Archive for the ‘Movements’ Category
Movements refer to social and environmental movements located within Melbourne associated with contributing to sustainable cities. Although they may appear to be isolated action, they contribute to a larger movement of action and thought. Consider the “relocalisation” movement. If you are part of such a movement with action occurring in Melbourne, Australia, you are welcome to post your experiences on the site. To do so visit the “How to use this site” page and follow the prompts.
Green Moves: Sustainable Properties in Australia
Posted in Movements by Kate Archdeacon on September 1st, 2010
Source: Green Renters
In the past we (Green Renters) attempted to start our own listings service for environmentally friendly rental property and that didn’t really work…
Then we linked up with a US site, that didn’t really work either…
So imagine how happy we were when we came across a new Australian based service called ‘Green Moves’, who do exactly what you’ve all been asking for and much more! Green Moves not only list your sustainable property but also assess them (to current Australian standards) to create a reliable and consistent standard for listings across the site.
So if you’re a tenant looking for a new home, or a landlord looking to list your property to like minded tenants, then drop on by!
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2010 Great Northern Clean Up
Posted in Movements by Kate Archdeacon on August 23rd, 2010
Source: EcoVoice
Following the success of last year’s inaugural event, Clean Up Australia has announced the 2010 Great Northern Clean Up will be held on the weekend of 11 and 12 September. Created after feedback that March weather made it difficult for North Australian communities to participate in Clean Up Australia Day, the 2010 Great Northern Clean Up is a great opportunity to get things ship-shape at the end of the tourist season and before the big wet kicks in.
Ian Kiernan AO, founder and Chairman of Clean Up Australia said, “Last year’s community spirit, passion and support was fantastic, with over 90 tons of rubbish removed by nearly 1800 volunteers across Northern Australia.
“We know as the tourist season draws to an end we’re likely to find new pockets of rubbish around, with bottles, cans, plastic bags and cigarette butts the main offenders. Once the wind picks up and the rain comes in, much of that rubbish will make its way into our waterways where it can harm or kill local wildlife.
“I urge people to think about areas in their community that need cleaning up, then register your site before the cut off date – August 29″ Mr Kiernan concluded.
Anyone can register a Clean Up site or volunteer for the 2010 Great Northern Clean Up on Saturday 11th and Sunday 12th September just by visiting www.cleanupaustraliaday.org.au or by calling 1800 CUA DAY (1800 282 329).
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Advanced Permaculture Principles and Planning Tools
Posted in Events, Movements by Holmgren Design Services on August 19th, 2010
This four-day residential course is designed to deepen understanding of permaculture principles, and improve conceptual skills and planning tools for permaculture practitioners, designers, activists and teachers. A Permaculture Design Certificate and prior reading of Permaculture: Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability are highly desirable for participants to successfully gain from the course, and contribute to it. The core of these courses is the presentation and workshopping in groups of the format of design principles from Permaculture: Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability. Additional presentations and group work focus on Reading Landscape, Landscape Mapping, Energy Descent Scenarios and Community Mapping. David Holmgren presents permaculture ideas through practical projects and personal example, providing a refreshing and unorthodox approach to the environmental issues of our time.
Saturday 18th to Tuesday 21st September 2010
Hepburn Primary School, Main Road, HEPBURN VIC 3461
Cost $530, includes meals and camping on-site.
For more info email info@holmgren.com.au or phone 03 5348 3636. www.holmgren.com.au
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DIY Sustainable Garden Design with SGA
Posted in Movements, Research by Kate Archdeacon on August 19th, 2010
Source: cuttings, the Sustainable Gardening Australia (SGA) newsletter
The Sustainable Garden Design Series aims to help gardeners design or redesign (build or rebuild) their gardens as sustainable landscapes. Each month we will take you through the steps necessary to ensure the best possible outcome for all your hard work!
Autumn is a good time to make changes to your garden in southern Australia – especially after the first rains, as the soil is still warm and the plants will have an opportunity to get established before the next dry season. So now is a good time to start thinking about it and to prepare a plan.
The Principles of Sustainable Landscape Design:
1. minimise the requirement for energy inputs.
2. minimise the requirements for high water inputs, above that which naturally occurs in the particular region.
3. maximise opportunities for biodiversity at all levels.
4. maximise vegetative biomass.
5. maximise the opportunity for the growth of produce and other useful materials.
6. minimise the risk of weed-escapees moving into native habitats.
7. minimise or eliminate the use of materials that disrupt, destroy, pollute or damage natural systems/communities where they are sourced.
8. minimise the risk of disruption, pollution or interference to other systems.
Part 1 – Getting Started
Part 2 – Your Needs, Wants and Budget
Part 3 – Drawing up the Design
Part 4 – Choosing Plants
Part 5 – The Soft Landscape
Part 6 – The Hard Landscape
Part 7 – Water Gardens
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Where to find Australia’s Climate Change Leaders (psst – it’s not Canberra)
Posted in Movements, Opinion by CarbonetiX on August 17th, 2010
Image: Linfox
If you are sick of the climate change talkfest in Canberra and looking for the kind of leadership where actions and results do the talking, jump on tram 59 going past Essendon, put your bike on the train and head on past Frankston to Hastings, or catch the Epping line train and get off at Preston.
