A Prisoner of Hope

The following is a speech written and delivered by Bioneers Executive Director Joshua Fouts at the 2018 Bioneers Conference. View the full keynote video here.

View more keynotes, transcripts, and more from the 2018 Bioneers Conference.

I have to admit I had to trash many versions of this talk. Every time I thought I had formulated a coherent presentation, another dramatic shift, another revelation in one the countless mind-boggling scandals we are currently enduring, another assault on decency somewhere in the world, another challenge to my previous notions of reality, would force me to reevaluate what I thought and what I should say.

I know I am not the only one during this very dark time in U.S. and global politics to experience disorientation and to start to question so much of what I had taken for granted and thought I understood. I have to admit I have been experiencing many moments of gloom and despair.

But as I was getting ready to come to Bioneers — an experience I always find rejuvenating — I began to look around for guidance to help me build up my resilience, find a bit more clarity, and reconnect with a sense of purpose. I looked in both predictable and unexpected places: Conversations with family members, my own experiences and memories, in my observations of the natural world, in the words of leaders and thinkers I respect, both contemporary and from generations past, quite a few of whom have been here at Bioneers over the decades.

I can’t say I found any simple answers, but the exposure to all that wisdom helped. Then I read something that once again blew my mind and sent me into another tailspin. An investigative piece in WIRED magazine revealed that Russian trolls had been behind efforts to create dissent among Star Wars fans, folks for whom those films serve as empowering metaphors for their own heroic journeys through life. How amazingly clever and how diabolical! This was an attempt to penetrate people’s myths and divide and demoralize them in their psychic core. This is akin to an enemy attacking not your land or infrastructure, or even just your elections, but your very dreams. (Cue Leonardo DiCaprio, Ellen Page and the cast of Inception to get to the bottom of this.)

It reminded me of a speech George Lucas (the creator of Star Wars of course) gave in which he outlined Star Wars’ key moral theme: the contrast between light and dark. “There are two kinds of people in the world,” he said, “compassionate people and selfish people…If you go to the side of the light, you will be happy because compassion, helping other people, not thinking about yourself, thinking about others, that gives you a joy that you can’t get any other way.” While “Being selfish, just following your pleasures…you’re always going to be unhappy. You’ll never get to the point … You’ll get this little instant shot of pleasure, but it goes away and then you’re stuck where you were before. The more you do it, the worse it gets. You finally get everything you want and you’re miserable because there’s nothing at the end of that road, whereas if you are compassionate and you get to the end of the road, you’ve helped so many people.”

Now, granted, this is an over-simplified teaching geared to big budget movie morality tales, and all of us contain light and dark potential, but it still contains some core truths. And thinking about Lucas’s words, the sheer amount of darkness we’re currently seeing in the world made me begin to wonder if the dark side just has too many advantages, whether The Force really isn’t with us. I began to doubt the words of Martin Luther King which I had long wholeheartedly subscribed to: “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” I had just been seeing so much more injustice than justice lately, and in so many parts of the world at once.

But ultimately two wise voices got me back on track. The first was, ironically, the late Joseph Campbell — who advised Lucas on Star Wars’ mythology. I came across a quote of his: “As you proceed through life, following your own path, birds will shit on you. Don’t bother to brush it off. Getting a comedic view of your situation gives you spiritual distance. Having a sense of humor saves you.” And that hit me like a ton of bricks. Yes, the Age of Trump had been making me lose my sense of humor. If I can’t laugh, above all at myself, the bastards will really have won, so thanks, Joseph. Step number one, accomplished: I turned the laugh track back on.

And that reawakened humor triggered a familial memory, an anecdote about my father, a world-renowned researcher on primates. When he was a young professor he had been working with a group of chimps to whom he was teaching sign language. He was out with a young male chimpanzee named Booee and a group of human graduate students. In those days, the chimps were unfortunately required to wear a sort of leash around their necks, called a “lead” as they are much stronger than humans — eight times stronger, pound for pound, in fact and therefore perceived as being quite dangerous.

At the end of the lesson my dad told Booee that it was time to go back into the chimp compound, an unpleasant collection of rusty cages that no human would want to live in, so why would a chimp? Booee protested by promptly climbing up a tree, but my dad, the young alpha male professor, was not about to be humiliated in front of his students by a chimp, so he thought he’d show Booee who was boss by wrapping the lead around his wrist so that Booee had no room for movement, getting very close to the tree and angrily demanding that Booee come down. In response, Booee, calmly, with one arm, reached down, grabbed the lead and lifted my 200-pound father off the ground swinging from the lead.

My dad, in what I can only infer was a moment of ego free clarity, quickly changed the subject: He looked up at Booee and signed, “I forgive you.” Delighted, Booee leapt out of the tree into his arms and off they went. So not only might birds shit on us, but non-human animals and the rest of nature will surely show us who is really in control, bringing us back into line if we don’t learn respect, compassion, forgiveness and empathy — for all beings, not just humans.

The second voice that helped me regain my bearings was an essay from Rebecca Solnit that really gave me a much-needed historical perspective. It drove home how many things really have dramatically changed for the better. She wrote: “Thirty years ago Ronald Reagan was president, the threat of an apocalyptic nuclear war seemed very real, a large swathe of the earth lived under the totalitarianism that got called Communism, which seemed like it might last centuries rather than another year…Anita Hill had yet to speak up and almost no one addressed sexual harassment…Same-sex marriage was virtually inconceivable to most people; the Lawrence vs. Texas ruling decriminalizing gay sex nationwide was fifteen years away; First peoples had been almost entirely erased in public discourse … and we got most of our energy from coal.” Aha, thanks Rebecca. Step 2, check: Don’t lose sight of the long game because of all the distractions of this current surrealistic nightmare.

