4 principles 2015

Permaculture Design Principles

MUM Permaculture Design Certification Course

April 2015

2nd law of thermoynamics a primary consideration

Energy spontaneously tends to flow only from being concentrated in one place to becoming diffused or dispersed and spread out

Toby Hemenway Principles

www.patternliteracy.com.

Permaculture principles are brief statements or slogans that can be remembered as a checklist when considering the complex options for design and evolution of ecological support systems. These principles can be seen as universal, although the methods that express them will vary greatly according to place and situation. Fundamentally, permaculture design principles arise from a way of perceiving the world that is often described as 'systems thinking' and 'design thinking.’

• Responsibility to relinquish power, self regulating systems:The role of beneficial authority is to return function and responsibility to life and to people, if successful, no further authority is needed. The role of successful design is to create a self-managed system.

• Stress and Harmony:

• Stress may be defined as either prevention of natural function, or of forced function. Harmony is then the permission of chosen and natural functions and the supply of essential needs.

Prime Directive

The only ethical decision is to take responsibility for own existence and that of our children.

- Bill Mollison

Core Principle

Every function covered by many elementsEach element performs many functions

Primary Principles for Functional Design:

• 1. Observe. Use protracted and thoughtful observation rather than prolonged and thoughtless action. Observe the site and its elements in all seasons. Design for specific sites, clients, and climates.

Primary Principles for Functional Design:

• 2. Connect. Use relative location: Place elements in ways that create useful relationships and time-saving connections among all parts. The number of connections among elements creates a healthy, diverse ecosystem, not the number of elements.

Primary Principles for Functional Design:

• 3. Catch and store energy and materials. Identify, collect, and hold the useful flows moving through the site. By saving and re-investing resources, we maintain the system and capture still more resources.

PA Yeomans “Water for Every Farm” - keyline design

Yoemans Plow - 11 hp /tine

Pond and swale systems on contour, keypoints passively harvest rainwater

Primary Principles for Functional Design:

• 4. Each element performs multiple functions. Choose and place each element in a system to perform as many functions as possible. Increasing beneficial connections between diverse components creates a stable whole. Stack elements in both space and time.

Primary Principles for Functional Design:

• 5. Each function is supported by multiple elements. Use multiple methods to achieve important functions and to create synergies. Redundancy protects when one or more elements fail.

Local Economy:Water

36 in rain = 1,000,000 gallons per acre

Primary Principles for Functional Design:

• 6. Make the least change for the greatest effect. Find the "leverage points" in the system and intervene there, where a the least work accomplishes the most change.

Primary Principles for Functional Design:

• 7. Use small scale, intensive systems. Start at your doorstep with the smallest systems that will do the job, and build on your successes, with variations. Grow by chunking.

Principles Derived from Living and Energy Systems

• 8. Use the edge effect. The edge—the intersection of two environments—is the most diverse place in a system, and is where energies and materials accumulate. Optimize the amount of edge

Principles Derived from Living and Energy Systems

• 9. Accelerate succession. Mature ecosystems are more diverse and productive than young ones, so use design to jump-start succession.

Principles Derived from Living and Energy Systems

• 10. Use biological and renewable resources. Renewable resources (usually plants and animals) reproduce and build up over time, store energy, assist yield, and interact with other elements.

Chicken Tractor

Principles Derived from Living and Energy Systems

• 11. Recycle energy. Supply local and on-site needs with energy from the system, and reuse this energy as many times as possible. Every cycle is an opportunity for yield.

Attitudes

Attitudes

• 12. Turn problems into solutions. Constraints can inspire creative design: "We are surrounded by insurmountable opportunities."

Attitudes

• 13. Get a yield. Design for both immediate and long-term returns from your efforts: "You can't work on an empty stomach." Set up positive feedback loops to build the system and repay your investment.

Video

Obtain a yield

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSTFfKHJg4Y&list=UUszWVJMsQubTLsnYEeJ20mA

Attitudes

• 14. Design limits yield. The designer's imagination limits total yield more often than do the laws of physics.

Attitudes

• 15. Mistakes are tools for learning. Evaluate your trials. Making mistakes is a sign you are trying to do things better.

Work where you’re wanted Work where it counts

Start at your front door……

Rules for resource use:

• Ranked from regenerative to degenerative, different resources can:

• 1) increase with use;• 2) be lost when not used;• 3) be unaffected by use;• 4) be lost by use;• 5) pollute or degrade systems with use.

