Books: Jared Diamond’s Collapse

I’ve had a few questions at talks I give about what books I’d recommend, and I’ve given out a few names depending on the topic. I realised though that I haven’t put anything about our growing library on the blog, so I’ll try and rectify that over the coming year (no promises!)

I thought I’d start with something scene-setting, rather than the slew of practical books that I usually recommend.

“Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive” takes a look at the collapse of historical civilisations, and then sets that in a modern context. Diamond looks at deforestation, overpopulation and pollution, and the inability of civilisations to live within the capacity of the land they actually live in, rather than the one they wish they inhabited. I thought it was quite well written, although it did need a bit of perseverance at the start. It cleverly took me from the position of smug modern human, mocking those foolish primitive islanders, through to foolish modern Australian, being paid to deforest the land.

It was not all doom and gloom though – there are some good examples of societies that have struck a balance and survived whilst neighbouring civilisations fell. Overall, it does a lot to highlight how precarious our “all-powerful” societies really are. Well worth a read.

Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair.

If you like the sound of it, pick it up at your local library or bookshop, but if you have to buy it online please follow this Amazon link – Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive and the Trafford Eco House will get some money from your purchase (it won’t cost you any more).

 

Our Carbon Footprint – June

Now we’re into Summer, our Carbon Footprint results are well overdue:

Our Energy Consumption: 2559 kWh

Our Carbon Footprint: 648 kg of CO2

And, as we’re still with Good Energy, who only supply electricity from renewable sources,  we can remove electricity from our carbon footprint:

Our carbon footprint with 100% renewable electricity: 550 kg

So there we go – going down, albeit affected by the driving from our recent holiday. We need to work on getting the gas down further though.

 

Our Carbon Footprint – January

It’s been a while since I posted our Carbon Footprint results, and what better time to do so than just after such a brutally cold spell. This really highlights the difference between the light, warmer months and the dark cold winter.

Our Energy Consumption: 4478 kWh

That’s a major difference from our starting month (August) of 1396 kWh – and all the increase is due to gas used for heating.

Interestingly, there was not a significant change in electricity consumption, even though the aquaponics system is now running and we did use an electric heater in the polytunnel on several occasions.

Our Carbon Footprint: 994 kg of CO2

We just scraped in under 1 tonne, mainly thanks to an extremely low mileage this month (thanks to being snowbound mainly).

And, as we’re still with Good Energy, who only supply electricity from renewable sources,  we can remove electricity from our carbon footprint:

Our carbon footprint with 100% renewable electricity: 781 kg

So there we go – still going up rather than down! Very interesting going through our first winter in the house, let’s hope the consumption is down from here.

 

Our Carbon Footprint – September

Our second full month in the eco-house, the figures this month are affected by the 12-day holiday we took this month. It was a serious driving holiday – Trafford to Central Germany. We could have flown, but decided to take the “eco” option – we’ll have a look at how green that was later. This month saw the heating start to come on – albeit on a very occasional basis, and we’re using the lights a lot more in the evening.

Our Energy Consumption: 2718 kWh

That’s a pretty big number compared to last month’s 1396 kWh – and almost all the increase is due to the car:

That’s the difference you see when you drive 2154 miles instead of the 830 in August. Interestingly, there was not a large drop in electricity consumption, even though we were away for more than a third of the month.

Our Carbon Footprint: 722 kg of CO2

And, as we’re still with Good Energy, who only supply electricity from renewable sources,  we can remove electricity from our carbon footprint:

Our carbon footprint with 100% renewable electricity: 597 kg

So there we go – going up rather than down! Not a great start to the monitoring, but mostly due to the one-off impact of that 1800 mile across-Europe driving holiday. We’ll see how we go in October, now that the heating is on and the lighting is getting good use too.

 

Our Carbon Footprint – August

We’ve had our first full month in the Eco-House, so here’s our monthly report – our Carbon Footprint for August. We’ll be plotting these each month on a graph to see how we go. I’m anticipating that this’ll be one of our lowest months – the lights have hardly been on, and there’s been no heating used. It’ll be interestiung to see how we go through the winter, and then how next year’s figures compare.

Our Energy Consumption: 1396 kWh

As you can see, the majority of our energy came from using the car – 830 miles at an average 49.9 MPG . That’s significantly higer than previous months – not helped by a 300-mile round trip on the bank holiday weekend. Now lets convert this into our Carbon Emissions:

Our Carbon Footprint: 412kg of CO2

What’s interesting to see here is how the electricity we use has a much higher impact on our Carbon Footprint than it should for the energy we use. With that in mind we’ve changed electricity supplier to Good Energy. Good Energy only supply electricity from renewable sources, so we can remove electricity from our carbon footprint.

