Our Advent calender

Of course we have an Advent calender and of course we did not buy it in the store. It's essentially a little box with Christmas pictures glued to the sides and a number in the front. The numbers are cut out of cardboard and we change it every day - Dave fills it one day, I fill it the next day, each of us gets 12 turns. It's exciting because you never know what's in it, maybe a riddle, a quote, chocolate, coupon for a head massage (by the other person obviously). I told Dave not to go shopping but he can use everything that's already in the household. Seems to work fine ... 20 days to go.          

Renewable Energies - Bullfrog-powered

We receive the Organic Box (www.theorganicbox.ca), fresh organic produce sourced in Northern Alberta, Southern BC, and a few Western US states such as California. They also offer local organic milk, bread, eggs, flour etc. They tell you the name of the farm or producer where your food comes from which is nice. Anyway, in their last newsletter they informed us that their operations, running the office, the warehouse, the coolers, are now bullfrog-powered.   

The Rocky Mountain Soap Company produces its "100% natural skin care" in Edmonton. Besides their own shops their products are being sold at the gift shop of our favourite museum in the city, the Royal Alberta Museum. That’s how I found out. Reading the website of the Rocky Mountain Soap Company I learn that they not only care about the ingredients of their products but also about the packaging, shipping, lighting, and the energy they use. They are bullfrog-powered.      

                 

Bullfrog is an Alberta power company offering 100% wind power for an extra 2 cents per kilowatt hour. They reckon it adds 40 cents per day to the average family’s electricity bill. I pulled out our last monthly bill – we used 85 KWH. For us that would be $1.70 per month extra, no big deal. But that would mean that the average household uses as much electricity in 4 days as we use in a month. We then thought about the average household … must be a house, with bigger or lots of rooms and possibly lots of appliances. Admittedly, our heating is not included in our electricity bill, we have a coin laundry in the basement and we don’t have many appliances or a block heater for our non-existing car. That leaves us with lights, phone, fridge & freezer, stove and laptops. Period.

Our power bill is actually something that terribly annoys me. We pay less then $30 per month, $5 is for the power, the rest is distribution and administration fees. Where is the incentive to save energy, please? Seriously, if we weren’t renting, we should simply install solar panels on roof or balcony and get off that grid. Even more so, because most of Alberta’s energy still comes from coal. Edmonton (and the rest of the prairies possibly) gets so much sun every roof here should be plastered with solar panels. It works fine for Germany and the sky there is more often grey, overcast, or something else but sunny.  I can hear the scepticism already, like, what about the angle of the sun in winter? Will it produce enough? Probably not, but winter does not last 12 months here. What about summer?! Imagine operating your air conditioning with solar power. Fancy! I mean, wind power seems to work and really it is not that windy in Edmonton. When I first came here I used to mark in the calendar when there was actually a breeze outside, it seemed so rare to me.With everything humanity has invented I am sure there's a way to install solar panels so they catch the most sunshine possible. Some smart brain will now how.   

The harm of living in the countryside

Until a few weeks ago I thought living in the countryside is the solution to escape air pollution in cities. But a report about Prince Edward Island (PEI) on the East coast of Canada revealed that the asthma rates on the island are the highest in the country although there’s no industry there. The reason seems to be the monoculture of potatoes widely grown on PEI and sprayed with pesticides as frequently as every 4 days! A mother interviewed for the documentary stated that the breathing problems of her daughter practically disappear when they leave PEI for holidays.

I wonder. Living in areas of high cattle density such as Lethbridge, Southern Alberta should consequently come along with lots of exposure to the greenhouse gas methane which is emitted by cows. I have not heard about any ill-effects of it though – let me know if you have. Maybe methane in the air acts differently than pesticides and fertilizers and the effect on our health is not quite as obvious. Isn't it terrible that even living in the countryside is not any more what it used to be?! Now I have to be careful about what is grown and raised in that particular countryside that I want to move to!

sustainable or not sustainable

Vanessa Farquharson went to an Anti-Styrofoam party Toronto. The goal of the supporters is to get rid of polystyrene and replace it with something biodegradable like NaturoPack. It’s made out of corn, sugar cane and potatoes. That’s a little controversial to me because we have seen the consequences from ethanol where farmers suddenly produce more corn for fuel than for human consumption and market prizes go through the roof so that people who depend on that food can’t actually afford it any more. This can’t be it.  

