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Richard Heinberg will debate energy analyst, former oil exec, and economist
Jose Alberro in the ‘burbs.  It would be great if there a strong post carbon
contingency at the event.

Mt. Diablo Peace and Justice Center presents a
"Working Towards Peace Forum" on PEAK OIL

Wednesday, February 22, 2006 at 7:00 p.m.
Mt. Diablo Unitarian Universalist Church,
55 Eckley Lane, Walnut Creek

What is PEAK OIL?
Does it cause high gas prices?
What does it mean for our future?
What can be done? What should be done?

Speakers:
JOSÉ ALBERRO is currently a Director of LECG, a global expert services firm.
His expertise is in economic and financial modeling; sector analysis;
strategy, regulatory, and performance improvements, particularly in oil and
gas sectors. From 1992-1994, Dr. Alberro was Director General (CEO) of
Mexico’s PEMEX Gas and Basic Petrochemicals. He is a former consultant to
the United Nations (World Bank, UNDP and ECLAC). Dr. Alberro received a
Ph.D. in economics from the University of Chicago.

RICHARD HEINBERG is an expert on Peak Oil, and the author of The Party's
Over: Energy Resources and the Fate of Industrial Societies, and Powerdown:
Options And Actions For A Post-Carbon World. He is a core faculty member at
New College of California, where he teaches courses on "Energy and Society,"
and "Culture, Ecology and Sustainable Community.”
Suggested Donation: $5.00-$20.00
Mt. Diablo Peace and Justice Center, 55 Eckley Lane, Walnut Creek, CA *
925-933-7850

As this is a bay area group, I'm posting to it rather late that tomorrow
evening is the monthly SF meetup group meeting, 7 PM, at the American
Friends Service Committee location, 65 9th Street (just south of Market) in
SF. (and I am posting about two months of meetings in case people need to
plan early...)

This month we have some standard agenda items and several discussions
planned, as well as an update from those of us on the supervisors committee
(we are planning on meeting individually with all the SF supervisors at the
beginning of 2006).

Next month there will be a speaker: my next door neighbor, Marc Geller, who
drives an electric car he fuels (at least in sunny times, and at least
partially) with those solar panels he installed last summer.

Marc is a representative of Plug-In America (http://www.pluginamerica.com/)
- His presentation will be entitled The relationship of PV and EV, both of
which are related to a personal decreased energy footprint.

Dennis

The Bay Area group is meeting at the Rockridge library
on Wednesday 12/21 at 7:00p. The library is walking
distance from BART.

Proposed agenda:
   * Discussion of current events
   * Announcements
   * Review accomplishments of 2005
   * Ideas for projects in 2006
     - Rapid response team to counter news stories,
        commentators, or public officials
     - Publishing projects (informational materials)
     - Online outreach
     - Post Carbon speaker training
     - Awareness-raising with local groups
        in affinity with our values

Any other agenda item proposals? Just forward to this
mailing list.

Bring some food to share with others!

Dear Group,

I noticed that this group is mostly east bay based, so I started one
for San Francisco.

This new group is about building a sustainable community in SF before
"peak-oil" hits, and less about the specifics of peak-oil itself.

So if anybody on this group lives in SF, this group could also be a
valuable resource.

Remember, the premise of this group already assumes that peak oil is
not just a theory. No stats, charts, or timelines are needed here. I
just want to build a group of like minded people who feel the need to
organize and prepare for the threat.

You may join at:

sfpeakoil-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

I hope to see you there.

-Paul

Hello everyone,

While I was in Denver for the ASPO conference, I managed to find the
time to see the natural history museum.  My grandparents used to live
in Boulder, and this was one of our favorite destinations.  Especially
the IMAX, where the big screen is so overwhelming you get dizzy, swim
with whales, and raft down the Grand Canyon on rivers of film.

The IMAX show was "Mystic India", a very ecologically incorrect film
with shots of zillions of people releasing similar numbers of
balloons.  The film was worth the price of admission to see where the
word juggernaut originated -- it comes from the enormous floats pulled
by thousands of men through spiritually overcome crowds that gyrate
and yell as the floats thunder down the streets.

Overall the story within the film was about Neelkanth, an
eleven-year-old boy who leaves home in 1792 by plunging into a raging
river so no one can track him down and prevent him from becoming a
swami. He's owns absolutely nothing but the loincloth he's wearing for
the rest of his seven year, eight thousand mile journey across India.
   This is something everyone should see before shopping season - we
really don't need all this stuff to be happy, do we?

After the movie I journeyed from the transcendent to the repellent.
Long before I arrived, I could hear shrieks and laughs at the exhibit
"Grossology".  The walls were painted with dayglow green slime oozing
downwards.  The A to Z exhibits ranged from Athletes foot to Zits.
There was "way too much information" on bad breath, barf, belches,
blisters, blood-sucking insects, boogers, bruises, burps,
constipation, dandruff, diahhrea, dust mites, earwax, eye gunk, farts,
guts, pus, poop, smelly feet, snot, spit, sweat, tapeworms...

Kids crawled through a small intestine, walked into a giant nose full
of mucus, tried to guess which poop went with which animal butt,
pumped soda into a man with a clear glass stomach until he burped,
shot snot into a nose with booger guns, and climbed a wall of
blisters, scabs, warts, and wounds.

As I walked through the exhibits, I overheard a docent telling a crowd
of parents that children just love the word "sphincter", and was
nearly knocked over by a mother who didn't even try to guess if she'd
just smelled armpits, butts, smelly feet, or bad breath.

To get to the museum, I walked through Cheeseman park and kept getting
sentimentally weepy at the sight of snow-capped mountains, memories of
the grandparents, how lovely the light was, the joy of kicking fallen
autumn leaves.  I was in a state-of-grace I wish I could always feel,
but I think Buddhist Jack Kornfield has it right with his book title
"After the Ecstasy, the Laundry".

I had to hurry back to the youth hostel where I'd been staying to get
the shuttle out to the airport.  At least my bags were lighter, I gave
away some sweaters to two lovely young British girls on their first
Big Adventure, their warmest clothing only sweatshirts, and they were
about to head to Utah in November. They were traveling by Greyhound
Bus, and so far the trip was adventurous in ways they hadn't planned on.

I ran into Jim Baldauf outside his hotel. He was one of the organizers
of the Denver ASPO conference, and he and his wife shared their town
car with me out to the airport. What a wild and wonderful man Jim is,
full of spirit and warmth.  It wasn't long before Jim included the
driver, Dave, in our conversation.  Dave was grateful, he said most
people ignored him and said the most outrageous things, as if he
couldn't hear them.  I told him about a column in our local paper
called the "Night Cabbie", but this driver wasn't about to start his
own newspaper column, he already had a mission in life.

He told us that he'd seen every documentary in the Denver Public
library system and memorized them all.  This has allowed him to make
1,500 of his own DVD's, cut and pasted from the Denver library
documentaries.  He told us "There's so much information that people
don't know, about the Weapons of Mass Destruction, and all sorts of
things" and "My parents and I have agreed to disagree on my films".
I asked him when I got out how he found the time to do this, and he
said he only got a few hours of sleep a night so he could spend more
time putting his films  together.

I wish you good luck in finding your own magnificent obsession!

Alice

Re: finding more oil

At Denver ASPO, several speakers mentioned that high
tech was finding more oil sooner and getting it out
quicker than would have otherwise happened, which will
make the depletion rate on the other side of Hubbert's
curve STEEPER.  If the depletion rate is 8%, as CEO
Gould of Schlumberger believes, then we're down to
less than half the present oil in less than 10 years
after peak!!!

Not only have we sucked it up faster by dipping more
straws in, and found more oil with 3D imagery, we've
pushed too much water and other enhanced-oil-recovery
methods too soon and too forcefully out of sheer
greed, preventing some oil from EVER coming out so
that a few shareholders and company executives could
be enriched.

Read Matt Simmons "Twilight in the Desert",
theoildrum.com, google depletion rate, Deffeyes, etc.



--- sfbayoil@yahoogroups.com wrote:

> ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor
> --------------------~-->
> Get fast access to your favorite Yahoo! Groups. Make
> Yahoo! your home page
>
http://us.click.yahoo.com/dpRU5A/wUILAA/yQLSAA/NHYolB/TM
>
--------------------------------------------------------------------~->
>
>
> There are 2 messages in this issue.
>
> Topics in this digest:
>
>       1. New well log analysis technique to find out
> missing oil & gas zones
>            From: "huilai2000" <huilai2000@...>
>       2. Pemex senior engineer interview
>            From: "Gaylord Moore"
> <gaylord_m@...>
>
>
>
________________________________________________________________________
>
________________________________________________________________________
>
> Message: 1
>    Date: Thu, 01 Dec 2005 09:28:18 -0000
>    From: "huilai2000" <huilai2000@...>
> Subject: New well log analysis technique to find out
> missing oil & gas zones
>
> I try to summarize what I read from www.logdigi.com
> to save your
> time. If more and more missing oil & gas zones are
> discovered in US
> and around the world, oil & gas price can go down
> and people will
> pay less for gasoline. Hope most of people getting
> benefit from it.
> -------------------------------------
>
> What Makes New Well Log Analysis More Accurate
>
> LogDigi technology completely adopts relative
> concepts and rebuilds
> a strict lithologic conductive equation. It is
> significantly
> improved well log analysis technology and different
> from current
> well-logging interpretation methods that use
> absolute concepts.
>
> Traditional technologies are all based on an
> approximate value in
> the designing of well-logging equipment, result
> measurements, data
> collection and data processing. When facing
> extremely complex
> lithology, it is necessary to design models in each
> area based on
> changes in objective conditions. Traditional
> technology does not
> adapt based on changes of objective conditions.
> Traditional
> technology is often affected by different
> lithological, regional,
> and well conditions. Traditional technology cannot
> accurately locate
> oil and gas zones with complex lithology.
>
> LogDigi technology has changed the current
> technology model of
> evaluating quantitative oil/gas formations. This
> technology is a
> breakthrough in well-logging technology, and an
> innovative method
> for the discovery of new oil and gas zones. LogDigi
> technology can
> automatically remove the influences of lithology
> variations in
> different areas and different depths. It can also
> compensate complex
> conditions, such as influences of deep intrusion of
> mud filtrate in
> drilling with saline mud. LogDigi method also
> evaluates the
> influences of oil layer flood out and automatically
> finds out
> whether or not the parameters are accordant with
> actual situations.
> This allows them to achieve more than 90% accuracy
> to locate oil and
> gas. Click the following link for detail
> presentation.
> http://www.logdigi.com/Low_Resistivity_Pay.pdf
>
> 90% old oil wells do not have Nuclear and Sonic
> logging. For many
> oil companies, in order to re-exam their oil fields,
> they have to
> send down sophisticated nuclear, and acoustic tools
> on a wire-line
> for the well. It costs them a lot to do that.
> Logdigi can re-
> evaluate oil fields with existing logs. They do not
> need "many times
> costly core sample taken from the well", and
> "sophisticated nuclear,
> and acoustic tools are sent down the well on a
> wire-line". What they
> need just gamma ray (or SP), and resistivity. They
> determine the
> fluid and pressure distributions throughout the
> reservoir, the
> natural energy sources available, and the methods
> most useful in
> recovering the maximum amount of oil or gas from the
> reservoir. They
> analyze, interpret, and optimize the performance of
> individual
> wells. They decide if it is economically feasible to
> make the
> investment needed to produce the well. If it is, the
> production
> engineer is given the tasks to determine how to
> bring this valuable
> fluid to the surface. They analyze data to locate
> drilling sites
> where oil and gas may have accumulated in commercial
> quantities.
> Click the following link for additional
> presentation.
>
http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case2/case2_files/frame.htm
>
> More results if you are interested:
> http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case2/plot.pdf
> http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case3/report.pdf
> http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case3/result.pdf
> http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case3/plot1.pdf
> http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case3/plot2.pdf
> http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case3/plot3.pdf
> http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case1/result.pdf
> http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case1/plot.pdf
> ...
> -------------------------------------
> I just want to share some new technology info with
> people. I hope
> you are interested in it. If not, please simply
> delete my email. I
> am sorry for wasting your time.
> Thanks.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
________________________________________________________________________
>
________________________________________________________________________
>
> Message: 2
>    Date: Fri, 02 Dec 2005 03:14:51 -0000
>    From: "Gaylord Moore" <gaylord_m@...>
> Subject: Pemex senior engineer interview
>
> i thought this was worth sending out because the
> issue of rapid
> decline (greater than 10%) came up in the interview.
>  Alice alerted us
> that rapid decline was discussed at ASPO-USA Denver.
>
>
> TheOilDrum.com
> OilCast.com #28: Pemex exclusive 'We are in the
> middle of Hubbert's
> curve'
> Posted by Prof. Goose on Thu Dec 01 at 2:58 PM EST
> Topic: Supply/Production
> Tags: oilcast, oil, peak oil, pemex, Hubbert (all
> tags)
>
> Oilcast.com today breaks an exclusive interview with
> a senior engineer
> from Mexican state oil company Pemex, who says "the
> days of the
> Mexican super giants are over." He claims Pemex is
> in the "doorway of
> depletion" and "in the middle of the Hubbert curve."
> (You can also
> just read the transcript in the right sidebar if you
> wish.) Link:
> http://oilcast.com.
> Comments (12) | Permalink
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
________________________________________________________________________
>
________________________________________________________________________
>
=== message truncated ===




__________________________________
Start your day with Yahoo! - Make it your home page!
http://www.yahoo.com/r/hs

i thought this was worth sending out because the issue of rapid
decline (greater than 10%) came up in the interview.  Alice alerted us
that rapid decline was discussed at ASPO-USA Denver.


TheOilDrum.com
OilCast.com #28: Pemex exclusive 'We are in the middle of Hubbert's
curve'
Posted by Prof. Goose on Thu Dec 01 at 2:58 PM EST
Topic: Supply/Production
Tags: oilcast, oil, peak oil, pemex, Hubbert (all tags)

Oilcast.com today breaks an exclusive interview with a senior engineer
from Mexican state oil company Pemex, who says "the days of the
Mexican super giants are over." He claims Pemex is in the "doorway of
depletion" and "in the middle of the Hubbert curve." (You can also
just read the transcript in the right sidebar if you wish.) Link:
http://oilcast.com.
Comments (12) | Permalink

I try to summarize what I read from www.logdigi.com to save your
time. If more and more missing oil & gas zones are discovered in US
and around the world, oil & gas price can go down and people will
pay less for gasoline. Hope most of people getting benefit from it.
-------------------------------------

What Makes New Well Log Analysis More Accurate

LogDigi technology completely adopts relative concepts and rebuilds
a strict lithologic conductive equation. It is significantly
improved well log analysis technology and different from current
well-logging interpretation methods that use absolute concepts.

Traditional technologies are all based on an approximate value in
the designing of well-logging equipment, result measurements, data
collection and data processing. When facing extremely complex
lithology, it is necessary to design models in each area based on
changes in objective conditions. Traditional technology does not
adapt based on changes of objective conditions. Traditional
technology is often affected by different lithological, regional,
and well conditions. Traditional technology cannot accurately locate
oil and gas zones with complex lithology.

LogDigi technology has changed the current technology model of
evaluating quantitative oil/gas formations. This technology is a
breakthrough in well-logging technology, and an innovative method
for the discovery of new oil and gas zones. LogDigi technology can
automatically remove the influences of lithology variations in
different areas and different depths. It can also compensate complex
conditions, such as influences of deep intrusion of mud filtrate in
drilling with saline mud. LogDigi method also evaluates the
influences of oil layer flood out and automatically finds out
whether or not the parameters are accordant with actual situations.
This allows them to achieve more than 90% accuracy to locate oil and
gas. Click the following link for detail presentation.
http://www.logdigi.com/Low_Resistivity_Pay.pdf

90% old oil wells do not have Nuclear and Sonic logging. For many
oil companies, in order to re-exam their oil fields, they have to
send down sophisticated nuclear, and acoustic tools on a wire-line
for the well. It costs them a lot to do that. Logdigi can re-
evaluate oil fields with existing logs. They do not need "many times
costly core sample taken from the well", and "sophisticated nuclear,
and acoustic tools are sent down the well on a wire-line". What they
need just gamma ray (or SP), and resistivity. They determine the
fluid and pressure distributions throughout the reservoir, the
natural energy sources available, and the methods most useful in
recovering the maximum amount of oil or gas from the reservoir. They
analyze, interpret, and optimize the performance of individual
wells. They decide if it is economically feasible to make the
investment needed to produce the well. If it is, the production
engineer is given the tasks to determine how to bring this valuable
fluid to the surface. They analyze data to locate drilling sites
where oil and gas may have accumulated in commercial quantities.
Click the following link for additional presentation.
http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case2/case2_files/frame.htm

More results if you are interested:
http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case2/plot.pdf
http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case3/report.pdf
http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case3/result.pdf
http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case3/plot1.pdf
http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case3/plot2.pdf
http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case3/plot3.pdf
http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case1/result.pdf
http://www.logdigi.com/casestudy/case1/plot.pdf
...
-------------------------------------
I just want to share some new technology info with people. I hope
you are interested in it. If not, please simply delete my email. I
am sorry for wasting your time.
Thanks.

We are in the proccess of creating an educational PDF
on Peak Oil to be printed and distributed outside of
the theatres on opening night.  We hope to have them
ready for the limited release next Wednesday...We will
definitely have them for the nationwide release.



--- Dennis Brumm <brumm@...> wrote:


---------------------------------
http://syrianamovie.warnerbros.com/

"A campaign to reduce our dependence upon oil" it
says, but somehow the
trailer looks like we need to reduce our dependence
upon media violence.



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francisco bay area
Petroleum                                    Peak oil

        Electrical engineering
           Mechanical engineering
              Petroleum industry


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---------------------------------

http://syrianamovie.warnerbros.com/

"A campaign to reduce our dependence upon oil" it says, but somehow the
trailer looks like we need to reduce our dependence upon media violence.

At 2:30pm, I will be speaking at the Why Not Oil fundraiser in Downtown
Oakland.  We will also have a booth there.  If anyone would like to help at
the booth, please let me know.


Café Axé
1525 Webster Street,
Oakland, CA

Saturday, November 19, 12:00pm - 6pm
408.410.7576


WhyNotSolar is a Non-Profit pending 501(c)3 that is currently raising money
to sponsor four volunteers to go to Nepal and install solar in a remote
village that has never had electricity. However, installing solar is not our
only goal, sharing information and helping people learn and ask why.

WhyNotSolar will be having a fundraiser on November 19th at Café Axé
Cultural Center on 1525 Webster Street in Oakland. We will have
informational booths inside the café to educate people about alternatives in
energy and lifestyle. Some of the topics displayed will be:
residential/international solar, recycling/composting, biodiesel/straight
veg, vegan and solar cooking.

Just in front of the café there will be a solar powered sound stage where
bands will play. Yes, music powered by the sun. Across the street will be
two parking lots restricted for show vehicles promoting alternative
transportation methods. Examples of factory electric vehicles like the
Corbin Sparrow and Rav4 EV to a 1973 VW Karmann Ghia with full electric
conversion. That's not all, there will also be vehicles that run off
vegetable oil. Imagine driving up to your local Chinese restaurant and
filling your "gas" tank with their used fryer oil and driving off. One thing
all these cars will have in common, no fossil fuels.

Why are we trying to cover so much in one place? Good question. I work in
the Renewable Energies field for a Photovoltaic firm. My favorite question
from people is, “I know I can do so much more to help, but what is there and
where can I start?” I say, “Let’s show’em”.

Don't forget to check out our website to learn more about the event and
guest speakers.

www.WhyNotSolar.org
www.WhyNotSolar.org/events

FOOD AND GETTING ACQUAINTED

Potluck meal and a chance to meet new people and re-connect.


FILMS

We plan a showing of 'Peak Oil - imposed by Nature'.
In addition Milton Ariail and Alice Friedemann will present
highlight clips from the ASPO-USA Denver World Oil Conference.

DISCUSSION

Richard Katz will introduce a surprise - IEA acceptance of the
concept of Peak Oil... finally.
What does the make up of the presenters at ASPO-USA Denver World Oil
Conference tell us about where we are in the march to Peak Oil.
What are the ramifications of the Kuwaiti announcement that Burgan,
the world's second largest reservoir has peaked.  Mexico's Cantarell
reservoir which is the third largest reservoir is scheduled to peak
at the end of the year.

PROJECTS

Dave Room will give an overview of his plan to start an assessment
project in the Bay Area similar to the project in Willits.

Hi Everyone,
Alice Friedmann and I are planning to attend the
meeting and report back from the ASPO-USA Denver World
Oil Conference.  If someone wants to setup a TV, I can
bring some highlight clips of some of the speeches.
Please let me know...

