European week for waste reduction

This entire week from 16-24 November it is the European week for waste reduction, which also has a Dutch website.The aim is to encourage all Europeans make others aware of renewable sources and recycling options. 

While the one entry listed for the Netherlands is a clothing swap in The Hague, our own campus also regularly has clothing swaps, the latest during the sustainability week. 

As for awareness, I still think the best publication with options along the entire supply chain was: Circular Economy 3.0 - Solving confusion around new conceptions of circularity by synthesising and re-organising the 3R's concept into a 10R hierarchy.This shows the following ten options, and the first 4 (R0-R3) and R7 are specifically for consumers to consider, and can really help with rethinking choices for circularity in our own lives.

R0 = Refuse

R1 = Reduce

R2 = Resell, Reuse

R3 = Repair

R4 = Refurbish

R5 = Remanufacture

R6 = Re-purpose

R7 = Recycle materials

R8 = Recover energy

R9 = Re-mine

 

Article on environmental migrants in coastal Bangladesh published

The journal Habitat International has published an article I co-authored with my colleague Md. Nasif Ahsan and other co-authors, titled: ‘Displaced by nature, driven by choice: Exploring the factors influencing environmental migrants' habitat preferences in coastal Bangladesh'.

You can access it for free until December 20 2024 here:https://authors.elsevier.com/c/1k0wSiuWnJ3Lj 

The abstract reads as follows: 

"This study examines the factors influencing environmental migrants’ habitat preferences in southwestern Bangladesh. Using a multi-stage sampling technique, we selected 408 households in rural and urban areas, who had moved to their current locations due to climatic extremes. We applied relevant regression models to analyze the complex interplay of socioeconomic, environmental, and institutional factors shaping migration decisions. Our empirical results suggest that, despite having greater access to services in cities, migrants reported lower levels of well-being than their rural counterparts, which could be attributed to reduced social cohesion and limited opportunities for participation in decision-making. Disaster preparedness, early warning access, and prolonged exposure to environmental hazards significantly influence migration decisions and well-being. Protracted post-disaster suffering increases the likelihood of migration to urban slums, emphasizing the vulnerability of rural populations. Men are more likely than women to migrate to urban areas, possibly due to perceived employment opportunities. Surprisingly, while slum dwellers have better service access, their well-being scores are lower than rural residents. Access to education, healthcare, safe drinking water, and early warning systems are all crucial determinants of well-being. Policy recommendations include improving disaster preparedness and early warning systems in rural areas, developing targeted interventions for urban slum migrants focused on social cohesion and income diversification, and implementing gender-specific support programs. This research contributes to understanding environmental migration dynamics in Bangladesh and informs policymakers about sustainable resettlement strategies. Future studies should explore non-linear relationships and expand to diverse geographical contexts."

National energy week

The week of 14 to 20 October is national energy week in the Netherlands. This is aimed at government and business stakeholders and has 4 different trade shows throughout the country on the topic, and promotes the energy transition. 

Our Dutch climate agreement has as aim to cut CO2 emissions in half by 2030 (compared to 1990) by 5 goals:

• Built environment: by 2050 7 million houses and 1 million buildings should be disconnected from gas
• Mobility (traffic and transport): by 2050 there are no emissions
• Industry: circular by 2050 and close to no GHG
• Agriculture and land use: climate neutral by 2050
• Electricity: by 2030 all electricity comes from renewable sources

A lot of this agreement focuses on energy related technologies. But there are still technologies costing energy that we don't think about too much in our daily lives. Starting from using less, here are some things we could consider.

Email and attachments: 20 mails a day (no attachments) is the equivalent of driving 1000 km a year. The mails are stored on a server and only if you delete them from your trash, will they stop costing server space and thereby energy (and water for cooling). A 1MB attachment in an email supposedly costs 15g CO2 emissions. So it is better to send a link to a shared file than the attachment itself. As example, if you would send 25 MB per week, you could save over 19 kg.

Email signatures: "An average email signature that features a profile picture and company logo" could be 0.08 MB, which doesn't seem a lot. Depending on how many mails you send, it could add up quickly. According to this link it could become e.g. 10 emails per day * 1.2 grams CO2 * 255 working days = over 3 kg of CO2 emissions. So it is good to reconsider if you need to send the company logo to everyone you mail, or any other text/links in every mail. Does the recipient already know you? Best leave it out.

Saving files on a drive/dropbbox/other online server/cloud: Again, the data centers require energy and water to maintain access to your files. The larger the files, the more resources required. While it is not much, cumulative it becomes a lot and it is good practice to remove files you no longer need, also for security reasons. In 2021 3.7 TWh electricity was provided to data centers, 3.3% of total Dutch electricity use. 

According to milieucentraal an average Dutch household emits 18,500 kg CO2 per year. Yes, it is not much to save around 1/1000th of your annual emissions, or 1/500th, assuming there are 2 people in the household that might reduce these emissions. But times all households in the Netherlands, this becomes a much larger share once more. As these are mostly automated steps that cost little time to set up or adjust, it is an easy change to implement, and all small bits help.

Examples of Green Infrastructure - Berlin

What could be more in touch with urban nature than sharing your meal outside with a bird?

The conference site itself, Atelier gardens, is located just South of the former Tempelhofer airfield and houses a film studio. The name suggests the location is very green, and as we arrived new plants and an irrigation system were being installed. There were trees (very welcome as cover for both sun and rain as we walked between the buildings) and diverse bushes, as well as herbs for cooking at the on site restaurant.

Given that we had four action packed days at the conference site, I didn't get to see much of Berlin, but some parts are definitely very green. Even within the dense inner city, once you got off the main roads and into the smaller hidden alleys, entire building facades could be green, and outside terraces added plants where possible. I also visited Viktoriapark, which has a higher hill overlooking the city, though the trees covered much of the surroundings, and a waterfall running downhill.

To me the question when visiting cities these days is, how can we measure how much of the city fulfills the ambitions of the 3-30-300 policy, and how can we increase this in the areas that need it the most, as they are often already quite densely built? You can see different available methods for measuring and those in development in the link. Would these methods work where you live, is the required data available? What do you think would be the result of the 3-30-300 scan for your city?

World Environment Day

It's World Environment Day and this year's theme is on land restoration, desertification and drought resilience. In the Netherlands you could visit e.g. the ReNature festival. 

It is a good time to consider the impact of land use on the soil and life within in, and how nature based solutions might help recover soil quality and increase drought resilience. Not just for humans either.

World Biodiversity Day

It's world biodiversity day and the UT has many relating events the coming weeks. Check them out here: BioBlitz 2024: what species can you find on campus? Explore the campus & help spot plants and animals

Gotta catch them all! Help find more species we didn't know exist at our green UT campus during the events listed. You can find more news on international events here, as it is a UN initiated day, and translation to Dutch here.

 

 

 

Examples of Green Infrastructure - Vienna

Here are some examples of green infrastructure from Vienna, Austria. While I got the chance to see only a small part of the city, it has left me with a mixed impression. On the one hand, there are several large parks, and the Danube river and a canal cross the city, allowing for blue-green infrastructure as well. 

 

 

 

On the other hand, the inner city is densely built and doesn't allow for large green infrastructure. In some cases, it is even mobile. I realize that during my short visit I have only gotten an impression of this large city, but especially the newly developed area north of the river really drove home the point that green infrastructure should be a part of urban planning with the same priority as other services. There is nearly no space for nature, while there are thousands of apartments and therefore people with the need to visit and experience nature, preferably within 300 m of their homes.