I remembered that Archbishop Desmond Tutu had once said, “I am not an optimist. I am a prisoner of hope.” I think hope is what brings so many of us back here to Bioneers each year. And this weekend has really helped reboot my hope. Hearing about all the inspired, courageous work and all the innovative projects so many of you are involved in has dispelled much of the darkness I was wallowing in. Hearing from so many youth from such diverse backgrounds, identities and ethnicities who are here participating in our Youth Leadership Program on scholarships, which all of you make possible — thank you! — has given me enormous faith in the future. Theirs is a generation so far ahead of us from the get-go: allergic to racism and injustice in their very core, totally comfortable with the authentic expression of gender identity, unwilling to tolerate continued gun violence.

My son, August, who is 17, is here today. He has grown up as part of this more expansive generation. His acceptance and openness to people from all walks of life inspires me. It is what he knows is right in his bones. In many ways he has become a teacher to me. And you heard yesterday from the extraordinary Edna Chavez whose strength and resiliency exemplify the unstoppable momentum of these young leaders. This generation will not go back in time. I now see I was wrong to doubt MLK’s wisdom. I am convinced that today’s emerging leaders will ultimately succeed in ushering in far more enlightened times. And it’s important to note that much of the progress we have made in the past few decades is still in place — even though we still face many challenges.

So, that has been some of my inner journey this past year. I can’t promise I won’t have moments of doubt and fear, but one thing my quest for guidance and this incredibly uplifting weekend have reinforced for me is that no matter how infuriating the daily headlines might be, I will do my utmost to keep at it, to work for the world we want to see, and to choose hope, empathy, and compassion. But I will also do my best to remember not to take myself too seriously, lest the birds and chimps and the entire natural world decide to set me straight.

Dung Beetle Medicine

The following is a speech written and delivered by Bioneers Co-Founder Kenny Ausubel at the 2018 Bioneers Conference. View the full keynote video here.

View more keynotes, transcripts, and more from the 2018 Bioneers Conference.

Recently I happened across a fading old post-it tacked in an obscure corner of my office. It’s a cartoon of two beetles. One is saying to the other: “Of course we put up with a lot of shit. We’re dung beetles.”

That’s kind of what life is feeling like these days, isn’t it? We’re charged with cleaning out the stables of a misbegotten, decaying civilization — composting it into fertility — and replanting it with new growth. This is a transformative and traumatic moment — a time of rise and demise. We’re in the maelstrom. How we navigate the pathways forward will set the course for decades and centuries to come.

Perhaps it took a breakdown this breathtakingly extreme to reveal the democracy theme park for what it is, and to mobilize enough people to actually change the system devouring people and planet. In this psychotic episode of politics gone feral, we’re grappling with an illegitimate regime. It lost the popular vote. It seized power by exploiting an electoral reality distortion field nakedly corrupted by voter suppression, gerrymandering and an anti-democratic electoral college.

It has been doubly overwhelmed by a disinformation mass media machine and Russian black ops and cyberwar. The democracy theme park is also a Potemkin Village, and Putin’s a Republican.

To be clear, I’m a registered independent. But with that said, I have to agree with Noam Chomsky that the Republican Party is “the most dangerous organization in human history.”

Climate change denial. Environmental mass murder. A war on women. A strategy of stoking racial and ethnic hatreds and white nationalism. Refugee children ripped from parents and caged in internment camps.

Raw power brandished to stack the Supreme Court with a hard-core party partisan, corporate hack, accused sexual assaulter and human shield for executive immunity. It’s government by gangsters and warlords, aligning globally with authoritarian regimes while erecting a Banana Republic here at home.

The Banana Republicans are pedal to the metal dragging us full-throttle into the abyss — right when time is of the essence to floor it in the opposite direction. The US republic is ostensibly based on the “consent of the governed.” I revoke my consent. How about you?

As Michelle Alexander wrote, “We are not the resistance. A new nation is being born. Trump is the one who’s fighting it. The regime is radically out of step with the ground truth of American culture and the arc of today’s diverse, interdependent world. They’re like the Japanese soldiers in World War II still fighting on an island who didn’t yet know the war was over. As Frederick Nietzche observed, “All great things must first wear terrifying and monstrous masks in order to inscribe themselves on the heart of humanity.”

As Naomi Klein sees it, “The reason the mask has fallen off, and we are now witnessing undisguised corporate rule is not because these corporations felt all-powerful: it’s because they were panicked. Our movements are starting to win. Rather than risk the possibility of further progress, after decades of privatizing the state in bits and pieces, they decided to just go for the government itself. It’s a corporate takeover.”

But make no mistake: Trump is just a babbling hood ornament on the Hummer of a plutocracy gone off-road. The 2008 financial crash outraged the public and stoked serious talk of nationalizing banks. It spawned the Occupy movement, the fight for $15, a surging fossil fuel divestment movement, and mass social movements all over the world committed to toppling political corruption, social injustices, and austerity schemes that further concentrate wealth and distribute poverty. The imperative now is to convert these movements into systemic change.

At its core, this maelstrom is a literal “male-strom”: the death throes a patriarchy hell-bent on retaining its power. Peak toxic masculinity is a distress signal: It’s on the run.

In the US, for the first time, women comprise a majority in the workforce. Of the fifteen job categories projected to grow in the next decade, only two are primarily male. Women comprise a majority in colleges and professional schools. They’re gaining ascendancy in many professional careers. Record numbers of women are running for office this year and will win.

We know that wherever women have decision-making power, all the metrics improve dramatically. “States that have improved the status of women are as a rule healthier, wealthier, less corrupt, and more democratic.” They’re less likely to engage in conflict both domestically and globally.

The physical security of women directly correlates with national security. Ending violence against women is literally a national and global security issue.

This is the moment for men everywhere to put the equality, safety and leadership of women front and center. It’s high time to redefine masculinity, and begin healing the gender wound with truth and reconciliation. The future of the world depends on it.

As Heather McGhee said here at Bioneers last year, “Our democracy has become as unequal as our economy. Capitalism is writing the rules for democracy, instead of the other way around. For three generations, now, politicians have stoked white anxiety, successfully linking government to undeserving minorities, and gaining support among white voters for cutbacks in public spending, regulation, and public solutions.”

Heather’s conclusion is this: “We need a ‘we’ to survive, and that’s exactly what racism destroys. The proximity of so much difference will finally force us to admit our common humanity. The beauty is in who we are becoming. It’s the country’s fulfillment and salvation.”

