Author Archives: thinkofitasanadventure

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About thinkofitasanadventure

My husband Peter and I attended a sustainability conference with Richard Heinberg of the Post Carbon Institute in 2010. We learned some hard truths about climate change that shook us to our core. We knew we needed to transition away from fossil fuels as soon as possible, for the sake of our children. We initiated a neighborhood Transition group (Transition Longfellow). It became the center of our lives. In 2019, we downsized and moved to a tiny rural village. It's a whole new way of life and we've got a lot more learning to do. We're choosing to continue to "think of it as an adventure."

Free Solar Educational Workshop (and bulk buy opportunity)

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2010 was a banner year for solar photovoltaic (PV) systems installed in Minnesota. A record 225 new PV systems were installed last year, nearly tripling the previous record of 76 PV systems in 2009. This free workshop highlights the Solar Hot Water/Air Heat Bulk Purchase Program — Make Mine Solar. Sessions include:

  • Energy Efficiency Techniques by Todd Fink of Century
  • Solar Air Heat and Solar Hot Water Basics by Todd Fink of Century
  • Program Basics by Laura Cina of MRES

Participants will learn:

  • The basics about solar  hot water and solar air heat technology and how it works
  • How the bulk purchase program works,
  • Cost, rebates, tax credits and financing
  • How to choose an installers and next steps

Everyone will get a chance to talk to the installers one on one about a project. You can get a site assessment before the workshop so you can communicate information about your specific project and site better when talking to the solar installers.  Sign up for a low cost site assessment at MN Renewables (the link on their site is broken so you’ll have to email them to inquire: info@mnRenewables.org.

Community Solar Educational Workshop
Monday, May 2, 2011
6:30pm-8:30pm
Matthews Park, 2313 28th Avenue S., Minneapolis

Attendance is free but they ask for an RSVP here.

Ending Junk Mail

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Recycling paper is better than dumping it in landfills, but it’s still a huge waste of resources to manufacture, transport and dispose. Here’s a  link to tips about ending junk mail. Note: Leslie and I have eliminated a lot of junk mail, but it’s damned persistent. To finally end unwanted catalogs, we had to cut out the mailing labels with the customer ID, and send it back with a request to stop mailing us. We used postage-paid postcards from the post office to simplify the process.

A Resilient, Sustainable Community Produces What it Needs

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This month we’re reducing paper use and one of my biggest areas of paper consumption is “facial tissue” (kleenex). In preparation for this challenge, I ordered cloth handkerchiefs online. When they arrived, I was dismayed  to see that they had been made in China and each handkerchief had a paper label telling me so.

Really, can’t we make handkerchiefs in the U.S.?

I shared my disappointment at last week’s meeting of the Longfellow Sustainability Group  and we got to talking about local companies where useful products can be found. That led to a conversation about buying local and buying U.S. if you can’t buy local. Someone recommended the website MadeinUSA.com.

Continue reading →

Midwest Renewable Energy Fair – June 18-20

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We hear from our friend in the know that this is a really big — and wonderful — event for anyone with a serious interest in energy and sustainability. Check it out at the Midwest Renewable Energy Assn website.

The MREA Energy Fair transforms rural Central Wisconsin into the global hot spot for renewable energy education. The Energy Fair brings over 20,000 people from nearly every state in the U.S. and several countries around the world to learn, connect with others and ready them for action at home. The Energy Fair is the nation’s longest running energy education event of its kind, featuring:

  • Inspirational keynotes, lively entertainment, great food, and local beer.
  • Over 275 exhibitors of sustainable living and energy products, including a clean energy car show with demonstration vehicles
  • Over 200 workshops
  • Sustainable food and chef demos

The Energy Fair is held in Custer, WI just seven miles east of Stevens Point. That’s 224 miles from Minneapolis, folks. If people are interested in attending, let’s talk about renting a passenger van or carpooling. There is camping on location.

April Mini-Challenge: Taming the PAPER dragon

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This month the Longfellow Sustainability Group will be looking at ways to reduce/reuse/recycle paper — all kinds of paper: kleenex, paper towels, mail, magazines, and personal products.

Our neighborhood recycling program picks up clean paper and cardboard. If you are part of the City of Minneapolis pilot program for collection of  organics, you can include your paper waste that has been contaminated by food. It’s not too late to sign up for organics collection. Just click on the link above.

Fighting Built-In Obsolescence

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One of the foundations of the Transition Town movement is reskilling — learning how to do the things that people used to know how to do in order to live. Repairing broken items is one of those skills, but how do you do it when the item in question was built to break and be unrepairable? (Having just thrown away 2 irons, I’m feeling this dilemma acutely.)

Check out this article about Repairware in Treehugger. If you have examples of easy-to-repair items, please post responses here.

Home Electronics: If we’re gonna have ’em, we can be greener

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A few stats from treehugger.com

  • 15 percent: Percentage of money spent on powering your computer dedicated to computing, worldwide; the rest of the $250 billion is spent on energy wasted in idling.
  • 70 percent: Percentage of waste composed of discarded electronics, out of all hazardous waste.
  • 529 pounds: Amount of fossil fuels required to manufacture a 53-pound computer system (including the monitor), along with 49 pounds of chemicals and 1.5 tons of water.
  • 15 billion: Batteries produced annually worldwide.
  • 40 percent: Of the energy used for electronics in your home is used while these devices are turned off.

Home electronics take energy and add up to waste, but if you are going to have some of them, there are things you can do to minimize the problem.Treehugger also has a guide to Green Computers and some other ideas on going green with your home electronics.

Greenpeace has a produced a guide to electronics that looks at how “green” they are in terms of pollution. Here’s a link to the Green Electronics Guide.

Finally, take a look at Epeat, a global registry for green electronics.

Sustainability – Resilience … what’s possible?

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Daniel Lerch, in a video posted at The Post Carbon Institute, believes that “sustainability” isn’t possible and that we need to focus on “resilience” —  building the capacity of a system to withstand disturbance while retaining its fundamental integrity. Take a look at the video and weigh in. What does this mean for how we talk about the issues we’re facing?

Sustainable choices and quality of life

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Attempts to live more sustainably remind me of the saying, “cheap, fast or good – you can have any two, but not all three.” Take breakfast for example:

Leslie and I were grocery shopping. She wanted little packets of apple-cinnamon instant oatmeal. It’s fast and (relatively) cheap. But I think it’s slimy and involves wasteful packaging. So I bought oats in bulk, and apples for applesauce to stir in. Simmering the apples made the whole house smell wonderful. I used the hand-crank food processor we got at the fair instead of the electric processor. It was easy and gave me perfect control over the texture. The sauce is delicious, and the reusable container won’t have to be thrown out or recycled.

But Leslie was skeptical, objecting to the time it would take to make “real” oatmeal in the morning. She could have it good and cheap, but not fast. I offered to make it for her because I usually get up first anyway. But it makes me think about the choices, drawbacks and benefits of more mindful living. We have to slow down, be more mindful and adjust our routines. So far, I am enjoying the creativity and higher quality results.