Category: ecofriendly

What’s Wrong with the Water?

September 13, 2019 / / 0 Comments

I started this post a year and a half ago, but today felt important to finish it since the news read: “Trump administration to roll back 2015 waterway pollution regulations” So this blog post is a tad cathartic for this devastating news and hopefully gives you tools to address this issue with me.

Hey question: Is water a human right?

Do we all deserve clean drinking water? Do we all deserve enough water to drink, bathe, and grow our own food?

If you think yes, then there’s a few things you should educate yourself on:

  1. Our farming practices – which industries take a disproportional amount of water (beef and almonds) I too am struggling with cutting out almonds
  2. Watershed and damming – dams are HIGHLY political. Cutting off natural waterways to siphon the water to other locations is NOT a good thing for natural ecosystems or those who would naturally get the water (likely YOU and your community)
  3. Environmental protection standards – Even though the EPA is rolling back on some laws, California may potentially pass laws that keep the previous national regulations in place in our state. I’m proud to be working on this at my job with 350 Bay Area. Subscribe to our newsletter here to get petitions like this sent to your inbox.
  4. The P word (P******) – the sooner we get over the fairy tale that scientists are going to find a solution to all of our plastic use, the faster we can fight this issue. The first step: TURN OFF THE TAP. We need to literally stop making it. Which is a two-step process: first stop using it. Then, support legislation that regulates it. Why? It’s expected in just a few decades there will be more plastic in the ocean than fish. Microplastics have even been found in 90% of all table salt – NatGeo. We also know that plastic affects our hormones and brain functioning. BPA-FREE DOESN’T MEAN SHIT. That is just one chemical in the MANY that has actually been tested and regulated in plastics. There are tons of new ones popping up all of the time that we haven’t fully investigated (and even harder – regulated).

The Hoax

The biggest hoax ever is bottled water. It is simultaneously ruining water and commodifying a free resource – or as I believe, a human right.

But unlike plastic straws, I don’t want to point the finger at just one little thing. There is so much to be done (starting with the four points above) and much much more.

In my opinion, there is a fundamental issue with how we value our resources. Watercoin, the cryptocurrency for water, is one example of how we could rethink our value-system and value water in a free market better.

Day Zero

April 16th, 2018 Johannesburg ran out of water. If you think their inalienable rights were violated that day, want justice, and don’t want this to be you, let’s do something. I know it seems so far away, and water is so global and unattainable (you literally can’t hold it), but there is plenty we can do locally.

What to do TODAY

Learning more about the topics mentioned above are a great start. But if you’re looking for a quick fix, here are some easy things you can do TODAY:

  1. Stop eating beef (A 1/3-pound burger requires 660 gallons of water) – For perspective, one person drinks about 180 gallons per year, so that is enough water for 3.5 people to drink for an entire year in just 1 burger
  2. Stop buying cotton products (One cotton t-shirt takes 713 gallons of water to make) Watch this short video about cotton by BBC
  3. Subscribe to environmental legislation updates
  4. Be Zero Waste – avoid plastic like the plague, don’t make trash (but veganism is more impactful than recycling tbh)
  5. Queue up the documentary Water & Power on Netflix
  6. Don’t buy Wonderful brand nuts
  7. Do something extra – my list is clearly not exhaustive. For example, Dasun is volunteering to research and code a watershed project that maps water distribution in CA. He found this cool opportunity on Volunteermatch.org – a great site to find roles that utilize your skills.

-Nanimal

How To Be an Environmental Activist (or anything else you want to be)

February 17, 2019 / / 0 Comments

This isn’t your normal How To Guide. I recently realized the exact same reasons I became vegan can apply to other big life decisions/ changes. So today I wanted to break it down again, using the same framework of ability (psychological, economic, and physical) – but this time applied to how to become an environmental activist professionally… or anything else you want to be.

Why  – Psychological Ability

     Denial

The first hurdle is denial. My brother George had a funny point that “No one knows what they are in denial about”.  So denial is a tricky thing. Many articles have come out stating that the new denial is not that climate change isn’t happening, it’s thinking what we’re doing is enough.

