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Sustainability Saturday #10

Jess Lundie — Sat, 23 Oct 2010 20:23:10 +0000

Grist featured an article this week about the “war” between the city and the suburb. (Yikes – talk about a loaded word in a liberal military household.)

I am still trying to figure out where I stand on this one – there are valid arguments in both camps (and some kind of ludicrous ones as well). I don’t know that the framing of this issue as a war is useful and I’m not sure if it’s already inevitable. While I agree that this kind of framing can be mobilizing, I think we’ve all seen how “war” efforts can stagnate and deflate serious problems. The War on Poverty and the War on Drugs, anyone?

/end mini-soapbox

Photo CC || http://www.flickr.com/photos/migulski/

Given all that, I’m not sure if these articles are particularly useful. If framing this issue as a war is detrimental to finding sustainable solutions, I hate to be spreading it around. But on the other hand, perhaps this is an effective method of building momentum.

The Grist article that I mentioned above links to and extensively quotes from this interview with Worldchanging’s Alex Steffen, but it is definitely worth reading the full piece in its entirety.

From last year, part one and, more recently, part two of Saving The Suburbs.

And finally, an article I could barely get through – The War Against The Suburbs. It’s vitriolic and filled with disdain, but certainly does its best to… well, just give it a skim.

So what do you guys think? Are we at war? Is this framing a useful construct?

Sustainability Saturday #9

Jess Lundie — Sat, 16 Oct 2010 14:22:56 +0000

Today, yesterday, tomorrow – water. Okay, so not actually tomorrow, but for this Sustainability Saturday I’m going to continue with yesterday’s Blog Action Day theme of water. But in retrospect, that post seems a little gloomish to me. And I don’t want to be a gloom shroom, so today’s water roundup is going to be all about solutions. Amazing, beautiful, creative solutions to the water-related issues at hand!

Drinking Water

First off, drinking water. We need it. Around a billion people are without it ever day, and hundreds of thousands of children die each year due to lack of access to drinking water. The problems with water as far as drinking is concerned are cleanliness and access.

From the ingenious Roundabout Play Pump, which harnesses kid-energy to provide water for an entire village, to the Hippo Water Roller and the Q Drum, people are coming up with elegant answers to the question of water transport.

Photo CC || http://www.flickr.com/photos/edytamaterk
Also, check out their wonderful photostream on Flickr!

Something as simple and as affordable as the LifeStraw could make the difference for people in countries with limited access to clean water, particularly given the expectation of increased freshwater shortages in the future. The ability to sip clean water from a stagnant pool could mean the difference between life and death for millions of people.

Our Oceans

As for the oceans, unfortunately we’re not making much progress getting the plastic back out of the Pacific Gyre. But there are some real solutions on the front of sustainable fishing and food production.

Catch shares are a new way of distributing fishing quotas that, at least as of now, seem to be working to sustain and rebuild fish populations. With a catch share system, fishermen actually have an incentive to preserve and maintain the fish population. Okay, so unless you’re a geeky wonk like me, catch shares may not be sexy and creative, but here’s something something more important than sexy: catch shares are working.

There are also some very creative responses to the pollution issues posed by traditional fisheries. Ecologically sustainable ways to farm fish are out there. It can be done, and again, there are people doing it! (But for now, don’t assume that you’re doing the planet any favors by buying the farmed fish in your local grocery store. Be sure you know where your seafood comes from.)

Can you see this video? If not, click here to watch it on the blog.

But most exciting for me is aquaculture. Aquaculture is so cool! Veggies + fish + small space + almost no waste = amazing. Aquaculture is one of those cool ideas that can make sustainability sexy. Particularly since it’s not just an idea on the drawing board. It’s real and it’s happening right now.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Can you see the video? If not, click here to watch on the blog.

Anyone have any positive, hopeful water-related projects or news to share?

Happy weekend, everyone!

Sustainability Saturday #8

Jess Lundie — Sat, 02 Oct 2010 20:27:54 +0000

As promised and intended for last week, in honor of the fact that I have spent the last two weeks canning things (and that there appears to be no end in sight), this week’s Sustainability Saturday is about canning. There’s not much more to say about that except thank goodness for the internet! I don’t think I would ever have felt confident enough to take on this project without all the resources (and new friends!) I’ve found through the internet. Thank you, Al Gore.

First off, first canned, fig jam. This was a great recipe to start with and it turned out really nicely. It didn’t gel quite enough, but I know now that was my fault, not the fault of the recipe. I actually can’t say enough good things about the entire Pick Your Own site. It’s a fantastic resource for real and local foodies.

