[ July 12, 2009; 9:00 am to 12:00 pm. ] **Venue:** Oak Flats Neighbourhood Centre, Fisher Street, Oak Flats Learn how to set up a compost bin or worm farm to manage your kitchen waste, produce valuable fertilisers and soil conditioners for your garden and minimise odour from your garbage bins. Participants will receive a free compost bin on completion of the course! This activity is [...]

[ July 11, 2009; 9:00 am to 12:00 pm. ] **Venue:** Girl Guide Cottage, Hindmarsh Park, Kiama Come and learn the basics of successful composting and worm farming, as well as the revolutionary Bokashi bin system. Each household participating in the workshop will receive a FREE COMPOST BIN, or can purchase the Bokashi Bin at a reduced rate. This offer is only available to [...]

[ July 11, 2009; 9:00 am to 1:00 pm. ] **Mt Keira to Wollongong Botanic Gardens via Robertsons Lookout Bushwalk** This amazing Bushwalk will take you through the Open Forest and Heath of the Illawarra Escarpment. We’ll look for signs of animals such as wombats and search for carnivorous plants, and food plants such as Sarsparilla and Mat Rush, along the edges of the trail. The [...]

[ July 11, 2009; 9:00 am to 12:00 pm. ] **Venue:** Kiama Downs Childcare Centre In the Illawarra we have many fascinating animals living around us – in our gardens, over the back fence and in the trees and bushland in our streets. Come to this interactive workshop and learn more about our four legged neighbours and how you can encourage them to stay around. Facilitated [...]

[ July 1, 2009; 10:30 am to 12:00 pm. ] **Venue:** Discovery Centre, Wollongong Botanic Gardens Learn the basics of two ways to reduce your ecological footprint and give your food scraps new life! In this workshop you will learn how to set up and maintain a worm farm and also how to develop and look after a healthy active compost heap. Find out the best [...]

[ July 1, 2009; 9:00 am to 1:30 pm. ] **FREE Hungry for Change, NSW Food Summit, Illawarra Regional Forum.** **Venue:** Main foyer, Building 41, University of Wollongong On 22-23 October this year, the Sydney Food Fairness Alliance will hold the NSW Food Summit. This summit will be the culmination of events across the Greater Metropolitan Sydney area, including the Illawarra. This is your opportunity to contribute [...]

[ June 27, 2009; 8:00 am to 1:00 pm. ] **Venue:** School Flat, Black Beach, Kiama Kiama Council will be celebrating World Environment Day on Saturday, 27th June in conjunction with the Kiama Produce Markets. Residents will be able to not only pick up some great produce, but will also be able to visit the Council Information Tent where they can get updated on the exciting [...]

[ June 27, 2009; 9:00 am to 3:00 pm. ] In this hands-on, practical workshop you’ll learn how to make Haloumi cheese, Quarg and Yoghurt. Please note this full day course has a charge of $30 per person (this is subsidised from a retail cost of $90 per person). This activity is open to residents of Wollongong, Shellharbour and Kiama Council areas only. Bookings are essential [...]

The “Kev’s Patch” campaign is gaining momentum! I’ve teamed up with a couple of other bloggers (Gavin from The Greening of Gavin and Julie from Go Greener Australia) to set up a new site promoting the initiative – the Kev’s Patch blog.

I love that header image above that Julie did for us!

If you think it’s [...]

While putting together notes for my talks over the weekend, I noticed something interesting. The amount of electricity we saved each day by converting 10 halogen downlights to CFLs (4 kWh) is about equal to the amount of electricity we are generating each day (on average) since installing a 1 kW grid-connect solar power system.

The [...]