Your first stop is near Essendon airport, with a brisk ten minute walk to the offices of Linfox. You’ll get a clue of what is happening when you notice that the trucks won’t be idling in the car park. In a training room there is a group of drivers, listening to a burly presenter talking about the likely impacts of climate change if we do nothing. David McInnes, Group Manager Environment and Climate Change, then takes you aside and quickly goes through the ten principles of fuel-efficient driving that the drivers are learning in the Eco Drive training. He explains that “Linfox takes the position that climate change is real, that it is most probably caused by human activity, and that Linfox sees that it has a responsibility to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions.” To reduce its emissions Linfox have been following a eight step cultural change process developed by Harvard academic John Kotter.
Since 2007 Linfox has quietly gone about creating a sense of urgency in the organisation about the importance of reducing its carbon footprint, then acting on that sense of urgency. Without quite knowing how it would do it, its board of management set a target to reduce greenhouse emissions per km by 15% by 2010. As a result of this leadership stand, late last year Linfox announced that it had reached its target early, and had in fact achieved a 28% saving, translating into substantial savings in diesel costs. McInnes is quick to point out that “this has required significant investment, but that to date the savings outweigh the costs.” He attributes the saving to cultural change, and how thousands of drivers changing how they drive has slashed their diesel use. Linfox has now set a target of reducing its emissions per km by 50% by 2015, and is willing to go beyond business as usual with the additional investment that will be required to achieve this.
Your next stop is Westernport Secondary College. You catch the train to Frankston then ride your bike for an hour to Hastings, or else then catch the Stony Point line train and walk for ten minutes to the school from Hastings station.
Assistant Principal Hannah Lewis greets you and shows you round the school. You see how the old centralised heating system is now idle, replaced with energy efficient gas space heaters in each classroom. Light fittings have been “de-lamped” – that is, a fitting with two fluorescent tubes has had one removed and a reflector put behind the remaining tube to increase its light output. She explains how “a lighting assessment has ensured that de-lamping has been undertaken selectively so that illumination levels are still in accordance with the Australian Standard.” This low cost measure has resulted in a halving of energy use in those light fittings that have been de-lamped.
Melbourne Farmers Markets: August
Posted in Models, Movements by Kate Archdeacon on August 13th, 2010
Source: Melbourne Community Farmers’ Markets
From the August 2010 Newsletter:
There’s no keeping a lid on it – we’re delighted and proud that Collingwood Children’s Farm Farmers’ Market has been awarded Australia’s Most Outstanding Farmers’ Market in delicious magazine’s 2010 Produce Awards. Seven stallholders were also celebrated; Garlic and More, Warialda Belted Galloway Beef, Angelica Farm, Daylesford Organics, Moondara Blueberries, Mt Alexander Fruit Gardens and (…drumroll) Holy Goat La Luna Cheese, national winner in the “from the dairy” category. We accept the award on behalf of the many 1000’s of people who have endlessly supported us over almost eight years since the inaugural Melbourne Community Farmers’ Market. Seems like a lifetime and boy, what a trip! Thank you all.
Back on earth and winter rolls on. What a great season it’s been for produce; who could complain there’s not enough variety? Citrus has been amazing all season, the humble spud has stepped up in increasing variety and recognition of quality, kiwis have stocked us up on Vitamin C and got us through the winter lurgies, brussel sprouts would get my vote for the underrated veg of the year and, how about this year’s fennel? Fabulous!
So what’s going on with Victoria’s absent produce over winter?
Here’s a snapshot…asparagus beds will have been mown and furious weeding will be taking place on the Westernport flats, garlic shoots will be up and the bulbs will be forming underground in the heavy sodden soils of Central Victoria, broad beans are looking just like seedlings waiting for some warmth to grow and flower in time for harvest in November, orchardists will have just finished the enormous job of pruning every tree before the bud, flower, pollination and fruit setting stages of Spring. It’s way too early for veg growers to be planting tomatoes and Summer stocks so they’ll be weeding and preparing the beds for November. Chooks are back ‘on the lay’ but production is still well down on Spring and Summer. Last, and by no means least, spare a thought for dairy cows calving in paddocks around Victoria.
The reality is, for those of us not directly involved in food production, that whilst many stallholders are not at the markets much hard work still goes on in what seems to be the ‘off season.’
Visit the website for more…
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Edible Street Gardens: The Need for Design Guidelines
Posted in Models, Movements by Kate Archdeacon on August 12th, 2010
Source: Australian City Farms & Community Gardens Network
From “Farmers of the urban footpath & the need for design guidelines for street verge gardens“ by Russ Grayson:
Edible Street Verge Gardening is something that has been going on for the past 20 years or so in our cities but is now capturing the public imagination such that the number of plantings is rapidly increasing. For advocates of edible landscaping in our cities, this is good news but for local government the practice can be confusing. What has become apparent during the recent upsurge in the popularity of edible footpath planting is that a set of design and planting guidelines are desperately needed. Most verge plantings to date have been created by gardeners who know what they are doing. The possibility emerging from the current boost in popularity is that those less knowledgeable will create gardens with inappropriate plants and without considering other footpath users.
