Homecoming

I have a look round St. Paul’s Cathedral and take photos of the London skyline. I spot some green roofs and a PV array and some pretty good bike parking at Euston. As we spin northwards the sky gets bluer. It is a little known fact that we do have sun in Manchester, but we save it for special occasions and when I lift thebike off the train it feels pretty special to be back.
The sandbar is closed but Polomental is sitting outside eating onion bhajis. I give him his duty free which I managed to fit in by dangling carrier bags off each handle bars. Katface arrives, we get beers from the shop over the road and cut up the cycle chic stickers she got in Copenhagen so instead of reading ‘Hold my bicycle while I kiss your boyfriend’ so they say ‘Hold my friend while I kiss your bicycle’ and stick them on our bikes. The housemate arrives on the Pashley and we have another beer. There’s a lot of cars out, all getting wound up and angry with each other. It’s because the Mancunian way is shut, the big not-quite-a-motorway flyover route that generally stops this sort of scene. Katface suggests we ride it home so we cut past the barriers – easy on our bikes. There’s no roadworks going on yet – I think they’ve just put the bollards up and we fly along, four abreast with the sun shining overhead. This is home.

Kilometers 5030
Kilometers cycled 400
Countries visited 5
Transport carbon emissions 156 kgCO2

October 9th Presentations, Presidents and Lighthouses

So despite cobbling my presentation together on the train and not having a proper run through beforehand it went rather well. No one nodded off and I even got some laughs (and at the right places!) and had a few people come up and say well done afterwards which was very nice of them.
Then I had a crazy cycle back from London Bridge to the hostel. Before I was out of the station proper a taxi driver tried to kill me, and then shouted at me for it. I backed down and got out of his way (before he barged me out of it) and shouted ‘Oh I’ll be back in the UK then, welcome home’ after him. Even though I was up against the clock I stopped to take a series of photos of cyclists (and cars and buses and f**cking taxis and motorbikes) leaving the lights at the bottom of the bridge. It was pure chaos. The bikes were mostly at the front with a couple of motorbikes and everything else up against their back wheels like a great wall of metal death and when then pulled away I was amazed that no one died in the rush to barge past and overtake the cyclists. I know I know that they do it every day but you can’t just put a blue line on a map and call it a ‘cycling superhighway’ – you have to put the blue line on the actual physical ROAD as well.
As always in London, I spend more time pushing my bike than riding it but from St Pauls to Trinity House I do ride, with my camera phone in my pocket so I can take pics of everyone who tries to kill me.
Trinity house, where the presidents dinner is, is very posh but they are not at all sniffy about the newbike and happily let me chain it inside their railings. Inside is all sweeping staircases and chandeliers, a string quartet, huge paintings of famous royal types and ships - of course. It is the headquarters of the lighthouse association and we are treated to a potted history of the organisation and the building by a great speaker who tells it like he’s sharing gossip from last night about close friends as he namedrops monarchs and politicians, many long dead. Dinner is delicious, the wine is free and my dinner date is driving not drinking so I get to have his as well and by the time I have to get up to be given my award I’m on the port and brandy and look frankly wasted - on my photos at least. There is a professional photographer there who gets me to pose next to a ships bell with my certificate – I dread to think how badly they will come out.
At least by the time we leave the streets are empty. St Paul’s Youth Hostel don’t have a bikepark but they let me bring it inside. I’m woken by the bells and reminded of a hungover Katface in Copenhagen shouting ‘I don’t believe in your god, shut up and let me sleep’. But I quite like it, I have a lovely view and the breakfast is ace.

