Can We Cut Our Budgets and Raise Our Quality of Life at the Same Time?

It's official, the sequester has begun. Federal spending cuts have been ordered, $85 billion "across-the-board", about 10% of the budget. The press has been bombarding us with projections about how disruptive and damaging will this cut may be to the economy and to us.

The question comes to mind: Can anyone cut an already tight budget in ways that improve rather than degrade their quality of life? Fortunately many people are already well on the way to building a lifestyle at the individual level that improves their quality of life while reducing the cost.

Some wealth building cost cutting strategies at the individual and household levels:

Cutting Food Costs
Up to 25% of the food purchased spoils without being eaten. Can we improve our food inventory control to prevent waste? How much of our food can we grow ourselves either at a community garden or on our own land? (http://www.forbes.com/sites/bethhoffman/2013/02/07/what-food-do-we-throw-out-how-to-stop-food-waste-at-home/)

Cutting Health Care Costs
Many of our health problems relate to our diet and lifestyle choices. Can we eat more vegetables and berries and less meat? Can we get more exercise to improve fitness?

Cutting Utility Costs
Do we need our homes to be quite so hot in the Winter? So cold in the Summer? Can we reduce drafts with some DIY caulking? Can we use fans instead of A/C in the Summer? Can we make better use of passive solar benefits the way our pets and wild animals do?

Cutting Education Costs
Can we make better use of the many FREE internet resources such as Khan Academy and Coursera? Let's remember that Abraham Lincoln's formal education consisted of only 12 months of classes with various itinerant teachers.

Some of the organizations that help us to help ourselves:

Green Thumb http://www.greenthumbnyc.org/
Just Food http://www.justfood.org/
NYC Compost Project http://www.nyc.gov/html/nycwasteless/html/compost/compostproj.shtml
GreenHomeNYC http://greenhomenyc.org/
Khan Academy https://www.khanacademy.org/

A wealth building low-cost business initiative:

On the drawing board - Greg Todd's proposal to set up bike carting of compostable waste from coffee shops and small food related businesses http://www.nycpermaculture.info/events/105698722/
Let's have more businesses that make use of Nature's Money please!

Can it work?

 A few decades ago an American president turned down the thermostat at the White House and wore warm sweaters. He lost the next election by a landslide (and the Federal debt burden jumped under his successor). Does it seem as if each president after that has avoided calling on us, the American people, to make sacrifices together even for vitally important common causes? Why aren't we being challenged to our full potential?

Imagine a nation of people so capable of taking care of our own needs that there is no longer much demand for Federal or State subsidy programs. From such a position of strength, we can reasonably demand lower tax rates. Increased self sufficiency from the grassroots level on up may be just the kind of start we need towards a better future!

While we work on our end....

How about cutting a 'little off the top'?

 

Cooperating together will get the job done!

To paraphrase Ben Franklin, a "penny saved" is a penny we don't need to earn, and a penny we didn't earn is not taxable. Yay!

How the Most Affordable Food Became the Most Costly

Today, Ash Wednesday, marks the beginning of the Lenten Season for many Christians. Many other religions and cultures also have seasonal periods of austerity and sacrifice which typically include restricted food choices.

For Lent, sacrifice traditionally means going meat free, eating seafood instead. The "Fish on Friday" tradition likewise is a respectful sacrificial observance. Huh??? But my supermarket circulars show much higher prices for seafood than meat!?!? Yes seafood has become a much more luxurious and costly food since the time when these traditions originated. (Many types of fruits and vegetables are also higher in price than some types of meat - but that's a subject for a future Blog.)

In the time of Jesus and his apostles, the poor ate fish because it was abundant and cheap.
What has happened to our rivers, lakes, estuaries, and oceans and the life in them in the last several decades?

Pollution and Infrastructure



Overfishing


Deep Ocean Trawlers

 
 

Measuring Our Fossil Fuel Use

http://engineering.columbia.edu/model-created-map-energy-use-nyc-buildings

Henry Gifford often points out the we need to measure our energy use if we want to manage it successfully.

January is an excellent month to look over our energy bills for the past year, comparing it with the average use of fellow New Yorkers. We can set goals for the new year and decide on strategies to achieve them.

Here, where many people don't have private cars, our buildings account for two-thirds of the energy used by the city.

 Drilling down to the unit level, take a look at the following table. Note these default values represent a very high rate of energy use. Nevertheless our energy cutting needs to start with measurement, so let's fill in our own table of monthly energy use.

Convert therms to kWh by a factor of 29.3

or use the conversion calculator at http://www.unitconversion.org/energy/therms-to-kilowatt-hours-conversion.html.

