The Latest Ideas for Becoming Eco-Friendly

It is time to turn back time and reduce the amount of devastation humans have caused the environment. This environmental cause has already been started and is led by groups around the country and around the world.  Companies like the U.S. Green Building Council works with companies both within the United States and abroad to encourage more eco-friendly buildings.  Furthermore, municipalities spanning the country are getting involved in finding greener, more cost-effective ways of producing energy and running a city.


Municipalities often install public transportation systems to reduce carbon emissions. Unfortunately, these buses can actually increase pollution levels if there are not enough riders on a bus. Each diesel bus releases 130 tons of carbon dioxide annually. To ensure that public transportation lowers emissions, Oakland had the revolutionary new idea of using zero emission buses. This new fleet is powered by hydrogen so the environment is completely undisturbed. As Oakland grows their fleet from three to eight buses, the city will be able to serve as an example of environmental awareness for the rest of the United States.


One of the most exceptional ideas in use today is the water use reduction system at Destiny USA, an enormous shopping mall in Syracuse, New York. This program is designed to harvest rainwater from the rooftop. It is projected to save 4 million of gallons of water every year. Overall, this lowers the buildings water usage by an impressive 78 percent.  The roof of the expansion has a system in place to collect rainwater that will be used to flush common area and tenant toilets. Also, there are retention ponds located in the parking lots to hold excess water and replenish the ground. In times of severe storms the roof collection system and water retention ponds will hold rainwater and reduce the volume of water sent to the city waste treatment facility. After installing this noteworthy program, Destiny was credited with an Exemplary Performance award from the USGBC.


Whenever a power plant creates electricity, it actually releases one third of the energy into the environment as heat. Instead of wasting this source of heat, some officials in Chicago have found a solution. The heat that is produced during fuel combustion is used to create more electricity. Chicago uses co-generation plants to use all of the heat produced in the electricity generation process. Each co-generation plant produces just a third of the carbon dioxide that is made with a traditional coal powered plant. Chicago took a step further and set a goal of having 25 percent of the city’s electrical consumption made with in a co-generation plant. These plants basically work by collecting steam from the gas combustion processes. This steam can then be used to heat buildings or water.  This process helped Chicago become much more efficient.

Each of these initiatives has one thing in common: a commitment to building a better world. Through the innovative green initiatives and new design concepts, cities like Chicago and Oakland are making a difference for their residents and the world. Other companies and cities can copy the methods used to lower carbon dioxide emissions and create a healthier planet.

Written by Cliff Barre who blogs at Peace, Love and Travel with Cliff and Tiff

Ambient Air Quality and Electricity Self Generation through Fossil Fuel combustion in generating plants.

Ambient air is the air that surrounds where we live and work or our immediate environment. It is basically the air we breathe. How clean and free from pollution the air is therefore affects the quality of life that we can enjoy and increases our life expectancy. Air that is highly polluted reduces life expectancy as a result of the associated health and environmental hazards of the pollution.

Good air quality is not only good for humans; it also ensures the preservation of other living constituents of the environment such as wildlife and vegetation thereby preserving our ecosystems. Good air quality is also necessary for sensitive members of the population such as children, the elderly and people prone to asthmatic and other respiratory attacks. Children are particularly vulnerable as the process of lung growth and development continues until adolescence, and they have incomplete metabolic systems, immature immune defenses and higher breathing rates than adults.

Generally, bad air quality affects human health by causing respiratory and allergenic illnesses, heart disease, cancer, adverse pregnancy outcomes such as deformations and lowering of male fertility. Air pollution occurs as the by - product of any combustion process. It entails the release of gaseous substances such as chemicals or small particles regarded to as particulates into the air that can cause severe harm to humans and other living organisms, buildings and the natural environment. Studies have shown that pollutants from fossil fuel combustion not only prove a problem to the ambient air of the immediate vicinity where it occurs but they also can travel long distances. As with the emission of harmful gases from vehicles, generating sets also emit harmful chemicals that affect air quality.

In a country like Nigeria where there is an inadequate supply of electricity from the national grid to residences, offices, hospitals, government buildings and public infrastructure, the electricity needed to power these places are being produced by generating sets/plants that serve as a back up. Generating sets burn petrol and diesel to produce electricity. This releases high amounts of carbon dioxide and other gases such as nitrogen and sulphur oxides as well as particulates containing burnt hydrocarbons into the surrounding environment causing pollution and reducing the air quality. Sometimes, these generating sets are not in good working conditions and therefore produce more hydrocarbons causing more pollution. With more specific regard to diesel generating sets, studies have shown that for each watt of power output, diesel generators produce up to 20 times as much particulate pollution, or soot, as the most advanced, natural gas-fired power plants, and up to 200 times as much nitrogen oxides, precursors to ozone, or smog.

Developed economies, like the United States, have regulations that govern the discharge of these pollutants into the atmosphere. The clean Air act of 1970 in the USA for example regulates air emissions from stationary and mobile sources. The Act has established National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) that are enforced at the state and local levels through various local regulations and these standards are enforced. As a matter of fact, most generator installations require a permit. This way, good ambient air quality can be maintained.

Above threshold values, the general effects of pollutants on public health as a result of electricity self generation is shown below.

Effects of emissions from generating sets on human health

Pollution from fossil fuel burning electricity generating sets with particular emphasis on the oxides of carbon, nitrogen and sulphur produced having reactions with water vapor in the atmosphere and fall back to earth as acid rain.

The most significant long term effect of fossil fuel combustion in generating sets is its contribution to global warming and climate change. (Read up on Global warming and climate change in previous posts) The effects of global warming are that sea levels rise as a result of melting glaciers in the arctic  This will cause flood events to occur with water covering many low islands. This displaces many plants, animals and humans in the geographical areas where they occur. Plants will die, causing several animals that depend on plant to die also. The effect is that food scarcity will occur causing a displacement of humans. Drought will also occur as a result of changing precipitation and weather patterns leading more desert formations and severe food scarcity. Some other effects include heavy rainfalls, heat waves that will bring about a change in temperature cycles and cause climate change. Due to warmer temperatures, drier leafs easily ignite causing forest fires.

To mitigate against the effects of fossil fuel combustion in electricity self generation, alternative sources of energy such as solar and wind sources which produce no emission  as well as renewable sources such as bio fuels should be developed and encouraged.

Energy conservation techniques should also be introduced in homes and offices to reduce electricity consumption. This way, information on the actual energy consumed can be collated which will help to rightly size generators and therefore reduce emissions from generating sets as a result of over sizing.

In developing countries like Nigeria where regulations on generator installations are not in place, the government should engage scientists in coming up with energy policies and sanctions that will discourage generator installations especially when the capacities are more than the actual demand. For this to succeed, the government has to guarantee electricity supply at affordable rates to consumers otherwise it will be a cheaper alternative to self generate electricity through fossil fuel burning generators.

Finally, it is easier to manage pollution from a single source e.g. high capacity gas turbines in electricity generation than several small sources. In the long term, it is cheaper and safer and should therefore be encouraged.