Our carbon footprint with 100% renewable electricity: 258 kg

So that’s a significant reduction – 37% off our carbon footprint in one go. If every month was the same as August we’d be on track for an annual carbon footprint of just over three tonnes. Not bad for the four of us. Unfortunately not every month will be like August – so we’ll see how we go!

Our initial target is to come in well under the nine tonnes of CO2 per adult that is the average Mark Lynas quotes in the Guardian. To make the comparison fair though we need to include a couple of other things on the graphs – water consumption and public transport use. I’ll try and get some of those on the September figures.

 

Getting an Allotment in Trafford

A very tricky topic this one – demand for allotments is up across the country, and Trafford is no exception. Unless you have a friend who is having trouble keeping up with their allotment, and who might want to share, then the only thing to do is to get your name down on a waiting list. These are held by allotment secretaries, volunteers all, who have the hard job of explaining that it might be 10 years before you grow your first carrot.

We’re on the list for the allotments at De Quincey Road, and there are only fourteen people ahead of us. However there are only nine allotments, so it could still be a awhile! It never hurts to ask though – you can find the list of Allotment Secretaries at the Trafford Council website, but be nice to them, they’re not paid to listen to people complaining about the waiting lists!

If that list is too long for you, there is an alternative, the LandShare website. Just put in your postcode and you’ll find people nearby with large gardens they want to share. It’s well worth a go.

But do make sure you get on the waiting list for an allotment – and then start asking your local councillor what the council is going to do to ensure there are enough to go around. You can find details of your local councillors here. And you can always raise it at your local Neighbourhood forum.

 

Monty Don aims to change the way we garden – and eat

Monty Don, gardener, journalist, author, ex-presenter of Gardener’s World and now President of the Soil Association is a convert to the Peak Oil cause and the Transition Movement.

Last November he wrote a great article for Gardener’s World magazine – you can find a copy over on Transition Culture - in it he talks about the invisible footprint we leave as gardeners, and stresses that we need to move to a much more local society.

This August, just as he starts his new post at the Soil Association, he gave a wonderful interview to The Guardian. In it he discusses creating an underground movement to spread the message that we need to be growing much more of our own food. He also wants to move the Soil Association into a more central role in ensuring the sustainability of Britain’s food supply.

I would much rather someone bought food that was local and sustainable but not organic than bought organic food that had to be shipped across the world. We’ve got to move away from making people feel lesser because they’re not [eating] organic. There is no doubt about it, ‘sustainable’ is a better expression for the same sorts of ideas than ‘organic’.

You can see this emphasis through the work the Soil Association is doing now – their latest taste of the good life courses talk about helping to “create a vibrant relocalised food culture” and leading ”a planet friendly lifestyle”.

Monty will be one to watch – let’s hope he manages to get his guerilla gardening movement going – we’ll all be better prepared if he does.

 

Is the end of cheap food a good thing?

Blimey, that’s a controversial thought!

Tuesday’s Sydney Morning Herald was trumpeting “the end of cheap food” with world prices rising, and Biofuel production eating into already failing croplands.

98% of me recoils against this idea, but there’s 2% of me that’s listening to WRAP‘s stats on the waste of food in the UK. You can check out the facts at the Love Food Hate Waste website :

• A third of food in the UK is wasted – just try it at home – bring three bags of shopping in , then take one straight out to the bin again – it’s a SCANDAL.
• That wasted food is the CO2 equivalent to taking 20% of the cars off the road – that’s right – 1 in 5 cars.
•  The figures are just ridiculous – 6.7 million tones of food every year, with an estimated cost of £8 billion per year.

So let’s just think about this. We put taxes on petrol to stop people driving, to save the planet. But the CO2 equivalent of 1-in-5 cars is WASTED by us all throwing food away.

So maybe more expensive food is a good thing – it’ll make us value it more, make more people grow their own, and reduce the waste that’s going on?

Of course, that’s in an ideal world . . . in reality, I’m sure that the most waste comes from the wealthiest households, those least affected by the price rises (and by the petrol taxes) so when is somebo0ody going to come up with a solution that is not weath based? That really is the question.

Anyway, while we’re all pondering the big questions of life . . . here are a couple of great links to help make a small difference on our own waste levels. Abby at the Daily Tiffin talking about planning and storage, and Aidan Brooks (an Apprentice Chef) with a whole heap of useful links.

And don’t forget – fill out your own Food Waste Diary to see if the problem begins at home! I’ll have a go with ours, and see how we go.