Author Pankaj Mishra recently observed that, just like today, in the late 19th century an unprecedented wave of corporate globalization caused massive global migrations and racial mixing. Like today, mass social movements erupted worldwide to resist empire and its elites.

As Mishra describes, “For fearful ruling classes, political order depended on forging an alliance between rich and powerful whites and those rendered superfluous by industrial capitalism. Exclusion or degradation of nonwhite peoples was a way of securing dignity for those marginalized by economic and technological shifts.

“Today,” Mishra continues, “it has reached its final and most desperate phase, with existential fears about endangered white power feverishly circulating once again. Global capitalism has promised to build a colorblind world through economic integration. But as revolts erupt against globalization, politicians and pundits in the Anglosphere are again scrambling to rebuild political communities around what W.E.B. DuBois in 1910 identified as ‘the new religion of whiteness — the ownership of the earth forever and ever.’ The religion of whiteness increasingly represents a suicide cult.”

The suicide cult of the U.S. regime is a desperate “whitelash” against a society inexorably on its way to becoming a majority-minority population. It’s a cultural revolution of pluralism that cannot be turned back.

As Jose Antonio Vargas put it, “This country is only going to get blacker, browner, more Asian, and gayer. Women will break all barriers. A country that has barely dealt with the black and white issue is now getting more complicated with all these ‘othered’ people. What’s left is this question of how much change can straight white men and white people handle?”

But the biggest change we’re facing is climate change. Over the past couple of years, Mother Nature stopped knocking and just blew the doors off. Climate resilience is about to become the central organizing principle for everyone’s lives.

The climate swerve of U.S. public opinion is finally tipping. The markets have spoken. The age of renewables is unstoppable, promising $26 trillion in growth and 65 million new jobs by 2030.

As climate chaos keeps worsening in fast-forward, this shift will radically accelerate. But, as Bill McKibben points out, “climate change is a timed test, and we’re failing.” We need to take bolder, bigger and more holistic measures. It means the reinvention of everything.

Perhaps the single greatest breakthrough initiative underway is Project Drawdown, founded by our friend Paul Hawken. Its goal is to actually reverse global warming by drawing carbon out of the atmosphere back to pre-industrial levels. All the practices and technologies documented in the best-selling Drawdown book are already commonly available, economically viable, and scientifically valid.

But Project Drawdown’s true power lies in its holistic approach that goes beyond the imperatives of clean energy technologies and keeping the oil in the ground.

Eight of the top 20 solutions it showcases relate to changing the food system. Combining reduced food waste and a plant-rich diet — the #3 and #4 solutions —  would make them #1. Combining girls’ education and family planning — the number 6 and 7 solutions — would comprise the second top solution.

These examples illustrate the kinds of systemic dynamics that will both reverse atmospheric CO2 and improve virtually all areas of life. It’s eminently doable with what we already know and have.

In just one year, drawdown projects have spontaneously ignited around the world from the grassroots to the canopy. Paul says the goal is for drawdown projects to be common practice worldwide within 15 years. It shows how we can realize a radically different scenario: actually healing the climate and ourselves.

Realistically, government is the only force big enough to stand up to the corporate juggernaut. The government is us — if we take it back.

What we need government to do today is a Green New Deal. The same battle over corporate state capture that’s playing out today took place in the 1930s when FDR saved capitalism from the capitalists with the New Deal.

The parallels are striking: extreme inequality and wealth concentration — wholesale deregulation — corporatized courts — restrictive immigration policy — and the rise of white nationalism and Fascism.

But there’s one big difference.

As the late Tom Hayden pointed out, “The great work then was to save us from the Depression. The great work today is to save us from climate catastrophe and the end of civilization as we know it. We need to put every person in this country and on this planet who’s out of a job or underemployed into a great green employment project. The starting point is to combine the notions of reducing emissions and achieving jobs and environmental justice.”

At the time it was being built, it wasn’t called the “New Deal.” It was called “the movement.” The programs and models percolated from the bottom up from the “laboratories of democracy” — cities and states.

That same scenario is recurring today with green blocs and regional and bioregional green alliances among cities and states. Cities consume over two-thirds of the world’s energy and account for more than 70 percent of global CO2 emissions.

We know that real wealth creation is based on replenishing natural systems and restoring the built environment, especially our infrastructure and cities. It’s based on investing in our communities and workforce. Restoration is estimated to become a $100 trillion market. Every dollar we spend on pre-disaster risk management can prevent seven dollars in later losses.

One key to building resilience is greater decentralization against the inevitable failure of centralized systems. Think decentralized power grids and more localized foodsheds and economies. Localized economies are the kryptonite of global markets. Some of today’s most innovative and successful models are arising from the work of The Democracy Collaborative, co-founded by Gar Alperowitz, who’ll share some stories later this morning.

The Democracy Collaborative is demonstrating what a Pluralist Commonwealth could look like. It marks the end of the growth economy and the start of living within our planetary means. It supersedes the false binary of capitalism and socialism, instead creating a mixed economy in service to the common good, climate action and equity.

It devolves substantial political and decision-making power to local and regional entities, coupled with designing democratic governance structures. It prioritizes economic security and intergenerational community wealth creation. At the core is distributed ownership through diverse forms of public, private, cooperative and common ownership.

These kinds of objectives may be closer than they appear. This is the time to seed the field. Small changes can have big influences.

One driving force will be the epic generational shift underway in the US and around the world. Numerous credible polls consistently reveal U.S. Millennials and Gen X’ers — the biggest generations in our history – with large majorities holding overwhelmingly progressive views. They’re also more than 40 percent nonwhite, the highest share of any adult generation.

By 60-80 percent, young people want climate action, support same-sex marriage, recognize racial discrimination as the main barrier to African Americans’ progress, and believe immigrants strengthen the country.

Sixty-five percent believe the country is on the wrong path. Seventy-one percent want a third party. Fifty-one percent oppose capitalism.

