EcoLiving Solutions

On Yahoo News I saw this about how the IPCC head of thought “Obama ‘ought to do a lot more’ on climate.”

Rajendra Pachauri head of the Nobel Peace Prize winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, said Thursday that Obama should do more to reverse Global Climate Change.

“I personally feel he ought to be doing a lot more,” Pachauri told reporters after a debate on climate change in Stockholm, adding the president “really has to assert himself to see that the US passes legislation” prior to the Copenhagen summit.

Obama though has to deal with motivating the American electorate about the need for real action on GCC. And this just as the right is gleefully getting a hard on about all those emails that taken out of context and were hacked from a University in the UK.

Copenhagen takes place in the Danish capital from December 7-18 and nations will attempt to cobble together a climate treaty to replace the Kyoto Protocol which expires in 2012.

Apparently the US Senate was supposed to take up a climate change bill sponsored by Democratic Senators John Kerry and Barbara Boxer, but the White House pulled back, see how contentious this issue is and that support is limited being as such that Americans were prefer to assume that the skepics are correct and business as usual with regards to the climate is just fine.

While the skeptics in the USA succeed in getting a discussion to question Global Climate Change it seems the scientific community is sending more information about the need to raise a more serious alarm as to the potential implications of current patterns of development and economic activity.

A recent study says that Rising CO2 Will Cause Catastrophic Sea Level Rise according to an Antarctic Study. The worst case scenario is now being floated: that Sea levels could rise by up to six metres if the world fails to get pollution under control.

In the spirit of Blog Action Day, and the need to address global climate change,  I am writing about some of the my experiences with regards to some inspirational ways to address global climate change. Nature magazine online has an article about biochar, which its proponents hope will help to sequester carbon to reduce Global Climate Change. However anti-biochar activists see it a unproven technology that could potentially do more harm than good.

We’ve known several people associated with this effort and both are featured in the article. Jim Fournier organized the Planetwork conference in 2003 where I first found out about oneVillage. He later became involved in biochar research through a company called Eprida and now has a company Biochar Engineering that produces small ovens for researchers. Robert Flanagan also started out at Eprida. He now is based in China researching the use of small biochar producing cookstoves. He envisions selling these stoves to a “billion developing world farmers to whom the food and fuel shortage is real.” The idea is to provide heat for cooking as well as heating their homes as a way to migitate carbon emissions at the “bottom of the pyramid”.

I was intrigued by the idea of the latest innovation in the green movement which is ecofriendly lawn care. Annie Carey “Marketing Goddess” of Clean Air Lawn Care, recently sent me an email indicating that they had been nominated to be Entrepreneur Magazine’s Emerging Entrepreneur of 2009.  She says of the nomination:

This is a testament to the changing face of business – a commitment to being green, setting high ethical and environmental standards, and being an example to others. Clean Air Lawn Care is a sustainable lawn care service that uses clean electric lawn equipment powered through renewable energy. We have solar panels on our trucks that keep the equipment charged throughout the day. We also offer an organic lawn treatment program. Our success is because of all our customers and friends who believe in making a difference and believe in us.

To view the video and vote, go to the following link:

http://www.entrepreneur.com/e2009/vote/emerging.php#432

Jacky Foo has been a supporter of Integrated Farming and has been doing work very similar to what ZERI’s George Chan has done over the last 10-15 years. He has recently focused his efforts in Africa and has joined a Africa Rural Connect (ARC) Contest (this is the same organization that put together a contest that our colleagues at Fantsuam Foundation just won). This content is a “call for ideas” that address fundamental problems of agricultural development and rural poverty in Sub-Saharan Africa; and especially women, the rural poor and the needs of rural communities.

His project is in Kenya and is entitled : “The Ndekero Challenge: A Systems Approach for Rabbit Keeping by a Rural Community in Partnership with a Commercial Rabbit Colony Farm:”  http://arc.peacecorpsconnect.org/view/653/

ARC will pick 40 projects (out of hundreds) based on popularity voting and forward them to a panel of judges who will decide on 1 for the grand prize of 20,000 US$.

