EcoLocalizer

Sometimes, you come across a Website that’s just so full of great, inspiring and exciting information, you can’t get enough of it. That’s what happened when I came upon the Buckminster Fuller Challenge Idea Index, a database of entries into the annual Buckminster Fuller Challenge to solve “humanity’s most pressing problems in the shortest possible time while enhancing the Earth’s ecological integrity.”

The challenge, launched last year, honored its first winner this past June: a plan for a “Comprehensive Design for a Carbon Neutral World: The Challenge of Appalachia,” submitted by John Todd, a research professor at the University of Vermont and founder and president of Oceans Arks International. And just last month, the institute unveiled its Idea Index, which provides details on entries in every area from community and energy to transportation and water. It’s too much to take in all at once, so today, let’s look at some of the innovative ideas in one area alone: food.

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First, there’s Paul Platosh’s designs for “Eco-op: A Radical Rethinking of the American Supermarket.” A resident of Portland, Oregon, Platosh conceives of 11 washable, reusable food containers that could replace all the various types of food packaging currently used in grocery stores. Customers at each Eco-op would fill their containers with the food items (locally grown whenever possible) they wanted, then weigh them to determine the price. Considering packaging accounts for nearly one-third of all the solid waste generated in the U.S., and that packaged foods are marked up big-time, an idea like Platosh’s could help both the environment and food-buyers’ bottom line.

Next, check out Michele C. Bertomen’s and David C. Boyle’s proposal for (NY) City Eden. Their idea envisions a scaffolding system on the outside of city buildings that could support planters for urban gardens. The setup would not only allow New Yorkers to grow more of their own food, but would help reduce heating and cooling costs (by providing “green” insulation outside the buildings), reduce runoff by taking up rainwater and even build community by promoting social interactions.

Then there’s Daniel N. Smith Jr.’s amusingly titled, yet promising, “Sh*t Happens.” The New Jersey-ite’s concept? Portable composting toilets that could be marketed commercially and provide a steady source of “humanure” for agriculture.

“Agriculture Design for Holistic Farming,” developed by Francis Mulville, Lou Preston and Susan Preston proposes developing a truly sustainable agricultural system with a family-owned farm and vineyard in California as the testing ground. The holistic approach would look to grazing animals to replace many of the functions now performed by machines: mowing, weed control, insect control, and so on. They say their plan would also help rebuild the organic content of farm soils — something they say could sequester up to 170 million tons of carbon if only half of the world’s 20 million acres of vineyards followed suit.

In a time when there’s so much disheartening news about the environment, food and agriculture, it’s really refreshing to discover there are plenty of good, workable and innovative ideas out there … if only they could all be implemented. The neat thing about these entries to the Buckminster Fuller Challenge is realizing how simple it could be to actually make many of these ideas reality.

I hope to explore other innovative ideas in different areas of sustainability soon. In the meantime, though, you might want to explore all the entries available for browsing at the Buckminster Fuller Challenge Idea Index. Warning: it’s addictive!

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