Please take a few minutes - right now - to read Greenpa's post about the murderous impact of food market speculation on the world's poor and needy, and follow it up with an action.
I'm going to write to my member of parliament.
Showing posts with label help needed. Show all posts
Showing posts with label help needed. Show all posts
Saturday, 19 April 2008
Thursday, 13 March 2008
Discuss: growing food in cities, and using the internet to learn how
During the course of my work this week I had reason to visit a school in north-eastern New South Wales. That region has a reputation for attracting and fostering people with "alternative" views and values, particularly in regard to environmental protection and sustainable living. So it was that one of the teachers, knowing beforehand that I publish this blog, introduced me to a student who has a keen interest in permaculture and who is also active in a group centred around the Transition Towns concept (see link in my "highly recommended" sidebar).
Now, not that this blog has a huge world-wide audience or anything, I would like to give that student the opportunity to remain anonymous but at the same time see if I can't get a bit of discussion going here around a couple of the ideas that have come to mind as a result of our meeting.
I put that TT link over there ages ago and haven't looked at their site in months. I think they're clearly world leaders, forging a path to the future. What I'm not so sure about is how to make that path into a highway wide enough to take the cities along with the towns. I should revisit their site and see if there's been any progress on that subject.
One of the obvious things (to me) is that people in cities will need to grow food for themselves and their immediate community. More than that, they'll need to do so sustainably, recycling nutrients in efficient closed loops and doing it all with an absolute minimum of external energy inputs. In other words we need permaculture cities. Unfortunately the vast majority of city dwellers know nothing about growing anything.
Take me as an example: I have a borrowed copy of the 2nd edition of "Introduction to Permaculture" and recently bought the Digger's Club's "Australian Fruit & Vegetable Garden". I've been experimenting in the back yard for the past year or so, but so far have very little to show (or eat) as a result.
So, you thus-far anonymous student, if you're looking for school project ideas that combine IT with permaculture, you might consider starting an online library of training/instructional podcasts or other resources to help city folk like me with no horticultural knowledge transform our backyards and balconies into productive, sustainable food gardens. Seriously - was there ever a period in history prior to the present day where an entire generation of a civilisation had no idea how to grow their own food? We need that knowledge back again, and the internet provides a platform unlike anything else in human history for the distribution of knowledge.
The internet might well be our best defence against falling into another dark age as oil production falls. We stand to lose a great deal of our personal mobility. It just won't be feasible for people like me to travel hundreds of kilometers in a single day just to provide some brief specialist service. But if we can maintain and build on our communications infrastructure and the library of publicly-accessible knowledge then the physical isolation won't necessarily be a barrier to skills and ideas.
What I would like to do now is to invite you all to hit the comments and have a bit of a discussion about those two ideas and their intersection. Will city people need to grow their own food in the future? Can the internet be used effectively to deliver training in the essential garden skills and design principles? If you're a city person, what kind of online resources do you think would help you? If you're a gardening guru, how could you best capture and share what you have learned?
Now, not that this blog has a huge world-wide audience or anything, I would like to give that student the opportunity to remain anonymous but at the same time see if I can't get a bit of discussion going here around a couple of the ideas that have come to mind as a result of our meeting.
I put that TT link over there ages ago and haven't looked at their site in months. I think they're clearly world leaders, forging a path to the future. What I'm not so sure about is how to make that path into a highway wide enough to take the cities along with the towns. I should revisit their site and see if there's been any progress on that subject.
One of the obvious things (to me) is that people in cities will need to grow food for themselves and their immediate community. More than that, they'll need to do so sustainably, recycling nutrients in efficient closed loops and doing it all with an absolute minimum of external energy inputs. In other words we need permaculture cities. Unfortunately the vast majority of city dwellers know nothing about growing anything.
Take me as an example: I have a borrowed copy of the 2nd edition of "Introduction to Permaculture" and recently bought the Digger's Club's "Australian Fruit & Vegetable Garden". I've been experimenting in the back yard for the past year or so, but so far have very little to show (or eat) as a result.
So, you thus-far anonymous student, if you're looking for school project ideas that combine IT with permaculture, you might consider starting an online library of training/instructional podcasts or other resources to help city folk like me with no horticultural knowledge transform our backyards and balconies into productive, sustainable food gardens. Seriously - was there ever a period in history prior to the present day where an entire generation of a civilisation had no idea how to grow their own food? We need that knowledge back again, and the internet provides a platform unlike anything else in human history for the distribution of knowledge.
The internet might well be our best defence against falling into another dark age as oil production falls. We stand to lose a great deal of our personal mobility. It just won't be feasible for people like me to travel hundreds of kilometers in a single day just to provide some brief specialist service. But if we can maintain and build on our communications infrastructure and the library of publicly-accessible knowledge then the physical isolation won't necessarily be a barrier to skills and ideas.
