eTool - analysis software for sustainable design

RSVP before this Thursday 19th May 2011 to make sure you get a spot on 25 May! Email info@etool.net.au or call 6364 3805

More info on eTool here

Thong Nation: Throwaway Footwear Now Taking on a Greener ‘Sole’

Flip-flops, usually made of polyurethane, are the focus of both recycling and upcycling efforts this spring.

The moment our old friend Mr. Sunshine makes his presence known, socks and lace-up shoes are typically pushed aside in favor of those perennially toe-baring delights known as flip-flops, and boy, what a relief they are. Bestowing the wearer with an instant form of eco-friendly air conditioning during seasonal heat waves — often for as little as one solitary dollar per pair — the rubber-soled wonders seem innocuous enough, but Mother Nature would likely disagree.

Here’s the first problem. Today’s models are commonly made with crude oil-based polyurethane (aka #7 plastic) rather than sustainably produced natural latex rubber, and are almost always excluded from municipal recycling programs.

They are also so impossibly affordable and manufactured in a rainbow of alluring colors and patterns that consumers can easily justify owning a dozen or more pairs, which ends up fueling hyper-consumerism. Rather than spending the time to repair or even creatively upcycle a flip that has met its final flop, we typically chuck and replace what is no longer up to snuff since there’s always an infinite, budget-worthy supply at our fingertips.
Read article

Axe falls on heritage centre, school

FOR 16 years, Dwellingup has been associated with beautiful woodwork from the Dwellingup Forest Heritage Centre and Australian School of Fine Wood – and many residents are angry about the abrupt closure of the centre last week.

Senior lecturer Malcolm Harris said although he had heard about financial issues a few months ago, there was no warning last Monday when “the axe fell”.

“We had just started class when members of the board and Peel Development Commission informed us the centre was closing as of that moment,” he said.

Mr Harris said most of the eight students and four staff members were in shock.
Read article
Although I've taught here for a semester in 2008 and my experience was that I was teaching in a soap opera, I was shocked by this news. The school had so much potential...

Inventor creates unique amphibious vehicle

Inventor John Hinton, has created a unique amphibious vehicle. The 76-year-old used his lawnmower and his boat to create a lawnmower boat.

I think there might be some guys in WA with a boat who would like this idea ;)

Great Sustainable Home Challenge: Part 2

WA has some of the worst soils in the world. Sandy, dry, devoid of nutrients - it's a wonder we can grow anything at all.

But living in a virtual desert shouldn't stop you boosting your home's sustainability by growing your own food. All you need is to give your garden a bit of TLC, and your veggies will be ready for harvest before you know it.

"Contrary to what you may think, it's actually really easy to produce a productive, healthy and sustainable garden, using a lot less water," said green guru Chris Ferreira.

As part of his Great Sustainable Home Challenge, in which he will transform his 1950s Hamilton Hill house into a bastion of green living, Chris enlisted the help of horticulturalist Peter Coppin to sort out the soil.
Read article

Guru turns 50s home into 'green' model

To green-living guru Chris Ferreira, the phrase "hot property" is far from a compliment.

Many modern homes are failing one of the basic requirements of WA architecture - to keep out the West Australian summer heat.

The unshaded walls and dark-coloured roofs typical of many new homes mean that brickwork and tiles can hit 80C in the full sun - meaning bad news for energy bills.

He has challenged West Australians to improve the sustainability of their homes - and save themselves money in the process.
Read article
More info and free workshops at Great Gardens here

Marsupial brings hope to withering wheatbelt

IT wasn't long ago that many third-generation farmers on the West Australian wheatbelt had never heard of the brush-tailed bettong, more commonly known as a woylie.

Today, they are hoping this critically endangered, wallaby-like marsupial may hold the key to getting passing tourists to stop overnight and put much-needed revenue back into withering rural towns.

Community sanctuaries in which native animal populations can recover behind feral-animal-proof fences are a growing trend in conservation and helping to pull some of Australia's most endangered species back from the brink of extinction.
Read article

Design : Made : Trade

When you are in Melbourne check out State of Design Festival and also Design Made Trade during Furnitex, the International Furniture Exhibition.

Design:Made:Trade is a diverse and inspiring trade exhibition space, including some of Australia’s leading furniture, fashion and industrial design brands.

