Back to the 100 Things list...(possibly a boring read about myself and where I am at, but it is good for me to have a re-read of the list and help solidify it in my mind).
39. Buy sturdy, high quality, well made boots, and make sure you have several extra pairs. The same is true for work gloves. Well Simon's current employer supplies new steelcap leather boots each year (totally unnecessarily!) and until now he has just accepted them, however has been keeping the old (perfectly fine) boots. So he has about 3 pairs of boots for this purpose. I have one pair of hiking boots and a pair of sneakers I don't actually wear for day-to-day stuff, but will be great shoes for more heavy duty stuff.
41. Many people with indoor jobs don't have an appropriate wardrobe for a life largely spent outdoors - their winter clothes aren't warm enough for extended periods of outside work, their summer clothes are made of artificial fibers and don't breathe well, they don't have appropriate shoes, hats, etc... Now is the time to assess your wardrobe and overcome its deficiencies by checking out thrift shops, ebay and yard sales. Our wardrobe selections are pretty much all about practicality these days. We both have all weather gear in mostly natural fibres.
48. Consider growing cotton or flax in your garden, and spinning, weaving, knitting or crocheting with it. Even if you cannot grow very much, we will need people with some experience with small scale clothing production. Well, we do have a few flax bushes in our garden - and my mum knows how to prepare and use it. In fact, myself and some girlfriends are already keen to learn a few things from her one weekend!
62. Children, the elderly and ill or disabled family members are more likely to experience "appetite fatigue" and stop eating if their diet suddenly changes because of a crisis. Start eating the foods in your storage in the ways you are likely to enjoy them right now. Allow your bodies time to adapt to whole grains, more fresh vegetables, beans, a vegetarian or mostly vegetarian diet, fewer fats, less salt and sugar, etc.. Dietary changes are stressful - so make them gradually. Even short periods of malnutrition can do real harm. This is a really good point and not something I would have thought of, but it makes so much sense. I had a similar discussion last weekend with my stepdad about "slow food" and how we have been moving towards a whole foods diet free of processed food for probably 18mths (since Nathan was diagnosed with Coeliac's). I remember what it was like to suddenly find ourselves on a new diet that needed to be implemented just like that (and that meant moving away from most processed foods which contain gluten in some shape or form). It was quite traumatic for about a week (and was in hindsight one of the best things that happened to us). However, I think now, it would be quite easy to find ourselves without the remaining things that we do buy processed.
66. Learn basic first aid, herbalism, and any other useful medical information you can come by. Have the tools to assess conditions, deal with basic medical crises, and endure an epidemic or crisis in your home if hospitals are turning people away. This is something I have been mindful of. I have never been really interested in herbalism, but have just purchased a 2nd hand book on locally found herbs and their medicinal uses. I also have a friend who prepares and uses herbs who I will be learning more from.
71. Consider homeschooling if you can. Not only is it a good energy saver, it can spare your kids some ofthe heavier pressures to consume. It is also a lot of fun for both parents and kids. Haha, even more positives for homeschooling!
75. Create household routines that can be adapted even if things change - bedtime routines, the morning cuppa, whatever it is, these provide reassurance and stability for adults and children. Even if the bedtime routine is done by flashlight and the cuppa is hot water poured over mint from your garden, stable routines say "some things have changed, but the essentials remain the same." I like this! Particularly for me with the cuppa - I could imagine myself getting the same (well similar, who am I kidding!) enjoyment out of a mint tea in the morning, just coz that's what I've always done.
76. If you have young children, buy books for older kids at yard and library sales. Stock up on educational books as well so that if the schools close, you can continue their education. Remember, children who are raised in hard times may not be as excited as you are about reading books on gardening and building - these things may be natural to them. So have books on as wide a range of subjects as possible - mathematics, art, history, politics. And have some escapist material for both children and adults - mysteries, science fiction, comic books, romance novels - everyone needs to be taken away now and again. Well for a family who loves books, this is not an issue. I have been hand-me-downed masses of non-fiction type books from my grandmother along with some classic novels that even I wouldn't mind reading one day.
82. Consolidate trips whenever possible - do your grocery shopping, your library run, your errands ahead. This involves planning ahead what you will eat, where you will go, so keep records and record expected activities - if your mother's birthday is next month, make sure you think about the ingredients for her cake and her present while on your monthly shopping trip. I have been more mindful of doing this with using our car less, however, I need to look ahead and plan a little more for further out things opposed to a week by week plan.
86. If you live within 2-5 miles of shopping, invest in one of those little carts that you drag behind you. There is no reason able bodied people can't shop on foot at those distances. Now I know exactly why we used to see grandma's everywhere dragging their little bag-on-wheels - wonder if the local op shop has an old stash...