Best,
Milton Ariail
Post Carbon Institute


--- flynn william <wrflynn1@...> wrote:

> I'm new around here and I can't make it this month
> because I'm out of town  I want to go to the next
> meeting so keep me posted please.   Bill
>
> Gaylord Moore <gaylord_m@...> wrote:This is
> a reminder of the November meeting of the East Bay
> Oil
> Awareness Group at the Rockridge Library from 7pm to
> 10pm next week on
> the 16th.
>
> We should have some agenda items by this weekend.
> If there is
> something you want added to the agenda let me know.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> SPONSORED LINKS
> San francisco bay area Petroleum Peak oil Electrical
> engineering Mechanical engineering Petroleum
> industry
>
> ---------------------------------
> YAHOO! GROUPS LINKS
>
>
>     Visit your group "sfbayoil" on the web.
>
>     To unsubscribe from this group, send an email
> to:
>  sfbayoil-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com
>
>     Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the
> Yahoo! Terms of Service.
>
>
> ---------------------------------
>
>
>
>

This is a reminder of the November meeting of the East Bay Oil
Awareness Group at the Rockridge Library from 7pm to 10pm next week on
the 16th.

We should have some agenda items by this weekend.  If there is
something you want added to the agenda let me know.

Here's an article which walks around the issue of resource depletion
and gets ya thinkin' about upcoming conflicts in Malawi.  If you've
yet to read Diamond's Guns, Germs and Steel or Tainter's The
Collapse of Complex Societies... just maybe this will tickle your
interest to do so.

Anyway, I had no idea that this was happening in Malawi but
considering worldwide population growth, I guess it's a no-
brainer... the depletion of a supportive resource for short term
benefit will result in conflict and crash.

R


---------------------------------------------------------------------
-----------

November 1, 2005
Malawi Is Burning, and Deforestation Erodes Economy
By MICHAEL WINES
MALOSA, Malawi - Lovely and lissome, the masuku tree rises maybe 35
feet at maturity, its wood the hue of a rare steak, its branches
dotted with sweet golfball-size fruits that ferment into a tasty
wine.

Working just after sunrise atop a small mountain not far from here,
Injes Juma and his nine friends needed less than five minutes to
sever a masuku at its base and send it crashing to the ground.

Another five minutes of furious hacking with axes and machetes
reduced the tree to a stack of five-foot logs, ready to be carried
down the steep grade to the highway below.

Mr. Juma and his friends are loggers, members of a vast fraternity
that has illegally laid waste to half this nation, mostly in the
last 15 years, all to hawk firewood and charcoal at roadside stands.

Because of them, experts say, Malawi loses nearly 200 square miles
of its forests annually, a deforestation rate of 2.8 percent that
the Southern Africa Development Community says is one of the highest
in sub-Saharan Africa.

The cutting blights a pastoral, sometimes breathtaking landscape. It
dries up streams, pollutes the air, lowers the water table, erodes
the soil and silts rivers so badly that, officials here say,
hydroelectric plants are blacked out by the gunk.

It is hard to think of many other things that Mr. Juma and his
fellow loggers could do that would damage the nation more.

The problem is that it is hard to think of many other ways that Mr.
Juma and his fellow loggers could make a living, period.

"The problem is that we have nothing else to do," said Mr. Juma, a
wiry 33-year-old with a neon green shirt tied around his bare waist,
standing over the remains of the chopped-up masuku. "We have no
money to raise our families. We have nowhere to run, nothing else to
do. So we have to cut the trees to feed our families."

In few places do the dictates of modern environmentalism butt so
painfully against economic reality as they do here in Malawi.

Two-thirds of the nation's 12 million people earn less than a dollar
a day, according to the United Nations Human Development report.
Nine-tenths of those two-thirds live in rural areas where both jobs
and the odds of escaping poverty are nonexistent.

For hundreds of thousands of those rural dwellers, sales of firewood
and charcoal provide virtually their only income.

Wood and charcoal are the preferred cooking and heating fuels in
Malawi, even in the poorer parts of cities, and the demand is huge:
the World Bank estimated in 2001 that charcoal consumption alone was
twice what the nation's woodlands could sustain without further
deforestation. Indeed, loggers illegally clear 100 square miles of
forest each year just to meet the demand for charcoal, the
government says.

Yet the income - less than $8 million a year nationwide, by official
estimates - is pitifully meager, as Mr. Juma's band of loggers can
testify.

A single masuku tree, felled and cut into logs and branches, brings
about 2,000 kwacha, or about $15 at current exchange rates, when all
has been sold. A bundle of three or four branches sold by the
roadside brings about 15 cents; a thick five-foot section of trunk,
up to $1.50.

Mr. Juma and his fellow loggers say they cut about 15 trees a year,
the most the group can sell in a region where dozens of wood vendors
line the main street of every town. That provides an income, on
average, of about $20 a month.

That $20 must support the 10 men, their 8 wives and 16 children - 34
people in all. Whatever else they have comes from casual labor as
gardeners, for about 40 cents a day, or from the vegetable plots
outside their one-room huts, just off the main road linking Blantyre
and Lilongwe, Malawi's two main cities.

"Sometimes we just do without food because the money doesn't last a
month," said Kabaitha Langwan, a gray-stubbled, 52-year-old logger
clad in a red T-shirt bearing the words "surf extreme." "We lack
money even for soap and bathing."

"It's a lot of hard work for very little money," said one forester,
an expert who is working under a foreign government grant to reduce
illegal logging. "Nobody does it by choice. But they have very few
options."

In theory, at least, Malawi's impoverished millions could benefit by
saving the woods instead of clearing them.

Some studies indicate that the income from forest beehives and their
honey can exceed the profit from firewood sales. Practitioners of
traditional medicine scrupulously tend their patches of wood to
maintain supplies of forest mushrooms and exotic plants used in home
remedies.

More than that, simple math shows that Malawians could cook their
food far more cheaply using electricity - if it were available -
than by buying and burning wood or charcoal.

But only 2 percent of Malawians are hooked to the electrical grid,
and for the rest, merely the cost of plugging in - buying a meter,
and buying a stove with which to cook - makes electricity a pipe
dream. Only so many beehives can fit into a forest. And all the
arguments about the long-term benefits of woodlands pale beside the
relentless need to find the next day's meal.

And so along the main road, almost all the hills have been shaved of
their leafy canopies of trees, leaving behind a rocky bristle of
scrub and dirt. Plumes of smoke curl skyward from behind the peaks,
the signatures of charcoal makers at work.

More than a fifth of Malawi's forests vanished between 1990 and 2000
alone, the World Bank says, and 23 species of trees are considered
to be endangered.

In many places, the biggest patches of untouched woods are the ones
that protect community graveyards.

Michael Pathungo, the assistant forestry officer in Malawi's
southern region, said the nation's heavily populated southern half
has now lost up to four-fifths of its tree cover.

"The rate of cutting is dwindling," he said, grasping for a shred of
good news, "because there are no more forests."

At 10:58 AM 10/24/2005, you wrote:
>Dennis...Is there any way to remove or hide all those ads?  You can
>delete this email...Janet

Not that I know of. It's free, so they have them. I use Eudora for email
and I guess I don't see much of what you're talking about, just a "Yahoo
Group Sponsoer" area with a lot of the group information at the bottom.

Dennis

Hello Post Carbon large and small of the Bay Area~

I'm sending out a shout out to all interested people-
those of you who have been active in this smaller
sub-division of the PC-510 group and those of you who
draw interest in joining an active participation of
solutions for post carbon living...

It's been a while since we last met.

We shelved the October two-day conference as the
momentum of organizing for it began to wane...  Many
of us came to the conclusion that putting on a
conference around PC solutions wasn't the best use of
our time and
energy.

In the wake of Katrina, we've all seen the suject of
peak-oil wash into general awareness.  From BP and
Chevron's ads to the news papers...  As Chevron puts
it: Energy will be one of the defining issues of this
century, and one thing is clear: the era of easy oil
is over.
What we all do next will determine how well we meet
the energy needs of the entire world in this century
and beyond.

Some of us have been talking about what the community
of the East Bay can do to formulate plans of
sustainable living.  It helps to see the bigger
picture.  What is Berkeley and Oakland's carrying
capacity for food consumption and production, for
example?  This kind of data could be useful in many
contexts; most obviously,  as an overview of what we
have to work with.

In the final conference organizing meeting, James
Kalin suggested that we embark on a Willits-style
assessment.  I agree with James and propose that those
of us with the time and inclination do an assessment
of essential urban living needs such as:

ð        Food consumption and production
ð        Water consumption and supplies
ð        Energy consumption
ð        Transportation



More subject areas could be covered depending on how
many people join the project.  Each research area
would have a steering comittee, and progress could be
reported on in a meeting once every several weeks.

The report could be presented to city council members
and urban planners.  If city council members and urban
planners had this kind of information from a credible
community group, it could be used in a powerful mode.

I've cut & pasted a little segment of what the
Tompkins County Relocalization Plan in New York state
is organizing around food at the bottom of this mail.

Please take a moment to think about this idea....

Green Fest is coming up.  Who will be attending the
fest and Richard Heinburg & Joanna Macy's talk on
Saturday from 4-4:45pm?

The week following this festival would be a good time
to have a meeting to actualize this project and/or
hear ideas of what people have in mind for an action
plan.

I welcome any replies, thought or feedback you all may
have!

Yours in the vision~~

ingrid

Here is an excerpt from the TCRP web-site:

Local food production
As the price of oil rises, the increasing cost of
transportation will make local food production
essential to maintaining a proper level of nutrition
in the County, and the high cost of living will make
it necessary for most people to grow a significant
portion of their own food, just as they did before and
during World War II. Thus a two-pronged approach is
needed: one effort to encourage maximum utilization of
our farmland and one to encourage every household in a
position to do so to establish its own garden.
Ordinances that hinder household food production in
urban areas of the County will need to be revisited.

The County will need to cut taxes on agricultural
land, fund programs to train people in sustainable
gardening, and encourage the formation of CSAs
(community supported agriculture, that is, farm
produce subscription programs) in order to create as
much local agricultural production as the area can
sustain as quickly as possible. The County may need to
jumpstart partial self-sufficiency by providing plants
and animals free to households, much as forestry
programs provide seedlings for reforestation projects.
If food prices rise more quickly than expected, a
surge in demand for breeding poultry and small stock
may quickly exhaust limited sources of supply, so
programs to encourage local breeding programs may be
advisable to maximize the availability of spare
breeding stock in advance of demand.

The unusual demographics of Tompkins County will pose
special challenges to self-sufficiency. A large
portion of the population moves every year; this is
not conducive to home gardening. And much of the
population consists of students, who are not here
during most of the growing and harvest seasons.

