Change the World Wednesday – 30th Apr

Vegan cheese – image: Bunny Kitchen

So, my secret is out. I can eat vegan… Like I said, I do from time to time, it’s just not planned, and it’s more likely to be vegetarian.

I was pleased to hear from die-hard vegans that the vegan cheese link I posted was good, or at least worth trying.

Because you are such nice people, I’ll share another link with you.

I guess old hands will now about this stuff already, but it may be new for some.

Cashew Cream, can be used as a dairy substitute in many dishes and recipes.

The comments have many useful links for the veganish.

Clorinha waiting for new sand in her box

I just had a Kit Kat and coffee break.

The coffee is real enough, but the Kit Kat, Clorinha, needed new sand in her box.

Last week’s CTWW was about bees, and one of the challenges was about making flowers available.

Well, good news for the bees, my main chili pepper bush has produced a new crop and is flowering again. It is dotted with lots of little white flowers.

Lots of Red Hot Chili Peppers

Lots of little white flowers

So, my bees are happy. They’ll be even happier when the passion fruit vines start flowering.

Before we get on to CTWW for this week, São Paulo’s reservoir levels have dropped to 11.3% of capacity; down from last week’s 11.9%.

Click the banner for the full post

This week’s CTWW is about circling.

Circling is something I have never considered, and something I never do.

In my day when I drove, it wasn’t necessary. Apparently this is another sign that I am no spring chicken any more.

Do you circle? To find the answer you’ll have to visit the full post over at Reduce Footprints because I am not reposting that bit of the challenge today.

OR … If you don’t drive, or want more of a challenge, please focus on other ways to reduce petroleum use. Here are some suggestions:

• Buy local products (they don’t travel as far to get to your market).
• Go “Scent Free” or use essential oils (95% of the chemicals in most perfumes and scents are derived from petrochemicals).
• STOP using plastic bags!
• Air dry your clothing (saves energy which means reduced oil consumption).
• Choose natural, Eco-friendly cosmetics (most lipstick and glosses are made with petroleum products).
• Switch to soy-based printing inks (most inks on the shelf contain petroleum products).
• Say “NO” to nylon and polyester (both petroleum based).
• Avoid aspirin which contains … yep … petroleum.
• Avoid hair color and opt for a natural dye like henna … or just go natural!
• Grow and/or buy organic foods (fertilisers and pesticides contain petroleum).

Well, that’s quite a list. Let’s see how I measure up:

I live in an urban area, there are really no products that are local. Oh, and the bad news; the new sacolão that opened in our area has closed already, apparently the wife had to be hospitalised and the other family members found it a drag to continue. Even the owner of the building doesn’t know for certain if the closure is permanent or not.

Scent free, well, I’ve covered that with my orange and vinegar pots and spray, works just fine.

Stop plastic bags is a drag here. Generally I get paper bags from the supermarket, or shopping locally I use my carry bag.

Air drying… All my drying is on the clothes line, I don’t have a clothes drier and consider them totally unnecessary and a waste of resources in the manufacture.

I don’t use lipstick or glosses… I don’t like women who do. I am a member of the ‘ban cosmetics brigade’.

I didn’t know that soya inks existed. I have a friend who works in a place where they recharge printer cartridges, I’ll talk to him about it, maybe they don’t know either.

I don’t wear nylons, for the same reason I don’t use lipstick… I don’t like polyester clothes, I don’t like the feel of the material, and in the summer here it doesn’t absorb sweat.

I don’t have Aspirin, but I do use Paracetamol on the odd occasion I need it; I’ll have to look into whether it has the same petroleum type base.

Hair colour is not a problem for me… No hair! What I have left goes natural. Once again, I consider hair colour in the same light as I consider cosmetics; a total waste and the epitome of vainty.

My fertiliser comes from my compost heap, and I don’t use pesticides in the garden. I do have fly spray in the house for mosquitoes (remember the dengue fever issue from last week’s post.

You can get dengue once and you are very sick for about eight days, if you get it again you can die.

I have already used my ‘get out of jail free’ card.

Okay, so I don’t measure up too badly. But, I am always on the look out to improve what I already do.

 

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Simple Green Ideas

These one’s are simple ideas, but could be a bit of work.

Got one of these in the backyard?

