Fuelishness! Fuel Economy Blog » South America

Believe Sustainability is the first member in South America of the Sustainable, Low Carbon Transport (SLoCaT) Partnership

Michael — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 02:37:37 +0000

Source: Believe Sustainability

The current discussion on fighting climate change brings a clear need for reductions on greenhouse gases emissions caused by transportation. Transport related CO2 emissions are expected to increase 57% worldwide in the period 2005 – 2030, being 80 percent caused by transportation in developing countries. This is directly linked to an overall lack of sustainability represented by poor urban planning, increased motorization, increased air pollution and noise, growing congestion and decreasing road safety.

It is in this context that Believe Sustainability has become the newest member of Sustainable, Low Carbon Transport (SLoCaT) Partnership, aiming to expand its projects on sustainable mobility worldwide.

SLoCaT Partnership is an international organization hosted by the UN Department of Economy and Social Affairs together with development banks and international agencies. It intends to provide opportunities for coordination and cooperation among organizations working on sustainable, low carbon transport.

Believe Sustainability SLoCaT Partnership has a multi-stakeholder membership of more than 40 organizations, among universities, governmental agencies, institutes and NGOs. To promote the partnership, members must demonstrate commitment towards sustainable mobility and low-carbon transportation, and promote the discussion at the regional, national and global level. Thus, Believe Sustainability, an organization located in Brazil that develops consulting on sustainable mobility and creator of the BetterAir Project http://www.projetomelhorar.com.br, comes in great time to join the Partnership, emphasizing the importance of the subject on developing countries in South America.

Center for Science and Environment (CSE)

Center for Transportation and Logistics Studies (PUSTRAL), Gadjah Mada University

Civic Exchange (CE)

EMBARQ, The WRI Center for Sustainable Transport

Global Environmental Facility (GEF)

Global Transport Knowledge Partnership (gTKP)

Interface for Cycling Expertise (I-CE)

International Union of Railways (UIC)

International Transport Forum (ITF)

Institute for Global Environmental Strategies (IGES)

Institute for Transport Policy Studies (ITPS)

Institute of Transport Studies (ITS), University of California, Davis

Korean Transport Institute (KOTI)

Ministry of Land Infrastructure Transport and Tourism, Japan

National Center for Transportation Studies (NCTS), Philippines

Rockefeller Foundation

Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI)

United Nations Environment Program (UNEP)

University College of London, Department of Civil, Environmental and Geomtaic Engineering

University of Transport and Communication (UTCC) Hanoi

VEOLIA Transport

WWF International

How to ensure people’s transportation and at the same time be sustainable?

Michael — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 01:23:29 +0000

by Lincoln Pavia, The MelhorAr Project

The better that the economy of a country is, the greater the demand will be for transportation and the larger the impact will be on the public transportation service and the emission of CO2, with obvious repercussions on the traffic of towns and cities.

The MelhorAr (Improve Air) Project of Sustainable Mobility arose from the need to develop a culture concerned with managing the demand for mobility in a sustainable manner in order to reduce the use of individual transportation, responsible for 70% of the occupation of the earth and for the problems arising from this option such as pollution and investments in modal infrastructure, as well as to discuss alternative, more sustainable means for cities.

Evaluating the current models of mobility of the large global urban centers, the MelhorAr Project opted to develop projects focusing on the corporate market, responsible for a large part of the transportation in cities, both of workers and of the distribution of consumer goods. This work model is unique throughout the world, as most consultancies perform with governments.

Nowadays the projects of sustainable mobility are still for the public sector, especially in Europe, where the main focus is on modal integration (interconnection between modes of transport) as a means of encouraging people to walk or cycle in order to reduce the pressure on public transportation. In developing countries where a large part of the population does not earn enough to use public transportation, the option for these cases is to get about on foot. However, to the extent that the economy becomes stronger in developing countries, these people end up opting for individual means of transport, as a large part of the public transportation does not cater efficiently for this new public of the layers D and E. Moreover, the most serious problem is the nonexistence of modal connections, so that people travel most of their route using a single mode. The challenge now in our country is to increase the options of collective means of travel without burdening towns and cities with works of infrastructure and investments in transportation which increase the social, economic and environmental impacts. In developed countries (G8), people usually choose to displacement by car, increasing pollution and affecting the quality of life of the population. Making life unbearable in the city.