So how do you address what you’re avoiding and/or semi-intentional ignorance? Information in the age of information! I’m a practiced and published researcher and I took two months researching the most impactful job you can do… and it was environmental work across the board. The information is so abundant, compelling and moving you may just be inspired to work on climate solutions as well. Here are some sites worth bookmarking:

     Attribution

OK so maybe you aren’t in denial and you agree we need to do more BUT you attribute blame to larger organizations. To which I say, the entire system needs solutions and we need to be part of the solution at every level.

Governmental – Some people say this is the ONLY way. I don’t agree, but if you think governmental solutions and regulations are the most important why not try to professionally influence them? You don’t have to just be a lawyer; there are a ton of ways to do it. Otherwise, you can vote for green candidates, and be civically active.

Technology and other Eco-Friendly Options – again, tons of jobs in this! Some may say these will be the only jobs one day (especially with automation). Green technology, energy, food alternatives, transportation, city planning, ocean clean-up and more. You are skilled, and your skills would be highly valuable in AT LEAST one of these types of solutions.

Consumerism and Personal Choices – I’ve started to feel like people aren’t going to change unless the options don’t affect their lifestyle and moreover improve it (ex: fake meat has to be delicious, electric cars also have to be luxurious, etc.) so that is why CREATING the options is even more important than adopting them, because once we create our ideal society, adoption will naturally follow.

Volunteering – isn’t drastic enough frankly. This is an all-smart-hands-on-deck situation.

     My American Dream

Finally, similar to denial, we don’t want to accept that the baby-boomer notion of the American Dream is fucked. Yours, mine, and for generations to come. What good is a mansion that burns down or gets flooded? Sure maybe you can secure a nice little spot for yourself where you have a huge water supply, but how fun will that be when you don’t have a community to enjoy or even any animals around?

Think about this though: This upcoming March, 2019 KIDS are walking out of school for “Day Zero” to protest climate inaction by adults. They know their future is being robbed, and we too aren’t going to die before we see some pretty horrible shit.

Fortunately it is not too late to turn this around, and we can still have an American Dream, albeit different and more synchronous with the environment and arguably with each other, if we only dare to dream it and do it.

How  – Economic Ability

This is the most obvious hurdle to switching jobs. While some companies may have excellent promotional practices, it is widely acknowledged that the highest pay raises occur when you switch companies. One main reason is because your current employer will not give you a 20K raise, whereas you may get a new job offer that starts 20K higher.

Ok so we know it makes sense, but how do you do it? Two ways:

  1. Invest in yourself. Investments can be risky, but if you don’t know your value, others won’t either.
  2. Treat unemployment like a job. Apply to jobs rigorously and take time off. Spend 40 hours a week minimum if you are unemployed. Clock in if you need to (there are tons of timer apps – my favorite is Toggl).

When  – Physical Ability

When should we pursue such jobs? ASAP. Why? The IPCC gave us 12 years – generously. What if we were given a 12-year ticker to an atomic bomb? People would be freaking out. And climate change is worse, irreversible, and “bombing” the entire world simultaneously.

In Sum

All of the other reasons to do it will also follow as benefits. The ones I listed for veganism (that oddly apply here) are:

  • Sustainability – For your personal sustainability – the job market will go to shit with climate chaos anyway. Planet and human species sustainability would also be nice.
  • Animals (Unnecessary Suffering) – you will be working to PREEMTIVELY combat what is already becoming THE LARGEST contributor to human suffering (think: war, food production issues/famine, vector-borne diseases, water-borne diseases, heat-related illnesses, and more. I’m not exaggerating, look. it. up.)
  • Net sum (Positive) – you get to wake up every day feeling happy about what you do (yay)! We Americans are huge emmissions creators, so might as well mitigate your own carbon footprint at the very least.
  • Health – the health effects from inhaling fine particulates (from fires) alone are: lung cancer, stroke, dementia, type two diabetes, and heart disease.
  • Independence – you know you can get any job you want, and you choose to make a difference. You are not beholden to money as the primary motivator. Why else would you work your shitty corporate job with coworkers who lack empathy in an industry that exploits Earth’s resources and workers along the production line? It doesn’t have to be that way.

