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Enzymes used in cleaning products and food 'are potent allergens', warns study

Research says genetically modified enzymes, which allow products to be still labelled as ‘natural’, should be tested like potentially hazardous chemicals

Genetically modified enzymes used in food, perfumes, medicine and cleaning products are “potent allergens” and should be tested like other potentially hazardous chemicals, experts have said.

There has been an explosion in the use of enzymes to boost flavours and aromas, including in low-fat foods, helping to create a sector worth about $10bn (£7.7bn), according to a study published in Occupational & Environmental Medicine.

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Source: Guardian Environment

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Enterprise car rental company leaves Alec after public outcry

Company follows lead of Ford and others in exiting rightwing American Legislative Exchange Council after consumers condemned membership

The car rental giant Enterprise says it has resigned its membership in the American Legislative Exchange Council (Alec), an anti-regulation lobby group that has pushed against climate change legislation, effective immediately. The announcement follows last month’s revelation by the Guardian of the publicly environmentally friendly company’s contributions to the group.

Enterprise is the largest car rental company in the world and owns Enterprise Rent-A-Car, National and Alamo. It has sought recognition for its tree-planting programs, aimed at offsetting carbon emissions, and its increasingly large fleet of clean vehicles.

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Source: Guardian Environment

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‘It’s a depressing sight’: climate change unleashes ghostly death on Great Barrier Reef

Months after the worst coral bleaching event to hit the reef, Australian conservationist Tim Flannery returns to a tourism hot spot 50km north-east of Port Douglas to witness the destruction wrought by a warming planet

John Rumney says that just a year ago, this particular spot was once the most stunning coral garden on the entire Great Barrier Reef. If a film crew said it wanted to get a cliche shot of the reef with its mind-boggling richness of coral and fish species, this was where he took them.

Now he’s taking us there to see the destruction wrought by climate change. He says the fact this reef was used in so many films and magazines means it’s a perfect location to see the effects of the recent bleaching event.

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Source: Guardian Environment

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US tests reveal major TV manufacturers may be manipulating energy ratings

Natural Resources Defence Council claims Samsung, LG and Vizio have designed sets that perform well in testing but disable energy-saving features in real-world conditions, causing energy consumption to soar

Independent tests in the US have found that the energy consumption of Samsung and LG TV sets nosedives under test conditions but can soar by up to 45% in real-world use, raising questions of manipulation by software devices.

TVs from the top three best selling US brands – Samsung, LG and Vizio – have also been found to be switching off power-saving features without warning, as soon as consumers make “out of the box” changes to their main picture menu settings, which can double the TV sets’ energy usage.

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Source: Guardian Environment

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A day at the California farm where the workers will get the pay they deserve

Phil McGrath’s family has farmed in California for five generations. Now, as the state mandates overtime pay for laborers, he is one of the few owners committed to the new law: ‘We’ll know we tried to do the right thing’

Ninety minutes from downtown Los Angeles, flowers of all shapes and sizes grow next to the historic US highway 101. Year round the patches of mixed colors fill a small portion of the 300-acre McGrath family farm in Camarillo, which includes sprawling fields of berries, tomatoes and other organic plants.

Javier Carranza is an expert when it comes to chopping and trimming vegetation with a hand scythe between the dirt rows. He has harvested flowers and organic produce at McGrath’s for 19 years, with his father and two brothers. They all live on the property in a simple structure reminiscent of old mustard yellow barracks on local military bases.

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Source: Guardian Environment

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How to “change the world” of learning at university

UCL engages multidisciplinary student group in circular economy challenge

Digital technology is creating new opportunities for personalised learning journeys every day. Educational Apps are flooding the market of primary and secondary schools. Employers attribute increasing importance to collaboration, creativity and communication in their recruitment processes. Yet, the traditional lecture-seminar format of higher education has resisted change. However, there are signs of change at institutions like UCL. In recent years, the university has piloted a new learning format connecting students with experts to address real-world challenges. Find out how students from a range of disciplines work together to take on a two-week challenge in changing the world.

Inspirations for a different kind of education can be found in places like Hill Holt Wood, a woodland social enterprise that offers alternative education services to young people who are not in mainstream education. A dedicated team of rangers puts teams of young people through their paces in woodland management, green construction projects, cooking with local food, alongside the usual classroom English and Maths. There, the young people develop skills through experience and practice, such as problem solving and teamwork.

