Amy Boyer

Intergenerational trust and Indigenous rights: This perspective on traditional ecological knowledge made me think about intergenerational trust in a new light: trust that those who came before had wisdom and used it well.  Meanwhile, Chile has a final draft of a new constitution that recognizes Indigenous rights and places responsibility for dealing with climate change on the government. It's not clear whether it will pass in September's plebiscite, but Mapuche delegate Rosa Catrileo Areas is calling it a win for Indigenous people regardless.

 Claire Inciong Krummenacher

Lessons for our times from a Hopi farmer: Amidst reports that Earth has a 50-50 chance of reaching an annual average of 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels at least once between now and 2026, my favorite piece this week was this Al-Jazeera profile of Michael Kotutwa Johnson—a Hopi farmer championing Indigenous agricultural knowledge in northeastern Arizona. By sharing the farming practices honed by the Hopi over thousands of years of cultivating crops in unforgiving landscapes, Johnson hopes to bring awareness to the lack of support for Hopi farmers and provide solutions to intensifying agricultural challenges.

 Courtney White

The ‘Tesla effect’ transforming machinery: The New York Times published an interesting article on how the ‘Tesla Effect’ is transforming other fossil-fuel powered machinery, including snowmobiles, lawn mowers, and personal watercraft, to run on batteries (they’re also much quieter). Start-up companies are pitching themselves as “The Tesla of…” to attract investors. Apparently, the lawn and garden industry has gone electric faster than the car industry! Here and here are articles about electrifying the recreation industry. Here’s an expo of electric powersports. Are you ready to buy an e-boat?

 Emily Jensen

Climate budgeting brings regeneration to Oslo: In Oslo, Norway, regeneration is happening in lots of little ways — from vegetarian school lunch programs to zero-emission construction sites to rewilding cemeteries. These small but pervasive changes are thanks to an annual process called climate budgeting that has every city department identify specific policies and actions to reduce its emissions. Eleven other cities have committed to follow Oslo’s lead in a climate budgeting pilot program, including Barcelona, Los Angeles, Mumbai, Paris, Rio de Janeiro, and Tshwane.

 Kavya Gopal

The limits of forests as carbon sinks: Two studies published earlier this week—one focused on tree growth, the other on climate stresses—have profound implications on the assumption that forests will continue to be carbon sinks in a warming world. This interview with Ecologist William Anderegg, who was involved in both studies, explains that drastically reducing emissions is necessary to continuous cell growth processes in trees, which are very sensitive to increased wildfires, droughts, and insects. Carbon offsetting markets that rely on forests as carbon sinks need to very carefully model the benefits forests can deliver in the face of increasing emissions.

 Milica Koscica

Foraging food and medicine in the Bronx: I enjoyed reading about one woman's wild foraging journey in the middle of NYC's Bronx borough, in a place called Concrete Plant Park—one of only two city parks where foraging is allowed. Incredible to learn that she forages daily, in green spaces tucked between subway lines and highways, to provide about 25% of what she eats and all her medicine. It’s a powerful reminder of how urban foraging sits at the intersection of food security, food sovereignty, climate change and justice, and the importance of having more safe, healthy, and legal spaces to gather wild food.

 Juliana Birnbaum

Report links fossil fuels to human rights violations: A human rights commission in the Philippines published a milestone report linking fossil fuel companies with the human rights violations resulting from climate-linked environmental disasters. It was the first national human rights body to determine that oil corporations have obligations under human rights law and should be held liable for their role in driving the climate crisis. While it doesn't carry the power to compel companies or governments to act on the findings, it may have broader implications for the pursuit of similar cases worldwide.

 Robert Denney

Hotels headed for net-zero: This recent article provides some examples of hotels with net zero ambitions. One is the Hotel Marcel in New Haven, Connecticut. It was previously a Brutalist-style building from the 1970s that has been retrofitted and is now being called the first net-zero carbon emissions hotel in the U.S. Meanwhile, in Norway, the Svart hotel is being described as the world’s first net energy-positive hotel. It will run on solar energy, engage local suppliers for food, have a zero-waste restaurant, and bottle its own drinking water to keep single-use plastics to a minimum.

 Tim Treuer

Plant-based innovation: I just got back from a wonderful ski traverse in Canada. I was really pleasantly surprised to see a number of new plant-based meat options at the likes of Tim Horton's and Qdoba as well as in the grocery store. When I got home, I came across a friend's story about a start-up making plant-based eggs. I know these things aren't the same as fundamentally transforming our food and ag systems in deeply regenerative ways, but I am heartened to see that there's increasing interest and options for folks looking to at least take a step or two away from the most problematic food sources.

Field Report from Our Readers

We asked where you’re seeing regeneration in action.
Here are a few of our favorite responses:

• Public pollinator habitats: Tres Crow of Atlanta, Georgia, reports that his organization Roots Down has converted over 130,000 square feet of public landscapes into food forests and pollinator habitats since Earth Day 2021.

• Urban edible plant nursery: Melissa Cecile is part of Bioregional GreenWorks, a permaculture-based worker-owned cooperative in Los Angeles that’s working to increase access to fresh, nutrient dense food for those in need across L.A. county through an edible plant nursery.

• Homescape rewilding: Richard and Annette Rubin are spending their retirement years rewilding their homescape in Taos, New Mexico, and have even written a book about it. 

  
  

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