump-starting its electric car manufacturing industry. The goal is to have one million electric cars on German roads by 2020 and bolster the range and selection of models produced in Germany.
As one reader comments at the bottom - “Leadership”, from the Germans.
EON SE (EOAN)’s plan to spin off its fossil-fuel plants marks a watershed moment in Germany’s renewables effort that will likely bolster the country’s already leading position in clean energy.
EON’s announcement is the culmination of a push to wind, solar and other alternative energy forms that the German government began 14 years ago with subsidies to reduce the country’s reliance on fossil fuels for power production. That plan gained added momentum in 2011 with a decision to close the country’s nuclear reactors following the Fukushima accident.
Chancellor Angela Merkel’s bold move is already beginning to pay off, with Europe’s largest economy for the first time getting more electricity from renewables this year than any other source. About a quarter of Germany’s power now comes from green energy, compared with 6.2 percent in the U.S. and 4.8 percent in France.
“We are in the midst of a giant transformation process of our energy system,” Deputy Environment Minister Jochen Flasbarth told reporters yesterday in Berlin. “Renewables are the increasingly dominant factor in the German energy mix. EON’s decision is a piece of the puzzle.”
6. Software is eating the world.
Should there be one set of rules for all companies? Does a monopoly in one industry have the same features as a monopoly in another? What about software? What about Amazon, Facebook, Google or Uber?
Some time ago I discussed the growing power of software firms and the challenges and opportunities with a friend. He emailed me this statement, “Issue: ultimate power is currently being consolidated in very few key holders i.e. Uber of 2025 will control a monopoly over the worlds transportation network”.
I was intrigued to read the Economist’s thorough take on the matter. It’s also inspired me to download Peter Thiel's new book “Zero to One”.
If competition and antitrust regulators and economists get their way my friend’s statement may be proved wrong in 2025. If not then he is likely on the money and the consumers of software may have to look after ourselves.
"WE ARE taking over the world of yoga.” At the graduation day for 500 Startups, a school for entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley, such statements of focused megalomania are the norm. “We will own this space,” predicts the founder of a company that helps shops send digital offers to nearby phones. A company which rates people’s online behaviour says it is planning “world domination”.
It is a joke that sounds like hubris, and there is indeed plenty of that to be seen. But in this context global ambitions on the part of the only-just-begun are oddly reasonable. If your idea for a service or product can be scaled up to cover the world, why would you not plan to do just that? And if your idea cannot be scaled up that way, should you not find one that can? After all, capturing a significant, even dominant share of the world market more or less straight out of the box is clearly possible. It has been crucial for the internet’s biggest successes: Amazon (About half of America’s book market, more than that in e-books); Alibaba (about 80% of e-commerce in China); Facebook (which claims 1.3 billion active members); and Google (68% of online searches in America, more than 90% in Europe).
Regulators worry that such dominance lays consumers and competitors open to all sorts of abuse. A European Parliament resolution calling for the European Commission to consider the break-up of Google by splitting its search engine from “other commercial services”, which was to be voted on shortly after The Economist went to press, is a bit of cheap political grandstanding. But the commission’s concerns about Google are real.
7. On the topic of targets...
I want what Tony’s smoking...
The Australian Government’s current trajectory on climate change is summed up by a quote from Prime Minister Tony Abbott that coal is “good for humanity”.
The World Resources Institute, a US Development Agency promptly and correctly told Abbott off, citing renewable energy as a much better way to boost countries’ economic growth.
Abbott seems confused - concerning from the leader of a country with the highest emissions per capita and heavy reliance on fossil fuel industries.
Time to pull your head out of the sand Tony. Perhaps the Germans can help?
Australia is one of just four nations not on track to meet emissions reduction promises, a UN report has warned, while a US-based research firm has poured scorn on Tony Abbott’s insistence that coal is “good for humanity.”
A report by the UN Environment Programme states that the world should aim to be “carbon neutral” by 2070 at the latest. Exceeding a budget of just 1,000 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide would risk “severe, pervasive and in some cases irreversible climate change impacts”.
