Getting a home energy audit helps heal the planet, saves money, and makes for a more pleasant home. Everybody wins.
President-elect Obama understands the importance of efficiency, and so part of the economic stimulus package is to insulate all public buildings.
But let me tell you about that window. A few years ago, I decided to make our property as green as possible. First, I wanted to get solar panels. But the solar experts that I talked to said that the place to start is getting an energy audit, because you can save more energy faster and cheaper this way.
So I called in an expert in energy efficiency for a consultation. Bill Calfee, of Peak Energy Solutions, in Dorset, Vermont came by to do the energy audit. We walked through the house. Opening a closet in the guest room, we stood underneath the hole in the ceiling to the attic. There wasn’t a cover over the hole to the attic. “Well, here’s a big thing,” he said. “This is some of that easy-to-fix, low-hanging fruit that I mentioned. The money you’ll save by fixing this will make up for the cost of the audit many times over.”
See, the unheated attic is normally the same temperature as outdoors. Yet because there was no hole cover, the warm air was rising into the attic and cold air was descending. We had the equivalent of an open window to the outside. No wonder the house always felt drafty!
Calfee pointed to the black dust and grit attached to the pink insulation that had accumulated on the side of the hole. He said this was the residue of passing air, signifying lots of air passing through this space. “D’oh!” I said. Apparently, the house builders had only covered the hole with a piece of plywood. Somehow it had been gotten pushed aside and left uncovered. We think it had been that way for years. The closet door was often closed, so it wasn’t quite a wide-open window, or we might have noticed earlier. But that room was always cold. The next day somebody came and built a thick, foam-board insulated cap for the hole, and now it’s tight as a drum up there.
So I tell this story to illustrate why home energy audits are important. Experts can see things other people wouldn’t see. Sometimes you have to call in the pros. Additionally, the pros have a few superhero tools for sussing out a home’s efficiency. They have the blower door and the thermal camera!
Calfee brought a sort-of hand-held video camera that measured heat and cold. Pointing to the plastered over walls, the camera showed where the house builders hadn’t brought the pink roll insulation all the way to the top of the bay between the joists. By leaving just 2 inches uncovered, it was creating a steady heat lose. Pointing to the laundry room, he showed a section that somehow didn’t get insulated at all. The camera showed small cracks in the foundation that were easily filled. Everywhere that cold air was rushing in was made visible and so we could deal with it.
Next Calfee used “the blower door” to measure how airtight the house is. The blower door is a strong fan attached to a laptop computer, with a plastic sheet that fits snug over a door frame. You shut every window, door, and vent in the house. Then you turn on the blower full speed for five minutes. Then you turn it off and the computer measures the fan’ activity. Is it spinning backwards? How fast? By pressurizing the house in this way, we could see how airtight the house was.
Very useful information. It turns out though our house was only ten years old, it was pretty leaky. Recently, they did the blower door again, and now the house is tight. Getting this house to be energy efficient feels like a victory to me. It took almost two years, numerous calls to plumber, carpenters, and insulators, but now the house really is efficient and warm and green.
Here’s a short summary of what we ended up doing. We had a foot of cellulose insulation sprayed into attic to insulate the ceiling thoroughly. Fixed the cracks in the basement foundation. Made holes in the walls and blew in extra cellulose insulation. In the basement, we had a foam sprayed over the concrete walls, because concrete has an “R-value of 1” (or insulating ability of a single pane of glass.) The walls were sprayed with this gooey, soy-based foam, which hardens into a layer of insulation that looks like the surface of lemon meringue pie.
In the big picture, energy efficiency is one of the most important places where our society can start dealing with the environmental crisis. Every watt of energy that we save is one that Vermont Yankee doesn’t have to toxically produce. A tight house burns less oil and thus less carbon. Energy expert Amory Lovins of the Rocky Mountain Institute says that saving energy should be a huge part of our national energy plan. He calls saved energy “negawatts.”
Eventually we did get a pretty cool solar system. Forty percent of the homes HEAT is generated by the sun. We put in a big solar system that heats water that runs underneath the floors as radiant floor heating. Eighty blue vacuum-tube solar panels gather the sun’s heat, which warms tubes of the antifreeze liquid propylene glycol, and then circulates down into the basement to a 500 gallon water tank that stores the heat, and then it flows through tubes under the floors as radiant floor heating. This is a beautiful way to heat a home. The floors are warm to the feet. The energy is free and burns zero carbon. As we strive to create a zero-carbon world, solar heating systems should have a place of honor. We estimate this solar system will pay for itself with savings on oil bills over 10 years.
A real estate agent told me that everyone says that their home is tight but most houses aren’t. Creating a super insulated house could be a priority if you are building a new home, but it probably won’t be unless you plan for it. Construction workers are often more concerned with getting a job finished than creating a house that has long-term low heating costs. Efficiency and green building techniques should be ”the new normal”, but they aren’t yet.
I strongly encourage everybody get an energy audit and to deep insulate their homes. It saves money and energy. It’s a good investment if you own the house, because you’ll pay lower fuel bills in the long run. Additionally, houses with green credentials are a lone hot spot in the housing market, according to a recent article in the Wall Street Journal. And the house is just nicer to live in. After the truck came and blew lots of cellulose insulation all through the walls and the attic, it was like a giant blanket had been placed over the house. Investing in good insulation is smart for the energy bills, the earth, and for our feet.
More info is online at www.efficiencyvermont.com. and www.serg-info.org and www.energy-wise-homes.com.
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Monday, December 1, 2008
Transition Town cofounder rallies Vermonters
“I feel an intense urgency to do this work, and I hear that all over the world” said Naresh Giagrande, one of the founders of the Transition Town movement in the UK. Indeed, on that Nov. 24th evening at Montpellier’s Unitarian Church, one could feel that positive, encouraging, ready-to-go energy. It was an inspiring evening, and an auspicious beginning for Vermont’s Transition Town movement.
