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Post by caveman on Dec 31, 2011 8:00:07 GMT -5
I have the RMH book by Ianto Evans and will take a look. I think that frictional losses in smaller pipes make scaling down troublesome. I have made a sort of pocket rocket to burn waste oil and it worked. It has a 4" flue.
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Post by Cye on Dec 31, 2011 9:31:37 GMT -5
this one's got a 4" diameter riser which i guess makes the system diameter 4"? unusual is that it follows the design of the rocket mass heater but has no mass. www.youtube.com/watch?v=ER3TsTLDZsk
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Post by caveman on Dec 31, 2011 13:12:05 GMT -5
If the heat exhanger on that one is efficient I wonder how there is enought heat left in the exhaust to get it up the chimney. I would be much happier with that one if it exhausted horizontaly, It might 'rocket' a bit more too.
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Post by campbeji on Jan 4, 2012 12:30:56 GMT -5
I'd agree that a small commitment would be great for a starting point, and may be as far as many people would want to go and that would be great too. There are a couple of challenges that would need addressed though; - If we wanted to buy, say a 10 acre site at about £40,000, we would need 100 people to cough up £400.00 each, but how long till we get that many interested?
- If you had a 1/10th acre plot and then decided to buy anothers plot you could end up with little bits spread all over the place, that might be a real pain (but maybe not)
- If we were setting it up so that the individual people actualy owned their own plot, with the land title etc, there may be expensive legal fees to do this. It may be easier and cheaper to set up as an organisation of some sort that actually owned the land and the people then owned a share of the organisation that entitled them to benefit and use a specific plot or plots of land, ie a not for profit company with 100 shares with a nominal cost of £400 each and £10 eact per year (for ongoing costs)
Obviously everyone will have their own ideas about how this should be run, and thats OK but we will obviously need to settle on a final set up before we got lots of people interested or we would end up with 100 different ideas of how to run it. Whatever way we go with it you can put me down for a plot, maybe more if I can scrape the money together Jim
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Post by cye on Jan 4, 2012 17:32:37 GMT -5
jim i take all your points thoughts as follows:
i had in mind that a range of plot sizes would be available, so we wouldn't end up with it all in small plots - maybe this would reduce the severity of the problem you describe
regarding ownership, the collective would actual buy the land and register the title, then issue trust deeds to the individual owners, meaning that the collective only has official title to one's plot with the legal owner being the trust deed holder. AFAIK this should work and avoid lots of individual conveyancing melarkey.
BTW, there's unconfirmed talk of tree allotments in Carrick council area, with support from council, more info available in a few weeks.
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Post by campbeji on Jan 4, 2012 20:43:11 GMT -5
I take your point about some people having larger plots, I was using the 100 people scenario as a worst case situation. I still think that gathering enough people together to actually buy some land will be a challenge, unless we can get some help from an external source, wheter thats the current land owner, a loan of some sort, or government/lottery/grant funding of some sort. The external funding (if available) will probably depend on the set up of the collective. Carrick council, helping with a scheme like this? ? I'll believe that when I see it They don't have a great reputation for setting up and running anything, take the Knight Ride as an example. Jim
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Post by campbeji on Jan 4, 2012 21:04:24 GMT -5
I was maybe a litle unfair to Carrick council in my last post, they do support the Eden allotments project which by all accounts is a great success. I believe it is one of, if not the, biggest allotments in N. Ireland.
I wonder if this is where the 'tree allotments' are, I remember seeing a tree planting event at Eden allotments in conjunction with Conservation Volunteers and sponsored by Carrick Council. Although this event was part of tree week and not them setting up 'tree allotments' in the form we are discussing.
Of course it may be something totally different. Jim
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Post by campbeji on Jan 5, 2012 11:18:56 GMT -5
Just a quick update on the land on the Longshot in Doagh, it has already been sold, for just under £60.000
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Post by campbeji on Jan 5, 2012 12:27:25 GMT -5
I had a quick chat today with a chap called Michael Oliver from the Countryside Management Scheme at the Forestry Service, basically asking about help and support that may be available for a scheme such as ours. The purpose of the forestry service is to create and manage tall, long standing woodland and forest, so basically not a lot they can do for us. He did, however, have some info that will be worth following up, - Grants may be available from DARD NI
- Woodland trust
- Killynether wood Scrabo - They have a current coppice scheme being run, he thinks by the DOE
- A Focus Farm - This is a farm that is set up to share technology and ideas - John Martin in Greyabbey has one of these but he didn't have contact details
- Agri Food Research facility - Renewable energy section at AFBI in Hillsborough, we can set up a visit here apparently, check out the video at www.afbini.gov.uk/index/about-us/about-us-we-do-what/afbi-promo-video-renewable-energy.htm
OK thats it for now, I'm being called for dinner, Spagetti Bolognese yum yum Jim
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Post by campbeji on Jan 5, 2012 18:59:07 GMT -5
I found this link to the Focus farms website page for John Martin www.focusfarms.co.uk/farmers/JohnMartin.htm, not that there is a lot on there but it may be worth giving him a call to set up a visit if a few people are interested and ofcourse assuming he is up for it. Jim
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Post by cye on Jan 8, 2012 12:51:17 GMT -5
Jim
Thanks fo this. The link isn't working for me though,
John Martin is well know here as he has been growing short rotation coppice willow for a few yrs now and had been encouraging others to do so as well. he is also involved in the supply of willow woodchip biomass fuel to the community biomass heating system in the (semi) eco village in lisburn (Woodbrook, built by Savilles who are now in administration like many other property developers). I have a good friend who lives at Woodbrook and i think he knows John.
there's another john, john gilliland up in the north west who is also into mass production of biomass using willow.
i was talking to a guy yesterday who attended our transition derry/inishowen meeting on community woodland, who grows willow for baskets, but has also some limited experience with the hybrid willow used for biomass. i'll maybe see if he can share his experience with us.
keep up the good work!
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Post by campbeji on Jan 8, 2012 18:51:48 GMT -5
The stupid thing added a comma to the address, it should be www.focusfarms.co.uk/farmers/JohnMartin.htmI guess he has been encouraging others because he believes in it as an alternative and with so many farmers being paid not to plant crops (I still can't get my head round that) and with the land still being available for biomass it's probably a good idea for most farmers. What do you think about organising a visit out to him to have a look-see. Jim
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Post by cye on Jan 9, 2012 13:50:35 GMT -5
worth talking to him certainly, tell him what we're thinking, i.e., potential collective purchase of some land, keen to learn about short rotation willow coppicing, see whether he can give us general pointers, on growing and potentially buying?
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