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(IsraelNN.com) The Knesset Monday night approved an amendment to existing legislation in order to give more authority to municipalities to fight air pollution. Cities now will be able to close streets at certain hours and limit the number of vehicle on roads in order to cut pollution.
Violators may be fined, but each city's plan will require the approval of the Ministry of Transportation. Income from the fines will be used to improve the quality of air by building and maintaining bicycle routes and subsidizing bus travel.
Israeli energy initiative makes climate change a social cause By Karin Kloosterman Environmental entrepreneur, Eyal Biger, the founder of Israel's Good Energy Initiative. January 31, 2008
For every car that drives, every plane that flies and every appliance that gets plugged into the wall, a price is paid by the environment. The burning of fossil fuels for use in transport, industry and our day-to-day lives, emits carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.
Al Gore has exposed the effects of global warming at great lengths. And some activists around the world - like those from Israel's Good Energy Initiative - think that there is still time to turn around, or at least stop, the acceleration of climate change.
The Good Energy Initiative, a non-profit organization, is the first and only voluntary carbon offset provider in Israel. Through donations, it lets people and organizations neutralize their "carbon footprint" by funnelling cash investments into local grassroots educational and social projects. Carbon offset money also goes toward developing new alternative energy projects.
This term carbon neutral is used when the amount of greenhouse gases one emits (a carbon footprint), is balanced either through the purchase of offsets, or by greenhouse gas reduction practices.
The Israeli project is unique because its offset projects are all based locally, and have a strong social element. Not only does the organization plan to reduce greenhouses gases emitted locally, it educates schoolchildren about global warming, alleviates pressures on marginalized communities, and creates new alternative energy projects.
By working locally, the initiative may also have profound implications for peace building, too. What normally happens in carbon offsetting initiatives is that projects are carried out elsewhere, often in developing nations.
But for $6 a pound, one can neutralize your carbon footprint through Good Energy and know that the projects are being monitored closely. The group currently appeals for donations from conference organizers, the media, and even those flying to the Holy Land on mission trips.
Since it was founded a year ago by environmental entrepreneur Eyal Biger, who specializes in biological fuel alternatives, the initiative has helped a number of local businesses go carbon neutral. The list includes The Marker, a Hebrew language business daily; and the organization is currently advising coffee chain Aroma Israel, how to become carbon neutral.
The offset money goes to a number of local projects, and includes an effort to reduce emissions by replacing boilers with solar heating systems in apartment buildings. The group has supplied solar energy systems for cancer-stricken children in Bedouin settlements. In lieu of diesel generators, their parents now use a non-polluting means to keep medicine cool.
Good Energy is also running an organic waste composting program for communities and public entities; and has developed a regional incandescent-to-CFL bulb campaign.
"Ours is a social venture. Our only profit is the social profit," Tom Brecher, environmental advisor at Good Energy tells ISRAEL21c.
The Good Energy Initiative owes its start in life to the Heschel Center for Environmental Learning and Leadership, Israel's premiere environment education center. Heschel will support Good Energy until next year.
This particular project is "super innovative" says Heschel's resource developer David Pearlman Paran. "It is breaking new ground in Israel. Its focus on social initiatives is fairly uncommon," he says, and it adds value by "improving energy efficiency and society."
How does Good Energy compare to other offset organizations in the rest of the world? "It is up to speed, and in some ways it is far ahead," replies Paran.
There's nothing fishy about it. Israeli Prof. Yonathan Zohar has spent a lifetime researching fish production and has a solution that might stop the world's dramatic decline in fisheries. Hip "green" environmentalists and sushi lovers will like it too.
Zohar has created fish farms for the urban environment. His special self-contained fish pools can be built close to fresh food markets, in city warehouses and even in your condominium.
"It is clear that the consumption of seafood and fish is on the rise, because of the great health benefits... but now we are over-harvesting," warns Zohar, director of the Center of Marine Biotechnology at the University of Maryland. "We need to change that practice and become more efficient in a way that is compatible to the earth."
Zohar, who was born in Jerusalem and is a graduate of Hebrew University, thinks his solution is ideal. In the basement of the center in Baltimore, he has built a series of high-tech fish pools. They are filled with freshwater from the tap, and have been adjusted with salts and buffers to mimic the marine environment.
Using advanced concepts of microbiology, Zohar has entrained special microbes to live in symbiosis with the fish in order to digest their waste. Aerated by plastic plugs that house the microbes, the fish pools are bio-secure and contaminant free, according to Zohar.
In addition, part of the solid waste that is created by uneaten food or microbial byproducts is converted into methane and used as biofuel, says Zohar. This is significant. Zohar was one of the original team to develop the technology of fish farming in floating cages at sea in Israel.