What I would like to do now is to invite you all to hit the comments and have a bit of a discussion about those two ideas and their intersection. Will city people need to grow their own food in the future? Can the internet be used effectively to deliver training in the essential garden skills and design principles? If you're a city person, what kind of online resources do you think would help you? If you're a gardening guru, how could you best capture and share what you have learned?
Saturday, 3 November 2007
Maths Problem
Solve:
A man has two identical water tanks of diameter 2.2m. Mere moments after connecting the downpipes to catch rainwater, the heavens open up and the tanks fill to a height of 0.8m. If the tanks have a combined capacity of 10,000 litres, how much higher can the water rise before it starts to overflow out the side of the tanks where no drain pipe currently exists, quite likely causing serious damage to the compacted rock dust foundation on which the tanks are sitting?
Answer:
Not bloody far enough! The bottom of the overflow outlet is less than 1.2m higher than the base of the tank, meaning the tanks are about two thirds full after just one night's worth of moderate rain and a couple of showers.
A bit of quick pipe work by my helpful neighbour (the one who installed the downpipes without the drainage in place, saying it wasn't going to rain soon enough to be a concern...) has now mitigated the threat. Any overflow will now be channelled a few metres away over the lawn where it can't cause any major trouble. Proper drainage to the street is a project for another day.
The next question is what to do with around 6,500 litres of water, given that I don't yet have a pump or any plumbing to take water into the laundry and toilet where it's needed. Thankfully the answer doesn't require a calculator: time to go pump shopping.
A man has two identical water tanks of diameter 2.2m. Mere moments after connecting the downpipes to catch rainwater, the heavens open up and the tanks fill to a height of 0.8m. If the tanks have a combined capacity of 10,000 litres, how much higher can the water rise before it starts to overflow out the side of the tanks where no drain pipe currently exists, quite likely causing serious damage to the compacted rock dust foundation on which the tanks are sitting?
Answer:
Not bloody far enough! The bottom of the overflow outlet is less than 1.2m higher than the base of the tank, meaning the tanks are about two thirds full after just one night's worth of moderate rain and a couple of showers.
A bit of quick pipe work by my helpful neighbour (the one who installed the downpipes without the drainage in place, saying it wasn't going to rain soon enough to be a concern...) has now mitigated the threat. Any overflow will now be channelled a few metres away over the lawn where it can't cause any major trouble. Proper drainage to the street is a project for another day.
The next question is what to do with around 6,500 litres of water, given that I don't yet have a pump or any plumbing to take water into the laundry and toilet where it's needed. Thankfully the answer doesn't require a calculator: time to go pump shopping.
Sunday, 8 July 2007
Yellow thumb
This had to happen at some point. I think I've hurt my tomato plants.
I'm not sure whether I mentioned this in any previous posts, but the nice guy who delivered my new tanks spotted my tomato plants as he walked by them and commented appreciatively about their healthy condition. As a novice gardener I was immediately in awe of his expertise (he recognised the plant on sight!) and so I took his following comment quite seriously: "you just have to make sure they get enough sun otherwise the fruit won't ripen."
Oh! Not enough sun? Well I'd better move them then!
And so I relocated the pot from where these plants had grown from seed to their obviously healthy and vigourous condition, complete with the first tiny green fruit starting to appear, and plonked them firmly into a full-sun position. "There you go," I thought. "Drink up that warm sunlight."
Over the next fortnight I was encouraged to see lots of flowering and the setting of new fruit. But at the same time, things started appearing to be less than ideal overall. Some of the lower branches wilted slightly. Some of the leaves dropped off. And in the past few days, a distinct yellow tinge has appeared through maybe a third to a half of the plants.
I don't know what exactly might be the cause of this. It could be completely normal, for all I know. Or maybe the change in position was harmful. Maybe there's a lack of nutrients, or a less than ideal amount of moisture. But it's worrying.
In my continuing ignorance I have moved the pot back to its original position. I have topped up the pot with some of the nutrient-rich soil I have been excavating from the site where I'll be installing one of my water tanks. I watered that through and then added a layer of dry grass clippings on top as mulch to try and conserve the moisture and protect the soil from the cold, dry winds we've been experiencing recently.
Now I'm just crossing my fingers and watching to see what happens next.
I'm not sure whether I mentioned this in any previous posts, but the nice guy who delivered my new tanks spotted my tomato plants as he walked by them and commented appreciatively about their healthy condition. As a novice gardener I was immediately in awe of his expertise (he recognised the plant on sight!) and so I took his following comment quite seriously: "you just have to make sure they get enough sun otherwise the fruit won't ripen."
Oh! Not enough sun? Well I'd better move them then!