Convert Btu to kWh by a factor of 0.000293

or use the calculator at  http://www.rapidtables.com/convert/energy/BTU_to_kWh.htm.

Default Values for Residential Tenant Space Column 1	Column 2	Column 3
Month	Tenant-paid electrical energy use (kWh/unit)	Tenant-paid heating energy use (kWh/unit)
January	420	1454
February	370	1238
March	350	1022
April	340	562
May	360	202
June	430	29
July	530	0
August	570	0
September	440	58
October	360	360
November	350	749
December	380	1209

Source: Values are based on averaged New York State Energy Research and Development Authority data for multi-family residential buildings in New York City from 2006 – 2009 and correspond to the 25th percentile of building energy performance.   http://www.nyc.gov/html/planyc2030/downloads/pdf/040111_final_benchmarking_rule.pdf

Some strategies for reducing home energy use - http://www.motherearthnews.com/renewable-energy/Save-Money-On-Energy.aspx#axzz2MXy3Z1ff

Notice how clever some nonhuman New Yorkers are in energy management:

NYC pigeons know have to make use of  passive solar gain and thermal mass

On the other hand, designing a pigeon roost over a pedestrian walkway...well...

Typical Buildings are energy wasters in their construction and operation.

Resilient Buildings are environmentally friendly and energy efficient to the point where they can maintain livable conditions even in the event of extended loss of power or heating fuel.http://www.resilientdesign.org/resilient-design-strategies/

The Passive House standard for building heating and cooling is met with only 15 kWh per sq meter per year (approximately 4750 Btu per sq foot per year or .0475 therms per sq foot per year).   http://www.passivehouse.us/passiveHouse/FAQ.html

Net Zero Buildings have zero net energy consumption and zero net carbon emissions on an annual basis  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-energy_building 
 
Living Buildings are environmentally sound, generate their own energy, capture and treat all of their water, operate efficiently, and are aesthetically pleasing. http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=earth-talks-living-building

Where are we in the spectrum of home energy usage? What can we do to improve?

___________________________________________________________________
Typical Energy Use   Resilient Building      Passive House          Net Zero       Living Building

Reflecting on Ethics for a Better World

As our year comes to a close in a season normally filled with joy and celebration, many hearts are heavy because of the toll both of natural disasters and human tragedies. Is it possible for humans to live in harmony with the Earth and with each other?

Care of People

Care of the Earth

Having a Surplus to Share

Who in today's world follows these three principles? Actually there are so very many that we can list.

Some of the organizations and businesses:
New York Cares  http://www.newyorkcares.org/
Occupy Sandy  http://interoccupy.net/occupysandy/
Khan Academy https://www.khanacademy.org/
Acumen Fund   http://www.acumenfund.org/ten/
The Working World  http://www.theworkingworld.org/us/what-we-do/
Habitat for Humanity  http://www.habitatnyc.org/
NY Restoration Project  http://www.nyrp.org/
Just Food  http://justfood.org/
Green Thumb http://greenthumbnyc.org/
City Harvest  http://www.cityharvest.org/
Polyface Farms  http://www.polyfacefarms.com/
Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage  http://www.dancingrabbit.org/

Some of the individuals:
Joe Leuken  (http://now.msn.com/joe-lueken-supermarket-boss-transfers-ownership-of-business-to-employees)
Salman Khan  http://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelnoer/2012/11/02/one-man-one-computer-10-million-students-how-khan-academy-is-reinventing-education/
Jacqueline Novogratz   http://www.forbes.com/sites/helencoster/2011/11/30/novogratz/
Brendan Martin https://www.ashoka.org/fellow/brendan-martin
Vicki Robin (and deceased partner Joe Dominguez) http://ymoyl.wordpress.com/
Bette Midler http://www.nyrp.org/
Dr. John Todd http://toddecological.com/
Colin Beavan  http://noimpactman.typepad.com/blog/about-colin-beavan.html
Cecil Scheib  http://roadtripnation.com/CecilScheib
Will Allen  http://www.growingpower.org/
Joel Salatin http://www.polyfacefarms.com/story/
Henry Gifford  http://www.energysavingscience.com/
Chris Benedict  http://www.businessinnovationfactory.com/iss/innovators/chris-benedict
Gennaro Brooks-Church http://www.examiner.com/article/interview-with-gennaro-brooks-church-founder-of-eco-brooklyn
Bill Mollison  http://www.scottlondon.com/interviews/mollison.html
David Holmgren  http://www.holmgren.com.au/
Sepp Holzer  http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/011217.html
Rob Hopkins  http://www.ted.com/speakers/rob_hopkins.html
 
There are so many many more (including my wonderful colleagues at Green New Yorkers Meetup!) Which organizations and individuals would you like to add?

