3 weeks of kms Monitoring

Week 1 - 186
Week 2 - 330
Week 3 - 255
Average - 257

Still a lot lower than we did when we lived in Beeliar!

186...

... the number of kms we did last week. Significantly less than the 900 or so we used to do when we lived in Beeliar, owned 2 cars and Ainslie drove to work!

I will maintain a weekly log of kms over the next month and use the average to r-calculate our carbon footprint.

Sewing the Seeds...

We planted our first crops today. Beans, Brocoli, lettuce, tomatoes, silverbeet, chard and heaps of other stuff I can't remember.
We also planted out our aquaponics grow bed so we'll be able to see a clear comparison, assuming the aquaponics system is cycling.
Will post photo's soon.

Aquaponics

Been a while, but I just wanted to mention that we have got some new 'pets'for our aquaponics project. We took delivery of 25 trout which are settling into our 1000 litre tank quite nicely.They are fingerlings, which means that they are about a finger long. I think we've done ok because these guys are pretty big for a finger!

The down side is that they are sharing our tank with about 30 silver perch which are significantly smaller. A good size snack for the trout.

Which gets me thinking; I better not use the term 'pet', the next thing I'll know is the kids will want to name them. I'm thinking "Breakfast", "lunch", ...

Downshifting...

Ainslie and I have now become downshifters. Well kind of. It hasn't been entirely voluntary. Let's just say that when the bottom fell out of the sub-prime market in early 2008 we were perfectly aligned to feel the full force of it.
Anyway, that doesn't really matter because we are embracing the whole downshifting concept with relish!
We have now moved into a rental property which is perfect for allowing us to grow a significant amount of our own produce. It already has mature orange, grapefruit, mandarin and plum trees and there is plenty of room for us to set up our chook house.
The location is great - we are walking distance to a railway station, very close to our very favourite daycare centre, Como Children, and the local school is excellent.
It has allowed us to sell one of our cars which will significantly improve on our carbon footprint figure.
And finally, I've been offered a place at Curtin Uni to do a Ph.D!

Check out our lovely oranges!

Work is now underway...

25.16 tonnes of carbon/year

So how do we get this down and,
what figure would be a reasonable figure to aim for?

I would love to say "zero" as being the target for our emmissions but unless we consider becoming totally self-sufficient like these 2 characters, then it's just not realistic. And even they couldn't do it - they were still tied to the National Grid and used petrol driven farm equipment to boot!

I'm going to leave the final figure to aim for at present and look at the question of how to improve on our current situation. The breakdown of our figure is as follows:-

Waste - 3.3 tonnes
Travel - 11.76 tonnes
Energy Use - 6.95 tonnes
Food - 3.15 tonnes

I will look at these items individually in the next few posts...

So... Which Calculator?

Right, so I have 4 different figures for the amount of carbon we, as a family, produce.
The Climate Friendly calculator did not include for waste production and type of diet so it was always going to come up shorter than the rest. There was really nothing to choose from with the other three. They all used the same or similar variables as the base for their calculations and came up with different figures but as the carbon offset industry is unregulated this isn't really a surprise.
So, I'm going to use the carbon neutral calculator because it was nice and simple to use, and it had the added feature of including public transport as a factor, which will become a feature in our carbon footprint in the next few months. The site also provides a figure of 28 tonnes as being the average amount of carbon produced by a single Australian in a year.

Carbon Offset Companies (cont.)

To their credit, the Southern Metropolitan Regional Council came back to me after I emailed them that their website was broke!

They suggested using the Carbon Neutral Calculator which returned

25.16 tonnes of carbon

based on emisions from waste, cars, energy, air travel and food.

Carbon Offset Companies

I'm using the top 5 carbon-offset Companies as listed in "G Magazine" to establish what my family's emissions are;

CLIMATE FRIENDLY

18.2 tonnes of carbon based on the use of cars, flights and power consumed at home.

CLEANER CLIMATE
A struggle to find the carbon calculator and then, after some redirections, I couldn't get it to work on my computer.... hmm

CLIMATE POSITIVE

24.72 tonnes of carbon. More complicated calculator basing it's figure on location, number of occupants, power consumption, amount of waste produced, car travel, food and flights

SOUTHERN METROPOLITAN REGIONAL COUNCIL
Link to carbon calculator did not work!

CARBON REDUCTION INSTITUTE

26.5 tonnes of carbon based on all travel, car useage, waste and power consumption. Power calculated on amount of energy used (both gas and electricity).

"Climate Code Red" David Spratt & Philip Sutton

Frightening!!!
You need to read it now... went to a talk by the author, David Spratt

A real wake up call!
I've only read 20 or so pages and I can't put it down...

Twitter

Getting side tracked by twitter.... neglecting my blog.
Recognition is the first step in putting things to right!

A Worm Farm for Como Children

Having got involved with the Daycare Centre that looks after my daughter, Cate, I offered to help them with some environmental projects, the first being a worm farm.

ok, ok, it's a bit rough around the edges but it's a start!

