Sustainability: Imagination Matters

Guo and Niu are quite the inspiring couple not only when it comes to their relationship, but also when it comes to sustainability. It's pretty much a closed cycle over here. Nothing goes to waste, in fact most things are re-used to serve another purpose. Here are a couple of things they do to ensure sustainability on their farm and in their home:

• They use used water to water their plants (i.e. the water from their air conditioner that is gathered from a pipe leading from the AC unit to a bucket [they never leave their AC unit on overnight]).

• They feed leftover food from meals to their ducks and chickens, usually making a hodgepodge of fruit, fish, vegetables, and/or pet food pellets (these animals are indiscriminate, they eat up everything)(the ducks are my favorite, the rooster is my nemesis, as well as Dan's)

• The rest of the leftover food, such as watermelon rinds, mango skins, and things of that nature are gathered in a bucket to be composted on their farm.

• Some of the types of weeds we pull on their farm are used to feed the rabbits.

• They eat eggs laid by their own chickens and ducks so they never buy from outside sources.

• They have solar panels on their roof that supply them with solar energy at night (mostly used for lighting-- Guo says the solar energy provides 5% of their entire household energy consumption).

• He re-uses soda cans and transforms them into a light shade (like a little hat) and small trays for holding things like toothpicks.

• They use wood/branches from their own farm to make drying racks, benches, hat racks, and tables.

• They use herbs and grasses from their farm to make tea (the tea tastes too grassy for my taste).

• They eat the mangos, papayas, bananas, and other vegetables and fruits from their farm.

• They use coconut shells for light shades.

• They use LED and fluorescent lights to conserve the amount of electricity they use (the LED lights are 3 W, or is it V? Derf.)

• They don't use their water heater much (this doesn't matter because hot showers here would make me melt).

• They have small fans that probably go through one full rotation every 5 seconds and mostly use hand-held fans made from tree leaves.

• They gather any plastic material to bring to them to their home in Haikou (main city), which they go to about every month, and throw the garbage all out there since there is no place to throw away such material here in this rural village (no garbage cans, no landfill, no garbage collecting agency).

I could go on and on and on, but I think you get the idea. Sustainability is entrenched in everything they do. It's so much easier to be wasteful, but they really put the time and commitment in being sustainable. I asked them (through Dan) what motivates them to be sustainable. Guo's response was that he likes saving things and he likes the environment, giving him the desire to protect it in any way he can. We remarked on his little innovations throughout the house, such as the coconut lamp shades, and Niu smiled and said that he has a big imagination that stems from his engineering days. Her comment made me think a lot.

Imagination. Shit! That's it. We just need a whole lot of imagination to solve some of these environmental problems of our day, and to be personally sustainable. We need to think outside of the box to solve these unique issues. I'm not naïve, I know imagination isn't the only thing we need to put these ideas to practice. I guess what I'm trying to say though is that instead of spending $10 million a day in Libya to secure oil reserves by attempting to put a pro-Western leader in place, we should be funneling that money and effort into thinking of new creative ideas to replace oil as an energy source. Oil will run out, inevitably, at some point anyway. If we did, we wouldn't need that oil and we wouldn't have to kill innocent people over it, both Libyan and possibly American (in the future). Thinking about it like this makes sustainability and environmental conservation/protection an interesting challenge that we all should face head-on. A lot of people think of sustainability and environmental solutions as difficult, boring, and impossible to achieve, but if we all used our imagination being environmentally conscious wouldn't have to be a mundane, tedious task. Think outside the box. Part of the problem is that the individual feels like his/her effort will not make a difference, for example, in solving global warming; this is a noxious line of thinking. Guo and Niu's efforts are making a difference, and although it may not be a global difference, it could be if their neighbors and their neighbors and their neighbors and my neighbors and yours would do what Guo and Niu are doing. Perhaps their dedication to sustainability does inspire their neighbor to compost. Who knows? A little bit from a lot of people can go a long way. Humans are a special species in that our ability to adapt is amazing. We've survived through so much, in so many different conditions, and we are still flourishing (although this depends on our ability to respond to such environmental issues, population growth, water scarcity, etc). What makes humans so adaptable and different from other animals are their mental faculties, their ability to be creative and innovative in adapting to new, challenging conditions. We need to do the same to solve these environmental issues. The government, I think, could do a better job in challenging people to think of these ideas, like an energy alternative (perhaps a combination of many), perhaps through monetary incentives or the like.

I think Jane McGonigal, has the right idea in approaching the idea of changing the world through unconventional means. According to her bio on TedTalks, she "directs game R&D at the Institute for Future, a nonprofit forecasting firm where she developed Superstruct, a massively multiplayer game in which players organize society to solve for issues that will confront the world in 2019. She [also] masterminded World Without Oil, which simulated the beginning of a global oil crisis and inspired players to change their daily energy habits." You can see her talk on Tedtalks here. These individuals would need to take it outside the gaming world, but at least it's attempting to force people to think about these kind of scenarios, and new solutions to these problems, even if virtually.

So I ask you this.....

ARE YOU UP FOR THE CHALLENGE? I am.