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April 2005
Life after the Oil Crash
"Life after the Oil Crash" has a good explanation of what Peak Oil means, and its effects, with lots of useful references to back up the statements.
Civilization as we know it is coming to an end soon. This is not the wacky proclamation of a doomsday cult, apocalypse bible prophecy sect, or conspiracy theory society. Rather, it is the scientific conclusion of the best paid, most widely-respected geologists, physicists, and investment bankers in the world. These are rational, professional, conservative individuals who are absolutely terrified by a phenomenon known as global “Peak Oil.”"Are We 'Running Out'? I Thought There Was 40 Years of the Stuff Left"
Oil will not just "run out" because all oil production follows a bell curve. This is true whether we're talking about an individual field, a country, or on the planet as a whole.
Oil is increasingly plentiful on the upslope of the bell curve, increasingly scarce and expensive on the down slope. The peak of the curve coincides with the point at which the endowment of oil has been 50 percent depleted. Once the peak is passed, oil production begins to go down while cost begins to go up.
In practical and considerably oversimplified terms, this means that if 2000 was the year of global Peak Oil, worldwide oil production in the year 2020 will be the same as it was in 1980. However, the world’s population in 2020 will be both much larger (approximately twice) and much more industrialized (oil-dependent) than it was in 1980. Consequently, worldwide demand for oil will outpace worldwide production of oil by a significant margin. As a result, the price will skyrocket, oil-dependant economies will crumble, and resource wars will explode.
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SMH: Papyrus listing
The Papyrus float made the press, in a fairly ordinary, and a decidedly strange, story.
Sydney Morning Herald (Apr 15)
Papyrus Australia Ltd made its debut on the Australian Stock Exchange on Friday on the back of a new process to make paper from banana plants.
The stock was trading at 17 cents by 1330 AEST in a tough day for Australian equities, after earlier launching a $4 million initial public offer at 20 cents per share.
Papyrus said its technology produces a fibre mat from the trunks of banana plants using no external water or chemicals and minimal energy.
Funds from the raising will be used to build a full-scale, commercial manufacturing facility in north Queensland, close to extensive banana plantations, during the next two years to showcase the technology.
"As the process should favourably compare both economically and environmentally with existing paper producers, the company believes that expressions of interest created from showcasing the technology will allow Papyrus to establish and formalise strategic alliances to fully exploit commercial opportunities with suitable partners," chairman David Wyatt said in the company's prospectus.
Pretty much the same story ran in Asia Pulse
This one ... also from the Herald, was a little stranger
Yogi, our senior chartist, was excited by the prospect of a Papyrus Australia float this week.
"You wouldn't read about it, Bone!" he said, reading about it. "It says here that Papyrus has the scientific know-how to convert banana plant fibre into raw paper or banana ply paper!"
I nodded, although I couldn't see it myself. If it's so good, why didn't the ancient Egyptians choose banana skins to write on?
Yogi read on: "The banana tree is an alternative fibre source and the company's technology converts a renewable agricultural waste product - the banana tree trunk - into raw paper."
Well, you can imagine the withering sounds of approbation from our ethical investment consultant, Emeritus Professor Valerie Carr-Edwards.
"Quite right, too - it's about time we turned to bananas!" she quipped. "The Kyoto Protocol explicitly states that banana-based writing paper should be adopted by the developed world forthwith!"
"What about all these banana republics?" asked FastCash. "Are they supposed to use banana skins too?"
"Of course not! One can't expect the poorer nations to adopt our standards of environmental protection!"
"So you reckon a banana republic like, say, Equatorial Guinea should be allowed to write on bark for 100 years, say, before they switch to bananas?"
Val threw up her hands and stormed out.
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Water filter from clay and coffee grounds
An Australian scientist has developed a new water filtration system, an invention that potentially will benefit millions of people in developing countries and would enable anyone in the world to drink water safely.
The ABC ran a story and the directions for making it, along with photos are here.
I particularly liked it because it showed an innovative use of available materials to create a low-tech cheap solution to a pervasive problem.
Posted by at 8:55 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Papyrus Australia listed on the Australian Stock Exchange
Papyrus Australia has developed a process to make paper out of Banana waste using no chemicals or water and minimal power. Costs are projected to be similar or lower than making wood-pulp based paper. With ~100 million tonnes of banana waste worldwide each year, this project has a huge potential both economically, and in terms of its sustainability impact.
Papyrus has gone public today (14th April), with a listing on the ASX (Australian Stock Exchange) with code "PPY". (Chart)
In my opinion, this company offers a huge opportunity, but is also a high risk investment. The technology is world-beating, a fundamentally different way of making paper, but it has to be scaled up to a commercial scale, which all the consultants and experts think can be done, but it will inevitably have challenges. The company also has to develop a management team with the necessary business skills to run an operation with the majority of its market in developing countries. It also has to face the challenges of retaining an ethical and sustainability commitment while being listed on a stock exchange.
See: www.papyrusaustralia.com.
