Naked Heart takes Sustainability seriously and is on track to achieve carbon negativity by 2030.
The Burning Man Project has taken the lead as a global pilot project in demonstrating the feasibility and achievability of becoming Carbon Neutral:
Naked Heart is stepping up to play its part in this plan. We intend to do this through:
1. Mapping and monitoring Carbon Sources
2. Reductions in Consumption
3. Gaining Efficiencies through Communal Effort
4. Identifying Local offsets
5. Investing in Non-local offsets
6. Hiring Non-local offsets
7. Paying for Sequestration
8. Conversion of input from Fossil to Renewable (Green)
Mapping and Monitoring Carbon Sources
We have performed an exhaustive survey of our carbon usage and are using that to spotlight areas that can be converted to greener practices.
Generally it is thought the the average Burner produces about 2500# of CO2 through their participation in attending Burning Man. The line we draw is: "What impact would disappear if Burning Man disappeared?"
We have broken that down into categories:
600# CO2— Home:The average American weekly carbon footprint. (food, utilities, commuting, etc)
300# CO2— BM Project: Man burn, water trucks, DPW, SF office
300# CO2— Participation: The footprint of a participant particular to their stay in Our Village
(power, water, food, infrastructure)
1300# CO2— Travel: Primarily jet fuel to get to the event
2500# CO2— Total Participant Footprint
We have broken these carbon sources out individually because we deal with each of them differently.
Home: We do not address this footprint for 2 reasons: First if BM did not happen, these loads would still be present. Second many of these loads are reduced by virtue of being at Burning Man. We feel that this at-home reduction is an offset to on-playa loads. We understand that not all Home loads disappear. An office is still being air conditioned, family is still at home running the washing machine, etc. But some loads are clearly retired: Commuting, meals out, fuel intensive recreation, etc. We claim 300# CO2 credit for these retired loads. That equates to a remaining 300# on-playa contribution
BM Project: I think that this is primarily what the general public imagines when they think of Burning Man. "Hell, Burning all that wood in the Man and the Temple, that's a lot of CO2" Yes, that is true, but it is also a matter of optics. The Man/Temple burns are by definition carbon neutral. It is the DPW generators, water trucks, food delivery, individual vehicles, year round operations, SF utility bills, etc. That are creating fossil carbon loads. Those are our main focus. We leave this load up to the BMP to account for and offset.
Participation: This is the lion's share of our neutrality plans and program. This is the decisions and expenditures made on behalf of each of our campers by leadership. It is power generation, water delivery, food delivery, getting all the materials to playa, buying all the materials off-playa, etc. We are taking on the full 300# CO2 footprint for this category.
Travel: This varies widely by participant. We are an international village that has members from every continent except Antarctica. there is a 1000:1 difference between the impacts of different campers. For this reason we ask that each traveller offset their own impact. We then ask them if they pledge to do so. We tally the amount of un-offset impacts and deal with those as a village. Most airlines these days offer the option of paying for offsets at time of booking. If that is not an option, we urge travelers to purchase offsets at:
Reductions in Consumption
All of the camps in our village are here for the long haul. We buy and build infrastructure with a 15 year life span. This is the ultimate re-use. We also seek to procure yearly supplies in bulk. Instead of having every participant bring and prepare their own food, we have communal kitchens that use wholesale ingredients procured in case quantities. We use fresh produce instead of canned. We have bulk water delivered instead of using 2.5 gal. totes. We discourage showy "flash fashion" costuming and encourage "wide open hearts" as a costume. (Who can resist a naked smiling person?). As we identify additional areas where we can reduce consumption, we will do so.
Gaining Efficiencies through Communal Effort
Our village has a Burner Express Bus utilization of 90%. We have not obtained hard data from the bus operators but we believe that this has reduced our carbon footprint by 70# CO2 per camper, mostly due to not idling in line for entry or exit. There is also a tremendous amount of savings in infrastructure load when we combine desires and fulfill them as a camp: Group shade, showers, kitchens, etc.