Next, we have Food In Jars. Wow, just wow. I estimated my tomato order based on her fantastic picture of what 60lbs of tomatoes looks like, and her recipe for Unfancy Pickled Jalapeno recipe answered my question about what to do with 5lbs of jalapenos. Somehow I didn’t end up with nearly that many jars of finished product, but it may be because I ended up with lots of cosmetic slicers instead of romas.

And finally, I would be remiss if I did not mention DH’s favorite from this whole process: jalapeno jelly. He joked that I should have made more than two batches, but when I see how much of it he’s eaten in the last week… maybe I should have. I certainly had the jalapenos for it!

I canned most of my tomatoes whole in order to speed up the process and because I couldn’t decide how much of what to make. But I did make a couple batches of tomato sauce and salsa from the recipes on Thy Hand Hath Provided. My sauce ended up a little runny and bland – my fault, not the fault of the recipe – but the salsa was delicious.

I also almost set the house on fire. Literally. Casualty: cork trivet that hitched a ride onto a burner on the bottom of a pan. Oops. Disaster averted though, thank goodness.

Do you have any good recipes to share – your own or anyone else’s? Leave the link (or the recipe) in the comments!

Sustainability Saturday #7

Jess Lundie — Sat, 11 Sep 2010 15:23:32 +0000

In the spirit of disaster preparedness and zombie attacks, I present to you this super-cool disaster planning tool. I’m not being end-of-the-worldish here, but I think this kind of thing is a good exercise that can bring to light some of the areas in which your household is disconnected with your community. What I want to know is where is the little zombie icon under the “What to do if…” section? What to do if… ZOMBIES! (Zombie picture borrowed from Grist’s Stupid goes viral: The Climate Zombies of the new GOP)

I also really enjoyed Chef Kelly Myer’s column on preserving fruits in alcohol, which I found while searching for blackberry recipes, and it inspired me to try peaches or nectarines next week. Per usual, as new as this seems to me, this is probably something my great-grandmother could have taught me if she were still alive.

On the other side of news, here’s a good article for the climate skeptics in your life: Arctic Round-Up: New Sea Routes Opening Up, New Infrastructure Imagined, and Canada’s Taking Action. Amazing how the Arctic totally isn’t melting. It’s all in our head. Those are fake trade routes and fake ships and I have no idea what you are talking about Canada has a military huh?

Finally, I really want to build an Earthship. Or I wanted to until one of my lovely Tweeps (come waste time with me on Twitter!) said that he had wanted to until he stayed in one. Apparently they are crazy humid! So I’m amending my desire to wanting to go stay in one and see if I can take the humidity. Anyone care to join me? Also, they are made of recycled tires that may or may not offgas. Does any of you science-minded readers have thoughts on handling that issue?

Happy fall-is-coming weekend, everyone!

Sustainability Saturday #6

Jess Lundie — Sat, 28 Aug 2010 16:37:40 +0000

Happy Saturday, everyone. It’s been a fairly good week in sustainability news. And by that I mean that no additional catastrophes (at least not that I heard of) joined the more or less Hollywood-esque summer we’ve been “enjoying.”

Along those lines, here’s a great article about how to lower your movie theater and popcorn budget this summer; just turn on the news.

Alright, sorry… /end cynicism.

Last week I wrote a bit about writing a new, more epic story for your life. This family did just that. They set a goal, they started working towards it, and they reached their goal two years before they had hoped to. For those skeptics out there, it is possible and people are doing it. Check out Family of Four Grows Their Food in a Swimming Pool.

After Copenhagen there was a lot of discussion about addressing climate change on a local or regional level. But maybe what we need to be doing in the wake of the failure of federal climate change policy is celebrating the EPA.

Getting even smaller, this week I concluded that I don’t have to do all of it. But because we definitely want to do some of it ourselves, check out Sustainable Eats’ Simple Lives Thursday blog hop for a ton of great thoughts, ideas, recipes and discussions about living more sustainably on an individual level. And oh… the recipes. Yum.

And finally, I can’t believe it’s almost September. I didn’t participate in One Small Change in July and August, but I’m pondering what I want to do for September. One idea I had was having a No Plastic month, but I haven’t made up my mind yet. Are you signing up for the next One Small Change challenge?

Hope everyone is having a wonderful weekend!

Sustainability Saturday #5

Jess Lundie — Sat, 26 Jun 2010 17:43:18 +0000

Yay, it’s Saturday! And the sun actually came out for a whole two and a half days this week. It was like a miracle, or at least it felt like one. Hello, sun! We’ve missed you!

