How the Swedes keep themselves warm :)

There's a town in beautiful Sweden that uses a very interesting way to keep themselves warm during their very cold cold winter.

The people in Halmstad, Sweden uses the heat from burning bodies to keep themselves nice and warm! Don't worry, they're not ruthless killers. It's from the crematorium. Cremation of human remains can release toxins, like mercury from dental fillings, so the filtration of off-gases is very, very important. In order to effectively clean the emitted gases, they have to be cooled from 1000°C to under 150°C. Recovery of this heat for warming first the crematorium buildings and later the public heating system will save costs and use less water as well.

Heating is one of the biggest perpetrators of energy guzzling and carbon emissions in any house that needs it. Instead of having people paying so much for fossil fuel heat, why waste all that heat when people can reuse it to heat up their loving homes :)

Tip of the day: Or if you live alone with your partner, you can always keep each comfortably warm by stripping down to nothing and using your body warmth ;) But please remember to cover your windows with your curtains. You wouldn't want to be labeled as an exhibitionist or have peeping-toms hanging around. The first you'll save money on electricity and the latter as well, plus more! That is for the colder climates. For us people living on this hot hot island of Singapore, instead of blasting the air-conditioner to -10°C (that is sarcasm) or a more likely 18°C, just use less clothes or thin ones when you sleep and you can put the air-con up at a comfortable 24°C or just the old mighty fan :)

Using grass to run your car?

No, they are not planning to pluck out grass from the Earth to change it to biofuel.

That wouldn't be environmentally friendly right, using precious land to farm grass. And plus it'll be weird looking at bald patches on the ground. The Carbon Trust is working together with the University of York to research how using microwave technology could turn garden and wood waste into biofuel. The process of using microwave to heat the waste without oxygen is called pyrolysis. The research will look at how this process could be used to produce a biofuel to blend with fossil fuel or as a fuel on its own. The carbon footprint of this new pyrolysis biofuel could potentially save 95% of carbon compared to fossil fuels.

The trust also announced the creation of a new consortium of British businesses led by Axion Energy, which will aim to enhance existing pyrolysis technology to produce biofuels created from organic waste materials en masse. The consortium aims to produce its first biofuel from a pilot plant in 2014 and estimates that this will save seven million tonnes of carbon, the equivalent to the annual emissions of three million cars. If this research goes through then it will be great for Singapore with the many grass cutting days they have here, which is done every other week. Wakes my son up from his sleep and makes my kitties scurry for safety!

Tip of the day: If you have a cold, go old skool and use a handkerchief instead of disposable tissues :) Maybe you'll start a new fashion statement!

Global oil reserves and fossil fuel consumption

The world is showing no sign of weaning itself off fossil fuels: in the 28-year span covered by the BP data below, worldwide reserves of oil fell only twice – in 1998 and 2008.

Oil has been the world's fossil fuel of choice since the late 1960s and our taste for it doesn't seem likely to diminish in the short term. Oil companies are still keen to secure any undiscovered reserves while continuing to be a powerful lobbying presence. You may think that with pressing concerns over peak oil and global warming, the world would be slowly weaning itself off the energy-rich liquid. But in the 28-year span covered by the BP data below, worldwide reserves fell only twice – in 1998, and a decade later in 2008.

Opec nations control the lion's share, with 76% of the world's reserves. Interestingly, many of the Opec countries' proven reserves have barely changed in the past 20 years, despite massive exporting activity.

The largest percentage growth in oil wealth is in Vietnam, with a 39% surge in its proven oil reserves from 2007-08. This newfound wealth corresponds to 1.3bn barrels, which may sound like a lot, but would feed the world demand for less than three weeks (17 days) at 2008 levels of consumption.

Oil consumption fell by 0.29% from 2007-08, while its more polluting relation coal saw a 3% increase in its use. Reasons for coal's recent rise include the low price of emissions trading permits and the fuel's increasing promotion as key for 'energy security'.