GREYTON AREA BIRD LIST

The bird list has been updated to include the recent sightings of African Openbills.

HAPPY NEW YEAR FROM THE BLAZING SOUTH

In response to the previous blog, if only it were as simple as that! The power from this development is destined for Cape Town, not the Overberg. Greytonian has also extensively researched the subject and come to the conclusion that these industrial wind farms (as opposed to small domestic or community projects) are an enormous con. Too many people just blindly accept the so-called facts put out by environmental lobbyists, and it is a sad fact of modern society that anyone who has the temerity to question 'the environmental establishment' is branded a heretic. So much for scientific honesty and integrity. Greytonian has briefly stated his views in the Greyton Sentinel, January 2010. It can be read at: Greyton Sentinel January 2010

By the way another little advertised fact is that wind turbines consume electricity from the grid just to keep going, and as a consequence they grind to a halt during a blackout - very handy.

Has anyone calculated the carbon cost of the two recent climate change conference farces?

Greytonian is, and always has been, despite being brought up in Cumbria,  strongly in favour of clean and safe nuclear power. By the time that any residual nuclear waste might be a problem Homo so-called sapiens will have long destroyed this planet and moved on to wreck another place.

Carbon footprints – wind turbines – letter from West Cumbria 2

Happy New Year from the frozen North.

I have blogged at length on the fact that wherever I go in Cumbria I can see a wind turbine or 2 or 3 or more. I actually quite like windmills and I also am a supporter of energy from renewable sources – 1 of them being ‘the wind’. I think we need a mix of energy sources and our UK government for some reason has dubbed West Cumbria ‘Britain’s Energy Coast’ – (the cynic in me also sees this as a cloak for ‘The World’s Nuclear Waste Dump’). I also wonder why the Cumbria based Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (the NDA) doesn’t  just call itself ‘The United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority’ and have done with it.
I digress and refer the reader to previous blogs.

So: …cutting from www.overberg.co.zaBack to my point for discussion and comparison – wind turbines.

Currently Cumbria has 200 turbines and to make Cumbria energy self sufficient, using just wind, we would need some 2,000 more. 
The visual impact of 2,200 wind turbines scattered over the most beautiful county in England is……well… It just won’t happen – will it?

However if we are to keep down carbon emissions and control temperature rise to less then 2degC we need to have a mix: nuclear, tidal, hydro, wind and solar and bio-fuels of course. The mix is really dependant on what is available and, for Cumbria, that seems to be water (tide and hydro), wind, bio-fuels (and nuclear).
For the Western Cape it’s got to be solar, wind, bio-fuels and nuclear.

I’ve googled some statistics and my web-based research reveals the following:

• The Western Cape is approx 22 times bigger than Cumbria.
• The Overberg (4,340 sq miles) is 2 times the size of Cumbria.
• Cumbria has a population of 500,000 compared to 220,000 in the Overberg i.e. Cumbria although one of the most sparsely populated parts of Britain has more than 4 times the density of the Overberg
• Now here’s a beauty: Cumbria gets 23million day/night visits a year; compared to 1.1million to the Overberg (or 15million to the Western Cape).
• Based on population the Overberg could stand another 1million or so visitors – can we/you cope??

Trying to find sensible energy requirements and usage is much more difficult. Cumbria, though similarly rural, is more industrialised than the Overberg and of course … much colder. The best I can work out is as follows:

• Cumbria needs 25TerawattHours per annum
• The Overberg will need less even pro-rata so I assume backing off the industrial/developed apportionment that it should be approx. 8 Terawatt Hours per annum
• 600 wind turbines in a field near Botrivier should just about do it.
• The 100 MW plant proposed by Eskom is only about 40 Turbines….. so think about that.
• The Nuclear plant at Koeberg is an 18 times bigger producer of electricity than the 100MW wind plant but still only produces 6% of SA’s energy needs.

We all have to do something to control temperature rise:

• use less – spend less - compromise
• burn less coal – or move to clean coal
• use solar
• use the wind
• use the tides
• Use bio-fuels
• use the hydro schemes
• use safe nuclear

My next letter will be on a different subject..Water again!

The Big Fire

Hope all is well -

I've seen Fire and I've seen Rain

Remember the Brand?
I am still convinced that we should twin.
West Cumbria has had the Floods.
Wester Cape has had the Fires.

PROPOSED CALEDON WIND FARM

Is this what tourists like to see?

An extensive wind farm comprising 150 turbines each with a total height, including blades, of 120 meters has been proposed in the Overberg for an area North of the N2 highway stretching from Bot River in the West to East of the R43 road to Villiersdorp. Links to the initial EIA documents have been established and will be updated as more become available. Links to references and general articles about industrial wind are also available. The Draft Scoping Report was published on 11th December 2009, for comment by 3rd February 2010. It can be accessed through the links in the right hand column, and will also be available at the Greyton Library.

Oh won't you write me a letter frae West Cumbria: Nr 1

Some of you will know that we flit between the Western Cape and West Cumbria. I know strictly that this particular posting isn't strictly to the point of the Greytonian blog but it is about Climate Change and that's affecting us all.

The World News  (BBC and Sky anyway) for the last 2 weeks or so has been a continuous following of the floods in West Cumbria in particular my home town of Cockermouth. We live about 8kms out of Cockermouth and were saved the worst of the storms. It's a lot like, when we are back in the Western Cape we live 8kms out of Greyton and also seem to miss the worst of the storms.

Cockermouth is a lot like Greyton though bigger more analagous in size to Caledon. But the aspect - nestling in the mountains at the confluence of 2 rivers and the dependance on tourism and hospitality, arts, crafts, history, market, and dormitory for the commercial parts of West Cumbria. As I said the scale is different - there are at least 30 restaurants/pubs/hotels and on the main 2 streets getting on for 60 independant small traders - gift shops, galleries, grocers, card shops, hairdressers, artists, bookshops ... you get the picture.
Imagine then the whole centre of Greyton - the main street and 200 metres either side engulfed - a roaring torrent (60kph I'm told) of water 3.5 metres deep. The cause of the deluge - a 1 in a 1000 years storm.

Cast your mind back to the Greyton November storm of 2008 (1 in 50 years) and the 2007 November storm (also a 1 in 50 years!). The bridges and culverts and fords were washed out back then - in fact there are some still washed out. We had friends from Cockermouth staying with us in Greyton during the November 2008 floods and they now blame us for the flooding in Cockermouth.

The main area of Cockermouth now looks like a war zone clean up.

They reckon that it will be 2 years before things are back to normal. I am very pessimistic.

Imagine again, that Greyton couldn't trade for 2 years and that the inhabitants would have to live out of hotels in Caledon or Botrivier for that time. I think it would be the end of the place.

So far the community is strong - the war time spirit prevails. I'll try and keep up the news feed.