Archive for the ‘Models’ Category
Models refer to existing sustainable models or frameworks of action that are occurring in Melbourne. A model could possibly be applied elsewhere in a different context. For example, “permablitz” is a model of urban agriculture installation that many people are applying in different parts of Victoria. Sustainable Melbourne strongly encourages environmental organisations and institutions to post their own environmental initiatives (ie. “models”) on the site to share with others. To do so visit the “How to use this site” page and follow the prompts.
Green Your Laneway: City of Melbourne Guide
Posted in Models, Visions by Kate Archdeacon on September 14th, 2011
Source: City of Melbourne
Photo by Tokyo Green Space
Green Your Laneway
Do you live or work off a laneway? Are you interested in laneway greening? Anyone can improve their laneway for the benefit of everyone. Many people in the central city don’t have traditional gardens but that doesn’t mean you can’t have any plants. There are many opportunities to green your home or business; you just need to know where to start. Green Your Laneway is a guide to inform laneway communities on greening using planter boxes, wall creepers and green roofs and walls within their properties.
The article includes links and further information:
- What can I green?
- What can I plant in my laneway garden?
- includes a link to the CoM suggested list of species for use in Melbourne’s laneways
- Have you considered maintenance?
- Do I need permission for greening?
- Have you considered access and safety?
- Are you seeking funding? (!!!)
Check out the page on the CoM website for more information, and check out Tokyo Green Space for more inspiration.
Photo by Tokyo Green Space
Photo by Tokyo Green Space
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Toaster Rescue: Repair Workshops in Review
Posted in Models by Kate Archdeacon on August 15th, 2011
Source: InDesign Live
From “State of Good Repair” by Alice Blackwood :
There was a sense of excitement, and perhaps just a hint of exhaustion, at the launch and auctioning off of the many re-found and re-purposed treasures created during The Repair Workshops last week [end of July]. Held as part of the State of Design Festival, The Repair Workshops saw 3 tonnes of salvaged rubbish – bike frames, broken televisions, bed frames, soft toys, instruments and more – brought down into the long yellow-lit corridors of the basement at Donkey Wheel House. For 3 days (and probably nights!) a team of ingenious designers, artists, scientists and amazingly inventive creatives worked away, hobbling together everything from vegetable colanders to record player parts, fashioning real, live working objects: lights, talking television sets, motorbike helmet speaker systems, rejuvenated dining room chairs, cutlery sets… the list goes on. The auction event went off without a hitch, with enthusiastic participants vying for their own unique piece of trash-turned-treasure.
“We raised over $2,000 for Environment Victoria and saved hundreds of dollars in landfill fees for the Brotherhood and Vinnies,” reports Co-Organiser Leyla Acaroglu. Of the pieces hard won: “I bid fiercely for 2 restored chairs and I won! They are now sitting proudly at my dining table – a testament to repair and creativity!”
It was overall, a huge project, with the workshops opening to the public over the weekend just passed. “The response from the public was amazing!” says Leyla. “We had over 500 people come through and did over 75 repairs. “People would come in and tell us about their umbrella/hair straighter/ toaster/play station control/iPod/stereo, and how they didn’t want to have to throw it out.” In most cases they would leave with a fully repaired item. “Many people just came along to visit and asked if we would be there every week as they wanted to come back. In short, the project as both a new and educative venture was “a raving success”. “We engaged lots of people with repair and value in products and we saved lots of things from landfill.”
Check out all the photos online at The Repair Workshops blog and Facebook page.
Read the full article by Alice Blackwood on In Design Live
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Mineral Water in Eco-Kegs, Delivered by Bike
Posted in Models by Kate Archdeacon on August 11th, 2011
Source: Broadsheet
Image courtesy dhmsco
From “Kegs, Bikes and Bubbles: dhmsco’s Mineral Water Revolution” by Hilary McNevin:
We got to thinking about the environmental impact of buying imported mineral water in glass bottles and found a company with a bright idea and a three-wheeled bike. A keg of mineral water built into a Danish Christiania three-wheeler bike – it’s pimped, it’s got a brolly, it’s looking good and it’s coming to a market, café or restaurant near you.
