Storytelling

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Permalink Reply by Les Squires on June 29, 2008 at 5:31

Yesterday, 26 June, Kate and I met Ben Levi and Aria Seidl. We joined Ben at 3:00 at their home and he showed us all thru his self-sustaining home -- http://www.dialogue.org/sustainability.html Wow! Were we impressed. We did the techie thing -- looking at every feature they've built into their buildings and grounds, even comparing the kilowatt capacities of my own home in Louisville with his in Boulder. Kate and I are approaching a year of zero charges for electricity.

After comparing tools we use on our Internet work, Ben took us to a fundraiser for Global Response -- a very noteworthy environmental organization headquartered here in Boulder. They do international letter writing in support of noble causes. We met some super people. Aria had prepared a wonderful meal for about 90 people. It's wonderful to see a person's internet photo come alive. Thanks to all of you for sharing Ben and Aria with us at least part of the year!

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Permalink Reply by Geoff. Waterhouse on June 29, 2008 at 13:02

Greetings all.
I am new to this so I don't know where it will end up. Comments, good, bad or indifferent, from recipients will be appreciated.
Grant Stephen submitted a brief report on the Kerikeri meeting and I would like to submit a slightly larger one.

I am pleased to report that "Bay of Islands Transition Towns" held its first public (Peak Oil) Information evening at the Wharepuke Sub Tropical Garden Centre in Kerikeri last Thursday, wonder what happened in "Coro" that night!.
The name was to be "Kerikeri Transition Town" originally, but it was changed to "Bay of Islands Transition Towns" so that places like Paihia, Opua, Kawakawa and, perhaps even Kaikohe could be included. I am pleased to say that expressions of interest (simple not compound!) have been received fro Opua, Kawakawa and a chap in Kaikohe. I believe also one in Russell. It seems that we are gathering momentum on New Zealand's last frontier and I hope that a similar evening to the Kerikeri one can be put on soon in Paihia and Kawakawa.
The organisers had expected between 45-50 people to attend and were pleasantly amazed when over 100 turned up. The room was packed and Ken Ross, the facilitator, quipped that " we are going to need a loaves and fishes experience!"

The evening comprised an introduction by Ken Ross followed by a move, kindly loaned by Transition Town Kaitaia, which comprised segments taken from the likes of "End of Suburbia" and put together into a single movie. The job was done by a "WOOFER!" I hope that is right and don't ask me what it means. The individual was, apparently, a girl from the USA who shares the views of Transition Town people. After the tea break and "the feeding of the 100," with a few scones left over, a talk was given by Tomas Lindstrom who is an economic development office for Enterprise Northland. He had produced an excellent discussion paper on 29 April 2008 called " A FUTURE KAIPARA IN A CHANGING WORLD AND CLIMATE" It is well worth a read. I am attaching a copy of it and I hope you find it interesting

There was a reporter from Radio New Zealand there with a tape recorder so, hopefully, there will be some good exposure from that.

We really didn't cover everything as we had some "technical problems" and ran out of time. Another meeting/evening is hoped to be held in a few weeks so that decisions on "where and what now" can be made.

Watch this space!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Kind regards
Geoff. Waterhouse

Attachments:

• Kaipara - FUTURE.pdf, 40 KB

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Permalink Reply by Les Squires on June 29, 2008 at 15:11

Geoff. Great report and upload. When the group is ready you might want to consider creating a Group here on this site for "Bay of Islands Transition Towns". That gives the group an identity, place to post minutes and supporting files, a mailing list for the group, etc. Let me know if you have questions about the best procedures.

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Permalink Reply by Ted Howard on July 3, 2008 at 12:07

Hi folks
Thanks Deidre!
I doubt I can keep up with events to the point I can be keeping up with posting here as well....

Yesterday I made front page of the Nelson Mail, on behalf of Transition Nelson. I was phone interviewed about our Transition Nelson press release on Friday, and I notice that most of my comments (warnings) of potential swift and significant changes from that interview have been left out...business-as-usual, huh?! Don't ya luv corporate media!

By the way "great endorsement" for the city does NOT apply to how great Nelson is, but to the work and foundation for TN that has been laid down here by the dedication of such groups as ASPO-Nelson, Nelson Environment Centre, Nelson Sustainable Transport Futures Group and of course the TN steering group! So a big thank you to those folk who put in the work, regardless of the flack we have received over the years for being out on the edge.

Nelson is NOT very "sustainable" right now, in fact it's pretty crappy, fragile and unsustainable!!
The comment "the community is really ready to make some changes" only applies to those who are awake, and right now there's not enough of us to make a significant difference before the manure really dumps on the windfarm way more than it is already...but some of us are trying to make a difference.....it's so good to be able to create at least some supportive community here.

Exciting times!
Ted

http://www.stuff.co.nz/nelsonmail/4605213a6007.html

Nelson gets green tick Nelson | Wednesday, 02 July 2008


GREEN STEP: Ted Howard with his Xtracycle bike and Nelson home page for Transition Towns.
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Nelson is enhancing its reputation as a city with green-minded residents, after being named New Zealand's fifth Transition Town.

