the cost of damaging the earth

part 1 of this three part BBC series (author - richard anderson) - Nature' sting- the real cost of damaging the earth - throws ups some startling economic facts.

A recent study for the United Nations Environment Programme, entitled The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (Teeb), put the damage done to the natural world by human activity in 2008 at between $2tn (£1.3tn) and $4.5tn.

and as bee populations alarmingly decline, someone is doing the pollination and at a cost..

In the US in 2007, for example, the cost to farmers of a collapse in the number of bees was $15bn, according to the US Department of Agriculture, contributing to a global cost of pollination services of $190bn

it is quite clear that the rapid degradation is caused by the unending human desire to have more which is fuelled by corporate growth which is fuelled by share indices and so on...

Trucost has estimated the cost of environmental damage caused by the world's largest 3,000 companies in 2008 at $2.15tn.
That equates to around one-third of their combined profits.

the data is better than the article, but it is to be noted that the economics of the our excesses is coming to light.

planting trees - lots of them

this year we have planned to plant around 400 tree. refer item no. 5 in things are afoot.
we should get upto 350 trees based on our current count.
around 300 will be pongamia pinnata and the rest will be a mix of fruit trees (coconut, mango, sapota, guava, etc)

a lot of tree planting drives are carried out by a variety of organisations, typically on occasions like World Environment Day, etc.
most of them are utter rot.

tree planting is tough work and takes energy and care. you need people with the utmost dedication and devotion - who do not care about the photo ops and the newspaper publicity and the conscience laundering.

we planted around 50 trees in early june when we had a series of wet days. and after 3 months we have 47 survivors. we are proud of this survival rate.

so it all boils down to timing - timing of the rains.
we were readying the plant the remaining 300 trees sometime in september, just after a good spell of rain from the SW monsoon and then the NE monsoon will take over.
we had got an expert pit digger, arjunan, to dig the 300 odd pits. each pit is a cube of length 18 inches. gap between each tree is 25 feet.
his work requires an altogether separate post. filling up a a pit is such hard work, imagine digging it.

and as per his advice, we filled up 130 pits today with 1 cu ft of manure and shovelled in most of the dug out soil. at the next rain, we would plant the trees.
this filling up we did today afternoon under mild, pleasant weather.
at around 330 we were getting ready for our regular evening chores of watering, sickling, etc.
as we set out, the skies opened up for 15 mins. heavy showers.

so stopped all other work.
wheel-barrowed 25 saplings and started planting them.
by the time we were getting to the end, the skies opened up again. yes, again.
almost perfect synchronisation with the rain gods.
the newly planted trees get their first fresh dose of life-giving water directly from rain.

scintillating feeling. maybe this is what giving birth feels like.
targetting planting another 50 trees tomorrow.

composting human waste - humanure

5 months ago, i wrote about the sanitation at pR - a reasonably debated post.

since then, we used the ecopan system (stage 2 in the above post) for exactly 37 days till one vault had filled up (early may). it was an volume estimation error; we had anticipated that one vault (approx 2 cubic feet) would last for around 4-6 months.

while we hit a roadblock on moving to the ecosan toilet (stage 3 in the above post), we reverted to the 2 pit system (stage 1 in the above post).
we thought that during the peak summer, there was a much lower risk of ground water contamination. of course, it was irking that we took a step back rather than forward. but like all experimenters, we are prepared for a bit of back and forth.

so when one is in deep shit over shit, one goes to the god of shit - aka joseph jenkins - the humanure guru (DV has just posted on this at pointreturn.org).
his epic book - the humanure handbook - is just that, an epic. and free to download.

this is how he starts...

There is a disturbing theory about the human species that has begun to take on an alarming level of reality. It seems that the behavior of the human race is displaying uncanny parallels to the behavior of pathogenic, or disease-causing, organisms.
When viewed at the next quantum level of perspective, from which the Earth is seen as an organism and humans are seen as microorganisms, the human species looks like a menace to the planet. In fact, the human race is looking a lot like a disease — comprised of organisms excessively multiplying, mindlessly consuming, and generating waste with little regard for the health and well-being of its host — planet Earth.

and so he goes on to brilliantly compare human behaviour with pathogens in chapter 1. but before one yawns off to say that he is being overly sarcastic, he ends with a hopeful prediction...