The most urgent challenge is to execute an inventory count of the emissions of public and private collective transportation. It is true that while most emissions come from individual means of transport, the automotive industry is already investing millions of dollars in building more economical, hybrid and electrical models and adapting their engines to cleaner fuels, although the traffic will continue to increase. In the collective transportation sector, we do not yet have an inventory count of emissions of the journeys made. The Public Sector will have to do its homework executing an inventory count of its fleet of buses, trains subway trains, etc. The metropolitan train and subway companies will be increasing their capacity of attending to the public by increasing their networks, which will generate a greater emission of CO2 as the Brazilian and others countries generation of power depends upon thermoelectric stations. The pertinent question is how much power will these increases require? Countries has the capacity to build hydroelectric and thermoelectric stations, but will they be sufficient to cover the demand of new consumers, electric cars, collective electrical transportation?

How will the private sector of collective transportation be able to complement this demand with a quick, cheap, more efficient and sustainable public transportation?

The meeting of Cop 15 in December of this year will stress the need to execute inventory counts of CO2 for several reasons:

Global Warming

Climatic Change is one of the greatest challenges to be faced by governments, productive sectors and physical entities. Several studies report some large climatic changes with the increase of greenhouse gas emissions. The scientific research concerning climatic change indicates that its action will have an impact upon natural systems. This will be able to lead to a significant alteration in the availability of production resources, and so upon the economic activity in general.

With this scenario, several international initiatives are being developed and implemented to stabilize and, if possible, to reduce the concentration of greenhouse gases (GHG) in the Earth’s atmosphere. These international initiatives have an immediate effect upon market blocks (European Community), developed countries (Japan) and developing countries (Brazil and China). Indeed, there are already restrictions on production in developed countries and these restrictions tend to increase. Limits of emissions for productive sectors in developed countries will have an immediate effect upon the commercial relations and on obtaining financing or financial resources by official organs such as the World Bank for building an infrastructure in cities and the IFC for financing business projects. Besides barriers for exporting products or taxes upon products and services which emit a lot of Co2.

Inventor Count of Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Emissions

Any initiatives related to GHG are based upon the quantification, monitoring, reporting and checking of emissions,
capturing and stocking of these gases. This foundation is well represented by an inventory count of emissions and outlets of GHG of the company, so as to know the impact of its operations upon global warming, its sources of emissions, the possibilities of reduction and/or neutralization for different reasons which are:

• To know accurately the emissions associated with the activities of the company;
• To allow voluntary compensation programs;
• To identify new opportunities of Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) projects;
• To quantify future emissions related to new investments and organic growthof the company;
• To guide public or private disclosure proceedings;
• To support corporate actions as regards climatic change;
• To achieve a benchmark of the methodology of inventory count execution.

Why execute inventory counts of CO2?

Inventory Counts

In order to be able to promote actions of reducing GHG emissions, contributing to reducing climatic change, companies first need to know how much they emit and what the source of these emissions is. Once they have started the practice of executing inventory counts, they can then study possibilities of reduction in their operations.

Organizations can gain several benefits from the initiative of inventory counts. See below:

• Opportunities of cost reduction
Especially important at moments of financial crisis, cost reduction is related to improved efficiency in management processes, reduction or optimization in the use of energy and raw materials and adoption of alternate sources of energy.

• Creation of benchmark and opportunities to improve competitiveness
Corporate inventory counts can serve as a basis for identifying opportunities of improving the performance of the company from systems of comparing the emissions arising from the execution of processes and the generation of products.

• Participate in markets of GHG emissions
Identifying opportunities to develop projects which generate carbon credits or attract investments, producing additional revenue for the company, is another benefit related to the inventory counts of emissions.