The County’s permanent residents will also face
challenges in attempting self-sufficiency. There is
little room for gardening in densely populated areas,
and the soil isn’t the most productive for the types
of food that could be grown by residents. The lovely
small shaded lots seen in the City of Ithaca are not
well situated for the sunlight needed in our short
growing season. Many of the elderly and disabled won’t
be able to maintain gardens. Most able-bodied
residents have little experience in gardening and
almost none in animal care. The introduction of
livestock into urban areas could lead to outbreaks of
diseases such as avian flu; many viruses are capable
of migration between animal to human in such a
setting. Commercial agriculture is subject to a level
of regulation and record keeping that would be absent
in the general population; livestock raised by a mass
of untrained individuals could suffer outbreaks of
disease that we have no way of tracking or treating.
Even so, it’s difficult to envision a workable future
that doesn’t encourage as much home gardening as
possible, including a few chickens for every
household, as was common almost everywhere fifty years
ago.

It is possible that the optimum answer given our
demographics is to encourage denser populations
(easier to heat, easier to transport, easier to supply
with food, health care, and other services, including
education and jobs) and encourage agriculture by
providing subsidies (tax relief, housing, low-interest
loans) to those who would grow the food to support the
remainder of the community. Right now farmers are
getting old and retiring. They would love to see the
farms that their families have built for a century
continue to be productive, but farming right now isn’t
an attractive prospect for most young people. It is
possible that incentives and income could bring enough
farmers into the County to provide enough food for its
residents and maybe some for export (more on that idea
below).

Community gardens are not a complete answer to urban
self-sufficiency, but they could help. They could also
be expanded to provide some or all of the following
functions:

Access to heritage seeds. Hybridized and genetically
modified seeds are highly regulated and expensive. It
would be necessary to remove ourselves from that loop
quickly.
Facilities to store seeds for each year. Without a
seed stock, which the average individual isn’t capable
of maintaining, there’s no way to sustain production.
Transport to the co-op gardens so that people are able
to maintain them.
Storage for the harvest at the community garden level.
Root cellars or a canning facilty would be more
practical at this location. Most apartment dwellers
don’t have room to store a winter’s worth of food in
their homes.
Whether this model is appropriate for every community
remains to be seen, but any viable solution will have
to address the same points.

The role of Cooperative Extension in providing
gardening and livestock programs for households and
training in sustainable practices for farmers will be
critical to the creation of sufficient agricultural
capacity to support the 100,000 residents of the
County without dependence on inputs from other areas,
which will be just as hard hit as we are.

Research questions
Knowing our limits. What is the carrying capacity of
Tompkins County’s current agricultural base? What
would the carrying capacity be if that base included
all the farmland not currently in production and all
the former farmland that has been taken out of
production (bearing in mind that a share of the land
taken out of production in the last century — the
great depression state buy-outs that created Shindagin
Hollow, Connecticut Hill, Hector National Forest,
Michigan Hollow, etc. — was taken out because the land
was hardscrabble and could not even be used for
pasture)? What would the steady-state carrying
capacity of the County’s existing and potential
farmland be if the County were closed to outside
inputs of cheap fertilizer and fuel?

Urban farming. How can families living on the small,
shaded lots typical of houses in Ithaca create
productive gardens? What would be the optimum way to
raise chickens on those plots if the present ordinance
prohibiting the keeping of chickens were changed? Is
it possible to grow fruit trees in town? If so, where?
Would it make sense for the city to plant fruit trees?
How could we ensure that those trees were provided
with specialized pruning, knowledge of the diseases
that afflict particular species, and water at critical
times? At what point will the need of city dwellers
for locally produced food overcome their aversion to
the mess made by the fruit and flowers dropped by
productive trees and the wildlife and bees they
attract? How do zoning laws need to change in order to
maximize the agricultural use of land in the County
that is now considered to be residential?

Sustainability. How much organic fertilizer (manure,
compost) will be needed to keep gardens productive if
the farms that can no longer afford synthetic
fertilizer use up all of the organic sources for their
own needs? How do we enable and encourage households
to compost all their garbage and grass clippings, not
as a trash abatement measure but rather as an
essential component of a sustainable food system? At
what point do we start encouraging the use of
composting toilets?

Nutrition. Which crops are needed to sustain local
health (in terms of vitamins, for example)? How do we
make sure that people have ready access to them?

Local food distribution
It’s obvious that our current system of “big box”
retail merchandizing, wholly dependent on the car for
customers and cheap supply chains for goods, is in for
very hard times as fuel becomes more expensive. The
most critical distribution problem, simply because it
is the most essential, is going to be the distribution
of food. Local production must be accompanied by local
distribution in order to reduce the total distance
between producer and consumer as far as possible.
Tompkins County already enjoys the beginnings of a
viable local food distribution system in its farmers’
markets, but a model of distribution in which everyone
drives down to the Steamboat Landing or out to
Trumansburg is not going to seem sensible as
individual car trips become more expensive (or less
money is available to pay for them). We need either to
expand the system of local markets in order to reduce
the average distance people have to travel to get to
them or introduce ways to bring people in to the
existing centers more cheaply by transporting them in
groups. Either way, planning for this system is deeply
intertwined with planning the expansion of public
transportation.

Research questions
Getting a handle on the current system. How far do
farmers travel now to the existing farmers’ markets?
How many customers do those markets have? How far do
they travel to get to the markets? How much bigger
would the markets have to be in order to supply most
of the food requirements of the current population?

Designing an expanded system. What arrangement of
local distribution centers would provide the maximum
reduction of farmer/customer travel distance? Which is
more efficient, increasing the number of distribution
centers to reduce the distance traveled in cars or
increasing the access to existing distribution centers
via public transit? Would it help to establish a
farmers’ market in each township? How does bringing
food to households via weekly delivery from CSA
programs compare in efficiency with any of the schemes
in which consumers travel to a distribution center?
Could we apply the “Empire Livestock” system in which
one driver picks up the goods from each farmer and
brings them to a central location?

Engaging the private sector. We used to have an
extensive network of local food distribution centers;
they were called “grocery stores.” What can we do at
the County level to encourage a market-driven
re-establishment of local stores?

Winter food supply
Climate presents a special food problem for our region
because many of the fruits and vegetables that are now
available year-round from places like Peru and New
Zealand will only be available for part of the year
when we can no longer afford to have them flown in
from halfway around the world. People will need help
in learning how to plan meals around seasonal
availability again. Two areas of special concern are
the preservation and storage of food for the winter
and the supply of fresh vegetables during the winter.

Research questions
Winter crops. Recent research has shown it possible to
grow certain species of green vegetables well into the
winter in places like Maine that have winters even
worse than ours. What would be required to equip
households with the garden structures needed to
provide food for most of the year in Tompkins County?
How could we give people incentives to deploy such
structures far enough in advance to be functioning
before a time of critical need?

Preservation. What techniques are best suited to the
conditions we will be facing after the peak? Does home
canning make sense given the requirements for
materials, equipment, training, and storage space?
Freezing is the easiest way to preserve most foods,
but at what point on the curve of rising electricity
prices does it become uneconomical? Which foods can be
preserved by drying? How well prepared are we to
expand existing programs of education in canning and
preservation techniques to embrace most households?
How can we promote the creation of root cellars and
train people in their maintenance and use?

Individual self-sufficiency vs. collective action.
Does it make sense to think in terms of household
self-sufficiency in a population with a high
proportion of single residents, or should we be
thinking instead of individual contributions of labor
to a system operated in common? Should we focus on
providing individual households with the means to
preserve food, or should we concentrate instead on a
market-driven re-establishment of what was once an
extensive local food processing industry?

Emergency food distribution. At what point should the
County begin to implement its own food preservation
and storage systems? How much stored food would be
needed to keep people alive in case of an unusually
short growing season or a disastrous late frost, and
how would the County get it to them?

Diet and health. What is the role of the County health
department in monitoring the nutritional status of
County residents? How do we cope with health problems
caused by nutritional deficiencies that haven’t been
seen for decades? At what point does the County step
in to commandeer and distribute foods essential for
health to poorer households?

Website for the group:

http://ibiblio.org/tcrp/doc/project.htm


Good luck is another name for tenacity of purpose.
         — Ralph Waldo Emerson



__________________________________
Yahoo! FareChase: Search multiple travel sites in one click.
http://farechase.yahoo.com

Hello Post Carbon large and small of the Bay Area~

I'm sending out a shout out to all interested people-
those of you who have been active in this smaller
sub-division of the PC-510 group and those of you who
draw interest in joining an active participation of
solutions for post carbon living...

It's been a while since we last met.

We shelved the October two-day conference as the
momentum of organizing for it began to wane...  Many
of us came to the conclusion that putting on a
conference around PC solutions wasn't the best use of
our time and
energy.

In the wake of Katrina, we've all seen the suject of
peak-oil wash into general awareness.  From BP and
Chevron's ads to the news papers...  As Chevron puts
it: Energy will be one of the defining issues of this
century, and one thing is clear: the era of easy oil
is over.
What we all do next will determine how well we meet
the energy needs of the entire world in this century
and beyond.

Some of us have been talking about what the community
of the East Bay can do to formulate plans of
sustainable living.  It helps to see the bigger
picture.  What is Berkeley and Oakland's carrying
capacity for food consumption and production, for
example?  This kind of data could be useful in many
contexts; most obviously,  as an overview of what we
have to work with.

In the final conference organizing meeting, James
Kalin suggested that we embark on a Willits-style
assessment.  I agree with James and propose that those
of us with the time and inclination do an assessment
of essential urban living needs such as:

ð        Food consumption and production
ð        Water consumption and supplies
ð        Energy consumption
ð        Transportation



More subject areas could be covered depending on how
many people join the project.  Each research area
would have a steering comittee, and progress could be
reported on in a meeting once every several weeks.

The report could be presented to city council members
and urban planners.  If city council members and urban
planners had this kind of information from a credible
community group, it could be used in a powerful mode.

I've cut & pasted a little segment of what the
Tompkins County Relocalization Plan in New York state
is organizing around food at the bottom of this mail.

Please take a moment to think about this idea....

Green Fest is coming up.  Who will be attending the
fest and Richard Heinburg & Joanna Macy's talk on
Saturday from 4-4:45pm?

The week following this festival would be a good time
to have a meeting to actualize this project and/or
hear ideas of what people have in mind for an action
plan.

I welcome any replies, thought or feedback you all may
have!

Yours in the vision~~

ingrid

Here is an excerpt from the TCRP web-site:

Local food production
As the price of oil rises, the increasing cost of
transportation will make local food production
essential to maintaining a proper level of nutrition
in the County, and the high cost of living will make
it necessary for most people to grow a significant
portion of their own food, just as they did before and
during World War II. Thus a two-pronged approach is
needed: one effort to encourage maximum utilization of
our farmland and one to encourage every household in a
position to do so to establish its own garden.
Ordinances that hinder household food production in
urban areas of the County will need to be revisited.

