By Karolina Ek, Lydia von Gertten and Jacob ‘Jōshin’ Halcomb
Introduction
In 2020, the United Nations Secretary General announced “the world is facing a triple planetary emergency – a climate crisis, a nature crisis, and a pollution crisis. These are causing profound suffering: lost lives, lost jobs, rising hunger, declining health and widening damage from disasters.” [1] The necessary environmental knowledge, expertise, and solutions are available, all that is required is informed, careful action. Additionally, as Buddhists practice to cultivate compassion, ethical and moral behaviour, and wisdom; the call to action is even greater.
In Europe there are approximately 4 million Buddhists and over 500 million worldwide with affiliated institutions, temples, and centres in large or moderate sized facilities. Buddhists centres and institutions present a great opportunity as places for taking action to address the three crises. Additionally, Europe and her inhabitants have demonstrated continuing leadership and commitment to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) which address climate action, biodiversity, and pollution. A number of individuals, both members of EBU and not, recognized the need and opportunity, and the EBU launched the Sustainable Environment on Earth for All Beings (SEE-FAB) project in late 2021 in partnership with SEfficiency, a sustainability consulting group. As of now, approximately 13 centres in France, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom, the United States and Korea have expressed interest taking action to reduce their impact and strengthen and improve their communities.
Rationale
Before we explore the specifics of the project, it may help to understand the general motivation and science behind this approach. The project focuses on the collective behaviour of our Dharma centres because it is here where long-term, social change can take place. It isn’t just the technologies, buildings, and other infrastructure that locks us into high future carbon emissions and continuous environmental degradation. It is also the ‘normative’ ideas, the way we think about energy, waste, water, etc. and the related cultural behaviours and activities around that use that can lock in future emissions. We can see this often in our own lifestyles, our habits at home, in our family upbringing and in the expectations promoted through television and social media. Traveling for winter holiday ski trips, summers at the beach, shopping sales, meat at every meal, and so on.
Dharma centres can offer a place to learn, model, and promote-by-doing new norms and new environmentally friendly behaviours, expectations, and ways of being. Adding our own voices to the growing chorus of those not only calling for change but demonstrating the change we wish to see. This underlying motivation for the project reflects findings that show how minority groups can change and shape the emergence of new social practices and change existing behaviours. This type of action and its role in addressing the climate crisis is explored in Chapter 5 of Working Group III’s contribution to the 6th Assessment Report of the IPCC.
SEE-FAB’s Approach
The SEE-FAB pilot project seeks to support centres in this effort by providing knowledge and tools thereby building capacity for concrete action, consistent with science, on climate, biodiversity, and pollution. The principal approach for the project draws upon the Eco-Management approach (also known as environmental management system or EMS). Namely the “Plan, Do, Check, Act” approach. Meaning the centres first map out their activities and, to the extent possible, measure the impact of their activities and operations on energy use, water use, resource use, and biodiversity. The first step, Plan, involves measuring and getting a fundamental understanding of where a centre is having its most impact. This is a key step; it helps centres understand what interventions that are most efficient for them to focus on to have the greatest possible impact and helps to identify concrete opportunities for action – the next step in the Eco-Management approach: Do.
Understanding where a centre has large impacts gives the members of the centre an opportunity to discuss, evaluate, and collectively decide and take action to improve the environmental sustainability of their facility. To help guide the evaluation and selection of actions, SEE-FAB suggests considering four key “hot-spots.” These are areas that, for most households and organisations, have the greatest opportunity for positive impact. 1) Mobility/Transport; 2) Nutrition/Food; 3) Housing/Buildings; and 4) Goods and Services.
When considering what and how to foster change in the four hotspots, there are two helpful frameworks for shaping the kind of action centres can take. The first is the mitigation framework of “Avoid-Shift-Improve.” The second is for biodiversity related actions and applies the mitigation and conservation hierarchy’s 4Rs: Refrain, Reduce, Restore, and Renew.
As an example, say we are a centre in a major city, and we have completed a study of our energy use. Looking at electricity and heating bills, the types of lightbulbs we have, surveyed members to understand how they commute to the centre for events and teachings, and other areas relevant to our situation. We find that lighting and heating the space are the two largest energy uses since most of our members are able to commute by tram, bus or bicycle. We apply the “Avoid-Shift-Improve” framework and decide to avoid using lights when the building is unoccupied and when there is enough sunlight, we avoid turning on all the lights. For the times we can’t avoid their use, we shift to task lighting, for example using a desk lamp instead of the over-head lamps throughout the room. For the remainder of the time, we work to improve the lamps we use, switching to LED for any lamp that burns out.