...we will destroy neither the Earth nor ourselves. Instead, we will learn to live in a symbiotic relationship with our planet. To put it simply, the human species has reached a fork in the road of its evolution. We can continue to follow the way of disease-causing pathogens, or we can chart a new course as dependent and respectful inhabitants on this galactic speck of dust we call Earth. The former requires only an ego-centric lack of concern for anything but ourselves, living as if there will be no future human generations. The latter, on the other hand, requires an awareness of ourselves as a dependent part of a Greater Being. This may require a hefty dose of humility, which we can either muster up ourselves, or wait until it’s meted out to us, however tragically, by the greater world around us. Either way, time is running out.

and he beautifully mixes up history, science, philosophy, economics to lay bare the simple ways to convert human waste to manure.

ok then, the jenkins rah-rah is over now. back to the ecopan at pR.
as per his estimates the human faeces will compost completely within 47 days in a urine diverting toilet system (where there is no water mixing with the human waste)
and yesterday, we were around 60 days since sealing off the first ecopan vault. and 60 days of composting in the hot summer is surely enough.
so we went ahead and opened the vault. poked it around a bit.
and it looked like this.

we used a combination of sawdust, ash and dried leaves (just a handful) to cover the poop each time.

and we dug right in...


it smelt like compost, it looked like compost, it IS ready-to-use fertiliser.


jenkins' comparative data comparing different type of manure is below.
Manure %Moisture %N %Phos %K
Human 66-80 5-7 3-5.4 1.0-2.5
Cattle 80 1.67 1.11 0.56
Horse 75 2.29 1.25 1.38
Sheep 68 3.75 1.87 1.25
Pig 82 3.75 1.87 1.25
Hen 56 6.27 5.92 3.27
Pigeon 52 5.68 5.74 3.23
(would appreciate table making tips on blogger via email).

after bird shit (guano), humanure is superb as a fertiliser.
we agree. am sure that our fruits and vegetables will too.

humans are the geese that are laying golden poop. can we afford to flush it in nothingness?
in search of answers to these type of questions is what led us to move to pR. along with, of course, the morality of career choices and such-like.

the inspirational ishwarkaka patel

he is affectionately called Mr. Toilet.
since the early 60s he has been toiling over spreading good, simple, decentralised sanitation to each house in the country.

meet ishwarkaka patel (on the left).

photo courtesy - gandhi-king community
we did not meet him, but spent hours with his remarkable son - jayeshbhai patel, aka baby toilet.
very little of him is available online - a true tribute to a man focussed on his grassroots work.

he has created 2 institutions, Safai Vidyalaya and Environmental Sanitation Institute (ESI)
the simple act of creating toilets digs deeper over time towards removing manual scavenging, harijan welfare, women's empowerment, children's education, alternate energy via biogas and my favorite - elimination of the sewage grid.
and his genius has been to tie in all these factors in developing and spreading the 'toilet message'.
the innovative and lovely toilet museum adorns the entrance of safai vidyalaya - on the side of the sabarmati ashram. a display of various types of indian style commodes, cattle feed stations, etc.,



we have got back a variety of books/literature from ESI useful for awareness building and technical documents on building biogas units. dont miss it if you ever land up at the sabarmati ashram.

his recent and more swank establishment is the ESI knowledge center in Sugadh on the outskirts of Ahemdabad. we had the privilege of staying there.
pretty, superb design and inspiring messages all around.





displays and real-life models of a variety of toilet models.



even the floor tilings represent toilets :-)

a true architectural design classic which literally practices what it preaches.
a 2 lakh liter rain water storage tank - one wall of which is shared with the 2 conference halls. just imagine the cooling effect.
an operational biogas plant, natural lighting, solar panels and abundant greenery.

the shadow of gandhiji looms strongly on ishwarkaka and ESI.
ishwarkaka's life continues to be a lesson in determination, dedication and selfless devotion.

us military warns of serious oil shortages

from the recent guardian article...

