Here are five groups I have found to improve your sustainability on facebook. I am going by their own statements about heir sustainability and have no audit evidence to support these choices, but they are a step in the right direction.

1. I am doing one thing every day to be more sustainable

2. Those interested in environmental sustainability

3. Young people finding solutions to reduce their carbon footprints

4. I know my ecological footprint

5. Sustainable development for Goulburn

Yesterday the CSIRO released a map of likely climate impact zones around Sydney. The map highlights areas where climate impact will be greatest due to either the actions of changing climate or the inability for government to make changes rapidly enough, or of course both.

The vulnerability assessment was released by CSIRO and the Sydney Coastal Councils Group (SCCG) to assist local government in susceptable areas to understand the threat of climate change and to develop measures to reduce those impacts within their areas.

“The consequences of climate change in Sydney’s coastal region will be driven as much by socio-economic factors and decision making as by climate hazards such as heat waves and storm surges,” says research leader Dr Benjamin Preston, from the CSIRO Climate Adaptation National Research Flagship.

This is one part of the project with the final part, a consultative process to engage local government in looking at the processes which might prevent effective management of the threat. This analysis will study institutional issues affecting adaptation - decision making processes, planning schemes, community aspirations and infrastructure demands - to help councils adapt to climate change through future management decisions.

“This vulnerability assessment is an essential first stage in a journey to better understand the potential impacts of climate change on the region, and move towards more effective and adaptive management,” says SCCG executive officer Geoff Withycombe.

Last week the co-discoverer of the double helix, James Watson, had his genome published in the journal Nature. His was the second genome published. The first cost billions. Watson’s genome cost just a few hundred thousand. The first published genome was that of geneticist Craig venter.

In a decade your personal genetic code will be available for a thousand dollars or so. “This news is the crest of a giant wave in personal genomics that is coming,” says US geneticist Eddy Rubin, who is visiting Melbourne this week to mark the first ten years of Australia’s national genome research facility (the AGRF).

Rubin’s particular interests are in harnessing genomics to unlock the secrets of biofuels. Currently the biofuel feedstock of choice, in the US especially, is corn, but it is a really inefficient, carbon-intensive way of producing biofuels.

Rubin is investigating a variety of alternatives, including grasses and trees that can be grown on non-agricultural lands, and bacteria that can easily convert cellulose-rich plant fibres into useful biofuels.

Today Australian researchers firmly agreed that with the new tools available the cost of genome science is dramatically reduced, making it far more accessible.

“It’s now the right time for Australia to fund the generation of genomic data to enable us to understand and manage the genetic information of our native flora and fauna,” says Sue Forrest, Director of the AGRF.

from science in public

The Australian Conservation Foundation have produced an atlas of Australian’s eco-logical footprints. Earlier (here) I discussed the Museum’s refreshed footprint tool, “Bigfoot” and other impact calculators.

Now the ACF with the expertise of the Sydney University Centre for Integrated Sustainability Analysis have got us all covered with an atlas that shows the footprints of all areas of Australia.

Notably;

It reveals that people living in Australia’s wealthiest metropolitan areas are responsible for the country’s highest household greenhouse gas emissions, water, and land use.

This is probably not surprising, the wealthier you are the more you buy, the more you buy the greater will be your impact. Of course this is a general statement, if you are wealthier then hopefully you will be spending money ensuring that you buy the more efficient of everything, spend more to ensure your products and services are low impact, plantation grown and socially responsible products, and that you offset your greenhouse production.

Australians have the second highest per capita impact on the environment in the world, we can provide many valid explanations for this, but the truth is it is the things we buy more than anything else that are creating this impact. Take the ACF challenge to reduce your footprint.

Or for more detail the CISA site has a footprint calculator that lets you see the impacts of separate actions. But you do need to have a good grasp of how much you spend on different household activities. Though more difficult because of the need to have dollar values for different areas of expenditure I like that you can see that each dollar spent on, for instance your mortgage, adds to your impact, but that each dollar spent on meat is worse than everything else.

The team from Top to Top will be coming to the museum on Saturday and Sunday April 26 and 27. Com eina nad hear their amazing strories from a seven year expedition to travel the world without fossil fuels. currently they are cycling back to Sydney from Melbourne.

Dario will be taking us throught he many wonderful things they have seen along the way, and the solutions they have seen in communities dealing with environmental problems around the world. The presentation starts here at the museum at 11.30am both days.

Why bother going green when there are so many reasons NOT to do green things;

they appear to cost more
they can take more time
they might be unattractive
they may seem to be just a drop in the ocean
what about all the people doing nothing
i like my stuff
and so on and on

so why bother going green.

This New York times magazine article starts with the premise that going green is too much of a bother

BUT

It ends with one of the nicest and clearest call to action without mentioning light globes. The author, Michael Pollan, calls us instead to garden;

Measured against the Problem We Face, planting a garden sounds pretty benign, I know, but in fact it’s one of the most powerful things an individual can do — to reduce your carbon footprint, sure, but more important, to reduce your sense of dependence and dividedness: to change the cheap-energy mind.

