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Anonymous
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Some local evidence of global warming (and a confidence booster for autumnal lime mortar users)
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Anonymous
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I too, Ena, came late to central heating as a luxury! I also heat most rooms which we use - although we have a thermostat on each radiator and they are not scalding hot throughout, just enough to trickle through and keep the chill away. It's just we find once we allow the place to cool it takes some heating up again, and we have damp control to consider, too.
But do we really need all-day hot bedrooms? Isn't a thicker duvet a better idea? I know some warmth getting dressed is good, but after that...
However, I'm sitting here in a vest (well - its a sort of camisole really, not that unglam!) a long sleeved t-shirt and a fleece, with tights and trousers. It's a darned sight easier to keep me warm that way than it is to chuck money at heating the house and have me swanning around in a silk blouse (not that I own one, but you get the drift...).
I do think we are a terribly wasteful society in general, with people not considering the impact they are making on the planet as individuals. I'm not recommending hair-shirt misery, but there are so many things which could cut down on energy use.
I'm unconvinced about street lighting in many places - I know the arguments for, but I think they may have been overdone. I liked the dark in rural areas.
The other thing which is driving me bonkers is people who light up their houses externally, and their gardens. We have people in our village who have lights permanently burning now outside their front and back doors, even though there is an adequate street light. Worse, there are those with rather horrible (IMHO) and OTT lamps stuck around their garden, and with their drives (of only a few metres) lit up also. How much energy must this be using?
We have one lamp which comes on automatically when we arrive (it's dark and we need it to get up the path) and goes off again after a minute. We do have outside lamps with switches, but we switch them on to get fuel and then off again. We have energy saving bulbs in those.
Then there are those who have automatic lights, which are so bright they light up a huge area around, and stay on a long time, and are so sensitive that anyone walking within twenty yards of them triggers them off. We have one such which lights up the whole villge green when anyone goes near at dusk.
Grrrr!!!
But do we really need all-day hot bedrooms? Isn't a thicker duvet a better idea? I know some warmth getting dressed is good, but after that...
However, I'm sitting here in a vest (well - its a sort of camisole really, not that unglam!) a long sleeved t-shirt and a fleece, with tights and trousers. It's a darned sight easier to keep me warm that way than it is to chuck money at heating the house and have me swanning around in a silk blouse (not that I own one, but you get the drift...).
I do think we are a terribly wasteful society in general, with people not considering the impact they are making on the planet as individuals. I'm not recommending hair-shirt misery, but there are so many things which could cut down on energy use.
I'm unconvinced about street lighting in many places - I know the arguments for, but I think they may have been overdone. I liked the dark in rural areas.
The other thing which is driving me bonkers is people who light up their houses externally, and their gardens. We have people in our village who have lights permanently burning now outside their front and back doors, even though there is an adequate street light. Worse, there are those with rather horrible (IMHO) and OTT lamps stuck around their garden, and with their drives (of only a few metres) lit up also. How much energy must this be using?
We have one lamp which comes on automatically when we arrive (it's dark and we need it to get up the path) and goes off again after a minute. We do have outside lamps with switches, but we switch them on to get fuel and then off again. We have energy saving bulbs in those.
Then there are those who have automatic lights, which are so bright they light up a huge area around, and stay on a long time, and are so sensitive that anyone walking within twenty yards of them triggers them off. We have one such which lights up the whole villge green when anyone goes near at dusk.
Grrrr!!!
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Anonymous
Guest
It's a question of mentality. I don't want to sound (or be) defeatist but it is very difficult to get through to some people.
I'll give you an example. During the extreme draught a few years ago when the chairman of yorkshire water was trying to get us all to bath in a washing up bowl, two at a time, I did a survey on a house. The owner had a hose pipe running into a crack in the garden. You know, the type of crack that opens up in clay gardens during dry weather. The owner told me that he had been running the hose into the crack for three or four weeks and the crack was still there. 'God knows where all the water has gone to' he said.
I asked him if he had heard of the hose pipe ban but he just shrugged and put the hose back down the crack.
I'm afraid there is nothing you can do with these people!
I'll give you an example. During the extreme draught a few years ago when the chairman of yorkshire water was trying to get us all to bath in a washing up bowl, two at a time, I did a survey on a house. The owner had a hose pipe running into a crack in the garden. You know, the type of crack that opens up in clay gardens during dry weather. The owner told me that he had been running the hose into the crack for three or four weeks and the crack was still there. 'God knows where all the water has gone to' he said.