The US military has warned that surplus oil production capacity could disappear within two years and there could be serious shortages by 2015 with a significant economic and political impact.

it is interesting that this is coming to the public from the US military - which could be the largest user of oil and not from the energy think tanks across the world.
the entire report is here.
their prediction should seriously alarm a lot of people.


what this implies is that status quo in thinking about energy will lead to drastic price rises across all categories of basic items and obviously chaos will reign supreme...

and the report continues on the big security issues that will hit us in the coming decades (not that one needs the intelligence gathering abilities of the US military to come to this conclusion):

1. demographics
2. economics
3. globalisation
4. energy
5. pandemics
6. cyber
7. water
8. food
9. climate change
10. space

the 5 marked blod are, easy to see, heavily interlinked and cannot be viewed separate from each other.

the solutions may appear drastic, but is inevitable within our lifetimes itself, it is time we closely pare our consumption-led lives.

auroville

auroville is an universal town nearby puducherry.
shri aurobindo and the mother are the leading spiritual inspirations and the latter has played the pivotal role is creating auroville.

it is a happening place, teeming with naturalists and some wonderful projects and inspiring people.
1. pitchandikulam forest
2. pebble garden
3. nadukuppam
4. sadhana forest
all these and many more have converted an once desolate landscape into a green oasis.

and there is so much more that goes on in art, culture, education, etc.
planning a holiday, this could be an alternate location to work, learn and grow.

pRis luckily just around 60 kms from auroville.

sikkim - the place to be in 2015

sikkim has a mission 2015. it is very impressive list of objectives for the state.
do check it out.
i was totally impressed by agenda item 2:
- to make sikkim an organic state by 2015
(am sure they meant organic farming).

and more interestingly, it appears that already decently vast tracks of land are already fully converted into organic farming.
and they have already passed some remarkable laws to safeguard the environment:

1. Banned smoking & Pan Parag in 2001.
2. B the use of non-biodegradable materials like plastic, poly-bags, Bio-medical / chemical waste in 1997.
3. In 1995 banned the Green felling in forests & no clear felling, only dead, dying and diseased trees allowed to be removed for the bona fide use.

while the need to be like 'other countries' is a bit laughable, i will blame it on some over-zealous mckinsey-type consultant (am sure they nominate their lowest level consultants to sikkim).

managing sanitation at pR

sustainable design (like permaculture) mandates that 'nothing goes to waste' including 'waste', i.e., there is nothing that is waste, i.e.^2, everything has a use.

a potentially queasy problem in going off-the-grid is the management of human waste (note - not disposal, but management)

lets get to the evolution of the toilet design at pR.

stage 1
the simplest toilet in the world in the hole in the ground.
this hole is connected to a tank/pit which collects the faeces/urine/water.
in cities with areas not connected by sewarage systems, this tank is called the septic tank and the municipal authorities arrange to empty them at designated intervals.
in villages, sulabh's bindeshwar pathak and safai vidyalaya's ishwarbhai patel have pioneered the two-pit latrine system aka pour-flush-compost latrine.
this is how this system has been installed at pR. the pic on the right shows the top covers of the two pits.


the key short-coming of this system, is the potential contamination of the ground water (by leaching) as the faeces is mixed with the flush-water and the urine (total approx 3 litres per use).
also, in the case of heavy flooding, there is a risk of leakage into the over-ground fresh water systems (lakes, tanks, etc).

stage 2
it was clearly evident that we would need to address the above shortcomings.
1. the faeces should be kept separate from water and urine.
2. the faeces collection should be safe from flooding.

enter the urine diverting ecopan from paul calvert's eco-solutions.
here it is installed at pR.
this is the indian style version. the wooden frame (pic on right) is for holding.


