The Carbon Economy Series, sponsored by the Dallas Community College Districy (DCCCD), Urban Acres, Arete Consulting Group, Earth Day Texas, Farm Girls Organic Radio Show, Anne’s Health Food Center and Market, Dallas Water Utilities, is a New Mexico nonprofit dedicated to teaching sustainable principles and practices with world-renowned speakers.

A new yearly conference will give participants the knowledge to spend less money, work smarter rather harder, do more with less, reduce waste, conserve energy, reduce water use, become healthier, shrink our carbon footprint, grow food and help the Earth. The theme for the custom educational series is building resilience through sustainable practices and is held throughout Dallas in community college campuses in the winter and spring.

Cedar Valley College, in Lancaster, will host Joel Salatin, from Polyface Farms, as a keynote speaker on from noon to 2 p.m., January 28. His talk, Securing Our Local Food System, is free to the public (RSVP requested) healthy snacks will be provided. Salatin promotes local, solar-driven, carbon-fertilized systems and has been featured in the documentary films Food, Inc. and The Omnivore’s Dilemma.

He says, “Those massive Kansas wheat fields and California almond groves, for most people, represent efficiency and abundance. Nothing could be further from the truth. Backyard gardens and multi-speciation are far more productive per acre.”

Salatin will also be featured from 7 to 9 p.m., January 28, 7pm-9 pm at the Celebrity Chef Gourmet Farm to Table Dinner Fundraising event at Urban Acres.

The funds generated will go toward scholarship money for his one-day workshop at Cedar Valley College the next day, from 9 to 5 p.m., January 29, Local Food To The Rescue, on the nuts and bolts of how 20 people create $2 million of revenue by providing more than 10,000 people a month with healthy, organic food while maintaining a happy and healthy lifestyle.

From 7 to 9 a.m., January 30, Urban Farms will host a power breakfast with Salatin,  where people can hang and chill with him over freshly roasted coffee.

Zero waste means that in order to manufacture a product, it has to be good for people/society, good for the environment and not just economically viable, but what our world would be like. A lot of things in the landfill would not be there; child labor or slavery would not be tolerated and exploiting the environment in the quenchless thirst for oil would not be the status quo.

Adhering to the triple bottom line: that which is good for people, for the planet and good for creating yield for future generations, along with buying locally and committing to zero waste, can have a tremendous impact on how much money we spend, what our environment looks like and how healthy we are.

In crafting the Clean Economy Series, the organizers looked at how we can empower the whole human being (mind, body and spirit) through sustainable education, based on natural systems, solutions that mimic nature, where cooperation instead of competition is the norm and relationships are valued, instead of just the individual parts.

The group will hold a workshop on Wise Water Use, February 21 and 22, at Eastfield College and Urban Permaculture Design, with author Toby Hemenway. Urban Permaculture: Sustainable Practices to Save Money and Resources, at the DCCCD Sustainability Summit, will be presented April 16 and 17, at North Lake College.

Iginia Boccalandro, the founder of the Carbon Economy Series, is a permaculture designer with Arete Consulting Group. For more information, call 469-554-9202 or visit CarbonEconomySeries.com.