“

Fuller quote: Pollution is nothing but the resources we are not harvesting. We allow them to disperse because we've been ignorant of their value.”

Permaculture Principle: Unmet needs or inputs = work unused inputs. Unused Outputs = pollution

Permaculture design process from foundations to solutions

Strategies

Ethics (fundamental values)

Design Principles

Techniques &

Specifications

Design Methods

DesignSolutions

Exercise

Hand out holmgren principles graphic

Apply these principles to your social relations

Holmgren Recap

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_-J71k2bXE#t=144

Methods of Design

• Analysis - listing characteristics• Observation • Deduction from Nature• Options and decisions - decision trees• Data Overlay - overlay different data• Random Assembly • Flow diagrams• Zone and sector analysis

Example: Design with Zones and Sectors

Sectors: Where do influences come into the site?

Zones: Areas of Greater or Lesser Human Activity

Zone and Sector analysis

Greening the Desert

Some Permaculture Techniques(Not all applicable at every site)

Gardening:Mulch gardenKeyhole BedsBiointensive

Guilds Four Season Gardening/Harvesting

Wildcrafting/GleaningGrafting

Chicken TractorForest Gardening, Food Forest

Herb SpiralGrow Compost And Grass Barrier crops (Comfrey)

Food preservation and storageMarket Gardens, CSA

Techniques cont’d• Water:• Efficient and wise use of water• Match source of water to use• Rain Catchment Systems• Grey water systems• Earthworks for storage of water in the landscape - Swales• Ponds, Tire Pond• Natural Swimming Pool

Building:Natural Building - Straw, Cob, EarthRound Wood ConstructionPassive Solar DesignDense Human Settlements

techniques cont’d

Energy:Efficient and wise use of energySolar ElectricWind ElectricSolar Hot WaterSolar CookingBiomass systems (wood heat, compost heat)Energy systems for buildings - passive and active solarGeothermalUse of renewables for mechanical energy (Water pumping windmills)

Waste and Nutrient CyclingComposting, Sheet CompostingRecyclingDumpster Diving, GleaningCompost Toilets (Humanure)

techniques cont’dInvisible StructuresLocal CurrenciesLETS systems (Local Exchange and Trading)CooperativesLand TrustsEcological EconomicsNo interest banking systems

Natural Swimming Pools

Herb Spiral

No -Till Sheet Mulch Gardening

• Forest Gardening• Guilds

Barefoot FarmMarlin and SerenityCedar Falls Urban Ag

At the market…

Growing Power, MilwaukeeWill Allen

• Integrated vericomposting, aquaculture/aquaponics, vegetable production, greenhouses, retail sales, training/education center, livestock, tree crops - in a low income neighborhood

Mollison clip - village homes

Ecovillage clip

Imaging, creating, and advocating for these choices is the Great Work of the upcoming generations

Efforts on many scales scales

Transition TownsNatural Step

Fairfield ModelCuba

Vietnam

Permaculture Education

• Permaculture Design Certification course– First step toward becoming a permaculture design

professional– Bill Mollison owns the intellectual property rights

to the word “Permaculture”– Minimum 72 hours of instruction using a

curriculum based on the Designers Manual– Work with an experienced designer– Decentralized, self regulating structure

“The stone age didn’t end because we ran out of stones….” - Saudi Oil Minister

Economy of Scarcity Economy of Abundance

Nature’s Economy: Ecosystem Services

Man’s Economy

The Great Work of GenerationsMINE:

- Mall of America and suburbia“Greatest misallocation of resources in Human

history” - James Howard Kuntsler

Motto: “If brute force isn’t working we’re not using enough of it”

UPCOMING: - A delightfully diverse, safe, healthy and just world, with clean air, water, soil and power - economically, equitably, ecologically and elegantly enjoyed by all.

- Co-exist with Otherness

The Next Generation

“We are charged with designing the future,

not being victims of it”- R Buckminster Fuller

How can/should institutions like ISU inform this process?