The Daylesford and Hepburn Mineral Springs Company (dhmsco) have taken a simple and very logical idea and are literally taking it to the streets. Founders and directors of dhmsco, Mitch Watson and Brylie Rankine have been selling their mineral water, which is sourced from the Daylesford spring naturally carbonated, to their customers in customary bottles, but have now taken the next step of providing restaurants and cafes mineral water in recyclable eco-kegs.
[...]
The beauty of serving water through a reticulation system such as a keg is that, while cutting down packaging to a minimum, it also eases the costs and environmental impacts of travel and shipping. The water can be sold by the glass or bottle in the restaurant and the bottles Watson supplies to the restaurants are made in Spotswood, Melbourne, rather than being manufactured overseas and shipped to Australia.
The next step is to make more Melburnians aware of the quality of dhmsco’s mineral water and the notion of the mineral water keg, which is delivered on via the keg bike.
[...]
Restaurants in Melbourne to have dhmsco mineral water on tap so far include, Little Creatures, Dandelion, The Corner Shop and Ladro. Watson is also in the process of developing syrups to add to the water in classic flavours such as cucumber, hawthorn, elderflower, natural tonic and rosehip (he’s also working on a nettle syrup but acknowledges it’s not quite ready to go).
There is the opportunity to check out the dhmsco keg bike, taste the water and the syrups at the Melbourne farmers markets (mfm.com.au) each Saturday from mid-August at its various locations. “We want people to try the syrups and tell us what they think,” explains Watson. “We’re doing research.”
Read the full article by Hilary McNevin on Broadsheet.
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Local Harvest Website for Melbourne: Seeking Input
Posted in Models, Movements, Seeking by Kate Archdeacon on August 4th, 2011
Source: Ethical Consumer Group
Image: This Is A Wake Up Call via flickr CC
There is a growing need for easy-to-use information for sourcing food locally.
Local Harvest will be a website resource focusing on food relocalisation and the promotion of alternatives for food production in an urban setting. This includes a national directory for finding food co-ops, food swap meets, community gardens, farmers markets, box systems, ‘pick your own’ farms, farm-gate products, organic retailers, seed saver networks, free-range meats, and more. Users can find alternative local food sources based on their own locality by placing in a postcode.
A second component will be the promotion and exploration of do-it-yourself alternatives for food production and meeting essential needs, including resources for growing your own food, making your own produce, storing and preserving, low energy living.
We will largely be drawing from the many existing resources, and collating them into one place. This idea is based on the one existing for the USA found at www.localharvest.org.
- Core objectives of the project are to help people move away from dependence on the supermarket and industrial food system, and support local producers, reduce transport distance and associated energy and carbon impact, and build up connections between urban consumers and rural producers.
- The target audience is initially city dwellers who are looking to minimise their impact regarding food choices. Ultimately however, it will be a useful resource for everyone who eats and is concerned about making a difference with their everyday purchasing choices.
- Additional components such as a forum and blog by producers and/ or users may be included to enhance the ‘community’ and resource sharing aspect. A companion to the website resource will be an iPhone and smart-phone app using the same data.
- Local Harvest will be comprehensive and user-friendly, and an effective tool in encouraging behaviour change in food choices.
Involvement
Let us know if you’d like to be involved in this project. Here’s some ideas.
- be part of the organising team
- help with funding
- tidying up the content
- contributing content (resources you know of in your area)
www.ethical.org.au/local_harvest
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Urban Farmers: “Homegrown” Film Screening
Posted in Events, Models by Kate Archdeacon on July 13th, 2011
| 20 July , 2011 | ||
| 12:30 am | to | 9:30 pm |
Life Changing Docos and the Transition Decade Alliance proudly present HOMEGROWN, hosted by the Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute
Join us for the last public screening of HOMEGROWN… it follows the Dervaes family who run a small organic farm in the heart of urban Pasadena, California. While “living off the grid”, they harvest over 6,000 pounds (2.7 Metric Tons) of produce on a fifth of an acre (800 square metres), make their own bio diesel, power their computers with the help of solar panels, and maintain a website that gets 4,000 hits a day. The film is an intimate human portrait of what it’s like to live like “Little House on the Prairie” in the 21st Century. After the screening the on-stage panel of experts will discuss the issues and solutions raised by the film, and field questions from the audience. Come along and meet the people that are an integral part of positive and sustainable solutions.
