Footsteps can light

Our energy needs are not diminishing, our hunger for power is insatiable and the prediction is that we will need 50 per cent more by the middle of the century, says Professor Gary Mcewan

hile I shared the dismay of the majority at President Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accord, the news was neither a shock nor a deep concern for me.

As the second biggest carbon emitter on the planet, this incredibly short-sighted decision will certainly go down as a monumental mistake but the decision was softened a little for me as it came right after I visited the Shell Making the Future Festival in London.

The four-day festival was crammed with 40,000 (particularly young) people looking, touching, understanding, competing and watching demonstrations of the latest clean technologies that are the real future of the energy industry.

From hydrogen fuel cells to energy-efficient combustion engines to power-producing kites and electric cars, the positive energy and momentum created by our young people to create a future world that is cleaner, more sustainable and less harmful was incredibly inspiring.

I cheered on the eco-marathon, 170 student teams from 29 countries who had built and were racing incredibly fuel-efficient vehicles built for speed, efficiency and endurance around a one mile track. These young engineers of the future were using energy efficiency as their driver to create manned transportation that was using one litre of fuel to travel in excess of 2500km. Their ingenuity was astonishing but even more remarkable were the sheer numbers of young people involved and their passion for developing new ways of doing things that reduce to close to zero, the negative impact we make as we live our lives.

I met young people who were generating power from the pavements we walk on.

I saw a football stadium floodlit using the energy of the players running around the pitch, I watched as a road that had been absorbing energy all day literally lit up at night so that street lights were not required.

Rooms were illuminated using the simple principles of gravity. This level of innovation left me satisfied that we are truly orientated toward resolving our future energy needs using brain power and not just fuel power.

Our energy needs are not diminishing, our hunger for power is insatiable and the prediction is that we will need 50 per cent more power by the middle of the century. This energy demand, if met by conventional carbon sources, will simply result in irreversible global damage. We have to broaden the ways in which we harness and generate power that does not leave our planet damaged for future generations. We require our young people to grasp the challenges we have in energy and become the innovators, scientists and engineers we need to create a low-carbon world.

Quite why the US President is fixated on making America great again when the rest of the world is trying to make the planet great again is rather beyond me but in the fullness of time I suspect his stance will be an irrelevance as long as the majority understand that we need to develop a much wider approach to how we generate clean power. Despite President Trump, I have faith. ● Professor Gary Mcewan is CEO Elevator, Aberdeen.