The County will need to cut taxes on agricultural
land, fund programs to train people in sustainable
gardening, and encourage the formation of CSAs
(community supported agriculture, that is, farm
produce subscription programs) in order to create as
much local agricultural production as the area can
sustain as quickly as possible. The County may need to
jumpstart partial self-sufficiency by providing plants
and animals free to households, much as forestry
programs provide seedlings for reforestation projects.
If food prices rise more quickly than expected, a
surge in demand for breeding poultry and small stock
may quickly exhaust limited sources of supply, so
programs to encourage local breeding programs may be
advisable to maximize the availability of spare
breeding stock in advance of demand.

The unusual demographics of Tompkins County will pose
special challenges to self-sufficiency. A large
portion of the population moves every year; this is
not conducive to home gardening. And much of the
population consists of students, who are not here
during most of the growing and harvest seasons.

The County’s permanent residents will also face
challenges in attempting self-sufficiency. There is
little room for gardening in densely populated areas,
and the soil isn’t the most productive for the types
of food that could be grown by residents. The lovely
small shaded lots seen in the City of Ithaca are not
well situated for the sunlight needed in our short
growing season. Many of the elderly and disabled won’t
be able to maintain gardens. Most able-bodied
residents have little experience in gardening and
almost none in animal care. The introduction of
livestock into urban areas could lead to outbreaks of
diseases such as avian flu; many viruses are capable
of migration between animal to human in such a
setting. Commercial agriculture is subject to a level
of regulation and record keeping that would be absent
in the general population; livestock raised by a mass
of untrained individuals could suffer outbreaks of
disease that we have no way of tracking or treating.
Even so, it’s difficult to envision a workable future
that doesn’t encourage as much home gardening as
possible, including a few chickens for every
household, as was common almost everywhere fifty years
ago.

It is possible that the optimum answer given our
demographics is to encourage denser populations
(easier to heat, easier to transport, easier to supply
with food, health care, and other services, including
education and jobs) and encourage agriculture by
providing subsidies (tax relief, housing, low-interest
loans) to those who would grow the food to support the
remainder of the community. Right now farmers are
getting old and retiring. They would love to see the
farms that their families have built for a century
continue to be productive, but farming right now isn’t
an attractive prospect for most young people. It is
possible that incentives and income could bring enough
farmers into the County to provide enough food for its
residents and maybe some for export (more on that idea
below).

Community gardens are not a complete answer to urban
self-sufficiency, but they could help. They could also
be expanded to provide some or all of the following
functions:

Access to heritage seeds. Hybridized and genetically
modified seeds are highly regulated and expensive. It
would be necessary to remove ourselves from that loop
quickly.
Facilities to store seeds for each year. Without a
seed stock, which the average individual isn’t capable
of maintaining, there’s no way to sustain production.
Transport to the co-op gardens so that people are able
to maintain them.
Storage for the harvest at the community garden level.
Root cellars or a canning facilty would be more
practical at this location. Most apartment dwellers
don’t have room to store a winter’s worth of food in
their homes.
Whether this model is appropriate for every community
remains to be seen, but any viable solution will have
to address the same points.

The role of Cooperative Extension in providing
gardening and livestock programs for households and
training in sustainable practices for farmers will be
critical to the creation of sufficient agricultural
capacity to support the 100,000 residents of the
County without dependence on inputs from other areas,
which will be just as hard hit as we are.

Research questions
Knowing our limits. What is the carrying capacity of
Tompkins County’s current agricultural base? What
would the carrying capacity be if that base included
all the farmland not currently in production and all
the former farmland that has been taken out of
production (bearing in mind that a share of the land
taken out of production in the last century — the
great depression state buy-outs that created Shindagin
Hollow, Connecticut Hill, Hector National Forest,
Michigan Hollow, etc. — was taken out because the land
was hardscrabble and could not even be used for
pasture)? What would the steady-state carrying
capacity of the County’s existing and potential
farmland be if the County were closed to outside
inputs of cheap fertilizer and fuel?

Urban farming. How can families living on the small,
shaded lots typical of houses in Ithaca create
productive gardens? What would be the optimum way to
raise chickens on those plots if the present ordinance
prohibiting the keeping of chickens were changed? Is
it possible to grow fruit trees in town? If so, where?
Would it make sense for the city to plant fruit trees?
How could we ensure that those trees were provided
with specialized pruning, knowledge of the diseases
that afflict particular species, and water at critical
times? At what point will the need of city dwellers
for locally produced food overcome their aversion to
the mess made by the fruit and flowers dropped by
productive trees and the wildlife and bees they
attract? How do zoning laws need to change in order to
maximize the agricultural use of land in the County
that is now considered to be residential?

Sustainability. How much organic fertilizer (manure,
compost) will be needed to keep gardens productive if
the farms that can no longer afford synthetic
fertilizer use up all of the organic sources for their
own needs? How do we enable and encourage households
to compost all their garbage and grass clippings, not
as a trash abatement measure but rather as an
essential component of a sustainable food system? At
what point do we start encouraging the use of
composting toilets?

Nutrition. Which crops are needed to sustain local
health (in terms of vitamins, for example)? How do we
make sure that people have ready access to them?

Local food distribution
It’s obvious that our current system of “big box”
retail merchandizing, wholly dependent on the car for
customers and cheap supply chains for goods, is in for
very hard times as fuel becomes more expensive. The
most critical distribution problem, simply because it
is the most essential, is going to be the distribution
of food. Local production must be accompanied by local
distribution in order to reduce the total distance
between producer and consumer as far as possible.
Tompkins County already enjoys the beginnings of a
viable local food distribution system in its farmers’
markets, but a model of distribution in which everyone
drives down to the Steamboat Landing or out to
Trumansburg is not going to seem sensible as
individual car trips become more expensive (or less
money is available to pay for them). We need either to
expand the system of local markets in order to reduce
the average distance people have to travel to get to
them or introduce ways to bring people in to the
existing centers more cheaply by transporting them in
groups. Either way, planning for this system is deeply
intertwined with planning the expansion of public
transportation.

Research questions
Getting a handle on the current system. How far do
farmers travel now to the existing farmers’ markets?
How many customers do those markets have? How far do
they travel to get to the markets? How much bigger
would the markets have to be in order to supply most
of the food requirements of the current population?

Designing an expanded system. What arrangement of
local distribution centers would provide the maximum
reduction of farmer/customer travel distance? Which is
more efficient, increasing the number of distribution
centers to reduce the distance traveled in cars or
increasing the access to existing distribution centers
via public transit? Would it help to establish a
farmers’ market in each township? How does bringing
food to households via weekly delivery from CSA
programs compare in efficiency with any of the schemes
in which consumers travel to a distribution center?
Could we apply the “Empire Livestock” system in which
one driver picks up the goods from each farmer and
brings them to a central location?

Engaging the private sector. We used to have an
extensive network of local food distribution centers;
they were called “grocery stores.” What can we do at
the County level to encourage a market-driven
re-establishment of local stores?

Winter food supply
Climate presents a special food problem for our region
because many of the fruits and vegetables that are now
available year-round from places like Peru and New
Zealand will only be available for part of the year
when we can no longer afford to have them flown in
from halfway around the world. People will need help
in learning how to plan meals around seasonal
availability again. Two areas of special concern are
the preservation and storage of food for the winter
and the supply of fresh vegetables during the winter.

Research questions
Winter crops. Recent research has shown it possible to
grow certain species of green vegetables well into the
winter in places like Maine that have winters even
worse than ours. What would be required to equip
households with the garden structures needed to
provide food for most of the year in Tompkins County?
How could we give people incentives to deploy such
structures far enough in advance to be functioning
before a time of critical need?

Preservation. What techniques are best suited to the
conditions we will be facing after the peak? Does home
canning make sense given the requirements for
materials, equipment, training, and storage space?
Freezing is the easiest way to preserve most foods,
but at what point on the curve of rising electricity
prices does it become uneconomical? Which foods can be
preserved by drying? How well prepared are we to
expand existing programs of education in canning and
preservation techniques to embrace most households?
How can we promote the creation of root cellars and
train people in their maintenance and use?

Individual self-sufficiency vs. collective action.
Does it make sense to think in terms of household
self-sufficiency in a population with a high
proportion of single residents, or should we be
thinking instead of individual contributions of labor
to a system operated in common? Should we focus on
providing individual households with the means to
preserve food, or should we concentrate instead on a
market-driven re-establishment of what was once an
extensive local food processing industry?

Emergency food distribution. At what point should the
County begin to implement its own food preservation
and storage systems? How much stored food would be
needed to keep people alive in case of an unusually
short growing season or a disastrous late frost, and
how would the County get it to them?

Diet and health. What is the role of the County health
department in monitoring the nutritional status of
County residents? How do we cope with health problems
caused by nutritional deficiencies that haven’t been
seen for decades? At what point does the County step
in to commandeer and distribute foods essential for
health to poorer households?

Website for the group:

http://ibiblio.org/tcrp/doc/project.htm


Good luck is another name for tenacity of purpose.
         — Ralph Waldo Emerson



__________________________________
Yahoo! FareChase: Search multiple travel sites in one click.
http://farechase.yahoo.com

Hello Post Carbon large and small of the Bay Area~

I'm sending out a shout out to all interested people-
those of you who have been active in this smaller
sub-division of the PC-510 group and those of you who
draw interest in joining an active participation of
solutions for post carbon living...

It's been a while since we last met.

We shelved the October two-day conference as the
momentum of organizing for it began to wane...  Many
of us came to the conclusion that putting on a
conference around PC solutions wasn't the best use of
our time and
energy.

In the wake of Katrina, we've all seen the suject of
peak-oil wash into general awareness.  From BP and
Chevron's ads to the news papers...  As Chevron puts
it: Energy will be one of the defining issues of this
century, and one thing is clear: the era of easy oil
is over.
What we all do next will determine how well we meet
the energy needs of the entire world in this century
and beyond.

Some of us have been talking about what the community
of the East Bay can do to formulate plans of
sustainable living.  It helps to see the bigger
picture.  What is Berkeley and Oakland's carrying
capacity for food consumption and production, for
example?  This kind of data could be useful in many
contexts; most obviously,  as an overview of what we
have to work with.

In the final conference organizing meeting, James
Kalin suggested that we embark on a Willits-style
assessment.  I agree with James and propose that those
of us with the time and inclination do an assessment
of essential urban living needs such as:

ð        Food consumption and production
ð        Water consumption and supplies
ð        Energy consumption
ð        Transportation



More subject areas could be covered depending on how
many people join the project.  Each research area
would have a steering comittee, and progress could be
reported on in a meeting once every several weeks.