And so I relocated the pot from where these plants had grown from seed to their obviously healthy and vigourous condition, complete with the first tiny green fruit starting to appear, and plonked them firmly into a full-sun position. "There you go," I thought. "Drink up that warm sunlight."
Over the next fortnight I was encouraged to see lots of flowering and the setting of new fruit. But at the same time, things started appearing to be less than ideal overall. Some of the lower branches wilted slightly. Some of the leaves dropped off. And in the past few days, a distinct yellow tinge has appeared through maybe a third to a half of the plants.
I don't know what exactly might be the cause of this. It could be completely normal, for all I know. Or maybe the change in position was harmful. Maybe there's a lack of nutrients, or a less than ideal amount of moisture. But it's worrying.
In my continuing ignorance I have moved the pot back to its original position. I have topped up the pot with some of the nutrient-rich soil I have been excavating from the site where I'll be installing one of my water tanks. I watered that through and then added a layer of dry grass clippings on top as mulch to try and conserve the moisture and protect the soil from the cold, dry winds we've been experiencing recently.
Now I'm just crossing my fingers and watching to see what happens next.
Saturday, 9 June 2007
Having a lapse
The reduced frequency of blog posting is probably an easy giveaway. I'm "backsliding", to borrow a term from the Christian tradition.
Showers are getting slightly longer. Meters are being read maybe twice a week. Takeaway food has become more common. The little car's fuel economy is well over 10L/100km and the big car's pushing 12. Ice Break consumption has increased again.
I have two ideas about why this may be happening.
First, I'm a perfectionist. I get terribly frustrated if things can't be "right" and I tend to avoid or ignore such things. I'm feeling overwhelmed by the enormity of the challenge of transforming the modern world into a sustainable society -- just try to avoid producing any kind of plastic waste for a whole day and you'll get a feel for how big a job we have ahead of us -- and my personal efforts feel about as effective as an amoeba trying to stop a bulldozer.
And that leads into the second idea. In my work I tend to get de-motivated if I'm always going it alone - I always get more done when working as part of a team. In the context of this sustainability thing I haven't yet found anybody local to "team up" with and that's making it hard to sustain my own momentum.
Showers are getting slightly longer. Meters are being read maybe twice a week. Takeaway food has become more common. The little car's fuel economy is well over 10L/100km and the big car's pushing 12. Ice Break consumption has increased again.
I have two ideas about why this may be happening.
First, I'm a perfectionist. I get terribly frustrated if things can't be "right" and I tend to avoid or ignore such things. I'm feeling overwhelmed by the enormity of the challenge of transforming the modern world into a sustainable society -- just try to avoid producing any kind of plastic waste for a whole day and you'll get a feel for how big a job we have ahead of us -- and my personal efforts feel about as effective as an amoeba trying to stop a bulldozer.
And that leads into the second idea. In my work I tend to get de-motivated if I'm always going it alone - I always get more done when working as part of a team. In the context of this sustainability thing I haven't yet found anybody local to "team up" with and that's making it hard to sustain my own momentum.
Thursday, 24 May 2007
Which way to bet
Pulling back my vision to around 2037 or so, if the modern world hasn't crashed by then and I'm still alive, I'll probably need to have some decent savings behind me to help sustain Michelle and I through our later years. That's the conventional economic wisdom which leads to superannuation and other financial investment schemes.
On the other hand, the combined pressures of climate change, peak oil, peak soil, overpopulation and so on could conceivably bring the global economy to its knees and effectively wipe out any such investment. It could be argued that it would be far wiser to invest in a parcel of productive land and work to establish sustainable food, shelter and energy resources there.
Of course it's not a black and white decision - there's a whole world of choices in between the two extremes.
So what do you think? What would be the smartest things to invest in today? Perhaps there's a sensible minimum level of both those kinds of "wealth" I should be aiming towards: part practical self-sustainability and part abstract financial portfolio.
Either way, success depends on factors well outside my personal control. I suspect I'm going to end up betting both ways.
On the other hand, the combined pressures of climate change, peak oil, peak soil, overpopulation and so on could conceivably bring the global economy to its knees and effectively wipe out any such investment. It could be argued that it would be far wiser to invest in a parcel of productive land and work to establish sustainable food, shelter and energy resources there.
Of course it's not a black and white decision - there's a whole world of choices in between the two extremes.
So what do you think? What would be the smartest things to invest in today? Perhaps there's a sensible minimum level of both those kinds of "wealth" I should be aiming towards: part practical self-sustainability and part abstract financial portfolio.
Either way, success depends on factors well outside my personal control. I suspect I'm going to end up betting both ways.
Wednesday, 16 May 2007
Withdrawal symptoms and other downers
Today was the first day of my self-imposed Level 1 Ice Break Restrictions and it wasn't my best day ever.
