Life in the first climate-neutral neighbourhood in the Netherlands is largely determined by the weather and the seasons.
Collage: Golnar Abbasi & Arvand Pourabbasi. Lees dit artikel in het Nederlands.
Reliability vs. Sustainability
Fossil fuels are available on demand: we can use them whenever we want to. This has brought us a society in which the weather and the seasons no longer matter. The infrastructure networks for electricity and gas are available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. In 2019, the Dutch were without electricity for 20 minutes and without gas for 51 seconds – a reliability of more than 99.99%.
Because of fossil fuels, we have adopted a lifestyle based on a very reliable energy supply. To give a simple example, no one would install automatic doors if the electricity supply's reliability was only 50%. That would result in doors not opening or closing half the time. In short, the higher the reliability of the infrastructure, the more energy-intensive the lifestyle.
The idea is that we can switch from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources such as solar and wind power while keeping the energy supply just as reliable. But that is problematic. Wind and solar power are not always available, which means we would need to build a vast energy storage infrastructure. This costs money, time, and resources, and therefore threatens to make the transition to renewable energy production expensive, slow and unsustainable.
The Rhythm of Nature
The energy supply in Bospolder-Tussendijken is entirely based on renewable energy sources: human power, fire, sun, and wind. Just like fossil fuels, human power is available on-demand, with the difference that people – unlike, for example, the natural gas infrastructure – must be motivated to provide energy. A biomass fire is also available on-demand, but firewood must be grown, harvested, and transported, and these activities also depend on human power.
The residents of the first climate-neutral neighbourhood in the Netherlands have found a solution. Human power and fire are combined with energy from solar panels and wind turbines, weather permitting. When the wind is blowing hard or when the sun is shining brightly, solar panels or wind turbines take over the role of fire and human power. However, the neighbourhood does not have extensive energy storage. When it is dark and windless, the energy supply switches back to human power and fire.
In summer, solar panels in the Netherlands provide about 10 times more energy than in winter. Source: Thuiszonnepanelen.nl.
The yield of wind energy per day in the month of October 2019. Source: SER.
This means that the residents live according to the rhythms of the weather and the seasons. On sunny summer days, energy is abundant. Those days, residents hardly need to produce any energy themselves, and often come together on the public squares to enjoy themselves. Those are the times when technology that would otherwise consume too much power - video games, cinema, jacuzzi - can be used without any problems. Those are also the times to charge battery-powered gadgets so they can use them later – when the sun or wind has gone again.
During a winter storm, there can also be an abundance of energy – and then we find most of the residents in the covered bathhouses. On the other hand, windless, dark days require hard work. That is good, because if we are more physically active then we need less energy for heating. Of course, not everyone is relaxing when the sun is shining or the wind is blowing. A generous portion of sun or wind also makes many jobs and production processes a lot easier.
Party without Energy
The residents of Bospolder-Tussendijken can also relax without energy. Many people sit around the communal fires on cold winter evenings, where stories are told and acoustic music is played. The diversity of the district ensures a varied cultural offer.
Holidays have also become more flexible. For example, Christmas is celebrated on the first windy day of December. The beginning of summer is celebrated on June 21st, the longest day of the year. On that day, BoTu also attracts many visitors from other parts of Rotterdam and the Netherlands.
Bospolder-Tussendijken has 40 small wind turbines, each with a maximum power output of 10 kilowatts. The average yield per day – viewed throughout the year – is 820 watt-hours per wind turbine or 32.9 kilowatt-hours for all wind turbines combined. Of course, the energy yield goes up considerably when the wind blows hard. In ideal conditions (Beaufort 7 for 24 hours per day), the 40 wind turbines together deliver 9,600 kilowatt-hours per day. This corresponds to the electricity consumption of 1,400 households in the period before the energy transition. If there is very little or no wind, the wind turbines will, of course, not produce anything.
Several residents in Bospolder-Tussendijken are very enthusiastic about solar panels. A do-it-yourself culture has emerged in which people install solar panels on roofs, balconies, and window sills. The neighbourhood now has a surface area of solar panels that corresponds to 15% of the territory (150,760 square meters). This gives an average daily yield of 53,600 kilowatt-hours, which corresponds to all households' electricity consumption in the period before the energy transition.
Naturally, the solar panels provide much less energy on a cloudy day, and they do not deliver anything after sunset. In the summer, the neighbourhood can have significant surpluses of solar energy. On a beautiful summer day, the solar panels can generate more than 80,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity, more than the daily electricity consumption of all households from before the energy transition. That excess electricity means that all the neighborhood's energy needs are well covered, and they can enjoy energy-intensive technology.
Next episode: the harbour.