Millennial and Gen X voters will likely be the biggest cohort in the 2020 elections. Along with women and communities of color, their activism will change every institution in society in the foreseeable future. As the deep ecologist and Buddhist scholar Joanna Macy puts it, “We are part of a vast, global movement: the epochal transition from empire to Earth community.”

Which brings us back to dung beetles.

Over the past few years, scientists have discovered that dung beetles have many gifts. They’re not to be poo-poo-ed.

These humble creatures face fierce competition for this black gold. The male beetle plunges furiously into the mosh pit, rapidly piecing together bits of dung into a round ball. He rolls it away full-tilt boogie in the straightest possible line to escape dungway robbery.

It’s no mean feat to stay on the straight and narrow because the beetle is pushing that ball facing backwards and upside down, head toward the ground. How do they do it?

Researchers noticed an odd phenomenon. If the beetle seemed to lose his way, he climbed on top of the ball, performed an energetic circular dance, then rolled right along. By manipulating the time of day, scientists learned that he’s recording a mental snapshot of the sun, moon or stars. If he gets lost, he calls up that Beetle Maps snapshot and gets right back on track.

As one scientist commented, “We love working with the beetles. No matter what we do to them, they just keep on rolling.”

So, Bioneers — perhaps in these times, we can learn some dung beetle medicine. If we lose our way, just climb on top of that ball, dance by the light of the heavens, and keep on rolling.

Keep the Bioneers Conference With You Year-Round

At Bioneers 2018, we’re hearing from some of the world’s foremost innovators, who are sharing their ideas and solutions for a more equitable, sane, green and just future. These are people who are digging in, even as the issues they face become increasingly overwhelming. They’re a group that inspires us to keep fighting.

The speakers at Bioneers are mighty, but mightier still is the force of the Bioneers community at large.

For nearly three decades, Bioneers has brought you stories from leaders like those we’re hearing from at Bioneers 2018. And in the days and years to come, we’ll do the same. The list of individuals, groups and organizations leading the charge toward the future we need is steadily growing. And their stories must be told and shared.

You have the opportunity to hold the Bioneers experience not just for a weekend, but every day of the year. You have the ability to share the stories from our community that inspire you and would inspire so many others.

Here are the best ways to keep this energy flowing once the conference is over:

• Sign up for our email list. Each week, we’ll share with you news and happenings from Bioneers who are moving the needle. Tell your friends!

• Subscribe to our award-winning podcast. Get inspiration straight from the leaders who are making change happen.

• Follow us on social media. Help us spark a conversation about what’s happening globally in environmental progress, human rights, food and farming, and more. FACEBOOK | TWITTER | INSTAGRAM | YOUTUBE | LINKEDIN

• Dig into Bioneers.org media. Our website hosts a wealth of content sure to ignite you to act collectively to solve big problems.

• Support our work. Bioneers is a nonprofit organization, and we rely on the support of our community to bring you the programming you count on throughout the year. Double your impact right now through a generous matching grant from Honeycomb Portfolio. All donations will be matched, dollar for dollar, up to $50,000! Honeycomb Portfolio is a female-founded fund led by Bioneer Azita Ardakani, which invests in early-stage, nature-inspired, for-profit social enterprises. Support with Venmo or Paypal by giving to donate@bioneers.org or donate via our website. Every dollar is a step toward storytelling that matters and the sharing of solutions we all need.

We look forward to continuing the conversations sparked at Bioneers 2018 with you in the days, weeks, months and years to come!

Planting trees, capturing carbon, cleaning the air: These innovators are looking to nature to develop innovations that give more than they take

By: Erin Connelly, Communications Director, Biomimicry Institute

The most recent climate change report from the UN was yet another wake-up call that business as usual won’t stop the runaway effects of our warming planet. It’s time to focus on solutions and design strategies that create products, materials, buildings, and systems that help all species thrive. Biomimicry – emulating nature’s patterns and strategies to develop sustainable technologies – can help us get there.

Through the Biomimicry Global Design Challenge and the Biomimicry Launchpad, the Biomimicry Institute and the Ray C. Anderson Foundation are working to support nature-inspired innovators to bring their ideas to life. This year at Bioneers, six international teams from the Biomimicry Launchpad will showcase their climate change solutions, all based on lessons learned from living systems. For the past year, these teams have been testing and prototyping their designs and working with biomimicry and business mentors to try to bring their innovations closer to market.

These teams are looking to nature to accelerate reforestation, capture carbon, create more efficient heating and cooling systems, clean the air, and support local food systems. And on October 20th this year, we’ll be at Bioneers to announce the winners of a $25,000 second prize from an anonymous donor and the $100,000 Ray of Hope Prize from the Ray C. Anderson Foundation. Here are six teams competing for the grand biomimicry prize:

Restoring forests with a multifunctional system that protects tree seedlings as they grow.

Bruno Rutman Pagnoncelli was 1000 feet above the Atlantic rainforest in Brazil when the idea first came to him. Strapped into his paraglider, soaring high above the earth, he saw acres of remote forest lands stripped bare of trees. He knew that current methods of reforestation are labor-intensive and high-maintenance. From his perch in the clouds, he wondered – was there a way to disperse seeds just like nature would do it? A way that would ensure that seedlings survived and thrived without requiring as much human maintenance? When he landed, he started sketching out what would become Nucleário – a new way to restore the rainforest, inspired by nature.

Nucleário is an all-in-one reforestation solution, designed to be used in remote areas of the Atlantic rainforest. The device significantly reduces maintenance costs by protecting seedlings from leafcutter ants and invasive grasses. The design also prevents soil leaching and increases soil moisture levels by functioning like leaf litter, and mimics how bromeliads collect water from rain and dew to provide a microclimate that attracts biodiversity.

After winning a number of design awards for the initial Nucleário design, Bruno teamed up with his brother, Pedro Rutman Pagnoncelli, who quit his job to help his brother with his business and bring this concept to market. Their main goal is to help make reforestation efforts less expensive, less dangerous, and less reliant on human maintenance. Currently, there are over 17 million hectares in the Atlantic rainforest targeted for reforestation efforts, and Nucleário could be a critical tool in the success of those efforts.