These cages have become deeply controversial because the waste created by the farmed fish pollutes the surrounding seawater. In addition, the waters where the fish are raised are often heavily polluted with heavy metals such as mercury, leading to problems such as the recent toxic sushi scare in the US.
"I am trying to develop the next generation technology, to address cages and nets in light of environmental concerns," he says. "It is clear we are over-harvesting the ocean and running out of fish. We've focused on an alternative land-based method that can be used in the urban environment."
The urban fish pools, each about the size of a children's pool with higher walls and a roof, can be put into operation anywhere Zohar stresses. "They can be placed in the mid-West or in Las Vegas," he says.
These urban fish pools certainly address the problem of declining fish populations. According to the Food and Agricultural Organization, about 75 percent of the world's commercially fished species are either depleted, overfished or fully fished. If current trends continue, the fisheries will collapse by 2050.
The pools can also address another environmental issue - our carbon footprint - how far food needs to travel before it arrives at the dinner table. Eating locally is becoming not only fashionable in the United States; some people consider it to be more important than eating organic.
Zohar is now looking for an investor to build a pilot plant. But the idea is not a dream - a prototype, replete with living fish, now resides in Baltimore. There, he is growing Mediterranean gilthead seabream (Sparus aurata), also known as dorade royale, or aurata.
And the taste? "Our fish were tested by local seafood restaurants and were highly praised for their taste, texture and freshness," says Zohar. "We are currently shifting our focus to additional high value marine fish, to include the European seabass (bronzini) and cobia."
Cities and companies in the US are concerned about energy usage. Not only does consuming excessive electricity to cover lighting costs for streetlights and stores, affect the bottom line, it also takes a toll on the environment.
Now Netanya-based company Metrolight has a "green" lighting solution that will be easier on the accounting books and also the earth. The company has engineered a lighting control system that prolongs the life of industrial high-intensity discharge (HID) lights, while making them more efficient at the same time.
HID lights are the most common type of lights used in city streetlights. They are also found in grocery stories and shopping malls. Brighter than fluorescent, HID lights suffer quickly from wear and tear, via an igniting and operating mechanism known as a ballast.
Through its flagship product, the Smart Electronic Ballast, Metrolight has developed a new kind of ballast that not only extends the life of the lamp, but which can make industrial lighting more efficient. Up to 65 percent more efficient, the company says.
Metrolight has been in the business since 1996, and after seeing the success of its product in the global marketplace, it now has a bold ambition of reducing America's (and the world's) total energy consumption by three percent. This equals the CO2 pollution emitted by 65 million cars, and millions - if not billions - of dollars in savings.
The company claims to have already saved its customers about $6.5 million.
"We are selling energy savings," says Metrolight's CTO Jonathan Hollander, who has helped develop the ballast. He explains that the traditional magnetic ballasts used in HID lights, quickly reduce the output of the light by about 50 percent. To compensate, as a rule, light designers install lights that are stronger than necessary.
This is wasteful, reasons Hollander. "Light designers know this and will overshoot," he tells ISRAEL21c.
To keep the HID light strong and long lasting, the core of Metrolight's solution is its ballast, which controls the light ignition process slowly, by not destroying the electrode, says Hollander. In technical-speak he says: "We operate the lamp with a high frequency regime."
According to a 2002 US Department of Energy report, lighting amounts to about 22 percent of all electricity used in America. Of that, HID lights account for 26 percent of lighting energy, or about six percent of the total energy used in lighting. If Metrolight can save up to 65 percent of six percent, the company estimates about three percent of America's total energy costs can be conserved.
Cities in the US are using the solution, so is the Tenafly Racquet Club in New Jersey and the Carlsberg beer factory in Israel. Metrolight reports that some 250 thousand ballasts have been installed in locations around the world.
"When we realized that what we do has the potential to save energy, this was something that we were excited about," says Hollander. "We want to save three percent of the world's energy. That is a huge amount of savings. We are concerned about the world we live in and try to minimize damage, and Metrolight is an effective way to do that."
I would like to suggest a new creation and trade name for part of the commercial area in Modiin-Maccabim-Reut. I suggest merging society’s need to promote employment together with preservation of the city’s environmental quality, and announce the establishment of:
“THE ISRAELI CLEAN-TECH CENTER”
Rationale & Vision
An employed resident who earns an honorable income can be free of worry about the environment. An unemployed resident who does not earn an honorable income cannot be free to worry about the environment. And therefore, it is clear to all of us that every resident needs help in finding work in general and preferably near his home in particular. There are many residents in Modiin-Maccabim-Reut who work in the field of high-tech and who, in order to earn a livelihood, must drive to other towns every day sometimes an hour and-a-half to two hours away in each direction. Others are unemployed altogether and frequently leave the city due to lack of local work opportunities in his/her profession.
