The more I read about sustainability, the more obvious it becomes that everything we need to know to avoid ecological disaster has been around since the 1970s. We may have wasting time and muddying the waters for thirty years, but those ideas are now coming into their own. That legacy of innovative thinking includes permaculture [...]
Archive | July, 2009
The Prix Pictet 2009
The Prix Pictet returns for its second year, offering a prize for photography on the subject of sustainability. Last year featured a stunning shortlist, and this one’s just as good. The theme this year is ‘earth’, following last year’s ‘water’. My own favourite is Sammy Baloji’s juxtapositions of historic photographs over the decaying industrial landscapes [...]
The Manchester Report
In the industrial age Manchester was a huge hub of innovation, with hundreds of patents filed. Inspired by this legacy of creative problem solving, the Manchester Report project invited a series of thinkers to present their most imaginative ideas for fighting climate change. The top twenty are all available to view on the Guardian [...]
Permaculture in the suburbs
I may have mentioned that Lou and I went to visit Mike Guerra’s permaculture garden a few weeks back. Lou interviewed Mike as part of a mini-series for the gardening programme on BBC Three Counties Radio, and then re-cut the audio for a short documentary about permaculture. You can listen to it on the Ecologist [...]
Move the Zero
Here’s an innovative idea for tackling world debt – since 90% of debt is imaginary money, spirited out of thin air by the banks, why don’t we ‘move the zero‘ on our debts and write off the made up bit? As you will know if you’ve been paying attention to the financial crisis, most of [...]
The Happy Planet Index 2.0
The new economics foundation has published a second edition of the ‘Happy Planet Index‘, its groundbreaking new measure of success. Rather than counting economic activity, as GDP does, the HPI measures the ‘ecological efficiency’ of an economy. The countries that do best are delivering long, happy and meaningful lives to its citizens, with a minimum [...]
Global rich list
Where are you on the global richlist? Click the banner to find out. HT – Breathe
speaking louder
I come across a lot of great images that capture something about sustainability, without an earth from space, a melting iceberg or a polar bear in sight. I thought I might see if I can post one every week. Herewith post number one of a saturday series. HT Reineke.
Where does all the world’s food go?
Another illustration from ActionAid’s ‘Let them eat promises‘ report, this one shows where the 08/09 harvest went. As you can see, less than half of the crops grown feed people directly. A large proportion goes to animals, which are then eaten in turn – a very inefficient way to feed ourselves. A growing percentage goes [...]
ReBurbia – re-imagining suburbia
Last night Transition St Albans hosted a screening of ‘The End of Suburbia’, a film exploring the unsustainability of suburban sprawl in an age of peak oil. The film mentions New Urbanism at the end, the revival of pre-automobile town planning, walkable cities and local high streets. With the suburbs on my mind, I was [...]
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