A question that I have found myself
drawn to the last couple of years is how to create a world where
there is room for both humans and nature. Living on an island
automatically forces you to be more sustainable. Sustainability is
not the focus of the research station, it is research, so some
activities are by their nature unsustainable but some good practices
are put into practice. In this post I'll give a brief description of
life on this island.
The basics
Air, water and food. The basics. The
air on the island is clean and speckled with stars at night so that's
OK. Water can be troublesome on an island. There is plenty of salt
water around, but fresh water can be scarce. Luckily this island has
it's on freshwater aquifer (grondwater in Dutch). Water is pumped up
and stored in large tanks uphill. This gives us the water pressure
needed. We need to be careful when working with salt water at the
station. If we spill too much it might pollute our freshwater supply,
I was told.
Food definitely not a local supply.
Every two weeks we have to order food online an this food is
delivered by the supermarket to a barge, which takes two days to
reach the Island. So by the time the food reaches our stomachs it has
travelled quite a distance, with the carbon footprint that comes with
it. The island is a national reserve so we are not allowed to catch
fish close to the island and the station is not allowed to grow their
own food, seriously limiting food self sufficiency.
Waste
Shipping waste off the island is
expensive and the garbage is therefore separated. All non-meat food
waste is composted, burnable materials are burned, recyclables as
glass and some plastics are recycled and the remainder will be
shipped out and ends up in a landfill. Since it is not allowed to
grow food the compost gets buried. Human waste is collected in
composting toilets and gets buried too. I know burying usable compost
isn't optimal, but at least it feels good not to flush 10 litres of
drinking water out every time you “go”.
Energy
Potentially you could use to bio-gas
from the compost to cook food on to make some use of it at least.
Right now we have gas bottles that fuel our stove. Heating water is
not really an issue here since we are in the tropics. Each house is
equipped with a solar hot water system and you can easily take a nice
warm shower after you get out of the water. The ocean is about 24°C
and even in a wetsuit it gets cold when you spend enough time in the
water and a warm shower is really nice then.
A large proportion of the electricity
is generated with solar power. There is a large photo voltaic solar
system plus battery bank and the station runs on solar power during
the day and a large part of the night. When the batteries run out a
diesel powered generator takes over. The major energy consumers here
are the sea water pumps. The aquaria on land are continuously
supplied with clean running seawater. Pumping water is one of the
most energy demanding things you can do, so a large proportion of the
solar energy goes to keeping the seawater storage tanks topped up.
The seawater tanks are placed about three meters above the ground so
seawater can be gravity fed to the experiments.
Internet
Since I can post messages on our weblog
you know I have internet on the island. However, internet is also
limited. You either have mobile internet through your phone or you
use the research stations' wifi. For both you need to pay and you'll
only have access to internet at the station, 50 metres out it is gone
again. For the wifi you buy 500 Mb access vouchers. I make sure that
the pictures I post and send by email have been reduced in size, and
I don't send movies. Furthermore, I have also closed down the
automatic file synchronisation I had through dropbox since this would
eat my 500 Mb rapidly.
Tides
The difference in water hight can be
quite high, sometimes 2.5 meters between high and low tide,
especially around full moon (spring tide). You have to plan your
trips around the tide because you might not be able to get back to
the moorings otherwhise.
Logistics
Before you can do any research at
Lizard Island Research Station (LIRS) you have to have a permit from
the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority (GBRMPA). This takes a
looong time, so you have to plan ahead. On the plane to the Island
you can only take a maximum of 30 kg baggage, if you want to take
more you need to ship it to the station beforehand. You can place
orders at special companies in Cairns and they'll ship it to you, for
an appropriate price... When you arrive at the island you have to
sign a small pile of paperwork, which gets significantly higher if
you go scuba diving. However, after a short (re)introduction to the
maritime VHF radio, a check of your boating licence and boating test
by the station you are free to go exploring!
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| I am staying at a house called "Loomis" |
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| The main building of the research station |
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| The central corridor of the research station |
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| The dive shed. The blue fins you see are mine :-) |
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| The boat log. |