“The main bottleneck in forest restoration is seedling maintenance. If you just plant seedlings and go away, more than 90% will die. Every three months, you have to cut grass, water, apply fertilizer to avoid this,” said Bruno. “With Nucleário, we can plant more forest in less time.”

The Nucleário team has been testing the system with the World Wildlife Federation in Brazil in the Cerrado region, one of the most biologically diverse areas in the world. “We’re testing Nucleário against a control group and, after two months, we’re already seeing positive results,” said Bruno.

Nucleário is more than a design to Bruno and Pedro. They grew up in the rainforest, exploring the area and learning how to whitewater kayak as young boys. They know how much the region’s health plays a key role in protecting the watershed, and also their community and neighbors. “We can see how the rainforest helps people live,” said Bruno “We believe that the forest can help climate change but can also empower poor people in the country and create wealth for them.”

Bioneers will be the first opportunity for the Nucleário team to show their product in the U.S. “We’re very excited to see what people think and get feedback,” said Bruno. “Expanding our network with other nature lovers – that’s just what we’re looking for!”

Extracting carbon dioxide passively and efficiently to create cleaner air.

If you had been walking by the architecture building at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo one day this past July and peered upwards, you would have seen a large group of people, up on the roof, intently sketching, planning, and debating.

At this rooftop gathering, a team made up of architects, chemists, and designers came together to hone a design that they hope will help create cleaner air in dense, urban environments.

ExtrACTION is a technology that extracts carbon dioxide from the air without using electricity or fuel to operate. This team studied how plants like cacti maximize air flow and atmospheric water capture to create a carbon-scrubbing and filtering panel system. It’s an affordable, low- maintenance, resource-efficient approach that can be used in a variety of locations, including on buildings and along freeways, to lower greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

“We’re trying to extract the CO2 passively, which, as far as we know, hasn’t been done before,” said team member Kristin Fauske.

ExtrACTION started as an architectural thesis project, which won first place in the Biomimicry Global Design Challenge student competition in 2017. The team was invited to join the Biomimicry Launchpad, and six additional team members came on board to join the original three members – Fauske, Megan Hanck, and Anna Laird.

“We’ve gotten to this point in the world where, if someone doesn’t do something soon, it’s bad for everyone,” said team member Christian Vian. “I would love to be on that curve of people who are doing something good. It’s better to jump on this curve while we have the people, technology, and drive to do so. There’s not a whole lot of reasons not to do this.”

Team member Saul Flores agrees, “I lived in Mexico City for one year and got to experience the side effects of extreme air pollution the first week I was there. It was shocking to see the physical impact of pollution and the health issues it causes. That has been a big driver for me.”

The team looked at over 50 different biological organisms to study models for how to extract airborne CO2. The result? A new approach to capturing CO2, using a panel system that extracts the CO2 from ambient air using a resin that mimics the catalyst in natural CO2 conversion to bicarbonate.

“Doing something that can make an impact is a really fun experience,” said team leader Megan Hanck. “I’m looking forward to engaging with other people who are passionate about biomimicry at Bioneers.”

Studying nature’s filtering functions to help communities breathe easier.

Tsung-Yi Lin and Hung-Jen Lin are looking to nature to help communities breathe easier, starting with those hardest hit by air pollution in Taiwan.

After taking a trip last spring to visit small villages located directly beyond the boundaries of one of the largest petrochemical plants in the world, the two students from National Taiwan University and their collaborators saw first-hand just how local residents’ health and livelihoods were being affected by pollutants. In particular, they saw how particulate matter, specifically PM2.5 – the kind of pollution that is so small and light that it remains in the air longer and can more easily settle into people’s lungs, plants, and more – was affecting aquaculture farmers in the region.

Their innovation, called Refish, is designed to capture this particulate matter in an energy-efficient way. The design is meant to be accessible, affordable, and easily mounted anywhere, helping communities improve air quality directly and protecting aquaculture ponds from the detrimental impacts of pollution,.

The team applied lessons from the filtering functions of African violet leaves and the oral cavities of fish to create a filter that is able to trap particulate matter without getting blocked.

“Some plants have trichomes on the surface that trap particulate matter in the atmosphere,” said Tsung-Yi. “When the rain comes, it dissolves the particulate matter, and minerals can get into stomata to be used by the plant. We mimic this process to collect and trap the pollutants.”

The team also looked at how fish like the devil ray filter food particles via a gill structure that prevents particles from going out through the gill, and instead, flow into their throat.

Originally, the team designed their innovation to be placed on vehicles, to capture PM 2.5 on the road. After visiting the small villages in the shadow of the petrochemical plants in Taiwan, they pivoted to instead focus on the aquaculture farmers, whose fish are dying because of the pollutants in the air.

“We did some research in villages that are really harmed by air pollution directly,” said Hung-Jen. “We chose to work with fishermen first because we can measure a direct effect on their fish, and their livelihoods are directly affected by pollution.”

The team is currently working on testing and prototyping their design in the lab and plan to test it in the field soon with the villages they visited.

“When we go to the village and talk to them and share our idea, it feels like their response is positive,” said Tsung-Yi. “We feel like we’re doing something really important.”

Creating a cooling system that feels like being under a shady tree.

Imagine how it feels to be underneath a shady tree on a hot day. Now, imagine if you could feel that same way inside a building, even at the height of a sweltering afternoon.

Syndy Dovale Farelo, Samuel Serna Wills, and their team from Barranquilla, Colombia, are developing a new, energy-efficient way to cool homes in their region, by creating a plant-powered alternative to air conditioning.

In Barranquilla, Dovale Farelo says, residents are always conscious of the heat, organizing their days around it and making their decisions based on how to stay comfortable during the hottest parts of the day. Climate change is only making the problem worse.

“Architectural designs are usually made by people who don’t live in Barranquilla and don’t design the houses for Barranquilla,” said Serna Wills. The result? People rely on air conditioning to cool down inside—if they can afford it. With refrigerants being one of the top contributors to global warming, developing an alternative to inefficient, chemical refrigerant-fueled air conditioners can have a major impact.

