So you think you know about sustainability?

Rude awakening for thine truly. I just found a survey from the International Society of Sustainability Professionals --the ISSP Sustainability Knowledge Competency Study. Thinking I was fairly knowledgable, I clicked to take the survey. Hoo boy.

Here are a bunch of events. I have some familiarity with some of them...
Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and Their Disposal
Bruntland Commission/Our Common Future
Commission on Sustainable Development
Convention on Biological Diversity
Intergovernmental Forum on Forests
Kyoto Protocol
Limits to Growth/Club of Rome
Millennium Development Goals 2000
Montreal Protocol
Silent Spring/Rachel Carson

How are you doing so far?
Keep going....
UN Environment Programme
UN Forum on Forests
Vienna Convention for Protection of the Ozone Layer

Now, some organizations
AccountAbility
Business for Social Responsibility (BSR)
Carbon Disclosure Project
Earth Policy Institute
Environmental Protection Agency
GEO-4
Global Environmental Management Initiative (GEMI)
Hadley Centre for Climate Change
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
International Society of Sustainability Professionals
Millennium Ecosystem Assessment
World Business Council on Sustainable Development
World Resources Institute

Not through yet with humbling myself
Now for sustainability frameworks
Herman Daly's Triangle
Triple Bottom Line

Now for some principles
Adaptive management
Agenda 21
Caux Roundtable for Business
Ceres
Cradle to cradle
Earth Charter
Equator Principles
Hannover Pronciples
Melbourne Principles
Precautionary Principle
Talloires Declaration
UN Global Compact

Had enough? But wait! There's more!!
Practices and Protocols
AA1000
Closed loop recycling
Dematerialization
Design for environment
Ecological footprint
Environmental/Sustainability Management System/ISO14001
General Reporting Protocol
Global Reporting Initiative
Green Chemistry
Greenhouse gas protocol
Industrial ecology
Life Cycle Assessment
Life Cycle costing
New urbanism
Permaculture
Product stewardship/EPR (extended producer/product responsibility)
SA8000
Smart growth
Socially responsible investing

My humbling is not over but I am tired of tapping. So I'll continue layer with more stuff I think I should already know about.

Peace, y'all

Molly (the humbled)

Start wherever you are

That is one of the key messages I got at the low carbon diet training.

Climate change has begun. We must address it!

It will take at least 10 years to scale up renewable energies and new technologies. Conservation is available today. It's the low-hanging fruit. And when we are in a conservation mind frame, we are more inclined to embrace the new technologies that come along.

US citizens are 5% of the planet's population and use 25% of its resources. And we waste up to 75% of it through inefficiency and ignorance. Americans are a huge part of the problem--so we also can - and n
must - be big part of the solution.

We like to think we are the world's most innovative. Fine. (and no let hago and tend the garden).

Join me in reducing my carbonfootprint. I'll start where I am. Thee do likewise.

Peace, y'all

Molly

Sustainability starts with me - phase 1

Sustainability is my present focus. At work I am the default, de facto lead for the team that is supposed to to some good with no impact on staff time. At home I am always looking for ways to walk more gently.

This leads me to right here. At home we bought a new, energy-efficient fridge. So new and clean, my husband doesn't want all those magnets and flyers to go on the new fridge. What to do with those things? One of these is a small poster from the E3 conference 2 years ago. E3 stands for economy, education, and environment. It illustrates the interconnectedness of what we do.

I quote:
it all comes down to personal choices--at work, school, or church, people must choose sustainable behavior. Imagine e3 as a wheel and the spokes carry messages (goals) out from the center (individual behavior). People may learn at school, work, or club, and bring that behavior home, changing their own behavior.

I am seeing this interconnectedness very clearly. Hope to harness it to amplify my peacemaking.

peacemaking through environmental ed

Today I salute my coworker Ginger. She is a peacemaker even if she doesn't know it. She tends to be on the agressive side interpersonally, and complains a lot. Still--she is always, always seeking to make the world a better place. She is trying to build and strengthen community, promote justice, link people in good ways, help children--all through the lense of environmental education. Helping children understand nature and how to help it is a form of peacemaking. Working to build a stronger and healthier community is peacemaking.

Recently I read a summary she wrote of a summit of community members working to improve the "E3" process in our counties. The three E's are economy, education, and environment. The three need each other. The big move toward green this and green that, even greenwashing, indicateds businesses and business folk see the value of the environmentalism to their bottom line. (Hooray!) What struck me intensely was how all of the elements of the plan support a peaceful community, one that is in greater harmony with Mother Earth.

Hooray for you, Ginger.