Thursday May 14, 7pm 2015 Booksigning Paul Relis 
Out of the Wasteland: Stories From the Environmental Frontier. 
Chaucer's Books Loreto Plaza Shopping Center, 3321 State St, Santa Barbara, CA 93105

Come and welcome Paul Relis, as he signs his book, Out of the Wasteland. http://www.paulrelis.com founding Executive Director of the Community Environmental Council Paul Relis takes us on a journey of the environmental frontier, from the heady days of the birth of environmentalism in Santa Barbara, into the intricate, obfuscated but all important world of government and policy, to important new environmental technologies that can, indeed, free us from this age of oil.

Paul Relis was the founding Executive Director of one of the first regional environmental organizations in California at the young age of 23. Together with colleagues, he built the Community Environmental Council (CEC), which played a pivotal role in defining the future of Santa Barbara and the California South Coast. He has served on the California Integrated Waste Management Board, and worked in the private sector, focusing on waste- derived bioenergy. Through this work he has traveled the world in search of technologies that could end the nation's dependence on landfill and produce carbon-neutral renewable fuels.

Out of the Wasteland: Stories From the Environmental Frontier. This book encompasses my 44-year journey where I began as an activist in the wake of the infamous Santa Barbara Oil Spill in 1969, went on to found the non-profit Community Environmental Council of Santa Barbara that continues to this day, then to oversee California's solid waste and recycling laws as an executive in the California Environmental Protection Agency, and finally as an executive in a private waste/recycling company developing anaerobic digestion facilities to convert source-separated municipal organic waste to zero carbon renewable fuels. The books traces the roots of modern sustainability and provides an international view, based on work abroad, of our prospects for dealing with climate change.

Paul Relis was raised in Long Beach, California. While studying at the University of California, Santa Barbara, a massive oil spill erupted off the coast of Santa Barbara on January 28, 1969, that devastated the coastline, killed much aquatic life, and severely damaged the local economy. The oil spill was a transformative event in the history of the U.S that influenced the establishment of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Earth Day and other landmark environmental programs.

The oil spill was a life changing event for Paul. He became the first executive director of a newly formed nonprofit, the Community Environmental Council CEC) at age 23. The CEC played a critical role in staving off several proposed developments that would have changed Santa Barbara forever. And, under his leadership, the CEC built visionary projects including recycling facilities, urban gardens and an urban farm, green buildings and other programs that, decades ago, presaged the core elements of sustainability today.

After twenty years of locally based work Paul took an executive position with the California Environmental Protection Agency where he helped lead the state of California’s nation leading recycling programs that have forged a multi-billion recycling industry and institutionalized recycling that touches most of California’s 38 million people.

After his government service Paul became an executive in a private company where he led efforts to deploy technology to convert municipal organic waste to renewable natural gas, a zero carbon fuel suitable for running heavy duty trucks and buses. Today the company is building one of the largest plants in North America to provide fuel for up to 400 heavy duty vehicles. This project will serve as a template for an emerging bioenergy industry that will reduce dependence on greenhouse gas producing fossil fuels and greatly reduce our reliance on methane generating landfills.

From 1996-2013 Paul taught in the Environmental Studies Department of the University of California, Santa Barbara. He is a board member emeritus of the Community Environmental Council and sits on the boards of the American Biogas Council and the Bioenergy Association of California.

Paul and his wife live in Santa Barbara, California and Taos, New Mexico. They have three children.

 
(805) 962-2571
P.O. Box 92156, Santa Barbara, CA 93190
margie@sbpermaculture.org
http://www.sbpermaculture.org

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