I suggest you all read the article all the way through, all the way. Then look into the act of changing your dependency on others to supply all your food, all your needs;

Cheap energy, which gives us climate change, fosters precisely the mentality that makes dealing with climate change in our own lives seem impossibly difficult. Specialists ourselves, we can no longer imagine anyone but an expert, or anything but a new technology or law, solving our problems. Al Gore asks us to change the light bulbs because he probably can’t imagine us doing anything much more challenging, like, say, growing some portion of our own food. We can’t imagine it, either, which is probably why we prefer to cross our fingers and talk about the promise of ethanol and nuclear power

I have a second family which of Italian origin, and nonno in this family grows a great vege garden, my father who grew up in a different age grows a great vege garden and always has. I walk to my inner city supermarket and complain bitterly about the quality, taste and age of the produce. well I did and will for just a few weeks more. I have found a backyard now and I intend to join my father and adopted Nonno in the pursuit of feeding myself.

Like some reality TV sea changer I expect my simplifying my life will be a complex thing. But I look forward to telling you about the successes. So tell us about yours.

Bigfoot 2.0 a new eco footprint calculator for sustainable living is now available at the Museum’s website. This a new version of our old calculator of the same name, it’s faster, quieter and has new figures in the calculations.

Bigfoot calculates your individual ecological footprint as the area of land taken to supply all your needs, including the forests to absorb your CO2, land and ocean to produce your food, land to dispose of your waste, space top live in. The average Australian has a footprint of 7 Ha, about the same area of land as occupied by Sydney’s (former) Olympic Stadium.

When I calculate my footprint I need about 5 Ha of land to supply everything I need. This works out to about 55 times the size of my little block in Dulwich Hill. More importantly this 5Ha is about 4 times as much land as is my share of the earth’s space. So if everyone on earth had the same demands as me we would need 4 earth’s to be sustainable.

Please let us know your footprint and what you are doing to reduce it. What am I doing I hear you say? I am;

- using compact flourescents and looking at LED lighting
- using natural gas for all heating while investigating the appropriate time to change to solar water heating.
- growing many veges and endeavour to source local produce where possible.
- buying Greenpower while investigating the best time to install a grid connected photovoltaic power supply.
- collecting rainwater and recycle grey water.
- reducing reusing and recycling where possible.

My biggest footprint downfalls are tranport (I have family interstate) and being a meat eater.

Try the calculator tell us your results and what you think.

You are probably very aware of the “is he or isn’t he” stories going around about a real pregnant man, I am not going to wade into those arguments but just remind you all that we had a discussion here about the ethics of male pregnancy during Ultimo Science Festival 2007. You can see pictures and read more here.

A hole in the hydrogen gas of the Milky Way, GSH 277+00+36. This is an image of the hydrogen gas made with the CSIRO radio telescopes at Narrabri and Parkes.

The 2007 Powerhouse Wizard Naomi McClure-Griffiths has given us a short insight into the work she does and a little success;

Next year, 2009, is the International Year of Astronomy (www.astronomy2009.org). The year was chosen to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the first use of an astronomical telescope by Galileo Galilei. Around the world people are gearing up to make a great splash in 2009 with hands-on observing, touring astronomy image exhibits, lectures and all sorts of events to raise the public consciousness of astronomy. It should be a pretty special year.

One of the events planned for the IYA, is a large exhibit of astronomical images called “From Earth to the Universe” that will be displayed around the world in public parks, art museums, train stations, etc. Late last year there was a call for submission of images. My organisation, the CSIRO Australia Telescope National Facility (ATNF), submitted a number of images, including my image of a hole in the hydrogen gas of the Milky Way (see above). I was extremely pleased to learn today that it has been selected as one of the top 35 images at http://www.astronomy2009.org/cornerstones/fromearthtotheuniverse/topimages.php It’s pretty exciting to make it into a group of such beautiful images. I feel particularly honoured as there aren’t many radio astronomy images in the group and mine is one of them!

- Dr Naomi McClure-Griffiths
CSIRO Australia Telescope National Facility

Naomi’s current research is continuing to advance our understanding of our home galaxy. She is now the principal investigator on the Galactic All-Sky Survey (GASS), which is a major international project to map all of the hydrogen gas associated with the Milky Way to better understand how the Milky Way was formed, how it has evolved and how it interacts with its neighbours. This survey is already revealing exciting and unexpected discoveries about how the Milky Way plays rough with its galactic neighbours, the Magellanic Clouds.

The Powerhouse Wizard award, sponsored by Wizard Home Loans, recognises emerging leaders in Australian innovation and achievement. Established by the Powerhouse Museum in 2004, the award includes a $5,000 career development scholarship and also provides a platform for the recipient to engage with new audiences and showcase their talents during their term as Powerhouse Wizard.

The 2007 Powerhouse Wizard was announced at the Museum’s Life Fellows Dinner on Thursday 8 November.

2007 Powerhouse Wizard - Dr Naomi McClure-Griffiths
Dr Naomi McClure-Griffiths is an Astrophysicist at CSIRO’s Australia Telescope National Facility. Aged 32, she has been widely recognised for her pioneering work in the study of the Milky Way and her passion for communicating astronomy to the public.

Naomi’s research has dramatically improved our knowledge of the structure and the interstellar ecosystem of the Milky Way in several ways. In 2002 she discovered a previously unrecognised arm of the Milky Way, which led to invitations to speak at international conferences and institutions, sparking other groups to follow-up the discovery.

Through her research, Naomi has also doubled the number of known ‘supershells’ in the Milky Way. These objects are created by some of the most energetic events known - around 100 times larger than supernova explosions - and have diameters of more than 500 light years.

Better late than never.