Green Energy for the World

By ELINANDO B. CINCO

MANILA, Philippines — THE day is not far away when Western European countries, known for exporting medicines, cars, tennis players and beauty contest winners, will be selling their non-traditional export to the world – green energy.

“Green,” what?

That may, indeed, sound Greek to not a few of our readers.

But Sweden, in particular, one of those nations in the continent so obsessed with environmental protection, is upbeat about this “green energy” thing.

In fact, it has already perfected this developmental product.

And the Swedes want the world – already reeling from increasing pollution and decreasing sources of energy – to join them in adopting what their country has been successful at.

In the August 15, 2011, issue of the American TIME weekly news magazine, is a front-page feature article whose title appears to tell it all:

“Stockholm runs on green energy and wants to export it to the world.” And to quote the opening paragraph:

“Call it recycling opportunity. After their failed bid to host the 2004 Summer Olympics, Stockholm city leaders decided to turn a would-be sports village in the Hammarby Sjostad district into one of the world’s successful eco-villages

“The practice of powering buses with biogas, recycling rainwater for irrigation, and using organic waste for fertilizer spread to other districts of Sweden’s largest city.

“Today the city’s water is so clean that fishermen actually stand on bridges in the central business district catching fresh salmon and trout.”

Why am I quoting all this?

It is simply because some of those Swedish initiatives are already being done here in the Philippines since 2008, or even earlier. With concerted government assistance and workable technical inputs from the private sector, we could have easily preempted the successful Nordic experiment.

And some of those environmental benefits would have filtered down to communities in Metro Manila or in some other major urban areas.

TIME explains those possibilities:

By 2050, Metro Manila, just like Stockholm, could become a fossil-fuel-free metropolis. The latter is now acknowledged as the First European Green Capital, given the accolade last year.

Take note of this – Stockholm hopes “to turn green into gold by exporting smart power to a now energy (saving)-conscious world.”

At its Royal Seaport, now under construction, is a smart grid that will allow renewable energy (including solar and wind power) to flow among the homes and offices of residents.

Thus, “buildings will become ‘green houses’ that not only use but also store green energy and then feed it back into the grid whenever possible.”

Through this initiative, carbon emissions will be reduced “to less than 1.5 tons per person by 2020, well below the US average of 20 tons. Ships will be able to plug in and charge up using the onshore electric grid, meaning, they can shut off noisy engines, making the harbor area more attractive to live in.”

“Di ba nakaka-inggit?”