Toyota paving the way ...

I read an article today Toyota Making Green Cars May Mean Destroying Japan Rice Paddies . As it goes, Toyota is set to pave over 1,600 acres of 17th Century old rice paddies and cedar forest in Aichi, by creating a new test track. When confronted with a list of endangered birds that will most likely be effected, Toyota made no comment. Probably, their 5 trillion yen in cash is enough said for the Japanese government - despite their own green-wash rhetoric about the need to increase Japan's self-sufficiency rate (currently only 40%). But what's another 1,600 acres of concrete ...

The Toyota president Akio Toyoda, who is clearly on a mission said:

“Over the next 100 years, I hope that cars will remain something that people will need. We must make sure that that happens.”

What a visionary! It's easy to see how he became head of the world's largest automaker.

WVO update

It's been a while since I added anything about how the project is going on running a diesel car on waste vegetable oil (WVO) or as it's also known straight vegetable oil (SVO). So here's an update...

Unlike the first winter, the car (a beaten up Toyota Hilux Surf) ran really well this winter. The reason: better lagging on the fuel lines under the car so that the oil, when heated by the heat exchanger on it's way to the engine, stayed heated. In the previous winter it was being cooled by the minus wind-chill temperatures under the car and so leaving the car powerless. On these occasions, the only solution was to switch back to diesel - made possible because the WVO system we use is a so called 2-tank system.

So now the car is running pretty much trouble free and my focus is on getting the WVO:diesel ratio as high as possible (or do I mean as low as possible?). Anyway, for the 21 months we've been running the car on WVO, and including all times we needed to nurse the car up steep hills by switching back to diesel, of the total amount of fuel we have used, 76% has been WVO. Given a few long summer holiday trips; to Fuji Rock music festival this July (1,100kms round trip), and Hokkaido in August (2-4,000kms round trip), this percentage should be well up, may be even to the 90% plus area.

Of course the more kms we cover, the more money we are saving, despite the criminally low price that fuel is still at - Oh where are the CARBON TAXES?! Although the goal of driving carbon neutrally, rather than cost saving, was the motivator for this project, costs are always interesting to consider. And here are a few details...

While the cost of the car was only 100,000 Japanese yen (JYN), the total costs of equipment and garage fees connected with the WVO 2-tank conversion came to 270,000JYN. We have now used 2180 litres of WVO which comes to a saving in diesel of about 218,000JYN (using average prices over the last 18 months or so).

And in this top graph is a record of the monthly fuel we used in 2007/08. In the winter, the amount of diesel and even kerosene (to prevent the vegetable oil from freezing) are higher than in the summer when the long trips and minimal use of diesel really starts to show. A similar pattern should appear this summer too after the month of June 2009.

Finally, it's worth noting that I finally got around to changing the extra filter (Delphi HDF296) the other day after 8,000kms, and although very dirty, hadn't been causing any problems despite some blogs mentioning that the filters need changing after every 2,000kms or so. This might be down to diligent filtering of the veggie oil before it gets put into the car.

If anyone would like to know more details on this project or WVO systems in general, contact me or visit my homepage where I have or details and useful links.

Addicted to growth (part 2)

The latest in the Japanese Government's drive to get people back into the shops and spending again is a policy offering so called 'eco-points' to people who buy new energy efficient appliances. A good idea at first glance. After all, in Lester Brown's Plan B3.0 Mobilizing to Save Civilization there is a full chapter dedicated to the importance of energy efficiency. But here is the part which to me screams Green-wash! The bigger the TV, the more 'Eco'- points you get ... the larger the fridge, the more 'Eco'-points you get. ...What!?

Similarly, the government is spending billions on reducing the cost of highway charges so that people will get out and travel more and hence spend more. In the same article was the governments claim that it is committed to fighting global warming. So again .... What the !!??

When environmental collapse is becoming more reality than remote possibility, the Japanese government, as with most other governments still fixated on economic growth, would do well to reflect on the words of Meadows in his 2001 article Economic Laws Clash with Planet's:

Economics says: Compete to perform efficiently. The reward for successful competition will be growth.

The Earth says: compete yes, but keep your competition in bounds. Don't annihilate. Take only what you need. You're not in a war, you're in a community.

Governments: Just forget about growth. Instead, how about committing yourselves to real policies of substance that are clearly thought through, are genuinely based on long-term goals which favour stability over growth, reward fairness rather than greed and power, and that will genuinely give the planet a chance to provide a lasting quality of life for future generations.

Gaia's free gifts

Last year I decided I needed to start growing food for the family - the logical solution if you are looking to minimize your carbon footprint from the food you eat and ensure it's chemical free.

By the end of the summer though, it was evident I am not a natural gardener. The only success was a tomato plant which actually sprouted from soil from our compost. Almost everything I

had actually sown, failed to provide any significant produce.

Consequently, I decided that foraging was far easier and provided a better prospect of a return.

This proved to be so, and during the autumn, and now this spring, I'm finding I'm able to regularly provide a healthy green salad for the family without trips to the shop.

I also discovered that acorns used to be a staple food in Japan, North America and many other parts of the world. Unfortunately living, as over half the world's population now does, in cities, people are far removed from nature and indeed the knowledge about the potential harvests that can be provided and as a result, sustainable foods like acorns have virtually vanished from all the world's dinner tables.

