CCBF and University of Hong Kong published a paper “Every Building a Powerhouse”  they missed the point and an opportunity.  I am afraid that academic’s still don’t get it. What is needed is “community” scale,  a cluster of buildings, an estate, development or community these can yield cost effective low carbon solutions.  And it’s not a new concept, think about district heating – its been tried and tested in Europe and USA for many decades. However, what I propose here is to expanded that concept, to go beyond district heating to use 21st century design ideas and technology, essentially its a blueprint for a sustainable green community.

Ask an Engineer

Engineers spend a lot of their time struggling to match demand and supply profiles in a building. However, if we consider the wider picture in a community opportunities arise from diversity, the diversity amongst a number of buildings in a community. Think about an office block and a residential tower, during the day light hours the residents are in work and the building consumes little energy, whilst the office is occupied during the day.

Using Community Resources

Hong Kong is sadly lagging behind other first world nations in its handling of Municipal Solid Waste (MSW), every year another reminder is sounded the landfill sites are exhausted, yet the policies don’t change, MSW is collected and transported across the territory burning diesel fuel to the near bursting capacity landfill sites.

The typical housing estate or development has opportunities municipal solid waste is only one, the sewerage, energy use, but these are invisible, hidden from people in our communities, and in my encouraging the NIMBY attitude.  We should know by now- throw it away! means get it away from me.  However, no single community or district should be forced to bear a huge portion of the environmental burden for the entire population of Hong Kong.

In areas like Hong Kong and Singapore, where land is scare, dump waste into landfills is simply not sustainable, government agencies are starting to recognise the problems, but the solution is not tackled.

A community based solution means the waste owners need to see the results of their own waste, in the energy sector we often say if it not measured is not managed, and the same is true for waste management. Its going the be difficult to encourage households to reduce or manage municipal waste whilst it remains hidden and silently moved to a distal landfill far from their own backyard. Instead, I propose these valuable waste streams should be used in the community for the community.  Where excess green electricity is generated it should earn a significant premium for the community generator from the utility companies. 

Waste used for local power generation, sewerage for local methane production, rainwater harvesting for local water use. The main advantage for local community based solutions, over the single building is that the supply and demand profiles are diverse, where one building requires more water, another building with lower usage can meet the demand.

On the topic of waste, we need to see the big picture, organic material from the countless garden and sitting out areas is collected by hand and stuffed into ubiquitous black plastic bags for disposal, presumably sent to the landfill. At the same time, tonnes of fresh organic material is imported for building new gardens, there is a very obvious disconnect, the necessary policy to manage environmental resources is missing. Waste food can be rapidly processed into compost also.

Other past projects, including green buildings have shown that where people can be engaged the value of the investment increases,  making the community a more desirable location will also impact the real estate market significantly increasing property valuations.

We should have progressed further, yet our environment continues to provide “free” resources divorcing us from the true cost of resources, materials, water, and energy keeping them artificially low, not a great incentive for recycling or management is it? It’s time for a change.

All new buildings by regulation mustbe provided with two separate water systems, potable and flushing water. The flushing water infrastructure must be designed to handle sea water.  in buildings uPVC is the material of choice for pipework serving all sanitary appliances.  WC cisterns are designed without any metal components exposed to the corrosive seawater.

WSD Distribution Diagram

Underground the pipework distribution utilises cement lined piping for sea water to the service reservoirs and buildings as shown in the above diagram (courtesy of Hong Kong Water Supplies Dept. http://www.wsd.gov.hk).

Having separate potable and sea water infrastructure has another advantage, in the event that one water service is shut-down for maintenance, that doesn’t stop all the water services. Furthermore, since the sea water provides part of the buildings water demand, the potable infrastructure is smaller and lower cost.

One of the major objections against using sea water is a concern that potable water and seawater piping could be cross-connected, in reality that’s an unlikely occurrence because the materials are different, its physically difficult to connect a cement lined pipe to PE piping.

China is starting to embrace sea water as a resource too.

Its obvious really, in coastal areas, why flush our precious potable fresh water down the toilet? The use of sea water is a low-tech solution to lower and conserve potable water usage, and very cost effective.

