Sustainable Socio-Technological System Essay Example for Free

Sustainable Socio-Technological System Essay Every thread of the problems faced by the present human society can be traced back to first industrial revolution of late 18th century and early 19th century that took place in Britain and from where it was embraced by the entire world. The industrial revolution set in motion the process of changes that have since then subsequently transformed the character of not only human society but of entire earth. Air, water, land and sky, all bear the effects of the changes inflicted by human march through industrial revolution and the effects have not been pleasant by any order.   One of the consistent features of the industrial and post industrial revolution has been unprecedented rate of consumption of energy resources, which is the principle reason behind depletion, and instability of earth’s ecological and environmental system (Pirages, 1996). In the endeavor to exploit the full range and scope of advancing technology world required huge energy supplies, which it was unable to obtain from traditional wood fuel or steam power. A quest was soon underway to find that magical energy source that could fuel world’s transition in the new age of speed and power. And soon this magical source was discovered in the form of fossil fuels-petroleum oil and coal with which human world completely shifted in the modern age. The age of automobiles, airplanes, rockets, and computers almost rushed in simultaneously and since then continued to evolve and modify endlessly on the same essential design that is solely based on using the energy of fossil fuels at an increasingly higher rate. 20th century did not merely saw extravagant increase in the consumption of energy resources but also a massive population explosion where population of world tripled from 2 billion in 1930 to 6.5 billion by 2005, thereby making it impossible to reduce the consumption rates (Tyler, 1997). With demands continuously pressing ahead, world’s energy intake also almost doubled from 1973 to 2002. This giant rate and quantity of energy consumption has put world across two crises that have s potential to challenge the very existence of humanity and accompanying life forms, if its not resolved immediately. In the blind rush of growth that world has followed, it became over occupied with the immediate enjoying of wonders of fossil fuel without ever considering the consequences of its maniac pace of growth. The consequences of exploitation, on their part, did not take much time to manifest and air-pollution, water pollution and marine pollution, terms hitherto unheard of, were entering popular terminology. Fossil fuels are essentially hydrocarbon compounds and although they are extremely rich in energy content, their extraction from deep oil wells, refinement and use involve release of harmful and poisonous gases at each step of process, that dangerously increased contents of carbon di-oxide, sulfur oxides, nitrous oxides and chlorine compound in environment, changing the chemical composition of land, air and water. After the discovery of ozone hole in 1985,   humanity encountered the first major threat to its own existence in   so far innocuous journey in the modern high-energy, high-speed age. In subsequent years more catastrophic phenomena, such as global warming and melting of polar ice caps conclusively showed the inherent flaws and dangers associated with man’s present course. Of all the actors of the modern world that have caused upshot in consumption of fossil fuels and hence contributed towards the crisis of environmental pollution and global warming, transportation sector takes the role of the progenitor and spearhead. The role of transportation has been preeminent in humanity’s march through economic development of 20th century. The great mobility offered by transportation sector in personal and freight movements created the foundation of entire industrial infrastructure. However, in the process it also emerged as the biggest consumer of fossil fuel, accounting for more than 70 % of the fuel consumption all over the world. Also it is one of the   biggest polluter and driving cause of pollution. The exhaust fumes from millions of vehicles add toxic gases to atmosphere resulting in poisonous smog. While these gases and fumes add to atmospheric pollution and contributes in global warming their direct impact on human health results in diseases like asthma, migraine and cancer along with sharp rise in cases of hypertension and cardiovascular diseases.   Apart from all these, transportation sector results in thousands of purely avoidable deaths each year due to road accidents.   The largest share in transportation sector belongs to personal and individual motorized vehicles, which are currently numbered at over 600 million and are expected to grow to 2 billion by year 2050 (Heywood, 2006). In the view of already depleting oil resources, the size of motorized industry in 2050 would be unsupportable by even existing fossil reserves and certainly untenable in 2050. These figures and analysis put the sustainability prospects of current transportation model in question. Every study conducted shows that if transformative changes are not introduced at institutional and policy level, the entire transportation sector may come to a standstill in few years, turning the wheels of development backward. Sustainable transportation is also a vital issue from current environmental and economic perspectives because researches have proved that increase in motorized transportation has negative economic implications eventually. Thus finding a sustainable transportation model that represents and safeguards interest of both society and industry is essential if world aims to achieve balanced prospects of growth and development (Burwell and Litman, 2006). Part II Sustainable Transportation Transportation plays two important roles in the economy. First it is a complete industry in itself, with