He says that “To remain short-listed for the next 2 weeks, he needs more votes. Please vote for his project and support his effort. The instructions for voting (takes about 5 minutes) are here: http://www.globetree.org/africa/rabbit-net/arc-endorse.htm

A online colleague of mine – ZERI Practitioner Eric Fedus – recently updated us about the posting of a video he helped produce as part of a presentation on Integrated Farming at the Permaculture 08 conference in Brazil (Integrated Farming System – English Version).

Eric also shared with me a documentary produced by people in the UK as a way to highlight a successful Integrated Farm in Brazil called Irno Pretto that ZERI’s George Chan developed in the late 90s working with TECPAR’s Alexandre Takamatsu. This is also available for viewing on Google Video.

Olatunbosun is a biotechnologist focusing on the production of alternative energy from organic wastes): http://www.ted.com/pages/view?id=305

The great thing about this event is that you can get a chance to attend the 2009 Grassroots Recycling Network Recycling and Zero Waste Conference in Devens, Massachusetts on October 18-21, 2009.

The half-day ZERI Workshop focusing on Nature’s Best Sustainability Technologies and Natural Systems to “help industry be more sustainable, create more green jobs and increase their bottom line.”

Its worth noting that ZERI’s founder Gunter Pauli has been focusing on Nature’s 100 Best, a project he is working on with Janine Beynus President of the Biomimicry Institute.

Key concepts that will be highlighted at the workshop include:

1. Why nature doesn’t have waste, and why we do
2. Why systems must take priority over products and processes
3. Inputs, outputs, abundance, and resilience
4. Merging social, economic, and environmental values

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TEDx Taipei’s website featured Shai Agass’ work and his bold plan for mass adoption of electric cars. On a related note to this…OVF’s Joy Tang may also be presenting at TEDx Taipei (Oct 16,17). I almost expected to see Pixel Qi’s Mary Lou Epsen as one of the speakers. I am reminded that my other life at Arcosanti puts me in a place of Cognitive Dissonance – seeing the progression of the electrical and at the same acknowledging the realization the car is a problem for humanity not just because of its CO2 emissions but because of the huge amount of resources that it takes to operate and maintain each one. Also there is the social sustainability issues of dislocation of community life and culture due to the impact of the care both in terms of constructing megafreeways and also in relation to the removal of people from real time interaction with other people and cultural artifacts as well as ecological sensory and touch experiences.

Reducing the cost of Solar: Australia’s Printable Solar Cells effort moves forward using printing presses to make Solar Panels: http://www.energymatters.com.au/index.php?main_page=news_article&article_id=329

SolaRoof’s Rick Nelson updated me that he plans to appear at RMI 2009 in San Fran Bay Area:

Somehow I get on all these green newsletters email lists. Not all of them I like or even have time to read. However iGreenBuild’s Bi-Weekly Newsletter caught my eye. Claims it provides the most current industry information about Green Building as well the most current and popular events regarding Green Building.

Matthew Kaddat is the publisher of igreenbuild.com

I liked the article/blurb titled “A shift in the Wind.” He says there is a new call going out across the nation and that there are changes in our lives that have historical consequences at all levels of our society. And yet not all of them with a promise of an easy and successful conclusion. Driving this change is the dissatisfaction we feel with the situations in our lives that in the past may have felt beyond our control. Click Here for More Information

Here is an interesting technology that reminds me of the Arcosanti Energy Apron. However, there is a key difference, Energy Alternatives, LLC Greenward™ Ridge Vent harvests ambient hot attic air as it escapes through the ridge of your roof converts that thermal heat into a form of renewable energy to heat the incoming water into your hot water tank, reducing CO2 emissions and saving money, albeit its designed for the single family home the arch-nemesis of Paolo Soleri. Click Here for More Information

Another technology of interest is geothermal. Indian Lake Local Schools, Lewistown, Ohio, is finishing construction on a state-of-the-art elementary school that will feature many of the latest “green” practices, including a ground source geothermal heat pump system. Education and sustainability design go together in helping the student to see the way in which technologies should come together in an integrated way in the design process to create synergies within any system. Click Here to read more ->

Recently a discussion group on green technologies called Krystal Planet included mention of a Chinese decree banning or reducing plastic bags. It is estimated by one report (”Plastic bag limits save China 3 mln tonnes of oil per year“) that it will reduce 3 billion barrels of oil per year.

