Migros has been making a push to encourage electric cars on the Swiss market
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – A 200m2 Migros m-way store opens at rue de Lausanne 54 in Geneva today, near the Cornavin station, in the same historic registered building that houses the Brazilian Mission.
It’s the first electric mobility shop for Migros in French-speaking Switzerland, and to make sure the public beats a path to it the store is offering 25 percent off on everything except cars to customers who spend CHF1,000 or more.
M-way is the public face of Migros’s push to encourage green energy and the shop sells electric scooters, bikes but also electric cars and home charging stations plus all the other accoutrements of a life that includes electric vehicles.
Summer, Grimsel Pass, Alpmobil partnering with Migros for silent, less polluting electric cars
The company is extending its programme of charging stations, and it’s been active in working with Alpine resorts to introduce fleets of electric cars for tourists, to reduce pollution in the mountains.
Swiss forests (here, Bern) are an economic and environmental priority, but poor wood-burning stoves could counteract forestry efforts
BERN, SWITZERLAND – More than 15 percent of fine particles, those minuscule bits of dust that are harmful to health, come from wood-burning stoves, the Swiss federal government now says, twice the amount shown by earlier research.
Reducing the quantity is a public health priority, with the popularity of home fireplaces growing, but an changes to regulations need to be aligned with an economic and environmental priority, to better develop and exploit Swiss forests.
The amount of wood burned for fuel is on the rise in Switzerland, according to Swiss energy officials, and it is likely to continue to go up if fossil fuel prices rise.
Switzerland is closely watching the example of Germany, which recently tightened its laws for wood as an energy source. It lowered the acceptable limits for home fireplaces, including existing ones.
Pilot projects have been started in some Swiss cantons in an effort to find better tools for measuring home fire emissions.
Burn dry wood in a correctly installed and properly functioning fireplace, for your health
A group meeting in Bern this week concluded that there is a huge difference, in terms of health and air pollution, between good home fireplaces and those that don’t meet today’s standards. Quality is directly linked to proper installation, the group says, as well as correct use and burning the right materials.
The question is of growing importance because the number of automatic wood-burning stoves has tripled and the number of manual home wood-burning stoves (poeles) has doubled in the past 15 years according to the Swiss Energy Office.
Swiss authorities, researchers, firms and cantonal officials, many of them with Cercl’Air, met 8-9 November to discuss the effectiveness of air filters on home fireplaces and to review Swiss regulations governing small wood-burning units.
Switzerland’s law requiring certification for home fireplaces went into effect in 2007, but the implementation has been phased in, through 2012.
Cercl’Air is a group that brings together corporate and governmental Swiss air quality managers.
Today’s filters function mainly with electrostatic separation, but this works only if the fireplace is correctly installed and functioning properly. Studies are showing that a large number of wood-burning systems of medium- and large-size are not correctly installed, and these will be targeted to reduce fine particles in the short term.
More problematic are smaller units, under 70 kW, whose emissions are currently measured visually in most cantons to ensure, for example, that only dry wood and not household waste is being burned. But this approach is inadequate with older fireplaces that are not up to current standards.
Meanwhile, the Energy Office provides tips for anyone using wood for fuel, including avoiding creating too much soot through:
- proper ventilation in the fireplace
- using only dry wood
- lighting the fire properly
- avoiding using too much wood.
Federal Energy Office brochure on using wood-burning fires correctly (Fr, PDF)
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Beijing residents are not only complaining about the city’s infernal early winter smog, but also about how much of it there is and how the government is measuring it. Wiebo-users, China’s microbloggers, have taken to the Internet to vent about the city’s air, asking why the government’s measurements differ significantly from US measurements. Wednesday the city’s government vowed to clean up its act and the city’s pollution problem, which exacerbates the problems provoked by cold wet winters and icy, sandy blasts from the Gobi desert to the north.
Links to other sites: AFP, CNN, China Meteorology forecast for Beijing (Ch), Telegraph
Public transport special offer will run to 15 February
Saleve rises out of the fog: Lake Geneva in winter often sits in a damp blanket of fog that traps fine particles (photo taken 23 January 2010, ©2011 Obwoodman, http://www.flickr.com/photos/86813892@N00/)
Lausanne, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Last week’s too-high level of fine particles in the air around Lake Geneva, higher than allowed by federal legislation, has fallen to within limits, according to canton Vaud.
Geneva and Vaud both issued warnings to residents last week to stay indoors and do fewer sports if they are elderly or susceptible to lung problems. The combination of cold air above and warmer air on the lake combined to trap fine particles in the air, up to about 1,000 metres altitude. The problem is not uncommon in the Lake Geneva region in winter.