• Submit accounts to the shareholders and stakeholders
Shareholders and stakeholders can be better informed of the risks and opportunities associated with the management of GHG emissions from the data provided by the inventory counts.

• Replicability and chain impact
By means of inventory counts it is possible to understand and reduce impacts on the value chain, involving vendors and buyers in actions of reducing GHG emissions.

• Outline and attain goals of socioenvironmental responsibility
Many companies already internalize in their operations voluntary goals of a socioenvironmental nature, and reduction of GHG emissions can be another goal incorporated in this process.

• Evaluate liabilities and get ready for future policies of GHG emissions
Companies can be prepared for regulations about GHG emissions by means of inventory counts which allow them to identify sources and volumes of emissions, as well as to outline reduction plans which put them in line with future policies of emissions.

• Guarantee opportunities in the international market
The globalized market increasingly requires companies to have a good conduct in terms of performance in sustainability, and the good management of GHG emissions is one of the main aspects demanded in international transactions.

The governments of developing countries will have to have goals of reducing Greenhouse Gases, one of which is C02, whereas in the Kyoto protocol these countries were only voluntary. This will cause a new impact upon their economies as to receive investments for infrastructure from the World Bank, BIRD, the IFC will request an inventory count of these reductions, greater studies about impacts, etc. And the countries will place new carbon barriers to 0 continue exporting and importing products, etc… Brazil will not only have to reduce the emissions referring to the deforestation of Amazonia, as the companies will also have to indicate in their reports what the impacts of their business is upon the environment.

Every productive process generates an emission of Carbon. Electricity and Fossil Fuels are involved among other activities.

With an inventory count in hand it will be possible to request investments, and improve the life of people in towns and cities. The transportation sector is one of the most sensitive areas and the one which has the greatest probability of improving the life of people in cities, as it is calculated that over 80% of people live in cities nowadays, and that in not more than 40 years 99% of people will live in cities. The Planning Secretary of São Paulo City disclosed during the seminar “Challenges for a Sustainable Mobility in São Paulo City” that the plan of climatic change approved by the city council envisages the fiscal waiver of ISS for companies which execute plans of reducing CO2, which creates an opportunity for the transportation sector to execute its inventory counts and a plan for reducing its emissions.

How does the MelhorAr Project of Sustainable Mobility perform in the transportation sector?

Executing the mapping of transportation in companies means surveying how people travel to work. Means of transport, time of transport, distance traveled, type of fuel and the connections made by the workers. After this survey geo-referencing is executed in order to diagnose what the best mode for this transportation would be. The objective is to outline some indicators of the means of transport and travel time, and monitor the social, economic and financial impacts. The result of this is a company with a much more efficient and more sustainable mobility with less possible impact upon the city and population in general. Through this mapping it is possible to calculate the emissions of scope 2 (direct emissions such as its own fleet) and scope 3 (emissions of workers and outsourced fleet).

Transportation Sector

In order to execute the inventory count of emissions of Co2, it is necessary to count the fleet of vehicles, quantity of journeys, route, etc… Through a calculation basis taking into account certain factors the emissions are calculated. Not only of CO2 (climatic change) but also of other more deadly polluting gases which affect people’s health. This inventory count is known as scope 2 if the emissions are direct, and as scope 3 if they are indirect in the methodology GHG Protocol (developed by the WRI – World Resource Institute, headquartered in Washington and currently the methodology most used in the world).

The application of principles in the inventory counts of GHG (greenhouse gases) is of paramount importance for ensuring that the information related to GHG is the result of a safe calculation. The principles which will form the basis to guide our reporting process are as follows:

Scope: All the emissions and relevant removals of GHG from the company are included. Consistency: Significant comparisons between the information related to GHG is possible. Accuracy: The inaccuracies and uncertainties are reduced as far as possible. Transparency: Sufficient and appropriate information is revealed so as to allow decisions to be made with reasonable confidence. Relevance: The sources of GHG, data and methodologies appropriate for user requirements of the GHG inventory count are selected and reported.