The church was packed. Vermont’s crunchy intelligentsia turned out in force. The energy in the room was palpable and refreshing. Climate change can be pretty doom and gloom, and the Transition Town movement nicely short-circuits this by shifting to a positive vision for a low-carbon future. Citizens are encouraged to create committees or councils that “Start creating visions of a positive future.” By “unleashing the collective intelligence of humanity”, the climate change crisis can be addressed by “letting a thousand flowers bloom.” On his powerpoint, Giagrande had written a T.T. slogan, “Action without vision is just busyness. Vision without action is fruitless.”
Giagrande is currently on a worldwide speaking tour to spread the word about this movement to create an “abundant, pleasurable, resilient future.” Resilient is a key word in Transition culture, meaning the ability of a living system to withstand shocks. In this case, a resilient, transitioned community will withstand the shocks of peak oil with grace. One quick way to measure the resilience of a community is looking at the cords of firewood and seeing if they are well-stacked, notes Richard Heinburg, author of Peak Everything.
Transition Town started in Totnes, England. A group of citizens have worked together to create an ‘energy descent plan’ that looks forward into a desirable future. And they are cultivating a pleasant vision: old school, homespun, communitarian, and fun. They are trying to embody that Buckminster Fuller proverb, “You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the old model obsolete.”
The Transition Town has a component called The Great Re-skilling. Giagrande said “We are probably the most useless generation in history. Most people can’t cook their own food, let alone grow it.” The Great Re-Skilling encourages people to meet their own needs rather than employ energy intensive delegation of the task. Or to reframe it, do it like our grandparents did before we paid Chinese slaves to do it. Mend soxs. Fix that bicycle instead of throwing it away and getting a new one. Grow and store food.
The Transition Town model is hugely hopeful. There are abundant web resources at www.transitiontowns.org.
Vermont has it’s own Transition website transitionvermont.ning.com. And also, on Dec 6th, at Vermont Technical College, there will be a conference on this subject, called “Community-based Approaches to Energy and Climate Change.”
Onward and upward, Transition Vermont!
The church was packed. Vermont’s crunchy intelligentsia turned out in force. The energy in the room was palpable and refreshing. Climate change can be pretty doom and gloom, and the Transition Town movement nicely short-circuits this by shifting to a positive vision for a low-carbon future. Citizens are encouraged to create committees or councils that “Start creating visions of a positive future.” By “unleashing the collective intelligence of humanity”, the climate change crisis can be addressed by “letting a thousand flowers bloom.” On his powerpoint, Giagrande had written a T.T. slogan, “Action without vision is just busyness. Vision without action is fruitless.”
Giagrande is currently on a worldwide speaking tour to spread the word about this movement to create an “abundant, pleasurable, resilient future.” Resilient is a key word in Transition culture, meaning the ability of a living system to withstand shocks. In this case, a resilient, transitioned community will withstand the shocks of peak oil with grace. One quick way to measure the resilience of a community is looking at the cords of firewood and seeing if they are well-stacked, notes Richard Heinburg, author of Peak Everything.
Transition Town started in Totnes, England. A group of citizens have worked together to create an ‘energy descent plan’ that looks forward into a desirable future. And they are cultivating a pleasant vision: old school, homespun, communitarian, and fun. They are trying to embody that Buckminster Fuller proverb, “You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the old model obsolete.”
The Transition Town has a component called The Great Re-skilling. Giagrande said “We are probably the most useless generation in history. Most people can’t cook their own food, let alone grow it.” The Great Re-Skilling encourages people to meet their own needs rather than employ energy intensive delegation of the task. Or to reframe it, do it like our grandparents did before we paid Chinese slaves to do it. Mend soxs. Fix that bicycle instead of throwing it away and getting a new one. Grow and store food.
The Transition Town model is hugely hopeful. There are abundant web resources at www.transitiontowns.org.
Vermont has it’s own Transition website transitionvermont.ning.com. And also, on Dec 6th, at Vermont Technical College, there will be a conference on this subject, called “Community-based Approaches to Energy and Climate Change.”
Onward and upward, Transition Vermont!
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Fetus Origami, Endocrine Disruptors and You...
a Report from VPIRG Environmental Action Conference
I enjoy going conferences. It’s like an intense college immersion experience, minus the binge drinking and the tests. At the Vermont Technical College on Nov. 15th, VPIRG held their annual Environmental Action Conference. This Vermont’s biggest and best environmental conference, a sort of bio-regional Bioneers Conference. I came away with a head full of ideas of ideas that I’d like to share.
The highlight for me was learning from keynote speaker Sandra Steingraber, author of the book Living Downstream: An Ecologists look at Cancer and the Environment. She said so many interesting things and here are some.
- The human fetus is folded together as with origami, flat sheets of tissue folding into the emerging body. The fetus starts growing head first, then downward, and center first and then outward. So if the baby has webbed feet, the toxic exposure was likely in the 11th week, when the outer stuff had started.
- The worst time to get hit with toxins is when you are really, really, really small. “Exposure during the opera of embryonic development can multiply exposure effect,” Steingraber said. After implantation on the womb wall, the egg is very vulnerable and after conception too.
- We should be thinking about pollution from the human rights perspective, Steingraber said. We have a right to live in a world without getting cancer. We have a right to be fertile and have children if we want them. We have a right to not get poisoned by Roundup’s Atrazine, no matter how much it would impact the economy to take it off the market. Lawyers from the Vermont Law School are pursuing this, and articulate this view in an article (available on-line) called “Law for An Ecological Age.”
- There is a massive movement to protect people from chemicals. Here are some resources in that movement. A blog called Nontoxic kids. A ‘Safe Cosmetics Campaign”. An European Union program called REACH, which will document all the chemicals that are on the market. Also, check out Rivernetwork.org, the Collaborative on Health and the Environment, and the Alliance for Clean and Healthy Vermont.