On the plus side though, this means in autumn, there are plentiful amounts of acorns to be collected and turned into a very agreeable flour for a truly brown, brown loaf of bread. Labour intensive but well worth the experience and taste.

One other strategy taken to offset another possible poor showing in the vegetable bed, was to plant fruit trees, bushes and vines - with the hope that they are more difficult to fail with...

Although my foraging is going well, I have decided to return to the garden and try again this spring to grow a various collection of vegetables, salads and herbs. So far, my daugher's cress is doing very well, and there are signs that our beetroot and peas have decided to give it a go.

As an update, I will blog again on growing one's own food later in the year - and particularly if my efforts prove more profitable than last year.

Addicted to growth

"We used to think you could spend your way out of recession ...  I tell you, in all candour, that option no longer exists. " Jim Callaghan 1976 Labour party conference.

Whether or not those words were true then, in light of the 'recession' we are unwittingly bestowing on Gaia, they are certainly true today. In very crude terms, the more the economies of the world grow the more the natural economy of the earth is compromised and displaced.

Recently there seems to be a growing realisation of this more serious airtime given to the ideas of the growing base of the enlightened among us who see this global recession as an opportunity to re-evaluate the core values of the world's economic system and as a real chance for building a better economic system which values decisions based on quality of life rather than profit and the futile pursuit of unlimited growth and increasing GDP. 

As Herman Daly reminds us in his paper on the virtues of Steady-state Economics: the verb "to grow" has become so overladen with positive value connotations that we have forgotten its first literal dictionary denotation, namely, "to spring up and develop to maturity." Thus the very notion of growth includes some concept of maturity or sufficiency, where by physical accumulation gives way to physical maintenance; that is, growth gives way to a steady state. It is important to remember that "growth" is not synonymous with "betterment."

Still though, world leaders are unquestioningly following growth as the ends rather than the means to the ridiculous point where we have the Taiwanese government giving each citizens over $100 shopping vouchers as if it will be a cure to the countries economic woes. And here in Japan, we have the Prime Minister proudly announcing a similar scheme, while a local city government is giving over $1,100 to people who purchase a new Mitsubishi vehicle. 

Consider for a moment - giving people more money to consume when every kg of consumables produced by our current economic system, in turn, creates a staggering impact on the environment - an average of 32kgs of waste. 

Alternatively, rather than wasting money on these mindless and irresponsible schemes couldn't it just be redirected to public social and environmental programs?  President Obama seems to be more in line with this reality by pledging to implement a huge spending scheme to create new jobs in the renewable energy sector.

 

As highlighted in the film the 11th Hour when is the time going to come when, all governments and policy makers switch back the ends and the means so that once again quality of life rather than growth is the focus for 'development'? 

The first step is to ditch GDP as a measure of a country's development and replace it with one which more accurately measures development .... but that's another blog I guess

 

Conditioning from conveniences

On a very merry night out in Osaka on New Year's Eve, while coming out of a pub housed on the 1st floor (2nd floor in Japan), seeing exiting customers waiting for the lift to go down to the floor below got me going. 

How is it that we have got to the point where people unquestionably wait for a lift (elevator) to come to their aid for moving up or even down one floor, when next to the lift there is a 'manual' device (stairs!) which invariably offers the same service in a quicker and cheaper (in environmental and health terms) manner?

While my cohort on that night's merriment thought that moaning about this point was perhaps taking things too far, but for me it represented a larger problem - our conditioning that comes from conveniences, which paradoxically, leads us to lose-lose habitual actions and decision-making. 

In everyday life similar the results of this conditioning can be seen everywhere. Just go to any check-out counter to see shop assistants putting single items into tiny plastic bags and customers with bags and pockets, unquestionably accepting them.

Anyway, sorry to start the new year with a bit of a moan but once you notice these things you may see that it soon becomes something you need to periodically vocalise, or indeed, blog about.

May 2009 be filled with a greater awareness about how we are being conditioned and where it is leading us.

Never so easy

It's sometimes difficult to be upbeat about the future of our planet with the daily stream of eco-related stories and reports that indicate the continuing decline of the earth's environment. I've recently given this some thought however, and decided to pay more attention to the positive stories and items that I come across. Yes, it's necessary to be aware of the (often depressing) facts to gain an awareness and appreciation of the need for change and action, but surely, once one reaches a certain level of awareness, it would seem healthier and probably more productive in terms of motivation, to focus on the positive news.

Anyway, this train of thought led to this entry. Recently, the number of products and services available in Japan to the ethical consumer appear to be on the rise.  In addition to the niche products and services which have for sometime now have been out there on the internet, more mainstream and visible products are starting to surface. Here are a few of those.

Carbon-free nengajo (new year's cards). These can be bought at post offices and for an extra 5yen a fund is collected to offset the carbon used in the production, and possibly delivery of the card. Last year 38,000 tonnes of CO2 were offset with these cards.

Organic wines now seem to be much easier to find. These include wines from Cono Sur which has gone one step further towards reducing its environmental impacts by using carbon neutral delivery. Look for the bicycle on the label if your interested in this wine. Available at Liquor Mountain.

It is also encouraging to see the growth of the fair trade goods from places such as Sisam, which has an ethical interior shop East of Hyakumanben, on Imadegawa, Kyoto, and People Tree, a long established fair trade outlet.

Other ethical and eco-friendly shopping links can be found here and should expand during 2009