 

But a really big one…

Try this:

A tree pavillion

Or, if it’s a smaller one:

Bird bath and garden

Or, if it’s already horizontal:

Garden seat

Or, just hollow it out a bit:

Planter

Or, just leave it for the kids to use their imaginations:

Kids love old stumps

If it’s really, really big:

Make a sandbox for them

Or with a bit more work, it could be lined and become a garden pond.

Or, make a decorative table, or one for the BBQ.

A tree stump table

Or, you could leave it to the bees, or make something more substantial for them.

Or, you could just dig it out and miss a wonderful opportunity…

Monday Moaning

We have become too bloody lazy!

Yes, laziness has become epidemic.

The vast majority of people just couldn’t get off their fat acre to save themselves.

Gadgets, are the bane of modern living and our lives are full of them, a great number of them totally useless, unneeded and a waste of the earth’s precious resources in the making.

Look at this…

Pathetic!

What ever happened to lift, tip and pour?

“Oh, but that requires energy.”

It’s bad enough that you buy processed juice at the supermarket, but to stoop to this level is beyond comprehension.

Why not BUY oranges and get fresh juice?

“But I do! I have one of these.”

Another bloody gadget!

Whatever happened to these?

It’s bad enough that it’s made from plastic, but it’s far more ecologically correct than any motorised gadget.

We go further into this laziness thing.

Celery

Here’s an example.

You buy your celery at the supermarket, and usually a bunch of celery is far more than you want; so some, if not most, finishes up in the trash or compost.

Celery off-cut

Celery, like many vegetables can be grown easily from off-cuts, no need for a garden or seeds or even getting your hands dirty.

Next time you buy celery, could be the last time you’ll ever need to do that again.

Trimming your celery, you have the root end as an off-cut.

Stand it up in a saucer of water, and watch what happens. Once you have green shoots growing from the centre, put it in a planter with potting mix or home compost so that just the green is above dirt level.

You want to see the results? Visit 17 Apart

Next time you need one stick of celery, just break one off, no need to buy a whole bunch.

Maybe you didn’t know you could do this. That’s because supermarkets have made you lazy! They’re just too damned convenient.

What could be more convenient than having your celery or other herbs on the kitchen window sill at your beck and call?

We have got ourselves into a rut, and we can’t see how to get ourselves out.

But we can, we just have to turn the clock back, back to grandma’s day.

Because, if we don’t, we are doomed to be getting fatter, lazier and more reliant on resource wasting gadgets.

*Jumps down off soap box*

 

Nature Ramble

Nature Ramble isn’t always about animals and birds, discoveries or threatened with extinction. It can also be about habitats, often these habitats are generally unknown by the majority, or are themselves under threat. Such is the case today.

One thinks of Spain, great wines, Basques and Catalonians vying for independence, failing economics and great beaches. But you rarely hear about the nature in Spain like you do about Africa or the Amazon.

Spain’s wetlands wonder is under threat for a second time in 16 years

Doñana national park, a haven filled with rare birds and wildlife, survived a toxic flood. Now tourism, an oil pipeline, demand for water and the return of mining have left it on a knife edge

Evening in Donana national park. Huelva province, Andalucia. Photograph: Alamy

The view from the visitors’ centre at the southern edge of Doñana national park is striking, to say the least. From its plate-glass windows, you gaze – over a small lake ringed with bulrushes – at a group of tamarisk bushes covered with squawking, screeching birdlife. Cattle egrets, night herons, purple herons and glossy ibis have made their homes here, while in the foreground flamingos and spoonbills wade gracefully through the shallow, reed-filled water.

This an ornithologist’s dream: 200,000 hectares of salt marsh of unrivalled importance to the birdlife of western Europe. Dozens of Britain’s most loved migratory birds, including house martins, swallows, cuckoos and warblers, find precious rest here on their annual migrations from Africa.For good measure, Doñana, a UN World Heritage Site, is home to some of Europe’s rarest birds, including the Spanish imperial eagle, while its mammalian inhabitants include the highly endangered Iberian lynx.

It is a glorious, vibrant landscape. Yet it exists on a knife-edge, a point brought home dramatically 16 years ago last week when almost two billion gallons of contaminated, highly acidic water, mixed with arsenic, cadmium and other waste metals, surged into the park from a dam that had burst its bank at Los Frailes mine 45km to the north, near the little town of Aznalcóllar. A toxic tsunami of mine tailings poured down the Guadiamar river and over its banks, leaving a thick crust of metallic crud over a vast stretch of parkland.