Sustainability Saturday is without theme this weekend, because frankly my life is weird these days, and not lending itself to themes.

First up, Tuna’s End. The tuna, the tuna, the tuna. More on this later, but here’s something to think about as you read this thoroughly researched and excellently written article about the decline of bluefin tuna: trade is everything.

Shared by a reader a few weeks ago (see, I’m catching up!) here is a graphic representation of the wide world of oil – where it comes from, who has it and how we use it. Note the transportation sector – yikes!

In case you were looking for a little oil spill deja vu in your life, does any of this look familiar?

Sometimes The Oil Drum is a little too dense and doomish for me, but this week they had a brilliant guest post on the relationship between oil, agriculture, food, hunger, and obesity. It is well worth the read.

As is fairly frequently the case, the best article I read this week came courtesy of Worldchanging – a discussion of why they haven’t been covering the BP oil spill, and an excellent explanation of systems, solutions-oriented thinking. We need to be ambitiously and optimistically pursuing creative solutions.

This super-cool proposed solution appealed to my inner geek .

Ok, so never mind. The theme this week was oil, with a little bit of food thrown in because food is tasty and we need it.

Finally, I feel it is my duty to share with you, so that you may learn from my experiences. I did a shout out on Twitter and Facebook asking for organic solutions to my issue of aphids on my fruit trees. The final verdict was water, with or without soap. FYI, washing the aphids off your fruit trees when there is a slight breeze results in a rain of bug parts and pissed off, wet biting ants! Just saying. (My fruit trees look much better though.)

Happy Saturday, folks.

Sustainability Saturday – #3

Jess Lundie — Sat, 29 May 2010 18:39:02 +0000

It’s Saturday again – man, did this week go by quickly!

This week we’ll be heading a little more to the theory side, with one exception: BP oil spill top-kill. You’d almost have to live in a hole in a ground to have missed this, but be sure to keep an eye and an ear out for more status updates today.

So Now To The Theory

This great article explores the relationship between globalization and sustainability in terms of environmental carrying capacity. This makes sense – it’s what competitive advantage is all about. But I don’t remember Adam Smith mentioning the ecological ramifications.

The Powerful Vagueness of Sustainability discusses sustainability as a systemic process guided by our best science, instead of as a scientific absolute. Another advantage of a deliberate “vagueness” or openness about the details is that it encourages creativity. However, I would argue that this creativity must be guided by strong and clear principles if it is to result in effective and meaningful solutions.

The New York Times Freakonomics blog covered an article in Rolling Stone (if anyone has a link to the original article, let me know?) about how corporate buyers are purchasing farmland to capitalize on food shortages and other potential effects of climate change. Fascinating, and I’m not really sure how I feel about it.

Finally, Racialicious gives us an insightful discussion of racial considerations in the sustainable food movement. In my opinion, this is a must read and a must think about. Also, I’m a huge fan of the gummy bears.

Happy weekend, everyone!

Sustainability Saturday – #2

Jess Lundie — Sat, 22 May 2010 18:58:00 +0000

Since there’s a good chance not all of you spend your week submerged in news about sustainability, environmental politics, grassroots efforts, etc., I thought I would share with you some of the interesting things I came across this week.

Before the Oil Comes – From Megan Jordan, author of Velveteen Mind, a different side of the BP Gulf oil spill. It’s a beautifully written piece that is well worth reading.

Locally Grown Won’t Cut It – Here’s a glimpse into the other side. It’s good to remember that there are organized entrenched interests at work here. In other words, people’s livelihoods are caught up in preserving the status quo. The changes we advocate are very threatening to a lot of people, and it would behoove us to remember that.

A fascinating “Sustainability Faceoff” between McDonald’s and Starbucks. The article itself acknowledges that, on the surface, this may seem like an unusual choice of businesses. But a sustainable future is not going to be based on companies like McDonald’s and Starbucks magically disappearing. It is going to require corporations across the board to move systematically towards the “mouth of the funnel” in ways that are commercially and economically feasible – LED lightbulbs, sustainable fishing programs, recyclable and compostable packaging, and supplier sustainability scorecards (or something similar).

From Gabon, here’s a example of how important it is to find creative ways for local communities to be engaged in conservation efforts.

And for you real food types, how to make your own butter in a mason jar!

Finally, Sustainability Education Provides a Reason to Hope. We need as many reasons to hope as we can find.

Happy Saturday, everyone!