Objectives: Determine the sources of GHG emissions (Kyoto Protocol) such as: Carbon Dioxide (CO2) Methane (CH4) Nitrous Oxide (N20) Sulfur Hexafluoride (SF6) Hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) Perfluorocarbons ( PFCs)

DEVELOPMENT OF THE WORK

3. Identification of Sources and Outlets of GHG
The team of consultants will identify and document the sources of GHG which contribute to the emissions. The same applies to the outlets, when relevant to the company. The sources of GHG are the ones associated with the consumption of electricity (e.g. illumination, functioning of equipment), burning of gas (e.g. ovens, in the restaurant kitchen), oil combustion (e.g. vehicles), solid fuels(e.g. coal), use of production resources (e.g. chemical products), the use of cooled air, paint solvents, etc. This activity will occur through interviews, documentation and visiting the area.

Scope 3 Mobile combustion Total of air trips. Point to point, we will need to determine the total of KM. Rented cars – Total of KM – Motorization Company cars – total of fuel used Fleet of buses (chartered bus)– Total of KM and motorization LPG for hoists Fugitive Emissions Storage, release from production, processing, transmission and use of fuels. Unintentional release of substances which do not go through chimneys, drains, exhaust pipes… During the use of cooling and air-conditioning machines and equipment, leakage of methane (conveyance of natural gas) Stationary emissions Generation of electricity, steam, or power using equipment in a fixed place

After executing the Inventory Count the company should study what opportunities there are for reducing the impacts such as greater efficiency in journeys, reduced consumption of fuel, establishing greater control and applying the concept of eco-drive. Reduction in the quantity of journeys, and means of transport which are more efficient and better adapted to the public modes of transport existing in cities. Incorporation of technologies which reduce traveling time, such as GPS, control of traffic reduction and avoiding stretches with traffic jams by integrating data with the departments of local transport and Engineering. Adoption of cleaner and more efficient fuels.

Execution of inventory counts which will be available for companies and public organs.

Execution of Clean Development Mechanism projects to obtain resources for increasing cleaner transportation.

The MelhorAr Project performs inventory counts of mobility and studies to make the transportation sector more eco-efficient.

For further details:
www.projetomelhorar.com.br <http://www.projetomelhorar.com.br>

Lincoln Paiva ( Lincoln@projetomelhorar.com.br )
Conceiver of the MelhorAr ( Improve Air) Project of Sustainable Mobility
+5511 3030 1700

Beyond the PR – Additional Detail about Believe Sustainability

Michael — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 01:21:01 +0000

This morning we published a press release regarding the 2nd place finish in the ITS Congestion Challenge. I wasn’t really sure that a second place finish would be news worthy, but after seeking the advice of a few colleagues, I decided it wasn’t a bad idea.

I decided to highlight one of the most interesting bits in the release with a comment from Mr. Lincoln Paiva from Brazil who found FuelClinic at the ITS Congestion Challenge, and wants to work together to take advantage of our new “clean cities” derivative product currently under development.

One such silver lining is a partnership with Believe Sustainability in Brazil, who is interested in using FuelClinic to help reduce carbon emissions from transportation in São Paulo, one of the world’s largest and heavily populated cities.

“We are researching more sustainable ways to reduce the pressure of individual transport in the chaotic traffic in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro” said Lincoln Paiva, CEO of Believe Sustainability and Organizer of Improve Air (http://projetomelhorar.com.br/) Project Sustainable Mobility. “FuelClinic would provide a system that can help change the concept people have regarding the use of the car.”

Brazil is truly energy independent, with sugar-cane ethanol being plentiful, our little promotional video needed a few updates - including translation into Portuguese, and swapping out the “transportation relies on oil 98%” with a “20% of CO2 is produced by transportation”. Mr. Paiva wanted to use the animation during a conference he was speaking at, so we decided to produce a 2nd version.

Here’s the Portuguese version: