Matt Prescott (environmental scientist) looks at the technological possibilities when it comes to living green.
There’s perhaps no reason why I should feel embarrassed about the collective thrill my mate Toby and I felt on charging my mobile phone on solar power gathered during a day of wandering through the undulating hills of Wiltshire. That and the enjoyment of walking on a footpath slicing across Madonna’s property – a right of way many hundreds of years old that she was attempting to get closed. Nice feeling that – using the oldest source of energy in a state-of-the-art zero emissions endeavour to ensure my girlfriend got the routine late night call from the tent. (The update of our journey westward usually involved reports of inconvenient delays caused by pubs obstructing the path). Between my solar charger and wind-up torch, I found myself in modern camping comfort without the drawbacks of having no in-tent charging point or feeling guilty about my otherwise ceaseless demand for electricity and its impact on the natural world I was enjoying.
Increasingly, many of the energy technologies on offer to consumers do actually displace otherwise energy demanding routine actions – like boiling a kettle or telling the time – so investment in them usually works out to reduce household energy use and hence save money. An important point that environment critics often point out is that these gadgets and technologies really need to save more energy in use than they took to manufacture, package and transport to the consumer. Whilst this figure will clearly vary a little, most technologies have a pretty impressive energy payback time, with traditional solar photovoltaic cells typically cited at under two years for example. Clearly the durability of the product is important, and as a member of the Green Rewards Sustainability Advisory Panel, I’d say that we’re always keen to hear back from as many of you as possible about how well made your products are. Having trialled the Solar Monkey for over a year now, I can vouch for its reliability. It’s currently on vacation with my dad in New Zealand, but please let’s not go into that.