various component industries as its part to create the whole structure and second it is the backbone of various other industries and economic activities (OECD, 1998). Transportation affects prospects of sustainable development at many places. The extraction of fossil oils and their consumption in internal combustion engine causes pollution, smog, acid rains and lead to increased concentration of carbon-dioxide in atmosphere; transportation network and road construction cause additional damage to natural environment and contribute in climatic change; the waste generated through transportation, fuel waste as well as industrial waste add toxic and harmful waste to environment (OECD, 1998). Therefore transportation has become the prime focus area in the quest of sustainable development. The sustainable model of transportation attempts to integrate the entire scope of transportation with real needs of human movement and renewed energy sources that does not pose dangers of depletion, or add to environmental pollution (Pirages, 1996). Sustainable transportation strategies include the vital dimensions of operations management, pricing policies, use of clean fuels, improvement in vehicle operation technologies, and integration in land use and planning in transportation infrastructure (Deakin, 2003). The implementation of these strategies requires combined operations at national and regional levels and need to channel efforts at government, business, scientific and community levels (ibid). Guidelines and principles for Sustainable Transportation In devising the guidelines for transportation to make it sustainable and environment friendly, the following issues emerge as areas of prime concern (Guiding Principles, 1996) Access: Transportation is the principle form through which people can access places and goods, contributing prominently in social and economic development. The integrated strategic direction involve a) demand management- Optimizing transportation needs and requirements of society. It includes curtailing unnecessary transportation requirements through use of better communication technology and packaging technologies and redesigning urban landscape. b) diversifying options: it includes providing people with greater number of options through which they can meet their transportation needs. Equity: It defines the need for government and communities to institute transportation policies that ensures social, regional and government equity by striving to attend to transportation needs of all the sections of society. Health and Safety: The sustainable design of transportation system shall include measures that make it conducive for physical and mental health of people and social and community well being. Responsibility at individual level: The safety of climate, natural environment and resources concern every one and hence it’s a collective as well as individual responsibility of people to safeguard them Policy intervention for sustainable development It is widely recognized at policy level that modifying the present transportation framework on sustainable paradigms would be more convenient and cost saving, rather than completely replacing it with a new framework that might be unable to perform at satisfactory levels. The various   policy options to make the existing model of transportation sustainable are broadly categorized as a) regime optimization and b) regime-shifts (Hoogma, Kepmp, Schot and Truffer, 2002). The distinctions assigning the different technologies in either of the two categories are somewhat vague and they are constantly being worked and assessed. The vital trend to emerge so far out is that there are potential technologies and innovations that can be used for both regime optimization and regime shift. The current transport regime considered exclusively for policy and technological intervention is land transportation system, with its huge impact on environment, society and economy. Various policies and strategies for sustainable transportation, as categorized by Deckins (2003), are, Vehicle and Fuel Technological Changes: The only practical solution to the problem of growing fuel scarcity and harmful level of pollutants ejected   technological innovations in energy field that can reduce dependence on petroleum oil by providing alternative and sustainable sources of energy. It shall serve two immensely useful purposes that are a. minimizing U.S dependence on foreign oil and b. preventing the environment from damages associated with use of petroleum oils and products. The certainty of oil exhaustion has inspired efforts from both government and corporate sector to research and develop the new fuel technologies as a providential measure for survival, growth and progress in forthcoming days of oil crisis. Past decade has seen great move on technological researches in alternative fuels. Various new techniques and models have already been introduced in the market to test their viability and capacity to successfully replace petroleum as chief source of energy. Most of these innovations are specifically aimed at transportation sector because it is the chief consumer of petroleum oil and as principle cause of increasing oil imports. Due to distinct requirements of different sectors in transportation, there are various technologies. Passenger vehicles, public transport vehicles and freight transportation carry specific needs that are difficult to be met by a single alternative fuel technology.   