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Learn about the need to quadruple resource productivity to double wealth while halving resource use for environmental sustainability and wealth growth. Environmental policies, energy efficiency, and decoupling wealth from energy consumption are discussed.
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Quadrupling is twice as good as doubling Ernst von Weizsäcker Bren School Bren School Corporate Partners Summit May 11th 2007
Environmental Policy in the 19th Century Nature Conservation
Environmental Policy After „Silent Spring“ Pollution Control Nature Conservation
Stabilizingclimate requires halving GHG emissions, but a world of 7 billion people rather wants a doubling!
l Some say wind energy is the answer
Many believe biofuels will be the answer. • But biofuels can be • an environmental nightmare • economically problematic, • socially disruptive
Economically problematic: Prices for reducing one ton of CO2 using biofuels (in Euros; €500 = $630) (The present market price for a one ton permit of CO2 emissions is below €5 and may go up to $15 within a year) high estimates low
Socially disruptive: Mexican corn prices for tortillas doubled due to fuel demand
Renewable sources of energy are helpful and desirable. But they do not solve the problem of global warming, for a very long time to come! What then?
So let us look for a more radical solution: Decoupling wealth from energy consumption!
Decoupling wealth from resource consumption means increasing resource productivity
Environmental policy after climate and resource problems became prominent Resource Productivity Pollution Control Nature Conservation
Quadrupling resource productivity would allow us doubling wealth while halving resource use!
Imagine a bucket of water weighing twenty pounds.How many kilowatt-hourswould you need to lift that bucket from sea level up to the top of Mount McKinley?
1 kwh The answer is: One fifth of a kilowatt-hour! (- assuming that one watt-second equals one Newton-meter)
We can increase efficiency for energy, water and materials at least fourfold
Amory Lovins‘ Hypercar, re-dubbed „Revolution“, is four or seven times more fuel efficient than today‘s cars Hypercar 120-150 mpg Today‘s cars 20-30 mpg Energy efficiency
House in the Alps Rocky Mountain Institute Heating efficiency
Energy efficiency in office buildings The Donald Bren School, a Platinum LEED building Energy & water efficiency
From incandescent light bulbs to solid state lighting Energy efficiency
Matsuhita refrigerators: steadily increasing efficiency
Typically, however, a factor of four is unattainable if we look at efficiency of simple processes.Bigger gains come in when comparing complex systems. Here, we talk about productivity
Old: Increasing labour productivity New: Increasing resource productivity Changing technological paradigms
„Productivity“ is much richer than „efficiency“ Productivity is about networks and cascades Efficiency is inside a box (e.g. mpg)
Integrated energy, water and transport optimization Source Ulf Ranhagen, Stockholm, 2006
What has been the main driving force for the increase more than twentyfold of labor productivity? Economists would say it was labor cost. What has been the main driving force for the inrease more than twentyfold of wages? Economists would say labor productivity
Labor poductivity went in parallel with labor costs This suggests a strategy of actively elevating energy prices in parallel with energy productivity increases
In Japan, the new catchword is the “Cyclical Economy”
The sixth wave of technological innovation (after Charlie Hargroves, Brisbane, Australia)