I spent last week at Royal Roads University delivering the first Residency of the Sustainability Graduate Certificate. Ten students from across Canada provided a rigorous proving ground for the Integral City approach to sustainability. Using the Integral City Compass to prove the design with three leverage points, here is what we did. Integral City Compass [...]
A few days ago a trusted colleague, John Steiner, sent me an email thread that told the story of an interesting Japanese invention - a machine that converts plastic into oil. You can see a video for yourself if you click here. This machine answers a question I have harboured for years, and that is: if plastic [...]
One of the things I like about the Holland America cruises is the ship's log they give at the end of the voyage. It is an interesting accountability document for key resources, especially water and fuel. My recent cruise on the MS Rotterdam used 120 tons/day of fuel to travel a toal of 3529 nautical [...]
When you are looking for weak signals about the toughness of economic times look to see how business keeps the revenues flowing. I just returned from a floating city holiday aka a cruise. The travel industry has been hit in so many ways from terrorist threats, biological invasions and economic down cycles it is interesting [...]
November Greetings, Integral City-zens and Friends of Integral City Today's Integral City Sparkie for the City Brain : … a tension in favor of the values and behavior that are most coherent with the current life conditions will tend to be maintained. The flip side of this behavior is that the dominant culture will protect itself against [...]
I have been watching the outcome (or not?) of the recent Australian election with some interest. I have been thinking about swarming (as in what can we learn from the bees when they swarm?). My bee sources (books, articles, movies) tell me that the swarming process is a kind of hive decision. That when it [...]
This artcle in Vancouver gives updated information about the role of honey bees in human systems -- particularly the food system. It points out the disrespect we (the most evolved species of vertebrates) pay the species that is the most evolved species of invertabrates. You can learn more about the lessons bees have for humans in [...]
If you want to find out how complex the relationship between ecology, water resources and human food supplies is becoming, check out this item on Endangerd Species Act Ruling and food production in California. In order to even grasp the players in this scenario one has to gain some altitude and look at it systemically. It [...]
I am always on the look out for blogs and writers who can write dispassionately about the issues that affect cities. I just discovered this one by Dr. Joe Romm today. It has a great archive and the following quote from the blog can be fully read at www.climateprogress.org Climate Change Progress. Thanks to the [...]
This article published early in December 2009, reveals the biases of the voting blocks at Copenhagen, based on their emissions, GDP and % of world population. The spectrum of intelligences hidden inside these numbers does not reveal who the complex thinkers are in each block -- those people who can think at a geo-centric level and [...]