In an analysis of each signatory to a UN goal to limit global warming to 2C above pre-industrial levels, the report found that just four nations – Australia, Canada, Mexico and the US – needed to do more to meet their respective emissions reduction targets by 2020.
8. The power of crypto currencies.
Kim Hill interviews Andreas Antonopoulos - entrepreneur, writer, university lecturer and guru on all things Bitcoin and crypto currency.
He was a keynote speaker at New Zealand’s first ever cryptocurrency conference in Queenstown last weekend. He has also built three startups using Bitcoin technology and dedicated his career to the area - what he calls the "edge of a technology transformation".
Andreas finds interesting, relevant and elegant ways of articulating why Bitcoin and other crypto currencies built on the Blockchain technology exist, how they work and what they can be used for.
While the arguments go both ways, I am firmly optimistic and excited by crypto currencies. The things they enable are as big and broad as you can dream of. Distributed Anonymous Corporations (DACs) are one example. You can read about Lazooz, a ridesharing application a bit like Uber or Lyft which functions on its own native crypto currency.
If you haven’t properly understood the concepts then Kim and Andreas’ chat is 24 minutes of your life well spent.
9. Access over ownership.
In 1950 the American Dream was owning a house and the maximum amount of consumer goods.
In 2050 the American Dream may be owning nothing, but having access to everything.
The Sharing Economy is the tool enabling this shift from ownership to access. At a high level the sharing economy involves - utilising inefficient assets so the resources of those who have, can be accessed by those who want.
What happens when the importance of access to things trumps the value of owning those same things? The end of ownership. From computer hardware, to houses, trucks, cars, and more, the notion of ownership is changing as software enables the matching of people and organizations that have things and those that need them.
Joining a16z’s Balaji Srinivasan to pick apart this trend are Joe Gebbia, Airbnb co-founder and chief product officer; John Stanfield co-founder and CEO of Local Motion; and Ben Uretsky, co-founder and CEO of DigitalOcean.
10. A giant leap for mankind?
With China and the United States announcing brave new commitments to limits on greenhouse gas emissions, and the European Union reaffirming its own, its helpful to look at what this means for staying within the two degree temperature rise limit.
The World Resources Institute have done it, comparing both countries’ historical trajectory with new targets, analysing what this will mean and whether its realistic. In the author’s views the adoption of a common assessment and reporting standard presents a key challenge, while declining “technology costs” (think renewables, utilities, transport) and demographic changes (think population trends, urbanisation and the new Aussie/Kiwi dream) provide a promising context for achieving these goals.
Moves like this from the world’s XXL emitters suggest changes are underfoot in the way they are thinking about the need to cut emissions. Obama forcing climate change onto the agenda of the G20 summit, hosted in Australia, is further evidence that decisive leadership may be starting to happen.
If New Zealand is going to stick to Tim Groser and the central Government’s approach of being a 'fast follower' we better start following and ramping up our own targets.
With the historic climate announcement by President Barack Obama and President Xi Jinping, the United States and China joined the European Union in committing to new limits on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. These three economic powerhouses emit about as much each year as the rest of the world combined, so their commitments have important implications for the world’s ability to stay within its carbon budget.
While China and the United States are at different stages of development – reflected in their historic and per capita emissions – the numbers suggest both countries’ proposed reductions are a meaningful deviation from business as usual. Further efforts will be needed, however, to ensure these targets are met and that ambition is enhanced.
19 Comments
RE: #5
The government intends to go further, setting goals to increase the use of alternative energy sources to as much as 45 percent of all power generated by 2035 and boost that figure to 80 percent by 2050.
I can only suggest they hurry up since Germany's southern EU neighbours will be champing at the bit to ward off the winter cold. Read more
#1 What are those cities producing? (and where is it going?)