Some of the major and most popular of these technologies, where majority of research and development has taken place, are (Aldrich, 1996) Hybrid Vehicles, electric vehicles, use of ethanol as fuel, fuel cell vehicles, use of hydrogen as fuel and vehicles operated by solar power. Road vehicle operations improvement: The management of road vehicle transportation has significant bearing on sustainable transportation. It consists of areas such as-a) traffic flow improvements that involve measures of improving traffic signal timings, ramp metering, flow metering and removal of bottlenecks to improve the efficiency. The net benefit is reduction of time, better fuel efficiency and smooth transportation; b) Transport system improvement with thrust on constructing smart highways, smart vehicles, accident management and scheduling arrangements; c)educating drivers on appropriate fuel conserving techniques as well as traffic guidelines to help them utilize the system better; d) Improving management techniques in logistics and fleet management. Demand management: To optimize the transportation system according to exact requirements of people, so as to minimize the waste and maximize benefits, it suggests measures as such a) modal substitution where transits are redesigned and improvements are made for walking and biking purposes that provide incentives to people for using alternate mediums of transportation; b) substituting trucks by rails that is environmentally cost effective and involves less consumption of fuel and emission of harmful gases while improving efficiency; c) telecommunication improvements or transport telematics that involve technological systems that are either follow either driver oriented approach or centralized management oriented approach by introducing traffic automation that are vital from safety and efficiency point of view (Hoogma, Kepmp, Schot and Truffer, 2002). The major tools of this measure include telecommuting, tele-shopping, teleconferencing, distance learning and use of information technology in transportation and traffic management. Vehicle Technologies 1.Hybrid Vehicle: As the name suggests, hybrid vehicles combine dual technologies for their operation. Technically they are hybrid electric vehicle with an electric motor that drives the vehicle (Hoogma, Kemp, Schot and Truffer, 2002, 41 ). In the case of a typical electric vehicle, hydrogen fuel cell or chemical batteries such as advanced sealed lead battery, nickel cadmium and lithium ion are used for auxiliary power (Aldrich, 1996). However in the hybrid electric vehicles, the electric drive technology is combined with a gasoline-based power generator for running the electric motor and charging the batteries. Bio-diesels: Bio-diesel, as the term suggests, is a type of renewable fuel obtained by agricultural products and used as fuel in heavy-duty vehicles. The major sources currently under research for bio-diesel are soybean, rapeseed, corn, cottonseed, peanut, sunflower, and canola (Aldrich, 1996, 85). The process of making bio-diesel involves use of an alcohol such as methanol which is treated with oil of selected agricultural produce to form glycerin followed by separation of fatty esters, recycling of excess alcohol and purification of esters to produce a fuel that bears remarkable closeness to diesel, however with higher octane number (Aldrich, 1996, 85). Currently bio-diesel is used when blended with petroleum diesel, especially in European markets, with commendable results. Hydrogen: There are great interests in using hydrogen as fuel in transport industry due to the great flexibility of options and performance it offers. Hydrogen can either be used as fuel in place of gasoline in internal combustion engine or it can be used as energy carrier in fuel cells, the latter being the major research area in automobile sector (Aldrich, 1996, 87). Generally, hydrogen is obtained by decomposing hydrocarbon fuels, electrolysis of water and photolysis. It is stored directly in form of gas, liquid or as chemically with metal hydrides (Hydrogen Economy, 2002, 2). Due to its low energy volume, direct use of hydrogen as a fuel would require considerably large volumes to fuel the vehicle. On the other hand, hydrogen is extremely efficient in fuel cells. In a fuel cell, hydrogen combines with oxygen to produce electricity, Use of public transportation and mass transit system: Mass Transport System Apart from introducing alternative fuel and technologies to replace and minimize fossil fuel consumption, another area where fuel consumption can be easily reduced is creating a more robust and functional public transport and mass transit system. It is cost effective and time consuming to redesign the existing public transport system, especially in major cities, to cut down fuel consumption by reducing number of vehicles on the road. While airplanes are already a popular and heavily used long distance intercity mass transit system, there are many available areas of intervention in short distance intercity and intra-city transport to provide fast and reliable transit facilities while simultaneously reducing traffic, freeing up space on roads and parking and moderating fossil oil consumption. The transportation system , excluding freight transport, is presently divided in two broad categories a. privately owned individual all purpose vehicle transport system and b. public transport system consisting of buses, trains, trams, and metros under the control and maintenance of public administration and public transport companies ((Hoogma, Kemp, Schot and Truffer, 2002, 36-37). Public transport system is usually characterized by low cost, fuel-efficient transit system capable of carrying large number of people on a fixed route (ibid). It has been felt over time that a sustainable and efficient fuel policy needs to incorporate advanced public transport system as one of its key focus area. Additionally the light rail and bus services can be expanded to cover specifically high traffic and downtown areas of major cities. An integration of public transport and private vehicle system can be achieved by providing sufficient parking space at stations and depots of public transport system. It would encourage people to use their private vehicles to access public transport system, resolving one of major issues of limited accessibility involved with mass transit system. Inventing new strategies for sustainable transport development Sustainable development, by its definition, is development that has