Raincoast

Recently I put together a research project with the help of the Center for Sustainable Food Systems and the UBC SEEDS program to develop an on-site composting program at the UBC farm. I was surprised to learn that this was not already happening, but I soon realized why. It would be a huge undertaking… Although […]

The competitive world of academia often leaves us as students feeling deficient in some way when we compare ourselves to others. Having recently read a collection of works, Letters to a Young Poet, by the German poet and author Rainer Maria Rilke, I felt it appropriate to share the messages I took away from it. […]

The city of Vancouver has pledged to become the greenest city in the world by 2020. To accomplish this goal, the city has identified three areas of focus, concentrating efforts on issues relating to carbon, waste, and ecosystems. Food is one aspect of any city that relates to all three of these areas. Carbon from […]

Another very cool waste conversion project was started by my good friend Rolf Eriksen, owner of the Happy Acres Sewage Processing Plant located on Orcas Island in Washington State. As a side business, Rolf began trucking sewage off Orcas, and bringing potable water onto the island (in different trucks of course) to augment the groundwater […]

During a trip through Oregon this summer with a good friend, I picked up The Oregonian during breakfast, and on the front page was a most interesting story titled “Waste? Or energy to burn”. The article explained how the Gresham municipal treatment plant near Portland was planning to save over half a million dollars annually […]

Thanks for visiting the Raincoast! A little about me: I am currently in my second year as part of the Global Resource Systems program at UBC, and I love waste! More specifically I love the many things we are able to do with waste. We often think of waste as an end of usefulness, but […]