Earth is a blue water-planet and each of us needs to be water-wise. Water is one area where people resist commodification and corporate control. Instinctively, we each understand that water is life. What more can we do to express and sustain our innate love of water? Join us to share radical, accessible, and hands-on solutions to earth's water crises as an integral part of our daily lives. This interactive conversation will range from rainwater to bathwater, garden ditches to watersheds, and the viability of modern civilization to the health of your fruit trees. Consider your local water situation and bring questions to our three water experts--greywater activist Laura Allen, watershed permaculturalist Brock Dolman, and rainwater harvester Brad Lancaster.
Brock Dolman is a co-founder of the Sowing Circle, LLC Intentional Community & Occidental Arts and Ecology Center, where he co-directs the Permaculture Program, Wildlands Program and the WATER Institute in Sonoma County, California. He is a wildlife biologist, permaculture designer, water educator and watershed ecologist. Brock has been the keynote presenter at numerous conferences and has taught Permaculture internationally in Costa Rica, Ecuador, U.S. Virgin Islands, Spain, Brazil, China, Canada, Zimbabwe, Democratic Republic of Congo, Cuba and Haiti & and widely in the U.S.A. He was one of the core co-facilitators for the International Permaculture Convergence 8 (IPC8) Design Course in Sao Paulo, Brazil and IPC11 in Pinar del Rio, Cuba, and has co-taught at least 70 Permaculture Design Certificate Courses since 1995. He has been featured in the award winning films: The 11th Hour by Leonardo DiCaprio; The Call of Life by Species Alliance; and Permaculture: A Quiet Revolution by Vanessa Shultz. In October 2012 he gave a City 2.0 TEDx talk. For over a decade he has served as an appointed commissioner on the Sonoma County Fish & Wildlife Commission. In 1992 he completed his BA, graduating with honors from the University of California Santa Cruz with the Biology Department and Environmental Studies Department.
Laura Allen is a founding member of Greywater Action and has been exploring low-tech, urban,sustainable water solutions for the past 15 years.Laura leads classes and hands-on workshops on rainwater harvesting, greywater reuse, and composting toilets through Greywater Action. Laura is the lead author of the San Francisco Graywater Design Guidelines for Outdoor Irrigation, and authored the book The Water-Wise Home: How to Conserve and Reuse Water in Your Home and Landscape (forthcoming on Storey Press). Her work has been featured in Ask This Old House, the New York Times, Nightline, Mother Jones, and more. The Greywater Installer’s Training she developed and teaches, has trained over 100 people from the US and Canada how to design and install greywater systems. Laura has presented widely on greywater reuse, including at the Water Smart Innovations Conference, Bioneers, California Environmental Health Association conference, the Water Conservation Showcase, and Green Festival. She also works on codes and policies to legalize and support simple, affordable, sustainable water systems. Laura holds a BA in environmental science from UC Berkeley, as well as a teaching credential, and a master's degree in education.