Coincidentally ;-), the three ethics: earth care, people care and fair share  form the foundation for Permaculture Design.  http://permacultureprinciples.com/ethics.php

Can we ever have a modern global society based on these principles rather than the currently popular but highly destructive Social Darwinism? Let's start with Permaculture education and practice. From there we can build a community of social and business networks with likeminded people.

Local Permaculture Teachers:
Claudia Joseph http://permaculture-exchange.org/
Andrew Faust http://www.homebiome.com/
Julie Welch http://www.linkedin.com/pub/julie-welch/5/231/584

Revolutions have started this way. 

On with the Permaculture Revolution!

http://www.permacultureprinciples.com/ethics.php

 

Strategies for Resilience in a Post Sandy Era

Tracks of all tropical cyclones in the northern Atlantic Ocean between 1980 and 2005
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tropical_cyclone_basins

An insurance company has aired advertisements saying "You didn't choose to be in the path of Sandy..." Sadly for us, this isn't quite true.  We have chosen to live in a known tropical cyclone zone. We have not designed our homes, buildings, subway stations, and subway tunnels to be storm resistant. We have destroyed the original natural storm barriers, namely oyster reefs and salt marsh flats. And despite many warnings, we did not adequately prepare before Sandy struck.
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/ny-mostly-ignored-reports-warning-superstorm

Where are you on the Flood Zone map? Addresses in NYC can be checked on http://gis.nyc.gov/oem/he/index.html

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-10-28/new-york-mayor-orders-evacuation-zone-residents

Climate scientist, Dr. Trenberth, has been  harshly attacked  by climate change deniers for his projection that the risk of harm from severe weather, including hurricanes, would increase. Branding Dr. Trenberth an "alarmist" his critics went further to assert that infrastructure investments to mitigate hurricane damage were unnecessary and a waste of money.

Hopefully our tristate area will listen to Dr. Trenberth and not his critics.

Municipal Initiatives:
Reassess building codes and evacuation zone borders
Determine how best to flood-proof power and transportation networks
Make sure our vulnerable populations, especially those in hospitals and nursing homes, are provided for
Decide how to protect the coast with levees, dunes, natural structures, or a combination
Determine how to fund the many projects that will be needed!

Paying for the infrastructure changes we need will be expensive indeed...however...experts estimate that a dollar spent for prevention will save 4 dollars of damage!  

Permaculture Principle #11 says "use edges and value the marginal"...the interface between two ecosystems can be particularly valuable and productive. I believe that designing with nature instead of waging war with nature will be the best solution. Will our leaders agree? http://www.permacultureprinciples.com/principle_11.php

 



Individual Initiatives:
We need our trusted friends and family...and they need us. In emergencies, we help each other with places to stay, child care, sharing cars, food, supplies, internet access, and so much more.
It's good to know how things work. How to light a stove or oven when we have gas but not electric. How to flush a toilet without running water. How to compost food and yard waste, even sewage waste... etc.
It's important to stay healthy and fit if possible. We are better off if we can walk, bike, climb stairs, carry heavy stuff, perhaps cut fallen tree limbs, shovel sand...etc.

Above all, being willing to creatively use and respond to change, which is Permaculture Principle #12, will lead to positive results! http://www.permacultureprinciples.com/principle_12.php

 


Greenies, what would you add to the list?

Connecting the Dots Between Climate Change and Extreme Weather

Is smoking related to cancer? Does diet affect health? Today we recognize as fact that these are indeed related. Yet in the past, many business and political leaders fostered controversy and doubt about these issues for decades letting millions of people make harmful choices.

Similarly, today, many business and political leaders want doubt and controversy to shroud the question of whether there are dots to connect between extreme weather, climate change, and the fossil fuel industry that pumps carbon into our atmosphere. (Dr Trenberth is one of the climate scientists roundly vilified and branded an "alarmist" for his call to plan for and adapt to a changing climate.) 


As millions of people from the Caribbean to the U.S. and up to Canada suffer heartbreaking devastation from the unprecedented destruction of SuperStorm Sandy, we must address this issue in order to map a course for our future.  Do we assume storms like Hurricanes Katrina, Irene, and Sandy are just a matter of natural variability of "normal" weather so that we should simply rebuild and live life as "usual" or do we recognize that the Earth has changed and that we need to live differently to adapt to the new conditions?

Scientists choose their words carefully and so Climate Deniers think scientists are testifying that recent weather disasters are completely unrelated to Climate Change.

NOT SO!