Design:Made:Trade returns for its fourth year and will be accompanied by a huge number of programs including workshops, talks, exhibitions and displays. This historic site comes alive with activity during the first week of the Festival.
Thursday 21 - Sunday 24 July 2011

Down-Under Hypocrites Bet All on China’s Boom

That’s essentially the message Treasurer Wayne Swan is sending about Australia’s odds-defying bet on Chinese growth. The government’s latest budget pledges to deliver the quickest improvement in the nation’s finances on record -- without specifics about how that will happen.

The absence of such detail is telling and can be boiled down to one thing: an even bigger gamble on China’s 10 percent growth and its voracious appetite for Australia’s resources. It’s risky to so fully hitch the hopes of 23 million people to a single nation that’s still developing.
…
Of course, if a critical mass of Australians has reservations about something, lawmakers must listen. And listen, they did. Yet arguments for quashing the takeover -- deterring investment into Australia, for example -- were tenuous. Everyone knows Australia’s resource sectors are booming and those who want a piece of it won’t care who runs ASX.

The real colonization is arguably taking place on the ground -- or, more to the point, beneath it -- in Western Australia. China’s voracious appetite for raw materials to fuel its rise is at record levels and set to continue rising. It’s leading to bubbles in the 13th biggest economy.

Press reports are full of tales of 24-year-old miners with no college degree making more than the Federal Reserve chairman’s annual $199,700 salary.
…
Australia is flirting with “Dutch disease,” whereby financial benefits of a resource boom lead to a hollowing out of other sectors. The worry is that Australia becomes all too happy to be a mining site for China and takes its focus off a more diverse economic future.
Read article

Update: Australia's Dutch Disease diagnosis
The term was coined in 1977 by The Economist to describe the decline of the Netherland’s manufacturing sector after the discovery of a large natural gas field in 1959. But our version of the 'Dutch Disease' is even more serious because it may have infected the banking system.

Karratha emerges as 'Saudi Arabia' of algal fuel

The boss of what will be the world's biggest algal biofuel operation has described Karratha as the "Saudi Arabia of algal fuels" as he unveiled the project in the Pilbara.

Aurora Algae chief executive Greg Bafalis said the company had searched the globe to find the best site and stumbled across Karratha after a chance meeting with Austrade.
"We started with meteorological data, we came in (to Karratha) and thought it was perfect - it had everything we needed," the California-based executive said.

"It was the highest solar radiation on the planet, a great CO{-2} source from the natural gas business that's here and great land for us to expand on."
The 8ha demonstration site, built with up to $2 million in government grants, has six half-hectare production ponds already producing more than 15 tonnes a month of algal biomass.

"We produce roughly 30 tonnes a year out of each acre of algae - so you go could grow up to 10 tonnes of fuel a year out of each acre," Mr Bafalis said.
Read article

Debate over Kojonup wind farm plan

The Wheatbelt town of Kojonup is set to become the latest flashpoint in the debate over wind farms amid plans to build WA's second biggest wind energy project nearby.

A group of local business people, through the company Moonies Hill Energy, wants permission to construct 74 wind turbines at a site called Flat Rocks, 30km south-east of Kojonup. The project would cost almost $500 million, have a generating capacity of 150MW - enough electricity to power 90,000 homes - and "save" about 730,000 tonnes of carbon emissions annually.

But local residents say the wind farm pre-empts the findings of a Senate inquiry into the health impacts of wind turbines.
Read article

One-third of world's food wasted: UN study

Talking about the need of GM to feed this ever growing population…
A new study from the United Nations has found that around one-third of all food produced in the world every year is either wasted or lost.

It says the surprise is that the problem of food waste affects both industrialised and developing countries in almost equal measure.

However, the study says food waste is more of a problem in industrialised countries, where both retailers and consumers throw mountains of perfectly edible food staves into trash bins.

In poorer countries, food losses during harvest and in storage mean lower incomes for small farmers and higher prices for consumers.

The study says this squandering of resources could be reduced by improving harvesting techniques.
Source

Against the grain

IS GM food safe? And does a fatty diet cause obesity? The consensus view says yes to both. But these people dare to think differently.

