Now is the very last minute to join this autumn’s Eating Well on a Budget challenge! If you’re quick, you can still join our fab group in this fun and eye-opening experience. Great low-carbon food doesn’t need to be expensive! Or would you like to taste great local food and hear from our Eating Local bloggers, what life really is like with a local diet? Then book a place at out Eat Buy Local event! Great new ideas on sourcing and cooking local and seasonal food.
Carbon Conversations are starting again – make this the autumn you really get started on your low carbon lifestyle! Find out why so many people think this is fantastic, life-changing course! These are the final courses for this year, so sign up now if you don’t want to wait till 2013!
If you have already experienced Carbon Conversations, join others at the annual Carbon Conversations Reunion on September 13th. A nice way to share experiences on cutting down carbon, works also well if you feel like adding a little oomph to your carbon cutting!
We are looking for a volunteer admin to join our friendly team. If you’d like to gain some valuable office work experience, find out more below!
Carbon Conversations groups starting in October
This is the time of year we often sign up for evening classes, wanting to make a fresh start with something that interests us. Why not make this the time you sign up for a Carbon Conversations group, which many people have found inspiring and life-changing? Whether you already know a lot or a little about how our lives contribute to climate change, you will find out a lot more on this course, plus practical, concrete, doable suggestions for halving your carbon footprint and enjoying it while you do! Making significant lifestyle changes is so much easier and more enjoyable when in the company of like-minded people. Find out why Jade called this the best educational experience she had ever had! To find a group near you and check the dates, visit our website – we have groups in Newnham, Mill Road area, Milton Road and Cottenham. To book, email elizabeth@cambridgecarbonfootprint.org or phone 01223 301842
Volunteer opportunity: Admin Assistant
Are you looking for office experience? Do you have a keen interest in environmental issues? Could you volunteer your time 3 mornings a week for 3 to 6 months for a small, friendly environmental charity in Cambridge?
You would be:
- Dealing with events bookings
- Dealing with phone and email enquiries
- Inputting data
- Managing newsletter sign-ups
- Maintaining parts of our website (for which training would be given in WordPress)
- Occasional postering around the town
- Other sundry tasks as required
We are looking for someone:
- Well-organised
- Reliable and committed
- With good communication skills, both written and verbal
- Basic IT skills (we can provide some training)
You would be working alongside our Volunteer and Events organiser and the CCF Co-ordinator, plus our board of six Trustees.
If interested, please send your CV and a covering letter to Elizabeth Bruce (elizabeth@cambridgecarbonfootprint.org).
Deadline 20th September, interviews planned for Tuesday 25th September
Last chance to join Eating Well on a Budget! 2 September
If you email Helen (helen@cambridgecarbonfootprint.org) today, there is still time to join the second round of our Eating Well on a Budget! A group of us will be picking up the challenge of eating delicious, nutritious, mainly local food for £21 per person per week. It can be done! Follow us on our blog!
CCF Book Group Meeting 3 September
Monday 3 September, 7.00pm – 9.30pm.
The CCF book group has one of its bi-monthly meetings coming up on 3rd September. We will be discussing our first climate change novel: “Far North” by Marcel Theroux. (Normally we discuss non-fiction books such as “Prosperity without Growth” by Tim Jackson – our last book was “Meat: a Benign Extravagance” by Simon Fairlie.)
We always have a great discussion and also bring home-made food to share, which makes for a really enjoyable evening. This time we will also be deciding on new books for the next few months. If you are interested in joining the group, email the office and they’ll pass the message on.
Carbon Conversations Reunion 13 September
Thursday 13 September, 7:30pm – 9:30pm, Hills Road
If you have ever done Carbon Conversations, whether last April or five years ago, you will know what a great course it is. This is a chance to catch up with how other people are getting on with their low carbon journeys, to share experiences, pick up ideas, get re-enthused. This is also an opportunity to think collectively about new ways of getting others involved in a low carbon lifestyle – CCF has one great new idea we want to discuss with you, but we’re sure you have other ideas to share! Let the office know at info@cambridgecarbonfootprint.org that you are coming and they’ll give you Bev’s address.
Herb Drying Workshop 13 September
Thursday 13 September, 6 – 7pm, Browns Field Community Centre
Take a tour of the edible garden planted this past spring by volunteers with Transition Cambridge’s Growing Spaces Project and learn how to dry herbs for cooking. You’ll get to take some herbs home with you and sample some herbal tea made from the plants in the garden. Space is limited in this 1-hour workshop so please email info@cambridgecarbonfootprint.org to book a place. (And if you are interested in more workshops like these, why not check out our SkillsFest on 6th October?)