I've been restless and lethargic. How's that even possible? A bit moody and glum. Didn't have much patience for the kids' stuffing around this evening. And most telling: working hard to come up with something to write here.
Not that I can blame it all on Ice Break withdrawals. My energy saving measures aren't having as much impact as I'd like and I'm a bit overwhelmed by how much time and effort it's likely to take to establish a productive and sustainable vegetable garden here at home.
So much to do. Looking forward to the Sustainable Living Fair in a couple of weeks. Should be some good inspiration to draw on there.
For now I'm going to curl up with a nice thick sustainable reusable low-energy sci-fi novel and pretend for a bit that it's the aliens which threaten our extinction rather than worrying about us taking care of that for ourselves.
I've been restless and lethargic. How's that even possible? A bit moody and glum. Didn't have much patience for the kids' stuffing around this evening. And most telling: working hard to come up with something to write here.
Not that I can blame it all on Ice Break withdrawals. My energy saving measures aren't having as much impact as I'd like and I'm a bit overwhelmed by how much time and effort it's likely to take to establish a productive and sustainable vegetable garden here at home.
So much to do. Looking forward to the Sustainable Living Fair in a couple of weeks. Should be some good inspiration to draw on there.
For now I'm going to curl up with a nice thick sustainable reusable low-energy sci-fi novel and pretend for a bit that it's the aliens which threaten our extinction rather than worrying about us taking care of that for ourselves.
Saturday, 5 May 2007
CF light bulb spookiness
Only days into the big switch from incandescent to compact fluorescent light bulbs, I've been forced to remove the bulb from the ceiling fixture in Joshua's room. He was seriously freaked out by it.
There is something very strange about the way the new bulbs are behaving here. At night, once your eyes have adjusted to the dark, all of the ceiling-mounted bulbs can be seen to give off small, regular pulses of light.
For a while I thought it might be due to some kind of energy build-up due to radio waves (we have a huge AM radio tower just down the road) but bulbs that aren't in the sockets don't flash. I suspected the ceiling fans could have been causing some kind of interference but it happens even when all the fans are off.
Joshua noticed it on Thursday night and it terrified him. Since I don't know what causes it or how to stop it, I had no choice but to remove the bulb.
Weird.
There is something very strange about the way the new bulbs are behaving here. At night, once your eyes have adjusted to the dark, all of the ceiling-mounted bulbs can be seen to give off small, regular pulses of light.
For a while I thought it might be due to some kind of energy build-up due to radio waves (we have a huge AM radio tower just down the road) but bulbs that aren't in the sockets don't flash. I suspected the ceiling fans could have been causing some kind of interference but it happens even when all the fans are off.
Joshua noticed it on Thursday night and it terrified him. Since I don't know what causes it or how to stop it, I had no choice but to remove the bulb.
Weird.
Wednesday, 2 May 2007
Leaky loo
Recently our toilet started leaking. Not in an icky way, just that there was a tiny flow of water coming from the cistern into the pan. At night time you'd hear a slow dripping sound. The kind that drives environmentalists totally crazy. Gotta stop the leak.
The guy at Bunnings muttered something obscene and said it'd probably be the seating washer. Eventually figured out which type of washer to buy and dived right in (so to speak) to the task of fixing it.
Good news: I replaced the seating washer and didn't break anything.
Bad news: it didn't fix the leak.
Oh, turns out the Bunnings guy wasn't swearing: there is actually a part of a toilet called the "ballcock" and it has washers that wear out too. No way to tell if my Caroma is a pre-2000 or post-2000 model so I bought both sizes figuring I can return one of them later.
Poking about in the cistern again for a bit. Can't for the life of me figure out how to get at the suspect components. Afraid to pull or twist too hard in case I break something and cause a real problem. Make sure there are no kids around, close my eyes and hit return on a Google search for "ballcock washer". Nothing offensive, but nothing helpful either.
If anybody knows how to get inside one of these things without breaking it, please let me know.
The guy at Bunnings muttered something obscene and said it'd probably be the seating washer. Eventually figured out which type of washer to buy and dived right in (so to speak) to the task of fixing it.
Good news: I replaced the seating washer and didn't break anything.
Bad news: it didn't fix the leak.
Oh, turns out the Bunnings guy wasn't swearing: there is actually a part of a toilet called the "ballcock" and it has washers that wear out too. No way to tell if my Caroma is a pre-2000 or post-2000 model so I bought both sizes figuring I can return one of them later.Poking about in the cistern again for a bit. Can't for the life of me figure out how to get at the suspect components. Afraid to pull or twist too hard in case I break something and cause a real problem. Make sure there are no kids around, close my eyes and hit return on a Google search for "ballcock washer". Nothing offensive, but nothing helpful either.
If anybody knows how to get inside one of these things without breaking it, please let me know.
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