Photo via VisualHunt.com
Photo via VisualHunt.com

Young engineers at UCL on the other hand are seriously good academics and immensely skilled at learning from books, lectures or through theory. In other words: they excel in the abstract. Despite their talents, there has been talk within professional engineering circles that universities are not preparing young engineers for the kind of complex, interdisciplinary challenges that will characterise the 21st century.

It is no longer enough for engineers to leave university with just technical knowledge and theoretical understanding.[1] Graduates must also be able to offer capabilities such as creative problem solving, design and innovation, and they must demonstrate a capacity for working in teams, across disciplines and in business or management, all along considering and design for the economic, social and environmental impact of their projects.

In response to the challenge, the UCL Engineering Faculty has developed an integrated programme, which is undertaken by all the engineering disciplines as part of their course. Since it aims to teach competences rather than abstractions, the programme is largely based on learning by experience, much like the Woodland experience.

Photo credit: Thomas Hawk via VisualHunt.com / CC BY-NC
Photo credit: Thomas Hawk via VisualHunt.com / CC BY-NC

What emerged is the two year long Integrated Engineering Programme, which is capped by How to Change the World, an intensive two-week course for second year engineering undergraduates from all departments across the Engineering Faculty. This also includes students from the UCL School of Management and from Computer Science.

It is a problem-based learning course in which interdisciplinary student teams are challenged to come up with solid, but innovative solutions to some of the globe’s toughest problems. We support students through a series of facilitated workshops to develop innovative and entrepreneurial approaches to complex 21st century challenges, which UCL develops in collaboration with its partners, the Ellen MacArthur Foundation among them.

How to Change the World encompasses 700 students, 125 teams, 40 staff, 40 partners and experts, 5 challenge themes and a lot of good will and hard work.

This year they set two circular economy challenges: one based around electronics and the other around the construction industry. They also run Smart Cities challenges, which can equally well be utilised for students to explore new funding models. The great thing about this programme is that the faculty only pose a challenge, accompanied with some materials and facilitated sessions. Students then take responsibility and lead their learning. How to Change the World thereby presents a platform for pedagogical innovation, breaking with the traditional lecture and seminar format. Learning journeys are created by the students themselves.

Photo via Visualhunt.com
Photo via Visualhunt.com

At crucial points in the design process, the partners from public, third and private sectors come in to collaborate with and advise student teams on their specific ideas. On the final day of How to Change the World students are assessed on their work in an Innovation Showcase, in which they display their challenge responses on trade-show stands and pitch their ideas to Dragons Den – style panels.

This year’s circular economy challenge produced some the best work of the programme – from circuit boards made from enzymatically dissolvable plastics, to modular cities and e-waste roads.

One of the most rewarding features of the course so far is that students report how much they talk about the programme when they meet employers. “It is the thing that most interests employers on my CV, because they know I can write essays and research, but they want to know that I can work in interdisciplinary teams and tackle real-world problems too”, tells one graduate.

One of the learning points for Kate and other staff running these programmes is that if you support young people, but let them work it out for themselves, they will always come up trumps. So much so, that one of our ‘Dragons’, ex-CEO of Atkins, told them that the average quality was not only, ‘well above what I’d expect’ but ‘well above what I get from industry’ as well.

The programme has just achieved its third birthday and the next step is to work out how to support students to take their ideas forward. That will make it a real gold standard

Notes

[1] Such changes are championed by industry, education and policy organisations. For example: International Engineering Alliance (2013) Graduate Attributes and Professional Compentencies http://www.ieagreements.org/IEA-Grad-Attr-Prof-Competencies.pdf Accessed 14.09.15, and Royal Academy of Engineering (2007) Educating Engineers for the 21st Century http://www.raeng.org.uk/publications/reports/educating-engineers-21st-century Accessed 14.09.15

Also see Kolmos A, Hadgraft RG, Holgaard JE (2015) Response Strategies for Curriculum Change in Engineering International Journal of Technology and Design Education 25: http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10798-015-9319-y Accessed 14.09.15

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ExxonMobil under investigation by US financial watchdog over oil valuations

Securities and Exchange Commission looking into how fossil fuel giant valued its assets since oil prices fell two years ago

The US Securities and Exchange Commission has launched an investigation into ExxonMobil over how the fossil fuel giant has valued its assets in the wake of falling oil prices and increasing climate change-related regulations.

The company has confirmed that the US’s top financial watchdog is seeking information on its financial reporting. Documents have been sought from Exxon as well as its auditor, PricewaterhouseCoopers.