The BEAM Society in Hong Kong (www.beamsociety.org.hk) is calling tenders for consultants to undertake the updating of the Hong Kong BEAM Interiors green building rating tool, here is the link to download the information:  BEAM Interiors consultancy

~~~ John Herbert

No more excuses!!! Join : “Green Business Networking Speed-Dating” organized by the FCCIHK and its Green business committee.

Its a  speed-Networking-event  for companies in the green industry :

• Unique opportunity to meet a maximum of companies in the green business in a minimum of time
• One-hour meetings organized under a speed-dating format
• 3-minute interviews
• Around 20 companies met during one hour
• Followed by a one-hour networking cocktail.
• Open to all actors in the field

Time efficient networking format, that suits your Hong Kong

Participants:

- Open to members of the French and German Chambers
- Participation of Delegates from the Environment Protection Department
- Diligent Group Ltd., EKKO (HK) Ltd, Suez Environmental

Register online on the French Chamber : Here

Power generating stations were once upon a time, small, and local, often located right on the edge of town.  Now remember at that time the fuel of choice was coal, so as the demand for the new electricity service increased, more coal was burnt in the cities increasing local pollution. Faced with the choice of clean up or move out, the generators moved outside the communities they served to remote locations that allowed larger plants to be constructed, they were out of sight and out of mind.

As the distance between the generator and consumer increased, extra losses in the form of transmission losses occurred, to cover the vast distances the transmission voltage was increased incurring transformer losses at each end of a circuit.

Long Transmission Lines Increases losses

Also have you ever wondered why many power generating stations are located near rivers or coastline? Because the process of using steam to electricity generates vast quantities of waste heat, and with the generators now located at distal sites there are few neighbours to use this high grade waste heat so its dumped into the nearest convenient river, cooling tower or seashore.

Inland generators overcome the problem by building cooling towers (pictured below) using vast quantities of water to dump the waste heat into the atmosphere.

FLICKR http://underclassrising.net/

To be frank the thermal efficiency of a typical coal fired generating station is miserably low approximately 30 -35 percent.

So today, after pushing the generators and pollution away from us, it should not be a surprise to find that less than 10 percent of the energy in fuel ever reaches the consumer or put it another way 90 percent of energy in the fuel is lost forever.

There are viable alternatives for China and elsewhere in Asia. Cogeneration is the engineering term we use, essentially it is a system that will use that waste energy and that means a dramatic efficiency improvement.

The waste heat energy can be used for heating,  process, or air conditioning system and provides an overall thermal efficiency nearer 85 percent,  nearly 300% improvement over conventional plants.

Adsorption chillers are a breed apart, they create chilled water but heat energy through a process of concentrating and dilution of spacial salt compounds. High grade waste heat from any source could be used to power air conditioning without the need for large electrical supplies (some electricity would be still needed for the associated air handling units, pumps and automatic controls).

Local Cogeneration as the name implies is close to the consumer and demands a cleaner fuel, natural gas is a good choice where available.

One barrier for the wider implementation is the utility companies themselves, having invested billions of dollars to build and operate the plant and equipment, they have unsurprisingly created rules to protect that investment.

What is needed is community based approach, for example use the locally created waste to fire cogeneration plants for that community. Instead of hiding from the problem, make it visible, a showcase,  demonstrate that waste from their office or home will be burnt across the street to provide local community electricity.

For manufacturing plants using high pressure steam, a simple design change can result in large benefits, generate superheated steam to drive an electricity turbine first, that will power your factory, and use the turbine exhaust saturated steam to serve your process, and return the condensate to the boiler – its a simple and elegant solution but often overlooked.

Here is a link to an interesting article about the multiple use for steam generation

Instead of using technology, China has sadly followed the western development model for coal fired plant, plus suffering the torment of wasted energy plus regular power outages. Many businesses in China, particularly in Guangdong have no choice except diesel fuelled engines to overcome frequent blackouts and shortages, whilst simultaneously wasting Gigawatts in wasted heat.

Countries with a strong demand for heating homes and offices, such as Germany and Nordic countries in Europe waste heat from power generators is used in district heating systems delivering heat to the doorstep. Here in Asia, and the tropics where air conditioning is demanded for comfort, waste heat from power generators, or biomass boilers should be used to power to absorption chillers.

The public and governments are increasingly focused on demand side awareness, and it is noticeable, through more efficient lighting, LED’s fittings, and air conditioning systems but remember that is one part of the story.  In Hong Kong 1/3rd of the power generated is used to drive air conditioning equipment,  so businesses today are paying utility companies to waste fuel resources that can’t be replenished. Don’t you think it is time to get smart? I do.

– John A. Herbert, Kelcroft, Consultant

Hong Kong Trader magazine featuring an interview with John Herbert, Kelcroft

~~~ John Herbert, Kelcroft, Consultant

UPDATE (4 Nov 2010):

