118 The last rotation of earth
Martin Osborne
Water industry strategic advisor, asset planner and drainage expert Winner of the 2023 WaPUG Prize for contributions to the development of urban drainage practice
On Friday we went to see singer songwriter B C Camplight perform; including songs from his recent album The last rotation of earth. I like his style:
So does climate change mean that we are facing the last rotation of earth?
Climate change
2024 is expected to be the warmest year on record and is almost certain to exceed 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels for the first time. This follows on from the record-breaking 1.45°C in 2023, the previous warmest year on record. Temperatures in these two years were increased by El Nino but they still represent a long-term average of more than 1.3°C above pre-industrial levels.
1.5°C is seen as the threshold to potentially avoid the more extreme and irreversible climate effects. However, as Sergey Paltsev, deputy director of MIT’s Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change has said, “The science does not tell us that if, for example, the temperature increase is 1.51 degrees Celsius, then it would definitely be the end of the world.”
But things will get worse. If you think that current problems of intense rainfall, heatwaves and wildfires are bad: you ain’t seen nothing yet.
The water industry story
The water industry generally has a good story to tell on climate change. It is helping to defend against flooding and environmental impact caused by intense rainfall and it has done a lot to reduce its consumption of energy produced from fossil fuels. It is taking action to reduce emissions of methane from sludge treatment. It maybe has some way to go in reducing nitrous oxide emissions but it is starting.
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So overall there is a good story for the water industry to tell on climate change and, certainly in the UK, the water industry needs to tell good stories to counter all of the negative publicity that it gets. So what can we do to tell that story more effectively.
In 2021 Ofwat introduced a performance measure for water companies of reporting their operational greenhouse gas emissions. It is now working towards requiring reporting of embedded carbon as well. As part of this Ofwat has an ambition to include consideration of greenhouse gases in long term water industry planning.
Reporting greenhouse gases should therefore obviously be part of the DWMPs.
However, there is some reluctance in the water companies to embrace this ambition. This is largely due to the perceived administrative burden of calculating and reporting the carbon footprint of plans alongside the range of benefits that they will bring and the costs that they will incur. I think that this would be an opportunity lost. The reporting burden is not very large and can mostly be automated. But the benefits of being able to tell a good story on climate change and to be proactive in telling that story are priceless.
The future
Thinking ahead. The UK governments plan is to substantially decarbonise electricity generation by 2030 – that is just five years. The switch to electric vehicles is still slow but is accelerating. That will leave the largest carbon footprint as gas heating of houses.
Part of the water industry strategy to reduce the use of fossil fuels has been to burn bio-methane to generate electricity at sewage treatment plants. But when most electricity is from renewables that is a waste of a valuable resource that could replace fossil gas for heating.
So should the strategic plan be to put bio-methane into the gas grid and buy in electricity to run the treatment plants? I know that there are pilot schemes for this, but do we need a wholesale strategic change of direction?
Director of Infrastructure Development at Wessex Water
1wMartin's blogs are a great reminder of the bigger picture. We know that much of our energy is used pointlessly shifting water around. Its flipping heavy! Reducing water consumption at point of demand and reducing rainwater discharged at point of supply is a must. Back to the need for a national strategy to manage rain better where it lands.... Interesting stat: according to the laws of thermodynamics, for every 1°C that Earth’s atmospheric temperature rises, the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere can increase by about 7%. Back to reality, comparing two 30-year periods (1961-1990 and 1991-2020), the average temperature of the UK has increased by 0.8°C, rainfall by 7.3% (google Charting the UK's changing climate - Met Office for the source of this) Also scarily if you look at the average temperature for Hull between 1991-2020 it has been warmer on average than Heathrow in London was during the previous climate averaging period 1961-1990...Hull on earth
30+ Years in Digital Water Helping Utilities Use Models & Data.
1wGreat post, as always, Martin. Instead of pointing out that the latest year was the warmest on record, we should emphasize that 2024 is (at least on average) the coolest year of our future. That is a scary thought.
Pioneer of environmentally sustainable step changes in Drain and Sewer Cleansing. A move from reactive intervention to preventative maintenance. Promoting flood prevention and reduced CSO discharges..
1wThe ability to reduce vehicle movement and the huge environmental impact that sewer cleansing in all its current forms, is an area where Water Utilities could immediately make an impact. The introduction of purely mechanical preventative maintenance devices such as Flusher2 would be a perfect way to start. Maintenance thereafter could be performed my personnel and equipment to perform nothing more than manhole opening and minimal access when required using electrical vehicles. The increasing prevelance of catchment monitoring would inform any requirement for maintenance. Flusher2 would also aid catchment models and physically provide an early sight of hydraulic deterioration enabling early intervention. #carbonreduction #drainage #climatechange #dwmp
Specialist in Wastewater Networks
1wThe UK Water Industry should be getting this good news story out more in the public arena at a time when the industry seems to be on the receiving end of relentless criticism. Other industries like the Iron and Steel industry will need to step up, but I'm hearing there's reluctance for countries to lead the way on this due to small profit margins in a competitive global market.
Specialist in Urban Drainage planing, design, rehabilitation and maintenance. Winner of the 2024 WaPUG Prize from CIWEM's Urban Drainage Group for a significant contribution in the development of Urban Drainage.
1wI absolutely agree that greenhouse gas emissions should be taken into account in DWMPs. It would be interesting to see whether it would change the nature of the solutions proposed. Would surface water disconnection and green infrastructure solutions become more common if greenhouse gas emissions were taken into account?