8th October Home Straight

I planned to have a final cycle ride through the Dutch countryside to the ferry but my nose starts streaming and my head aching and within the space of an hour I’m in the throes of a cold bad enough to make my nose red and sore from the tissues and something (air? mucus?) come out of my tear ducts when I blow my nose. So instead I get the train, via Rotterdam, paying an extra few euros to take the newbike on unfolded. At Hook of Holland I cycle round the quiet streets beside the ferry port. It has everything you’d expect in Dutch village – several bars, a coffee house and three massive cycling shops. I find a place that does mussels in a garlic sauce that tastes like all of the garlic in the world and hope this will cure my cold. I could cut through bank vaults with my breath by the time I’m done eating it. Despite this a guy on the ferry boldly strikes up a conversation with me – he’s a composer of operas and his friend’s dad worked out the solution to the travelling salesman math’s problem – I have heard of neither the operas or the maths problem and he doesn’t know what the solution was so I go back to putting my presentation together, trying to breathe away from the netbook in case I melt it.
Friday morning and I come off the ferry to be greeted by five wide lanes and ‘CARS ONLY’ written big beneath them. A sign tells me that Harwich ferry port wishes me a safe and pleasant journey’ which rings rather false as the road to the station is an A road with no cycle lanes (but plenty of trucks). The little road leading into a housing estate says beside it ‘No through road’ so I go down the big road grumbling and complaining under my (still smelly) breath. When I get there it turns out that the station which I need is back at the port but I’d missed the signs so I cycle back and chat to two other cyclists on the station (because we’re all riding bikes) – they’ve just returned from five months touring Europe. Without folding bikes they’ve struggled on trains, especially in France and Italy and tell me that the Czech Republic has amazing cycle tracks but crap roads – needs a mountain bike apparently but great apart from that and very cheap.
On the train to London I start trying to pick just a couple of case studies for the presentation but then start to just put them all in on the basis that I can always skip through them but will need more if I do a longer presentation at our office later. I start to realize just how much stuff I’ve got, how many places I’ve seen and how much I’ve learnt.
In London I get a City of London cycle map which shows me a special bicycle route to London Bridge. I fail to see what is special about it – there’s no segregated bike lanes and the traffic ignores me. Maybe Boris will be painting some on really soon.
But it’s not all bad – people are generally friendly, the bacon butty I get at Liverpool street is good. I don’t have to pay extra to put my bike on the train. At Balham it seems that Boris has been out with his paint can and they have have big blue cycle tracks, like Copenhagen.

October 7th Rotterdam Climate Initiative

It’s easier to wake up than I expect, even after being up late, on the internet and then lying awake with my head buzzing. I’m up before my alarm for a short walk to Holland-Spoor station at the end of the road, past the bakery, the sex shop, the bong emporium and the abeya (the long black head to floor covering considered suitable by some muslims for ladies) fashion house.
In the world trade centre I meet with Paul, a colleague at a company we have professional links to and Nicole who works for the Rotterdam Climate Initiative. This came into existence in 2007 in the wake of the Clinton climate initiative. Media hype for the topic was high then and Rotterdam’s green mayor and government boldly decided on a reduction target for carbon emissions of 50% on 1990 levels by 2025. This was before any studies had been conducted into how feasible it would be – it was almost arbitrarily chosen as a suitably high target. The project and it’s sister scheme, Rotterdam Climate Proof have calculated that this represents a reduction of 46Megatons of Carbon emissions per year, and that 85-90% of this will have to come from the docks area. Currently the largest chunk of this (around 20MT) is expected to be a carbon capture and storage scheme being developed by E-on for a replacement power plant for which three gas fields in the North sea are being investigated for suitability – storage, as with nuclear is turning out to be the greatest challenge with this technology.
The latest elections have seen a shift to a more democrat/right wing coalition and so it is uncertain what funding will continue but they are confident that they have enough to continue the scoping studies that are underway. In four years time when the real work begins of ensuring that all the so-far voluntary commitment shown by various companies makes it into reality. The biggest problem they’ve faced, Nicole tells me, was an initial reluctance by companies – fears that their ‘level playing field’ was to be removed - but that over the course of the scheme they’ve come round to it and even started proposing initiatives of their own, or working in conjunction with competitors on areas outside of their area of competition (heat supply for example to industrial processes). The aftermath of the ‘climate hype’ has affected them too but they’ve learnt from this and are careful to present the scheme as a whole package that will see Rotterdam as a world leader on climate mitigation specialists, especially in the area of sea level rises. As I’ve been told by the people working in the domestic housing market government subsidies or support for low carbon initiatives is unreliable and no one can allow for it in payback calculations. The majority of the port companies look for paybacks times of less than two years on investment. This combination makes any sort of renewable energy take up almost impossible.
The Stadhaven, ‘city port’ area is the nearest bit of the part to the city and the target of a future large re-development scheme. After the meeting Paul drops me off there and I wander around taking photos of the architecture – there’s a few different styles from the ‘lets make it look like a spaceship’ and the ‘I went to Pisa for my holidays’ school.

but my favourite is this.