#3 Covered motorcycles. no big deal. if people wanted to do that they would. Think services, what is the car used for. Carrying families - you're going to see either walkability dense urbanisation like high and ultra low wealth US OR miles of suburban family hell (and with a family how do you get all the kids to school and all their stuff as well) Won't get kids into that covered bike.
#5 As soon as alternatives become entrenched then government will start taxing them directly (probably by the W) in order to protect it's revenue. Nz power companies are all ready pulling back hard against small holder co-generation investments.
#6 the push ads (and loyalty bs) is why many people don't want extra features and super smart phones.
#7 If cryptocurrency is so great, why has it's value halved in 12 months, with many 24 month old currencies going extinct - even many of the trading sites have or are reformetting themselves and pocketing anything they find "down the back of the couch". Haircutting much??
#8 truth in advertising - they have plans on board to force everyone to rebuy all their current gear to fit the new rules. they _just_happen_ to be able to supply all "your" demands for updated technology and machinery (you all know China and US are primary global profiteers of technology and machinery, right). Don't buy in to the scam (their commitment will just be subsidised greenwash, while they'll happily take your money)
#1 Export and Import Hubs - Technology Sector and great places to live
# 3 Not everyone is choosing to have kids these days, and my daily comute on my bike would be better off without all those tractors rolling around the city
# 7 Blockchain http://www.investopedia.com/articles/investing/052014/why-bitcoins-valu…
#1 no value add, just warehousing....
#3 True, and inner city living is good for that kind of person. also well done on the ZPG contribution. personally I think such people should get tax exemptions (after all it's not like the system is funding their kids (schools, teachers, free medical, extra parks, police to watch them until they can be taxpayers).
When I'm doing building work or computer work, I used to find some modern deathboxes just weren't big enough for the cargo. Now I've got a ute. I'd love to get an EV for when it's just me and the groceries and small items, but the capital cost is prohibitive (first world problem).
#7 There were two major BTC drops. (1) When the cops found a way to track the black market trade, and when the tax departments declared them value. Even the Mt Gox mega-theft didn't impact the market that much. And yes seen splits and lost dust but with the drop in value, plus the value that's gained in coin launches (stagging the exchanges) that isn't seen afterwards in mining or trade, the shine is certainly off the cryptos
#3 Absolutely agree - we often see this so-called solutions put forward with no appreciation of the multiple uses required of vehicles. Sure there are a lot of one occupant commuting, however there are other jobs either end of and outside that commute that the vehicle is used for
Plus the motorcycle is already invented - I commute on one every day and look far cooler that that geek-mobile
good article on the history of predicting El Nino
http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2014/12/04/how-scientists-unraveled-t…
#5 sorry to rain all over the Cherman Luv-fest, but the reality is much less hopeful:
- The nuclear switch-off and the need for spinning plant in sunless, still times (read: most nights) propels das Volk in seiner Gesamtheit straight into Russia's welcoming arms.
- Much of the existing generation is from the un-greenest fuel on the planet: lignite.
- The consequences of this energy policy foobar include forced relocations, destruction of existing green villages, and the concomitant social effects.
The money shot:
"Sigmar Gabriel, Chancellor Merkel's Energy minister, claims that more lignite mines are vital: "We need strategic reserves of gas and coal power for the times when the wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine," he said."
chuckle .. that's one of the major failings of digital media grabbing snippets and sound-bites and sloganistic crap from other digital media outlets .. it just clogs up the airwaves with nonsense
The swipe at Tony Abbott in #7 is much the same .. back story of that is Abbott is captive to the Minerals Council of Australia who receive $10 billion annually in government subsidies and spend a lot of that lobbying the government to do it's bidding, remove the carbon tax (done), eliminate the Minerals Resource Rent Tax (done), eliminate government incentives for renewable energy (done), replace it with a "direct action" plan by planting more trees which in turn when engulfed by wildfires release more carbon than all the coal-fired power generators
The latest chapter is the EPA's approval to establish Gina Rhinehart'ss latest coal mine venture at Abbott Point in Queensland, build a loading port, which requires dredging 90 million tonnes of spoil and dump it at sea between the coast and the Great Barrier Reef
That's what Obama was having a crack at Abbott about wanting the Reef to still be there for his grandchildren to see
Once again we see the total nonsense about Australia's per capita CO2 emissions - a figure we also see reported as a negative for NZ.