Parlez-vous français? Also published in French, here is the link:
http://www.lepetitjournal.com/hongkong/a-la-une-hong-kong/88814-ecologie-hong-kong-affirme-son-expertise-environnementale.html

click on an image to enlarge………. the red overlay indicates heavy traffic, green overlay indicates normal traffic, it is real time and that simple.

~~~ John A. Herbert, Kelcroft, BEAM Professional

EUI, or the other commonly used metrics for building efficiency are childs play to professionals, but the general public doesn’t get it. You need to spend your resources educating people what the metric means, but with MPG they get it!  Although the HKSAR hasnt taken up the challenge, opting for another EUI as part of the new building energy efficiency code (cap 611), the idea has taken hold in USA link from the Department of Energy Resources.

The USA State of Massachusetts has published a white paper ( link PDF white paper MPG for buildings).  Thanks for reading, here is my presentation slides on slideshare:

John Herbert, Kelcroft, BEAM Professional

If you dig deep enough, and long enough hidden within the Hong Kong BEAM website you might just stumble on the new BEAM FAQ page.  It was created by the BEAM Technical Review Committee (TRC) to answer many of the general questions by building owners and consultants about technical issues involved with obtaining BEAM certification – to save your time here is a shortcut:

Hong Kong BEAM Frequently Asked Questions  – BEAM FAQ

It has always been difficult to predict how and when the purely voluntary green building rating systems will become part of the building code requirements, not so for Malaysia, where the local newspaper reports today that all new buildings (new bungalows, semi-detached homes, government buildings) must have rainwater harvesting systems to gain building approval.

In case that over complicated link is broken, here is the report from the The Star (http://thestar.com.my):

Published: Monday June 13, 2011 MYT 4:42:00 PM

New bungalows, semi-detached homes, govt buildings must have rain water systems

By NG CHENG YEE

KUALA LUMPUR: Developers must include rain-harvesting systems in new bungalows, semi-detached homes and government buildings to get their plans approved.

This new regulation would soon be incorporated into the Uniform Building By-Laws to make the green feature mandatory, said Housing and Local Government Minister Datuk Chor Chee Heung.

The National Council for Local Government, chaired by the Deputy Prime Minister, had approved the new by-law on May 23, he said.

“Such a feature will allow owners of these premises to conserve rain water and use it to water plants, wash cars and for other purposes,” he told a press conference on Green Solution for Property Development Conference 2011: Greener Cities here on Monday.

He said developers who failed to include the feature in these buildings would not be able to get approval for their building plans.

On existing buildings, Chor said owners were encouraged to install such feature on a voluntary basis.

“We hope that when more houses are equipped with such feature, house owners will be able to see the benefit of it and follow suit,” he said.

Water conservation is a serious and often overlooked issue, countries across the region are only just beginning to consider and the fact Malaysia has acted can only be a positive indication.  As I have said before water is the new carbon.  Under the Hong Kong green building rating system BEAM fresh water conservation is encouraged with rainwater harvesting being one of many solutions. One would hope the Malaysian building code will address the issue of load (usage) reduction first and foremost, and no rely on rainwater harvesting to support unsustainable practices.

Three sensors neatly located directly above heater (lighting fitting)

Energy efficiency is easy right?  In a seminar about carbon and energy efficiency I noticed the neat location of three air conditioning return air temperature sensors – direct over a heater (aka lighting fitting) .  The truth is, energy efficiency is hard.

~~~ John Herbert, Kelcroft, Consultant.

Here is my top 5 green building challenges that need new solutions and green technology development.  Here is a link to the somewhat dark video on youtube:

and the presentation in pdf format.

Any other suggestions?

— John Herbert, consultant

BBC World Website (7 April 2011)

Hardly a day goes by without more news from the Japan’s stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, unlike past disasters, we have had more news, and media coverage that was inconceivable even ten years ago, and the unfolding tragedy in Japan and at the Fukushima Daiichi has impacted countries far from the leaking radiation.

Many countries including Germany, and China, have halted or postponed existing nuclear programmes for “safety checks” as the media report continues to report the countless attempts by the plant operators TEPCO to try and control the leakage from the wreckage. Japan like Hong Kong has few natural resources (coal, oil or gas) and relies heavily on its nuclear energy programme to provide 30% of its energy needs.