explanation of this design (refer to the pic on the left).
1. the middle of the long pan is for the urine colletion.
2. the lid (with red knob) covers the pit into which the faeces drops (there are 2 pits on either side of the urine collector - the knobbed one is in use and the other is closed).
3. the short pan on the left of the pic is for washing the backside post dropping.

this entire system is mounted (with brick and mortar) at a height of around 2 feet. so the faeces collection pit is above ground.
sawdust is used extensively to line the bottom of the pit prior to usage and after each use to cover the faeces. this will absorb excess moisture and prevent odours, etc.
the urine and wash water could be directly led to plant beds just outside the toilet.
Note: - we will be running the urine through a charcoal bed as we feel that it is too concentrated to be directly given to plants.

now the important part - what happens to the faeces.
the capacity of the collection pit is approx 5 cu ft.
and 5 people can use it for over 6 months without even hitting 50%.
at this stage, the in-use pit will be closed (after generous dumping of sawdust) and the sitting position is reversed and the other pit will be start being used.
within 6 months, the faeces in the closed pit will have decomposed and can be easily and safely removed and used as manure (very high quality).

the key shortcoming of this system is the physical discomfort involved in the perpendicular swivel move to reach the backside wash pan. and not too appropriate for saree wearers.

Stage 3
the Ecosan urine diverting toilet from biome solutions is a better design with the backside wash pan comfortably placed just behind the faeces pit. so a simple shuffle of around 3 inches behind will place the user right above this pan.

this design will be optimised shortly in Stage 4.

relationship between humans and plants

all species develop relationships through their life-spans.
mother-child, husband-wife, etc, etc are the easy ones among all known species (except the asexual organisms).

adding humans into the animal kingdom, there is a very interesting connection between animals and plants, which superimposes and supercedes all relationships.
this was posed to us by this most remarkable naturalist/humanist - deepak suchde (yes, the bearded gentleman) as "what is this relationship?"

this is the relationship of breaths.
the exhalation (उच्छ्श्वस) of plants is our inhalation (श्वास) and vice versa.
no other relationship can be so intricate.

i am still staggering.

sustsainable living in cities - the remarkable dervaes

a medium sized home in pasadena, california houses the incredible Dervaes' family.
growing nearly 3000 kgs of fruits and vegetables in around 4000 sq ft of urban space is just mind-blowing.

their experiments with simple and sustainable urban living is now an award winning documentary - Homegrown Revolution.



met them at an interactive session in mumbai last evening.
a truly amazing experience to hear their experiences and the underlying philosophies.
almost a modern day fukuoka.
one thing that strongly resonated is their strong anti-monsanto slant :-)

please check their other website, Path to freedom.

sardar sarovar - stories of displacement

indiatogether is running a series of articles by neeta deshpande covering the displacement (displaced by the dam) of the locals post the sardar sarovar dam over the narmada.

part 1 and part 2 are very readable. it is saddening that development is a many winners-many losers concept.
and that's never going to work. ever.

do follow the series.

while on the subject of water, here is a study - unravelling bhakra which highlights that the iconic bhakra nangal dam may not really deserve its legendary status.

for the record - i am anti big dams.

getting off the grid

the grid is the one that supplies a home with water, electricity, gas, sewerage.
in mumbai, the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai, Mahanagar Gas limited and BEST Undertaking form the grid.

getting off the grid would then mean to be able to live without external provisions of these facilities and utilities. implying self generation and usage minimisation.
i got introduced to this concept indirectly through the beautiful story of dhirendra and smita, evocatively chronicled by nipun.

treehugger interviews abe and josie, who have moved off the grid. their website chronicles their experiment. with a lot of pointers to aspiring 'off the gridders'.

we hope to get there soon.

won't stop fighting

one of the most beautiful songs depicting the fight of the tribals and adivasis against the tsunami of 'development'.
गाँव छोड़ब नहीं (gaon chodab nahin).
watch and enjoy.

flaws in understanding the planet situation

i say "planet situation" instead of "planet crisis" as my understanding grows.
and this commentary accuses a lot of us (including obama) of not understanding this situation correctly.