Disclaimer: I was part of Papyrus's management team until August 2004, and still have a fair number of shares in this company.
Posted by at 8:51 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (1)
Off to San Francisco, New York and Boston
I'm off travelling to San Francisco, and then to the Environdesign conference in New York, then Boston and then back to New York for the Social Venture Network, followed by a couple of weeks back in San Francisco and then home (Byron Bay) via Taipei.
Full details, dates etc in my "contacts" page.
I'd be happy to hear from people doing stuff I might be interested in. I'm especially interested at the moment in Fair Trade for non-food items; Green Building; Downshifting and Voluntary Simplicity, and any interesting technologies ready to try out in Australia.
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Declaration of Leadership for Sustainable Business
Gil Friend has come up with a declaration to challenge sustainable business leaders to do even better. His poster summarises simply and clearly a worthwhile set of practices for businesses. He's promising the audio of the talk where it was introduced soon, and the story behind the poster is on WorldChanging.com
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Radio interview on Red Terra 8 Apr 05
These are the links for the topics I'm planning to talk about on Red Terra's show this morning, I might not get a chance to get to all of them ...
Feel free to email me mitra@mitra.biz about any of the items below.
Campaign against the mega-concert venue in Tyagarah, www.tyagarah.org. Will a much-expanded blues festival, and multiple other large multi-day partying events really enhance our community?
Downshifting Downunder - www.downshifting.net.au
Downshifters are people who make a voluntary, long-term change in their lifestyle that involves accepting significantly less income and consuming less. Motives may be varied and include those relating to personal life and those based on principle.
Downshifting Downunder is a new organisation, coming together to catalyze and co-ordinate a downshifting movement in Australia that will significantly impact sustainability and social capital.
Natures Child Wholesale - www.natureschild.com
Natural and Organic Baby products, collaborating with an Indian anti-sweatshop pro-fairtrade NGO to create organic products.
Papyrus Australia - www.papyrusaustralia.com.au
Paper from Banana waste - I worked with them last year and they just listed on the stock exchange.
Byron Sustainable Venture Network
A network of businesses in the Byron area involved with sustainability and environmentally friendly products. (talk to me about this).
Trip to the US ... two conferences
Environdesign9 - www.environdesign.com
Sustainable design of products and buildings etc.
Social Venture Network - www.svn.org.
SVN has been promoting new models and leadership for socially and environmentally sustainable business since 1987.
Posted by at 9:35 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
A summary from the Exeter Climate conference
I had heard that the Exeter Climate conference called by Tony Blair had made some scarey predictions of the magnitude of climate change to be expected, and the magnitude of emission reductions needed to prevent the worst of them (its too late to prevent a significant amount). This article by Michael McCarthy gives a good summary, and this paragraph gives a flavor.
We were taken aback. The opening day brought disclosure of two major new threats to the world. The first concerned Antarctica, with a warning from the British Antarctic Survey (the body whose scientists discovered the ozone hole) that, perhaps because of rising temperatures, the vast ice sheet covering the western side of the continent may be starting to break up. Were it to collapse into the sea, the West Antarctic Ice Sheet would raise global sea levels by more than 16 feet. Goodbye London; goodbye Bangladesh.
Only four years ago the IPCC TAR said it was safe for probably 1,000 years, certainly until the end of this century; last week Professor Chris Rapley, the BAS director, said that judgement would now have to be revised.
Continue reading "A summary from the Exeter Climate conference"
Posted by at 9:44 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Transmaterial
This resource has an amazing collection of new materials, many of which have an environmental/sustainability angle, they show how thinking outside the box has given us a lot of different tools for solving problems.
Posted in: Future"Transmaterial is a catalog of materials, products and processes that are redefining our physical environment. Edited by Blaine Brownell, the project started as a product of the week newsletter sponsored by the Seattle based architecture firm NBBJ. This incredibly comprehensive guide is as beautiful as it is informative. The entire 186 pages is available at transstudio.com as a downloadable .pdf file.
Posted by at 8:57 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Toshiba's new one-minute-recharge battery
Toshiba has announced what sounds like a big advance in Battery technology with a Lithium Ion battery that recharges to 80% of capacity in a minute; only loses 1% of its capacity after 1000 cycles; among other attributes that make it particularly suitable for hybrid vehicles.
The press release is unusually informative, with some neat charts for comparing it with other batteries.
I think the potential for a fast recharge has been overlooked in most of the reports on this battery. Sure its great for regenerative braking, but it also eliminates a lot of the range arguments against pure electric cars. At a sweep it creates the potential for doubling the range, since one could assume recharging at the destination (an unreasonable assumption if a recharge takes a few hours). Similarly, for long journeys a one or two minute break every hour is not an unreasonable expectation.
The gains compound, i.e. if a car (or scooter or bike) only has to travel one hour between recharges, then the mass of batteries to be carried can be reduced, which means less energy needed to carry the batteries around, and so on.
I'd love to get a set of these for my electrified pushbike, it would make it practical for a LOT more uses than currently.
Posted by at 8:38 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (1)