Warmer air throughout Switzerland has eased the situation and warm, sunny weather for most of this week should help keep the air clearer.
Vaud offers 3 month half-price CFF card to increase public transport use
Vaud’s Bol d’Air programme will remain in place until 15 February, says the canton: for CHF34 instead of CHF54 the canton’s residents can buy a half-price CFF rail card that is good all trains, boats and postal buses in Switzerland, and it provides reductions on urban transport systems, including the Mobilis regional system. Details and coupon
The programme is designed to encourage people to switch to public transport once an alarm is sounded for unacceptable levels of air pollution.
Geneva Friday offered an explanation, in French, and fine particles levels in neighbouring towns, to put the problem in perspective. The web page is worth bookmarking if you have allergies or lung problems, for future pollution alerts.
Ikea’s grand opening, Geneva-Vernier store 15 September, follows years of wrangling
Ikea Vernier Wednesday morning, before the crowds hit the grand opening
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The grand opening breakfast Wednesday morning 15 September at Ikea in Vernier was just the right kind: copious, with a wide selection of choices. Copious because it accompanied, Swiss-style, numerous speakers who all started by naming and thanking individually each dignitary present.
A wide selection because this is, after all, Ikea. And if the blue and yellow everywhere, including of course Ambassador Per Thoeresson’s tie, wasn’t a clue that Ikea is Swedish at heart, the glass of Schnapps at 07:00, at the end of breakfast, was a giveaway.
Sweden's ambassador to Switzerland, Per Thoeresson
“For me, like any Swede, Ikea represents Swedish values, Swedish culture,” Thoeresson told several hundred early morning breakfast guests, who thanked Sweden’s “other ambassador”, the home furnishings giant which has become an institution for foreigners in Switzerland. “It’s no accident that Switzerland was chosen as the first location in Europe outside Sweden. Switzerland is in the middle of Europe, Sweden and Switzerland share many values—including a sense of design, of functionality.” He added that the two countries “have become a little closer” thanks to Ikea.
It wasn’t always clear this would be the case.
This is the eighth Ikea store in Switzerland, but the 10-year battle to open it prompted one Geneva politician to say over breakfast that “Ikea in Geneva at one point meant ‘obstruction’ but today it’s a good example of working together.” The commune of Vernier repeatedly refused to approve the project, saying it needed guarantees the store wasn’t giving: a major concern was the potential for traffic problems. Protestors complained about future pollution and the canton of Geneva and Vernier commune battled over the number of exits from the store.
Burying the hatchet: what Ikea will bring Vernier, Geneva
The commune finally accepted the project in October 2008, after Ikea agreed to numerous conditions, which increased the bill considerably, and construction moved ahead. Final cost: CHF109.4 million, when the attic area is included.
Opening day shows a store that had 7,000 applications for 300 jobs. Eighty percent of those hired are from canton Geneva and 40 percent from Vernier, making Ikea a key employer in the canton with Switzerland’s highest unemployment rate.
The 31,000m2 (attic included) store has a parking lot with 850 places, but it has made a serious effort to discourage shoppers’ use of private cars: it’s easy to reach using bicycle lanes and public transport: buses 6, 19, 23, 28, 57, Y and trams 14 and 16, train Regio R from Cornavin. If you’re buying furniture you can’t put on the bus, you have two relatively green options: home delivery and Mobilité natural gas rental vehicles.
Ikea is expected to bring the commune tax revenues of up to CHF800,000.
Ikea is Ikea is Ikea, but this is Geneva, where living space is at a premium
Inside the store, everything is familiar to anyone who has visited Ikea elsewhere. It is slightly smaller than the store in Aubonne and the line of merchandise is essentially the same, but the Vernier store caters to a slightly different population. “People in Geneva have a bit more money, but smaller living spaces,” one employee told visitors. The kitchen selection is larger and there are numerous clearly marked sections for people with apartments of 25, 35 or 50 square metres: small spaces.
The rare opportunity to see an Ikea store without customers charmed breakfast guests, but at 09:00 as the grand opening drew near the most impressive sight was scores of employees racing to finish shelves-stocking before the doors opened. And only one protestor showed up.
Ikea Vernier web site, with hours
TSR timeline of Ikea political battle, Vernier-Geneva
Ed. note: GenevaLunch will publish a photo gallery of the new store before it opened, late Wednesday. Watch for the update here!
Zero Emissios race three-wheeler
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch.com) – Eight people, 11 wheels, four countries, 80 days and unmeasurable amounts of sunlight: add it up and you arrive at Zero, the name of the solar race around the world that left Geneva early Monday afternoon 16 August.
The group includes a jeep, a three-wheeled electric car, a motorbike and a scooter, all of which could be mass-marketed cheaply, say their teams of drivers.