The report could be presented to city council members
and urban planners.  If city council members and urban
planners had this kind of information from a credible
community group, it could be used in a powerful mode.

I've cut & pasted a little segment of what the
Tompkins County Relocalization Plan in New York state
is organizing around food at the bottom of this mail.

Please take a moment to think about this idea....

Green Fest is coming up.  Who will be attending the
fest and Richard Heinburg & Joanna Macy's talk on
Saturday from 4-4:45pm?

The week following this festival would be a good time
to have a meeting to actualize this project and/or
hear ideas of what people have in mind for an action
plan.

I welcome any replies, thought or feedback you all may
have!

Yours in the vision~~

ingrid

Here is an excerpt from the TCRP web-site:

Local food production
As the price of oil rises, the increasing cost of
transportation will make local food production
essential to maintaining a proper level of nutrition
in the County, and the high cost of living will make
it necessary for most people to grow a significant
portion of their own food, just as they did before and
during World War II. Thus a two-pronged approach is
needed: one effort to encourage maximum utilization of
our farmland and one to encourage every household in a
position to do so to establish its own garden.
Ordinances that hinder household food production in
urban areas of the County will need to be revisited.

The County will need to cut taxes on agricultural
land, fund programs to train people in sustainable
gardening, and encourage the formation of CSAs
(community supported agriculture, that is, farm
produce subscription programs) in order to create as
much local agricultural production as the area can
sustain as quickly as possible. The County may need to
jumpstart partial self-sufficiency by providing plants
and animals free to households, much as forestry
programs provide seedlings for reforestation projects.
If food prices rise more quickly than expected, a
surge in demand for breeding poultry and small stock
may quickly exhaust limited sources of supply, so
programs to encourage local breeding programs may be
advisable to maximize the availability of spare
breeding stock in advance of demand.

The unusual demographics of Tompkins County will pose
special challenges to self-sufficiency. A large
portion of the population moves every year; this is
not conducive to home gardening. And much of the
population consists of students, who are not here
during most of the growing and harvest seasons.

The County’s permanent residents will also face
challenges in attempting self-sufficiency. There is
little room for gardening in densely populated areas,
and the soil isn’t the most productive for the types
of food that could be grown by residents. The lovely
small shaded lots seen in the City of Ithaca are not
well situated for the sunlight needed in our short
growing season. Many of the elderly and disabled won’t
be able to maintain gardens. Most able-bodied
residents have little experience in gardening and
almost none in animal care. The introduction of
livestock into urban areas could lead to outbreaks of
diseases such as avian flu; many viruses are capable
of migration between animal to human in such a
setting. Commercial agriculture is subject to a level
of regulation and record keeping that would be absent
in the general population; livestock raised by a mass
of untrained individuals could suffer outbreaks of
disease that we have no way of tracking or treating.
Even so, it’s difficult to envision a workable future
that doesn’t encourage as much home gardening as
possible, including a few chickens for every
household, as was common almost everywhere fifty years
ago.

It is possible that the optimum answer given our
demographics is to encourage denser populations
(easier to heat, easier to transport, easier to supply
with food, health care, and other services, including
education and jobs) and encourage agriculture by
providing subsidies (tax relief, housing, low-interest
loans) to those who would grow the food to support the
remainder of the community. Right now farmers are
getting old and retiring. They would love to see the
farms that their families have built for a century
continue to be productive, but farming right now isn’t
an attractive prospect for most young people. It is
possible that incentives and income could bring enough
farmers into the County to provide enough food for its
residents and maybe some for export (more on that idea
below).

Community gardens are not a complete answer to urban
self-sufficiency, but they could help. They could also
be expanded to provide some or all of the following
functions:

Access to heritage seeds. Hybridized and genetically
modified seeds are highly regulated and expensive. It
would be necessary to remove ourselves from that loop
quickly.
Facilities to store seeds for each year. Without a
seed stock, which the average individual isn’t capable
of maintaining, there’s no way to sustain production.
Transport to the co-op gardens so that people are able
to maintain them.
Storage for the harvest at the community garden level.
Root cellars or a canning facilty would be more
practical at this location. Most apartment dwellers
don’t have room to store a winter’s worth of food in
their homes.
Whether this model is appropriate for every community
remains to be seen, but any viable solution will have
to address the same points.

The role of Cooperative Extension in providing
gardening and livestock programs for households and
training in sustainable practices for farmers will be
critical to the creation of sufficient agricultural
capacity to support the 100,000 residents of the
County without dependence on inputs from other areas,
which will be just as hard hit as we are.

Research questions
Knowing our limits. What is the carrying capacity of
Tompkins County’s current agricultural base? What
would the carrying capacity be if that base included
all the farmland not currently in production and all
the former farmland that has been taken out of
production (bearing in mind that a share of the land
taken out of production in the last century — the
great depression state buy-outs that created Shindagin
Hollow, Connecticut Hill, Hector National Forest,
Michigan Hollow, etc. — was taken out because the land
was hardscrabble and could not even be used for
pasture)? What would the steady-state carrying
capacity of the County’s existing and potential
farmland be if the County were closed to outside
inputs of cheap fertilizer and fuel?

Urban farming. How can families living on the small,
shaded lots typical of houses in Ithaca create
productive gardens? What would be the optimum way to
raise chickens on those plots if the present ordinance
prohibiting the keeping of chickens were changed? Is
it possible to grow fruit trees in town? If so, where?
Would it make sense for the city to plant fruit trees?
How could we ensure that those trees were provided
with specialized pruning, knowledge of the diseases
that afflict particular species, and water at critical
times? At what point will the need of city dwellers
for locally produced food overcome their aversion to
the mess made by the fruit and flowers dropped by
productive trees and the wildlife and bees they
attract? How do zoning laws need to change in order to
maximize the agricultural use of land in the County
that is now considered to be residential?

Sustainability. How much organic fertilizer (manure,
compost) will be needed to keep gardens productive if
the farms that can no longer afford synthetic
fertilizer use up all of the organic sources for their
own needs? How do we enable and encourage households
to compost all their garbage and grass clippings, not
as a trash abatement measure but rather as an
essential component of a sustainable food system? At
what point do we start encouraging the use of
composting toilets?

Nutrition. Which crops are needed to sustain local
health (in terms of vitamins, for example)? How do we
make sure that people have ready access to them?

Local food distribution
It’s obvious that our current system of “big box”
retail merchandizing, wholly dependent on the car for
customers and cheap supply chains for goods, is in for
very hard times as fuel becomes more expensive. The
most critical distribution problem, simply because it
is the most essential, is going to be the distribution
of food. Local production must be accompanied by local
distribution in order to reduce the total distance
between producer and consumer as far as possible.
Tompkins County already enjoys the beginnings of a
viable local food distribution system in its farmers’
markets, but a model of distribution in which everyone
drives down to the Steamboat Landing or out to
Trumansburg is not going to seem sensible as
individual car trips become more expensive (or less
money is available to pay for them). We need either to
expand the system of local markets in order to reduce
the average distance people have to travel to get to
them or introduce ways to bring people in to the
existing centers more cheaply by transporting them in
groups. Either way, planning for this system is deeply
intertwined with planning the expansion of public
transportation.

Research questions
Getting a handle on the current system. How far do
farmers travel now to the existing farmers’ markets?
How many customers do those markets have? How far do
they travel to get to the markets? How much bigger
would the markets have to be in order to supply most
of the food requirements of the current population?

Designing an expanded system. What arrangement of
local distribution centers would provide the maximum
reduction of farmer/customer travel distance? Which is
more efficient, increasing the number of distribution
centers to reduce the distance traveled in cars or
increasing the access to existing distribution centers
via public transit? Would it help to establish a
farmers’ market in each township? How does bringing
food to households via weekly delivery from CSA
programs compare in efficiency with any of the schemes
in which consumers travel to a distribution center?
Could we apply the “Empire Livestock” system in which
one driver picks up the goods from each farmer and
brings them to a central location?

Engaging the private sector. We used to have an
extensive network of local food distribution centers;
they were called “grocery stores.” What can we do at
the County level to encourage a market-driven
re-establishment of local stores?

Winter food supply
Climate presents a special food problem for our region
because many of the fruits and vegetables that are now
available year-round from places like Peru and New
Zealand will only be available for part of the year
when we can no longer afford to have them flown in
from halfway around the world. People will need help
in learning how to plan meals around seasonal
availability again. Two areas of special concern are
the preservation and storage of food for the winter
and the supply of fresh vegetables during the winter.

Research questions
Winter crops. Recent research has shown it possible to
grow certain species of green vegetables well into the
winter in places like Maine that have winters even
worse than ours. What would be required to equip
households with the garden structures needed to
provide food for most of the year in Tompkins County?
How could we give people incentives to deploy such
structures far enough in advance to be functioning
before a time of critical need?

Preservation. What techniques are best suited to the
conditions we will be facing after the peak? Does home
canning make sense given the requirements for
materials, equipment, training, and storage space?
Freezing is the easiest way to preserve most foods,
but at what point on the curve of rising electricity
prices does it become uneconomical? Which foods can be
preserved by drying? How well prepared are we to
expand existing programs of education in canning and
preservation techniques to embrace most households?
How can we promote the creation of root cellars and
train people in their maintenance and use?

Individual self-sufficiency vs. collective action.
Does it make sense to think in terms of household
self-sufficiency in a population with a high
proportion of single residents, or should we be
thinking instead of individual contributions of labor
to a system operated in common? Should we focus on
providing individual households with the means to
preserve food, or should we concentrate instead on a
market-driven re-establishment of what was once an
extensive local food processing industry?

Emergency food distribution. At what point should the
County begin to implement its own food preservation
and storage systems? How much stored food would be
needed to keep people alive in case of an unusually
short growing season or a disastrous late frost, and
how would the County get it to them?

Diet and health. What is the role of the County health
department in monitoring the nutritional status of
County residents? How do we cope with health problems
caused by nutritional deficiencies that haven’t been
seen for decades? At what point does the County step
in to commandeer and distribute foods essential for
health to poorer households?

Website for the group:

http://ibiblio.org/tcrp/doc/project.htm


Good luck is another name for tenacity of purpose.
         — Ralph Waldo Emerson




__________________________________
Yahoo! Mail - PC Magazine Editors' Choice 2005
http://mail.yahoo.com

Before we start shouting "cataclysm", here's a completely different
perspective... not at all a scared one (at least, not scared of the
flu).

(I can't speak to the credibility of the "Global News Matrix", but the
information sounds plausible.  It wouldn't be the first time that
corruption has led us down an unnecessary dead end.)  If this is true,
then the Right has once again (as it has repeatedly done so well) got
the Left scrambling around in paranoia and making a big profit to boot.