Not because it looks particularly nice but because I want to put it on a card and send it to all my architect friends with the slogan ‘When engineers rule the world’

October 6th Viverion, Lochem

Tuesday night Justin and Milena cycle me across town to a great Indonesian restaurant. It looks like a café – small with little formica tables, no alcohol – but the food is exquisite, especially a smoky mackerel fillet with a red paste topping wrapped and steamed in banana leaves and little crispy crackers made with nuts, completely lacking in the polystyrene texture of prawn crackers, with a peanut dipping sauce drizzled in soy, also a pot of fiery but sweet chilli sauce.
They tell me that there is a law in Holland that in any collision between a cyclist and a car the car is automatically assumed to be the guilty party, even if the cyclist has no lights or is riding badly. It’s been in place for a couple of years now (with complaints from some people but a big reduction in accidents involving cyclists) although they half jokingly, half seriously say it might not be around much longer with Mr. Wilders (who is viewed by everyone I meet here with the same sort of affection we have for Nick Griffin) in power. Since the recent election he has seen fit, as one of his first moves, to increase the maximum speed on the motorways from 120 to 130km. Good to know he's on the case with the really important issues! Afterwards we go to a bar with 164 types of beer – worryingly I recognize most of them but reassuringly we only have two as on Wednesday morning I am up and out early for the train to Deventer, across the country on the East side.
At the station I’m met by Bas from Itho Vent again who drives me to Lochem to meet with Henk. Henk works for Viverion, a social housing provider, and he gives me some background to their market as well as a project that they have ongoing at the moment. Whilst he lists the increasingly tight building regulations and EPBD as a driver it seems that social housing organisations across the board in Holland have chosen to target higher levels of energy efficiency and renewable energy generation for their own reasons - partly in preparation for what is coming, partly for corporate social responisbility but also because they want to. The have a ‘Gentlemans agreement’ he explains to all meet certain targets by 2020 – zero carbon in new build and 25% reductions in existing stock. How they approach this is up to the individual organisations.
As part of this Viverion have a development of 500 houses and are replacing them all between 2006 and 2016. One part of this, a collection of 57 houses is to be a test site for different technologies. From an initial list of 15 solutions they have trimmed it down to 5 which will be implemented. They have their calculations for the energy improvements they expect to see but are especially interested to see what impact resident behaviour will have on the results. The entire cost of the additional items will total 750 thousand euros, a bill that, with no grant funding, the association will have to foot. Legally they cannot charge more rent for low energy housing – there was some discussions around this in the government last spring but now with Wilders in neither Bas nor Henk seem confident that it will be back on the agenda any time soon – he has other priorities (like ensuring that cars can drive more quickly I say – they nod and laugh and I feel quite smug at being so well informed and up-to the-minute). The five levels of measures are as follows:

1. Demand flow ventilation – this is Itho’s product – the concept of carbon dioxide sensors in each room and humidity sensors in the bathroom giving ‘intelligent’ ventilation that will respond to the location of the occupants to provide adequate ventilation. At a cost uplift of 3K euros per house this lifts them just above the EPC value of 0.8 (in line with current regulations) to an EPC of 0.66.