In my opinion, the solution lies in aggressive marketing in order to attract “clean-tech” entrepreneurs, industry and factories to operate in the municipal commercial area and establish “the Israeli Clean-Tech Center”.
Regrettably up until today, there have been no marketing efforts in this sphere, and most of those working in the high-tech industry opened plants, industry and businesses in cities adjacent to Modiin-Maccabim-Reut such as Lod, Airport City, the new Terminal Park located next to Airport City, Yehud, Or Yehuda, Jerusalem, Petach Tikvah, Herzliya, Kfar Saba, Caesaria and Raanana. These towns succeeded with high-tech industries due to effective marketing done and being done these days, while Modiin-Maccabim-Reut remains empty of factories, industry and businesses in the field. And this is a pity.
What is “Clean-Tech”?
“Clean-Tech” or in Hebrew, “Environmental Technology Industry” are new technologies or products aimed at significantly reducing polluting emissions affecting the environment, or considerably purifying the environment from pollutants directly or indirectly. Clean-tech industry comprises those dealing with advanced and alternative energies which develop products that will provide the world with cleaner air, better quality industries for water purification, industries that provide sure-standing solutions such as solar energy from the sun, bio-energy industries, clean fuels, recycling plants, green chemicals industry, advanced agriculture, the field of water desalinization, non-polluting transport, biological alternatives for chemicals, biological fuels, polluting emissions treatment, green construction, proper irrigation, and more. It is estimated that in the past year, there were more than 200 issues on major world stock markets of companies that deal with clean-tech technologies! Major financial bodies have also entered the field of a healthy future. Ben Gurion University of the Negev is leading a variety of clean-tech research studies in Israel. Clean-tech is flourishing immensely. During 2006, there were 290 companies in the field, and another 400 were added in 2007. This industry is advancing at a spectacular rate.
The clean-tech industry is filled with challenges due to global warming, increased air pollution, lack of alternative fuels, and erosion of the earth’s natural resources. Clean-tech has attained high acclaim and support, even the State (the regulator) encourages its growth and companies and financial institutions are interested in investing in it.
Why is it worthwhile to establish clean-tech in Modiin’s business zone? TABA (land allocation registry) permits 4 types of activity in the commercial zone of Modiin-Maccabim-Reut, which covers an area of 1.5 million sq.m: high-tech industry, service centers (such as storage), offices and commerce.
Recently, a number of manufacturers arrived in the business area and established “service centers”. In my opinion, they will in fact set up huge storehouses for commercial purposes, and selected Modiin’s business area because of its attractive location in the center of the country, which is accessible to Highway 1, Route 443, Road 6 and Ben Gurion Airport, with access to the railway with lines from the south to Nahariya in the north, and more. While it is important that these warehouses are located here, I feel that they will not bring employment to the city’s residents, except for a small number of laborers. It is good to bring these businesses to the city, but in the right quantity, so that the increase in the number of storehouses will not in the end transform the area into one huge storage depot, whose activities will defer any attempt to call the area a high-tech or clean-tech center. One of the characteristics of high-tech industry is the concentration of production plants and entrepreneurs into one crowded area, but when many trucks pass through the area every day on their way to service centers – there will be a drop in scientific industries coming to the area. Therefore, I feel that we are at the 89th minute, when we have to designate and name part of the business area for high-tech industry, and part for “the Israeli Clean-Tech Center”, a move which will attract many businesses in the field to come to the area where many clean-tech industries are situated.
Modiin is an ideal location for the “Israeli Clean-Tech Center” due to the following facts: 1. Modiin-Maccabim-Reut was declared as Israel’s capital of environmental quality by the mayor and this designation matches the vision to establish clean-tech employment. 2. The city is a leader in many environmental issues such as the establishment of a recycling plant for construction debris, broad environmental education activities, underground communication and electrical cables, and more. 3. Many city residents have a high appreciation of the environment. 4. The existence of stringent environmental regulations regarding the opening of new businesses or factories within city limits. 5. The business zone is surrounded by open spaces, with the Ben Shemen Forest along the northern and western edges. 6. There is efficient and convenient access for vehicles to the business area. 7. The city has a human element that is interested in being employed close to home in the field of high-tech and clean-tech (the last survey conducted by the high-tech forum in Modiin showed that there are over 4000 residents in the city who work in high-tech!)