Looking to make some progress with it this week if Joe, the owners' partner is around to assist.

Will keep you posted!

The Green Debate cont...

.... Had a quick chat with Stephan and Alan after the "debate". I was disappointed in the numbers that attended and also in the feeling I get living in Australia, that is, that public awareness and active participation in environmental issues is pretty non-existent. The Aussie phrase, "she'll be right" springs to mind.
It was heartening to hear that Stephan thought that Australia was better informed than most places he had visited and the subject was clearly important to a lot of people.
The flip side could be equally dis-heartening, that the rest of the world is so out of touch....!

"The Green Debate"

Went to the WA Writers Festival yesterday, at the UWA campus to see the Green Debate.
Disappointing. Only because time ran out and the actual debate never took place. There was only time for 3 or maybe 4 questions from the floor I think.

What was interesting was to hear 3 opinions from specialists in the field.

So, in a nushell:

Stephan Faris
Reminded us of the huge gap between those who have and those who have not and how a solution that satisfies both is needed. He described an instance in Mozambique where a plantation of trees created for carbon sequestration had been burnt to the ground by farmers to make way for crops to feed the local community.

Clive Hamilton
Told us about how those scientists who are in the know about the future of our planet are wandering around in a constant state of terror over what's to come. He put across (very well) how we've been let down by a government that has renaged on promises made pre-election (what a surprise!) and described eloquently how Rudd has missed the point entirely. It's not about finding a compromise between science and the fossil fuel lobbyists. Science is science. It is a base of knowledge that is as close to fact as we can possibly get in terms of modelling the effect of climate change. It needs to be addressed by strong policies, there is no satisfactory middle ground!

Alan Weisman
whose latest book is the World without Us, in which he says that it will take 100,000 years for the Earth to recover from the damage we have done. His view seemed to be that we will make some miracle scientific or technical breakthrough that will save the day.... because that's what has always happened in the past. Not really sure what else he had to say other than pick up on points made by the rest of the panel....

Worm Farms

What a great way to contribute towards reducing carbon emissions....

- Feed organic waste to your worms (instead of contributing to land fill where it would generate nasty methane!)
- Have the worms produce a great compost for the garden
- There's also something called worm "juice" or "tea" which is a fantastic fertiliser
- and the whole thing can be contained in a box not much bigger than a shoe box.

It's only a small contribution but the kids love it and can learn a lot from it!

Carbon Emmissions from Driving...

Today has been a great day! We've managed to get rid of the Kia Grand Carnival "Bus" and will be replacing it with something(s) more practical....

The Kia did have its uses but I always hated the idea of having a people mover but there were bona fide reasons for the original purchase. Thankfully these reasons no longer apply.

Now if I'm going to Walk the Talk so to speak, as a "Greenie", having a 3800 c.c. V6 powered "bus" was never going to be a good look!
So, we are now going to be the proud keepers of;

• a VW Polo 1.4i, and
• an Alfa Romeo 156 Wagon

The combined capacity of these 2 vehicles is still 400 c.c. less than the SUV so it is certainly a step in the right direction.
The idea is that Ains will use the Polo for everyday commuting and I will drop of the kids at daycare with the Alfa and hopefully, use my bicycle as my main form of transport to and from University....

What I'd really like to know is how much this will ACTUALLY reduce our cabon footprint by. I know there are websites around that give figures but these tend to be for new cars - not the likes of these that are fast approaching 10 years old. I'll come back to this blog when I have researched this a bit further.....

In the meantime, thanks to "Granny" Choate for funding our transport in these, our desperate times!

Setting New Goals

Over dinner with my lovely wife, celebrating my birthday on Saturday night, I was challenged to set myself five goals to be reached by my 45th Birthday. So here they are:-

1. Become a regular contributor to a publication, for example G Magazine with knowledge and advice on green issues;
2. Start a blog and get familiar with the latest social networking systems available on the internet;
3. Take the family away for a break for a week;
4. Can't remember the fourth one!
5. This one was a fitness related goal which I may change...
   

Now I know these aren't S.M.A.R.T. goals but please, let's just take this one step at a time!

A Fresh Start

Just set up my "blog" on the Blogger web site. Have barely even looked at a blog before now! Not sure how this is going to go but I do feel compelled to keep a record of my progress towards gaining ( I hope) a PH.D....

The focus will be on Environmentally Sustainable Design, which is such a broad subject I don't even know where to begin!

The most exciting part I think is that it feels good. Really good. I've been disillusioned with architecture for far too long now and I know I have to take this opportunity (yes, being made redundant is an opportunity!) to really get my juices flowing again.

I know I'll keep saying this over the next few weeks, months, years but I need to make sure Ainslie, my wife and bread winner knows how grateful I am for this opportunity.

Hopefully, over the next few days I can start the process of organising my thoughts and planning my time efficiently. I'll be back soon......