I asked him if he had heard of the hose pipe ban but he just shrugged and put the hose back down the crack.
I'm afraid there is nothing you can do with these people!
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Anonymous
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We have the same problem in our village. Fortunately, there are no streetlights so you can see the stars at night but there are increasing numbers of floodlights attached to houses which light up the whole area. If a cat walks across a lawn at night the place lights up as if a prisoner has escaped!
And very soon now we can look forward to seeing lawns and the houses festooned with those ever-so-tasteful illuminated Christmas decorations and lights. When driving through villages between November to January you could easily mistake them for part of Blackpool seafront!
And very soon now we can look forward to seeing lawns and the houses festooned with those ever-so-tasteful illuminated Christmas decorations and lights. When driving through villages between November to January you could easily mistake them for part of Blackpool seafront!
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Anonymous
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There are remot(ish) houses round here which stand in splendid isolation in otherwise total darkness, lit up by these wretched Christmas lights. You see them for miles when on country roads at night. Anyone who complains is made to feel that they are killjoys. I agree - tacky and a waste of electricity. Grrrr!
And as for the water in that crack - it beggars belief how stupid some people are.
And as for the water in that crack - it beggars belief how stupid some people are.
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Anonymous
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I agree, the hose man was a pillock of course... but what can one do?
Johneds your post also illustrates _both_ sides of the problem, probably not intentionally.
The flip side of the coin is that we have not had a water shortage in Britain at least any time in the last half century: before that I wouldnt know. The reports of water shortages are simple fairytales made up to encourage people to use less water, which in turns keeps costs down.
The truth is Britain is so abundant in water that there is no need to even meter it. we have high annual rainfall, and dont lack the infrastructure to deliver all the clean water we need, and far more besides. We have such an excess of water that pillocks up and down the country can pour 100s of gallons a day of purified drinking water onto their gardens, and still we have enough.
NT
Johneds your post also illustrates _both_ sides of the problem, probably not intentionally.
The flip side of the coin is that we have not had a water shortage in Britain at least any time in the last half century: before that I wouldnt know. The reports of water shortages are simple fairytales made up to encourage people to use less water, which in turns keeps costs down.
The truth is Britain is so abundant in water that there is no need to even meter it. we have high annual rainfall, and dont lack the infrastructure to deliver all the clean water we need, and far more besides. We have such an excess of water that pillocks up and down the country can pour 100s of gallons a day of purified drinking water onto their gardens, and still we have enough.
NT
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Anonymous
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Nail on head about heating unused rooms there Evelyn. My proposal for future heating systems is (very very briefly) that they monitor human movement and thus calculate occupancy, learn the occupancy patterns, and only heat rooms when theyre about to be used. Theres a fair bit more detail to it, as rather more needs to be done to make it work effectively, but this system could save a substantial percentage of energy.
NT
NT
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Anonymous
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This 'evidence' looks to me like a classic statistical error. Lemme explain...
If you took for example just 3 years, you could pick any 3 years you liked, and falsely demonstrate how the climate was changing over that period. You could show it getting hotter, colder, whatever you wanted.
Now if you took for example 20 years, again you could pick any 20 years you liked, and falsely demonstrate how the climate was changing over that period.
And the principle is exactly the same with a couple of hundred. If instead you took the last 5000 yrs, you might (or might not) see these centurial ripples distributed randomly through those milennia.
We already know the climate wobbles about like this. We also know that random, semirandom and pseudorandom number sequences will contain low frequency components as well as high frequency.
Your data might indeed be explained by climate change, or might not, but it is not in any genuine way evidence of it.
NT
If you took for example just 3 years, you could pick any 3 years you liked, and falsely demonstrate how the climate was changing over that period. You could show it getting hotter, colder, whatever you wanted.
Now if you took for example 20 years, again you could pick any 20 years you liked, and falsely demonstrate how the climate was changing over that period.
And the principle is exactly the same with a couple of hundred. If instead you took the last 5000 yrs, you might (or might not) see these centurial ripples distributed randomly through those milennia.
We already know the climate wobbles about like this. We also know that random, semirandom and pseudorandom number sequences will contain low frequency components as well as high frequency.
Your data might indeed be explained by climate change, or might not, but it is not in any genuine way evidence of it.
NT
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Anonymous
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Let me put another side to this as well, for interest's sake.
Like all machines, turbines have limited life, and will be replaced with newer ones in time. As the tech improves, the turbines used will get noticeably better each decade. Where exactly is the point at which we should proliferate them?