As always, I’m happy to read cover letters and help you get dat new new enviro job.

out

 

 

-Nanarchy

Context for Change

July 8, 2018 / / 0 Comments

A bit heavy but hopefully inspirational, I wanted to share my thoughts, some statistics and research on the context that created my desire to work for long-lasting change professionally.

Most of my life…

  • The US launched and continues to be involved in the war in Afghanistan (17 yrs,  at least 31,000 civilian deaths).
  • Climate change has been a known and discussed issue (Inconvenient Truth, 2006 – but the gov knew in the 70’s) yet the statistics on the NASA website today were:

  • Income inequality and wealth disparity consistently widens (CBPP).

  • Childhood obesity in the US continues to grow (13.7 million children/adolescents in 2016) and diabetes too:

  • Human trafficking is estimated to have risen 35.7% IN THE US from 2015-2016 (Polaris, the human trafficking hotline).

And many more equally important maladies that have not been properly addressed by previous generations.

Out of Office

Here’s a general breakdown of the main activities that take up a day (assuming you don’t overwork, commute less than average, and sleep well):

I think it’s fair to say that most of us identify “ourselves” as who we are in our personal lives aka free time. Work is full of bureacracy, corporate ladders, non-personal clothing, and is a dehumanizing process of selling our labor for wages.  But when we spend just under a fourth of our time at work (and nearly a third of our waking hours), I don’t think we can necessarily write it off as “not who we really are”.  For me, this was the biggest reason for reconciling my personal beliefs with my career. ^

It’s also exhausting to spend our limited “free” time volunteering, organizing, being politically active, etc. Appealing to the lazier psyche and selfish altruism, working toward a just cause professionally allows you to relax more after work (and still be more of an activist than you would be if you attended every rally).

Why tho? Pleasure vs. Happiness

There are many social psych experiments that have studied the effects of exposing participants to money-related words/topics/objects (money priming) versus control groups (given random non-money-related stimuli) which then measured the differences in people’s behavior. One recent study published in a highly respected journal found that when people are primed with money, they feel less connectedness and act less prosocially. Another recent study concluded that money priming also causes people to be less: interpersonally attuned, caring, warm, and interdependent.

In addition to connection, I want to feel satiated – something that the ever-wanting, ever-purchasing capitalist dream inherently cannot provide (and some say detracts from). I still enjoy commodities, #notamonkyet, but I can attest that distancing my happiness from capital allows my happiness to raise higher than my next raise ever will.

This all culminates in the ultimate goal of seeking happiness, not just pleasure. In his best-selling book, The Hacking of the American Mind, Dr. Robert Lustig explains the 7 main differences between happiness and pleasure from the perspective of a neuroendocrinologist:

  1. Pleasure is short-lived; happiness is long-lived.
  2. Pleasure is visceral; happiness is ethereal (felt above the neck).
  3. Pleasure is taking; happiness is giving.
  4. Pleasure can be achieved with substances; happiness cannot be achieved with substances.
  5. Pleasure is experienced alone; happiness is experienced in social groups.
  6. The extremes of pleasure all lead to addiction, whether they be substances or behaviors (social media use, pornography, gambling). Yet there’s no such thing as being addicted to too much happiness.
  7. Finally and most importantly, pleasure is tied to dopamine (the pleasure biochemical/neurotransmitter), and happiness is tied to serotonin (the happiness biochemical/neurotransmitter).

Takeaway: “excess dopamine can lead to addiction, which erodes both present and future happiness. In simple neuroscience terms, dopamine downregulates serotonin. The result, states Lustig, is that ‘the more pleasure we seek, the more unhappy we get.'”

How even?

This is not to say that if you are a professional athlete you need to quit your job and pursue a social justice desk job; Colin Kaepernick has shown us there are ways to do both – live your fullest life while also fighting for others to do the same. So whatever your niche, work toward refining those skills. Gain knowledge, credibility and influence to help redefine your field toward mission-driven solutions. If the main barrier to pursuing idealist work is a pay cut, consider Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, and assess whether you are able to self-actualize yet.