- Canned food is a major source of exposure to Bisphenol-A (pronounced: biss-fee-n’all-A). The cans are lined with a plastic that contains the Bisphenol-A and it leeches into the food. I always knew canned vegetables were nasty! Now I know they contain a “endocrine disruptor.”
Endocrine disruptors happen because the body mistakes certain chemicals for natural hormones and then everything gets out of wack. The body uses hormones to get jobs done, in minute amounts, parts per trillion. When we take in tiny microscopic chemicals from the canned pineapple or the old Nalgene bottle, our bodies get confused.
In an issue related to endocrine disruptors, girls are getting their breasts about 3 years earlier than they used to, at 10 years old instead of 13. The menstruation start times are about the same, only a month ahead of where they were in 1970. This long window between breasts budding and menstruation is not good. Girls are at risk for breast cancer later in life because the body has a long window of increased estrogen levels connected to the breast development, but without progestrerone, a menstrual hormone that balances out the effects of the estrogen.
- Steingraber compared the economy and the environment as twin ecosystems with many parallels. Both were global and integrated. “Only there are no bailouts for the environment if we hit a major tipping point.” She said her 7 year old child ran into the room saying “the Dow dropped 500 points” not knowing what that meant. Perhaps we don’t mourn the ecosystem’s decline as much because we don’t have metrics to count it. We need numbers that document the rise in carbon parts per million, so that TV anchors can grimace and say “the Carbon Index rose today to a new high of 388 parts carbon per million today, making our air the most carbonated since the Age of the Dinosaurs.”
- In an exciting note from the activist perspective, the California environmentalists have found a delicious, elegant leverage point upon industry. California legislators passed a law that says companies must say on the label if there is something in the product that is illegal in Belgium. Companies have to identify everything that doesn’t meet the higher standards of the EU. Thus, they will probably just start importing products safe for the European market rather than relabel. They might just do the switch all across the country, thus bringing America into de facto harmonization with the E.U.’s more sensible and stringent laws! Brilliant!
I enjoy going conferences. It’s like an intense college immersion experience, minus the binge drinking and the tests. At the Vermont Technical College on Nov. 15th, VPIRG held their annual Environmental Action Conference. This Vermont’s biggest and best environmental conference, a sort of bio-regional Bioneers Conference. I came away with a head full of ideas of ideas that I’d like to share.
The highlight for me was learning from keynote speaker Sandra Steingraber, author of the book Living Downstream: An Ecologists look at Cancer and the Environment. She said so many interesting things and here are some.
- The human fetus is folded together as with origami, flat sheets of tissue folding into the emerging body. The fetus starts growing head first, then downward, and center first and then outward. So if the baby has webbed feet, the toxic exposure was likely in the 11th week, when the outer stuff had started.
- The worst time to get hit with toxins is when you are really, really, really small. “Exposure during the opera of embryonic development can multiply exposure effect,” Steingraber said. After implantation on the womb wall, the egg is very vulnerable and after conception too.
- We should be thinking about pollution from the human rights perspective, Steingraber said. We have a right to live in a world without getting cancer. We have a right to be fertile and have children if we want them. We have a right to not get poisoned by Roundup’s Atrazine, no matter how much it would impact the economy to take it off the market. Lawyers from the Vermont Law School are pursuing this, and articulate this view in an article (available on-line) called “Law for An Ecological Age.”
- There is a massive movement to protect people from chemicals. Here are some resources in that movement. A blog called Nontoxic kids. A ‘Safe Cosmetics Campaign”. An European Union program called REACH, which will document all the chemicals that are on the market. Also, check out Rivernetwork.org, the Collaborative on Health and the Environment, and the Alliance for Clean and Healthy Vermont.
- Canned food is a major source of exposure to Bisphenol-A (pronounced: biss-fee-n’all-A). The cans are lined with a plastic that contains the Bisphenol-A and it leeches into the food. I always knew canned vegetables were nasty! Now I know they contain a “endocrine disruptor.”
Endocrine disruptors happen because the body mistakes certain chemicals for natural hormones and then everything gets out of wack. The body uses hormones to get jobs done, in minute amounts, parts per trillion. When we take in tiny microscopic chemicals from the canned pineapple or the old Nalgene bottle, our bodies get confused.
In an issue related to endocrine disruptors, girls are getting their breasts about 3 years earlier than they used to, at 10 years old instead of 13. The menstruation start times are about the same, only a month ahead of where they were in 1970. This long window between breasts budding and menstruation is not good. Girls are at risk for breast cancer later in life because the body has a long window of increased estrogen levels connected to the breast development, but without progestrerone, a menstrual hormone that balances out the effects of the estrogen.
- Steingraber compared the economy and the environment as twin ecosystems with many parallels. Both were global and integrated. “Only there are no bailouts for the environment if we hit a major tipping point.” She said her 7 year old child ran into the room saying “the Dow dropped 500 points” not knowing what that meant. Perhaps we don’t mourn the ecosystem’s decline as much because we don’t have metrics to count it. We need numbers that document the rise in carbon parts per million, so that TV anchors can grimace and say “the Carbon Index rose today to a new high of 388 parts carbon per million today, making our air the most carbonated since the Age of the Dinosaurs.”
- In an exciting note from the activist perspective, the California environmentalists have found a delicious, elegant leverage point upon industry. California legislators passed a law that says companies must say on the label if there is something in the product that is illegal in Belgium. Companies have to identify everything that doesn’t meet the higher standards of the EU. Thus, they will probably just start importing products safe for the European market rather than relabel. They might just do the switch all across the country, thus bringing America into de facto harmonization with the E.U.’s more sensible and stringent laws! Brilliant!
Friday, November 14, 2008
Last minute criminality by the Bush FCC on cell towers
Here’s a good way to spot government mischief. Watch for announcements on the days of really big news. For example, on election Tuesday, Nov 5th ‘08, the FCC announced a major change in the regulation of the wireless spectrum.