2. Mechanical vent with heat recovery and low temperature underfloor heating, cost 7.5K euros, EPC rating 0.55

3. Increased insulation, mech vent with heat recovery, low temp underfloor heating, ground source heat pump, heat recovery from shower water, some solar PV and solar shading. This gets down to an EPC value of 0.29 (Passivhaus would typically achieve 0.3) but at a cost of 30K Euros

4. At this point they move into passivhaus construction (extreme insulation and airtightness). Heating is provided in these through the ventilation and solar thermal, solar shading and shower water heat recovery are all employed. EPC rating 0.27, cost 36K euros, so a much greater cost for a small reduction.

5. Staying with passivhaus they then add sufficient PV to provide the hot water as well getting up to a total of 40K euros and achieving an EPC rating of zero.

The interesting aspects of this project are the creation of a project team in the early stages that included suppliers of equipment who, in return for their input, will not be value engineered out in favour of someone who claims to do the same product for a few quid less and representatives of the residents association. Henk feels that this will be what makes the project work – because the whole team started with a common goal and aim in mind and worked together to create the whole concept, before they split off into their traditional roles and financial responsibilities.
The other key factor is the time this process has taken. The project was conceived five years ago, it took three years to come up with the ‘long list’ of 15 solutions and another year to whittle it down to five, which is where they are now. Construction has just started and they will complete in October 2011. They are still working out how they are going to monitor things like customer satisfaction and behaviour and plan an initial monitoring period of two years so I reckon on not much less than a decade to have some really useful conclusions – it’s a long time but a lot of thought has gone in.
I ask about other aspects – water, transport etc but with it being an existing development they haven’t had to look at these, although Henk tells me it’s a matter done by the planners on new build.
I catch another train to Utrecht and then another to the Hague. I retrieve the newbike from the underground bike storage at the station – this is in addition to all the free parking areas they provide. It's safe and dry, open from 4.30 in the morning until 2 the next morning. And costs 1 euro 20 per day. They have a bicycle repair shop and hire bikes there too. I ride home, with my lights on, trying not to let the knowledge that car drivers will be in the wrong if they hit me make me any less observant. It’s dark by the time I’m back at base. Last day tomorrow – a last minute meeting with Rotterdam Climate initiative has been arranged at 9.30 tomorrow morning and then time to see if everything will fit back in my panniers and head for the ferry.

October 3rd – Itho Ventilation

I decide to cycle to Schiedam from the Hague as it’s just over 20km on nice flat flatness and mostly along a canal side. I get hopelessly lost in the Hague – partly because the directions Justin gives me are ‘Just get to the canal and then you can ride right down the side of that’. Hmmm…. problem being – which canal? When I finally find the right one (which is massive and was quite clearly THE canal) I’ve only 20 minutes to cycle the remaining 17km. So with that, and getting briefly lost in Delft and having to buy a map in Schiedam I’m well late by the time I roll up to Itho ventilation where I am met by Ton, Bas and Willem. In the UK Itho just do domestic heat recovery but over here they do whole house systems, integrated with heat pumps or solar thermal. We talk about the construction in Holland ‘Of domestic, that’s what we do, we know nothing about offices, don’t ask us’ they cheerfully tell me. They’ve chosen their market and they’re sticking to it and what they do know about, they know a lot. They have live monitoring of all their recent heat pump installations and show me a case on one which was running in cooling mode even in January. They thought this was a fault until they looked at the neighbours – all of whom had turned their heating up to 24 degrees. Conclusion? Thermal insulation between dwellings, not just acoustic.
After an informative couple of hours Bas helps me work out train times for the meetings he’s set up with me for the next couple of days with a passivhaus architect in Belgium and a housing association and Willem gives me a 2015 calander. They had them made to send to people as a reminder that the building regulations then will mean whole house ventilation becomes a necessity (code level four looms equally for us). ‘It’s to say – if you just want to build to the regulations don’t talk to us now, but come and talk to us in 2015’ he explains.
They’re concerned about me cycling back, possibly getting lost again and in the dark but I assure them that I know the way now and that we have dark in Manchester. I am rewarded by a bright orange and pink sunset on one side of the canal and a rainbow on the other. I do get lost, several times but I still find my way home past a Chinese takeaway where I order too much food without knowing what it is I’m ordering and eat it too quickly with a growling stomach and nicely aching legs.