More than 25,000 kilos of dead fish were collected in the aftermath and nearly 2,000 adult birds, chicks, eggs and nests killed or destroyed. Even worse, the contamination persisted and many birds gave birth to deformed or dead chicks for several years.

It was Spain’s worst environmental disaster and the clean-up cost €90m (£74m). Suddenly aware of Doñana’s status as the nation’s most important natural site, Spain decided to spend a further €360m, some of it EU money, on restoring the landscape which, in the 1950s and 60s, had been drained in places to create rice and cotton fields. Some of this farmland is now being returned to its original wetland state.

It has been a costly but encouraging process. Yet the fate of Doñana still hangs in the balance thanks to the increasing pressures of modern life. An example is provided by local farms which, in a bid to provide western Europe with out-of-season fruit, have laid out endless ribbons of plastic arches in which they grow strawberries all year round. Strawberries drink a lot, however, and that has led farmers to pump up ground water – in many cases, illegally – and so lower the park’s critically important water table.

In addition, plans have been outlined to build an oil pipeline through Doñana, while other developers have announced proposals to expand local tourist resorts whose new hotels and golf courses would demand water supplies that would further erode the local table. Silt washed from nearby farms is also choking the channels that crisscross Doñana. The wetlands of Doñana are under threat of a death by drought.

However, the real body blow for conservationists has been the recent decision of the Andalucían government to reopen the Frailes mine which so very nearly destroyed Doñana in 1998. “This is Europe’s most precious bird sanctuary, both in terms of indigenous species and also as a resting place for birds that migrate between Africa and Britain and other parts of north-west Europe,” says Laurence Rose, of the RSPB. “Doñana already faces a great number of threats, but now they want to bring back the very cause of its near-undoing 16 years ago. It is extremely worrying.”

Having spent so much restoring Doñana to its past glories, it might seem strange that the local government should choose to announce that it wants mining companies to tender bids to rework Los Frailes. However, a brief examination of the state of the local economy provides an explanation. The crash of Spain’s banks five years ago hit the region catastrophically and unemployment in some parts of Andalucía is now more then 30%. Reopening the mine would provide more than 1,000 precious jobs.

Read more

Satireday on Eco-Crap

Make you Fink on Friday

Is this a wake up call?

 

Balcombe’s close encounter with fracking has a silver lining

Being the village at the centre of a national debate on energy production has made us think about our own responsibility

An anti-fracking sign in a window at Balcombe, West Sussex. Photograph: Graham Turner for the Guardian

Last summer the village of Balcombe inadvertently became the byword for something none of us would have chosen: public hostility to fracking.

A recent parliamentary briefing on public attitudes towards shale gas talks about “before Balcombe” and “after Balcombe”, as if our village was an event, not a place. Since then, our community has served as a lightning conductor for anti-anti-fracking flak put out by shale gas cheerleaders in government and the onshore oil and gas exploration industry. We have been accused of being irresponsible, unpatriotic, selfish and called Nimbys.

We didn’t ask for any of this. The threat of fracking took us by surprise, and so did our sudden celebrity as the poster child of the anti-fracking movement. This whole experience has been one of finding ourselves at the centre of events that are completely outside of our control. It has been a bewildering and divisive time that has opened up deep rifts in our once harmonious community.

Caroline Lucas’ arrest for her protest in Balcombe last summer – charges for which she was today acquitted – epitomised the polarisation of local opinion on this issue, with some villagers as alienated by the tactics used by protesters as others had been by the fracking plans.

But Balcombe’s close encounter with energy production has had one crucial silver lining. It has forced us to engage with energy issues to an unprecedented degree – making us think about the energy we use, where it comes from, the politics of energy provision in the UK, the pros and cons of different generation technologies and more.

This collective awakening has started us on a journey we might never have considered if fracking had never been on the cards – a journey towards a 100% renewably powered future. Our ticket to that future is a new community power company called REPOWERBalcombe. Its mission is to match our village’s domestic electricity consumption kilowatt for kilowatt with community-owned, locally generated renewable energy – and to re-unite our community behind this ambitious goal.

We’re not Nimbys. We recognise that we all need energy and that that energy has to come from somewhere, and we want to play our part in ensuring Britain’s energy security too. But we want the right to choose how we meet that challenge, and community-scale renewable technology gives us the chance to make that choice for ourselves.

Through REPOWERBalcombe, our community is choosing solar power and demand reduction to meet our energy needs. Our mission is all about taking responsibility for our energy supply, but in a way doesn’t harm the prospects of future generations or damage quality of life for our community.

