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From oil dependence to local resilience

Learnings from the July storms in New Zealand

We are still recovering from the storm this week. Our power and water was out for two days and now I am appreciating hot running water so much. Stories from friends and from conversations in supermarkets and shops afterwards have revealed heaps. There are the usual ones of garden sheds being blown over a five foot fence, skye TV aerials blown off houses, trees down etc. And there are the heartwarming stories of neighbours getting together for meals and sitting by candlelight telling stories and neighbours with power taking a thermos of boiling water next door.

News reports

One of our TT hub group, which met last Thursday said she was telling everyone they had better get used to it because there is going to be a lot more of this. A woman at bridge last night said she has driven all over trying to buy a radio which worked on batteries but they were all sold out, so she sat by herself with no radio. A permaculturist told me their solar and wind generation was enough for lights and radios but she didn't use the internet. Those with manual phones were exhorting others to have one as a backup at least.

My granddaughter is preparing with great enthusiasm and expense for her senior school ball. Her friend and she braved cold showers to be clean before they went for their spray on tanning! Such devotion to beauty.

I know for us we are now motivated to find another way of getting water in a power cut and also to replace our woodburner with a better one. We will probably get a gravity fed water tank. I also need a bigger supply of candles and batteries and will get our camping stove up and running. But we enjoyed our windup torches. And we will plant more firewood trees now...

My feeling is that in the Horowhenua area people at least will be thinking along the same lines. What if it happened again?

My other strong belief is that TT groups should make strong bonds with the local civil defence officials.

Tags: electricity, power

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Permalink Reply by Hirini R on August 5, 2008 at 9:13
Great reminder Deidre. Sorry to say but floods and storms are transition accelerators. Power cuts, cold water, no food are all good wake up lessons. I agree with the Civil Defence connection. Part of TT should be survival training for kids at school. Kids spend hours learning useless equations and meaningless facts yet many kids would not know how to light a fire, tie a bowline knot, forage for kai, make a temporary shelter, make improvised rope etc.. Transition Towns should include survival and life preservation skills modules. Perhaps this could be a joint venture with Civil Defence and NZ Red Cross.

Just my thoughts
Hirini
Permalink Reply by Deirdre Kent on August 5, 2008 at 10:57
Yes and yesterday I heard about a woman at Otaki Beach who was reliant on her electric bed to transfer to her wheelchair. The consequence was to stay horizontal, no radio, no phone. Their power was out for the best part of three days. Will try and find more. A lot of people just blamed the power companies! And equations aren't useless. Just that the currriculum must be urgently changed. Can't believe the local high school appears disinterested in growing food because you can't get NCEA credits for it.
Permalink Reply by Hirini R on August 6, 2008 at 0:11
Good points Deidre. Just to clarify my throw-away line eg equations are useless. It is just my frustration at working with school systems and NCEA. I do have a healthy respect for equations but only if they are useful. As a civil engineer and former army officer, I have used equations in all sorts of ways - from blowing up stuff through to designing multi-span structures. But you do need some practical appreciation and not just plug numbers into an equation and say ka pai - it should work now?

My point is kids need practical principles not just nice equations written in an 1B exercise book. Equations often turn soggy when the book gets wet. We had a similar situation on the East Coast in 1988 when Cyclone Bola hit. The community needed to work together because Civil Defence was trying to run operations from Wellington. Not listening to local reports about rising water levels. Then it was too late. After that incident, I started a school pilot teaching kids how to use VHF radios, report rising water levels, give map grid references, do search and rescue exercises, essential first aid blah blah etc. Yet the schools saw it as extra-curricular rather than core curriculum. It became too hard after awhile. Gah sometimes I feel like sticking a detonator up the curriculum. Maybe we need transition schools as well. Not just transition towns.
Hoe no
Hirini
Permalink Reply by Peter Goldsbury on August 7, 2008 at 23:03
Kia Ora Hirini,
You may be intersted in an attempt to help some kids use equations in some more practical examples related to their rural transition community.and environment.
regards
Peter
Permalink Reply by Hirini R on August 12, 2008 at 9:43
Kia ora Peter
I would be interested to find out more. I know kids can be taught to make eco-houses, create prototypes, eco-businesses, green trades etc. In fact they could create new societal models. Yeah, be interested. Then lets see if we can expand it. Start a revolution.
Regards
H.
Permalink Reply by Peter Goldsbury on November 16, 2008 at 21:28
Kia Ora Hirini,

Sorry I forgot to put the website in for this so you must thnk I am going crazy.. go to www.kaitiakitanga.net and see the energy / weatherstaion link by the picture.
P

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