What I Hope About The Future Of Singapore

As I mentioned in the previous post, I was sunburnt and I realised how nasty Singapore's weather was. It seems like all the bad memories of NS have been forgotten but I believe it is for the better of my mind. Walking under the Sun without any shade during noon is a pain. I would really like to see Singapore been much cooler. Those experiences made me ponder, is there a way to cool Singapore down?

As you know, there is this thing called Greenhouse Effect due to gases like carbon dioxide and etc. These gases lead to global warming and hot places like Singapore gets hotter (dammit). Then I read about the urban heat island effect, where concrete that are used in buildings and roads trap a lot of heat during the day and during nightfall, all these 'concrete forest' traps the heat and makes it unable to escape back to the atmosphere; open spaces lose heat faster. What a pain. There are research done to show that having more trees is good for reducing these heat trapping effect but with Singapore moving towards an increasing population to boost our economy, more land has to be cleared for housing, roads and etc. All these removes trees, grasses for the sake of concrete 'trees'. Even though there are parks or greenery around these buildings, it certainly helps to reduce the heat trapping abilities but it is better than nothing.

So what can we do about it? Building & Construction Authority has came up with new measures so that new buildings will be certified green if they meet the requirements. Incentives are also given for current buildings which adopt ways to make the buildings more green. I am lazy to type the details but you can google for it.

Actually, I don't really know what we can actually do to reduce these urban heat island effect. However, with Singapore being a tropical country that enjoys almost year long of sunlight, a lot of the energy is wasted. I would like to see more improvements to current solar energy generation techniques that does not require a lot of space. There are a few examples, such as solar roads and clear solar panels that might one day be efficient and cheap enough to replace our roads and windows.

Solar roads:
As you know, Singapore has a lot of paved roads and if solar panels are strong enough to replace our current asphalt roads, we will be able to generate a lot of electricity from the Sun. Of course, trees will be planted along roads to reduce noise and dust pollution, which in turn reduces the efficiency of these roads, current roads of flyovers and bridges might be able to implement this technology in the future. I don't want to go into details about the pros and cons unless I feel like it in the future, but currently this is more to raise awareness about this technology so that more research can be done on this area.

Clear solar glass:
We certainly would like to see our smartphones having longer battery life. Instead of improvements to the battery, what if we reduce the use of the battery so that it can last longer? Singapore is a 'concrete jungle' with many windows. If these windows are able to generate electricity for the cooling system of the building, it will certainly help to reduce the carbon emission of our electricity generation since most of our electricity comes from natural gas.

 Even though a good way to reduce the heat in Singapore is to grow more trees or maybe even to drape buildings with plants, Singapore is still too small to impact the world with our emission reductions but we still have a part to play, to set an example. Solving the local heating problem will hopefully make living in Singapore more bearable without air condition. Let's hope other countries will also do their part in reducing greenhouse gases emissions so that people like us will suffer less from the rising heat.

A Short Breather

Now that competition is over, I finally have a short lull period of 1 week. This is a very important break as I finally have the time to do some catching up on my school work and also a bit of my sleep. Being in an air conditioned room for a long time, I totally forgot how harsh the Sun can be. It was totally burning my skin, frying me. I think the last time I was sunburnt was during my NS days. Sunburn is no laughing matter, it hurts and I have no idea why it makes my skin itchy too. Luckily, the sunburn seems to be easing up and the peeling of skin seems minimal. Sometimes I am really unsure if I was bitten by mosquitoes or it is just the sunburn that makes my skin itchy. However, it is over now. There is finally time to think about life.

What is life? Why is life so tiring? Sometimes when I have enough sleep, these questions will surface. However, it was answered skilfully by a friend of mine. (Is he a friend?)

What is life?
- Life is about reading japanese light novels.

Why is life so tiring?
- There are too many interesting light novels to keep you going that you forget about sleep and your school work.

Time to "enjoy" the remaining week that I have before it is back to work. Let's hope I will continue to survive and enjoy life in the future (a.k.a. read light novels).