The team developed Cooltiva, which uses water, plants, and wind to create a cooling system that can work actively or passively. The design directs air through cooling channels, where it accelerates and loses heat via evaporative action. The team was inspired by how rose-shaped plants like the frailejón capture and direct water with their funnel shape and channels. They also mimicked the process of evapotranspiration to reduce the temperature of the incoming air using only water, and incorporated plants into the design to block sunlight and direct heat.

“In the city, there are park spaces with big trees. The climate there is so different and people are so comfortable,” said Dovale Farelo. “It’s such a contrast. But it also shows you that it’s possible, so why can’t we do this in our homes?”

Dovale Farelo and Serna Wills note that another perk of Cooltiva is that it incorporates more plants into people’s homes. “One of the special things about Cooltiva is the connection people make with the plants” said Serna Wills. “People see a causal relationship; when you take care of the plants, the plants will take care of you.”

The Cooltiva team is eager to learn from the audience and people they meet at Bioneers. Dovale Farelo says, “It is so valuable to hear about everyone’s experience and how they’re working with nature.”

Developing a circular HVAC system that harvests and uses waste heat.

For years, each time Mauricio Ramirez stepped in an air conditioned building, he couldn’t help but think – can’t we do better? He knew that city buildings gobble up huge amounts of energy, with the majority of their energy usage focused on heating and cooling.

As an architect and certified biomimicry professional, he knew there are hundreds of examples of how living organisms regulate temperature in energy-efficient ways. When he started pursuing a master’s degree in biomimicry, he decided to tackle the problem head-on. He teamed up with fellow biomimics Daniela Esponda, Maria Luisa Gutierrez, and Joseph McIlwain to create BioThermosmart, a thermal management system that harvests waste heat from buildings and cycles it back into the system.

“Nature has provided solutions to this in so many ways,” said Ramirez. “That inspires me to put something to market that in some years may change the mindset of the building owners that air conditioning is the only option.”

The team started to think of buildings as if they were large animals, studying how elephants, alligators, and toucans regulate temperature through their circulatory systems.

“A lot of wasted heat is generated by machines. We are trying to manage heat waste in a way that can be used and distributed to lower energy consumption,” said Esponda.

Currently, heat generated from IT server rooms, boiler exhaust, and more is not only wasted, but requires more air conditioning to keep the building comfortable. “Systems are developed in silos and they’re not trying to converge all the energy in the building from a holistic perspective,” said Ramirez. “There is obviously something wrong with that design.”

BioThermosmart mimics the way the veins in elephants open and close to release or keep heat. The team’s goal was to use liquid in the same way that nature uses liquid to move heat, in a passive way. They designed a series of patches or stickers that are connected to each other by insulated hoses; when the temperature rises or drops, a low-power pump releases or captures heat as needed. The system is operated by a controller circuit that sends data to a cloud server.

The team is eager to share their prototype with the crowd at Bioneers. “I’m looking forward to hearing the stories from the other teams [in the Launchpad],” said Esponda. “I’m also excited to see incredible speakers, learn more, and expand my understanding of the field and what’s happening in the world.”

Learning from soil ecosystems to build strong connections in urban food ecosystems.

Picture this: it’s lunchtime and you’re hungry for something healthy and nutrient-packed. You open an app called Rootlink on your phone and place your order for a salad. You know that the salads contain vegetables that were grown by local farmers and that they were prepared by chefs at a local kitchen. You order your salad, then go pick it up from a local distribution point, knowing that you not only will have a delicious lunch, but that you’re supporting your local food chain in the process.

Naeeme Mohammadi, Hooman Koliji, and the rest of their team created Rootlink to help support thriving local food ecosystems. They’re working to create a network of local partnerships, a digital platform, and a transportation and micro-distribution system, to connect local farmers to local community kitchens and make delicious, nutritious, locally-inspired meals that are accessible to all.

“We want to reimagine and reintroduce how people can connect to green food in a way that they’re empowered and they have choices,” said Koliji.

Mohammadi and Koliji first met as undergraduate students in Iran. Years later, they reconnected in Baltimore, where Mohammadi was studying social design and Koliji was teaching at the University of Maryland. Mohammadi was part of a team that won a finalist spot in the Biomimicry Global Design Challenge and she wanted to have the opportunity to take their idea further. She and Koliji teamed up to develop a hyperlocal, distributed food system that could operate with a minimal carbon footprint.

Rootlink’s approach was inspired by how mycorrhizal fungi support healthy soil ecology.

“We are focusing on creating a decentralized distribution system, so we looked at mycorrhizae and the network that develops underground,” said Mohammadi. “We got inspired by how this happens organically – there’s no centralized control system.”

Rootlink is designed to operate like a mycorrhizal network, delivering resources within urban ecosystems. Local farms and Rootlink partner kitchens produce and process the resources (in this case, healthy food). Rootlink then identifies key distribution points within the urban area.

The team is now based in San Francisco and is currently working to test this concept with partners, including the Butterfly Movement.

“If we achieve one goal, that is changing people’s minds and behavior,” said Koliji. “By making that change, the demand starts shifting, and that will correct all of those pathways of market and distribution that, ultimately, will have the impact we want.”

This is the first time that the two entrepreneurs will be coming to Bioneers, and they are eager to connect with people who care about improving our food systems and reducing climate impacts.

“I’m so excited to be among people with the same mindset,” said Mohammadi. “I’d like to hear what’s going on in the field and create other partnerships that help us to move forward in our project.”

A message from members of the Ceibo Alliance Leadership Team

A message from members of the Ceibo Alliance, delivering a keynote talk at this year’s Bioneers Conference on Saturday, Oct 20, 2018 at 10am.

In response to catastrophic assaults on their lands and cultures by corporate industrial civilization, the First Peoples of the Amazon have formed unprecedented alliances to protect lands and peoples. These four extraordinary Indigenous leaders, who help guide the Ceibo Alliance of several ancestral peoples of Ecuador’s northern Amazon, have traveled far from their homes to share their stories of resistance and solutions. They will offer guiding wisdom from their elders to show what’s at stake for their rainforest territories, what it means to the future of our planet, and what we can all do as allies to protect the Amazon, its First Peoples and life on Earth. http://sched.co/EXH4

Learn more at conference.bioneers.org

Preview Screening: Changing of the Gods

Dear Bioneers!

