a heat exchanger or a heat pump (depending on the time of year) to supply an entire residential area with space heating and hot water. The energy yield produced by drawing heat from the sea is 1 100 per cent, and that in turn results in a 50 per cent reduction in CO2 emissions. Users pay no more for this system than for a conventional one.

Engaging others

There are other ways of saving energy. The city council of Freiburg in Germany permits the construction only of low energy buildings on municipal land, and all new buildings must meet low energy specifi cations. Low energy housing uses solar power passively as well as actively. Besides solar panels and collectors on the roof, which provide electricity and hot water, many passive features of the houses use solar energy for regulating room temperature. Freiburg’s solar policy embraces the entire city. Various companies and public facilities make their roofs available for solar panels, in which the people of Freiburg can buy shares. They are paid for the power sold to the municipal electricity scheme.

The British town of Stretton is providing its citizens with climate change classes to show the 5 000 households how they can reduce their climate footprint. The classes are based on the idea of a slimming club. A computer programme will calculate how much GHG emissions each household is responsible for and then suggest ways of reducing that weight with participants invited back later for an emissions “weigh-in”. They will learn how high their emissions are through a computer programme which will also suggest ways of reducing that “weight”.

Joining forces

C40 (www.c40cities.org) is a group of the world’s largest cities, all of them committed to tackling climate change. Cities are central to the task, particularly as they bear a disproportionate responsibility for causing the problem. Cities consume 75 per cent of the world’s energy and produce 80 per cent of its greenhouse gas emissions. One idea promoted by C40 is the potential of cities to do more together than they can on their own. Pooling their buying power can bring down the prices of energy-saving products and speed the development and uptake of new energy-saving

THE CYCLE – REDUCE KICK THE HABIT 117
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