Nora

When people talk about living on an island I always imagine it is like living in a small village. Everyone knows each other, the postman comes in for a cup of coffee when he deliveres your mail. I imagine this is all true for Texel. But then, because you live on an island, there is the added difficulty of being stuck on it. When you live in a small village, you go to the nearest city to do…

As a physicist, I want to calculate things. I want to calculate how fast a rocket is travelling, I want to calculate where a quantum mechanical particle will end up and I want to calculate what the environmental impact is of street lighting. But then there is this term sustainability. I very much like the definition of Brundtland: "Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of…

When we came to Texel, I had no idea what the week would bring. A lot of work went into our proposals, but even more was waiting for us. But more so, a lot of interesting people were waiting for us. It started on Monday evening after a day of hard work and bad weather. We met the real 'Texelaars' to show them our ideas. Most ideas were met by a very positive public. One idea however, was not…

In the subsystem of Texel as Host, there are several important actors. Actors are the groups of people involved in the system. On the island there are four kind of actors: inhabitants, guests, tourists and visitors.   T he inhabitants - defined as a person or animal that lives in or occupies a place. Guests - people staying at a certain place because they were invited there. It is possible that…

To make the field of tourism more sustainable. That means to make the things sustainable that separate the tourists from the islanders. To do this, two fields are distinguished;   activities   and   use   of tourists. This is about activities that most tourists do. According to (Gemeente Texel, 2013) most tourists do: Walking, cycling, shopping, going to the beach, visit Ecomare,  eating out

Making a YUTPA analysis we considered the importance of all aspects for both tourists and texelaars in terms of our sub-system “Texel as host”.  The YUTPA analysis shows with the values we gave the different sub systems how important the Texelaars/tourists find the specific topic. We did the analysis twice. Once for the tourists and once for the Texelaars. The analysis is devided into four…

This week a huge storm was blowing through the Netherlands. In the fall there is quite some bad weather in the Netherlands normally. Wind blowing and a lot of rain dropping down on us. This is a lot of energy the Earths system is showing us. Thinking from a sustainable perspective, you would want to get a hold of this energy for our electricity needs. For instance the wind should drive the…

Aournd Christmas always a lot of light light up the city. In shopping streets mostly for a longer time, in houses in the christmas tree also for a longer time, and in cities like Delft they have an annual 'lichtjesavond', this is one day of extra lights all over the city. Environmentally seen, this is not very responsible, but the extra 'gezelligheid' in the city is worth it, mostly. The last…

In the subsystem of Texel as Host, there are quite some important actors. Actors are the groups of people involved in the system. On the island there are four kind of actors: inhabitants, guests, tourists and visitors. The inhabitants are defined as a  person or  animal  that  lives  in or  occupies  a place. [2]  Guests are people staying at a certain place because they were invited there. It is…

Energy On the island of Texel energy is being generated by solar photovoltaic systems and biomass fermentation. The more green energy that is generated on the island itself, the more sustainable the island becomes. This is supported by the goal the community of Texel put up for itself; to be energy neutral in 2020. To realise this, a lot more green energy resources should be created on the island.

GOALS OF OUR CONCEPT FOR TEXEL AS A HOST. Importing supplies from far away is unsustainable for there is a lot of exhaust and pollution because of transport, think of trucks, ships and airplanes. It should be a good trend if more products should be produced near the place where they are used. Texel is doing a good job by trying to produce locally as much as possible. Texel is a host for a lot…

Concept for sustainable tourism To make the field of tourism more sustainable. That means to make the things sustainable that separate the tourists from the islanders. To do this, two fields are distinguished; activities and use of tourists. This is about activities that most tourists do. According to (Gemeente Texel, 2013) most tourists do: Walking, cycling, shopping, going to the beach, visit…

This week we will be visiting Rotterdam. We won't be able to visit the Club WATT unfortunately, because it shut down. It was a club where the energy of people dancing was used to power the club itself. This is a great sustainable idea, and I remember that I calculated the impact in my first year of physics. This back-of-the-envelope calculation would go something like this: Say, we have people…

In our first class of Engineering for sustainability we took off our left shoe to make us feel more comfortable amongst each other. Next we were asked what our heroes were in sustainability. This is a very difficult question, which a lot of people attending the class could not answer very specifically. My answer was the Belgian government, because they are stimulating all residents to save energy…

Sustainable development is the greatest challenge of our time. It brings together a number of global problems—pollution and intoxication of the space in which we live; poverty and starvation; climate change; depletion of mineral and organic resources; ecological devastation; and global inequity. Different descriptions of sustainability sometimes compete, and sometimes create dilemmas for people…

Regarding sustainability, most island communities face two major challenges: energy supply and waste disposal. First, most islands do not have indigenous energy resources, but instead have to ship in fuels over often considerable distances, at a considerable financial burden. Second, most islands do not have enough space for operating landfills, so that waste is often burnt under hazardous…