Phil Calado – Charity Insights

CAT: Weeks 3 & 4: Farewell to the Hills

4 September 2016

I’m on the train home from the Centre for Alternative Technology after finishing the final week of my placement. My four weeks at CAT have been a great experience for many reasons. The people, the work and the amazing natural surroundings have been restorative and given me new energy and perspective. I will miss my morning walk through the ancient woods to the rewilded quarry, the birdsong and the tranquillity of the reservoir.

Throughout my time at CAT I delivered the ZCB talk to a total of 163 people. While the audience figures were on average quite low, I have gained a lot of confidence in delivering aural presentations and public engagement. By the final week I felt that I was beginning to introduce an element of emotion to the talk alongside just presenting the data.

*Me presenting the land use scenario in ZCB in the awesome Shepherd Theatre*

During the final week I was invited to another village in North Wales to deliver the presentation by an academic working in the field of psychology at Bangor university. In the future I would like to take the presentation to schools in London, where the audience is likely to be less well informed than the average visitor to CAT. This will depend however on my stress levels after I return to London!

My friend Matthew came and stayed for a few nights in week 3. We practiced some of the techniques I learned on the nature connections course and built a fire with the same reciprocal frame structure that is often used for constructing timber framed round houses. Each post supports the weight of the next (provided there is enough friction) and transmits the force down to the points of contact with the ground.

I see this as my first step towards one of my dreams: building my own roundhouse from timber and straw bales. I hope to attend one of CAT’s practical short courses on natural buildings next year. Matt left the centre saying that he felt inspired and that his well-being levels had reached around 9.5. He also said he had resolved himself to give up red meat after watching my talk and discovering that getting the recommended daily intake of protein (55 g) from beef is about 1000 times more carbon intensive, and uses four times the land as than getting it from nuts and seeds.

During my final week I completed the 2-page anti-fracking flyer that I had been working on for Paul. Lots of the skills I gained during my time at Imperial in writing and graphic design came in useful for this. It has been passed onto, John who does all the design for CAT publicity and reports, who will tweak it before it gets uploaded to the CAT website. I will update with the link when it appears online.

*Zero Carbon Britain Anti-fracking flyer*

Before I left, Paul and I went for a final ‘mindfulness’ walk around the woods together. I was sad to say goodbye and he gave me a big hug, which was touching. I feel like we became friends during my time at CAT and I hope to continue that friendship in the future.

The last four weeks have been a time of learning and personal growth. Hopefully CAT has benefitted from the experience too. I would like to thank the Charity Insights programme and team for giving me the opportunity to experience the alternative world that exists at CAT- I think it has been an experience that will stay with me for a long time to come.

*Farewell to the hills of the Dulas valley*

CAT Week 2: People and Environment

Phil Calado

26 August 2016

Hello from sunny/miserably wet/weather-indecisive Powys.

Visitor numbers and hence audience figures for the Zero Carbon Britain (ZCB) talks have been low due to extremes of hot and wet weather. CAT tends to be busiest when it’s a bit cloudy since most families head to the beach on really hot days, and no-one wants to tramp about in the rain (at a mostly outdoor activity centre) when it’s pelting down! In between giving talks I continued to update the ‘Who’s Getting Ready for Zero’ database with new scenarios although progress has been hampered somewhat by an ultra-slow satellite link-up internet connection… At the end of last week my supervisor Paul and I began discussing the idea of doing a ‘Zero Carbon Liverpool’ for a collaborator and expanding the ‘Zero Carbon’ brand out to cities across the UK. It is not something that I could attempt in my final two weeks here, but instead a possibility for a long-term (6-month) project for the future. Since the database has been difficult to progress with I have taken on producing a two-page ZCB summary flyer for anti-fracking campaign groups so that they can present an alternative to the public.

I have met some really interesting people here at CAT since I arrived. On Tuesday I met a lovely couple, Paul and Fallon who came to my talk. We ended up discussing geopolitics and ecological living for about two hours (the talk is supposed to be 20 minutes long).

On Thursday Roger, an old engineer who arrived at CAT in 1977 and who recently designed and built his own steam engine to power his Land Rover helped me take apart and clean an old piano. He was one of the original designers and engineers who built the water-powered lift that takes visitors from the car park to site level.

Last Wednesday I helped out on the door for my supervisor Paul who was giving a talk at a local arts venue, entitled ‘The Extraordinary Story of Human Beings, Energy & Happiness’. The story begins with the Big Bang and charts the course of human and technological development culminating in our present extreme energy culture.