An established practice
Street verge gardening is the practice of growing ornamental, native or edible plants on the footpath. The rise in popularity of edible gardens has brought the planting of fruits, herbs and vegetables, sometimes mixed with flowers and native plants, to our footpaths. The practice has caught the popular imagination and is another means of returning food production to our cities.
That edible verge gardening is an established practice in Australian cities is revealed by a walk around those suburbs where the immigrants of the 1950s and 1960s made their homes, particularly those suburbs favoured by immigrants from the Mediterranean region. What do you find on the footpaths here? Olive trees, now mature and productive.
Unknowingly, some councils have made their own contribution to edible streetscapes. Take a walk along a certain street in Stanmore, in Sydney’s Inner West, and you encounter the Australian bush food tree, the Illawarra Plum (Podocarpus elatus). This strange, plum red fruit with its seed on the outside can be picked and eaten raw or made into a sauce by those with a little culinary savvy. Walk down a particular street in Windsor, Brisbane, and you encounter another Australian bushfood serving as a verge planting, the macadamia nut. Then there are numerous species of lillypilly, the Syzygiums, that have been established as street trees and that yield edible fruit.
These examples may not be in large number, however they have been noted by urban gleaners.
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The rest of this comprehensive article covers Understanding council concerns, The realities of verge gardens, Design considerations for verge gardens, Functions, and Yields.
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Earth Building Conference 2010
Posted in Events, Movements by Kate Archdeacon on August 11th, 2010
EBAA 2010 Earth Building Conference
Is Insulation the answer to energy efficiency? Has the approach since 2003 been a success? Are 5 Star homes really that good? What about thermal mass and good design? We have had difficulty understanding why computers don’t like earth buildings. Some high profile academics also have concerns with NatHers. How can you build an energy efficient earth home? How can you build a Bushfire safe home? What is the best material in flame zone construction? What about fire bunkers? How to use earth in ways you never dreamed of revealed in a day of workshops? Get your hands dirty! Conference speakers are still being confirmed, but the focus areas will be: – Affordable housing – Flame zone and bunkers – Challenging bunker regulations – Forum: energy efficient earth houses – Workshops including Building a fire bunker Soil & brick Testing Brick production – Guest speaker dinner, Saturday night at Montsalvat.
17 & 18 September 2010
Eltham Community and Reception Centre
801 Main Road, Eltham 3095
Check out your next issue of Dirt and www.ebaa.asn.au for updates.
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Ethical Consumer Group Meal & Movie Nights: August
Posted in Events, Movements, Opinion by Kate Archdeacon on August 11th, 2010
Source: Ethical Consumer Group
Thursday 12th August, Yarraville
Capitalism: A love story
Is capitalism the only way? Is it the best way? This film by Michael Moore centres on the financial crisis of 2007–2010 and the recovery stimulus, and the disastrous impact of corporate dominance on the everyday lives of Americans. Topics covered include Wall Street’s “casino mentality”, for-profit prisons, Goldman Sachs’ influence in Washington, DC, the poverty-level wages of many workers, the large wave of home foreclosures, and the consequences of “runaway greed”.
Friday 20th August, Blackburn
The Power of Community: How Cuba Survived Peak Oil
When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1990, Cuba’s economy went into a tailspin. With imports of oil cut by more than half – and food by 80 percent – people were desperate. This film tells of the hardships and struggles as well as the community and creativity of the Cuban people during this difficult time. Cubans share how they transitioned from a highly mechanised, industrial agricultural system to one using organic methods of farming and local, urban gardens. A practical example of options and hope for our time.
Dinner 6.30 – 7.30pm – byo ‘food and thoughts’ to share, Movie begins 8.00pm. Wrap up by 10.30pm.
The Ethical Consumer Group meets once a month to discuss aspects of living out sustainable alternatives in a consumerist culture. Join us for “Meal and Movie” (.. or just movie). Visit the website for more information.
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Walk Against Warming Sunday August 15
Posted in Movements by Kate Archdeacon on August 10th, 2010
Walk Against Warming 2010: The Great Suburban Walk
There’s a federal election on its way, yet our political leaders continue to backflip, delay and deny on climate change. With so much at stake, it’s time for the community to put climate action back on the election agenda.
On Sunday 15 August Environment Victoria, our national partners and the Victorian climate movement is holding the 2010 Walk Against Warming to demand that our political leaders face up to their responsibility on climate change. We’ll remind them that to secure our votes, they must ‘Walk with the People, Not the Big Polluters’.
This election be part of the call for climate action. Please register for The Walk Against Warming at www.walkagainstwarming.org.au
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