The building of four new towns in England (housing being one of those aspects of policy devolved to the Welsh assembly government who are probably concocting some more crazy schemes like sprinklers in residential properties instead of schemes like this) at or near Whitehill-Bordon in Hampshire, St Austell in Cornwall, Rackheath in Norfolk and North West Bicester in Oxfordshire is a strange concept when you think about it. New towns have long been the butt of much humour - you only need to think of Milton Keynes and a whole plethora of jokes follow (What is the difference between a yoghurt and Milton Keynes? Yoghurt has culture. - admittedly not very good jokes)… populate them with the concerned eco-warrior types who will be attracted to these places and add a sprinkle of politics and I think we have the recipe for a whole new range of (not very good) jokes).

Putting aside my cynicism (believe me it’s hard) these seem like worthy and worthwhile developments - so long as true eco credentials can be established and renewability and sustainability not merely paid lip service to then these new towns may well form beacons of good eco-housing practice and catalysts for change in the wider community.

I must admit my first thought was ‘glad they’re not on my doorstep’ , but then I’ve had a bloody big gas pipeline on mine since 2007 so feel that I’ve done my bit in regard to what’s on and not on my doorstep!

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(Very) belated Happy New Year, so what has 2010 brought so far…

My formerly lost at sea oak flooring is spending January acclimatising and I plan to fit it, at least along the landing floor in February.

I’ve taken delivery and started fitting some mixed ‘brick’ shaped and mosaic travertine tiles that will be used as the kitchen sink splash backs and the back panel for the hob. I’m just hoping that my latest foray into the world of tiling can be quicker and more effective than the last one, the thought of regrouting anything again fills me with dread.

Apart from that I’ve been spending most of my time outside working on the ying/yang proposition of cutting down (or at least trimming) trees to plant new ones. It’s been nice to get outside, away from the tyranny of tiles…

I’ve also ordered several lots of seedlings, fruit plants and seeds from various suppliers all to be delivered over the course of the spring and summer. I’m hoping to be more successful in my foray into market gardening this time. Previous attempts have yielded little more than a crop or two of chillies and the occasional tomato.

…in short 2010 has brought little progress so far, I’ll put it down as an extended Christmas break and plan to power-on into the New Year from here (that’s if the distraction of the Six Nations rugby isn’t too great)…

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As I’ve mentioned earlier I have plans to start work this year on managing the small amount (I’d guess at around half and acre) of woodland that I have. As all our heating depends on either the sun (solar thermal water panels) or our stove (multi-fuel burner with boiler) the need for a dependable source of fuel is a constant one especially in the grey winter months (in fact it becomes a bit of an obsession). At this stage, management of fuel consists of four threads:

1. Buying in / bringing in fuel.
I’ve been buying in various types of fuel - mainly modern eco-log type products made of reconstituted chippings, saw dust and the like. I’ve found some of these very effective, but would rather not have to go to the trouble of sourcing them or the cost of buying them. I’ve also been lucky enough to have a source of ready felled timber from a relative that just needs cutting, bringing onto site and spliting. The need to transport the wood brings a certain overhead, but such a free resource can’t be sniffed at.

From Barn Conversion 2010

2. Planting new trees.
A two fold exercise, in planting I’ll remove established trees to open up areas of the woodland canopy. Firstly, this provides wood from the cleared trees for burning probably next year. Currently this is mostly ash and so should be burnable green (i.e. immediately) - I’ll try that out, but I’m not sure that is the most efficient use of the wood. Secondly, the replanting provides a future source of wood. Cutting down trees leads us to…

3. Coppice existing trees.
Where I’m removing existing ash trees, I leave the roots and stump in the ground and a don’t plant close by, thus hopefully leaving the opportunity for the coppiced tree to grow back and provide wood over and over again.

4. Establishing a bio-mass fuel source.
By this I mean planting a fast growing combustible resource - in my case willow. I’m currently in the process of ordering some willow trees from a local supplier so more on this shortly.

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I’ve been meaning to mention, I’ve been tiling again…

From Barn Conversion 2010

Hope that doesn’t mean I’ll be grouting again…
Joy!
If you enjoyed that post, then read these…Travertine tiling - pictures on August 13th, 2009As promised on my update for July, here are some early pictures of the downstairs tiling as it goes in. title category: ‘Barn [...]

The feed-in tariffs scheme certainly looks to be of great interest. For the unitiated, feed-in tariffs are the governments new scheme to encourage the takeup of renewable technologies through financial benefits. These financial benefits are two-fold, firstly in the form of savings made to on-going energy costs and secondly through a payment made through the [...]