How can you be more involved in nurturing a sustainable and just community where you live? Where could your deep passion meet your community’s needs? I am part of several communities within the community where I live. In the course of helping my neighbor farmers, and buying their produce, I enjoy a connection with their passion and their good food. 

I just had a free in-home evaluation by Zach Pegg from the TVA eScore program. The guy looked at all the systems in my house and gave me detailed recommendations for better energy efficiency. It was almost like having a free home inspection! The best part is that if I use one of their recommended service people, TVA will come back for free and inspect the work to make sure it was done right. I can't be at the next meeting, but I'm hoping someone can pass on this information. If anyone wants, they can get a free inspection if they use Zach's promo code: escorezach. Normally it's $75. www.2escore.com, 855-237-2673. 

This is the second time I've had this done - the last time was at my old house. It's really a good program. 

As you know I have been thinking about how to reduce my plastic use. This morning I heard an NPR story about plastic particles found in the air in the Pyrenees Mountains, far from any large cities. The quantity of particles collected on a meter was the same as has been collected on test boards in large cities. I called Customer Service for Aveeno, which is the brand of facial products I most use, and spoke to Jesse. I asked her to ask Aveeno to consider making their bottles from hemp which biodegrades. She seemed very pleased to hear of this and assured me she would pass the idea up in her organization.  

I thought I'd share this. https://cleantechnica.com/2019/04/09/6-books-about-climate-change-sustainability-you-need-to-read-this-spring/

I heard about this on NPR this morning - https://www.wwf.org.uk/updates/wwf-and-knorr-launch-future-50-foods

I am beginning a sustainability journal by writing down the least and most sustainable practices I engaged in at the end of each day. So far, it raises my level of consciousness and gives me a chance to see some positives.

TVA is accepting public comment on their Integrated Resources Proposal until April 8.   If you go to https://tvairp.com you can learn about the various proposals for how our energy will be sourced up through 2038. There is a bubble on the right that says "get involved" and that is where you can go to leave a comment. The bar graphs under "Our Portfolios" are interesting, especially if you change the "incremental energy" line to "total energy by 2038". I don't understand it perfectly, but I am surprised at how small the yellow (for renewables) portion of the graphs are in almost all of the scenarios, even by 2038. 

I've been looking for a good carbon footprint calculator, and the one listed in the reading this week was really good. I was appalled, however, to find that even with everything I'm currently doing, I *still* use 2.1 earths worth of resources! Wow! I hope to find some changes I can make, that I can live with, and still reduce this. 

Anybody know why I can't check in?

Read articles about former mayor Megan Barry's push for Nashville to be the "greenest city in the southeast," and it appears that David Briley is continuing to push sustainability in his administration.  The new police headquarters is up for LEED silver certification and has the largest rooftop solar installation in the city.  Transportation is our biggest challenge, and we appear to be at a stalemate as far as viable solutions go... We are also going to invest in NES's Music City Solar program because putting solar panels on our own home is not feasible.