Green Your Burn, Protect the Playa: Some History, Some Basic Principles

How green can you really be if you go to Burning Man? some have snickered in front of and behind my back. Isn’t Burning Man just mindless, pointless building and burning?

Point taken. Point considered. And, well, no, I don’t find going to the Black Rock Arts Festival aka Burning Man a huge contradiction to my commitment to living more lightly, more greenly, more sustainably on the planet.

Sure, staying home, growing my garden, riding my bike to the beach, turning off all electronics and not contributing daily to the web, etc would certainly consume fewer resources than going out to that big festival in the desert.

Like any vacation or festival, Burning Man has a huge carbon footprint created by all those folks traveling from wherever on the planet to the Black Rock Desert, home of the Burn.

But staying home wouldn’t be as fun or as rejuvenating or as invigorating as a few days of extreme life on the playa.

And to the credit of Burners everywhere, much has been done to green the Burn since the wild days back in the early 90s of Guns, Granola & Videotape when I first started going to Burning Man. Yep, back in those days, people thought nothing about hauling all kinds of stuff out to the playa to use in camp and then burn after, leaving hulking carcasses of half burned couches scattered here and there.  And going postal was a verb with many participants shooting up a post office.

Anyway, enough reminiscing! I’ll take the infrastructure, the streets, the lights, the giant shade structUre at center camp. I’ll willingly pay more for my ticket, and appreciate the efforts of the many to green the Burn and make it safe for all the too high boys and girls.

So how to Green Your Burn and Leave No Trace?

+ LNT PRINCPLE 1: PLAN AHEAD & PREPARE
+ GREEN PRINCIPLE 1: RETHINK & REDUCE PURCHASES

+ LNT PRINCIPLE 2: TRAVEL & CAMP ON DURABLE SURFACES
+ GREEN PRINCIPLE 2: CONSERVE ENERGY & REDUCE FOSSIL FUEL USE

+ LNT PRINCIPLE 3: DISPOSE OF WASTE PROPERLY
+ GREEN PRINCIPLE 3: REUSE WHAT WE CAN FROM YEAR TO YEAR

+ LNT PRINCIPLE 4: MINIMIZE CAMPFIRE IMPACTS
+ GREEN PRINCIPLE 4: RECYCLE EVERYTHING ELSE – AIM FOR ZERO WASTE

+ LEAVE NO TRACE PRINCIPLE 5: BE CONSIDERATE OF OTHER VISITORS
+ GREEN PRINCIPLE 5: COORDINATE W/NEIGHBORS TO SHARE RESOURCES

+ LEAVE NO TRACE PRINCIPLE 6: LEAVE WHAT YOU FIND & RESPECT WILDLIFE
+ GREEN PRINCIPLE 6: RESPECT THE ENVIRONMENT

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A recent issue of Jack Rabbit speaks shares these principles and reminds Burners: “One of the fundamental threads of Burning Man’s genetic fabric is a strong and abiding environmentalist ethic.  We’re extraordinarily lucky to be able to use the amazing Black Rock Desert as the canvas on which we paint our week-long masterpiece year after year.  We respect its beauty, its majesty, and its delicacy. It’s easy to forget, in this unforgiving, barren landscape, that the playa’s tough countenance actually belies an extraordinarily fragile ecosystem.

We consider it our responsibility to care for the Black Rock Desert, not just because the future of our event depends on it, but because it’s the right thing to do.  For more http://www.burningman.com/environment

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LEAVE NO TRACE & BE GREEN AT BURNING MAN

The Earth Guardians have been collecting and recording LNT tips for playa living. Visit their website at: http://www.earthguardians.net And for some eco-friendly burner resources, check out http://www.burningman.com/environment/

Here are our top ten LNT and Green reminders

1) BE A LNT GOOD NEIGHBOR, LEND A HAND, SHARE CLEAN ENERGY, CARRY A
MOOP BAG

2) PREPARE A LEAVE NO TRACE & A GREEN PLAN

3) RESPECT, RETHINK, REDUCE, REUSE, PRECYCLE, RECYLE AND RESTORE!

4) IF IT DOESN’T COME OUT OF YOUR BODY IT DOESN’T GO INTO THE POTTY.

5) CONSERVE ENERGY & USE ALTERNATIVE ENERGY SOURCES (SOLAR, WIND,
BIODIESEL)

6) NEVER LET IT HIT THE GROUND (INCLUDING GREY WATER & CIGARETTE
BUTTS), CLEAN AS YOU GO! & SECURE ITEMS FROM THE WIND

7) INITIATE A NEIGHBORHOOD MOOP SWEEP! GRID YOUR AREA BEFORE YOU LEAVE

8) GIVE YOURSELF, NOT GIFTS THAT ARE LIKELY TO BECOME MOOP

9) PREPARE FOR THE HUNGRY WIND – SECURE YOUR LOAD, ESPECIALLY YOUR TRASH

10) VOLUNTEER FOR CLEAN UP WITH DPW & PARTICIPATE IN ECO-RESTORATION
PROJECTS YEAR ROUND!

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Details in the next post!