Thinking about what happens in groups 18 September
Tuesdays 18 September, 16 October, 13 November and 11 December, 7.30 – 9.30pm, Central Cambridge
Are you a Carbon Conversations facilitator, interested in finding out more about working with groups? Learn to encourage members to become more confident about responding to feelings in groups, through the experience of being in one and reflecting on it. We will also provide some teaching about being in groups.
Booking essential, places limited to 12. Email info@cambridgecarbonfootprint.org to book.
Eat Buy Local: book for our celebration of local food! 21 September
Friday 21 September, 7:00pm – 9:00pm, St. Andrew’s Hall on St. Andrew’s Road, Chesterton
Food and drink make up nearly a quarter of our carbon footprint, so it’s as important to look at reducing our emissions from food as it is from our homes. One way is eating more seasonally and locally. For our Eat Buy Local event we have an exciting line-up of local food-producers who will tell us what’s available locally and what it’s like making a living this way. You can also hear from participants in our Eating Local blog, including people who have kept up the challenge for most of the year – what was it like, was there a particularly difficult time? Find out if this is something you could get involved with! We need you to book, as we will be serving a simple, delicious home-made meal from local ingredients, so we need to know how many to cater for. The evening is free, but we would appreciate a donation to help cover costs. CamBake, Waterland Organics, Hawthorn Farm, CamCattle, Cambridge Country Markets.
Email info@cambridgecarbonfootprint.org or phone 01223 301842 to book your place.
Trip to Hockerton Housing Project 29 September
Saturday 29 September, 11am – 7pm
Join us on a tour of Hockerton Housing Project. The tour lasts three hours, from 2pm to 5pm. It takes about 1hr 45mins to get there from Cambridge so we’ll leave around 11am which will give us time for a picnic lunch. We expect to arrive back in Cambridge by 7pm at the latest (the plan is to car share).
Cost: £24 (payable in advance) plus a contribution towards travel costs (payable on the day). We can offer a couple of bursaries to our volunteers.
Booking essential, places limited to 10. The booking deadline is 14th September. For further information, or to reserve your place, email the office at info@cambridgecarbonfootprint.org
SkillsFest 6 October
Saturday 6 October, 12pm – 4pm, St. Andrew’s Hall on St. Andrew’s Road
SkillsFest is a free skills sharing event featuring workshops, demos and tutorials on a variety of skills, including willow weaving, sewing, knitting, DIY energy saving tips, growing your own, bicycle maintenance, herbal healing, and lots more! We will also have a cafe, creche, recipe swap and lots of information on how you can continue learning and sharing skills after the event is over. Please note the creche will require booking ahead, which you can do via info@cambridgecarbonfootprint.org. There will be so much to learn and to do on the day; check our website for more details and latest updates!
CCF’s great fundraising Ceilidh 20 October
Saturday 20 October, 7.30 – 10.30pm, Arbury Community Centre, Campkin Road
Don’t miss this wonderful evening! We have the fantastic Cambridge University Ceilidh Band playing live for us, with their own caller, so you don’t need to know the steps in advance! There will be food and drink and a raffle with great prizes. Our last ceilidh was a packed-out success, so do book early! In order to make sure you are not kept away by cost, we have two ticket prices: £5 and £10 (or more if you can afford it – this is a fundraiser, be generous!) and you decide which you pay. This covers entry + food + one drink.
Have a look at our gorgeous ceilidh poster, which we would love you to download and display! Tickets can be booked from the office (info@cambridecarbonfootprint.org or phone 01223 301842).
Carbon Conversations facilitator training 20 October
If you have participated in a Carbon Conversations group, this is your chance to co-facilitate a group yourself! The training is free and you are always paired up with an experienced facilitator for your first group. If you enjoyed the course and want to help ensure others can experience it, sign up for this workshop and see if this is for you. (There is a wonderful facilitator’s guide, as well as the participants’ handbook you are familiar with, so you get a lot of guidance.) Email elizabeth@cambridgecarbonfootprint.org or phone 01223 301842 if you are interested.
