Through volunteering with NRCS I was given the assignment to document the before state of Northern New Mexico College's El Rito Campus. The Campus is located in El Rito NM, a very small town just north of Espanola, NM. The location is beautiful and easy to see why one might want to work and/or study. The campus is in the initial stages of lining up funding and purchasing equipment to take the entire campus off the grid and become self sufficient. I focused primarily on what "green" equipment they have set up at this time. Even the Cafeteria will serve local food grown on campus and from New Mexico farms. This seems to be a heavy trend right now. It was sold to me on the importance of National Security as fuel becomes more expensive and instability in the middle east and other parts of the world could get out of control. I personally get scared about isolationist trends, not dealing with problems does not make them go away, but I do understand direct financial and fiscal responsibility and shipping fresh blueberries from Maine to New Mexico (Let alone South America) may not be an option much longer. I'm a layman listening to people who are trying to predict the future but its easy to see the end of the supermarket as we know it and the resurgence of locally grown and raised products purchased during their harvest seasons and not year round. This is probably a healthier concept than most will be willing to except.