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The headline for this month’s Panos South Asia newsletter raises an interesting question and in consideration of that of changing perceptions of reality…what is the role of ICT in raising awareness of the urgency of this and other ecological issues that we face collectively as a species?

The climate has changed but have we? That’s always the big question. Almost every day, we are in touch with news about glaciers melting, mountains endangered, sea levels rising, floods and disasters. But have these consequences of climate change affected us seriously? Do we still continue to do things the old way? Environment experts say that changing human attitudes is one of the biggest challenges to saving this earth.

Recently Steven Chu Obama’s Energy Secretary travelle to China. Here is what the USA’s Time magazine had to say about it.

Did you know only 44% of Americans believe that something should be done about Global Climate Change and that in China that number is 96%? This issue also ranks last in America among the 20 top issues of concern. Its interesting to consider that why after all the coverage that this issue is so blase for so many Americans.

Taiwan High Speed Rail System Fast Facts:

• Taipei to Koasiung 90 minutes 345k or 250kph/120MPH
• USD18 billion ten years to complete.
• The same travel by car would take 5 hours.

US has no real HSR system at current time although there are plans for something to develop in several corrodors of US. For Taiwan a major issue was the connecting of the northeast-southwest corrodor where most of the people live in the country. The northeast is not as mountainous as the southeast and south central parts of the island which were the areas hardest hit by the recent Typhoon that hit the country.

More are the rail system here: http://www.thsrc.com

Actually according to PBS documentary called Trashed, the amount of trash produced by the average American continues to go up.

The consideration of the solid waste as a problem that continues to grow is really nothing new. The idea of the Throwaway Society is hardly nothing new. What might be surprising is that the per capita production of waste by the average American despite all the rhetoric about the greening of America.

My view is when the amount of waste produced per person starts to flatline, we’ll know that the green thinking has really taken hold and is starting to produce results on a grand scale.

Audrey Quaye introduced me to the work of the WTO, no not the World Trade Organization but the World Toilet Organization. As a social enterprise they take a “Market-based approach for achieving social goals.”

Their goals are ambitious to meet “the sanitation Millennium Development Goal (MDG) target to reduce by half the proportion of people without access to basic sanitation by 2015.”

In my Integrated Farming proposals I have tried to show people the potential of the sewage as a resource. Existing modern sanitation systems have major and fatal flaw – they assume sewage is a waste that you have to get away from you as quickly as possible using lots of water, pumps, chlorine and pipes, control systems, etc. All this consumes electricity as well as resources. Finally there is the issue of treating valuable biomass as a waste. Since biomass is finite, if we treat it as if its infinite then common sense tells us we’ll run out of it someday. Of course with that kind of policymaking its also likely that we’ll only see the problem after its too late, unless the current conventional thinking can be overthrown.

Getting to the point of the post is the fact that the world’s 2.6 billion toilet-less are potential customers. Yet that same kind of conventional think has ignored and neglected them as potential customers. Possibly that’s just as well because we cant afford either ecologically or economically to have them adapt to the modern system and its inefficient use of resources.

WTO incorporates Social Enterprise language and jargon well into their copy. They note that “the people at the so-called ‘bottom of the pyramid’ have recently become the focus of parts of both the corporate and development community.”

Whats interesting though is that a note “an ideological shift in thinking about markets…” That’s a key point of the core philosophy of the social enterprise movement and yet it is often not discussed. It needs to be, because while on the one hand you can identify any school of thought as ideology, really it is reflecting a desire to overcome ideological dogmatism and seek out a more thoughtful way of seeing the world that is solutions oriented. This is not to say that all ideological differences can be overcome but rather than it is about ability to be open to the best solution for humanity regardless of ideology that is key to overcoming the increasing polarization in our societies and indeed at the global level.

