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Examples of environmental best-practice in the FWBO
17 July, 2002

Colchester

- Centre and several individuals change electricity supplier to unit-e

- Low energy light bulbs in Centre

- Centre composts flowers, tea-bags etc for use in Centre garden

- In contact with local environment info centre

- Green leaflets and catalogues available in Centre library

- Newsletter distributed primarily by email

- Transport survey of journeys to Centre; trees to be planted in local wood in
  November to offset these journeys; lift shares to be suggested

 

consuming less

· Manchester Buddhist Centre's recent Simple Life week - fundraising £2,000 for centre improvements

· FWBO Community living in general

· Windhorse Trading's evolution and application of "take what you need" policy

· Committed cyclists in the Movement

consuming more wisely

renewable energy use

· The Manchester Buddhist Centre (MBC) complex, and two of the Manchester communities have contracted to receive all their electricity from Unit-E, a supplier of renewable electricity. They estimate this costs a mere £3/month extra for an average house.

organic fair-trade vegan food

· Earth Cafe, Manchester is wholly vegan and organic

· Friends Foods in London (name soon to change to Friends' Organic) stock organic produce, operate a water filter recycling and washing-up/clothes wash bottle refill schemes, plus offer expert advice on all aspects of health and nutrition.

· Buddhafield café and retreats are largely organic, vegan, plus good on recycling, low-impact, and general resourcefulness

· MBC - community allotment project

· Windhorse Trading - all food cooked and sold is vegan

· Wholefoods (mainly organic) are bulk-bought and sold on to Windhorse Trading workers by the business.

environmentally-friendly financial deals

· A MBC "affinity scheme" with Unit-E means that the Buddhist centre promotes renewable electricity and gets £10 for each new subscriber

· Triodos Dana Partnership guarantees Buddhist savers that their money will be used ethically

· An "ethical IFA" partnership is in discussion with Cittapala and others from FWBO (Central) - watch this space

investing in efficiency

· Bristol Buddhist Centre installed a high efficiency Condensing Boiler when they refurbished the building, they also use low energy light bulbs in all their normal fittings and tungsten filaments in all the others

alternative building techniques

· At the LBC's new retreat centre Potash Farm, a 17m diameter circular straw-bale shrine room seating 50 people is almost completed

· Rivendell retreat centre installed a reed-pond sewage treatment system, affectionately known as the "poo-ponds"!

· Earth Café in Manchester used organic paints and varnishes when converting the premises

· Grove Community eco shrine-room, Newcastle - a straw bale, clay and turf roof construction with recycled timber supports and floor. A comfortable and a very beautiful space to meditate

· Buddhafield - low-impact structures, compost toilets

to be checked out: Padmaloka community wing, Wild Cherry/Samaggavasa community renovation,

Vajraloka - good insulation in retreatants dining room

funerals

· Bhante has expressed a desire to be buried in a cardboard coffin and have a tree planted over him

· A "woodland burial" option is now available in 'Lokabandhu's wood' near Birmingham

recycling and eco-friendly right livelihood

. LBC Sudana bric-a-brac shop gives a great deal of dana to the centre and offers instant 'recycling' of clothes

carbon-neutrality

· The Buddhafield Festival 2001 is hoping to put sufficient money from car parking fees into their land fund, to be used for establishing sustainable woodland, in order to make the whole festival carbon-neutral

creating and safe-guarding havens for wild-life

· Madhyamaloka's squirrel-proof bird-table!

· Gardens at Padmaloka and Rivendell

· Lokabandhu's purchase of 25-acre woodland

· Buddhafield Permaculture retreat

· Guhyaloka's firebreaks

· Buddhafield's (Carl's) offer to do permaculture assessments of FWBO community gardens

raising awareness

· MBC library has environmental section, including Ethical Consumer, Permaculture, Ecologist, etc magazines

· Articles in Dharma Life, Golden Drum, etc by Saramati

· The proposed FWBO eco-web-page, at ecopractice.fwbo.org

· This "P.S." campaign

· ClearVision Key Stage 4+5 Buddhism video has a section on environmental issues

· Bodhipaksa's book 'Vegetarianism'

· Akuppa's (forthcoming) book on Buddhism and the environment

· Buddhafield's free 'tracts' - eg, Radical Ideas in Buddhism

 

events

· Dharma-Gaia evening at the LBC

· MBC Simple Life week - fundraising for centre improvements

· Green Buddhism retreat in 2000 at Vajrakuta by Lokabandhu

· Touching Earth retreats by Saramati

· MBC eco-group: newsletter, meetings, tree-planting, walks, straw-bale building, allotments

· Cambridge eco-group - just starting

· Cambridge Buddhist Centre is running a series of mandala nights on environmental issues this summer,

· Manchester Buddhist Centre is having an 'Environment Week' in the Autumn

· FWBO Eco-Village group

· Buddhafield Festiva

Building bridges between campaigning groups,
introducing Buddhist ideas to activists