I would like to introduce myself, since I am new here on this platform.
I am born and living in Rotterdam and a full time activist focussing on the port of Rotterdam.
This work is organized in the Stichting (Dutch legal form for a beneficiary mission) One Planet Port Rotterdam, which I founded together with two others. Our mission is to transform the port of Rotterdam to operate within all planetary boundaries and to safe-guard the well-being of current and future generations. We aim ‘to make the unseen seen’ - which means we address issues regarding safety, health, greenhousegas-emissions, and lacking transition plans.
As pillars of our approach we 1) seek legal ways to force governments (or their companies) to take swift and just action and take their duty of care more serious, 2) build communities to speak up their voice and unite in being a force towards governments and companies and 3) conduct visionary work, to envision the future of a circular port and worldwide trade system.
Within this mission air quality is key, because the lack of this quality (and the lack of sufficient measurement) causes people to suffer illness and loss of healthy living. We try to get measurement of air quality (and monitoring, reporting) on a higher level as well as the enforcement of legal standards. To support this and to get communities to engage we promote and encourage projects of citizens science.
I hope to find similar minds on this platform as well as knowledge and experience, to help us being more effective in realising our mission.
Hi Bart,
Working to reduce ship emissions in ports and its impact on cities’ air quality is an important task, especially for huge ports like Rotterdam. Very welcome to the Air for All platform!
I’m an air quality consultant working for Air Quality Organization of Västmanland, Sweden, one of the three counterparts behind the Air for All platform. The two major cities in Västmanland (still very small compared to Rotterdam), Västerås and Köping, both have ports with international / commercial ships that contribute to local air pollution while loading/lossing their cargo. We try to describe the impact on air quality (particles and NOx mainly) within these two cities, using emission estimations and dispersion models. I’m also cooperating with institutions responsible for air quality in Iceland and we are also there trying to describe the emissions and impacts of ships entering different ports there.
I hope that you have a good cooperation with the institutions responsible for measurements and modeling, e.g. DCMR, TNO etc and can access their data. It would be interresting to hear if you have been able to perform any citizen science projects on shipping emissions and impacts on air quality.
Best regards,
Lars Gidhagen
Might CircuLaw be a helpful approach: CircuLaw is a knowledge platform dedicated to enabling the transition to a circular economy by identifying opportunities in current law to support a circular future: https://www.circulaw.nl/ https://www.circulaw.nl/en
PS: with regard to your mission @Bart to transform the port of Rotterdam to operate within all planetary boundaries: In this interview, we spoke with Mike Schultz about the possibilities of sustainable fuels. @mike do you also have experience with reducing emissions in shipping and the environmentally friendly operation of port facilities?
Thanks, Sebastian
Actually I know CircuLaw, but I did not think of it in relation wih the port of Rotterdam. My experience with them is focussed on lowering or deleting legal treshholds to enable products that are legally ‘labelled’ as waste to enter a production process as a useful (raw) material for circular products. But I might contact them, to ask whether they have an idea on how the circular industry looks like indeed.
I am not in contact with Resilient Rotterdam - as far as I knwo them, they are focussed on climate adaptation in the city of Rotterdam, and less on climate mitigation in the port and global tradesystems. But thanks, for the tip.
I will definitely take a look at Hollandse Luchten, and contact them if useful.
With regards to our mission: we realy look at a challenge of overthrwoing an economic and industrial way of thinking. So, that goes far beyond ‘reducing emissions in shipping’ or environmentaly friendly operating a port. We think the transition is fundamental, especially when you look at it from a ‘just’ perspective. But anyway, I will also listen to Mike’s voice and think about what he says…Thanks!!
Thanks Sebastian. Apologies for the delay in my reply.
Bart, my background is in scaleup and commercialization of sustainable technologies, and have a worked on projects in areas such as sustainable aviation fuel, renewable diesel, municipal waste and biomass gasification, gas fermentation and CO2 utilization. Happy to chat further if that would be useful.
Dear @Bart
with regard to your aspired One Planet Port Rotterdam just transition, you may find inspiration and connecting factors in the Cornerstone Indicators - which are centred on reimagining metrics and indicators as tools for radical civic empowerment.