Ray Kerzweil is a inventor that has been one of the leaders of the Artificial Intelligence movement. Going beyond pure computer technologies he has identified ways that technologies are converging in different fields leading to synergies that is creating quantum leaps in how we address challenges.

With the sanitation field in emerging markets it is not so much about new fangled, sophisticated technologies though as it is about a rethink in the use and configuration of existing technologies.

For example in this field there are these major developments:

1. Visualizing a new and promising market, in which the sheer number of potential consumers compensates for their little individual purchasing power
2. Seeing a market for value added products that are produced from the wastes
3. Seeing a reduction in health and envirionment degradation costs through market driven investments in integrated sanitation and waste management systems
   

WTO says that Today’s market for sanitation is dysfunctional, due

1. Muted demand due to lack of capacity, awareness and a low priority among individuals and institutions who have become complacient with inadequate or non-existent sanitation systems
2. Lack of (freely) available sanitation appropriate technology designs for mass production
3. Dependence on donations is not sufficient to solve the problem of such a vast magnitude.

They believe a “Market based approach is required to address the problem at a large scale.” So their plan is  to build “efficient market infrastructure” to drive “demand through awareness, mindset change, low pricing and stylizing toilets so as to make it a symbol of status and owners pride.”

That might work but my thought is not to make toilets hip so much as to make toilets profitable in terms of the sewage effluent being seen as a valuable resource instead of a worthless waste.

WTO also wants to “install efficient market infrastructure” with the the “objective is to create Integrated Supply Chain…” That all sound interesting but I would like to hear more about specifics.

More here… http://www.betterplace.org/projects/236

The issue of global climate change is one that continues to challenge humanity.

Recently Obama faced resistance at a global summit in Italy to try to pressure developing nations to put caps on their emissions of CO2.

A report by James KAnter “Is Being Overweight a Climate Problem?” calls into question the diets of developed countries that encourage people to overeat.

A report in latest issue of the International Journal of Epidemiology concludes that being overweight or obese “should be recognized as an environmental problem” because of its contribution to climate change from additional food and transport emissions.

Phil Edwards and Ian Roberts of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine found that a lean population, like the Vietnamese, consume about 20 percent less food and produce fewer greenhouse gases than a population in a country like the United States, where about 40 percent of people are obese.

The authors also found that transport emissions will be significantly less in countries with healthy average body weights because it takes less energy to transport slim people.

Many people already are aware that driving an S.U.V. or traveling by plane can dramatically increase an individual’s carbon footprint, and the study seems to support the idea that some of the most effective ways of reducing emissions begin with changes in individual lifestyles.

The key thing to remember in all fairness is that it is not just about being fat but about how much food you consume. Many who are not fat and have high metabolisms also eat more than what they need. The real issue is that we live in societies that encourage addictive behaviors including eating too much food because this is good for the short term interests of those who control the food industry.

One of the pioneers of Integrated Farming George Chan is apparently very ill and is not expected to recover. While we only met once (briefly), we communicated via email intensively over these last few years and I continue to support his pioneering work.

A key aspect of his work that is of possible interest is that it was the result of the development of a more holistic thinking about agriculture that developed in the east particularly in China and Vietnam over the last 100 or so years and included the use of bio-reactors as well as a much more comprehensive approach to farming.

What’s fascinating is that despite China’s reputation as the world’s leading polluter, what has been termed the Circular Economy has grown there during at least the last 20-30 years as an alternative to the prevailing western development model.