Sustainable Design Reading Recommendations

• Ecocities - Richard Register• Natural Capitalism- Hawken, Lovins, Lovins• Cradle To Cradle - Milliam Mcdonough• The Nature of Design - David Orr• Permaculture: A Designers Manual - Mollison • Deep Economy - The Wealth of Communities and a Durable Future -

Mckibben• Short Circuit - Richard Douthwaite • Ecological Economics - Herman Daley• Community Energy - Greg PahlExcerpts and interviews available at www.biggreensummer.com (look for Iowa

Mayors Reader)

Resources

• Great web site for functional plant research - Plants for a Future

• Midwest Permaculture Education– Big Green Summer/ Sustainable Living Coalition - Fairfield– Cold Climate Peramculture Research Institute - Twin

Cities– Midwest Permaculture - Stelle Illinois

• Great web site for functional plant research - Plants for a Future

• Midwest Permaculture Education– Big Green Summer/ Sustainable Living Coalition - Fairfield– Cold Climate Peramculture Research Institute - Twin

Cities– Midwest Permaculture - Stelle Illinois

Resources

• Permaculture Activist Magazine (US)• Permaculture Magazine (Britain)• Permaculture Way, Permaculture Garden by Graham Bell• Gaia’s Garden by Toby Hemenway• Edible Forest Garden - Dave Jacke• Permaculture - A Designers Manual by Bill Mollison• Introduction to Permaculture Design by Bill Mollison• Permaculture - Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability by David Holmgren• Permaculture 1 &2 by Mollison and Holmgren• Natural Capitalism - Hawkins, Lovins, and Lovins• Cradle to Cradle - William Mcdonough• The Nature of Design - David Orr

Classics in Agriculture Tree Crops - J Russell SmithFarmers of 40 Centuries - KingOne Straw Revolution - FukuokaHow to have a green thumb without an aching back - Ruth StoutLiving the Good Life - Helen and Scott Nearing

Resources cont’d• www.professorlonniegamble.com• www.biggreensummer.com• www.abundance-ecovillage.com

Video (some available on Youtube or Google Video)The Global Gardener - Bill MollisonIn Grave Danger of Falling Food - Bill MollisonEat Your GrdenRuth Stout’s GardenGreening the Desert / other Geoff Lawton videosEcological DesignersThe Next Industrial RevolutionThe Man Who Planted Trees

Resources and Contact Info

www.professorlonniegamble.comwww.biggreensummer.com

www.abundance-ecovillage.comwww.renewfairfield.com

www.mum.edu

lonniegamble@yahoo.com

David Orr example

Mcdonough video clip - Emerson

“To the best of our knowledge, the sun is the only star proven to grow vegetables”

-Phillip Scherer. 1973

Energy

What needs to be done?

Iowa Energy Supply

• 97 % of Iowa’s electricity is generated from burning coal, oil, and nuclear fuels

Where our electricity comes from

90% of what people eat in Iowa comes from someplace else

Ecocities

Course Overview• Topics

– Permaculture ethics and principles for design

– Methods of design, what is design?

– Base maps, Overlays, Zones and Sectors

– Pattern Literacy: Patterns in nature and their application in designSpecial Guest Grover Stock

• (Grover’s wall picture)

Course Overview cont’d• Topics cont’d

– Home gardens, perennial crops, guilds, compost/fertility - Grover, Brian, Alex

– Water - Brian

– Energy - Lonnie

– Building -Brad

– Invisible Structures - Lonnie

– Saturday Evening - Films

Course Overview cont’d• Topics cont’d

Sunday - Hands-On ExtravaganzaSolar electric installation - Michael HavelkaSolar Hot water - Kevin HopfGrow Biointensive , Composting, Vermicomposting - AlexSheet Mulching, starting veggies - BrianRainwater systems -Grover, BrianAdobe Floors - John Freeberg, Susan WalshEarth Plasters, Straw Bale - Brad YoungGrafting, Plant Propagation - Sam James, Brian

Chicken Tractor

• Forest Gardening• Guilds

Herb Spiral

No -Till Sheet Mulch Gardening

Crmpi example - toby’s book

Abundance Ecovillage

Takao Furuno

Joe Salatin, Swoope, Va., moves his "shademobile" from paddock to paddock along with his beef cattle. He parks it where he feels the extra manure and animal impact will do the most good.

Maharishi University of Management, Fairfield, Iowa

Sustainable Living ProgramMaharishi University of Management

The first four-year university program in Sustainable Living

Goal: Provide students with the knowledge and skills they need to design, build, and maintain sustainable communities.

