The mounting unpopularity of onshore wind farms has impelled a large number of MPs to write to our Prime Minister requesting that subsidies for onshore wind be cut and that subsidies be redirected to help adoption of other renewable energy technologies that are contextually appropriate. There are some promising alternative technologies. Last year I was working on text copy updates for a local plumbing and heating firm’s website, Logic headquartered in Appleby-in-Westmorland, and came to learn more about recent developments in accessibility of renewable energy for domestic and commercial applications.
Solar panels Appleby-in-Westmorland
With the Renewable Heat Incentive and Renewable Heat Premium Payment schemes and the coming Green Deal in Autumn of this year, investment in green energy doesn’t demand sacrifice of the sky-line and sleepless nights from turbine stress. This is great news for our environment and a huge number of people will be grateful for the MPs who are making a stand on our behalf.
It is well worth finding out more about what technologies are available in your area at the moment. Cumbrian firms (Logic is local to me personally) are diversifying into environmentally sound installations such as heat pumps that can be about 400% efficient in terms of electricity expended for the amount of heat energy enjoyed. These deserve much wider consideration for adoption. Apparently, heat pumps operate according to the same principle as a domestic refrigerator, moving heat to where you want it from where you don’t. The economics are compelling, for every £100 spent on electric heating you can experience about £400 worth of equivalent warmth with heat pumps in a well insulated property. Furthermore many systems can be reversed to provide cooling when required in the summer months for those sultry days.
There’s also growing interest in biomass heating as a renewable clean burning option as carbon is released from our current carbon cycle rather than carbon drawn from prehistoric atmosphere as in the case of fossil fuels.
When coupled with underfloor heating, which gives even experience of comfort at lower energy expense, and solar water heating which can provide annual savings on household hot water of up to 60% and control panels that put you in control of your comfort, there is plenty of scope for environmentally friendly development in homes and business premises around Cumbria with commensurate savings in energy and from monthly bills. The advent of faster broadband and the trend for more work being conducted from home also promises to reduce carbon emissions to help meet the government targets.
In conjunction with efficient insulation, renewable energy technologies can cut energy expenditure from fossil fuels and reduce the CO2 emissions that are acidifying our oceans, warming seas to the point that corals blanch and die, and raising storm winds that hammer coral reefs and coastal communities; warming that in concert with deforestation contributes to flooding disruption of huge areas, in 2011 notably in central Thailand and Bangkok.
Our own MP for Penrith and The Border Rory Stewart has staunchly supported Cumbrian communities’ desire to be free of wind turbine clusters in his constituency.
It’s great to see reason gathering momentum nationwide and local firms stepping up to the challenge of helping us become a more sustainable society while retaining Cumbria’s natural beauty.
Tags: appleby in westmorland, plumbing and heating, Renewable energy, renewable energy technologies