(a) It’s us against the environment.

(b) It’s us against other men.

(c) It’s the individual (or the individual company or the individual nation) that matters.

(d) We can have unilateral control over the environment and must strive for that control.

(e) We live within an infinitely expanding ‘frontier’.

(f) Economic determinism is common sense.

(g) Technology will do it for us.

(Source: Gregory Bateson, ‘The Roots of Ecological Crisis’, in Steps to an Ecology of Mind, Ballantine Books, New York 1972)

read it. it is long but wise.

bangalore bombers

no, it is not a IPL/KPL team.
nor is it LeT's new attack plan.

it is a fantastic group of environmentalists who are bombing the city with seeds....yes with seeds.

Nine Bangaloreans of this group called Samraksha Dharitri are on a mission to make the Garden City green again by throwing seeds balls (see box) over barren lands of the city.

The group meets every Sunday to chalk out a strategy. Stephen Anthony, a techie and president of the group, says, “First we zero in on the location. One Sunday, we decided to go to Bilekahalli. Five sub-groups were formed and they were asked the survey the vacant land where seed balls can be thrown. By afternoon, the sub-groups were back with the report. They had identified 19 roads and 62 vacant plots. We handed over 600 seed balls and asked them to go ahead with the task.”

and our favourite natural farming god, fukuoka, is the inspiration.

Seed balls are a way for distributing and protecting seeds by encasing them in a mixture of clay and compost. Dry organic compost, seeds and clay are mixed together. Just enough water is added to the mixture while stirring to make the concoction bind together. The mixture is then rolled into small round balls and left in the sun for a day or two to dry. Once dry, these balls are ready to be dispersed. Seeds balls are an ancient technique re-introduced by Masanobu Fukuoka, an advocate of natural farming.

courtesy: propoor.org

green GDP

this concept is gathering steam across the place in indian media circles.
jairam ramesh says GDP = green domestic product.

tehelka's latest article espouses this concept in detail.

Green GDP seeks to evaluate and place a monetary figure for a country’s environmental resources. Simply put: if you know the cost of something, you will value it. If you don’t have a cost for something, you are happy to throw it away. Says Pavan Sukhdev, founder of the Green Indian States Trust (GIST) and pioneer of the Green GDP concept in India, “The traditional GDP simply does not measure the value of forests in national economy. In that sense, it is not a true reflection of wealth at all. The GDP must be made to to take into account the value of natural capital that is being destroyed — forest losses, degradation, declining water quality, etc. — and the creation of human capital in terms of education.”

on an absolute level, i am averse to putting a cost on anything, let alone forests, etc.
monetary value has become the most easily understood construct in our society.
a sad reflection of how we understand things, i must add.

i had written about david suzuki's explanation of costing the value of the services rendered by our mother earth at USD 33 trillion.

11th hour

saw the 11th hour (T1H) last evening.
in combination with the inconvenient truth (TIC), this movie raises much needed awareness on imminent and important issues around human existence.

while TIC was about one man's mission, T1H serenades a bunch of great experts to talk about their specific understanding of the issues facing the earth.

3 particulars notable and striking points were made by:

1. Oren Lyons - "And in time, it (the earth) will regenerate, and all the lakes will be pristine. The rivers, the waters, the mountains, everything will be green again. It will be peaceful. There may not be people, but the earth will regenerate. And you know why? Because the earth has all the time in the world. And we don’t. So I think that’s where we’re at right now."(emphasis mine)
2. David Suzuki - "I see a world in the future in which we understand that all life is related to us and we treat that life with great humility and respect. I see us as well as social creatures, and when I began to look back and say, 'what is the fundamental bottom line for us as social creatures?'...I couldn't believe it because it seemed so hippy dippy, but it was Love. Love is the force that makes us fully human."
3. Paul Hawken - " We need to be slower; we need to be smarter. Slow means disengaging from consumerism as the main avenue of experience. It doesn’t reject any consumption, but it says, “We’re not going to live our lives mediated by stuff sold out there in the market. We’re not going to base our identities and our meaning on what we buy. Instead of the long commute, the bigger car, the bigger house, let’s enjoy the local produce and have time to ourselves. Let’s understand that things are thieves of time because the more things you have, the more time you have to spend working to pay for them, the more your life is chained to a rhythm of perpetual purchase.
Being smart means reintroducing a term from before the Industrial Revolution—frugality. Frugality does not mean poverty or deprivation. It means the wise use of resources."

