Green Issues

I'm a fair bit fed up with the Christmas decorations that you have to buy - generally they seem to be tat with no real personal value and so much waste. So yet again we are making our own. First up this year is a snowman and some snow flakes. All make with left overs and bits we've got from charity shops. So anyway, the background of our snowman and his scarf was drawn by Spog No.1 and used some cardboard from an old box. Sprog No's 2 and 3 stuck a variety of cotton wall balls, bits and other stuff to make it white and we added a Spog No.2 designed Hat and Spog No.3 decorated anything she could with old coloured paper, crayon, or just about anything she could get hold of. We've added a whole load of simple snow flakes, white and what ever other colour paper, card etc that came through the door with flyers, bills etc.



Next are some Christmas Tree's, more snow flakes and just about anything else we want to do. More recycling Christmas ideas to follow

It's that time of the year when satsumas, oranges and the like are adorning our fruit bowls and there is a handy by product of eating these sweet delights - the peel.  I know it can be candied and used as an air freshener, but for me they represent great value as fire lighters.  Ok, so this only applies if your lighting a fire, but for those solid fuel stoves out there, keep all your peel and let it dry.  I put them on a south facing window sill and leave them for a couple of weeks, harder the better.  Anyway, once dry they make excellent fire lighters and with quite an intense heat they are easily enough to get kindling going.

So, my money saving tip for the winter, keep your orange peel, dry it out and use it to light a wonderfully warming winter fire. 

Had a good read this week with Patrick McCusker's Planet Dancing. It's the format that's interesting - as a series of short stories, it reads as though you are ploughing through a series of well structured blog rants that you you enjoy reading whilst waiting for the next slightly over descriptive tale or Irish American stereotype. You can tell the author is not of the blogging generation, but he has managed to capture the essence of getting the point across without using 200 odd pages to do it.

The short stories paint interesting pictures in your mind and I am sure that at least one will resonate with any reader. But you know, if I hear another reference to the first nation people's of north America I think I may be sick. In one he discusses names and by somehow linking names to nature we can return to our natural past, or at least the authors romanic view of the 'first people's of North America' natural past. Of course there is nothing wrong with myth and legend, but I am not sure we should base our hopes of future conservation on this romance.

There are also signs of some innocence by the author, for example, in another chapter the children of the world donate money to one of the worst symbols of environmental and social destruction, the United Nations.

If you think of it as a better presented collection of rants from blogs then you can count it as an interesting read with a strong ecological pictures.

Adrian Hollister Sept 2011.

I have another girl !! fourth in my line of girls. Born at 8lbs 1oz at home in West Ilsley, Berkshire.

At the moment I rarely drive, but when I do I am amazed by the cars speeding where drivers I assume are either desperately trying to make up time, or are in it for the thrills. Often it's the company car drivers that are pushing their limits without a care in the world for the consequences. Speeding and careless drivers are greedy consumers of fuel, car parts, road maintenance, and gas/noise pollution; they are also people who negatively impact communities the most. They do this by scaring people from walking, cycling, they turn communities into hermits afraid to leave their front door, and they risk the health of us all.

Regardless of the impact to speeding and inappropriate driving, there are also legal consequences - it is illegal to speed and something that can and often does lead to a criminal record. I don't know how many company car drivers there are out there, but I'm betting we have 100's of thousands of them and companies largely over look speeding as a criminal act. Generally companies would not do this for other crimes such as fraud (something we seem to have zero tolerance for).

I wonder then, if UK Companies should be compelled legally to restrict the speed of our company cars to 60/70mph and strictly discipline any speeding or inappropriate driving?

Help me in my Jedi training as I confront Volkswagen's threats to Planet Earth http://www.vwdarkside.com/en/jedi/adrian-hollister-729

Not too scientific this entry, but found a discussion at work in our sustainability forums asking " I've been looking for information about whether it really is more economical to use a slow-cooker than an electric oven or cooker."