Colin Beavan, aka No Impact Man, writes instead in his blog “To hell with sustainability”. He then makes the point that we can not actually sustain our current life style without destroying our planet and we therefore have to seek a life style that is better for us and the environment. This change includes that we shouldn’t try to make the packaging for junk food, or any take away as for that, more sustainable as in bio-degradable. The goal should be to make our kids, and ourselves I would say, eat food that is biodegradable to start with such as an apple. Since that is very idealistic and against the odds I suggest we should consider a bring-your-own-container-policy for take-away restaurants. At least for the transition period to healthier eating habits for everyone.             

Taking shopping to a new level

I went to check out the Earth's General Store - you greener grocer (http://egs.ca) today. It's an independent store that opened recently not too far from us. "Not too far" is measured on the size of Edmonton. It's 20 minutes on the bus. It's a great store. They sell grains & cereals, body care products and laundry detergents in bulk, some of them also pre-packaged. But they encourage customers to bring their own containers - great idea. They sell mesh bags that have a pull cord on top - 4 for $13 - I better make them myself. Otherwise, for the dry stuff they have paper bags that cost 5 cents each but there's no containers offered for the liquid stuff. 
Apart from foods and toiletries, they have diapers and a few other baby products, worm compost boxes and worms, rain collection barrels and lots of information on all kinds of "green things". The owner tries to offer a wide range of products in a small space so there's only a few containers of each product on the shelves. I bought Dave a toothpaste with all natural ingredients for his sensitive teeth and it costs about 5 times as much as the cheap paste I usually buy - and it was still the cheapest tooth paste in that store. I bought soap, borax and cereal, one is hemp cereal - yummy - and one is a 7 grain mix that needs to be mixed with liquid and I hope it will work for Ruby. I would love to shop there regularly for everyday foods but for now I think it will stretch our budget a little but too far. Alone switching to organic produce had a remarkable impact on our food budget which might be because we eat mostly vegetarian. Anyway, I think it's worth  it and I think we have a good diet. I'll come back to organic food in another post.           

Walking & cycling versus driving - part 3

My boss at school comes sometimes by bike to work. It’s a 3.5 km ride and she does it purely for the exercise. Another lunch lady was shocked how somebody could possibly cycle so far. Far? I could not help but say ‘that’s the attitude of somebody who never walks or cycles!’ She also said that she’d be a lot less busy if she did not have a car. And she is the one that freaks out having to walk from her doorstep to the car in -30 degree C – because it’s freezing cold. I’m afraid there’s too many people like her in this city, in this province, in this country, in some other countries such as the USA. Persons like her have weird opinions about very simple things in life.   

Obviously, if she hopped on a bike now or walked for 3.5 km she’d be pretty exhausted because her body does not have those muscles. People like her don’t seem to understand that all things are difficult before they get easy. But people like her are also the ones that complain about the bad bus service even though they never take the bus. Oooh, I wished people like her would wake up, give it a try for a month or so and realize it’s not that bad. Not to say it’s better than living in your damn car.          

There’s been a very interesting article on David Suzuki’s website bout Vancouver showing that change is possible – but the more pitch in the better. http://www.davidsuzuki.org/blogs/science-matters/2010/10/making-cities-more-livable-may-save-the-world/

Walking versus driving - part 2

If you get caught jaywalking in Edmonton a Peace Officer will write you a note to either show up in court or voluntarily pay a fine of $250. Yes, $250! You can speed through an intersection 2-3 times or drive 40 km over the speed limit for the same amount of money. Or you can buy 3 monthly bus passes. Outraged, I emailed my city councillor. His staff found out that the fine was approved after “a scan of fines across the country for similar offences was undertaken, with a range of $60 to $300 in various municipalities for jaywalking” and after 4 jaywalkers had been killed in 2007 on Edmonton's streets. Nobody told me how many had been killed on cross walks. Anyway, I found several cities charging $30-80 but none anywhere close to $300. What annoyed me more is that “the fine for motorists failing to stop for a pedestrian in a crosswalk is approximately $550”. Really?! I could point out at least one driver every day. So why does the city not crack down on drivers? Because it's the police's job?! It would certainly increase the safety of pedestrians and make this place a bit more liveable. But clearly these drivers are hard to stop. 

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not against jaywalking laws or fines as long as they are reasonable. And when it’s statistically proven that 89% of the drivers in Alberta are distracted while driving I don’t think the few brave pedestrians on Edmonton's streets should get the tickets. Finally, just these days the Alberta government has introduced a law against distracted driving - we’ll see if it gets reinforced.    

By the way, pedestrians do not jaywalk because they are suicidal; obviously pedestrians lose out against vehicles. Dave for example tried to catch his bus which only runs every 15 minutes. And of course he made sure there was not a car coming.