What better place to find yourself than at the top of the Sierras? I thought this to myself as I moved through another vinyasa at this year's Squaw Valley Wanderlust Festival. But yoga isn't just about bliss--it's also about the uncomfortable poses and the places inside us we struggle with, because this is where discoveries are made and where we grow from. Maybe it's ironic I'm reminded of this I look out at one of the most breathtaking views I've ever seen. But some of the women of the organization Off the Mat into the World, who are leading this particular class, remind me of this as I struggle to maintain my crow pose. Along similar lines, and some may find this surprising, yoga is not just about yourself. It's also about service. Which is why they formed Off the Mat: as a call for action to the yoga community to use what you learn during your practice and to take it out into the world, and use it for good. I had the pleasure of catching up with some of the women of Off the Mat at Wanderlust this weekend, while they were taking a breather between teaching classes, fundraising, and hosting a sold-out yoga class/jam session with Michael Franti. Here's the scoop on the most powerful and influential yoga activist group around...

How would you describe the Off the Matt community?

Suzanne Sterling: Here at Wanderlust we have people representing Off the Mat from as far as Japan, New Zealand, London, and all over the states--it's a global community of people  getting empowered to move solutions forward.

Kerri Kelly: Our community consists of a lot of yoga teachers, practicers, and activists who want to make a positive change in the world. 

How does yoga fit in to Off the Matt?

KK: Yoga gives people a tool set, the capacity and space to act from a place of presence.

SS: We don't want to become burnt out activists, so yoga is our tool to learn about ourselves--to find out our own strengths, how you respond to uncomfortable situations, what our coping mechanisms are--and take those tools to make positive change. 

What are the core values of Off the Mat?

KK: We have 3 main touch points. Empowerment: We teach people to use the mind-body connection they learn in their yoga practice to realize their purpose of what they're really passionate and ignited about, then give them the practical skill set to take it into the world and create tangible change. We do five day "intensives" to really dig into your stuff and awaken your commitment of wanting to make change in the world. 

Mobilization: With the numbers we have as a community, we can be a force. We want to be a movement for change. 

Action: We have something called the Global Seva Challenge which is a call to action to our community to fundraise for humanitarian projects abroad. It's sort of a combination of the first two--the collective community comes together to be a force for change. 

So what's the "off the mat" part?

KK: Our Global Seva Challenge is an invitation to the yoga community to join a different humanitarian movement each year and step into their leadership roll and start mobilizing their community by raising money and getting creative with their leadership. We raise over a half million dollars each year to use for projects, buildings, support, etcetera, in a country of need. We take the yogis who have met their $20,000 fundraising goal to the country that they've been advocating for the past year and participate in building the projects as well as to see the impact of their work. 
 

What other projects does Off the Mat do?

KK: Next year we're going to run a nonpartisan campaign called Yoga Votes to see if we can mobilize our 30 million member community to vote. The yoga community can be very powerful when we awaken our full potential. For example, when the Seva Challenge first launched, it was an experiment. We thought: What would happen if we asked yogis to raise money for a country that's in dire need? We gave them the tools they needed mentally and spiritually to do it, and when we found out we raised a half million dollars, it blew our minds. We knew we were on to something.

What countries have you helped with the money Off the Mat has raised over the past few years?

KK: The first year we went to Cambodia and worked with the Cambodian Children's Fund. The second year we went to Uganda where we worked on a couple different projects. This year we went to South Africa where we worked with the HIV/AIDS community. And next year we're going to Haiti to lend aid to the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. 

How did your interest in yoga lead you to your position at Off the Mat?

KK: Before I realized the power of yoga, I was on a very prescribed path in my life--I was in corporate America on my way to being a hot shot in the marketing world; I  was going to be a mom and move to the suburbs. But the yoga world invited me to listen in about what I really wanted and what I really stood for. And that started to steer me in a whole new direction, to where I am today. I started to wake up to my own talent as a coach and passion to support others and awaken them to the ways they're great. The yoga cracked open a world of possibility, but simultaneously it focused me. 