See this recent report on CNN online about the Green Revolution in China: http://edition.cnn.com/2009/TECH/science/07/03/china.alternative.energy/

The Nature Conservancy is doing some very innovative and impactful work in global development by promoting technologies such as bioreactors in China as well as other countries like Mali and Ghana. This included a profile of one beneficiary (Village leader Zhang Chengui was first in his town to adopt alternative energy) in a small rural community that has developed a very integrated greenhouse farming system that maximizes profits (since 2003 when the system was installed his income has tripled and is now about 8000 dollars a year) by enabling him and his family “to spend more time growing crops since installing a biogas digester-greenhouse, solar water heater, energy-efficient stove and rain-collecting cistern.” He has tripled his profits by reducing the amount of days he needs to collect firewood.

The Nature Conservancy got involved in that region, because it has increasingly taken a global and strategic approach to preserving nature seeking out the most biodiverse ecosystems such as the region Zhang is located (the mountainous area of northern Hunnan Provence). The key problem in the region was that people were using the forests as a primary source of heating and rapidly depleteing them. Now with the introduction of biogas and solar hot water systems, the pressure on the ecosystems is being reduced and at the same time a more efficient system of heating and cooking is being introduced with dramatic economic results.

Taking the idea of integrated farming to another level…many now have sought to take this very rural, developing country oriented model of more sustainable development/agriculture and consider its larger applications to create very integrated and self-contained built environments that could be suitable for a range of future living applications such as Urban Farming, Arcologies, Vertical Farms, etc.

While much of this thinking is still very abstract, theoretical and pie in the sky the reality for many researchers and leading thinkers is that on a very fundamental level, the so called model of development as we see in contemporary USA/Europe is grossly and inherently unsustainable. So the very model of development in terms of how we construct and operate the built environment must be rethought and indeed re-built/reformulated from the ground up – if it is that we are serious about creating a global movement towards sustainable societies/living.

A slightly different set (but similar) of criteria or areas of interest to might include the idea that the challenge to feed the world involves both the need to dramatically REDUCE:

• water consumption,
• unhealthy, unsustainable and in many cases exploitative reliance on rural areas by urban ones;
• use of toxic and resource intensive chemicals including industrial fertilizers;
• the use of genetically modified organisms;
• emissions of CO2 and CH4 associated with agricultural production;
• biodiversity and cultural heritage loss though the modification of pristine ecosystems into corporate/agribusiness monocultures.

So that the challenge is to ask ourselves what system or combination of systems can best address the above considerations?

My answer would be that we must consider permacultural based agricultural systems that focus on producing more of certain types of food (food that is high on nutritional content and low on ecological impact) closer to the point of consumption. And within that framework is the possibility that this may include water based systems as based on ancient eastern farming practices in which some or all of that system is enclosed within a greenhouse or series of greenhouse adjacent to the habitat/urban area .

We now have examples in which companies are now moving to the point where they can recycle all their waste.

The giant  Subaru plant in Indiana as reported by Chris Woodyard of USA Today is a great example. The automaker pledges that virtually none of the waste generated from its eye-popping output will wind up in a dump:

1. Copper-laden slag  is collected and shipped to Spain for recycling.
2. Styrofoam forms encasing delicate engine parts go to Japan to be used again for new deliveries to the plant.
3. Small protective plastic caps are collected in bins and melted down.

Subaru claims that 99.8% of the plant’s refuse is recycled or reused.

However this includes  a small portion, about 5%, that goes to a waste-to-energy plant that burns waste to make steam to heat Indianapolis’ downtown. Incineration is controversial in that it is believed that these plants spew toxic residues that are difficult to remove from the exhaust stream of the plants.

Subaru is one of a growing number of companies claiming or working toward “zero landfill” status.

Wangari Maathai ignited a movement to reclaim Kenya’s land from a century of deforestation, while providing new sources of livelihood to rural communities. Recently the PBS show Independence Lens did a documentary about her work called Taking Root.

Her courageous work inspired thousands, not only in Kenya but around the world and leading her to be nominated and win a Nobel Peace Prize. She now works through a NGO called the Greenbelt Movement.

According to Wangari Maathai:

I found myself not just a woman wanting to plant trees to provide food and firewood. I found myself a woman fighting for justice, a woman fighting for equity. I started planting trees and found myself in the forefront of fighting for the restoration of democracy in my country.