After working with the second step ‘do’, we then measure and check. Did the energy bill decrease? Are more visitors carpooling or taking public transportation? Are we achieving the environmental benefits we expected? If not, then what can we do to Act and change the approach or better communicate to our members, so they adjust their behaviour? In brief, this the Eco-Management approach the SEE-FAB project draws upon. The other approach, the 4Rs for Biodiversity action will be further elaborated later in the pilot stage. At present, given limited resources and time, SEE-FAB is initially focusing on energy use in centres.
Youth Engagement
SEE-FAB, through the great suggestion of our Buddhist colleagues in Sweden, is promoting and supporting the engagement of youth in this endeavour. As the impacts of climate change intensify, it is today’s youth and future generations that will face the worst of its effects. For this reason, it is increasingly seen as imperative to engage and empower young individuals, as active citizens, in environmental initiatives and policy. Dharma centres, as spaces for promoting new norms and new ways of being, have the potential to influence society positively when engaging with the wider community. Working with youth is a way for young individuals to take what they have learned to make positive changes in their home environments.
The SEE-FAB project encourages centres to conduct their environmental reviews and implement changes together with a youth group. It does this through teaching activities in manageable sections that can be conducted in the course of a couple of hours each. The youth group could be a scout group, a local sports club, an after-school activity group, or youth already familiar with your centre. The engagement is designed to empower young individuals in your communities, allowing them to learn and take part in making real improvements for sustainability by listening, reflecting, collecting data, and contributing with new ideas. This way, Buddhist centres can become spaces for co-creation and intergenerational unity towards the shared goal of creating a sustainable environment on earth for all beings.
Where we are today
The project, in development for approximately a year now, is currently pilot testing guidance on assessing Energy impacts with Yeshin Norbu in Stockholm, Sweden. Through the project’s partnership with SEfficiency, a sustainability consultancy, the team has produced short instructional manual and several tables and spreadsheets to support the engagement of youth in data collection on a centre’s energy-use. In addition to the guidance document, the SEE-FAB project presented at the 2022 EBU AGM in Paris. The team facilitated an abbreviated “Eco-Charrette”, which is a structured brainstorming session for developing ideas and identifying possible actions Buddhist centres could take to reduce their impacts.
After completing the initial testing of the guidance and making any changes needed it will be rolled out to other participating centres. Ongoing meetings among these centres will be organized in order to allow for peer-to-peer learning and sharing of good practice, support with questions, and so forth. It is our hope that through this approach – centres helping other centres, this approach can continue to spread among the members of the EBU and beyond.
Next Steps
SEE-FAB currently has a number of centres beginning with the pilot phase. We are testing the initial energy guidance document and data collection method. Upon completion of this initial phase the project will explore expanding into the other critical areas of water, resources, and biodiversity. Ultimately, this will be dependent upon available funding and resources. With the pilot under way, SEE-FAB partners are not actively seeking new centres or organisations for this initial test phase. However, we welcome and actively encourage centres interested in making these changes to get in touch with the team. Case studies or examples of environmental sustainability measures in your own facilities are very much welcome. Please feel free to contact the team by writing: SEE-FAB@SEfficiency.org
[1] Source: https://www.un.org/press/en/2020/sgsm20422.doc.htm accessed December 6, 2021
About the author
Karolina Ek is the assistant project manager for the SEE-FAB project, working on behalf of SEfficiency. She has an international background and experience working with youth and community engagement. She is currently pursuing a master’s degree in Sustainability Science in Sweden together with Lydia. Lydia von Gertten currently works on her master’s thesis project at the Sustainability Studies and Environmental Science program of Lund University. In addition to her strong love for animals, she explores ways to more effectively integrate ecological concerns into urban planning. Jacob ‘Jōshin’ Halcomb, through the consultancy SEfficiency, serves as a technical advisor for the project. His expertise is in sustainability science, facilities, and resource efficiency and environmental management. He remains grateful for the strong interest and commitment of the EBU in pursuing this project.
This article first appeared in EBU Magazine #10 – Ecodharma (Spring 2023). Download the full issue as PDF or browse all issues.