Learn more about Jenna.  Visit www.jennasfreelancelife.com

If you saw her walking down the street, you might mistake her for an oil tycoon. Always adorned in a broad-shouldered black suit, cowboy boots and hat, with a swagger and twang when she tips her hat at you and says “howdy” (not to mention having a name like Hunter), if you didn’t know who she was, you probably wouldn’t assume Hunter Lovins to be one of the most influential veterans in the green movement.

But she is: Over the past 30 years the green business pioneer has founded Natural Capital Solutions, co-founded the California Conservation Project and the Rocky Mountain Institute, advised the U.S., Afghanistan, and Australian governments, and been named Time magazine’s “Hero of the Planet.” Not to mention, she literally wrote the book on sustainability and economic development. With the enthusiasm of a young renegade and the no-bullshit mentality of an old Western cowboy, Lovins educates businesses, government, and us common-folk on how being green isn’t just a way to save the environment--it’s a way to prosper as a society. By reconciling the seemingly contradictory worlds of capitalism and environmentalism, Lovins even convinced Wal-Mart to adopt major sustainable business practices, setting a groundbreaking example that big business can go green. 

Green Girls’ contributing editor Jenna Scatena recently caught up with Lovins (donning her signature outfit) on Obama, green jobs, and our next big resource. Here’s what she had to say:

JS: Has your notion of “natural capitalism” changed as our economy and government takes on new challenges?

HL: It has. It's become clear to me that if this transformation to the clean energy economy is going to happen, it needs to be implemented by more than ideas—the ideas have to be put into practice.
I re-framed Natural Capitalism’s principals as: Use our resources more productively and more efficiently; Re-design how we make and deliver everything; And manage all institutions to be restorative of human and natural capital, which are in short supply. So it has shifted over time, and this is to some extent illustrative of how ideas grow and build upon each other, which is what we need to do more of.

JS: If most companies in the US followed this business model do you think it would have the potential to lift us out of the recession?

HL: Absolutely. The UN concluded investing in green jobs has the potential to create millions of new jobs worldwide, and other national studies show the same thing. For example, Florida’s Republican governor commissioned a Republican task force because he was interested in finding out what it would cost to put into place measures that could prevent climate change catastrophes. He was quite surprised when the results came back--not at the cost of the measures, but at the net profit of $28 billion and several hundred thousand jobs it would creat in Florida alone. In California a similar UC Berkeley study showed $78 billion could be added to the state economy by 2025 and 400,000 new jobs.

This simply is no longer an issue anybody ought to be arguing about, we just ought to be implementing it. We've got the proof academically, we've got it empirically, on the ground in communities which are pursuing it. This is simply better economics and a better route to prosperity—whether you're the globe, a nation, a region, a state or a county.

J: So why aren’t we?

H: That's a hell of a good question. Fear? But at the point the world runs out of oil, or it hits 100 bucks again, you're going to see interest in somewhat more prescriptive measures. What is our society going to look like without affordable energy? Unless we get about this transition pretty goddamn fast, we'll find out. There's nothing about the way we do business now that is sustainable. And essentially nothing that can get by without oil with our current structure.

J: There's a lot of hype around what will be the silver bullet of renewable energy. What’s going to be the next most important resource to invest in?

H: Efficiency, efficiency, efficiency. What we've done is poured a lot of our tax dollars into subsidizing unsustainably grown corn, which requires a lot of chemicals and fertilizers so that you get less energy out than you put in, then distill it in 150-year-old technology, then pour it into inefficient cars. This is daft.
It’s critical that we source biofuel sustainably, or we're only problem switching, not problem solving. We have every technology we need to solve our problems, it's just a question of political will.

JS: How do you feel about Obama's energy policies?

HL: [With a groan] Frustrated. Now, fair enough, he walked into a buzzsaw of intransigent Republican opposition, though at least he finally grew a backbone and passed health care. But he ought to be telling the truth to the country about what's possible and what will lift us out of the recession. There is no scientific doubt that we’re in a climate crisis, and there’s no economic doubt that the best way out of the recession is to invest in exactly the same solutions to the climate crisis. From where I sit, it looks like we're not doing a lot that we could be.

J: So if you could give one piece of advice to Obama, what would it be?

