[Terrapreta] city and farm

[Duane Pendergast]

            Very good point Lou,

 

And it's not just the new "agrichar" technologies. The new emphasis on using
biomaterials for ethanol and diesel fuel is being driven by the climate
change issue mixed with the idea that it will improve energy security for
the short term. The promotion of biofuels is based on the assumption that
carbon dioxide released from biofuels will be re-reabsorbed by growing
plants. That is not necessarily true. Even environmental groups are
belatedly realizing these approaches may not greenhouse gas reducers in the
long term, as forests are replaced with energy crops and the soil is mined
for every bit of instant growth it can muster. It seems few are thinking
through issues to sustainability of energy and food for long term security.
Your suggestion of city-farm synergy makes much sense.

 

Duane

 

-----Original Message-----
From: terrapreta-bounces at bioenergylists.org
[mailto:terrapreta-bounces at bioenergylists.org] On Behalf Of lou gold
Sent: November 14, 2007 7:47 AM
To: Terrapreta
Subject: [Terrapreta] city and farm

 

Hello All,

I've been trying to confront the issue of whether the new agrichar
technologies 
will be directed primarily toward energy or toward restoring soil qualities.
Isn't 
this just a new version of the question of productivity vs sustainability? 

The high tech discussion at the level of agribusiness seems to focus on
using 
agricultural wastes for more energy efficiency -- either integrated
cogeneration 
or producing more marketable fuel end-product. Profit/loss is based on a
relativley 
short term. Economics and ecology get separated. The result has not been 
good for the earth. 

Where did this separation come from? I suspect that it is because the farm
and 
the city got separated. As the technological reach of civilzation expanded
so did 
the dysfunctions production without sustainabilty. 

Would it be a useful path to start considering how the logic of Terra Preta 
might heal the city-farm separation? How? Perhaps by seeing the waste as
located 
in the city and thinking about turning this waste into an agrichar form that

would be sent back to the farm to restore the soil? Maybe it could be a
modern 
version of what was taking place in Amazonian Indian times.


Might it be possible to reconnect city and farm ECOLOGICALLY? 

What do you think? 


-- 
http://lougold.blogspot.com/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/visionshare/sets/ 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: /pipermail/terrapreta_bioenergylists.org/attachments/20071114/089a5001/attachment.html