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News for Dec 2004
(1) Second HHP wind turbine starts producing green power
(2) Insulation supports school education at HHP
(3) HHP hosts village transport meeting
(1) Second HHP wind turbine starts producing green power
To meet the ‘Zero CO2’ requirements of the new community building, HHP has purchased a second wind turbine. The 5kW rated turbine was supplied by a new and locally based manufacturer, Iskra. Like our first 5kW wind turbine from Proven, the machine is on a 26m tower and is estimated to produce up to 12,000kWhrs per annum.
John Balson of Iskra relaxes after fixing turbine to mast
.JPG)
On its way up..............!
.JPG)
Iskra turbine erected on 26m tower (Sustainable Resource Centre building in background)
.JPG)
It is not possible yet to comment accurately on their relative performances as Iskra are still fine-tuning the machine to maximise its performance. However it would seem with the limited data collected to date that they are fairly comparable. We are hoping to be able to publish relative performance data on our website in the next few months. One other factor that has already been noted by many visitors is that the Iskra machine looks far more elegant and less visually obtrusive, particularly when the blades are turning which almost completely disappear at even moderate speeds.
GO
BACK TO TOP OF PAGE(2) Insulation supports school education at HHP
Vencel Resil, the UK’s leading manufacturer of Jablite expanded polystyrene (EPS) recently sponsored the Bowbridge Primary School Newark visit to Hockerton Housing Project (HHP). The pupils took part in HHP’s educational experience “Sustainability in Practice”.
HHP has an educational programme designed to educate young people (problem solvers) about sustainability – what the problems are and what the solutions might be. To obtain maximum benefit from the HHP experience, an in-school introduction to the principles of sustainability is necessary before the trip and another in-school session afterwards to consolidate the learning points.
Bowbridge Primary selected shelter, energy and water topics for their visit. Other categories are food, waste and biodiversity. HHP devised a whole day of educational activity for the school, the exercises, undertaken by the pupils during the course of the day, link-in with the national curriculum.
The Shelter topic specifically relates to Vencel Resil’s sponsorship of the school-visit. The earth-sheltered homes were built using 300mm thickness of Jablite Expanded Polystyrene giving an extremely high level of insulation. The floors, walls and roofs of the homes are enveloped in the same thickness polystyrene giving an extremely high level of insulation and preventing heat loss. The houses have no conventional space heating devices, but maintain a typical temperature range of between 19-23 °C from winter to summer.
Karen Pedersen, Marketing Manager, Vencel Resil said:
“The HHP project aims to affect change in attitude towards long-term sustainability through building relationships with local schools. We thought it necessary to sponsor the school visit as HHP’s educational programme supports the National Curriculum and is a complete educational experience for young people to learn about the problems of sustainability in practice, the benefits of high levels of insulation and to discover solutions”.
(3)
HHP hosts village transport meeting
Hockerton village residents were invited on the 4th of December 2004 to meet and have a festive get-together in the new Sustainable Resource Centre at HHP. The purpose was that several new residents had moved in to the village and this get together allowed everyone the chance to meet and introduce themselves to each other and the older residents in a friendly atmosphere. It was also an opportunity for all to air their views about the roads bordering Hockerton and running through it i.e A617, Caunton Road and Southwell Road. The Get-together was well attended with over 22 families joining in, including children ranging from young babies to strapping youngsters at University.
There was universal consensus that the road conditions were unsatisfactory in view of the very busy and fast traffic, which entered and exited the roads through and around Hockerton. This had resulted in several fatalities, accidents and a fractured village atmosphere as several elderly and very young children could not even use the roads in the light of poor footpaths. Everyone was keen to try and address this problem though it was noted that there had been unsuccessful attempts made before.
Several residents were keen on having a footpath/cycle path from Hockerton to Southwell. It was estimated that this would cost approximately £100,000 and three funding bodies could be approached, i.e the County Council, the Regional Partnership and the Cycle Loop Funding. All agreed that a flashing sign reminding drivers of the 30mph limit as they approached Hockerton on A617 (either end) was highly desirable. Other suggestions made were for wider footpaths, rumble strips, more 30mph signs, 3-2-1 signings warning of the 30mph limit and an island at the Spread Eagle for safer crossing. It was also suggested that we should investigate the possibility of community speed reduction action groups as one resident had suggested that this was a possibility.
The notion of an informal bus service or shared car service was floated as several people travel on the road to Southwell and often find that they could benefit or offer their car sharing facilities to other families and children. The question then comes is how should we be communicating our desire to offer or take a lift to each other.
Village Children offered to work together to write a newsletter to the Council. Two editions, called ‘Kids-the Future’ have already been done and been delivered locally, to the council, local school and media. So far this has resulted in an article in the Newark Advertiser, interest from the school for their award winning newsletter and a response from the County Council (unfortunately not particularly positive).
Finally, it was agreed that we had all had a great time and the meeting had been successful both in terms of numbers attending and the views aired. This also engendered a persona of community spirit, which is difficult in a village such as ours due to the extreme busyness of the roads. We agreed that this communication link that is so tenuous should be nurtured and I should try to bring out a newsletter on this event and its aftermath.
(Edited from a post meeting report produced by Geeta Lakshmi – Hockerton village resident)