<http://www.globalnewsmatrix.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid
=3143>

RUMSFELD TO PROFIT FROM BIRD FLU HOAX
 
You can't make any real money without a boogeyman, and the new "Bird
Flu" hoax is the latest scam used to generate profits for
pharmaceutical company insiders.

"Finally, the pieces of the puzzle start to add up," writes Dr. Joseph
Mercola, author of the "Total Health Program." "President Bush sought
to instill panic in this country by telling us a minimum of 200,000
people will die from the avian flu pandemic but it could be as bad as 2
million deaths in this country alone."
<http://mercola.com/blog/2005/oct/19/rumsfeld_to_profit_from_avian_flu_
hoax>

"This hoax is then used to justify the immediate purchase of 80 million
doses of Tamiflu, a worthless drug that in no way shape or form treats
the avian flu, but only decreases the amount of days one is sick and
can actually contribute to the virus having more lethal mutations,"
Mercola continues.

"So the U.S. placed an order for 20 million doses of this worthless
drug at a price of $100 per dose. That comes to a staggering $2
billion."

US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, former chairman of Gilead, the
manufacturer of Tamiflu, will also make big profits, since he is a
major shareholder.

Better yet, Bilderberger spokesman Etienne F. Davignon (Vice-Chairman,
Suez-Tractebel) and Reagan-Bush former Secretary of State George P.
Shultz, PhD (Distinguished Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford
University) are also on the board of directors of Gilead.
<http://www.gilead.com/wt/sec/bod>
Another Bilderberger regular is Lodewijk J.R. de Vink, who sits on the
board of Hoffman-La Roche, Gilead's partner.
<http://www.roche.com/home/company/com_gov/com_gov_dir/com_gov_dir_vink
.htm>

In other words, the "Bird Flu" scam will generate outrageous profits
for globalist-insiders like Shultz, Rumsfeld, Davignon, and de Vink.

And where did Tamiflu come from?

According to the Gilead website, "In September 1996, Gilead and F.
Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd. entered into a collaborative agreement to
develop and market therapies that treat and prevent viral influenza.
Under the agreement, Roche received exclusive worldwide rights to
Gilead's proprietary influenza neuraminidase inhibitors, including
orally administered Tamiflu (oseltamivir phosphate), formerly known as
GS 4104. As part of this collaboration, Gilead and Roche jointly
conducted clinical development of oseltamivir phosphate, with Roche
funding all research and development costs. Roche has worldwide
commercial rights to Tamiflu, and Gilead receives payments from Roche
for the successful completion of program milestones and royalties on
product sales." (http://www.gilead.com/wt/sec/partners)

It should be remembered that Rumsfeld loves pharmaceutical scams. It
was after all Rumsfeld, as chairman of G.D. Searle, who pressured the
FDA to get Aspartame approved.

The FDA blocked its approval for ten years before Rumsfeld twisted arms
and broke who knows how many legs at the FDA. Now Aspartame, an
artificial sweetener as ubiquitous as it is toxic, continues to poison
America and the world.

So here! 's an advertising tagline:
Tamiflu -- It's the Bird-Flu Scam-Drug For You

Quoting Alice Friedemann <alice_friedemann@...>:

> Hello everyone,
>
> You've probably noticed an awful lot of coverage about the avian flu
> lately ...
>
> <snip>
>
> If this doesn't kick you into gear to buy emergency supplies, then I
> don't know what will.  You should have them anyhow for earthquakes,
> power outages, oil shortages, etc.  I have to admit -- I've read up
> on
> food storage, but haven't actually done it myself (mainly because I
> had a packrat Grandma that my husband is worried I'll become some
> day
> as genetics and old age kick in -- he'd go nuts if I started
> hoarding
> food...).  In another post I'll write up what I think you could do,
> and I hope others will too...  The fluwikie url above has a section
> on
> food, water, medical preparedness that looks good.
>
> I'd also like to know how to harvest rain water from our roof,
> anyone
> have any ideas on that?
>
> Alice

Before we start shouting "cataclysm", here's a completely different
perspective... not at all a scared one (at least, not scared of the
flu).

(I can't speak to the credibility of the "Global News Matrix", but the
information sounds plausible.  It wouldn't be the first time that
corruption has led us down an unnecessary dead end.)  If this is true,
then the Right has once again (as it has repeatedly done so well) got
the Left scrambling around in paranoia and making a big profit to boot.

<http://www.globalnewsmatrix.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid
=3143>

RUMSFELD TO PROFIT FROM BIRD FLU HOAX
 
You can't make any real money without a boogeyman, and the new "Bird
Flu" hoax is the latest scam used to generate profits for
pharmaceutical company insiders.

"Finally, the pieces of the puzzle start to add up," writes Dr. Joseph
Mercola, author of the "Total Health Program." "President Bush sought
to instill panic in this country by telling us a minimum of 200,000
people will die from the avian flu pandemic but it could be as bad as 2
million deaths in this country alone."
<http://mercola.com/blog/2005/oct/19/rumsfeld_to_profit_from_avian_flu_
hoax>

"This hoax is then used to justify the immediate purchase of 80 million
doses of Tamiflu, a worthless drug that in no way shape or form treats
the avian flu, but only decreases the amount of days one is sick and
can actually contribute to the virus having more lethal mutations,"
Mercola continues.

"So the U.S. placed an order for 20 million doses of this worthless
drug at a price of $100 per dose. That comes to a staggering $2
billion."

US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, former chairman of Gilead, the
manufacturer of Tamiflu, will also make big profits, since he is a
major shareholder.

Better yet, Bilderberger spokesman Etienne F. Davignon (Vice-Chairman,
Suez-Tractebel) and Reagan-Bush former Secretary of State George P.
Shultz, PhD (Distinguished Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford
University) are also on the board of directors of Gilead.
<http://www.gilead.com/wt/sec/bod>
Another Bilderberger regular is Lodewijk J.R. de Vink, who sits on the
board of Hoffman-La Roche, Gilead's partner.
<http://www.roche.com/home/company/com_gov/com_gov_dir/com_gov_dir_vink
.htm>

In other words, the "Bird Flu" scam will generate outrageous profits
for globalist-insiders like Shultz, Rumsfeld, Davignon, and de Vink.

And where did Tamiflu come from?

According to the Gilead website, "In September 1996, Gilead and F.
Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd. entered into a collaborative agreement to
develop and market therapies that treat and prevent viral influenza.
Under the agreement, Roche received exclusive worldwide rights to
Gilead's proprietary influenza neuraminidase inhibitors, including
orally administered Tamiflu (oseltamivir phosphate), formerly known as
GS 4104. As part of this collaboration, Gilead and Roche jointly
conducted clinical development of oseltamivir phosphate, with Roche
funding all research and development costs. Roche has worldwide
commercial rights to Tamiflu, and Gilead receives payments from Roche
for the successful completion of program milestones and royalties on
product sales." (http://www.gilead.com/wt/sec/partners)

It should be remembered that Rumsfeld loves pharmaceutical scams. It
was after all Rumsfeld, as chairman of G.D. Searle, who pressured the
FDA to get Aspartame approved.

The FDA blocked its approval for ten years before Rumsfeld twisted arms
and broke who knows how many legs at the FDA. Now Aspartame, an
artificial sweetener as ubiquitous as it is toxic, continues to poison
America and the world.

So here! 's an advertising tagline:
Tamiflu -- It's the Bird-Flu Scam-Drug For You

Quoting Alice Friedemann <alice_friedemann@...>:

> Hello everyone,
>
> You've probably noticed an awful lot of coverage about the avian flu
> lately ...
>
> <snip>
>
> If this doesn't kick you into gear to buy emergency supplies, then I
> don't know what will.  You should have them anyhow for earthquakes,
> power outages, oil shortages, etc.  I have to admit -- I've read up
> on
> food storage, but haven't actually done it myself (mainly because I
> had a packrat Grandma that my husband is worried I'll become some
> day
> as genetics and old age kick in -- he'd go nuts if I started
> hoarding
> food...).  In another post I'll write up what I think you could do,
> and I hope others will too...  The fluwikie url above has a section
> on
> food, water, medical preparedness that looks good.
>
> I'd also like to know how to harvest rain water from our roof,
> anyone
> have any ideas on that?
>
> Alice

--- SierraPermaculture@yahoogroups.com wrote:

