TALES FROM AN ECO-VILLAGE

Monday 21 September: I’m having dinner in the BioMio restaurant in Copenhagen with about 90 other bloggers, mainly from Europe but some from further afield. I’m sitting next to a Brazilian called Charles, for instance, who has just flown in from Sao Paulo. Opposite me there’s Tasha, an editor from the United States, and Radka from the Czech Republic, while Jodi, though an Australian, joins me in representing the UK.

We are here at the invitation of the European Journalism Centre, an NGO based in Maastricht. Our job in the next three months or so will be to blog about climate change in the run-up to the UN summit which takes place in December. To help us we are being given two days of briefing.

Today we have been in the Bella Centre, a strange low rise complex on the outskirts of Copenhagen, that looks like an airport terminal without an airport. Much of it is still under construction but it is where the two week Climate Change Summit will be taking place.

No-one knows how many people will be coming: the Danes guess at about 15,000, made up of government leaders and officials from 192 countries, plus the world’s media, NGOs like Oxfam and WWF, and a whole tail of climate activists there to put pressure on the politicians. All have to be accommodated, fed, transported and most importantly, policed. That’s the unenviable job of the Danish government.

After a day of sitting listening to presentations it is stimulating to have the chance to meet and discuss matters with fellow bloggers. The international atmosphere is stimulating; I am lucky that the common and now universal language is English. Most speak and write it mesmerisingly well. I ask Radka where she learned such perfect idiomatic English. She replies that she worked for a British company for a year in the Yorkshire countryside and went fox-hunting on Saturdays.

The following day we are up early bound for the eco-village of Dyssekilde. This is both a social and environmental experiment - a village into which a dedicated group of ecologically minded folk moved about twenty years ago and generally succeeded in persuading the rest of the inhabitants to follow their environmentally friendly lead.



The two hundred odd people in the village own a wind turbine for electricity (though the grid is available as back-up). They process their own waste water, having created more than an acre of willow beds to absorb the waste. The trees grow rapidly on the nutrients in the waste providing wood for fuel and fencing. For eco-efficiency there’s a communal bakery and a laundry and the one supplies heat to the other. There’s also a car pool to save on car purchase.

Most of the houses are experimental, heated by solar panels or geo-thermal energy - again arranged on a group basis. Some are strange polygons, minimizing surface area; others are built of novel materials, like straw (though lined inside and outside with conventional materials).

Surprisingly, these communal living arrangements seem to work well. No one is forced to do anything. Residents pay a small tax to the village and opt in or out of the communal projects. I have to say that the place looked rather unkempt and generally rundown: a lick of paint, some communal grass cutting might not have gone amiss, but maybe ecologists have other priorities. Mowing grass probably does not help your carbon footprint.

Can we do anything worthwhile as climate change bloggers? Despite starting with a massive imbalance - the result of ninety return flights to Copenhagen - I'd like to think we possibly can. The word needs to be spread; people need to understand what is likely to be required and be prepared to adapt accordingly. Politicians need to understand that there is a willingness for change among the population. We can't do much by ourselves but it's worth remembering that a million ants can move a mountain.

The threat to our planet is both serious and imminent. That’s what the scientists are telling us. Their worst case scenarios made only a few years ago are already being exceeded. In 1990 they predicted the rate of fossil fuel burning would increase annually by 1.1 per cent. That figure looks now more like 3.5 per cent.

The consensus is that the situation could well become irretrievable unless we all act now. Clearly governments have the prime responsibility - the world is not going to be saved by eco-villages, though of course these can help. But ultimately only governments can provide the infrastructure to deliver large amounts of clean energy.

Getting 192 countries - all with different agendas - to agree will be difficult to put it mildly. There is so much disagreement on other matters, trade, development, finance, security and so on. Somehow the politicians will have to find compromises, if not in December, then shortly afterwards. As the Chinese say - we are living in interesting times.

The photos show: a house and turbine at Dyssekilde; the waste water willow groves; and a rooftop solar energy apparatus