The elephant in the room is those pesky commitments to tackle climate change. China announced on the eve of COP16 (and reiterated at the recent NPCC 12th Five year plan [1] ) that it would reduce it’s Carbon Intensity by 40-45%   Hong Kong closely followed suit and also pledged to lowers its CI, but don’t mistake these Carbon Intensity reductions as energy efficiency improvements.

Carbon Intensity (CI) is defined as the quantity of carbon (CO2) emitted per unit of energy.  Therefore to lower your carbon intensity change from burning a high carbon fossil fuel like coal, to nuclear energy (or renewable energy) reduces the intensity, without any energy efficiency improvement, does that sound more like a Business As Usual approach than a real framework or strategy to tackle dwindling resources?

To achieve this impressive figures would be achieved by switching from power generation using fossil fuel to nuclear powered generation.  At Macau MIECF 2011 (31 March 2011) the Hong Kong Government’s EPD representative Mr Joe Fong [2] indicated that Hong Kong would increase the nuclear energy contribution imported from the mainland from 23% in 2009 to 50% by 2020.

Increasing Nuclear to 50% to lower Hong Kong's Carbon Intensity - Joe W.Y. Fong @ MICEF 2011

So, the obvious question needs to be raised,  if these promised CI reduction targets are to be achieved, and increasing nuclear energy production has been sidelined as a solution can will nations meet these ambitious targets? Is it even possible without increasing the contribution from nuclear powered facilities?  Fortunately, the answer to both questions is affirmative,  energy efficiency improvements can deliver real carbon reductions. It’s not sexy, and unlike building more power plants, it requires hard work on the ground, and political commitment but achievable.

Coupled with these unfolding events in Japan, unrest in the Middle East continues to cause jitters in the markets, dramatically increased crude oil prices adding salt to wound.  It seems that only major news reminds us that oil and other nature resources will not last forever.

Energy efficiency improvements are certain not a panacea for every problem a nation faces today, however developed nations have no excuses, I wonder how long it will take before politicians will truly embrace this opportunity.

– John Herbert, Kelcroft, consultant

1. China’s Carbon Intensity to be reduced by 40-45 % by 2020, based on 2005 baseline http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2011npc/2011-03/07/content_12125740.htm

2. http://www.macaomiecf.com/miecf2011/brochure/Urban_Planning/Joe_Fong.pdf

If pressure from government, NGO’s, and your competitors is not enough, you can add students to the list pushing for change…. here is the link to report [link] where the local students in USA are standing up to be counted, demanding that the local council change the city planning code to make their city greener.

The student group said  “a change in the city code would at the least put forward a public message of commitment to sustainability, which they called a step in the right direction.” Indeed it would.

– John Herbert, Kelcroft, Consultant

Suggest your idea, comment on ideas and then vote for the best suggestions, it an opportunity to drive green sustainable building, have your say: http://greenbuilding.ideascale.com/

There seems to be a growing trend that needs to be corrected.  For sustainable building and rating systems advocates including Hong Kong BEAM and US LEED often encourage more, more, more.   It might be more site greenery, or in the case of LEED more ventilation.  However, I foresee a tragic mistake associating “more” with sustainable.

For site greenery, I am not saying we should ignore soft landscaping, greening the landscape is beneficial, aside from the physiological benefit,  greenery creates a micro-climate zone that can provide sun shading, and help lower the ambient temperature.  Hence, a well designed micro-climate zone will lower the environmental impact and reduce building operating costs.   Additionally replacing those endless lakes of concrete with soft landscaping mitigates the urban heat island effect.

Property designed soft landscaping, and I include green roofs in that sector, have a positive impact, particularly when outdoor air is drawn from these miniature micro-climatic zones.

Under LEED rating system extra credit can be achieved, encouraging designers to exceed ASHRAE’s (the ventilation experts) recommended ventilation rate by 30%.  The increased operating cost for moving, filtering, treating the additional air volume is an extravagance that has seemingly been overlooked.

Designers, including the creators of rating tools, should take a comprehensive holistic approach,  simply demanding more soft landscaping needlessly increases the demand for primary resources, like soil and water, and secondary resources including irrigation systems, piping to service the larger requirement.   All I am asking Think! before we demand more.

~~ John Herbert, Kelcroft, Consultant

He makes Building Science more interesting, and honestly more interesting than my pitch. I can’t agree with him on every point,  although he is primarily focused on the US/Canada region,  I have witness the same type of mentality every day in Asia.  Finally, I would like to wish a Merry Christmas and a prosperous new year to you.

Enjoy!!

update:

also known as Cap 610 legislation link

— John Herbert, Kelcroft, Consultant