Established 2003, 110 students enrolled full time in 2008

Permanent Agriculture

• Show photos chestnuts kiwi walnuts persimmon

Course Overview• Week One– SL Department Overview– Intro, Global issues and the need for change, Design and

Sustainability, Roots of Permaculture– Monday Pizza and Outdoor Film: Ecological Designers– Permaculture Design Ethics – Permaculture Design Principles – Methods of Design– Wednesday Evening at the Sondheim: Restoring

Agriculture, Community, and Economic Self-Sufficiency – Jim Braun and Kamiyar Enshayan

Ethics and Design

Design and Ethics

Suburbia

Note: Temps not on same day as house photo

The Abundance of Natural Systems: Papayas

Seeds from one papaya: 200Germination rate: 75%

2010 Sustain Angoon Project

Alaska Project

Totem Clip

Sustainable Living Coalition , est 2001Empower individuals and organizations to live fully rooted in the abundant

flows of natural systems

Edible Cityscapes

2005 - Big Green Summer

Big Green Summer provides education and practical experience in imagining, creating, and advocating for beyond-sustainable communities - human settlements that work with natures design to celebrate the abundance of life on earth. Students live in an environment that is a laboratory for what they are learning - high performance buildings built of natural, local materials, utilizing solar and wind power, with organic gardens, rain collection, and community service. Students do classroom study and hands on projects in renewable energy, organic agriculture and local food systems, perennial crops and agroforestry, edible landscaping, water and waste systems, building with local, natural materials, and using biofuels. We investigate the social service, cultural, and political institutions and organizations that make the renewable economy transition practical, possible, and desirable.

Eliot

Surya Nagar FarmClimate responsive buildings

Rainwater Harvesting

Vermicomposting sewage treatment

1956 Beverly, MassachusettsPassive Solar House

1981

1982-1997 Hampden, Maine Elements Power Company/Maine Energy Partner

Souadabsacook Stream Hydro PlantGenerated 700,000 - 1,000,000 kwh per year

Passive Solar/Superinsulated * Composting Toilet * Rainwater harvesting * solar hot water * Interior constructed wetland to treat waste water * Local Lumber * Captured waste heat from generator

*

1985 Hampden, Maine

Superinsulated house, R-40 double stud walls, R-60 roof

1992 - Carrizo Plains, Ca

1994Christensen ResidenceSun Valley Idaho

• Uncle Elmer• Dad’s Boat

1957 – The Uncle Elmer

1994 -1998

San Diego, California

Growing Food in the City Organic Hydroponics

1996- PresentHawaii

Surya Nagar Farm Hawaii - Kaimu, Big Island

Earthbag Dome

It did not look like this…..

Sustainable Living ProgramMaharishi University of Management

The first four-year university program in Sustainable Living

Goal: Provide students with the knowledge and skills they need to help design, build, and maintain sustainable communities.

Established 2003, 110 students enrolled full time in 2008

MUM Guerilla Salad Project 2003“Grow food around where you live, then the rest of the landscape can be returned to wetlands and wildlands and we will create a whole new continent for our grandchildren to explore”

- Bill Mollison

Future Campus:SEED Center

Sustainable Education Enterprise Development

Sustainability Education and Enterprise Development (SEED) Center

Community Futures Conference 2007

www.renewfairfield.com

• Community planning process for sustainability• Initiative by Mayor Ed Malloy• Facilitated by UNI-based Institute for Decision Making ,

LaDene Bowen and Bill Wood

2008 - The Fairfield Green Planning Committee

2000 - Abundance Ecovillage2000

Abundance Ecovillage

• Picture of sign

Local Economy: Water

36 in rain = 1,000,000 gallons per acre Ecovillage =15 million gallons per year

Ecovillage Constructed Wetland/Living Machine

Passive Solar Design

Media/Community Radio

Energy and Sustainability

• Everything in the human economy comes from nature or from people

• Both require energy– Energy for extraction, processing, transport– Energy for nurturing, education, and culture

• Energy is neither created nor destroyed, so it seems sustainability would be assured BUT….

……But cont’d• Energy loses it’s usefulness as it changes form (entropy)• Therefore, we need a continual source of high quality,

low entropy energy to restore usefulness that is lost as energy is used and transformed. Without this regeneration and renewal, all usefulness in nature is eventually used up.

• Solar energy provides the energy that allows biological (and human) systems to become more orderly and complex

…….even more but

• Energy is essential for the development of complexity and order in the Universe

Energy is Crucial in Human EvolutionEnergy is Crucial in Sustainable DesignEnergy considerations are primary in Permaculture

Design

The Problem with Growth

David Suzuki on Growth

• Suzuki on growth

• Wind turbine at SL Center MUM