The transition to renewable energy is set to deliver an economic pay-off in the years to come. Various studies show that a shift to alternative energy sources will raise the GNP in the coming decade and create new jobs, as Prof Eicke Weber, spokesperson for the Fraunhofer Energy Alliance, points out. Fraunhofer scientists are developing concepts and solutions for the transition as it takes shape.

Large-scale farms of the agave plant used to make the drink tequila could be established in Australia's arid inland as a novel and greenhouse-friendly solution to our transport fuel problems, a University of Sydney academic has found.

Viterra is an agribusiness providing premium quality ingredients to leading global food manufacturers and its Tamworth malt facility has a grain capacity of 45,000 tonnes, supplying malt both domestically and internationally.

Until recently, Local Authorities in Queensland and Tasmania owned and operated their wastewater treatment facilities. Many of these plants were old, undersized and provided substandard levels of treatment. In most cases, the smaller plants used trickling filters or facultative ponds. By the 1970s, extended aeration package plants and oxidation ditch-type activated sludge plants became more common.

With growing concerns in Iraq about the heavy air pollution, the country’s Ministry of Environment took a decisive step in the direction for improved monitoring, control and prevention of air pollution, and announced a tender to procure five fixed and one mobile air quality monitoring stations to monitor SO₂, NOx, NH₃, O₃, SO₂, CO, PM₁₀, PM_2.5, methane, non-methane, BTEX and VOCs.

Coffey Environments has over 15 years of experience in the injection of chemical amendments into contaminated groundwater and lithologies across a broad range of contaminated sites throughout Australia. The company recently acquired the only licence in Australasia for Wavefront Primawave pulsed injection technology that has been demonstrated to improve amendment injection efficiency. To complement this new technology, the company developed a Remediation Amendment Injection Device (RAID) to provide a more effective chemical amendment delivery system that is claimed to provide higher success rates and safer injection events.

Rapid developments in medical technology, the paradigm shift to patient and family-centred care, and the inability of aging hospitals to accommodate the latest models of care, have all contributed to the current worldwide boom in hospital redevelopment.

The family owned and operated Jet Park Hotel & Conference Centre has recently been named as the recipient of an Enviro Gold Award. Awarded by Qualmark New Zealand, the Enviro Awards recognise businesses in the NZ hospitality industry that are working to reduce their environmental impact.

For many Australian food manufacturers there is increasing pressure from government agencies to reach higher standards of wastewater treatment for environmental discharge. In fact, throughout the western world, food manufacturers are facing similar challenges.

Melbourne’s biggest sewage treatment plant, the Western Treatment Plant, has, for the first time, used sewage to produce more than enough biogas to power the entire plant for the last two months.

Kingsley’s Steakhouse & Crabhouse in Woolloomooloo and Chophouse in Sydney CBD both signed up to GreenChef - an energy-efficiency program run by the Green Skills (Aust) Institute. The pilot program, funded by the NSW Government’s Energy Efficiency Training Program, was designed to see how changing behaviour and practices in restaurants would save power - and money. In just seven months, Chophouse reduced its total energy consumption by 14% and Kingsley’s was reduced by 5%.

Rockwell Automation recently hosted the ‘Innovations for Smart, Safe, Sustainable Automation Solutions in the Water Industry’ forum in Adelaide in May. The event was well attended by consulting engineers, water utility companies, government departments and system integrators, and topics discussed included innovations for automation, information, power and safety solutions for the water industry.

The Australian government has announced plans to introduce a carbon price mechanism from 1 July 2012. There will be a three-year fixed price period. The carbon price will start at $23 per tonne in 2012-13 and will be $24.15 in 2013-14 and $25.40 in 2014-15. From 1 July 2015 onwards, the carbon price will be set by the market. Under the plan, Australia will cut 159 million tonnes a year of carbon pollution from its atmosphere by 2020 - the equivalent of taking over 45 million cars off the road. In the article below, Elisa de Wit, Anthony Hobley, Noni Shannon and Dominic Adams from law firm Norton Rose Australia outline the impact of the carbon pricing mechanism on businesses.

Why is it that in the world’s driest continent we continue to throw away one of our most abundant water sources that goes right past our doors? Stormwater, we tend to ignore it until it runs through our houses or overflows our streets and then we only see it as a nuisance, but, for a more sustainable future, we need to reacquaint ourselves with the forgotten cousin of the water cycle.

In the last two years, since the initiation of moves by the federal government to move back into national policy on waste and recycling, the various state and territory jurisdictions have themselves lifted their focus up a notch also. It’s an interesting reflection on the positive influence an interested federal government can have on state and territory policy activity and the important role national government can play in co-ordinating state- and territory-based action.