Change the system and/or Change your job –> Change lives / Maximize your effect on Earth –> Live your fullest life / Live forever through your accomplishments and those that remember you

-Nanarchy

Helpful websites: Idealist.org and 80,000 hours

Where does it come from? Where is it going?

June 22, 2018 / / 0 Comments

People always seem perplexed by the questions: Where do I come from? Where am I going? But we rarely ask these questions about the products we use every day. You’re in luck though, because I aim to answer these questions for you right now!

Where does it come from? – Labor and materials.

I always think of the story about GAP using child labor to produce children’s clothing… So the best way to be sure that the products you use don’t harm others is to buy reused, upcycled, local and vegan. I know this is a tall demand, but it’s all about doing what is most feasibly possible for you (economically, socially, physically, mentally – see my Why Vegan post for more on this). Fortunately for clothing in particular, resale is often cheaper and you can sell your old clothes at the same time.

Many of our belongings harm us too. I recently went to a “Rethink Plastic” talk where researchers explained how plastic producers are able to switch out harmful chemicals faster than we are able to find out how harmful they are. We all know BPA is terrible… but there are tons of other chemicals that are apparently just as bad, yikes! Again, the best choice is to steer clear. Here’s a slide from Child Health and Devolpment Sudies‘ talk about ways to reduce our harmful exposure to plastics:

Pro tip – If you want to do a full cleanse, psyllium husk binds to many toxins in your body and helps get them out. You can get it in the bulk section of some grocery stores. Take a serving with water and go in a sauna.

Where is it going? – “There is no away.“

I recently met Heather, the founder of thereisnoaway.net, and love her message that our belongings don’t disappear when we throw them away, thus we should substitute our single-use throwaway items with recyclable ones.

I could go into our historical process of shipping our trash back to the countries that made the items and give more info about the sludge in our recycling bins, but it’s more important to know where to put what. Here are some sites for my Bay Area friends:

One Tier Better – Zero Waste

Even recycling uses energy and oil… so the best policy is to go zero waste. This sounded daunting to me too at first, and I am still chipping away at my wasteful habit repertoire. I recommend checking out Ecocity Builders’ tips for their      Zero Waste Challenge this July, which make the process much more conceivably achievable.  Also this awesome website.

One Person

Finally, if you are wondering whether one person matters, here are some figures: One person on average creates 4.40 lbs of waste / day [EPA]. One ton = 2000 lbs, so one person creates one ton of waste / 455 days. So every year and a third one person can save

  • One ton of paper recycle saves 17 trees [EPA].
  • One ton of plastic saves 16.3 barrels of oil [Stanford].
  • One ton of aluminum saves 4 tons of Bauxite Ore [MadeHow.com].
  • One ton of glass saves one ton of mixed limestone, soda ash and sand [EPA, Stanford].
  • Fun food calculator

Good luck forming habits to last a lifetime – and for generations to come.

– SustainableFarley @ gmail.com

Sustainable Ag Tech Startups – Business Is Booming and the Soil Is Rich

May 31, 2018 / / 0 Comments

Ag tech, short for agricultural technology, is becoming more abundant and garnering the interest of venture capitalists worldwide. In fact, one ag tech startup called Indigo has raised over $359 million in funding according to Crunchbase, the well-known startup assessment website. Indigo addresses the increasingly imminent need for sustainable agricultural practices through a process of applying microbe bioinformation to enhance crop health, and in return, crop yield. In a Bloomberg interview this January, Indigo’s president and CEO, David Perry, explained,

“The hope is that we are able to grow agricultural crops, improve yields in order to be able to feed a growing population, and do so in a way that is environmentally sustainable. So, we use less of our fresh water supply, we have less nitrogen runoff in that water supply and we create fewer greenhouse gases through the manufacturing and application of chemicals.”

 

Although it is the top-funded ag tech startup to-date, Indigo has many industry competitors. Take EdenShield, a company that has created non-toxic pesticides from indigenous desert plant extracts that lower plant aroma and thus attract fewer insects. EdenShield’s all-natural approach has raised $3.1 million in seed funding and is geared toward greenhouse crops.