I want to personally invite you to a one-time-only private screening of two episodes-in-progress from my forthcoming dynamic 10-part film series, “Changing of the Gods: Planetary and Human Revolutions.” The film screening will take place on Friday, Oct 19 at 7:00 in the Showcase Theater as part of the Bioneers Conference. Because we will be doing one final edit, your feedback will be invaluable to us. The Bioneers audience is famous for being among the sophisticated and smart in the world! The series features numerous Bioneers.

“Changing of the Gods” uses the framework of archetypal astrology to explore the arc of revolutionary cycles across history and how they correlate with planetary alignments. History doesn’t repeat itself, but it does seem to rhyme.

The series unfolds as a provocative mystery story, exploring today’s earthshaking global upheavals by focusing on the current “world transit” of Uranus and Pluto (2007-2020). Each time this planetary configuration recurs, a zeitgeist of paradigm-shifting revolutions, disruptions, breakdowns, and breakthroughs manifest in the collective psyche and behavior on titanic scales.

What is the revolution today? What is the transformation? Inspired by the book “Cosmos and Psyche” by acclaimed scholar Richard Tarnas, and featuring comedian John Cleese, we explore the current arenas of human activity where these revolutions and transformations consistently arise: political revolutions, women’s rights, Black liberation and civil rights movements, technological innovations, scientific paradigm shifts, and cultural revolutions involving “sex, drugs and rock ‘n roll.”

“Changing of the Gods” illuminates a new emergent understanding of the cosmos and our place in it. If these planetary alignments coincide with archetypally predictable shifts in human affairs, it may suggest that we live in a cosmos pervaded with consciousness and saturated with meaning.

We’ll screen two episodes-in-progress: the opening, “World Transits,” which sets up the mysterious premise of the correlation between planetary movements and entire historical and cultural epochs; and Women’s Rights Movements, which looks at the trajectory of social movements for women’s rights and feminism across history, and climaxes in this transformational #metoo moment.

I will introduce the episodes, and we’ll invite you to fill out an evaluation form, if you’re up for that. I hope to see you there!

With Love and Gratitude –

Kenny Ausubel
CEO and Co-Founder, Bioneers

Naropa University Leads the Shift from Earth Day to Earth Justice Day

The oppression of people and the oppression of Earth go hand in hand. This is an understanding shared by the students, faculty, and staff of the BA Environmental Studies, MA Resilient Leadership, Center for Inclusive Community, and Office Sustainability at Naropa University in Boulder, Colorado. In 2016, representatives from these areas came together and changed the April 20 tradition of Earth Day to Earth Justice Day. The intent of this action was multiple. First, it was a way to honor the one-year anniversary of Decolonize the Commons where in April and May of 2015, a group of diverse students, allies, and community members, camped on the Naropa green in order to raise awareness and take action against systemic white oppression at Naropa. Second, it rooted into the core values of interconnectedness and understanding that ecological and social issues are not separate concerns; rather they are part of interlocked systems of oppression. Finally, Earth Justice Day serves to honor Naropa’s commitment to take action on these values.

Naropa University is a small private institution that is Buddhist-inspired and a leader in mindfulness awareness and contemplative education. Founded in 1974, it has a legacy of activism for both ecological and social concerns rooted in mindful awareness and compassionate action. The students at Naropa have been leaders in making positive changes on and off campus, participating in community service and activism. These include helping Naropa: switch to wind power, divest from fossil fuel, offering a more diverse and ecologically centered curriculum, offering permaculture courses, creating a greenhouse and food forest, having a bike share program, becoming zero waste, creating a Center for Inclusive Community, hiring a Director of Sustainability, and engaging in socially responsible investing. The small size of the institution affords more participatory democratic decision- making and inclusive community. The creation of Earth Justice Day in 2016 followed along this tradition.

In rooting in the awareness that the oppression of people and the oppression of earth go hand in hand, there is a recognition that ecological and social issues arise from the same roots. Both are results of systems of exploitation. When addressing issues of racism, it is essential to trace these forms of oppression to their roots. In order to adopt an approach that is embedded in social action and supports human rights on the largest scale, it is necessary to understand the link between social and ecological injustice.

People of color and other diverse groups have always been involved with environmental issues. Since the advent of the ecological crisis, this has been most clearly visible through the Environmental Justice Movement. The Environmental Justice Movement specifically looks at the environmental issues facing marginalized communities such as communities of color both urban and rural, indigenous (Native Americans and Global Indigenous groups), working class and poor, women, and children. Environmental Justice recognizes that these communities are disproportionately affected by environmental issues than mainstream communities because they have less power to prevent and fight these conditions. The Movement critiques the mainstream Environmental Movement for not including the issues facing them, for often letting bad environmental companies move into their communities (Not in My Back Yard aka NIMBY) and for allowing the Global South to be exploited. It is important to recognize that Environmental Justice did not develop after the mainstream Environmental Movement. Marginalized peoples have been facing and fighting these issues since the onset of environmental issues but they have been framed as social issues (colonization, farm workers, genocide, toxic health, human rights, poor housing, etc. etc,). The Civil Rights Movement was extremely instrumental in bringing a voice to these concerns. The terms Environmental Racism and Environmental Justice were formalized in the 1980s and became commonly known in the 1990s.

While it is wonderful that Environmental Justice is becoming more and more recognized as important to the Environmental Movement, often it is viewed as a side dish to the larger movement.

In essence, it is the main dish because the oppression of the earth has always gone hand in hand with the oppression of people – these are not separate occurrences. We see this when we trace the history of the founding of this country where specific cultural groups – Native Americans, African Americans, Europeans, Latino Americans, Asian Americans, where exploited for cheap labor that directed coincided with exploiting the land. Professor of Environmental Studies and MA Resilient Leadership, Dr. Jeanine Canty speaks to this directly in a recent podcast.