The poster for Paul's talk on the history and environmental impacts of human development — The poster for Paul’s talk on the history and environmental impacts of human development

The talk describes how prior to the discovery of fossil fuels, the only energy that humans had access to came from an annual ration of sunlight stored either in plants, wind or rivers. Fossil fuels effectively gave us access to millions of years worth of solar energy, which we have subsequently burned up at an entirely unprecedented rate over the past 150 years or so. Tied-in with this is the story of how consumer Capitalism has given rise to over-consumption through advertising and public relations (originally branded as propaganda). There is then, the requirement for a new narrative and a positive vision for our future in which we live within our annual energy ration, but now with new tools to capture orders of magnitude more energy using renewable technologies. During the talk Paul was accompanied on piano and synth by Lola Perrin, a London-based composer and performer who wrote a score to accompany the piece. It received a lot of praise and positive feedback from the local audience and they have also been invited to perform the the Royal Opera House. I am expecting a front-row invitation.

This week I have been reflecting a lot on the importance of people and teamwork. CAT relies on volunteers and is a tolerant and considerate environment for people to come and work in. Sometimes these qualities mean that people on the fringes of society and with poor social conditioning are accepted onto the volunteer staff. While one of the functions of CAT as a charity is to act as a community hub, over the past week this has proven to be challenging to some of the volunteers (including myself) as one or two strong characters have dominated many social situations. A new week however brings with it a turn around of volunteers and has led to a new and fresh atmosphere.

The CAT reservoir from which drinking water, lifting and hydroelectric power (when it's working) are obtained — The CAT reservoir from which drinking water (don’t worry it gets cleaned), lift power and hydroelectric electricity (when it’s working) are obtained

On the weekend my girlfriend Abi visited and we escaped to the nearby village of Caersws where we looked after some chickens and mostly sheltered from the tempestuous weather.

The sun came out at the beginning of the week and Paul was kind enough to let me swap Tuesday for Saturday so that we could spend the day enjoying the beautiful valley between Machynlleth and Corris. I still haven’t quite managed to persuade Abi to move to North Wales but I think swimming in the CAT reservoir surrounded by lush flora didn’t harm my cause…

The Centre for Alternative Technology (CAT): Week 1

Phil Calado

15 August 2016

I’ve had a rollercoaster ride of a first week at the Centre for Alternative Technology (CAT) situated at the border of the Snowdonia national park in Wales. CAT is an education and visitors centre that aims to demonstrate solutions to sustainability. It was founded in the early 70’s in a disused slate quarry at a time when the scale of environment degradation from human activities was only just beginning to be understood. The early pioneers wanted to develop technology that could be of benefit to humans, nature and the economy. In a similar spirit, during CAT’s existent the quarry has been ‘rewilded’, and now hosts an abundance of wildlife.

This is the entrance to CAT. When it's working, there is a car lift that uses that is water powered. I'll explain more next time. — *Here’s the entrance to CAT. When it’s working, there is a car lift that is water powered.*

It’s a kind of living laboratory for experimenting primarily with building and permaculture techniques. Many of the practices, materials and techniques developed here are finding their way into mainstream modern architecture. My favourite so far has been synthetic slate tiles that are made from recycled car tyres (touching is believing!).

*Synthetic slate roof made from car tyres*

I arrived on Monday, exhausted having just finished revision of a manuscript for publication at Imperial. I really, really could have done with a holiday! Instead I had volumes of literature to read in preparation for my designated project: I am presenting CAT’s flagship research project ‘Zero Carbon Britain’ (ZCB) to visitors to the centre during twice daily talks. ZCB is a technical energy scenario that presents a positive vision of how Britain can transition to zero CO2 emissions within around two decades. It aims to inspire debate and inform policy on how we can rapidly decarbonise the UK, whilst also highlighting the co-benefits of a zero carbon society e.g. cleaner air and healthier lifestyles.

Probably my favourite building- the walls are just straw bales with lime render and it's been standing for a couple of decades. — *Probably my favourite building at CAT- the walls are just straw bales with lime render and it’s been standing for a couple of decades already*

I gave my first talk on Wednesday and have been steadily gaining confidence with the multitude of facts and figures that are required to look like any kind of authority on the subject. The audience figures have not been as high as we would have liked (ranging from around 2 – 14 per session) but the level of engagement and debate all round has been really positive. Alongside this core project I have started working on an update to an existing report called ‘Who’s getting ready for zero?’, which “…maps out how different actors at national, regional and city levels are already modelling the elimination of GHGs on science-based timeframes compatible with 2ºC.” Essentially ‘Who’s getting ready for zero?’ collates information from reports like Zero Carbon Britain from around the world to show what could be done to decarbonise the planet.

CAT has a great atmosphere to it. The people here are really friendly, helpful and there is a common purpose to the staff and volunteers. Outside of work I have been finding time to both socialise and to enjoy the beautiful natural surroundings. As an intern I have the privilege of being able to attend short courses that CAT runs here over the summer free of charge. I was lucky enough to participate in the ‘Nature Connection’ course that ran over the past weekend. The aim of the course was teach practices and routines for connecting more strongly with nature, for example by having a designated ‘sit spot’ which you visit every day to mindfully observe the plants, animals and landscapes around you. The course turned out to be much more powerful than I imagined (given that I was slightly cynical at the beginning). I could write a whole other blog about it but needless to say I highly recommend any reader to attend something similar. I came away feeling energised and ready for the new week ahead!