i liked T1H's approach to portray the immense potential and challenges that we face as a species and how solutions are well within our reach and the call for individual, collective and political action.
do watch.

morning at a zen garden - pune

the quick trip to pune.
catching up on the effervescent folks at the urban ashram.
who took me to taljai hills.
to the zen garden created by pandurang tambe.
a simple man who has spent over 7 years years regenerating a plot of 3 acres in the midst of a degraded forest area spread over 500 acres.
and just as a simple, ordinary citizen.
the Pune Municipal Corporation 'arden' report of 2006 says:

Making good use of his morning walk time for gardening, Mr Pandurang Tambe, a resident of Sahakar Nagar, single-handedly transformed a 3-acre wasteland into a green patch on the Taljai Hill. He used the process of Trap water, percolate water and changed the look of the land.

so a bunch of 7 of us landed up at this spot and joined tambe kaka in this work.
today was essentially de-rocking the slopy section of the hill.
uprooting rocks (all igneous) of all sizes was the plan.
the small ones get gathered in piles which he then uses to create bunds to prevent water/soil run off (erosion). the large ones become spots of assembly for people's backsides.
for over 2 hours, we had a blast - all this just by simple labour of shifting rocks and watching his dedication, simplicity and energy.
just rocking.

sarang alternative school

a beautiful concept - The Sarang School- is:

...the practice of life of a modern species that can live and let live. Education happens everywhere, 24 hours X 365 days. Anything that we hear, see, touch, taste or smell, making a change within us, is part of our education. Movies, ads, news, speeches, performances, people; all that interacts with us is part of our education. In today’s fast-changing world a static system is not the way to real education.

their brand ambassador

Gautham Sarang (28) is the only child who could go through Sarang’s curriculum continuously. He has traveled extensively as part of his studies and handles six languages with ease. He has worked as a contract labourer, photographer, milkman, taxi driver, blacksmith, percussionist, actor, skilled labourer, web designer, and project coordinator, as part of his education and to support the large Sarang family. Anuradha (Inset) completes him.

in a beautiful location which they have nourished.

dreaming a lovely dream

Sarang is a rural university in its early infancy which dreams of a society of self reliant individuals. Sarang’s goal is to prepare the next generation to live fulfilling lives using minimal resources. We dream of a rural university, proposing no degrees or certificates, but offering a space to learn to cope with life and all its myriad hues and tones.

would i love to teach at Sarang?

nature deficit disorder

richard louv coined this beautiful term - nature deficit disorder from his book 'Last Child in the Woods'- which talks about the increasing disconnect between children and nature that today's society has enforced.
the potential depradations of this disconnect should be obvious even to the casual observer.

in this delightful interview (part 1 and part 2), he comes up with some superb snatches:

Pediatricians will tell you they're not treating very many broken bones in kids anymore. What they are seeing now are repetitive-stress injuries in children, which generally last a lot longer, sometimes permanently, compared to most broken bones.

It's the litigiousness of the society that's probably the reason schools put up "no running" signs on the playground.

I know I'm out on a limb on that -- but that's where the best fruit is.

If we were really interested in education reform we'd have a "No Child Left Inside" movement.

We're in danger of having a whole generation disassociate from nature. Not only because they didn't go outside as kids, but because of the message being sent, often unintentionally, by environmental organizations and by the news media: When it comes to the environment, it's too late. Game's over.