“Federal regulators on Tuesday approved the largest ever expansion of wireless Internet access, unanimously backing a controversial plan to allow a new generation of devices to use the empty airwaves between television channels to go online” reports the LA Times.
High tech industry call this plan “wi-fi on steroids”, essentially allowing really strong cellphones to be embedded in your computer, that then allow wi-fi access everywhere. The park, the subway, the car, the mountain top, at the bottom of the ocean, no place will be inaccessible for computing pleasure, and everyplace will be equally basking in the waves of cell tower radiation.
This is not good. This is the Bushites administration conspiring with industry for a last gluttonous orgy of regulatory irresponsibility before slithering off. Cellphone towers are cancer causing now. This plan will expand cell tower use, prevalence, and wattage. Essentially, our world will become ever more radiated by the bouncing waves of ever more electronic devices.
The FCC ruling was opposed by TV industry groups, because they said the wireless internet traffic would interfere with TV signals. Theater and concert promoters also complained that there might be interference between a concert-goer’s I-phone and the performer’s wireless microphone. Reasonable concerns. A far bigger concern is that wireless technology causes cancer. Therefore it should be contained and not expanded into new horizons of electrosmog pollution.
Cell towers create electromagnetic radiation, a.k.a. electrosmog pollution. Billions of digital ones and zeros in pulsing waves enter a biological world. Biological life evolved technologies to gather information from waves. Insects use their antenna to gather information from the environment. Bats fly by radar by picking up waves. And now, suddenly, humans are sending vast, unregulated, strong waves into the ecosystems. Increasingly, we’re getting negative feedback.
Here are three snapshots from the emerging story that scientists are recognizing that wireless technology is unsafe. First, the european Interphone study is documenting the link from cellphones to brain cancer. Second, the firefighters unions no longer allow cellphone towers atop firehouse because towers increase cancer rates. Third, the honorable Rep. Dennis Kucinich recently held congressional hearings on cellphone safety, and heard testimony from doctors and cancer victims on the subject.
I have been tracking the issue for a few years now. And it is largely the same story. Citizen’s groups and a few government regulators chasing the runaway train of an unhealthy but widely adopted technology. But the facts are coming in. Cellphones will eventually be widely understood to be as cancer causing as cigarettes. In 20 years, no sane person will give one to their children.
In the meantime, I encourage people not to use cellphones or wireless laptops (especially around me), and to keep track of the issue by reading the online journal www.microwavenews.com.
Cellphone technology was let onto the market without sufficient health tests or regulation. Now cellphones are widely adopted, but this doesn’t mean they are compatible with human biology. It was a great mistake to let this seductive technology out of the box, and humanity will probably suffer huge increases in brain cancer because of it. I think all cellphone towers should be torn down. Cellphones should be turned off permanently and properly recycled. The companies that have gotten rich on this unwholesome technology should pay for a fund to cover the tab on brain cancer patients in the years to come.
I’d like to close with an elegant quote that summarizes the issue well, from Lewis Mumford, who wrote “Western society has accepted as unquestionable a technological imperative that is quite as arbitrary as the most primitive taboo: not merely the duty to foster invention and constantly to create technological novelties, but equally the duty to surrender to these novelties unconditionally, just because they are offered, without respect to their human consequences.”
We should say no to a wi-fi planet. I’m no technophobe Luddite. I love the idea of the internet as humanity’s central nervous system. But I want it to be wired. Wireless technology is simply unsafe.
May the communications industry take responsibility for the biological impacts of wireless radiation. May we live in a world where we can ride the bus without being radiated by our neighbor’s e-mail. May we develop an advanced human civilization that keeps technology in harmony with biology.
Theo Talcott
“Federal regulators on Tuesday approved the largest ever expansion of wireless Internet access, unanimously backing a controversial plan to allow a new generation of devices to use the empty airwaves between television channels to go online” reports the LA Times.
High tech industry call this plan “wi-fi on steroids”, essentially allowing really strong cellphones to be embedded in your computer, that then allow wi-fi access everywhere. The park, the subway, the car, the mountain top, at the bottom of the ocean, no place will be inaccessible for computing pleasure, and everyplace will be equally basking in the waves of cell tower radiation.
This is not good. This is the Bushites administration conspiring with industry for a last gluttonous orgy of regulatory irresponsibility before slithering off. Cellphone towers are cancer causing now. This plan will expand cell tower use, prevalence, and wattage. Essentially, our world will become ever more radiated by the bouncing waves of ever more electronic devices.
The FCC ruling was opposed by TV industry groups, because they said the wireless internet traffic would interfere with TV signals. Theater and concert promoters also complained that there might be interference between a concert-goer’s I-phone and the performer’s wireless microphone. Reasonable concerns. A far bigger concern is that wireless technology causes cancer. Therefore it should be contained and not expanded into new horizons of electrosmog pollution.
Cell towers create electromagnetic radiation, a.k.a. electrosmog pollution. Billions of digital ones and zeros in pulsing waves enter a biological world. Biological life evolved technologies to gather information from waves. Insects use their antenna to gather information from the environment. Bats fly by radar by picking up waves. And now, suddenly, humans are sending vast, unregulated, strong waves into the ecosystems. Increasingly, we’re getting negative feedback.
Here are three snapshots from the emerging story that scientists are recognizing that wireless technology is unsafe. First, the european Interphone study is documenting the link from cellphones to brain cancer. Second, the firefighters unions no longer allow cellphone towers atop firehouse because towers increase cancer rates. Third, the honorable Rep. Dennis Kucinich recently held congressional hearings on cellphone safety, and heard testimony from doctors and cancer victims on the subject.
I have been tracking the issue for a few years now. And it is largely the same story. Citizen’s groups and a few government regulators chasing the runaway train of an unhealthy but widely adopted technology. But the facts are coming in. Cellphones will eventually be widely understood to be as cancer causing as cigarettes. In 20 years, no sane person will give one to their children.