Fran Murrell, 49, GM campaigner, estimates she spends at least six hours every day reading about genetic modification (GM) issues. She’s the co-founder of MADGE (Mothers Are Demystifying Genetic Engineering), a volunteer grassroots organisation formed in 2007 in protest at the Victorian Government’s lifting of the ban on the growing of GM canola. Murrell travels regularly in Australia and overseas speaking at conferences and questioning the science and safety of GM foods.
Read full interview

More info on MADGE Australia

Forest Forum on Saturday 11 June 4pm at Notre Dame in Fremantle with MC Ben Elton.

Click to enlarge

3:45 - 4:15 pm: Registration and Welcome

4:20 pm: MC Ben Elton introduction

4:30 pm: Keynote speaker Professor Brendan Mackey

5:00 pm: Questions to BM

5:10 pm: Speaker on Biomass (to be confirmed)

5:20 pm: Clair Medhurst (residents for responsible mining) - BRL

5:30 pm: Glenn Dewhurst (black cockatoo preservation society) - Cockatoos

5:40 pm: Jess Beckerling (WAFA) - the ongoing campaign

5:50 - 6:15 pm: Questions and Discussion convened by MC Ben Elton

More info here

Milk in plastic bags

Many Canadians buy their milk in plastic bags (see Is Drinking Milk From Bags Weird?); next to returnable and refillable bottles, it is probably the greenest way package the stuff. In past posts, some have argued that cardboard cartons are probably better as they are recycled, although plastic bags are as well.
But this past weekend I noticed a number of milk bags drying on a line over the sink at a friend's house in Dorset, Ontario. I asked my host Elizabeth what she did with them; she said many things, because they are so strong.

She ran through an lengthy list of uses:
•lunch bags
•leftovers
•freezing and storing vegetables
•freezing and storing soup
•storage of oily rags while finishing furniture
•storage of paint brushes
Basically, any use that one might use plastic bags for, but because they have to hold and protect milk, the bags are far thicker than a baggie, they are stronger and last forever.
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto

Top 10: Bicycle-Friendly Cities

We need a few of these bicycle lifts in Perth

1. Amsterdam, The Netherlands
2. Copenhagen, Denmark
3. Bogota, Colom
4. Curitiba, Brazil
5. Montreal, Canada
6. Portland, Oregon USA
7. Basel, Switzerland
8. Barcelona, Spain
9. Beijng, China
10. Trondheim, Norway (see video)
Check them out here

Hillarys haul of shame

MORE than four tonnes of rubbish was removed from Hillarys Boat Harbour as part of a major underwater clean-up on Saturday.

Chris Dodd and Kim Sue, of Diving Frontiers Balcatta, headed the event, part of a Project Aware initiative raising awareness of how human lifestyle affects the marine eco-system.

“The event was to make people aware of how much rubbish gets dumped into our waterways,” Mr Dodd said.

Starting at 4am and finishing about 8pm, Mr Dodd said more than 150 volunteers and 60 divers pulled two truckloads of rubbish out of the harbour, a major recreational attraction for locals and tourists.

“There were chairs, toilets, suitcases, wheelie bins, shopping trolleys – you name it, it was in there.
Read article

Australian Innovation Festival - “From Concept to Sales and Everything In-Between”

Click to enlarge
I am speaker number 5 on this interesting event during the Australian Innovation Festival this Thursday 5 May from 4.30-9pm

If you like to come along please rsvp by sending Cameron an email: cameron@openii.com.au

The Grove's Waterwise Community Planting Open Day, Saturday 21 May‏

When: Saturday 21 May 2011
Time: 9am – 4pm
Where: The Grove: Leading, Learning, Living (1 Leake Street, Peppermint Grove WA 6011)
Important information:
· REGISTER NOW FOR THE PLANTING ACTIVITY AS NUMBERS ARE LIMITED
· RSVP by 16/05/11 - email community@joshbyrne.com.au or visit our website · Gloves and planting utensils will be provided.
· Closed in shoes must be worn.

Awakening the Dreamer, Changing the Dream - Symposium 5 May Murdoch University

Calling all citizens of Planet Earth! Solving the current environmental, social, and spiritual crises requires the voice and action of us all, as active citizens not passive consumers. The good news is each of us is waking up, you wouldn’t be reading this Newsletter if you weren’t, and millions of people are stepping into action together. Even better news, we are not alone.
More info here
(click to enlarge)