FACT*:
(Dr. Trenberth) "human-induced global warming has been raising the overall temperature of the surface ocean, by about one degree Fahrenheit since the 1970s. So global warming very likely contributed a notable fraction of the energy on which the storm (Sandy) thrived — perhaps as much as 10 percent"

FACT*:
"The ocean is rising relentlessly, and scientists say this is a direct consequence of global warming. Warm water expands, just as warm air does, and the warming of the ocean is one factor behind the rise. Another is that land ice the world over is starting to melt as the climate grows warmer, dumping extra water into the ocean."

FACT*:
(Dr. Emanuel) "coastal flooding on a scale that once happened only once or twice per century — the scale of Sandy, in other words — will become much more commonplace within the coming decades."

FACT**:

(Dr. Hoerling) "There is a nice historical record of the tide level at the Battery just below Manhattan that goes back to 1850s. And that time series, which is fairly complete up to current, shows a rise in the total sea level of about one foot in the 150 years of that record. Now, we have 14-foot rise related to Sandy. So one foot out of 14 may not be something that is critical. But it may very well be in the sense that that last foot may be the foot that moved the water into very prone areas."

*From NYT Green Blogs - http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/30/did-global-warming-contribute-to-hurricane-sandys-devastation/?ref=globalwarming
**From NPR interview - http://www.npr.org/2012/10/31/164055672/is-climate-change-responsible-for-sandy

Dr. Trenberth sums up the misunderstanding succinctly: "The answer to the oft-asked question of whether an event is caused by climate change is that it is the wrong question. All weather events are affected by climate change because the environment in which they occur is warmer and moister than it used to be." He illustrates by pointing out that steroids in a baseball player's system do not cause home runs all by themselves but do make home runs more likely. UC Berkeley linguist George Lakoff describes this confusion as arising from the public's misunderstanding of the difference between "direct causation" and "systemic causation". ^{http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Sandy}

Please submit your photos to http://connect.climatedots.org/

From 350.org

Join Green New Yorkers Meetup in signing up for

Al Gore's 24 hours of Climate Reality Project (Nov  14)

    http://www.meetup.com/GreenNewYorkers/events/84322082/

A Holistic Approach to the Healthcare Crisis

The debate is currently raging in the political, business, and public arenas over the best approach to medical insurance coverage for Americans. It is abundantly clear that our health care costs are painfully high and growing unsustainably!

Conspicuously absent is the recognition that the concept of insurance by definition is about covering eventualities that are unlikely to take place.

We need to do everything we can to make illness an unlikely event in our lives!
If we become healthier as a nation we will solve the healthcare crisis!

Can we accomplish such a challenge?

Fortunately many highly qualified doctors have pointed to holistic ways to achieve excellent health without costly medical interventions.

Take a look:

Dr. David Servan-Schreiber
Credentials: http://www.instincttoheal.org/article.php3?id_article=19#education

ANTICANCER LIFESTYLE

http://www.anticancerbook.com/

MENTAL HEALTH

http://www.instincttoheal.org/

Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn
Credentials: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caldwell_Esselstyn

CARDIOVASCULAR HEALTH

http://www.heartattackproof.com/

Dr. Joel Furhman
Credentials: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joel_furhman
DIABETES PREVENTION

SUPERIMMUNITY

http://www.drfuhrman.com/

Dr. Mehmet Oz
Credentials: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehmet_Oz
COMPLEMENTARY MEDICINE
http://www.doctoroz.com/

Although these esteemed doctors differ on many of their recommendations (I'm very sure I've never eaten a meal that Dr. Esselstyn would approve of...LOL), they all concur with the gist of Dr. Furhman's statement about nutrition in America:

"Those who eat the standard American Diet with an overabundance of calories but a very low nutrient per calorie intake are in a chronically malnourished condition. This combination of being overweight yet malnourished is the true life threatening epidemic in the modern world resulting in a medical care crisis and avoidable medical tragedies. With the ubiquitous consumption of low nutrient processed foods, nutritional deficiency has become the norm."

 "Health = Nutrients/Calories"

How do we avoid the outsized medical expenses currently typical near the end of our lives? Scott Nearing, famous for demonstrating how to live simply, also shows us a way of graciously exiting our earthly lives. In the words of his wife, Helen, he "quietly breathed away his life at home in Maine 3 weeks after his 100th birthday. He went with dignity, purposely fasting, after a long and good life."
http://www.amazon.com/Loving-Leaving-Good-Helen-Nearing/dp/0930031636#reader_0930031636
http://www.amazon.com/dp/0156004968/ref=rdr_ext_sb_ti_sims_3#reader_0156004968

Are we willing to accept the challenge
of attaining good health and long life
with low healthcare costs?