Getting that point across to manufacturers in order to cut back sharply on motor pollution around the world is part of the rationale behind the race.
Zero Emissions race two-wheeler
Louis Palmer, Swiss pioneer of green technology who in 2007-08 drove a solar-powered car 54,000 km across 38 countries, was at the UN in Geneva to send off three of the four teams from South Korea, Australia, Switzerland and Germany.
The fourth crew, the Korean team, joined the others in Lausanne, after it had technical problems in the Swiss Alps over the weekend.
Palmer, who organized the race, told journalists that the race “is about showing realistic ways towards a cleaner and greener future for the planet and its people.” The drivers will be cooperating rather than competing: the race is against time rather than each other, to see if they can make it through 16 countries around the globe in 80 days.
Driving on $5 a day, around the world
Zerotracer in the countryside
The drivers will need to recharge their vehicles every 250 km, at a cost of about $5 a day, but they have already compensated for this by generating clean energy (solar, wind, tide-powerd) and putting it into their local power grids.
The two-person teams will be back in Geneva in January 2011 after covering 30,000 km.
Their journey will take them Geneva to Lausanne, Brussels, Berlin, Vienna, Moscow, then across Kazakhstan and Central Asia to Shanghai.
From China they will ship out to Vancouver, Canada.
Zero Emissions race jeep
The next leg of the journey will take them down the west coast of the US, across Mexico to Cancun, arriving on time for a United Nations climate change conference in late November 29.
From Mexico they will cross to Portugal and continue on through southern Europe.
Working with nature to balance the fuel budget
A petrol-powered backup vehicle will accompany them. It, too, has compensated for its fuel use, as have other fuel “costs”: emissions for bringing the cars to Geneva, shipping them overseas twice, putting the drivers up in hotels. Julianne Priskin, who is the race coordinator and environmental adviser, says she will be running daily tallies of these expenditures to ensure these energy costs are covered.
Zero Emissions race web site and current positions (continually updated)
Minimal noise, no one to argue with and the window opens: a good place to work (photo, copyright 2010 Claude Vedovini)
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – It’s official: big offices are more likely to make workers take time off work, fall sick and in general suffer more misery than smaller office spaces.
A new study of Swiss offices shows that the larger the office space, the more complaints increase about the physical environment: surrounding noise from background conversations, telephones and office equipment; dry or stale air; temperature too high or too low or varying too much; inadequate lighting and draftiness.
Absenteeism and lower productivity are significantly higher in large offices than in smaller one, an additional cost burden for companies with large offices.
State media in China are reporting that a burst oil pipe that sent 150,000 litres of oil down two tributaries of the Yellow River, the Chishui and Wei rivers. The rupture was caused by a third party, says PetroChina. Pollution on the Chishui is reportedly serious, while cleanup operations on the Wei have brought the spill nearly under control there. The pipeline is designed to carry oil from the country’s northwest to the centre of China.
Links to other sites: Al-Jazeera, China View
Sydney, Australia was covered in red dust Wednesday morning 23 September as winds blew up clouds of sand off the desert west of the city. Winds along a 650km front were bringing dust from 1,500 km away and dumping 75,000 tons of dust every hour into the ocean east of the city, the New South Wales Department of Climate Change and Water says. Flights have been diverted, ferry services are disrupted, and city traffic has been chaotic. Air particle levels were 1,000 times the normal level. More than half the state of New South Wales was covered in dust by midday, according to the Bureau of Meterology. BBC, Sydney Morning Herald (video)
The Chinese government is making a push to have the country become the world leader in hybrid and all-electric vehicles within three years, reports the New York Times. “China’s intention, in addition to creating a world-leading industry that will produce jobs and exports, is to reduce urban pollution and decrease its dependence on oil,” says the US newspaper, which adds that given China’s dependence on coal for electricity, lowering pollution levels won’t happen easily.
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The balance of road and rail transport of goods across the Alps remained stable in 2008, with trains carrying 64% and road haulers 46%.
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - As of today, 19 February, the public can search the new Swiss pollutant release and transfer system, a databank of more than 200 companies whose annual pollutant releases exceed a specific internationally defined threshold.
Satigny in the Mandement on the edges of Geneva
Geneva, Switzerland (Tribune de Geneve, Fre) – Geneva has quietly decided to drop the idea its city council was promoting in early 2008, to reduce pollution by creating a toll to enter the city.
The global carbon budget, a method for calculating carbon added to the atmosphere, the “underpinning of human induced climate change,” indicates that CO2 emmissions have been growing four times faster since 2000 than during the previous decade. The budget, a project involving several universities and research organizations around the world, was published late Thursday night by Global Carbon Project (2008) Carbon budget and trends 2007.
