Come to the Great Peninsula Future Festival

Port Gamble will be the site of the biggest sustainability festival in Kitsap history on Aug. 2-3 and you are invited! Mark your calendars now for a great weekend of entertainment, food, crafts booths, stimulating speakers and displays on how to live sustainably in Kitsap County.

Why do we need a sustainability festival? And what is “sustainability” all about anyway? These are both good questions. I find a lot of folks using the term “sustainable” but when I ask them what it means they struggle for an answer.

In its simplest form, I think it means practicing stewardship so we leave the same or better quality of life and natural environment for our kids and grandkids that we enjoy. It means that we can “harvest” from natural systems but we need to keep them healthy and vital so we can continue to use and enjoy them over time. Those little sealed terrariums that folks used to have on their windowsills were a good example of a sustainable system. If you ever read “The Lorax” by Dr. Seuss, you know what sustainability isn’t.

Let’s move this question from the abstract to current issues. Are you concerned about paying almost $5 a gallon for gas? Worried about the cost of heating and electric bills? What about the rising cost of food, not to mention its safety these days? Wonder how healthy Puget Sound and Hood Canal really are under the surface? Curious about how we can build and remodel in ways that are better for the environment and ourselves? Concerned about protecting your pocketbook as well as the environment?

Then you will want to attend the Great Peninsula Future Festival for several reasons. First, it is going to be great fun for the whole family. There will be two days packed with fantastic entertainment including the Flying Karamazov Brothers juggling troupe (they’ll offer juggling lessons to the kids between performances), magicians, well-known bands and local blues singers performing on two stages each day.

There will be great craft and food booths featuring local products.

If you are curious about transportation alternatives that will save you money, come to the transportation section. You’ll see domestic and foreign hybrid vehicles, electric cars and scooters, high-mileage diesels, maybe a fuel-cell car and others. The Vehicle Research Institute at Western Washington University is sending students to show off some of the experimental cars they built – maybe including the solar car that came in fifth in the Across Australia solar car race! They will also show designs of a new hybrid bus they are designing for Kitsap Transit and other transit agencies in Washington.

Interested in alternative energy generation and energy conservation? You’ll see solar electric panels, wind generators, solar hot-water systems, groundwater heat pumps, bio-fuels and maybe information about tidal and low-head hydro generating systems. Experts on energy conservation techniques and technology will also be on hand to answer your questions.

When we buy local, we are fueling our own local economy instead of exporting our dollars. We reduce fuel consumption and fuel costs. We get fresher, real field-ripened, local produce from local farmers. Learn more about how you can buy local produce and other products and services in the county.

Development has a major impact on the environment, often in the form of stormwater runoff from homes, roads and businesses. Kitsap County Homebuilders are pioneering “low impact” development (LID) techniques like porous pavement that lets water runs through so it recharges the aquifer rather than being piped into the Sound. Learn more about LID techniques and other “green” building techniques for new construction and remodeling.

Have you read articles about problems in Hood Canal and Puget Sound? Want to know just how healthy they really are and what you can do to help restore them? The Puget Sound Partnership and local salmon recovery groups will be on hand to answer your questions.

Both the state and federal legislatures are spending a lot of time on issues of energy efficiency, climate change and protection of Hood Canal and Puget Sound. Come listen to state and federal legislators and a host of other experts on a variety of sustainability topics. State Rep. Larry Seaquist, State Sen. Phil Rockefeller and Congressman Jay Inslee are confirmed speakers.

Dozens of local and regional environmental and conservation groups will have booths and be available to answer your questions. You can purchase books on sustainability issues.

The festival’s major sponsors include the Kitsap Home Builders Association, Kitsap News Group, Olympic Property Group, the Port Gamble S’Klallam Tribe, Wet Apple Media, and the Washington State Extension Service. These and a host of other sponsors show the broad support from throughout the Kitsap community for a festival focused on sustainability issues.

Kitsap County is a unique and wonderful place to live and raise kids because of our connection with the natural environment. Living sustainably doesn’t have to mean sacrifice. It just means living smarter. If we do it right, our pocketbooks and the environment can benefit. See you at the festival!

For more information on the Great Peninsula Future Festival, including a schedule of events, go to www.greatpeninsulafuturefestival.org.

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