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Source: Guardian Environment

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Globechain enable re-use of one million tonnes of unwanted stuff

Tech startup Globechain has managed to redistribute one million tonnes of unwanted items and equipment via their innovative online platform, supporting the circular economy through direct re-use.

There's more than office tables and chairs re-used through Globechain - from duvets to coffee grounds
There’s more than office tables and chairs re-used through Globechain – from duvets to coffee grounds

The startup has worked with the retail, commercial and construction sectors, providing a way for businesses to get rid of their unwanted stuff. Shop refits, office moves and upgrades can result in products being replaced, and for many organisations this results in a waste problem, with companies often paying for removal and disposal at considerable expense.

Instead, Globechain acts as a marketplace that connects organisations with unwanted goods to others who are in need of equipment, such as charities or social enterprises.The activity facilitates some key aspects of the circular economy framework, namely that products go through multiple consecutive cycles of reuse, and are kept in operation with minimal refurbishment and remanufacturing. The process opens up higher potential savings in terms of material, labour, energy, and capital embedded in the product, compared with a new product or simply recycling the materials. An impressive 95% of all listings on the site are redistributed, mostly within 24 hours.

This week marks a milestone for the platform, having redistributed one million tonnes of material, and enabling the third sector to save over £600,000 in one year. Re-distributed items include fixtures from restaurants such as Nando’s, and medical equipment originally used by Bart’s NHS Trust. However, as well as these shop fixtures and furniture which have some history of re-use, Globechain has also provided a platform for the exchange of materials that you might not immediately consider for re-use, such as spent coffee grounds which have been used for a youth unemployment initiative, growing oyster mushrooms. Hotel chain Radisson Blu Edwardian also see the potential in re-use after using the platform to re-distribute 4,000 pillows and 2,500 duvets that would have otherwise been disposed.

Globechain CEO May Al-Karooni says that the platform is part of the solution in addressing the 177 million tonnes of waste sent to landfill each year in England, and that showing businesses the benefits of redistributing underutilised assets “is helping businesses pave the way for a new era in resources and re-use”.

Lead image: DijuatalTim / Flickr CC BY 2.0

 

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Paris climate agreement poised to come into force

UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, predicts global climate deal will be fully ratified by the end of the year after 31 nations officially sign up in New York

The Paris climate agreement is on the brink of coming into force after 31 nations officially joined the landmark accord, with the United Nations secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, predicting it will be fully ratified by the end of the year.

On Wednesday, 31 countries formally signed up to the Paris deal at the UN general assembly in New York. They include Brazil, the world’s seventh largest emitter of greenhouse gases, Mexico, Argentina and Sri Lanka. Oil-rich United Arab Emirates also ratified the deal, as did nations considered particularly vulnerable to sea level rise, such as Kiribati and Bangladesh.

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Source: Guardian Environment

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Why Sweden’s VAT tax breaks on repairs could be a big deal

The Swedish government is set to take policy steps to enable a different kind of behaviour in the way in which products are used and the life-cycles of goods. Tax breaks on repairs to bicycles, washing machines and just about any broken item are being brought to the parliament by the ruling coalition. Realities on the ground are not always closely linked to the intentions behind policies, but in the current business context, it’ll be interesting to see whether Sweden’s move provides some kind of model for other countries.

Photo via Visual hunt
Photo via Visual hunt

A VAT rate slash from 25% to 12% on repairs to a range of products, including bikes, shoes and white goods, has been put forward and a further piece of policy is expected where people will be allowed to claim back a portion income tax on the labour cost of repairing appliances.

“We believe that this could substantially lower the cost and so make it more rational economic behaviour to repair your goods,” said Per Bolund, Sweden’s minister for financial markets and consumer affairs told the Guardian.

These legislative initiatives are designed to foster a marketplace where it makes less sense for consumers to throw out broken items and to incentivise the repairs industry in Sweden.

While they are part of Sweden’s focus on reducing carbon emissions, what makes these policies most interesting is their potential link and indirect enablement of disruptive business trends like the sharing economy and maker movements.

Photo via VisualHunt.com
Photo via VisualHunt.com

There is already an emerging business case for higher levels of repair and sharing models, and a policy framework that systematically provides both labour and purchasing advantages for those behaviours could help those marketplaces become more entrenched and widely spread.

The tax breaks are part of the Swedish government’s budget proposal. If they are voted through in December, they could become law as early as 1 January 2017.

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