capacity to meaningfully continue itself without negatively affecting any chance of its failure or degeneration. Therefore sustainable transportation, according to this parameter, requires to incorporate measures and policies that help to grow along with changing dynamics of transport network and fuel technologies. These strategies include (Deckins, 2003) Land use and community development: It includes such activities as preservation, rehabilitation, redevelopment and redesigning of cities and suburbs with high population density. It also include additional measures such as infill in cities and suburbs, reusing of brown-fields, recycling buildings, and improving the quality of life through close location of workplace and residence. Consumer response to sustainable strategies: The major issue is to integrate consumers interests in sustainable strategies and technologies. Consumers should view these measures as crucial for creating a long term sustainable transportation plan that is adaptable for new vehicle and fuel technologies, technological up gradation and increased use of automation system, information technology and communication networks. Another major strategic intervention is about urban planning and transportation planning. It deals with concentration of urban growth, limiting urban sprawls and providing strategies for mixed land use that make intelligent urban structure and land use policies. It would help to mitigate transportation requirements by moving destination and source closer. It also recommends prioritising pollution prevention strategies and encouraging pedestrian and cycling movements as alternative to motorized mode of transportation (Guiding principles, 1996). Working towards a sustainable future transport Designing a transport system that successfully meets the present challenges of eliminating pollution, utilizing landscape space, carrying people safely and timely over their destination and most importantly which runs on such fuel technology is sustainable, without risks of running into shortage or worse, total depletion. Keeping in view of the every rising challenge of maintaining an increasingly large fleet of vehicles on the road in the coming years, the sustainable transportation should be able to accommodate both the present and future range of issues. The future sustainable strategy has following important policy and socio-technological dimensions (Schaller, 2007) Creating economic disincentives to drive: Presently the socio-economic system is oriented towards personalized driving. People prefer to ply to their respective destinations through personal mode of transport because it is time consuming, convenient and cost effective. However, in this process they do not pay for the environmental damage of pollution, cost of traffic congestion, charges of using roads, bridges and tunnels and appropriate parking charges. Further, even people are compelled to use personalized motor vehicles due to absence of a supportive framework of alternative medium of transportation. These problems can be tackled economically by raising the cost of driving personal vehicles while simultaneously improving the alternative transportation. The measures taken shall incorporate the total cost of owning and driving personal vehicles, in terms of the damage they inflict on the environment, quality of city life, congestion and accident risks involved. As discussed earlier, strengthening the public transport system and making it more affordable and cost effective would be greatly beneficial in creating disincentive for individual transportation. Redesigning cities and implementing thorough changes Redesigning cities and modelling them to make them conducive for future transportation needs is one of the most important policy and socio technological measures. The structure of major urban centres has already seen fundamental changes in their design and orientation with advent of mass transport structures of railways and metro and mono rails (Barret, 1996, 1971). It is well exemplified by cities of New York, London and Tokyo. With advent of motorized vehicles the cities started to grow and differences between workplace and residential places expanded due to speed and ease provided by these vehicles. Cities that are more dependent on non personal modes of transportation, or mass transportation are traditionally denser than cities whose entire urban structure is based on individual ownership and use of vehicles (ibid). The sustainable urban models requires cities to implement planning measures that make structure of transport more efficient by attuning both the urban landscape design and transportation system to each other requirements. The land use policies need to take such factors into account as population density and new settlement areas. Citing Kenworthy and Newman (1989), Barret shows as the density of population decreases in the urban areas, the consumption of petroleum goes up (ibid). Thus many cities of low population density in United States of America have per head consumption of gasoline several notches more than Asian mega cities like Hong Kong, Tokyo and New Delhi. Therefore sustainable designing of cities would require to create urban forms so that people have greater opportunities to access different destinations in limited time. Most, if not all, destinations, should be within walking distance (Ibid). Scaling of services and facilities should be with the view to minimize the travel requirements with well structured support provided in every locality. For the final step, the densely populated areas should be well connected with highly efficient public transport system. Reference Aldrich, Bob.. ABCs of AFVs: a guide to alternative fuel vehicles. California Energy Commission, Sacramento-CA. April 1996. 1st Feb 2007 http://www.p2pays.org/ref/26/25156.pdf Barret, Georoge. 1996.The Compact City: A Sustainable Urban Form?. Contributors: (edit) Burton, Elizabeth,. 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