The Hunter is Sprouting Books - Native Terrestrial Orchids of the Hunter Region Botanic Gardens18/3/2019 by Tim Roberts for publication in the Newcastle Herald on 18 March 2019
I regularly solve my Christmas gift problems in one fell swoop by buying up at the Botanic Gardens near Heatherbrae. Now there is a small but beautiful book about our local orchids to add to the range – the beautifully illustrated “Native Terrestrial Orchids of the Hunter Region Botanic Gardens” by Lynda McPherson. Lynda, the author and artist came to find her passion for natural history illustration later in life. Having raised the family she had time to explore and a chance meeting one University Open Day with the Natural History Illustration Degree staff ignited her passion to enrol and grow her love of nature through illustration. She is not the first one who has had such an epiphany when looking at the remarkable work done by students and staff of this unique degree program aimed at observing and illustrating subjects from nature, science and culture, with their linkages to the environment being central. During her undergrad studies, she found a mentor in Kevin McDonald, who introduced her to the beautiful orchids of the Hunter Region Botanic Gardens and to phenology – the study of cyclic and seasonal natural phenomena – and enthusiastically encouraged her to keep a journal of flora, fauna, and temperature and rainfall data. The outer tracks of the Gardens consist of very sandy soil, and this is the perfect environment for native terrestrial orchids. Native orchids are a very strong indicator of the ecological health of an environment, and as such, stand alone as a very valuable commodity in any ecosystem. Native orchids all over the world are becoming rare and endangered, and in many cases are already extinct. Each week she would venture out into the bushland in search of orchids photographing and recording the date, genus, species, density, location of each one found. This led to watercolour paintings of the twenty-five orchids identified at the Gardens, then to an informative poster and now to a book designed to highlight the beauty of the orchids, as well as raise awareness of their existence and importance. Lynda has fulsome praise for Kevin and the teaching staff of her degree. Saying they helped her overcome her self-doubt as the oldest student in the class and encouraged her to keep going. Lynda's book is available for purchase at the Hunter Region Botanic Gardens Giftshop .
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by Tim Roberts & Seth Williams, founder of MySequesterLast month I came across an innovative internet business that brings dollar benefits to small landholders through linking their tree planting with businesses that need to offset their emissions by purchasing and cancelling carbon offsets or carbon credits. Seth Williams, a remarkable young UON alumnus, has set up a platform that increases the benefits and accessibility of climate change action for landholders and businesses. Seth returned from working in India with a plan to do a tree planting and reforestation project in rural NSW, inspired by the great contrast that he witnessed in India between the environmental destruction and the incredible work done to tackle these issues by the people in the sustainable growth enterprises. He looked at ways in which he could receive funding by linking environmental restoration and carbon offsetting on a small scale, and created MySequester a platform that connects businesses and the community together in an initiative to offset carbon in the atmosphere through tree planting projects. This approach is unique in that it allows people to earn money for tree planting projects of any size without having to commit huge resources to the massively large mainstream offset projects. The MySequester projects are recorded by the tree-planters themselves and then purchased by businesses to offset their carbon emissions. Not only does this open up the carbon market to new groups such as schools and small landholders, but it also has some unique benefits for the organisations that want to reduce their environmental impact.
Organisations and businesses will be able to directly impact their local community, while gaining recognition and exposure for their positive contribution to the environment. In addition to this, MySequester aims to change the lack of transparency and community connection within the carbon offsetting process, by keeping projects within local areas as opposed to remote areas away from businesses and their customers. MySequester has already done many projects in the Newcastle and Hunter Valley Area that support tree planting for schools, farmers and local residents. If you have land you can be paid to plant trees to sequester carbon from the atmosphere. Have a look at this great scheme at the Tocal Field Days in the first weekend of May. Dr Margaret Platell and I have just returned from taking 10 UON undergraduates on a New Colombo Plan funded cultural immersion visit to Indonesian Borneo. In the two weeks: we compared the environmental consequences of traditional alluvial diamond mining with the excellent forest rehabilitation outcomes from large scale open-cut coal mining in both Central Kalimantan and South Kalimantan; and the pressures on ORANGUTAN and PROBOSCIS MONKEYS from mining and palm oil plantation expansion. "A trip of a lifetime", " I understand so much more than I did before", "the best time of my life", are some of the comments from our group. Long term relations have been formed between UON and our Indonesian partner University Lambung Mangkurat. Projects around orchids, fungi, primate ecology and mined land rehabilitation have sprung up from the original contact made by Tim Roberts in 2015 and the July and December 2018 NCP student visits. University of Newcastle will receive 100% Renewable Electricity from the grid through a 7 year contract with Red Energy for their Newcastle and Central Coast campuses from 2020. Red Energy, is a wholly owned subsidiary of Snowy Hydro. The first year of the contract, 2019, will be a transition year while Red Energy gears up its solar, wind and hydro capacity.
This will complement the $4 million 2.0 megawatt system installation expected in 2019 which will see over 6000 panels installed across approximately 25 buildings at the Callaghan campus with additional panels also installed at the Ourimbah campus. In 2016 the Tom Farrell Institute in conjunction with CLEANaS conducted a feasibility study on the Callaghan Campus going 100% renewable energy by 2020 as part of the Lighthouse Community Energy Project funded by the NSW Office of Environment and Heritage Growing Community Energy Program. This determined that it is both technically feasible and financially beneficial to implement 100% renewable electricity. Achievement of this goal by 2020 will place the University of Newcastle as a leader in Sustainability and Energy Management across the Australian tertiary sector; will stimulate research and teaching in renewable energy; and will drive new student enrolments across all Faculties with young people attracted to learn at the greenest and most innovative University in Australia. |
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