H: Tell the truth. Go out to the American people and really start telling the truth about the economic situation. He pulled together young people in almost unprecedented numbers on a campaign of “hope,” of “yes we can,” of “we are going to build the future.” And to the best I can tell, he has governed just like a Clinton. Fair enough--he has a few things on his plate. But I'd run a new campaign: Let's co-design the future that we want. Let's envision it and let's portray it. Let's get some of the biggest companies, or if the big companies are bereft of vision, get companies that are willing to invest in creating a much more desirable future.

JS: What are our biggest roadblocks to the green economy?

HL: Lack of imagination and the hassle factor. If any of us look at our lives and say what could I do? We think, oh but I have a meeting Monday, I've gotta pick the kids up, I've gotta pay the bills—the daily got-to-dos overwhelm great thinking.

JS: So what are some things that the average person can do?

HL: In every one of our homes or offices there are small measures we can do to save money, energy, and materials. Sometimes it costs a little more to buy from companies that have made a commitment to be sustainable, so eliminate something that you don’t need anyway and use that money to buy from responsible companies. Make a commitment, just try one a week or one a month. And when you run out of things you can think of, there are thousands of Websites, books, and organizations that will give you the next act. Like the old comic character Pogo once said: “We're surrounded by insurmountable opportunities.”

Learn more about Jenna.  Visit www.jennasfreelancelife.com
 

This past weekend, from June 11 — 13, the 32nd annual Harmony Festival in Sonoma, Calif., was crawling with 35,000 people looking for everything ranging from inspirational speakers, sustainable vendors, an eclectic array of music and of course, harmony. I like to refer to it as "a party with a purpose," says CEO Howard Sapper. This year’s welcome letter describes the Harmony Festival as “part Green Festival, part Burning Man, part X-Games, part Cirque du Soleil—” quite the production.

 

One thing kept running through my mind while I was there: What exactly does it take to run this event? I gained some insight by meeting up with some of the women who make the Harmony Festival the colorful success it is.

A key, and often overlooked, component to running a successful festival is to make sure the trash generated by thousands of people gets dealt with efficiently and sustainably. Judging by the highly organized bins and practically no trash on the ground, whoever was in charge of the trash here knows what they’re doing. I trailed some of the volunteers I saw collecting compost past the food vendors, past the eco skate ramp, hung a left at the campgrounds and followed them into a big red barn on the fringe of the fairgrounds. That’s where I found Green Mary.

I noticed Mary by the pin on her shirt that read “I talk trash” and thought to myself this must be who I'm looking for. I introduced myself and Mary pulled up an old swivel chair with no back and said brightly “I found this in a dumpster!” as she took a seat and offered me a glass of ice water.

 

Mary explained that she first connected with the Harmony Festival 13 years ago, when she was working for their HR department. It was around that time that Julia Butterfly Hill (the woman who infamously lived in a Northern California redwood tree from ’97 — ’99) graced the stage at one of the festivals and advised people that if they wanted to learn more about themselves they should look at their garbage: “I mean really look at it,” Mary said squinting at the word really as she repeated the words that changed the path of her career and direction of her life. So Mary did just that. She went home and took a good long look at her trash. What came of that experience was the revelation of Green Mary, her alias and the name of her event waste processing and diversion business.

She does about 200 events per year, including the Sierra Nevada Music Festival and Love Fest in San Francisco. She explained that the demand for her type of work is so high that she’s never hired a marketing person, because frankly, she says, she doesn't need one: “All my advertising is word of mouth.” And thanks to her 100 paid employees and carousel of dedicated volunteers, some of whom work until 5 a.m., the Harmony Festival is able to divert over 90 percent of its trash.

A festival also can’t be a success without a charismatic MC to get the crowd excited. So the next person I went on a quest to meet was one of the annual MCs — a woman who goes by the name Betty Biodiesel. I figured she might be tough to find, especially since I had no idea what she looked like or where I could find her, just the intriguing name to follow and a hunch that most people here would know who she was. I went to the stage she had been hosting at an hour earlier and asked a security guard who looked like he could have been part of the Hell’s Angels if he knew of Betty Biodiesel. His face lit up and he grinned as he said “Of course! She was just around here, but I’m not sure where she went.” I asked if he remembered what she was wearing and he chuckled at my ignorance. “Just look for the woman with a sunflower around her head and a bright green leotard.” I decided to hang around there for her and few minutes later a personified sunflower went zipping by on a biofuel-powered scooter. That must be Betty Biodiesel, I thought.