We know there’s an energy crisis coming, and we’re trying to do something about it. But fossil fuels are so last century. The future of energy is renewable, and the patriots of REPOWERBalcombe believe that Britain should be leading the world in the switch away from fossil fuels – not giving out mixed messages and dragging its feet.

Something very strange is happening when on the one hand ministers single out onshore wind turbines and solar farms for attack because they are so “unpopular”, while on the other hand they go “all-out for shale gas” – when polling consistently shows the unpopularity of shale gas.

Repowering Balcombe is as much about self-determination, choice and community power as it is about generating electricity. This is a newly possible model of energy provision that is being done by us and for us – instead of being done to us. If a group of local volunteer residents can do this for our village in our spare time, imagine what whole towns and cities could do to repower themselves if they try.

Opinion:

Yes, this is a wake up call. We need to wake up and face our responsibilities as a community. If we want power, then we have to make it.

We have become too reliant on the big companies and their ruthless practices. We have to empower ourselves, take back our control and send these bastards packing.

Yes, I see this as a wake up call. If a small place like Balcombe can do it, so can the rest of us.

Another warning

Casanare drought raises Colombia climate fears

Colombian cattleman Daniel Cuadra: “I don’t know what the future holds, but we need to prepare ourselves because next year could be worse.”

The rotting corpses of dead cows and wild capybaras line the road that leads from Paz de Ariporo to Hato Las Taparas in the Colombian province of Casanare.

At least 20,000 animals, including wild pigs, deer, small crocodiles and tortoises have died of thirst during a catastrophic dry season in this central region.

And many fear this year’s drought is only heralding a future of increasingly harsh summers and even more severe water shortages in Colombia’s plains.

Dry as bone

“Here we have two very distinct seasons: a dry season and a rainy season,” explains Angely Rodriguez who overseas agricultural and environmental affairs in Paz de Ariporo.

“In a couple of months, it will be raining so much, all this will be like a mirror, completely flooded.”

But that will be of little consolation to farmers whose livestock has been decimated.

Ms Rodriguez says dry spells – which usually last from December to April – are nothing new for the inhabitants of Casanare, but “never before during the dry season did we have such a lack of water”.

As we drive across the yellow plains, all we seem to come across are tanker lorries.

Some are carrying water to replenish ponds, marshes and other natural drinking sources as part of efforts by the authorities to alleviate the suffering of wildlife and cattle.

Water is being delivered to some of the worst hit areas to replenish ponds, but many of the lorries carry oil

But the large majority carry oil extracted from under the soil of these plains.

Ms Rodriguez thinks the recent boom in oil exploration and extraction in the area is to blame for the water scarcity in the summer months. “We’ve seen water sources that used to last all summer run completely dry,” she tells the BBC.

“We’re aware global climate change is part of the problem. But we also need to look into the consequences of seismic exploration and how much water the oil industry is extracting,” she says, as we drive past a flock of vultures feasting on another dead cow.

‘Too simplistic’

Like Ms Rodriguez, many worry about the consequences of seismic reflection – an exploration method that uses small controlled explosions to create an image similar to a sonogram to help locate new oil deposits.

Many in Colombia fear that this method affects water sources, and dismiss oil industry studies which suggest the contrary.

Read more

Change the World Wednesday – 23rd Apr

Update

A month ago in my Monday Moaning I wrote of the plight of São Paulo, Brazil’s biggest city.

They didn’t have water. The reservoirs that supply the city were down around the 30% mark.

Jaguari Dam – Responsible for 45% of Saõ Paulo’s water – image: Diario Central

A month later and the plight has become critical, the reservoirs have fallen to 11.9% of their capacity (last night’s news).

Now literally, they don’t have water.

The water company is pleading with people to save water, substantial discounts are being offered to those who reduce their usage by 20% from their previous average, those who use more than their previous average will be fined heavily.

Don’t say, “But that can’t happen here!” Because it is happening! NOW!

In some areas of the world the water situation has become serious, it’s up to you to see it doesn’t get worse.

Back to our regular programme…

The problem with rabbit food is that one good fart and I’m hungry again

The BIG question!

Did I go vegan for a day? The answer is no… I did two days. Nothing fancy, just simple salads and a home made garlic and herb vinaigrette.

I did it this time just to show you I could, normally I don’t plan them, they just happen, and normally they are more vegetarian than vegan; I do like eggs and cheese with my salad.

