Can Lode sustain itself?

News
Can Lode sustain itself?
Groups work toward industrial shift for long-term prosperity

By Dana M. Nichols
August 16, 2009
Record Staff Writer

SAN ANDREAS - After a history scarred by the booms and busts of gold mining and logging, it might seem unlikely that Calaveras County and neighboring portions of the Sierra Nevada would emerge as a hub for how communities can survive and thrive during economic, social and environmental turmoil.

Yet that seems to be exactly what is happening.

Some call it permaculture. Some call it sustainable design. Some call it economic conversion. A variety of groups ranging from private nonprofits to collaborations of government agencies to a loose network of community gardeners are all working on the long-term survival issue. They're growing vegetables for the hungry, finding new ways to manage forests, and training people in energy efficient construction technologies and how to incorporate food production into home site design.

And rather than being daunted by worldwide economic contraction, looming declines in oil production and climate change, many are optimistic that the Mother Lode, like pockets with similar climate in the hills around the Mediterranean, will be a place where people survive and even thrive in coming decades.

"You are living in Tuscany before the trees have been planted," said Ed Rich, an olive grower and olive oil producer who moved to Copperopolis in 1992. Tuscany is a hilly region of Italy that has been famed for thousands of years for the beauty of its landscape and the quality and variety of its food production.

Since Rich arrived 17 years ago, three other olive oil producers have sprung up in the area. Yet virtually everyone studying the long-term viability of the region admits it has a long way to go. Most food and fuel are imported. Much of the area's income is pensions drawn by retirees. And many of those with jobs commute to work in Stockton, Modesto or even the Bay Area.

Traditional industries are at perhaps their lowest ebb ever, with one of the remaining lumber mills near Sonora scheduled to close this summer.

At the same time, work has started to convert a former coal-fired electricity generation plant near Ione to burn biomass - including woody waste from area forests. The Buena Vista Biomass Power plant, due to begin operation in the spring, will draw its fuel supply from a 50-mile radius and is a big boost to efforts under way to cultivate new industries to thin fire-prone forests and find commercial uses for the resulting wood chips.

The concepts behind the conversion efforts aren't new. The term "permaculture" - which signifies both "permanent agriculture" and "permanent culture" - has been around for about a century. It signifies a way of life where permanent plantings, a mixture of crops and fertilization using livestock can sustain long-term production.

Permaculture advocates say their techniques contrast sharply with most current food production methods, in which chemical fertilizers and other inputs based on fossil fuels must be used to sustain yields.

And the term "sustainability" has been discussed, at least in some circles, for half a century - ever since some government leaders and energy analysts started warning that Americans should plan for a time when cheap oil was no longer plentiful.

Planning for the long term - including a future without cheap oil - has long been perceived by many to be a fringe idea. And cultural differences continue to prevent members of the Mother Lode's communities from working together, said John Adams, a member of the Foothill Collaborative for Sustainability who organizes the group's education pro-gram.

For example, people in the Love Creek area, near Avery, are pursuing a variety of efforts at sustainable development, including a forest managed to sequester atmospheric carbon and the recently founded Love Creek Center for Permaculture.

"But then you go down the road a few miles to Forest Meadows, and people kind of turn their nose up at Love Creek as a bunch of old hippies," Adams said, referring to the conventional subdivision of large homes just off of Highway 4. "There is still work to be done."

Some say the current economic contraction and efforts at community organizing may be breaking down old barriers.

Cooper Kessel, an architect based in Sonora, said that for decades he has urged his clients to incorporate energy efficiency into their buildings, often to no avail. This year, when he began weekly sessions of "The Crash Course," a class on peak oil, money, environment, food production and U.S. policy, he had to move it to a larger facility to accommodate the 50 people who showed up.

Kessel said he and organizers with the Foothill Collaborative for Sustainability plan soon to expand offerings of the course. And that class, as well as other events, has proved to be a springboard to networking people devoted to building sustainable businesses and communities.

"It is really about developing community, awareness and preparedness," Kessel said.

One goal is to use that base to promote the creation of "transition initiatives" that would chart a course toward building economies in Calaveras and Tuolumne counties that are less dependent on fossil fuels, Kessel said.

Permaculture advocates say they are still early in their efforts and need to continue education programs.

"It's pretty slow, because people still aren't clear what permaculture can offer," said Gabe Bridges, a consultant and produce grower based in Avery. Bridges, 32, grew up in the area and then went to design his own major in permaculture at University of California, Davis. Bridges has become a certified permaculture consultant through the Central Rocky Mountain Permaculture Institute.

Now, he's launching his own businesses and beginning to offer courses at the Love Creek Center for Permaculture, which he founded. Despite the slow growth of his own efforts, he said the Mother Lode has changed since he was a teenager.

"There were always a lot of people around here into that kind of stuff," he said of efforts to convert to a less fuel-intensive economy. "But now we're networked."

Contact reporter Dana M. Nichols at (209) 607-1361 or dnichols@recordnet.com. Visit his blog at recordnet.com/blogs.

Permaculture resources

Permaculture resources online:

• The Foothill Collaborative for Sustainability: www.foothillsustainability.org; serving Calaveras and Tuolumne Counties, with links to other groups, including the Central Sierra Ecological Building Association

• The Love Creek Center for Permaculture: lovecreekpermaculture.googlepages.com/home; near Avery in Calaveras County

• The Central Rocky Mountain Permaculture Institute: www.crmpi.org/Home.html

• The Crash Course: www.chrismartenson.com

/crashcourse; being studied by Mother Lode residents concerned about economic and monetary issues

• The Transition Initiatives movement:

transitionus.org or www.transitionnetwork.org; a network of communities around the world planning for how to prosper in the post-peak oil world
Sustainability efforts

Many groups and individuals are working on projects intended to revitalize the economy, increase food production and address problems related to water supply, wildfire and forestry management in the Mother Lode:

• The Calaveras Consensus Group has been meeting since last year, applying for grants and otherwise working to change the way the area's forests are managed and to create new industries burning biomass fuel from forests while improving forest health and reducing the pollution and risk from wildfires.

• Investors are gearing up to convert an old electricity plant near Ione to operate using biomass, including small-diameter wood from forest thinning. It should begin operating in 2010.

• The Calaveras Healthy Impacts Products Solutions project, based in West Point since 2005, has been retraining workers in forest thinning and other skills needed to control fire hazard, deliver biomass fuel and create other products from forest waste.

• Floating Islands International, a company that manufactures floating devices that use biological methods to remove pollutants from ponds and lakes, is gearing up to open an assembly plant on the Garamendi ranch near Mokelumne Hill.

• Courses relevant to economic conversion and environmental stewardship are proposed for a small satellite campus that San Joaquin Delta College plans to open near Valley Springs using portable classrooms from the Calaveras Unified School District.

• The Foothill Collaborative for Sustainability, a private nonprofit agency based in Murphys, has been offering monthly workshops in the past year on subjects such as permaculture and green building design and has a growing network of members in Calaveras and Tuolumne counties.

• Calaveras County supervisors recently voted that their General Plan guiding land use should include strong protections for forest and agriculture lands, a move backed by many ranchers, farmers and timberland owners.

• A community garden program started this year through the Calaveras County Agricultural Extension is yielding thousands of pounds of vegetables to help feed hungry families in neighborhoods and through the county emergency food bank in San Andreas. Many of those doing the garden work are clients of the Calaveras County Mental Health Department.