closet-keys:

tariqah:

plantyhamchuk:

samiholloway:

plantyhamchuk:

jordfast-lokispouse:

How much longer until the utopic Solarpunk future where Capitalism is dead and we all live in ecologically sustainable high-tech forest cities? Asking for a friend.

Until we make those ecologically sustainable high-tech forest cities ourselves. It’s going to take a lot of us to do it though, so best to spread the word (and gather native tree seeds).

And, like, get started now. Then our “weirdo houses” will be the only thing functioning when everything falls apart!

The only reason why we don’t live in a solarpunk world right now is because no one has bothered to make it yet. 

We’ll have to make it ourselves, and we’ll have to help each other make it. That’s why it is solarpunk. 

Some resources to consider creating or joining or doing:

• Repair cafes - create or join your local repair cafe! Repair stuff, learn how to repair stuff, teach others how to repair stuff.
  
• Map of Makerspaces - make some things! learn how to make some things! teach others how to make some things!
  
• Community Garden Map (note that this is US-only, and not a complete list) - join a local community garden
  
• Support your local farmers / local economy (US only link)
  
• Support or create a local Food Not Bombs chapter
  
• Support or create a local Food Not Lawns chapter
  

Grow food in 5 gallon buckets

• Volunteer for Habitat for Humanity (as a bonus you can learn extremely practical skills)
  
• Volunteer via 350.org to help the environment / the planet / the place we live and depend on
  
• Excellent-and-still-growing wiki from reddit’s awesome r/zerowaste community - great resource to learn how to live more lightly on the earth
  
• Spread the word about solarpunk, especially to engineering students. Show them projects like Open Source Ecology - Global Village Construction Set and Bridges for Prosperity 
• Learn how to Patch a Hole, Mend a Seam, and Fix a Hem

• Learn how to repair a hole in the sole of a shoe
• Learn some basics on passive solar design - clever use of the sun can create extremely energy efficient homes and buildings. You can use these principles to save on energy bills, even if you’re renting.
• Free USDA Complete Guide to Home Canning, 2015 revision - cut down on personal food waste! Learn how to safely preserve food. Very useful if you suddenly harvest / purchase for crazy cheap in season / dumpster dive a ton of perishable food.
• Donate to One Acre Fund, which provides training and capital to farmers (making them more productive and pulling them out of poverty) in various east African countries
• Donate to Bridges to Prosperity, which provides technical expertise, money, and volunteers, to help local people build and maintain their own footbridges in extremely isolated rural areas 
• joining r/solarpunk, and sharing links/ideas/art/music with the community. Also, upvoting stuff for greater visibility. There’s over 900 members!
  

This is so great

I want to add that if you want to do something like a repair cafe but don’t have the resources (whether that’s a space or money to give folks food), please consider proposing it as a program idea at your local library. Some libraries already hold repair cafes so it’s not a weird request, and if you can offer any evidence at all that you can help fill the library with interested people on the day of, librarians will almost definitely be willing to host and provide food and standard library-newsletter publicity. 

Libraries are a great resource for doing this kind of work. Other things I’ve seen libraries do: 

• starting a “Seed Library” where you can get free seeds to start your own garden and then you donate back seeds when your plants are grown
  
• providing free makerspaces for the community
• Having “item libraries” that lend out tools and kitchen supplies 
• hosting meetings of local community groups who otherwise wouldn’t have a safe location for everyone to meet