If that point of good enough technology were for example reached in 40 years, and turbine life were eg 40 years, would it really be wrong to put today's turbines in now? Given that they generate lots of energy during their life, make the owners money, and help encourage the widespread use of these mills, thus getting rid of the barriers to future proliferation.
I too have less than 100% enthusiasm about them, purely on the basis that their real world generating cost is on the high side, but if people want to pay for them, surely thats better than them spending on the endless pile of consumer#####they would otherwise spend it on.
If you want to curb unnecessary spending, as I think would be a wonderful move if it were practical, its not mills I'd tax but the assorted useless#####that fills so many of our shops. I'd support a sizeable novelty goods tax.
NT
Like all machines, turbines have limited life, and will be replaced with newer ones in time. As the tech improves, the turbines used will get noticeably better each decade. Where exactly is the point at which we should proliferate them?
If that point of good enough technology were for example reached in 40 years, and turbine life were eg 40 years, would it really be wrong to put today's turbines in now? Given that they generate lots of energy during their life, make the owners money, and help encourage the widespread use of these mills, thus getting rid of the barriers to future proliferation.
I too have less than 100% enthusiasm about them, purely on the basis that their real world generating cost is on the high side, but if people want to pay for them, surely thats better than them spending on the endless pile of consumer#####they would otherwise spend it on.
If you want to curb unnecessary spending, as I think would be a wonderful move if it were practical, its not mills I'd tax but the assorted useless#####that fills so many of our shops. I'd support a sizeable novelty goods tax.
NT
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Anonymous
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Whats needed to develop those 800kWers is not just to trial a few 600kW ones, but to sell them in quantity to raise the money to make it worth investing in 800kW machines. This is another reason why we need proliferation now imho.
NT
NT
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Anonymous
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Its always struck me that what they look like is so trivial as to be irrelevant, given the real issues. As Evelyn says, maybe not in beauty spots, but for the most part we need em and thats that.
Damn site less ugly than a huge concrete coal fired stack belching out smog.
NT
Damn site less ugly than a huge concrete coal fired stack belching out smog.
NT
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Anonymous
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I have some knowledge here, to find a forum with much more detail I'd google for steve spence (IIRC) or vegevan.
Biodiesel is processed WVO (waste vegetable oil). Theres no sense processing it if you can use the oil as is, and for heating I'm pretty sure can be used directly. There are a few extra issues with it:
- it thickens or congeals in cold temps, so you need to warm the tank and delivery pipe, and have a prewarm system available. This is all quite eaasy to do, but must not be omitted
- it attacks more materials than diesel or heating oil, so you need to ensure your system doesnt use incompatible seals, pipes, etc.
- it needs to be filtered for solids, which isnt hard.
- restaurants dont normally get rid of veg oil on the scale of a ton at a time. Some might do, but in those quantities theyre bound to have a disposal contract already.
PS if you need to neutralise the acids in the WVO for your system, lime is the logical choice. Yes, another use...
NT
Biodiesel is processed WVO (waste vegetable oil). Theres no sense processing it if you can use the oil as is, and for heating I'm pretty sure can be used directly. There are a few extra issues with it:
- it thickens or congeals in cold temps, so you need to warm the tank and delivery pipe, and have a prewarm system available. This is all quite eaasy to do, but must not be omitted
- it attacks more materials than diesel or heating oil, so you need to ensure your system doesnt use incompatible seals, pipes, etc.
- it needs to be filtered for solids, which isnt hard.
- restaurants dont normally get rid of veg oil on the scale of a ton at a time. Some might do, but in those quantities theyre bound to have a disposal contract already.
PS if you need to neutralise the acids in the WVO for your system, lime is the logical choice. Yes, another use...
NT
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Anonymous
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Sadly, in Northumbria and Cumbria too many are going to be in beauty spots... it's windy, and farmers are keen for the cash.
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Anonymous
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Thanks for that! Not sure that it's going to be a practical proposition for the time being.
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Anonymous
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The sea is the best place for wind turbines. I think the aesthetic appeal of the coast off Great Yarmouth has been improved by the turbines at Scroby Sands (see linked photo).
Mind you, this was a very bland and boring piece of coastline to start with.
You wouldn't want them in a bay in Cornwall.
Wind Farm at Scroby Sands (BBC site)
Mind you, this was a very bland and boring piece of coastline to start with.
You wouldn't want them in a bay in Cornwall.
Wind Farm at Scroby Sands (BBC site)
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Anonymous
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Thats my hope, that they migrate to the sea in future. There they wont affect any land values, will cause much less visual impact, and can make use of a truly vast area of higher windspeeds.