In the meantime, I encourage people not to use cellphones or wireless laptops (especially around me), and to keep track of the issue by reading the online journal www.microwavenews.com.
Cellphone technology was let onto the market without sufficient health tests or regulation. Now cellphones are widely adopted, but this doesn’t mean they are compatible with human biology. It was a great mistake to let this seductive technology out of the box, and humanity will probably suffer huge increases in brain cancer because of it. I think all cellphone towers should be torn down. Cellphones should be turned off permanently and properly recycled. The companies that have gotten rich on this unwholesome technology should pay for a fund to cover the tab on brain cancer patients in the years to come.
I’d like to close with an elegant quote that summarizes the issue well, from Lewis Mumford, who wrote “Western society has accepted as unquestionable a technological imperative that is quite as arbitrary as the most primitive taboo: not merely the duty to foster invention and constantly to create technological novelties, but equally the duty to surrender to these novelties unconditionally, just because they are offered, without respect to their human consequences.”
We should say no to a wi-fi planet. I’m no technophobe Luddite. I love the idea of the internet as humanity’s central nervous system. But I want it to be wired. Wireless technology is simply unsafe.
May the communications industry take responsibility for the biological impacts of wireless radiation. May we live in a world where we can ride the bus without being radiated by our neighbor’s e-mail. May we develop an advanced human civilization that keeps technology in harmony with biology.
Theo Talcott
Thursday, October 30, 2008
check out this great funny video about activism and peace
John Lennon was the first peace activist I felt a deep connection with. I love his music and idealism and all of that is well expressed in this beautiful interview accompanied by funny cartoon that gets the point across the universe.
check it out...
http://www.odemagazine.com/blogs/readers_blog/3571/john_lennon_all_we_need_is_peace
All We Need Is Love,
Theo
check it out...
http://www.odemagazine.com/blogs/readers_blog/3571/john_lennon_all_we_need_is_peace
All We Need Is Love,
Theo
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Great Quote from Transition Town newsletter
"Humans are capable of a unique
trick, creating realities by first imagining them, by
experiencing them in their minds. …As soon as we
sense the possibility of a more desirable world, we
begin behaving differently, as though that world is
starting to come into existence, as though, in our
mind's eye, we are already there. The dream becomes
an invisible force which pulls us forward. By this
process it begins to come true. The act of imagining
somehow makes it real… And what is possible in art
becomes thinkable in life". Brian Eno.
trick, creating realities by first imagining them, by
experiencing them in their minds. …As soon as we
sense the possibility of a more desirable world, we
begin behaving differently, as though that world is
starting to come into existence, as though, in our
mind's eye, we are already there. The dream becomes
an invisible force which pulls us forward. By this
process it begins to come true. The act of imagining
somehow makes it real… And what is possible in art
becomes thinkable in life". Brian Eno.
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
here's our new website address: www.shiresenvironmentalalliance.com
hi all
shiresenvironmentalalliance-shiresenvironmentalalliance.com !!!
we have a website, and soon you'll be able to google it
but for now
enter the whole thing and it should pop up
www.shiresenvironmentalalliance.com
onward
theo
shiresenvironmentalalliance-shiresenvironmentalalliance.com !!!
we have a website, and soon you'll be able to google it
but for now
enter the whole thing and it should pop up
www.shiresenvironmentalalliance.com
onward
theo
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
proposed mission statement for SEA
Our goal is to collaboratively initiate, create, and develope
a vibrant, local, ecologically sustainable community.
a vibrant, local, ecologically sustainable community.
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
Proposed Letter to the Editor
Dear Editor or Whom it May Concern,
Just as we are beginning to feel the effects of global warming with more severe, frequent and unpredictable weather in our area, we are also feeling the effects of another phenomena which has up to this point received less publicity. It is called peak oil.
Briefly, the world's oil production has been increasing for several decades, and the peak oil theory says that this increase will slow, come to a halt, and we will find ourselves dependent on a diminishing, increasingly expensive oil supply. Oil will not disappear all of a sudden. It will merely become harder to find and more expensive to extract. So if we think our gas prices are high now, we have peak oil to look forward to.
There are many groups and individuals in our community who are already working to reduce our dependence on oil by reducing our energy use to save money and find alternative energy solutions for our area. The Manchester Challenge to replace regular incandescent lightbulbs with more efficient CFL's is a successful example of our community's potential for action on the issue of peak oil.
The goal of the Shires Environmental Alliance (SEA) is to bring greater awareness of peak oil to the Shires area, and to bring together individuals and existing action groups to see what we can do together to help our community not only to survive global climate change and peak oil, but to live up to the challenges of our times and to thrive locally with a variety of creative solutions.
When we think of our community ten, twenty, or one hundred years down the road, what do we envision? What if we could have an open community forum where members of the community can share and find support for their own ideas and visions (of which the following are just a few suggestions)? What if our area could supply its own sustainable energy, by converting dams to hydroelectric and by installing windmills? What if every home and business received an energy audit, streamlining our electrical grid and conserving energy with a more effiecient system? What if we could feed our area with local food, fresh and in season, without worrying about fuel surcharges on our produce and other groceries? The possibilities are endless, if our community is the source of these initiatives.
I am an undergraduate student at Vassar College, majoring in Environmental Studies, but I've always felt that my home community is the Shires region. Like many other people I am concerned about the future of my community, and I know that by communicating with others my concerns, hopes and visions, and by becoming a part of the dialogue, I will help my community to strengthen and grow to meet the challenges of the future.
Danielle Laberge
Just as we are beginning to feel the effects of global warming with more severe, frequent and unpredictable weather in our area, we are also feeling the effects of another phenomena which has up to this point received less publicity. It is called peak oil.
Briefly, the world's oil production has been increasing for several decades, and the peak oil theory says that this increase will slow, come to a halt, and we will find ourselves dependent on a diminishing, increasingly expensive oil supply. Oil will not disappear all of a sudden. It will merely become harder to find and more expensive to extract. So if we think our gas prices are high now, we have peak oil to look forward to.