This has been bugging me, so I've clamp metered a few different devices to get a rough idea of how much electricity was consumed in my house making similar foods (stews). Amounts were about the same and the idea is to feed my greedy family of 5 (soon to be 6!!)...

1. Slow Cooker. An average of 20W per person for the food cooked (using boiling water at the start)
2. Microwave. An average of 85W per person.
3. Slow Cooker. An average of 100W per person.
4. Electric Hob (ceramic). An average of 240W per person.
5. Oven (electric non-fan). An average of 350W per person.

2 was higher than I expected, but in the 'rest' periods between the two microwave sessions the microwave still consumed power cooling itself down and turning the turntable etc.
3-5 are hampered by longish warm up times and cooking times are the key differentiator between them - longer the cooking time the higher the consumption


Device: Microwave
Cooking Time: 30 mins (10 mins cook, 5 mins rest & stir, 5 mins cook, 5 mins rest & stir, 5 mins cook all at 70% power on a 850W microwave)
Total consumption 425W, 850W per hour , 85W per person (five people)

Device: Slow Cooker
Cooking Time: 8 hours
Total consumption 500W, 63W per hour , 100W per person (five people)

Device: Electric Hob
Cooking Time: 1 hour (mostly low power simmer, seems to be 2.2KW hob)
Total consumption 1200W, 1200W per hour , 240W per person (five people)

Device: Oven
Cooking Time: 1.5 hours (put into cold oven)
Total consumption 1750W, 1160W per hour , 350W per person (five people)


Anyone else done a similar experiment?

The Leaf dubbed ‘the world’s first affordable, full production’ family, electric car has been available to order in the UK since September, with its first customers waiting until March 2011 for delivery. Two such customers have finally got their cars, read the full article.

It's a fascinating problem isn't it. Those who live in towns are likely to reap the biggest benefit of such as car, but I suspect that many wouldn't buy one just on the off-chance that they might make a longer journey once every year. Those who live in rural areas will be too scared to have one - after all, there might not be enough charge to get somewhere (and back). Until we have an integrated transport strategy, very limited range cars will always have a problem. If people thought that they could drive to a train station and comfortably get where they need to do, they would probably do it - even in rural areas; but at the moment a good percentage of the population has never or would never travel by train/bus as they are car centric.

For cars like this to make mass market they either need to improve the range (or options for recharging) to compete with existing car stock, or we need to reinvest in our transport strategy. But heavy investments would be required to change our car centric people into trains/bus users and I'm not sure any political party has the will to attempt this in one go - especially as the state of our public transport is poor at best.

Christmas has come and gone and give or take we have been good with our recycling. We've not used anything we haven't needed to use and we have reused everything we can (amazing how present boxes can be turned into play kitchens, dens and a whole bunch of other things for the kids). This year I also separated the different types of waste when presents were opened - largely wrapping paper, cardboard and plastic bits.

The bit we failed on this year is the food. Whilst the dogs did their best to consume anything meaty, smelly or windy (why do my dogs love brussel sprouts?); we are missing the chickens. They did an excellent job of consuming all of the bread, veg, rice, pasta, and to be honest just about anything passed their way; and, of course, there is only so much you can give the wild birds without attracting hoards of mice, rats and other nasties into your garden.

So for the first time in ages we are actually putting food waste into the bin. Next on the shopping list must be some more chickens.

The cold may be endangering for some, annoying for others, great fun for kids and the rest of us; but there is a clear advantage of all this snow. Go along a row of houses and you can see which ones don't have any insulation. Seriously try looking up at the roof line and follow the levels of insulation. I am surprise quite how many are snow free - melted due to heat loss from the house. Heading from Newbury to Reading on the train was amazingly interesting. Terrace houses work especially well for this little game as there is always one in a long row of them with a snow free brown roof. So go outside and look at your roof - white usually means you have good insulation (or no heating!), partially or fully melted snow shows how much of your household heat is heading out through your roof. A few quid spend now on insulation will add significant benefits to your heating costs and will do your bit for the environment and the sustainability of our fuel sources. Check your local energy companies for insulation offers.