[greenyes] Spring Report (zero waste and happiness)

[RicAnthony@no.address]

Richard Anthony
Recycle Scene June 2005
 
Spring Report
 
As I look forward to the July 10-13, 2005 California Resource Recovery 
Association Annual conference at the downtown Los Angeles Biltmore Hotel 
(www.crra.com), I think about some of the things I have learned while attending Recycling 
and Zero Waste conferences this spring in Beijing, China; New York City; 
Coventry, England; Waterville, Vermont; and Halifax, Nova Scotia.  
 
The Beijing event actually happened in January and really was the planning 
committee for the program for the R05 (www.R05.org) conference in Beijing 
September 25, 2005.  We asked the co sponsors, the Chinese Academy of Science, to 
let us add a couple zero waste workshops to the technical program.  The closed 
circle concept is popular in China.
 
Last year at the Community Recycling Network (CRN) conference in London, I 
spoke about zero waste, this year I attended because my company is helping a 
local NGO plan and build a reuse park.  Sometimes you make great friends at these 
events.  What motivates Suffolk CONNECT is the opportunity to do Good.  As 
expressed at the CRN conference by the keynote speakers from the Friends of the 
Earth and the Member of the European Parliament, ââ global warming and 
climate change are real threatsâ. sustainability means ending incineration and 
landfill â.working for zero waste. â 
 
At PACE University in lower Manhattan, New York City, the Grassroots 
Recycling Network (www.grrm.org)  held their second zero waste action work shop.  
Peter Montague of RACHELsâ Environmental and Health News and spokes person for the 
precautionary principle and environmental impacts called forââ producer 
responsibility and product redesignâzero waste as the goal.  Our sponsors Hugo Neu 
(a metals recycler) Aveda (a cosmetic manufacturer) and Ecocycle (a recycling 
company) supported the workshop as a means to develop community leadership in 
initiating zero waste programs.
 
The New England Resource Recovery Association (NERRA) held their event in the 
Vermont Mountains.  The fact that most of the incinerators that were built in 
the 1980ies are up for new contracts and the Yankee spirit of self reliance, 
filled the zero waste communitiesâ workshop with transfer station and citizens 
advisory committee representatives.  To them zero waste is savings.  I also 
learned that mountain biking in the rain can be quite thrilling
 
The Nova Scotia event combined happiness with sustainability, wellness, 
education and governance.  This conference on gross national happiness was held in 
Bhutan last year, the home of the Dali Lama.  Key Bhutan government officials 
and a large delegation attended this event at St Francis Xavier University 
near Halifax Nova Scotia.  Bhutan has declared happiness a national objective.  
Among other things, environmental quality has been declared by the government 
linked to happiness.  I spoke in a pre conference workshop on zero waste and 
spoke and moderated a sustainability workshop on resource management in the new 
millennium with talks about sustainable city planning and building in India, 
living off the grid in Canada, and rural solar education in India. The work 
shop participants concluded that limits were important.
 
Bringing it home at the San Diego Citizens advisory committee where we are 
working to getting organics out of the landfill, I suggested that a zero waste 
system for organics that composts and uses the material for making agricultural 
soil amendments may be the best way to creating the most happiness in San 
Diego County on this issue.  The committee seemed to like the idea.  
 
See you at CRRA in July.
Rick Anthony
6/05