> Date: 28 Oct 2005 18:01:35 -0000
> From: SierraPermaculture@yahoogroups.com
> To: SierraPermaculture@yahoogroups.com
> Subject: [SierraPermaculture] Digest Number 13
>
> ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor
> --------------------~-->
> Get fast access to your favorite Yahoo! Groups. Make
> Yahoo! your home page
>
http://us.click.yahoo.com/dpRU5A/wUILAA/yQLSAA/U8XolB/TM
>
--------------------------------------------------------------------~->
>
>
> There are 2 messages in this issue.
>
> Topics in this digest:
>
>       1. Event: Peak oil to be hot issue at SF's
> Green Festival Nov 5-6
>            From: Gryphon Danu
> <gryphon@...>
>       2. Bill Mollison Radio Interview
>            From: Gryphon Danu
> <gryphon@...>
>
>
>
________________________________________________________________________
>
________________________________________________________________________
>
> Message: 1
>    Date: Thu, 27 Oct 2005 12:09:19 -0700
>    From: Gryphon Danu <gryphon@...>
> Subject: Event: Peak oil to be hot issue at SF's
> Green Festival Nov 5-6
>
> /Published on 27 Oct 2005 by Energy Bulletin
> <http://energybulletin.net/10164.html>.// Archived
> on 27 Oct 2005./
>
>
>   Peak oil to be hot issue at SF's Green Festival
> Nov 5-6
>
> *by Shepherd Bliss*
>
>
> Peak Oil is finally getting more attention in the
> mainstream media.
> Environmental circles are also discussing it more,
> as evidenced by the
> Green Festival in San Francisco Nov. 5-6. This 4th
> annual event is
> co-sponsored by Global Exchange and Co-Op America
> (www.greenfestivals.org
> <http://www.greenfestivals.org>). Their previous
> festivals have reportedly drawn 20,000 to 30,000
> visitors, who pay only
> $15 for both days full schedule.
>
> Author Richard Heinberg will be joined by
> eco-philosopher Joanna Macy on
> Saturday to speak about "Avoid Oil Wars, Terrorism
> and Economic
> Collapse." A lecture on "Creative Solutions to the
> Peak Oil Challenge"
> by Chantal Simonpietre and Cliff Paulin will be
> given at the same time.
> Peak Oil activists Brian and Ann Weller of Willits,
> CA, will follow with
> a solution-oriented presentation "Building
> Sustainable Communities,"
> which will focus on the localization movement.
>
> Author Linda Hempel is scheduled to speak on
> "Farmers Growing Fuel,"
> also on Sat. The description of her presentations
> notes "As the era of
> cheap fossil fuels ends, alternative fuels are
> gaining rapid
> acceptance." She will focus on "biodiesel as a
> clean-burning, homegrown
> alternative fuel. Biodiesel is good for people, the
> planet and the future."
>
> The description of PlaNetwork Jim Fournier's
> presentation on "The Shift
> Point" notes, "The human population, peak oil,
> atmospheric CO2, mass
> extinction of species and the overall rate of
> consumption of renewable
> resources are all rapidly approaching absolute
> limits."
>
> Co-Op America Executive Director Alisa Gravitz will
> lecture on Sun.
> about "what it's really like to sit at the table and
> push corporations
> like ExxonMobil (and) General Motors to adopt
> responsible practices and
> policies."
>
> Among the nearly 500 exhibitors will be various ones
> related to energy
> depletion issues. The Post Carbon Institute, for
> example, will be
> present with information about its work. Following
> the Willits
> presentation of Sa., at 6 p.m., there will be a
> gathering of people
> interested in Peak Oil at the Post Carbon booth,
> #953, which is in the
> Community Action/Networking area.
>
> Publications reporting on Peak Oil will also have
> recent issues
> available to festival participants. HopeDance from
> Southern California
> featured three Peak Oil articles in its
> September/October issues,
> including reports on a recent Heinberg talk, on
> "Willits, CA Comes to
> Term with Peak Oil," and "A Peak Oil Primer." Its
> next issue also
> promises more articles related to energy descent.
>
> Peak Oil is likely to be mentioned by some of the
> other more than 100
> speakers. New Dimensions Radio cofounder Michael
> Toms will talk about
> "Ecology, Energy, Equity, Economics, and Everyone."
> Among other
> prominent presenters are Amy Goodman, host of
> Democracy Now!, who "will
> deliver a scathing critique of commercial news
> media." National radio
> commentator and Texan Jim Hightower will speak about
> "The Powers That
> Ought to Be." Other speakers include actress and
> yoga devotee Mariel
> Hemingway, Global Exchange co-founders Medea
> Benjamin and Kevin Danaher,
> economist Hazel Henderson, green architects Sim Van
> der Ryn and William
> McDonough. All for only $15.
>
> /(Dr. Shepherd Bliss, sb3@..., teaches college
> on the Big Island and
> writes for the Hawai'i Island Journal and the
> Honolulu Weekly.)/
>
>
> [This message contained attachments]
>
>
>
>
________________________________________________________________________
>
________________________________________________________________________
>
> Message: 2
>    Date: Fri, 28 Oct 2005 09:59:54 -0700
>    From: Gryphon Danu <gryphon@...>
> Subject: Bill Mollison Radio Interview
>
> Bill Mollison was recently on Aussie radio...
>
>
<http://www.abc.net.au/southeastnsw/stories/s1490468.htm>
>
> Bill Mollison had not spoken to the media for over a
> decade, but in a recent
> discussion on ABC South East, he joined Tim Holt and
> regular guest, John
> Champagne and spoke with the same passion, anger and
> hopes that drove him to
> develop the Principles of Permaculture and take it
> to the world 30 years
> ago.
>
>
>
>
________________________________________________________________________
>
________________________________________________________________________
>
>
>
>
------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SierraPermaculture/
>
>     SierraPermaculture-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com
>
>
>
------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>
>
>

test

Hello everyone,

You've probably noticed an awful lot of coverage about the avian flu
lately -- here are the headlines of some of the stories from just two
weeks in the New York Times:

OCT 21  U.K. Sets up bird flu database
Oct 20  Latin America Takes Bird Flu Measures
Oct 20  Middle East Braces for Migrating Birds
Oct 20  Turning a Flu Virus Into a Weapon
Oct 20  Bird Flu Going to East Africa, United Nations Officials Fear
Oct 20  Families Confront a Perilous World
Oct 19  Better Planning Is Needed for Flu Drugs, Experts Say Oct 18
Poultry Power: China, With Huge Flocks, Is at Big Flu Risk
Oct 18  As Alarm Over Flu Grows, Agency Tries to Quiet Fears
Oct 17  Recipe for Destruction Oct 16  From Washington, a Story About
a Killer Flu
Oct 15  Flu Strain Isolated in Vietnamese Girl Is Resistant to Drug,
Scientists Report
Oct 15  Europe Steps Up Efforts to Stop Avian Flu
Oct 20  Bird Flu Kills Thai Man, Jakarta Fears Mutation
Oct 20  UN Expert Says Bird Flu "Deeply Embedded" in Asia
Oct 14  US Says Bird Flu in Europe a " Troubling Sign"
Oct 13  Europe's Avian Flu Experts Hold Crisis Talks
Oct 13  Avian Flu in Turkey Is the Same Deadly Strain as Asia
Oct 11  Fortresses Against Flu
Oct 11  Pressure Rises on Producer of a Flu Drug
Oct  9  Danger of Flu Pandemic is Clear, if Not Present
Oct  9  The Front Lines in the Battle Against Avian Flu Are Running
Short of Money
Oct  8  Bush Plan Shows U.S. Is Not Ready for Deadly Flu
Oct  8  Bird Flu and the 1918 Pandemic
Oct  7  Talk of Bird Flu Pandemic Revives Interest in Passed-Over Drugs
Oct  7  Officials May Spend Billions To Stockpile Influenza Drug
Oct  6  Experts unlock clues to spread of 1918 flu virus
Oct  5  Fear of Flu Outbreak Rattles Washington

I've attached a very important document in the files section that you
should print off and have at hand, called
PreparingForNextFluPandemic.pdf by Dr. Grattan Woodson.

Dr. Woodson updates this periodically, the latest version is on the
page
http://www.fluwikie.com/index.php?n=Consequences.PandemicPreparednessGuides

fluwikie.com has a great deal of excellent information about the flu.

The reason you need to have this printed off, is that it contains the
medical supplies you need to have on hand, and instructions on how to
take care of people who are stricken.  The good news is that half of
you will get the virus and not even know it. But the other half will
get it to some extent, and many will only make it through if the folks
who are immune take care of them.  There won't be enough doctors and
nurses to do that -- you must rely on your family and friends.

Key points in the attached Preparing for the pandemic pdf:

- This new strain has the potential to kill hundreds of millions given
the right conditions.

- If we have a major event, it would be prudent to plan to be
self-reliant for about three months.

- While vaccination is our best hope of avoiding catastrophe, it is
pretty certain that none will be available when the first wave of the
pandemic spreads across the globe.  This means that in all likelihood,
the first wave will be characterized with a high rate of infection and
many deaths.

- A Major Pandemic will Disrupt Essential Public Services & Supplies.
In the event of a major pandemic with a case fatality rate that
exceeds 5%, it is my opinion that there will be a temporary breakdown
in food delivery, the electric and water utility services, and
possibly even public order in major urban areas worldwide.

- High population density is a well-known and understood factor
favoring epidemics, including influenza.  The world has never faced a
major pandemic with its population so large or so geographically
concentrated. This factor alone makes predicting the magnitude of the
impact of a major pandemic difficult.   The difficulty is not in
predicting whether these population factors will worsen or lessen the
severity of the pandemic.  There is no question that it will worsen
it, but by how much, we don't know.

- Cities are dependent on outside sources for critical supplies
including food, power, and water.  The provision of these essential
goods and services requires the highly coordinated efforts of a large
number of people.  During a major pandemic, these activities are
likely to be interrupted by widespread illness and death.   The
interdependent nature of modern society increases the risk that a
systematic failure could occur due to a domino effect precipitated by
the failures of one or two key institutions or resources.  In other
words, a failure of one critical system leads to the failure of
another and so on until the entire system collapses.

- Taken together, these factors are likely to result in the temporary
disruption in the basic supplies and services we all now take for
granted. The resulting chaos would likely be accompanied by a period
of temporary anarchy, especially within large urban centers.

- Water Service:  Public water systems employ staff that would be
expected to experience illness at the average rate of the community as
a whole.  So, absenteeism could affect service reliability, as would
loss of electric power, as these utilities use electric pumps to
pressurize their systems.  If water service is interrupted for a time,
remember to wait a while before drinking the water once service is
restored because it may be contaminated with bacteria initially.

- Find a Rural Refuge: During the Spanish Flu pandemic being away from
centers of population was safer but even small communities were hit
hard so it was no guarantee.  There was some flu in just about every
community; so living in a rural area is not going to be enough.
Reverse quarantines, where the community kept outsiders from entering
and bringing the flu with them did work occasionally in 1918.  Some
small communities might try this approach but for there to be any hope
of success, it will need to be very strict and be started at the
beginning of a pandemic or it will not work.

I've also attached an article from the New York Times with a
government scenario on what might happen when the avian flu strikes
the USA, lest you think that good doctor Dr. Woodson has let his fears
run wild.  Here are some excerpts:

"This week, the Bush administration is expected to release its
pandemic flu plan. The New York Times obtained a 381-page draft of the
plan, dated Sept. 30, 2005."  From the section "Pandemic Scenario -
Origin and Initial Spread":

"Overall, about 2 percent of Americans with influenza illness die. In
communities during the peak weeks of ... outbreaks, about a quarter of
workers are absent because of illness, the need to care for ill
relatives and fear of becoming infected".

[my note: 2% of 300 million is 6 million deaths. The 1918 flu killed
12.5% of the population, which would mean 37.5 million people now]

"During the peak of disease activity in the community, police, fire
and transportation services are limited by personnel shortages, and
absenteeism at utility companies leads to spot power outages. Supplies
of food, fuel and medical supplies are disrupted as truck drivers
become ill or stay home from work. In some areas, grocery store
shelves are empty and social unrest occurs. Long lines form where food
and gasoline are available".


If this doesn't kick you into gear to buy emergency supplies, then I
don't know what will.  You should have them anyhow for earthquakes,
power outages, oil shortages, etc.  I have to admit -- I've read up on
food storage, but haven't actually done it myself (mainly because I
had a packrat Grandma that my husband is worried I'll become some day
as genetics and old age kick in -- he'd go nuts if I started hoarding
food...).  In another post I'll write up what I think you could do,
and I hope others will too...  The fluwikie url above has a section on
food, water, medical preparedness that looks good.

I'd also like to know how to harvest rain water from our roof, anyone
have any ideas on that?

Alice

Dennis...Is there any way to remove or hide all those ads?  You can
delete this email...Janet

Welcome to the 10 or so people who've signed up this morning. I went
ahead and deleted our "test" messages from the past several days, so
from here on we're "official."