Kevin and Karen from the Center for Transformation Ecology made an appearance at this year's United Nations Global Conference on Climate Change in Bali, interviewing representatives from all over the world. Inquiry topics ranged from discussing personally transformative experiences to addressing the larger implications of integrating our diverse cultural circumstances and perspectives in order to work together at the global level. These interviews will be incorporated into a 20 minute short film that will be available to the public soon... updates on this can be found in our projects page.

Image: Distinguished guests at event marking the 10th anniversary of the Kyoto Protocol (Courtesy of http://unfccc.int)

During the Permaculture Intensive at the 2006 Symbiosis Gathering, mycologist Mia Maltz and filmmaker Nicola Peel discussed the use of fungi for biodegrading petroleum toxicity in the Ecuadorian Amazon.

Through the alliance of nonprofits like the Transformation Ecology Center, Cloud Forest Institute and the RITES Project, we brought at team together to form the Amazon Myco-renewal Project. This pilot project took place in Ecuador in November of 2007.

Scientists and community members worked in the field, documenting the baseline levels of the petroleum contamination in the soil and water in the region. We created three test areas around a 30 year-old, large, contaminated pool in the jungle, where we set up our three sites with three 10-meter long spillways that we inoculated with 300 kilos of oyster mushroom mycelium (Pleurotus ostreatus.). We mixed the oyster mushroom spawn in burlap bags with sawdust, woodchips and straw; everything was easy to source locally.

Enzymes produced by the oyster mushroom can biodegrade the oil and cleanse the soil and water. We created an Ecuadorian Mycological Society with the support Ecuadorian Mushroom Cultivators and Ethnomycologists. Through subsequent soil and water tests we intend to document the efficacy of using fungi for biodegrading petroleum contamination.