Technological answer for the polluted planet
Feb 6 2010 by Tony Henderson, The Journal
Life changed for Gareth Kane literally in the cold light of day. He talks to Environment Editor TONY HENDERSON
Gareth worked as a research associate on Newcastle University’s Design for a Clean Environment project.
He gained an MPhil in the eco-design of large products such as ships and oil platforms.
His next move was to head the Clean Environment Management Centre at Teesside University.
The centre works with industry on environmental solutions.
Gareth implemented the industrial symbiosis project, based on the idea that one company’s waste can be another venture’s raw material.
Examples include:
Potato waste from a crisp factory being composted and used as a farmland soil improver.
300,000 tomato plants being grown under glass using waste heat from a factory. Carbon dioxide from the same works is also used in the greenhouses to help ripening.
Offcuts from a plastic factory recycled into a range of projects including plastic kerbstones.
“Far more solutions can be found among these lines,” said Gareth.
After six years, he set up Terra Infirma to help companies introduce more sustainability into their processes.
There are many benefits for companies in going greener, ranging from an improved image and chances of winning work to increased profitability.
“If you look at the money being put into building a low-carbon economy then there is a mass of business opportunities,” said Gareth.
He lives in Heaton, Newcastle with Karen, a geologist who took a PhD at Newcastle University in minewater treatment and now lectures at Durham University.
They have two sons, Harry, three, and Jimmy, three months, and the new book is dedicated to their generation,
Gareth said: “When the crew of Apollo 8 brought back pictures showing the Earth floating like a blue marble, the human race was faced with a stark reality – we live on a finite limp of rock spinning through space.
“Two things became very clear – natural resources are not infinite, and if we exhaust them there is nowhere else to go.
“It is no exaggeration to say our natural world is in crisis. If the population of the world was to live like citizens of the UK, we would need three planets to support that lifestyle.
“If we all lived like the average US citizen, we would need five.
“It is only the poverty in which the majority of humankind lives that stops the planet giving up the ghost right now. But with the economies of India and China booming, it is imperative that something is done to make human life sustainable.”