The first thing I asked her about was where the name came from: “Well, back in 2002 I looked around and noticed that I was a girl in a man’s business, the fuel business.” Rather than trying to downplay her femininity to get ahead, she embraced it, “and Betty Biodiesel was born.” Betty is the co-founder of the Sonoma County Biodiesel Cooperative and has worked as a biofuel consultant. Since the birth of Betty Biodiesel she’s taught kids about biofuel — particularly the difference between sustainable and unsustainable biofuels. She helps run shadesofgreentv.net, an eco educational TV series, and regularly MCs events like Harmony Festival (her eighth year now). I thanked her for her time, then she sped away on her scooter, zipping through a group of burlesque-dressed women on six-foot high stilts.

The final woman on my list was Ms. Harmony Festival herself: Debra Giusti. After searching the entire fairgrounds (she was the hardest to find, since she wasn’t enthusiastically sorting trash or dressed as a sunflower), I found her in the Eco Pavilion next to a cob building exhibit, casually chatting with some fellow festival-goers.

Debra founded the festival 32 years ago, she says, “from my passion, fire and a mission.” She elaborated that back in 1977, in Sonoma (and beyond) there was a large group of people who wanted to transition to living more harmoniously with the earth, others and themselves. And thus became the very first Harmony Festival, then just about 500 people.

Since then, the festival has remained a place where community members gather to exchange ideas, find support, express themselves and just enjoy being together. “The Harmony Festival has evolved as the resources and people and information have changed, but it always stays on the cutting edge of what the next stage is for the festival’s core values — health, music, ecology and spirituality.” And it will continue to evolve as it inspires more ideas in people like Green Mary, Betty Biodiesel and the rest of the Harmony Festival community.

Learn more about Jenna.

My generation (or maybe just people in general these days) seems to be highly susceptible to apathy. A recent Gallup poll revealed that Americans' concern for the environment is at a 20-year low. Of the eight environmental problems Gallup listed in the March survey (including issues like air and water pollution and the loss of tropical rainforests), "global warming" remained at the very bottom of people's environmental concerns?with only 28 percent of those polled considering it a legitimate problem.

Even more shocking, perhaps, is another recent poll that shows American's belief that climate change even exists has sunk to an all-time low, despite mounting evidence and scientific consensus. Of course, as the Gallup poll's conclusion cites, there could be many reasons for the decline in concern: Some people view the environment's conditions in the US to have improved over the past decades, making it a lower priority issue.

photo via kanu101

Another factor to note is that other matters, such as economic prosperity and stability, have moved to the top of many American's concerns. Still, other reasons for this propensity toward apathy may be a bit more difficult to see at first blush. It's easy to scapegoat ill-informed media megaphones (eh-hem, Glenn Beck) and propagandizing anti-science organization like the Heartland Institute (who's heavily endorsed by Exxon). But it's rarely taken into consideration what we may be doing wrong within our own movement: How might the people who are promoting climate change awareness unintentionally be contributing to America's apathy and demise in concern for climate change? Here are a few possibilities:

• By bombarding people with catastrophic images

• By telling people to "save the polar bears"

• By being an environmental elitist

A December 2008 study by Earthjustice points out that "Having the time and money to be green seems out of reach for many? The perception that environmentalists are willing to sacrifice all self-interest to save the earth sets an unattainable standard." The Prius instead of the used '98 Camry, the home solar panels, the double paned windows, the organic produce instead of conventional, even the cost of CFL bulbs and Sigg bottles adds up. The idea that you need to have money and own certain products to be part of the solution can make people who don't have the means to be "green enough" feel that they can't do their part to help, compared to their more affluent counterparts. A 2007 survey that appeared in The New York Times revealed that 57 percent of Prius owners bought the car for its eco-friendly image, while only 36 percent said they bought it because it emits less carbon. Expensive "green" products, like the Prius, have become status symbols rather than effective tools to combat climate change. It gives the people who own "eco-friendly" products a false sense of accomplishment, and makes the people who don't have the latest green toys feel that they don't have the power to help.