Low Carbon Future: Dream or Nightmare? 29 October
29 October, 7.30pm – 9.30pm, St. Andrew’s Hall in Chesterton
What will peak oil and climate change bring to Cambridge, positive changes, negative consequences, both? Cast your imagination to the future in this interactive talk that explores the possibility of a low carbon world which is rewarding and enjoyable.
This workshop provides a taste of what Cambridge Carbon Footprint covers in our award-winning six-session course, Carbon Conversations, and touch on what Transition Cambridge created for their positive vision of Cambridge in 2030 earlier this year.
The event is part of the 2012 Festival of Ideas. To book please emailinfo@cambridgecarbonfootprint.org or call 01223 301842.
Eco-renovation workshop in Trumpington Pavilion 10 November
Saturday 10 November, 10:00pm – 4:00pm, Trumpington
Following on from our successful Eco-renovation in Progress evenings, we are very excited to be offering a Saturday daytime workshop focusing on the types of houses in a certain area: Foster Road, Paget Road and Byron Square in Trumpington, which have 350+ post-war semi-detached and terraced homes, some council-owned and some owner-occupied. These include homes with cavity walls and some steel-framed houses which require external cladding.
We now have confirmation that we will have two Eco-renovations in Progress visits to offer on the day (times TBC). There is only room for small numbers of people (probably eight at a time), so you need to book early (bookings have already started!). Everything else will be open to all on the day: specially-made videos of homes in the area, Question and Answer sessions with experts (including Anne Cooper of Acarchitects and Alex Rice of Green Tomato Energy), supplier stalls, DIY workshops. Detailed programme to follow.
If you live in the Foster Road area (post-war council housing, now partly owner-occupied) and are interested in having a free expert eco-renovations visit, giving you advice on how you make your home more energy-efficient in return for our filming you, or if you would be willing to host an Eco-renovations in Progress visit on the day, please contact info@cambridgecarbonfootprint.org or phone 01223 301842. More information to follow onour website.
Visit the new section on DIY eco-renovation on our website!
Tom and Anne Bragg have blogged about laying underfloor insulation, with lots of pictures and clear information for others who would like to do the same, whether themselves or by calling in a specialist.
Prizes needed for our auction of goods and promises in February!
As you know, we need to raise £25,000 by June 2013 – with your help we have raised £2,300 towards this so far. We hope to raise more at the ceilidh and also through our exciting auction of goods and promises next year – date to be announced soon!
In the meantime, we are on the look-out for interesting items or services to auction, from a weekend in a holiday cottage, somebody to do your mending for you for a month, a great meal, a work of art, baby-sitting, theatre tickets, a complementary therapy session… the list is endless! So have a think about what you would like to contribute and what you could ask your friends to give – just nothing too high-carbon, such a ride in a helicopter or a pair of jet-skis…
If you have anything to offer, please email info@cambridgecarbonfootprint.org or phone 01223 301842
Skillsfest Skill Sharers Wanted
SkillsFest is just over a month away (6th October) and we have a few spots left for Skills Sharers. We know CCF’s newsletter readership is full of talented people who have interesting skills. We’re looking for people who can show and explain their knowledge, in anything from a 10-minute demo that you repeat a few times to a 1-hour workshop. We can provide funding for materials as well as refreshments. Some ideas for the kinds of skills we are looking for include but are not limited to: wine making/home brew, jam making, community organising, tool sharpening, soil building, growing perennial vegetables, vermiculture, candle making, spinning wool, basketry, crochet, making and using natural cleaning products, graywater harvesting, making natural dyes, foraging – we know you can do it or know someone who does!
Contact Stephanie (stephanie@cambridgecarbonfootprint.org) as soon as possible for more details or to be added to our SkillsFest line-up.
Models wanted!
We are looking for some lovely volunteers to take part in a photo shoot campaign highlighting just how fabulous second hand things can look (“In praise of second hand”). We are looking for people to be in those photos and would love to hear from you if you’d like to take part. We are looking for the following people: a family with young children for a picnic scene, a couple who can punt (or two single people happy to pretend to like each other!), someone to pose on a bike, a male to showcase the coolest office in town, and some people ready for a night out. If you’d like to be part of this campaign or know any aspiring models please get in touch at info@cambridgecarbonfootprint.org. We hope to take the photos in September. See you in print soon!
Climate change, the Olympics, and the defiance of death
Amongst the hype and excitement, what does the Olympics say about our relationship to nature? It is easy to detect a flavour of bread and circuses, but we are also in a realm where politics and myth unite in defiance of death.
