We are now at a crossroads; trying to determine which path to take toward the source of energy we should use going into the future. Having grown-up on the use of fossil fuel as the primary source of energy, which we must admit has supported our sophisticated society for many decades; we are now faced with the ills of its use.
The burning of coal and oil has dumped so many millions of tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere that it has given the Earth a fever that seems to be eternally rising.
But an alternative path or another source of energy which is not new to us has emerged. Renewable energy sources have created this path and over the last decade they have come into their own, ready to provide us with the alternative that we need for the sustainable future of our planet.
Yet the path we choose between renewable and fossil fuel energy sources, as facilities managers submerged in a world focused on sustainability, is now more than ever an ethical one. Facilities managers who are the stewards of the built environment and its interaction with the natural environment must play a key role in the use of renewable energy technologies if we are to move to a more sustainable world.
An article by ASHRAE president William Coad chides the engineer for putting us on a path “of depleting the resources simultaneously destroying our fragile environment.” Coad points out that the engineer, bound by his ethical codes and professionalism has a “a moral obligation to address this problem.” Coad concludes that energy conservation is an ethic. I would like to agree and propose that the use of renewable energy sources and technologies is an ethical one.
In this context the pure economic arguments associated with the type of energy sources and technologies to use should be sidelined and dominated by the effects that our energy choices have on the environment and society and on the overall sustainability of our planet.
As members of the BIFM bound by a code of professional conduct, we must also adhere to all sections of it, including sections 2.8 and 2.9 which focus on environmental issues and concerns. The code seeks to govern our moral and ethical behaviour as facilities managers. These sections therefore are binding us on ethical and professional grounds to consider very diligently the impact that everything that we do has on the environment, specifically we are bound to the preservation of the environment. In my opinion not choosing renewable energy is considered to be in direct contravention of our code.
So as facilities managers standing at this very crucial crossroad pondering the path to take — fossil fuel or renewable sources — we must put on our ethical hats, invoking the code of professional conduct that governs us as facilities managers. We must be cognizant, that some key renewable energy technologies are now market ready and that the argument of technological developments must give way to one of ethics. The use of renewable energy now boils down, at least in my opinion to an ethical one. The facilities manager can bring this ethical decision making to bear through, education, leadership and the debunking of purely commercial interest, to include socio-economic, eco-efficiency and socio-environmental interactions . This we must do as we plot a course to a sustainable world.
John N. Telesford is facilities manager at the telecoms provider Cable and Wireless Grenada.