Moreover, sustainable ag tech is being developed for nearly every part of the farming process. Natureworks, a cleantech startup that boasts $150 million in equity, has found a way to turn carbon in the atmosphere into a product called Ingeo. Ingeo is “a new material for plastics & fibers with unique properties that all begin with greenhouse gases”. Among its many applications, Ingeo is used to make an assortment of sustainable agricultural products such as pots, landscaping, mulch film, yard waste bags and more.

“The CropX system automatically analyzes the exact water needs of different parts of each field based on topography, soil structure, and current moisture.”

–Crop X 2015 Press Release

 

CropX is an Israeli startup that uses technology to monitor and control irrigation. First, farmers self-install an in-field soil moisture and temperature tracker. Then, the software implements a cost-effective and perfectly timed water distribution process detailed in the quote above. Since 2013, CropX has raised $10 million in funding and expects to revolutionize crop yields and both water and energy conservation.

Some succeeding sustainable startups have been developing their technology for many years. mOasis was founded at Stanford in 2010 and has raised $6.2 million from investors. mOasis created a non-toxic, FDA-approved soil additive that assists plants’ water retention similarly aimed at addressing conservation, improving crop yield, and minimizing chemicals in the environment. Regarding mOasis’ soil additive efficiency,

“A field test from UC Davis found the product provided 30% yield increase for broccoli – using 25% less water.”

–Forbes 25 Most Innovative Ag-Tech Startups 2017 article.

 

Farmers aside, the demand for sustainable agriculture is remains. Consumer-driven companies are succeeding as well by delivering “hyper-local” produce. One company that has built impressive partnerships with supermarkets including Giant and ACME among others, is called BrightFarms. BrightFarms locates farms in close proximity to stores to deliver extremely fresh produce. It is no mystery how the company has raised $57.9 million.

Although many ag tech companies exist, it is exciting to see those with sustainable practices flourishing. Whether they are biology, chemical, software-based, they are raking in considerable cash that benefits farmers, consumers, the bottom-line and the environment alike. One can only hope that sustainability becomes a core consideration for agricultural investors and inventors. Keep an eye on the many Agtech accelerators to learn more about the most recent developments.

RAW Essentials

February 18, 2018 / / 0 Comments

Here are some RAW facts about some essential RAW foods and more:

Healthiest oil: Flaxseed oil (flavorless, keep in fridge, eat w/out cooking on salads, on grains, etc.) – has omega 3 fatty acids, is associated with telomeres one standard deviation above normal length, reduces inflammation/eczema, boosts metabolism

xxx Palm Oil xxx: Do not eat this shit, beware it’s in everything. -one of the world’s leading causes of rainforest destruction

Prebiotics: Dandelion greens, avocado, peas and more – prebiotics, as in the food for your microbiome or gut bacteria, approximately 3lb organ in your body that assists in regulating seratonin, preventing diseases, digesting food, other amazing functions

Recommended workout for optimal health: 45 minutes of sustained cardio 3x/week. Add stretches and muscle-building on other days.

xxx Sugar xxx: Sadly, ain’t we all addicted -#1 metabolism slower, big sugar interests are also creepy

 

Personal Favorites

Coffee: Fair trade, drunk black through a *reusable straw to preserve those pearly white – reduces cognitive decline, liver disease, melanoma, and oxidative stress in blood (disclaimer: perhaps biased evidence affirming my addiction)

Dancing: Burns more calories than running and increases social ties

Fasting: Eat only between hours of noon-9pm – higher functioning cognitive abilities, longer life-span, clean digestion

Grapefruit: blocks reuptake receptors that in turn, concentrates medicines in the body

Green tea: Add some coconut oil and enriched almond milk for a delicious matcha latte! – oil lines the stomach to prevent caffeine overload, almond milk has vitamin D for the Vegans

“Healthy” alcoholic drink: Tequila soda w/ lime (not tonic – which has similar stats to soda surprisingly)

Kombucha: a dank prebiotic

Pillz: B12, This Vegan Supplement, Piracetam – increase bloodflow in brain, Psyllium Husk – binds to toxins in bloodstream

Why Vegan?