NT
NT
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Anonymous
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... not unless youre very very keen on chips <IMG SRC="http://www.periodproperty.co.uk/discussing/smileys/smile.gif" BORDER=0 ALT="
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NT
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Anonymous
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Yes NT. I pinched that graph from out of a different context. Actually the original author was not using it to talk about macro scale climate change. He was using it to show how the data used by Ofgem to calculate the 'average' winter has changed. The average winter in the eyes of Ofgem is now warmer. They use this ‘average’ when they say there is enough generating capacity. In fact the author was suggesting that there might not be an underlying macro scale climate change and the graph indicated the problems with moving the goal posts. Hence, if we have a cold winter, one that is only a little colder than a longer term average than Ofgem uses, we could face a serious shortage of generating capacity. Major powercuts. (And damage to that new lime pointing.)
For the earlier context see:
Powerswitch Forum
For the earlier context see:
Powerswitch Forum
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Anonymous
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Well, that's basically what we try to do - although we also don't let rooms get freezing either. Our house rambles a lot, and some rooms are unused either because they aren't 'done' yet or truthfully the house is too big for two people (and associated junk of course) most of the time, although smashing when guests come. We encourage the latter as we think we are so lucky to live where we do, and want to share it with others, as long as they can put up with the lack of decoration and many mod cons. So it ain't all selfishness I add!
The simple measure of fitting thermostatic valves on radiators is one which I'd encourage others to carry out. Our heating system is not sophisticated (solid fuel) Obviously in warm weather we use the timer to only have it on in the evenings, but in cold weather we keep it on but turn down the valves in dining room, bedroom etc. The radiators keep the chill off, the rooms can be heated quite quickly by turning them up again if required. Bedrooms hardly need it. This is supplemented by wood and occasional solid fuel burning in a cast iron stove, and an open fire which is used for posh occasions in the dining room.
The useful thing about our heating is the fact that the chimney flue runs through the centre of the house, and warms the walls in two rooms.
I do wonder, when I go to the homes of friends with gas heating which goes off totally for hours at a time and then has to heat rooms from very, very cold, which is the better way.
I can't understand, either, the desire to heat homes all the time to the point you cn walk around in a T-shirt.
Bring back woolly vests and a rug over the knees in the evenings, I say! Save the planet and your heating bills as well!
The simple measure of fitting thermostatic valves on radiators is one which I'd encourage others to carry out. Our heating system is not sophisticated (solid fuel) Obviously in warm weather we use the timer to only have it on in the evenings, but in cold weather we keep it on but turn down the valves in dining room, bedroom etc. The radiators keep the chill off, the rooms can be heated quite quickly by turning them up again if required. Bedrooms hardly need it. This is supplemented by wood and occasional solid fuel burning in a cast iron stove, and an open fire which is used for posh occasions in the dining room.
The useful thing about our heating is the fact that the chimney flue runs through the centre of the house, and warms the walls in two rooms.
I do wonder, when I go to the homes of friends with gas heating which goes off totally for hours at a time and then has to heat rooms from very, very cold, which is the better way.
I can't understand, either, the desire to heat homes all the time to the point you cn walk around in a T-shirt.
Bring back woolly vests and a rug over the knees in the evenings, I say! Save the planet and your heating bills as well!
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Anonymous
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Interesting what you say about TRVs. I've never had much joy with them, but I guess I've been trying to institute smaller temp variations than you have (as all rooms here are used). Those valves are affected substantially by the temp of the rad itself as muich as the room air, so are really only accurate enough for large temp changes.
The best thing one can do with TRVs imho is to fit a proper programmable room stat, glue a 2w resistor to the TRV, use a wall wart for the supply to the resistor, and put this supply thru the switch contacts on the stat. Now the stat controls the TRV: when the contacts close, the resistor is powered, and the TRV shuts off.
This way its poss to get much finer control, and equally importantly, timer function with multiple set temps. This is ideal for bedrooms, which can be off muc of the time, just warmed once in the am and once at night.
NT
The best thing one can do with TRVs imho is to fit a proper programmable room stat, glue a 2w resistor to the TRV, use a wall wart for the supply to the resistor, and put this supply thru the switch contacts on the stat. Now the stat controls the TRV: when the contacts close, the resistor is powered, and the TRV shuts off.
This way its poss to get much finer control, and equally importantly, timer function with multiple set temps. This is ideal for bedrooms, which can be off muc of the time, just warmed once in the am and once at night.
NT