Wednesday, July 20 · 6:30pm – 9:30pm
Melbourne Law Building Theatrette
University of Melbourne
>>Bookings page (tickets are $20 on-line or $25 on the night)
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Where Are They Now? Ben Nicholson, Groof
Posted in Models, Research by Kate Archdeacon on June 30th, 2011
Here at Sustainable Melbourne we’ve been contacting Sustainable Cities Round Tables (SCRT) presenters, to find out how their projects and ideas have grown and changed since Ferne Edwards first launched the Round Tables in May 2007.
Ben Nicholson gave a presentation at the SCRT in November 2008, after spending two months studying green roofs in cities around the world as a Churchill Fellow. During this time, Ben met green roofs advocates; planners, environmentalists and designers, and he visited research sites and commercial sites, some of which have been in existence since the early 1990s. In his presentation, “Vital Signs for a Healthy City”, he described Melbourne as an adolescent city at risk of on-going health problems due to its large energy requirements, poor water management lack of biodiversity. Green roofs would change this prognosis by cooling the city, increasing urban food-growing space and wildlife habitat, and conserving storm water and energy.
In 2007, Ben established his own green roof consultancy, Groof, providing designs and advice to green roof developments in Victoria and overseas.
We caught up with Ben to ask about the changes in green roof implementation and acceptance in Australia since his presentation in 2008. There have been some notable green roof and wall projects developed in that time, including the vertical garden we sat next to in the foyer of the Gauge building in Docklands. During our conversation, Ben reiterated the importance of solid research and demonstration projects for industry players to assist in the development and maintenance of a successful Green Roof program in Australia’s cities.
Below are some extracts from Ben’s Churchill Trust Report:
Just as the ant spends a lifetime crawling up and down a tree without ever comprehending the tree’s full scale or its place in the wider world, so we spend our lives in cities without ever comprehending their true size or the impacts they are having on the planet… imagine for a moment you are sitting on a hill, watching a tree grow that, one day, will be crawled upon by an the ant mentioned above. And from this hill, imagine that you can fast-forward time as quickly as you like, so you sit and watch this tree grow from a tiny seed to a sapling to a huge, spreading lemon-scented gum in only a few short minutes. Now imagine that from the same hill you are watching your own city grow up from its earliest days of a few tents and dusty tracks into the sprawling suburbs, skyscrapers, freeways, factories and warehouses that it has become today. From this perspective, it is suddenly much easier to comprehend the amount of disruption that has occurred to all the other living things and natural systems forced to make way for the people and non-living things that make up your city today. We may never be able to bring everything back, but from the vantage of this hill we can at least start to imagine what our cities would look like when transformed into thriving eco-systems.
In many cities around the world, harm is being reducing by people as they build each new piece of eco-infrastructure into the city fabric. To do this properly, people first ask:
- what does harm look like?
- where is it most concentrated?
- where is the worst of it coming from?
[…]
During the fellowship I learnt that the green roof and wall industry in each city has developed in the presence of local champions, detailed science, government support and an enlightened citizenry. The people in the cities I visited have developed policy responses and designed ‘eco-infrastructure’ that is unique to their local topography, climate and system of governance. In the more advanced cities, I observed some or all of the following activities taking place:
- Environmental indicators such as topography, temperature, rainfall and biodiversity are examined to understand the ways in which a city impacts upon its host environment. Using data sourced from early settlement to the current day, time-lapse analysis reveals the extent to which the city has affected its surrounds. Forecasting models are then used to predict future impacts with the key variable being extent of vegetation cover.
- Economic costs for the design, construction and maintenance of air conditioning/cleaning systems, water supply/removal systems and agricultural production/distribution systems are compared with the costs of using green roofs and walls to identify areas of city management that can be carried out more efficiently using green roof and wall technology.
- The benefits of green roofs and walls are tailored to address environmental and economic ‘trigger points’ specific to each city. These trigger points inform local green roof and wall design and assist in targeting the most effective locations for the placement of green roof and wall infrastructure.
- Demonstration and research projects raise awareness and provide information for public, private and government sectors.
- Political support for green roofs and walls leads to subsidies for the eco-infrastructure industry and the incorporation of built form standards and incentives.