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Gunter Pauli, the founder of Zero Emissions Research and Initiatives lives in the San Francisco area now.  I  recently got an email  about ZERI’s Certified System Designer training from Gary Liss, regarding a June 09 workshop in the San Francisco Bay Area.

You Tube Video: Gunter Pauli, The logic of system design

Here is a nice introduction to ZERI approach and what will be taught in the workshop:

You can watch more ZERI related videos on YouTube.

Seminar will include ZERI principles and approach which focuses on two main areas:

• Learning from Natural Systems (Biomimicry) and using that knowledge to built more sustainable human systems.   To do this ZERI thinking considers how the 5 natural kingdoms operate as a whole system. The five design principles of ZERI Approach includes the realization that humans systems that use the 5 natural kingdoms found in nature operate in complete balance and achieve a high level of systemic efficiency.
• ZERI aims to go beyond a pure “systems” approach – and see it more holistically as a way to integrate the “five intelligences” that create wisdom based knowledge/technologies – learning and applying that knowledge from natural systems to build sustainable human habitats and means of production.

What the Workshop offers:

• Provides Key tools that take an integrated and systemic approach applying biology, chemistry, physics, and natural laws and principles to solving waste problems;
• Uses a Cash Flow Analysis that Discusses  the potential and pitfalls of sustainable development. How to develop new business ventures from waste – with the idea that in this process the whole economy will become more sustainable at the large scale;
• Explores how to deal with discards/waste flows as compared to traditional recycling market development ventures.

It is noted on the flyer that with the economic stimulus funding looming ahead of us, there is a huge opportunity to invest in new business opportunities that may be identified through a ZERI analysis of difficult to recycle materials and products.  As industries become more responsible for their products (under Extended Producer Responsibility or EPR), they will also be looking for more opportunities like these as well.

These are materials crucial for training highest-level staff from local government agencies and sustainable businesses that are serious about Zero Waste.

Register: https://www.regonline.com/63374_723584A

Through a mutual connection of mine, Andrew Philips (who has started the Hancock Permaculture center), I crossed paths with Laurie Schoeman on Facebook. Actually, Laurie and I first crossed paths via the Permaculture SF discussion Group as she was doing some research on alternative solutions to sewage treatment.

In my conversations with her, we discussed her work at the EcoCenter at Herons Head Park. She also is working on a blog about the project.

EcoCenters/Environmental Resource Centers are usually located in middle class and upscale regions such as South Face and/or are designed to appeal to the mainstream/middle class people and get them to consider more green solutions to reduce their Ecological Footprint. Historically the technologies featured at these centers have fit certain aesthetic and design standards that often created a misconception that green technologies and sustainability were only for the affluent. An alternative to this is work being done to promote a green consciousness in urban areas where people are struggling with the challenges of urban decline and blight such as with the EcoCenter at Herons Head Park in Hunter’s Point in San Francisco.

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Recently we have had a chance to consider the importance of culture in promoting sustainable development.

When we look at sustainability we have to consider that is what is now grossly unsustainable in terms of human impact on the ecology is a very recent phenomena. Most societies around the world for most of human history lived sustainably with their surrounding environment and that is why of course they were able to continue to exist as a society. Now as many of those societies struggle to remain viable in the modern world, we are discovering their “wisdom” in terms of how to exist in harmony with the environment with regards to constructing their built environments.

Recently Joy made a comment with regards to this that I wanted to share:

In Amartya Sen’s Development as Freedom, he closed the book by mentioning that millions of people are taking sustainable development and living into their own hands without waiting for the government or aid to live their lives around the world. I believe there are million of ‘eco living’ practices on the planet now as we speak.

My bold statement is that many of the people without the Internet access actually are more engaging in eco living in the way that has been handed down to them for generations.

Recently though they found themselves being cornered as the urban development and new technology continues to impact the economy in their life.

Having said so, the idea of documenting and collective the data on eco living related ot bamboo and others would be to serve the audience that desire to try different way of living.