Identifying Local Offsets
We surveyed the entirety of Burning Man for offsets. Ideally we were looking for high carbon emitters that could be brought in-house and be converted to low emitters. We focused on Motorhomes and RV's. These are ideal because they are high emitters, they have bad optics, and they are mobile. New for 2023 we have invited a motorhome camp into our village called Hook Up Camp:
We performed some calculations and determined that a motorhome that is generating its own power with its on-board Onan 5500 generator burns 0.6 gal of gasoline per hour to produce 2500w for running an AC. That is 4.2kW/gal. A big diesel generator achieves 14kW/gal. That is 3.3 times more efficient!! We realized that if we invited a fair number of Motorhomes into our village and power them with an efficient diesel generator that we could actually offset the entire carbon load of our village. Additionally motorhomes typically burn gasoline. There are no green gasoline alternatives but there are green diesel alternative coming soon. Reno has just built a synthetic crude plant that makes crude from landfill waste once these green fuels are available we will convert to their use and will easily be a source of carbon negativity for BRC.
We have direct local offsets due to motorhome inclusion of:
4.2kWh/gal @ 120 hr = 1400# CO2 per motorhome burning gasoline
vs
14kWh/gal @120 hr = 418# CO2 per motorhome powered by our grid
That means that we offset playa-wide 922# CO2 for every motorhome we power with our grid. The same is true of other camps using small generators. We calculate that each camp we power offsets 1200# CO2. This year we are planning a HUB that includes 12 camps operating off our grid.
In total, if we have 50 motorhomes and 12 camps, we can offset 63,000# of CO2 which is about 100# CO2 per camper.
Investing in Non-local offsets
There is a lot of talk about solar at Burning Man. We understand the interest but it has a lot of problems. When the equipment is only used for 1 week, there is a lot of carbon invested in making the equipment that may never be adequately offset. Additionally there is a huge human energy load needed to load the gear, transport it, build it, strike it, put it in storage or redeploy it. Even if the gear is used elsewhere when not used at the Burn, it is easily out of commission for a month each year due to removing and transporting it. All that to get 1 week of power. We have a better idea.
What if we identified a house in a state with great solar potential and a lot of coal in its municipal grid, like say Arizona. We install a solar system on a poor person's house who would never be able to afford solar otherwise. We claim all the carbon offset of their previous usage pre-solar. We realize that the optics are not as sexy but it is literally 6 times as effective towards saving the planet. Plus there is no need for batteries.
Hiring Non-local offsets
These are clearing houses of global carbon reduction projects. The exact make-up of the project varies but typical prices are $6-20/ton CO2. You can see some examples here:
We have done this in 2017-2022. In 2023 we expect to pay for 1000# of offset per camper
Paying for sequestration
This is the grand daddy of all carbon strategies. Permanently pulling carbon out of the atmosphere and entombing it in rock or some other strategy. Very expensive. It is unlikely that we will ever do this.
Conversion of input from Fossil to Renewable (Green)
Reno has just built a synthetic crude plant that makes crude from landfill waste once these green fuels are available we will convert to their use and will easily be a source of carbon negativity for BRC.
What we are Committing to
We are taking responsibility for 600# CO2 per camper. That is
300# CO2 Portion of Home use not retired by attending the event
300# CO2 Directly attributable to decisions made by campers/camps
Total reductions and Offsets circa 2023
Purchasing Choice Reductions: 100#/ camper
Communal Effort: 70#/camper
Local Offsets: 100# /camper
Non-local offsets 1000#/ camper
Total reductions and offsets: 1270#/camper
That results in 670#/ camper of carbon negativity. We believe that once we have compiled our data for 2023 that this negativity will be absorbed by un-offset air travel.
The non-local offsets are currently the cheapest to implement and we may pursue doing more of these. They are also the least visible. We would like to pursue some high visibility projects but are currently limited by the amount of Human Power available for implementation.