In my perambulations for last week’s post, I did fine this. Grateable and meltable vegan cheese on Bunny Kitchen. Just thought I’d say.

Without this fellow and his ilk, there wouldn’t be life on the planet

 Bees…

Yes, this week’s CTWW is about bees.

Click the banner for the full post

We’ve all heard that Bee populations are declining. Since bees pollinate the majority of our food crops, worldwide, their decline is a cause for great concern. Why are they in trouble? Research points to GMO agriculture and the use of pesticides. It’s time to take action! Here’s your challenge …

This week, take action to protect honey bees. Please choose at least one action from the following list:

• Plant at least one native, flowering plant in your yard. Avoid hybrid plants … they don’t produce enough nectar or pollen and are useless to bees and other pollinators.
• Plant a vegetable garden.
• Let pests live (natural pest controllers, like Lady Bugs, need them for food).
• Keep your lawn and garden pesticide-free.
• Eliminate chemicals in your home.
• Provide a year-round, clean source of water for bees (rainwater collection, a small garden water feature, bird bath, etc.).
• Leave some dead trees or plants in your yard … bees will nest in them. Or, place a bee house in your garden.
• Buy organic food.
• Take up beekeeping.

Well, let’s see how I stack up with that lot.

Attracts big black bees in the late afternoon. Honey bees are too small to pollinate these

My most prolific flower is the passion fruit; I currently have three that I am training along the house, fence and garage, and more in the plantling stage, three in the ground and about twenty saplings in a planter as standbys.

I have a few tomatoes and garlic around, mainly I have herbs and fruit.

The gulf fritillery caterpillars must be destroyed, or they eat the passion fruit vines to death. Other than that, insects are free to roam.

My lawn is pesticide free, in fact, my lawn is lawn free… I don’t have one.

We talked about harmful chemicals a couple of weeks ago. I am experimenting with orange and vinegar air freshener so that I have one less chemical.

Aedes aegypti plays Dengue once you’re sick, dengue twice you’re dead

Now the water feature here is a no – no.

Standing water is used by the Aedes aegypti mosquito to produce larvae, Aedes aegypti is the source of dengue fever, which is deadly, and seriously prolific here in many city areas.

Yes, lots of dead material around here, but not enough for natural beehives.

Buy organic, when I can.

Oh, the neighbours would be up in arms if I did that. My area is urban, the houses very close together. The authorities would pounce with a heavy pounce.

Well, there’s my summary.

Simple Green Ideas

This is so simple, and I have done this…

Need a new coffee table?

Got an old window lying around from house renovations?

Got some old bricks< glass would be classy?

NB: Lost the credit for this, if it’s yours, let me know and I’ll add it.

Monday Moaning

The world is head over heels in love with bio-fuels and fracking. The latter fraught with problems over excessive water use, pollutant chemicals, earthquakes. The former with diverting staple foods to energy.

Now a US government report tells us that bio-fuels may not be all they’re cracked up to be…

Corn biofuels worse than gasoline on global warming in short term – study

• $500,000 study paid for by federal government
• Conclusion: 7% more greenhouse gases in early years

Biofuels made from corn residue have attracted more than $1bn in federal support. Photograph: Marvin Dembinsky Photo Associate/Alamy

Biofuels made from the leftovers of harvested corn plants are worse than gasoline for global warming in the short term, a new study shows, challenging the Obama administration’s conclusions that they are a much cleaner oil alternative and will help combat climate change.

A $500,000 study – paid for by the federal government and released Sunday in the peer-reviewed journal Nature Climate Change – concludes that biofuels made with corn residue release 7% more greenhouse gases in the early years compared with conventional gasoline.

While biofuels are better in the long run, the study says they won’t meet a standard set in a 2007 energy law to qualify as renewable fuel.

The conclusions deal a blow to proponents of cellulosic biofuels, which have received more than a billion dollars in federal support but have struggled to meet volume targets mandated by law. About half of the initial market in cellulosics is expected to be derived from corn residue.

The biofuel industry and administration officials immediately criticised the research as flawed. They said it was too simplistic in its analysis of carbon loss from soil, which can vary over a single field, and vastly overestimated how much residue farmers actually would remove once the market gets underway.

Read more

Opinion:

Of course the biofuel industry would be squealing like stuck pigs over this report, because they’re about to be made into bacon.

The report shreds the advantage of biofuels in the short term.

It may mean that governments across the globe have to backpedal in their thinking.

But, of course, we know they won’t.