So fear not, those of you who can't "afford to be green," didn't watch "An Inconvenient Truth" and for whatever reason just don't find a connection between you and our polar bear friends. Because this isn't how we are going to catalyze the change we need anyway. The real ways we will have an impact in fighting climate change isn't going to come from being terrified, feeling sympathy just for the polar bears or even driving a Prius. The real impacts are going to come from strong nonpartisan climate legislation, clean technology developments and investments in renewable energy. But none of this will happen without the most important thing: a consensus from the majority of people that climate change is an issue we all must address. If we keep polarizing people on this issue, we will continue to make people who were once concerned about climate change increasingly apathetic. Or whatever.

--Jenna Scatena

Learn more about Jenna.

It's no secret: hybrid cars are sexy. They save on gas, they reduce carbon emissions and Justin Timberlake drives one. They have arguably been thought of as the most accessible vehicle, so to speak, to reduce greenhouse gases without infringing on our lifestyle. But while it may be the most seductive means to lower our carbon footprint, it's certainly not the smartest.


    photo source

There's something else that emits far more carbon than cars but, if we improve it, it also has the potential to reduce even more greenhouse gases than buying a hybrid or taking public transportation. It's called electricity. Our electricity sector emits twice as much carbon as our transportation sector—accounting for 40 percent of America's total carbon emissions. But the good thing is that it doesn't have to. That is, as long we make it smarter.

By implementing Smart Grid technology such as smart meters we can have a more advanced and efficient electricity transmission network than our current outdated one. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, if the grid were just five percent more efficient the energy savings would be the equivalent of taking 53 million cars off the road. In addition, it would increase our ability to distribute renewable energy and could reduce electricity consumption by five to ten percent, carbon dioxide emissions by 13-25 percent and the cost of power-related disturbances to businesses ($150 billion per year) by 87 percent.

Smart Grid supporters hope to use innovative technologies to improve communication between the electricity grid, meters and consumers. As the system stands now, most of us, as energy consumers, don't know the details of our energy costs or consumption. How can we effectively lower our electricity use if we can't monitor it? We need to know the specifics of our energy use to see where we can cut back. This detailed information could be provided by smart meters, enabling us to be active participants in our electricity grid rather than passive consumers.

Studies have found that when consumers have detailed information about their energy use (a la the smart meter), they can reduce energy consumption up to ten percent. Essentially, it gives consumers the incentive to improve their energy efficiency and helps balance the grid by encouraging people lower their energy use during peak hours. And using less energy means saving more money and lowering carbon emissions.

That's the less controversial side of the Smart Grid.

The more divisive component of the Smart Grid has to do with who gets access to our electricity use information and whether or not utilities will ultimately control our appliances. In the Smart Grid world, meters and the grid would be able to transmit real-time information with each other, making the grid more energy efficient, but also relaying detailed information to utilities—worrying some people about privacy and control issues. Though it remains to be seen how exactly this would play out as nothing is set in stone at the moment.

Without a more efficient and intelligent grid, we will continue to emit unnecessary amounts of greenhouse gases and lose our ability to be competitive in the international energy market. There is reasonable fear that without a Smart Grid, renewable energies like wind and solar will remain a niche market and the clean energy revolution will slip through our fingers. As former Vice President Al Gore recently proclaimed in his keynote address at the GreenBeat 2009 Conference on the Smart Grid: "The Smart Grid is as important to the clean energy revolution as the Internet was to the information age." Just as the Internet provided a new system for information exchange and spurred innovation and new business models, the Smart Grid has the potential to improve our energy distribution network and create similar opportunities for innovation.

We're in a time when innovation in clean technology is key, and how exactly the new grid will roll out is yet to be determined. What comes next doesn't need to be sexy—it needs to be smart.

by: Jenna Scatena for The Climate Community.
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