December 10, 2017 / / 0 Comments

Seeing as I’m coming up on the anniversary of my first attempt at Veganism, I wanted to share my reasoning for this deprived, desolate lifestyle. Just kidding, it’s actually been pretty great! Small concession: Many of my friends know me as a “freegan”. This came about at Brea’s work party when I was trying to stick to my newfound Veganism by only eating crackers. To my demise, I crunched into buttery goodness, and rationalized eating vegetarian at social gatherings while only purchasing Vegan products (freeganism). However, I constantly strive to minimize my non-Vegan consumption to foods that will otherwise be spoiled, or in special social circumstances.

Some reasons why I choose to be a V:

Ability (economic, psychological, and physical)

Many people do not have the economic ability to be Vegan, and some critics cite this as a reason why Veganism cannot sustain humankind… right now. I completely recognize that there are people on every continent who must sustain on animal products (such as a rural farmer or people who already do not have food access) and I am in no way suggesting they should become Vegan. Fortunately, I live in a society where it is extremely easy to be Vegan in an affordable manner, that is still yummy and nutritional. This ability to lead a more developed lifestyle, is of course a huge privilege, and I would feel as though I were squandering it by not accessing the Vegan resources.

What are those cute cubes?

The psychological barrier is somewhat of an unspoken barrier as to why many people choose not to be Vegan. My occasional freeganism is evidence of the social-psychological difficulties, but there is also the portion of labels and commitments. After all, it is a relationship with food. Lastly, Veganism requires changing your concept of food and nutrition. I was definitely afraid of tofu at one point. I even had to ease into buying tofu by only buying braised tofu for a year (not economical).

Finally, the easiest scapegoat – the physical barrier. Aside from the physio-psychological barrier that people “need” animal products, there is the very real threat of not getting the proper nutrients. It definitely took me 2 months before I felt 100% on a Vegan diet. This, however, was the fault of lack of information (often not accessible and rarely not taught to us). We now know the food pyramid that the meat and dairy lobbyists sold us is a fucking SHAM, and I guarantee if you take the correct precautions and eat enough protein your body will run like an electric motor. Those may just be cravings…

Sustainability – Veganism reduces carbon emissions. Plants turn carbon into oxygen. Antiobiotic resistance.

Animals (Unnecessary Suffering) – I wouldn’t be opposed to eating an animal that had a perfectly healthy and happy life which died from natural causes. I am, however, opposed to the current, capitalist food production system that values the bottom-line of producing food over the animals’ short experience of life – which is simply miserable. One obvious manifestation of our cognitive dissonance in our ability to justify eating animals is how we call them a different name when they are a “food” product (pig=pork, cow=beef, bloody=rare). Call it what it is people. At least chicken=chicken I guess… but maybe that’s just because people don’t give a fuck about chickens.

P.S. The dairy industry is synonymous with veal industry.

Net sum (Positive) – I first read about this idea by the anti-natalist philosopher. Essentially, if something bad doesn’t happen, the net effect is good. If something good doesn’t happen, the net effect is neutral. Thus, if we don’t hurt animals, it is good. And if we miss out on the yummy food along the way, it is neutral. Therefore, net sum is positive.

Does it still have calories if it’s vegan?

Health – You live longer and have less heart disease. Evidence: forced Veganism in Western European countries due to Nazi confiscation of all animal products. By replacing meat calories with starchy grains and vegetables, the death rate in Denmark at this time dropped by 34%. In Norway, the lack of animal product consumption resulted in significantly fewer heart attacks and strokes. These rose again with the reintroduction of animal products after the war.

Independence – You aren’t a sheep following other sheep eating sheep because corrupt industries want you to.

Veganism is a sometimes challenging, daily political act based on an idealistic worldview. I believe many people don’t realize this, and perhaps when they think “vegans are talking about veganism again” , they completely  miss the discussion of politics such as social justice, food sovereignty, sustainability and most importantly DANK food.

out

 

 

-Nanarchy

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