Read more at www.rorandall.org
Fracturing Politics
Tim Yeo, Environment minister in John Major’s government, has been taunting Cameron over aviation expansion: “Is he a man or a mouse?” The all-party consensus on refusing a third Heathrow runway may fracture, with Yeo arguing that now aviation emissions are subject to an EU cap: “we could cover the whole of Surrey with runways and not increase emissions by a single kilogram”. This bunkum imagines the dysfunctional EU Emissions Trading Scheme is perfect. But it’s ineffective because of corporate lobbying for huge carbon allowances and dubious offsets. It also ignores the extra climate change damage from aviation.
In the US climate change has become completely party-political. Mitt Romney, the Republican Presidential Candidate, contrasts himself with Obama: “President Obama promised to slow the rise of the oceans and to heal the planet. My promise is to help you and your family”. Although Obama’s been pretty ineffective since Republicans got a majority in the House, Romney would be much worse for climate change.
Another Romney pledge is that “The United States will be independent from energy sources outside of North America by 2020”. This is about massive exploitation of Canadian tar sands, the dirtiest fossil fuels, which take 3 times more energy to extract than normal oil and have horrendous health and environmental impacts. Energy independence also means much more fracking for shale gas in the US.
Media attitudes matter, so please sign this petition to the new BBC Director General, George Entwistle, asking for better coverage of climate change.
Tom Bragg
Gardening in September: Plants compete for medals in the ‘Plantalympic Games’!
It’s official… it has been the wettest summer for a hundred years! Although there have been dry, sunny days with temperatures in the high 20s, heavy downpours have been the most memorable feature of the summer of 2012…. 8th, 10th, 11th June, 7th, 13/14th and 19/20th July and 25th August to name a few dates! New water butts, bought earlier in the year when a long drought year was looming, have overflowed by several times their volume. The amount of water deposited when it has rained has been immense – a worrying sign that a warmer world atmosphere can hold more water vapour? The hope is that it is just a freak season, but ‘wishful thinking’ will not tackle climate change.
Read Keith Jordan’s article in full on our website.
Managing your Home Heating 6 September
Thursday 6 September, 7.30 – 9pm, Emmanuel United Reform Church, 72 Trumpington Street
For most people space heating is by far the biggest use of energy in the home. Are you heating more of your house than you need? Is it warmer or cooler than you want it? Does the heat from your radiators go straight our of your window? If you would like tips on managing your heating, or if you’d like to know what the latest in heating controls can do, come to ‘Managing your home heating’ and ask our experts: Peter Thom from Green Heat and Laurence Hardwick from Homaetrix, plus experienced householders.
For more information visit Transition Cambridge website (orwww.transitioncambridge.org/energyathome)
This event is part of the Emmanuel URC Environment Expo 6th-7th September.
Book launch: Looby McNamara – “People and Permaculture – Caring for ourselves, each other and the planet” 26 October
Friday 26 October, Heffers Bookshop, 20 Trinity Street (time TBC, finalised details from Penny Hall tcheartandsoul@gmail.com)
Book launch in Cambridge with Looby McNamara: People and Permaculture – Caring for ourselves, each other and the planet – The first dedicated Peoplecare book.
“This is the first book to explore how to use permaculture design and principles for people – to restore personal, social and planetary
well-being. People & Permaculture widens the definition of permaculture, taking it right into the heart of our own lives, relationships and society, making it relevant to everyone . It provides a clear framework and guidance for both experienced permaculturists and people completely new to permaculture, and indeed for anyone who wishes to live a more creative, abundant life. Including over 50 practical activities, People & Permaculture empowers readers with tried and tested tools to initiate positive change. It is a hands-on, powerful guide to creating a sustainable world.”
Permaculture Magazine
More reviews here. To find out more about Looby, visit her website.
People and Permaculture: Creating synergetic productive groups – a workshop with Looby McNamara 27 October
Saturday 27 October, 10am – 17pm at Trumpington Pavilion, King George V Playing Field, Paget Road, Trumpington
We will explore group life and how to make the most of the group energy and people’s skills. This will include decision-making, facilitation techniques and roles within groups. The workshop will be fun and interactive. Cost £45/£35 unwaged if booked and paid for by September 25th. After this date the cost will be £55/ £45 unwaged.
For more information and to book contact Penny Hall at tcheartandsoul@gmail.com. Please book early if your keen as places limited.
For more info about Looby go to her website