Transition Nelson steering group member Ted Howard said being granted official Transition Town status was a "great endorsement" for the city.

Transition Towns are a global network of towns and cities dedicated to raising awareness of the impact small-scale community change has on sustainabilty.

Mr Howard said the Nelson group's focus was to try to plan locally to build resilience in the face of issues such as peak oil and climate change.

It aimed to initiate a range of community-led projects to shift Nelson people to a low-energy lifestyle in a positive way.

"Transition Towns work on the philosophy that as individuals we can make some difference, but by pulling together as a community, this voice becomes very powerful," he said.

"With food and fuel prices escalating and likely to continue rising, the community is really ready to make some changes."

In April the Nelson Environment Centre received $152,000 from the Environment Ministry to support and develop Transition Nelson.

The Nelson group will be formally launched in September, but at its first public meeting, people had expressed an interest in food production.

Mr Howard said its meeting next Tuesday evening, therefore, would focus on opportunities to localise food again and produce it more sustainably.

The meeting would be of interest to people concerned about where their food came from, or those wanting to see more local food production.

People who had garden areas but did not have the skills to grow food, or would be happy for others to grow food in their gardens, should also attend the meeting, along with organic gardeners or those with training in permaculture, he said.

The Food Group will meet next at the Trafalgar Centre's Victory Room at 7pm. Entry is by gold coin donation.

For more information visit www.transitiontowns.org.nz or email Katy Steele at transitionnelson@nec.org.nz.

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Permalink Reply by Ted Howard on July 3, 2008 at 12:10

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Permalink Reply by Deirdre Kent on July 8, 2008 at 18:58

This was originally posted on google groups by Ted Howard. It is significant enough to reproduce here.

Hi folks
As co-ordinator of ASPO-Nelson (the Peak Oil research wing of Transition Nelson...), this is my summary of our last meeting...oil went to US$142 a barrel over night, and the NZ balance of payments deficit continues to increase at an unsustainable rate...

We had a lively ASPO-Nelson meeting last Wednesday night, where one of our members Jurgen Heissner, reported on his recent travels to Japan and Europe to visit family (he called it his farewell tour, as he has no hope of ever returning), and study village settlement patterns.
He pulled no punches:
1. Japan seems to be aware of climate change, but PO (peak oil) is virtually off the radar. The level of
dependency there for energy and food imports is extreme.
2. France had a very small ASPO group, but they believed in the silver bullet of nuclear power. Paris is a
mega city and will crash.
3. Italy had an ASPO group, but they were not available to meet up with. There was much evidence of
small electric cars, and scooters and bicycles...pockets of sustainable villages, but too much
population.
4. Holland has a grass roots active ASPO group who have now moved into practical responces at that
level and stated it's too late to do anything through the politicians. They believe in their silver bullet:
big natural gas reserves...which as of last week, now appear close to peaking...
5. Germany has a reasonable ASPO group and the EnergyWatch research group which is doing good work
exposing the crisis. The chief of the IEA (International Energy Agency) Dr. Fatih Birol, was grilled on German national
TV about fuel prices, and admitted the end was nigh, and that it would take $17 trillion to fix it. The
press was really starting to hammer both the IEA and the politicians. They were blunt and angry in a way not seen in New Zealand!
The Germans believe in their silver bullet of wind and solar PV...

The European Union has a 5 person team as an energy research unit, only one person on it has any PO awareness. That's to serve 300 million people...There's a high probability that the EU will break ranks with the IEA and set up their own agency, such is the level of distrust and anger.

The conclusion was that pockets of Europe may be OK, but the majority of the densely populated areas(mega-cities such as London, Paris, Holland, etc) are toast. The lack of permaculture or traditional village food systems except in the poorer and remote areas is very evident and appalling.

The IEA plan to release a report straight after the US elections (so that the US administration can't get a chance to interfere) in November, stating un-equivocally that the liquid fuel crisis is here, supply can not be increased and that oil has peaked. At that point all bets are off as to how long it is before widespread fuel and food riots break out.

Meanwhile Lufthansa Airlines have announced that they are closing down in 18 months if fuel prices don't come down, and Air Italia are 2 months from collapse.

The impression was that we will see significant shocks as the impact of US$135-140 starts to bight (lag time of weeks to 3 months). Most of Europe has no re-localisation or Transition Town movements, and will quickly bi-pass anarchy, and go into chaos.

The US was probably going to face collapse/fascist police state lock-down, with a heightened potential for currency collapse likely by or after the election.

All of this has put the fire under our local Transition Towns group to get active, by-pass the political process, and do what we can, to get the community networks going, and press locals to withdraw from the global system, and go local. Jurgen's impression is it's too late, but we'll do what we can. At the same time there is some who will fight us for the status-quo business-as-usual globalised empire... Let's hope the change will be so rapid, they simply pack up and go home to grow some food.
Regards
Ted Howard
ASPO-Nelson
ASPO-NZ (www.aspo.org.nz)
Transition Nelson

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Permalink Reply by Laurence on February 8, 2012 at 12:45

Tell your NZ community can do story on www.realsolutions.org.nz The Bank of Real Solutions

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