There are many groups and individuals in our community who are already working to reduce our dependence on oil by reducing our energy use to save money and find alternative energy solutions for our area. The Manchester Challenge to replace regular incandescent lightbulbs with more efficient CFL's is a successful example of our community's potential for action on the issue of peak oil.
The goal of the Shires Environmental Alliance (SEA) is to bring greater awareness of peak oil to the Shires area, and to bring together individuals and existing action groups to see what we can do together to help our community not only to survive global climate change and peak oil, but to live up to the challenges of our times and to thrive locally with a variety of creative solutions.
When we think of our community ten, twenty, or one hundred years down the road, what do we envision? What if we could have an open community forum where members of the community can share and find support for their own ideas and visions (of which the following are just a few suggestions)? What if our area could supply its own sustainable energy, by converting dams to hydroelectric and by installing windmills? What if every home and business received an energy audit, streamlining our electrical grid and conserving energy with a more effiecient system? What if we could feed our area with local food, fresh and in season, without worrying about fuel surcharges on our produce and other groceries? The possibilities are endless, if our community is the source of these initiatives.
I am an undergraduate student at Vassar College, majoring in Environmental Studies, but I've always felt that my home community is the Shires region. Like many other people I am concerned about the future of my community, and I know that by communicating with others my concerns, hopes and visions, and by becoming a part of the dialogue, I will help my community to strengthen and grow to meet the challenges of the future.
Danielle Laberge
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
We want a wind farm! petition
hi allies
this is my draft of the....
Petition In Support of the Equinox Wind Farm
We want a wind farm on Mount Equinox to provide the clean green power for our towns. We recognize that a healthy human future demands carbon neutral energy sources.
We support the plan for a town bond to pay for a municipal wind farm. Rough estimates suggest that 2.5 million will get us 6 windmills that power 3500 homes. After electricity bills repay the bond, we encourage the wind farm profits to go to the school system and other green projects.
We support the Wind Farm Town Bond issue being brought before a vote at town meeting next spring.
this is my draft of the....
Petition In Support of the Equinox Wind Farm
We want a wind farm on Mount Equinox to provide the clean green power for our towns. We recognize that a healthy human future demands carbon neutral energy sources.
We support the plan for a town bond to pay for a municipal wind farm. Rough estimates suggest that 2.5 million will get us 6 windmills that power 3500 homes. After electricity bills repay the bond, we encourage the wind farm profits to go to the school system and other green projects.
We support the Wind Farm Town Bond issue being brought before a vote at town meeting next spring.
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Update: How To Post Stuff Pt. 2
Hi everybody... Technical advisor Elizabeth here!
I just wanted to let you all know that you can now log on/post stuff using this email address as the Login ID:
shiresenvironmentalalliance@gmail.com
Then just enter the password (email Theo (theo.talcott@mail.sit.edu) or me (el2382@barnard.edu) if you don't remember it) and you are all set to post!
If you have any questions about the blog, or about how to make things snazzy, email me at el2382@barnard.edu, and I will get back to you really quickly.
Alliance out! (*special handshake*)
Elizabeth
I just wanted to let you all know that you can now log on/post stuff using this email address as the Login ID:
shiresenvironmentalalliance@gmail.com
Then just enter the password (email Theo (theo.talcott@mail.sit.edu) or me (el2382@barnard.edu) if you don't remember it) and you are all set to post!
If you have any questions about the blog, or about how to make things snazzy, email me at el2382@barnard.edu, and I will get back to you really quickly.
Alliance out! (*special handshake*)
Elizabeth
Sunday, July 27, 2008
film
The movie for at teleion holon on thursday sept 4th is really coming together
it has been added to
http://www.rainforestinfo.org.au/deep-eco/ESA/.
click on "schedule' and check details for the event
Also there is a good chance that Ruth will hook up with an Aussie environmental singer songwriter for the events on the east coast. that would be awesome if we had some wonderful music too.
Info and flyers etc are also at the above url, have a look around...let me know what you think... sally
it has been added to
http://www.rainforestinfo.org.au/deep-eco/ESA/.
click on "schedule' and check details for the event
Also there is a good chance that Ruth will hook up with an Aussie environmental singer songwriter for the events on the east coast. that would be awesome if we had some wonderful music too.
Info and flyers etc are also at the above url, have a look around...let me know what you think... sally
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
transition town videos
Here are the transition town videos for Rob Hopkins. Our area should really do this!
part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3B0zQ1pJAaY
part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhyIl_YBQz0
part 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wimiLJHRe6s
part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3B0zQ1pJAaY
part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhyIl_YBQz0
part 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wimiLJHRe6s
HOW TO POST STUFF
Hi Allies
As my homework, I said I'd write up a bit about how to use this blog. Here it is.
1. First, click on "sign in"
2. sign in, using my email "theo.talcott@mail.sit.edu" and our superdouble secret password " "
3. when you do that, it will open up to the dashboard, where you click on "New posts"
4. If you want to move a chunk of text with cutting and pasting, I found clicking on "edit Html" at the top let me do that.
5. write freely!
6. hit preview to check out what you've written and edit if you want, then hit "publish post"
As my homework, I said I'd write up a bit about how to use this blog. Here it is.
1. First, click on "sign in"
2. sign in, using my email "theo.talcott@mail.sit.edu" and our superdouble secret password " "
3. when you do that, it will open up to the dashboard, where you click on "New posts"
4. If you want to move a chunk of text with cutting and pasting, I found clicking on "edit Html" at the top let me do that.
5. write freely!