We could reduce our per capita emissions tomorrow by shutting the hydro powered smelter whereupon demand being unchanged - a new probably coal powered unit would open in Asia.
NZ reduces emmissions - Global emissions increase !
Similarly with our overstated agricultural emissions which are measured on a gross basis and do not subtract off the CO2 absorbed by the grasses consumed.
To reduce global emissions - we should produce as much as possible in the most efficient manner - that is NZ with grass fed animals. This would increase NZ's emissions but reduce global emsssions.
Per capita emission meadures for a global problem are a complete nonsense and should never be used for any basis of comparision.
#1, Most cities are historical and sprawl from the original coastal ports, long since they could be left to rust and efficient cities be developed for purpose and size, from scratch, 50-100Km adjacent with a highspeed link to support the migration. Chistchurch was sort of done this way, at the time, as there was no room for a city at the port, Canberra, Ordos, etc...
#3, not so much a solution as cramming and a bid for cash from the guilty greenie wannabes who would not ride a motorcycle or catch a bus.
#7, The Australian government actions only look strange if you consider them to be representing and leading their constituents. If you consider that they may simply be the mouthpieces justifying the continued profiteering of major old money and monopoly networks in Energy, mining, Media/Communications, it all falls into place. Add to that legally compulsory voting and the stage is set to be able to say to all that it was their choice.
#8, I would love to engage in bitcoin etc. but fear that the 1% would already have it speculated and hedged up the wazoo. Maybe it will settle and we can ditch the rentiers plaguing us within the current system.
Global Warming?? Hmm, perhaps this article will show some light on the matter.
NASA Admits That Winters are Going to Get Colder…Much Colder
www.thedailysheeple.com/nasa-admits-that-winters-are-going-to-get-colde…
#10 A giant leap for mankind? Or just politicians pulling the wool and feeling good about themselves. China's emmissions were going to peak in 2030 treaty or no treaty.
"It is a common belief that China's CO2 emissions will continue to grow throughout this century and will dominate global emissions. The findings from this research suggest that this will not necessarily be the case because saturation in ownership of appliances, construction of residential and commercial floor area, roadways, railways, fertilizer use, and urbanization will peak around 2030 with slowing population growth. The baseline and alternative scenarios also demonstrate that China's 2020 goals can be met and underscore the significant role that policy-driven energy efficiency improvements will play in carbon mitigation along with a decarbonized power supply through greater renewable and non-fossil fuel generation."
Look at the growth of the entertainment industry over the past, say forty years. Particularly sports.
How many billions of dollars are pumped into Olympic, Winter and Paraplegic games. Then there are the golf and tennis tournaments. And we have world cups for rugby, soccer and so on.
Not only do you have the sports people playing the game, but you also have the coaches, referees, sports writers and commentators, the grounds maintenance staff. The list of jobs created is endless not to mention the money that can be made from sport.
So, when robots do all the physical work, and computers do all the other stuff where will all the jobs be?
Governments wont pay a living wage to do nothing, after all you will have lots of spare time to get into mischief and give them a headache. You may even want to overthrow them and install a better system, cant have that. No best to keep the people busy earning a living. Besides when you are dependent upon a job to survive you are a slave.
Can you imagine a world in which we progress from from the physical entertainment world to the virtual reality world?
Just think of what you will be able to do and achieve in the virtual world. Instead of playing physical sports you may become a virtual sporting champion and earn millions. And like the physical world not everyone reaches the top.
The possibilities in the virtual world will be limitless.
No need to be jealous of the one percent. Want to live in a luxury home, well you can in the virtual world.
So I see virtual reality playing a very important part in our future.
Just think how lovely it will be for the one percent and the government. While everyone is buried in their virtual world they wont see what the one percent and the government is up to.
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