Five Years On

In our regular critical review, we revisit stories we identified as interesting back in 2001 – and check where they’re going now.

Bright idea

LEDs come into the spotlight

 Those little green numbers on the microwave take a lot of stick from the energy efficiency gurus for wasting more watts than the machine uses to cook food in its lifetime. But they’ve got one thing going for them – they’re LEDs.

The durable little light emitting diode is steadily making its mark on the eco-lighting scene. We picked out the use of LED arrays in California’s traffic lights in 2001 [GF30, ‘California goes for green traffic lights ’.], and today you’ll find them saving power at crossroads in cities as diverse as Denver, Delhi and Berlin. They’re in cycle lamps the world over, and can even be found in fridges, where the ‘stay cool’ bulbs really come into their own.

LEDs typically last 20 times as long as incandescents – and twice as long as ‘energy-efficient’ fluorescent bulbs. On the downside, they are more expensive. The main buyers so far have been councils looking for long-term savings. But the price is falling gradually – which, together with improvements in quality and brightness over the last few years, has started to bring them into our living rooms too.

Giles Boardman sells LED spotlights (clusters of the tiny diodes in one ‘bulb’) to the public through Efficient Lighting. Although he says they’re “no good for reading the paper”, he reckons homeowners will be using them for their entire space lighting by 2010. Manufacturers are aiming to raise their efficiency by a factor of four to 80% efficiency by then, making them 16 times better than traditional incandescent bulbs. (For one blogger’s spirited call for those to be banned, see www.ban-the-bulb.blogspot.com.) -

Hannah Bullock

Efficient Light, 08702 425 384,
www.efficientlight.co.uk

Steps in the City

Activists change the financial world from the inside

It doesn’t seem surprising now, but five years ago it was noteworthy that a string of environmental activists had swapped t-shirts for pinstriped shirts and moved into the City [‘Daniels in the lion’s den ’, GF30, p54]. What is surprising is that all those featured in the article still work there, even if they have moved firms or jobs within their firms.

The world of socially responsible investment (SRI) that they joined has also moved on. Not as much as any of them would have wished – it remains essentially a specialist niche, however much SRI people talk about influencing mainstream analysts. One significant difference, though, is that these days SRI recruits are less likely to come from NGOs. That is progress, because it means they’re more comfortable talking in the language of finance that colleagues and companies understand best.

Five years ago SRI was tolerated (just about) rather than appreciated by most of those in the mainstream. Now there is more appreciation of the value to investment houses – not least because the SRI business continued to attract retail funds after the dotcom crash when others were struggling. And there is more appreciation in the mainstream of the importance of some SRI themes, especially climate change and especially among analysts of the most exposed sectors (such as energy generation and airlines).

Ultimately, though, mainstream investment analysis is still trapped by short-term time horizons. The old joke has it that in the City, ‘long-term’ means after lunch, and the rise of hedge funds has meant that is more true and less funny than it used to be. Something else has changed – for me – in the five years since I wrote that piece for Green Futures. I too have followed a similar route, moving from corporate responsibility journalism to corporate responsibility consultancy. And I find myself agreeing with Raj Thamotheram (recently moved from pension service USS to AXA insurance) who said in 2001: “It’s much more liberating than I thought possible.” - Roger Cowe

Fertile ground

Indian farmers take on sustainable agriculture

What became of Schumacher College’s Indian sister in the Himalayan foothills? Has the fledgling organic farm and research centre, set up by visionary ecologists Vandana Shiva and Satish Kumar, spread indigenous wisdom far and wide and seeded a transformation of Indian agriculture? [GF30,‘India teaches its indigenous wisdom ’.].

For an outfit run on a shoestring, the Bija Vidyapeeth centre has done remarkably well, attracting government officials from both India and Europe to hear inspirational speakers such as Wangari Mathaai, Caroline Lucas and Herbie Girardet share their wisdom on issues like water, democracy and cities. Just as importantly, its week-long courses on sustainable agriculture are drawing in up to 300 local farmers at a time. They come for both classroom learning and hands-on experience in the 30-acre grounds, where they’re introduced to soil testing, organic compost making, seed collecting and herbal medicines. As with Schumacher, there’s an emphasis on communal living; participants tend the gardens, and prepare meals with organic homegrown food.

Shiva knows, of course, that it takes more than one college to find solutions for a whole subcontinent. She’s especially concerned that seed patents and GM crop trials will compound the debt problems that already face almost half of India’s farming households. Fearful that indigenous seeds will be lost to future generations, she’s launched a one-year ‘seed pilgrimage’ this spring, urging farmers to boycott GM cotton trials and collect and distribute GM-free seeds.

Yet she also places her faith in a chorus of voices like Bija Vidyapeeth’s across the world: “My dream is that we are part of a major network, where people learn the practical methods of sustainable living before they are forgotten.” – 

Charles Cotton

Bija Vidyapeeth, + 91 11 2653 5422,
bijavidyapeeth@vsnl.net,
www.vshiva.net

Power to the people

Residents keep waste company in line

 It’s not often you get a waste incineration plant inviting the community through its doors. But that’s what they did in Scotland, thanks to a ‘Good Neighbourhood Charter’ brokered between Dundee Energy Recycling (DERL) and local residents by Friends of the Earth [‘Dundee – where the smoke don’t blow ’, GF30].

As well as keeping the company in line through regular inspections of the plant, the community forum has worked with DERL to sort out issues like the bad smell in the area, and has got the truck route diverted away from a school entrance.

DERL certainly puts its “healthy relations with our local communities” down to the charter, which has recently been renewed for the second time. The opinion at the grassroots is much the same. “They’ve always done what the community has asked,” says forum member Rena Smith. But she’s not convinced that the charter should go on and on: “In five years’ time, there will hopefully be a better way of getting rid of waste.”

Tellingly, Friends of the Earth’s signatures are not on it this time round. “Back in 2000 we wanted to support residents in taking on some of the issues affecting them,” explains FOE Scotland’s Jeni Mackay. “But we’ve much more knowledge on incineration now, and there are bigger concerns that the community just can’t monitor – for example, is it increasing cancer clusters?”

What’s more, the charity isn’t convinced that such charters empower all those who are actually affected by such sites. FOE’s research shows it’s likely that only those who can afford to threaten class action are offered charters by companies, possibly passing the problem onto someone else less well resourced down the road.

So, might a neighbourhood charter help sort out the furore surrounding the Belvedere energy-from-waste plant planned for London? Not a chance, says FOE’s Michael Walhurst. “No community charter would justify this.” – Hannah Bullock

DERL, 01382 432777
FOE Scotland, 0131 554 9977

9 October 2006

Hannah Bullock and Roger Cowe