6. hit preview to check out what you've written and edit if you want, then hit "publish post"
7. did I mention that Bill McKibben confirmed he'd come to our conference on Nov. 7th at midday?
in green,
Theo
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Proposal for a Green Commerce Trail Thru Manchester
Please imagine this...
a family walks into Mountain Goat store and sees light green podium near the front door that says “the Green Path”. On top of the podium is a big dark green folder that says “Green stuff that this store has”. Inside is a background on all the products in the store with green credentials. For example, the Patagonia fleece is made of recycled bottles, and the company preserves biodiversity in Chile. At the end of the folder, they can see other parts of the Path. They see that Manchester Woodcraft is using wood that is certified to be sustainably harvested. Further, the Sirloin's salad bar is organic.
With this organizing tool, companies would be encouraged to bring organic, healthy, green stuff to Manchester. Students and designers could walk through town on educational tours of where green commerce is at.
Further, a website could list all the products, so somebody types in handbag, and up pops “Ralph Lauren’s fair-traded beaded by a woman’s cooperative in Zaire Evening Bag”. A website could support the Green Path, and be available on laptops in some of the stores.
The green commerce pathway could include stops at the downtown recycling center that took compost. The farmer’s market could be a stop. We could set up an ‘end of life cycle’ return spot, where people could drop off things for return to their companies. (Logistically complicated, but end-of-life returns are central to encouraging companies in green product design.)
This Green Path would allow people to walk through town with a green guide in mind, allow people to “vote with their dollars” more effectively, provide educational opportunities, encourage companies to bring their green stuff to Manchester.
Getting commerce onboard with a sustainable future is key to humanities survival. Giving visitors ways to identify green products would push that market segment.
Manchester should rebrand as town centered around the idea of sustainability and ecological commerce.
Theo
a family walks into Mountain Goat store and sees light green podium near the front door that says “the Green Path”. On top of the podium is a big dark green folder that says “Green stuff that this store has”. Inside is a background on all the products in the store with green credentials. For example, the Patagonia fleece is made of recycled bottles, and the company preserves biodiversity in Chile. At the end of the folder, they can see other parts of the Path. They see that Manchester Woodcraft is using wood that is certified to be sustainably harvested. Further, the Sirloin's salad bar is organic.
With this organizing tool, companies would be encouraged to bring organic, healthy, green stuff to Manchester. Students and designers could walk through town on educational tours of where green commerce is at.
Further, a website could list all the products, so somebody types in handbag, and up pops “Ralph Lauren’s fair-traded beaded by a woman’s cooperative in Zaire Evening Bag”. A website could support the Green Path, and be available on laptops in some of the stores.
The green commerce pathway could include stops at the downtown recycling center that took compost. The farmer’s market could be a stop. We could set up an ‘end of life cycle’ return spot, where people could drop off things for return to their companies. (Logistically complicated, but end-of-life returns are central to encouraging companies in green product design.)
This Green Path would allow people to walk through town with a green guide in mind, allow people to “vote with their dollars” more effectively, provide educational opportunities, encourage companies to bring their green stuff to Manchester.
Getting commerce onboard with a sustainable future is key to humanities survival. Giving visitors ways to identify green products would push that market segment.
Manchester should rebrand as town centered around the idea of sustainability and ecological commerce.
Theo
Monday, July 7, 2008
join us
we are meeting on Wednesday at 7:00 for a potluck at Theo's
and wish all who are interested to join us..
we vision a locally sustainable community and would like to invite
all who share that vision to please come
and wish all who are interested to join us..
we vision a locally sustainable community and would like to invite
all who share that vision to please come
Sunday, July 6, 2008
SEA INTENTIONS
SEA
what is the SEA?
The Shires Environmental Alliance is a local environmental group working together to heal the planet. We try to help the big picture with our small piece of the puzzle. We intend to be a NGO that organizes people and community for the planet’s benefit. We intend to maintain integrity and dedication to nonviolence, peaceful methods. We intend to be solution orientated.
Our first year goals...
-write up a vision for the Shires in 1 year, 5 years, 20 years, 100 years. For example, in one year, all the restaurants will compost and have biodegradable doggie bags. In 5 years, all the houses will be well insulated. In 10 years, there will be well-used big paths through the community. In 20 years, all the towns energy will be generated from local resources. And so on.
Here we can be at our most effective, recreating the tabla rasa of Manchester in our imaginations, seeing into and thus forming the future. One of the Bible’s proverb’s says “Where there is no vision, the people perish”. Let’s help provide a vision.
- We will host environmental conference, on Nov 15th, inviting Bill McKibben,
- We will advocate for best practices through the community by identifying them, and creating a letter campaign to ask local institutions to adopt them. For example, we’ll ask Casella to deal with e-waste, for in town recycling, and composting.
- We will put big ideas on the table, like the windmills on Equinox being spun again, but this time owed by a citizen cooperative of local residents. ( I heard of this exciting business model at Findhorn lecture!)
- We will put out a restaurant guide, assessing who is green, providing benchmarks.
- We’ll participate in the parades, build the trash deva puppets, establishing a lighthearted presence in the community.
For a SEA mascot, I nominate this great solar flashlight. (www.sunnightsolar.com). It took me years to find a good solar flashlight. The ones you shake don’t really work. But this one works. I once heard it said that “the future is hear, it’s just not well distributed.” This is true. There are lots of solutions. We want to encourage them. Also, these flashlights might make a good fun-raiser. We could buy a case for 15$ a piece and sell them for thirty, with each .
additional ideas...
- SEA encourages Manchester towards a different developmental direction: away from expensive clothes for tourists, towards green commerce and actual community. We aspire to rescue this central town from it’s developmental dead-end, and community erosion due to town center commerce overload. manchester might reinvigorate if it’s central gathering idea wasn’t clothes but was solutions for sustainable world, like fair trade stuff and organic items.
- I think it’ important that we get moving right away with stuff we can actually do. But also to spend a good amount of time envisioning.
- We should host another series of events at the Spiral Press to encourage community building, Alliance expansion, and public inclusion.