- Environmental and economic indicators are regularly monitored to refine eco-infrastructure design and placement.
- Over time, the economic and environmental costs associated with the negative impacts of urbanisation are reduced and the benefits associated with an increase in vegetation cover are multiplied.
[…]
As eco-infrastructure projects begin to reduce harm, there will be an increase in the demand for high quality products and services. It is therefore up to the people and companies who stand to benefit the most from this demand to provide funding for eco-infrastructure research and demonstration projects in the early phase of the industry’s development. We can learn a lot from the failures and triumphs of other cities. Now is the time to transform our negative impacts into positive ones. And in doing so, we will transform ourselves from being harmful pests to welcome guests.
Download Ben’s report to read more about his research, including case studies from his tour and further reading and recommendations.
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Does your organisation have a culture of sustainability?
Posted in Models, Research by timc on June 28th, 2011
Awake has recently developed the Sustainability Culture Indicator (SCI), an online survey tool designed to help organisations and groups evaluate the extent to which critical enablers of sustainability exist in their culture.
The information provided by the SCI allows the organisation to
- Identify the features of the organisation which are supporting, and hindering, the development of sustainability as a core aspect of the culture
- Ensure the design of activities and actions to promote sustainability are targeted to the areas of greatest need
- Set a baseline against which to track the impact of future efforts to embed sustainability
The factors measured in the SCI are derived from academic and organisational research, as well as being developed and refined through surveys conducted by Awake in several organisations and communities throughout Australia and New Zealand.
More information, including a sample report and brochure are available at the SCI webpage
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Appliance & Lighting Energy Calculator: Port Phillip Eco-Centre
Posted in Models, Research by Kate Archdeacon on June 8th, 2011
Source: Port Philip EcoCentre
The Port Phillip EcoCentre has developed a new energy calculator which will enable you to calculate how much energy you use in each room of your house for lighting and for appliances. It helps you identify opportunities for greater efficiency and shows you the results in $ and [CO2]. The potential savings in carbon and real AUD-moolah are staggering. Click here, download the spreadsheet, make a few minutes available to go round the house, counting lightbulbs and appliances, and you could save enough to pay for a holiday. Seriously.
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Using Treated Stormwater for Vegies
Posted in Models, Research by Kate Archdeacon on May 24th, 2011
Source: Clearwater
From “Is treated stormwater safe for growing food?“:
Treated stormwater is safe to use on your household vegetable patch according to a new report by the Centre for Water Sensitive Cities at Monash University. The study found that vegetables watered with treated stormwater, normally associated with having strong levels of heavy metals such as lead, and increased pollutants, were just as safe to eat as vegetables irrigated from mains water supplies.
Dr David McCarthy from the Centre for Water Sensitive Cities said that two major findings emerged from the study. “We found that using treated stormwater did not noticeably increase the level of contamination in the vegetables when compared with those irrigated with the mains water. Secondly, it seemed that the most likely route of pollutants entering the vegetables was through the soil or possibly through the atmosphere”, Dr David McCarthy said.
These findings were presented by Dr David McCarthy at a recent Clearwater event with project funding by the Smart Water Fund.
Click here to view a copy of the presentation which is available on our [Clearwater] website or for more information visit the Centre for Water Sensitive Cities.
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Vertical Gardens Made From Pallets
Posted in Models, Visions by Kate Archdeacon on May 16th, 2011
Source: Life On The Balcony
From How to Turn a Pallet into a Garden from Life on The Balcony:
[...]
Find A Pallet
The first thing you need to do is–obviously–find a pallet. I’ve had good luck finding them in dumpsters behind supermarkets. No need to be squeamish. It doesn’t smell. At least, it doesn’t smell that bad. 
Don’t just take the first pallet you find. You’re looking for one with all the boards in good condition, no nails sticking out, no rotting, etc. If you intend to put edibles in your pallet, be sure to find one that was heat treated as opposed to fumigated with pesticides.
Collect Your Supplies
For this project, you’ll need the pallet you found, 2 large bags of potting soil, 16 six packs of annual flowers (one six pack per opening on the face of the pallet, and two six packs per opening on the top of the completed pallet garden), a small roll of landscape fabric, a staple gun, staples, and sand paper.
[...]
Read the full post by Fern for step-by-step instructions and more photos.
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