This, in my opinion, is a classic case of win-win where everybody gains: clean-tech industries will open factories and businesses in the commercial zone of Modiin-Maccabim-Reut, the clean-tech industry branch will be advanced to benefit the Israeli market, many city residents will earn their living there, the city will profit from commercial activity and municipal taxes - in short: employment and income on the one hand, and preservation of the environment on the other!
How can the vision of “Israeli Clean-Tech Center” be advanced? In order to promote the issue, I plan to meet shortly with the projects manager that the city employs in order to promote the business sector, Mr. Gabi Valikson, and interest him in my dream of establishing the “Israeli Clean-Tech Center”. In addition, I plan to meet with Prof. Shemansky and Tamir Ben Shachar who are preparing a strategy plan for the municipality to promote the business zone.
Two months ago, I met with Ms. Chen Altschuler, Managing Director and owner of the venture capital company Altschuler-Shacham, which invests in clean-tech industries such as the green hothouse in Haifa. Ms. Altschuler expressed great interest in helping to advance initiatives in the field of clean-tech in Modiin, and will assist in promoting the dream of an “Israeli Clean-Tech Center”.
I also met with Ms. Clara Oren, Managing Director of “the green hothouse” which was established in Haifa. I asked her to consider establishing another green hothouse here in the “Israeli Clean-Tech Center in Modiin”, and I plan to meet with her again in order to assess this option.
About two months ago at the “Watek” exhibition that was organized by the Ministry of Environmental Protection about water and environmental technology, I met with Mr. Nir Kedmi, head of the Economic Branch in the Ministry of Environmental Protection, which promotes governmental policy concerning clean-tech (environmental technology). He told me that there is over $400 million waiting to be invested in clean-tech industries in Israel! I also met with Dr. Doron Lavi from the Parto Engineering Company Ltd, which is formulating national policy for the government to promote clean-tech (environmental technology). I plan to interest them in helping to establish the “Israeli Clean-Tech Center” in Modiin.
In addition, there are capital venture funds that are already raising capital for industry in this field such as the Oasis Company, Tamarix and Natchers and others whom we should approach and fast. These companies are in the midst of raising hundreds of millions of dollars for the clean-tech industry in Israel. We should hurry and not hesitate.
The European Union will be investing 32 billion euro in 2007-2013 to promote global clean-tech technology. Even Sherri Arison has established an investment fund for this purpose. Recently, I met with a number of city residents who work in the field and who are interested in helping to promote the idea. These residents claim to have connections with companies in Italy and other places that have shown an interest in investing in a special center for clean-tech industry. In addition, representatives for two Canadian Funds - SDTC (sustainable development technology Canada) - arrived in Israel to assess investment possibilities in clean-tech at the level of 2 billion dollars! The Brazilian company Petrobras is also evaluating investing in the area of clean-tech in Israel.
In my opinion, “clean-tech” is the future of Modiin.
Continuation of the Vision to Promote Employment in Modiin-Maccabim-Reut and Preservation of the Environment I am interested in establishing a green hothouse in the Israeli Clean-Tech Center in Modiin which will help senior scientists in the Ministry of Environmental Protection and me to nurture clean-tech start-up companies on their way.
I plan to host the “Annual Israeli Clean-Tech Conference” every year in the new Cultural Center in Modiin where entrepreneurs, industrialists, hothouse technologies and so on will participate in a workshop to advance the issue in the city in particular, and in Israel in general.
I plan to organize at the same time an annual “Clean-Tech Employment Fair” where residents can seek employment in their field and even in industries that will be established in Modiin.
I suggest that the future “Israeli Clean-Tech Center” in Modiin will be built according to “green construction” standards and “green materials”. It is vital that factories only use green solar energy, use and apply green treatment to sewage and garbage, acquire alternative power and fuel sources, use biological chemicals to tend municipal gardens, recycled water, use of recycling devices and so on. The business zone will operate in the spirit of “clean-tech”.
I suggest that investors be encouraged to establish industries with municipal assurance to use their products by return from these companies which will manufacture them according to clean-tech technology, garbage treatment, water treatment and so on.
I suggest a budget be allocated towards a “Start-Up Fund” in order to encourage investors to come and invest in the Clean-Tech area in Modiin.
A building that will be used as “a technological green hothouse in Modiin” should be considered.
To summarize:
In my opinion, Modiin-Maccabim-Reut can fill a unique niche as the leading clean-tech industrial entity in Israel and will lead the country in this realm.
The Green Prophet is a green lifestyle blog dedicated to promoting an environmentally-sound future for Israel and beyond.
Our contributors are not here to preach to the choir, but to offer some words of wisdom and then some, on how to make Israel and its neighborhood a better and healthier place for all.
We recognize that a lot needs to be done. With your feedback and support, let’s get there together.