- We should get our towns to adopt the earth charter. This can happen soon. We don’t have to wait for the Spring to start moving on this. We can start delivering copies of the Earth Charter to people who are on the town boards so they are familiar with it come spring, and get on next year’ ballot way ahead of time. We can post the Earth Charter in public places throughout the community, with a note about voting for the measure at town meeting.
- we can advocate for a local food system. We can put together a big detailed idea, get a grant written, find the funds, build a winter storage facility, get a farmer-to-school network, develop local food infrastructure. It would take some time to build but we should try and promote local food.
in peace
theo
what is the SEA?
The Shires Environmental Alliance is a local environmental group working together to heal the planet. We try to help the big picture with our small piece of the puzzle. We intend to be a NGO that organizes people and community for the planet’s benefit. We intend to maintain integrity and dedication to nonviolence, peaceful methods. We intend to be solution orientated.
Our first year goals...
-write up a vision for the Shires in 1 year, 5 years, 20 years, 100 years. For example, in one year, all the restaurants will compost and have biodegradable doggie bags. In 5 years, all the houses will be well insulated. In 10 years, there will be well-used big paths through the community. In 20 years, all the towns energy will be generated from local resources. And so on.
Here we can be at our most effective, recreating the tabla rasa of Manchester in our imaginations, seeing into and thus forming the future. One of the Bible’s proverb’s says “Where there is no vision, the people perish”. Let’s help provide a vision.
- We will host environmental conference, on Nov 15th, inviting Bill McKibben,
- We will advocate for best practices through the community by identifying them, and creating a letter campaign to ask local institutions to adopt them. For example, we’ll ask Casella to deal with e-waste, for in town recycling, and composting.
- We will put big ideas on the table, like the windmills on Equinox being spun again, but this time owed by a citizen cooperative of local residents. ( I heard of this exciting business model at Findhorn lecture!)
- We will put out a restaurant guide, assessing who is green, providing benchmarks.
- We’ll participate in the parades, build the trash deva puppets, establishing a lighthearted presence in the community.
For a SEA mascot, I nominate this great solar flashlight. (www.sunnightsolar.com). It took me years to find a good solar flashlight. The ones you shake don’t really work. But this one works. I once heard it said that “the future is hear, it’s just not well distributed.” This is true. There are lots of solutions. We want to encourage them. Also, these flashlights might make a good fun-raiser. We could buy a case for 15$ a piece and sell them for thirty, with each .
additional ideas...
- SEA encourages Manchester towards a different developmental direction: away from expensive clothes for tourists, towards green commerce and actual community. We aspire to rescue this central town from it’s developmental dead-end, and community erosion due to town center commerce overload. manchester might reinvigorate if it’s central gathering idea wasn’t clothes but was solutions for sustainable world, like fair trade stuff and organic items.
- I think it’ important that we get moving right away with stuff we can actually do. But also to spend a good amount of time envisioning.
- We should host another series of events at the Spiral Press to encourage community building, Alliance expansion, and public inclusion.
- We should get our towns to adopt the earth charter. This can happen soon. We don’t have to wait for the Spring to start moving on this. We can start delivering copies of the Earth Charter to people who are on the town boards so they are familiar with it come spring, and get on next year’ ballot way ahead of time. We can post the Earth Charter in public places throughout the community, with a note about voting for the measure at town meeting.
- we can advocate for a local food system. We can put together a big detailed idea, get a grant written, find the funds, build a winter storage facility, get a farmer-to-school network, develop local food infrastructure. It would take some time to build but we should try and promote local food.
in peace
theo
notes on posting..
I figured out how to post a cut & pasted piece of text. You have to click on the "Edit Html button and it opens the writing section up, otherwise the pasted text wouldn't appear properly
also, i encourage more discussion on this format. i'm excited to hear what you all are thinking about. the writing doesn't have to be perfect, nor the thoughts finished.
paz
tt
also, i encourage more discussion on this format. i'm excited to hear what you all are thinking about. the writing doesn't have to be perfect, nor the thoughts finished.
paz
tt
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Thursday, June 26, 2008
i am blogging
after about a zillion tries I finally was able to get into the blog.. ( i consistently forgot the dot after theo in the theo.talcott ..ect ect).. alas i am here and i am blogging!!! anyway i just sent a request to melissa for our table at solar fest.. will fill you all in as soon as i hear from her... am also working on the rewrite of our mission statement and notes from our meeting...lets keep the energy flowing with our collective wisdom and vision.......in prayer and for the earth.sally
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
we've got a blog! very exciting
hi everyone
that was such a good start to our project.
i think that' s the recipe for movement building
a sweet potluck dinner and good intentions .
i want this blog to be a place for lots of free thinking and posting
so let me start the ball rolling with some semi-randomish jibberish...
(with a purpose)
let' s use this blog to gather our ideas, to think collectively when we are not together, and to organize work parties, and whatever else.
i really like the idea of getting together for workparties, where some earth friendly activity is suggested and then whoever wants can show up. For example, I need help putting up the fence at the community garden. So how about next Monday at 6, whoever can, meet at the Rec center.
I am going to make a sign for my farmer market booth inviting people to join the SEA.
Dinner at my house next week at 7 on Wednesday. Invite everyone interested.
In between, let's get stuff done.
I particularly want to start gathering ideas about things we can do for the community.
I intend to write up something about the Transition Town movement to help get us thinking about that as an organizing tool.
Tell me what you all are thinking about!
in green,
Theo
Dear Humans,
Welcome to the Alliance. we just ate organic salad and strawberrys and maple syrup smoothies and Cabot mac and cheese and we're now discussing how to save the world...
junk parades, shires shares, all sorts of groovy things are being discussed.
stay tuned to this blog,
share what you got!
We want to build a big community movement to help our area become ecologically sustainable.
so we need your help and love and support.
please join us!
sincerely,
Theo Talcott
Sally Leonard
Bob Leondard
Lisa Laberge
Bill Laberge
Danielle Laberge (college embassador)
Elizabeth Laberge (technical advisor)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)