Creating a Sustainable Sunshine Coast - Nambour to Mooloolah

Climate change & peak oil action

I don’t know about you, but I am deeply concerned about the converging global crises of climate change and peak oil. These two issues are inextricably linked and both relate to our overuse and dependence on cheap oil and cannot, in my opinion be separated. Any solution to climate change must also address peak oil.

We have got ourselves in a real mess and the fragility and vulnerability of our ‘lifestyles’ is under the microscope.

There are an amazing number of articles on the background and history of both these topics available on the internet, in magazines, books, dvds, television programs and news items across all media, so I won’t go into the detail of defining what these problems are or explaining how we got ourselves in this terrible position, there are enough expert documents out there already.

I think instead, it is time to look at what serious action we, as members of our local communities, can take to really do something about this.

I’ve spent my career analyzing public opinion, monitoring topical issues and communicating messages to target audiences on behalf of corporations and organisations.

Recently, I have been putting these skills to work on the issues of climate change and peak oil with support from Janet Millington, a permaculture educator and sustainable systems designer.

Our local environmental group and council held a conference and expo recently about climate change and peak oil. Excellent speakers, well attended and very inspirational. But… there was no real talk of ‘action’. No presentations of what we can really do about it.

I see media stories with state and federal politicians talking about carbon trading schemes and planting trees in Indonesia as solutions. On the local front the best that most television programs and government seem to be able to offer is getting us to change to energy efficient light bulbs, buy energy efficient white goods, recycle and if you dare, start a compost bin.

All pretty basic stuff that most of us have been doing for years.

I see a gaping hole between the simple household changes that, to their credit, most people are embracing and the geo-political airy fairy ‘schemes’ the federal and international governments are touting.

To be honest, I think the lack of action by governments is that they really have no idea what to do about this overwhelming problem.

So I did a bit more research. I’m a permaculturist and permaculture was created in Australia by David Holmgren and Bill Mollison in response to the 1970’s oil shocks in the US. It was developed in response to our unsustainable reliance on cheap energy.

Now permaculture is extremely well known as a gardening method, and perhaps to its detriment is only known as a gardening method.

But a read of David Holmgren’s book; Permaculture; Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability and Bill Mollison’s Permaculture; A Designer’s Manual’s Chapter 14, reveals a much broader, holistic and social application of permaculture.

Further research uncovered the great work being done by Rob Hopkins in the UK. Rob is a permaculturist and he came up with the rather brilliant idea of getting his students to write an Energy Descent Action Plan, based on permaculture principles, for their local council shire.

The document was so successful and so useful, the council agreed unanimously to adopt its action plan. Kinsale is now the first town in the world to be a ‘transition town’, actively and publicly making the move from a high energy use town to a low energy use town. Real solutions, practical, achievable, timely, and measurable. Other towns in the UK are now starting to come on board as ‘Transition Towns’ following the idea we have here of ‘Tidy Towns’.

Now this sounded like a real solution to me. One people could get involved in and one that local government would grab with both hands.

Together with Janet, I’d already started work on developing a new permaculture course based on David Holmgren’s text that addressed peak oil and how we can move to a low impact, low energy use future (which therefore by default also addresses climate change).

The Time for an Oil Change course is being trialed in the second half of this year and students will study Holmgren’s principles and apply them to the restructuring of our region including; infrastructure, the built environment, relocalisation of food supply, economy, education, transportation, water, waste, energy, reskilling, employment and community governance.

From this the concept for a Sunshine Coast Energy Action Centre (SEAC) evolved. The Centre will open this August in Yandina and provide free weekly workshops, guest speakers, dvd screenings and other events to raise community awareness, understanding, education and empowerment about these critical problems and the solutions that are available.

Another key component of this community education program is a website, which is now underway. The www.seac.net.au site offers a communication point for the community to learn about climate change, peak oil, energy descent and permaculture.

This is all being done out of my and my husband’s own pockets and with the very kind donation of $1000 from a member of our local permaculture group which allowed us to get the website up and running. This is in contrast to the AU$9M given to the Climate Change Centre of Excellence in Qld to research the impact of global climate change on Queensland. But we believe this issue is so important that we are committed to making this happen.

We have developed some key partnerships with the Local Council, who are very supportive of these ideas and the local University, along with local business people and environmental groups.

From all of this we (myself, Janet, local permaculturists, students, the community, and council) will develop an Energy Descent Action Plan, similar to the Kinsale report, but done incrementally, that addresses the necessary changes needed for us to make the smooth transition to energy descent.

I have great hopes for these projects; the course, the centre, the energy descent plan – I hope we become a model of community action that can be replicated around the world, I hope we can motivate people into action, I hope we can relocalise our lives and community, but most of all I know I can look the next generation in the eye and say that I did as much as I could about climate change and peak oil.

Sonya Wallace
SEAC coordinator
M :: 0408 013 012
E :: info@seac.net.au