The first few Earth Justice Days have been filled with both educational and community centered events that include speakers, experiential workshops, art, dancing, food, planting food, clothing swaps, music, and all around fun. By embracing the seriousness of these issues and allowing the heavy emotions surface, the community is able to also ground in positive emotions and actions to alleviate suffering. While Naropa University is proud to be the first university to replace Earth Day with Earth Justice Day, it hopes that others will follow suit and this will become and common value for all.

Solutions From Indian Country: What The World Needs to Know

October 8 is Indigenous Peoples Day and while it might sound corny, here at Bioneers every day is Indigenous Peoples Day! Since our founding nearly three decades ago, Bioneers has celebrated and honored Indigenous knowledge and solutions to the world’s most pressing social and environmental issues. We work tirelessly every day of the year to get the word out about Indigenous issues and cultures, and to share ways that Indigenous knowledge can help solve our most pressing environmental and social concerns.

The 2018 Bioneers Conference will be bringing together more than fifty Indigenous changemakers from around the world to share their experiences working to protect water, reclaim land, and practice their religions through the annual Traditional Ecological Knowledge Workshop, the Bioneers Indigenous Forum, panelists, Keynote speakers and our partner tables and booths.  

Indigenous Forum speakers include Leah Mata (Northern Chumash), who is fighting to protect traditional seaweed harvests to re-balance the coastal ecosystems for all Californians; Hernan Payaguaje (Seikopai) who is battling oil extraction corporations to protect his Ecuadorian forest homeland; and, Susan Harjo (Cheyenne/Hodulgee Muscogee), whose tireless work for several White House administrations has shaped U.S. Federal Indian policy to protect sacred sites, secure religious freedom, revitalize Native languages and establish the National Museum of the American Indian.

When we organize the Indigenous Forum each year, we ask ourselves: “What kinds of solutions are coming out of Indian Country that the world needs to know about?” And, “How can we build cultural bridges so that these game-changing efforts can be supported and sustained?” The result is groundbreaking programming that can’t be found anywhere else.

On Friday, October 19, we are focusing on “Water is Life!”– the battle cry that encapsulated Standing Rock. Our first panel, Abalone Wars: Indigenous Voices from the Coastal Frontlines, showcases Indigenous leaders sharing their experiences on the frontlines of the battle to save our coasts while fighting to maintain their cultural connections to these resources, and our second panel, Mní Wičhóni: We Are Here To Protect Our Rivers, features women water carriers sharing what “water is life” truly means from a cultural and spiritual understanding.

On Saturday, October 20, Indigenous Forum panels are all about Indigenous Solutions for our most difficult environmental challenges. For the first time ever, we are hosting “Lunch with an Elder,” a powerful session with Tom Goldtooth of the Indigenous Environmental Network. This will be followed by Native People’s “Just Transition” to Clean Energy, an incredible conversation with two Indigenous women who have successfully transitioned their Native communities off fossil fuels. Our final panel, Beyond Sovereignty: New Solutions for Self-Determination, features a Native lawyer, a tribal government official, an artist, and a policy-maker exploring how tribes might begin to go beyond conventional applications of sovereignty to include food sovereignty beyond farming, economic sovereignty beyond gaming, and environmental sovereignty beyond current legal systems.

Sunday, October 21, is all about re-indigenization, or honoring ways that all people can acknowledge their roots and responsibilities. For the first time ever, we are bringing pairs of Native/non-Native allies together for a groundbreaking conversation about How To Be A Good Ally. Last but not least, our final panel explores “Blood Memory.” What is it? How do you tap into yours? And, how do you respectfully acknowledge the blood memory of others?  

The Bioneers Indigeneity Program warmly welcomes all people from different backgrounds, ages and walks of life to join our Indigeneity programming as relatives, friends, and allies. We can’t wait to see you at Bioneers 2018.

Yours Truly,

Cara Romero and Alexis Bunten

 

 

 

 

Bioneers Indigeneity Program Staff Alexis Bunten (Aleut/Yup’ik) left, and Cara Romero (Chemehuevi) right, take a break to visit the MOMA while campaigning for the Rights of Nature in New York City this past July.

Indigenous Visionary Plant Traditions

First Peoples have long used key sacred plants as powerful healing tools and to communicate with the “mind of nature.” In this truly unique session Bioneers associate producer and editor of Visionary Plant Consciousness J.P. Harpignies and ethnobotanist/artist Kat Harrison hosted deeply experienced practitioners of sacred plant traditions from the International Council of 13 Indigenous Grandmothers, including Mazatec Elder Julieta Casimiro; Maria Alice Campos Freire, a Madrinha in Brazil’s Santo Daime Church; traditional Cheyenne dance leader, sculptress and writer Margaret Behan Red Spider Woman; and Bernadette Rebienot, Omyene healer and master of the lboga Bwiti Rite.

Explore our Visionary Plant Consciousness & Psychedelics media collection >>

Managing the Soil for Carbon is Good for the Climate – Whendee Silver

Dr. Whendee Silver of UC Berkeley is researching the bio-geochemical effects of climate change and human impacts on the environment, and the potential for mitigating these effects. Dr. Silver is working with the Marin Carbon Project to establish a scientific basis for carbon farming practices that, if implemented globally, could have a significant impact on mitigating climate change.

Explore the Bioneers Carbon Farming series >>

Jayden Lim Conference Preview: Beyond the Headdress

Award-winning young Pomo activist Jayden Lim of the California Indian Museum and Cultural Center’s Tribal Youth Ambassadors program will be delivering a keynote speech Friday, Oct 19 at the 2018 Bioneers Conference. She will illuminate the hidden history of California and how she has had to grapple with stereotypes and historical trauma to find her identity as a Native youth.

Jaydem Lim (Pomo), a high school senior skilled in GIS software, business planning, and Pomo language documentation (and also a DJ since age 11!), serves as a Tribal Youth Ambassador (TYA) for the California Indian Museum and Cultural Center. Jayden spoke at the Obama White House ceremony honoring the TYA program and is currently working to make California switch Columbus Day to Indigenous Peoples Day.

Learn more at conference.bioneers.org