93. Think in terms of turning off, doing without, reusing, making less, rather than keeping your life essentially the way it was with only minor refinements of consumption. It is often better to get rid of the appliance entirely than spend a lot of money finding the most energy efficient option. So true!
94. If others don't seem to be responding to your message or sharing your concerns, remember that the evidence was there before you saw things too, and that everyone is ready to hear things at a different time. Don't stop trying, but be gentle and respect the time people need to adapt. I'm on a gentle mission of helping others see where things are heading...
96. For every new project you take on, consider letting something else go - if you are going to begin canning your vegetables, consider giving up vacuuming every day, and put it off. If you are getting involved in community affairs, cut down on the number of long phone calls with people you don't like. Try and cut out something you hate but do because you feel you have to, and replace it with something you enjoy, that also helps you prepare. And doesn't life become richer because of it??
97. Try and look cool. Of course it feels weird to say, "nope, I'm going to walk 3 miles to work" or "nope, sorry, we're not buying anything new this year." Do it with class and elan - pretend you are having fun, and leading the pack, even if you feel weird. The weirdness will go away on its own. Oh yeah!! Still feeling weird lol.
99. Think of peak oil and the other challenges that face us as an optimization exercise - how do I get the most fun, the best life, the most happiness, the most love, with the fewest inputs - the least money, the least energy, the least waste. Get excited about making it work. This is where I am at!
May 31, 2007
Can we do some juicing mum?
Nathan *loves* when we decide to juice some fruit and vegetables (and Danielle's quickly catching onto the fun with her "juice, juice!"). Often we will do it if there is a lot of left overs at the end of the week before our new delivery box arrives. But today, it was delivery day and it seemed a nice way to fill an hour (taking into account preparing the fruit/veg, juicing, drinking, cleaning the juicer and taking away the leftovers).
The other time I will often do juicing is when the kids are sick and I want to keep their bodies from using energy to break down high protein foods unnecessarily and instead skip regular food and go for fresh fruit and veg - and for us, the easiest and tastiest (not to mention an enjoyable activity) way to get those is through juicing.
I wish I hadn't left my camera in the car, I saw one of those memorable moments when they were both drinking their beetroot juice and had a bright red ring around their mouths.
These were the two combinations we made today using what we had available:
Beetroot Blast
1 small carrot
2 small apples
1 small beetroot
200ml water
Pear Pleasure
2 oranges
1 apple
1 pear
1 teaspoon honey
May 29, 2007
My Secret Garden
The majority of people who come to my house probably don't even realise that our property is 1/3 bigger again to what they see unless I mention it. Up until now, there has been a dense row of tall trees midway down the section right across (bar a very overgrown archway to the right side).
Since the area below is where we will be making our permaculture garden, we needed to let the sunlight in! So over the weekend it was a bit of a mammoth task to chop down the 3 centre trees and what a difference it has made - not only can we now see the rest of the garden from our lounge, but have actually gained a good 4 metres of land this side of the retaining wall where the trees were planted (and great for Nathan, he even now has a tree with a few branchs to climb).
There is still a lot of shading to the area over winter on the north and west sides because of the sun angle, so we will need to work around that.
But yay! Now we are planning the chook dome from The Permaculture Home Garden by Linda Woodrow.
May 25, 2007
Making a start...
I spent some time today pondering over the 100 Things list...and these the things that we are already achieving out of the first 50.
1. If you live in a place where it gets hot in the summer, consider building a screen room (a room with screened windows all around or almost always around), either attached to your house or seperate. You can put a wood cookstove in the screenroom and use it as a summer kitchen for cooking and canning, avoiding adding heat to your house. You can also sleep in the screenroom when it is too hot to sleep inside, and reducing or eliminating the need for air conditioning. The room can double in the winter as a woodshed. If you cannot build on, freestanding screenrooms are also a possibility. For sleeping even a mesh camping pavilion or tent under the trees will be better than many houses. Well this isn't relevant for us, where we live in this country doesn't get *that* hot, nor *that* cold all year round. We currently have no air-con or central heating anyway. I do like the idea of maybe enclosing a portion of our front porch though for weather protection for storing things that may need to easily accessable instead of having to traipse to the garage. Not high priority though and easy enough to do from recycled marials under our house if the need arises.
2. For those in cold climates, consider a four poster bed. These were once not merely decorative - with heavy coverings for the top and the sides, they could be heated with your body heat, and provided a cozy sleeping space in an era when bedrooms were unheated. A frame can be added to many existing bedframes if you are at all handy, and curtains are easily made. You can also add wall hangings and tapestries as cheap forms of insulation to existing walls. They can be made from old blankets and cheap fabric, or can be as artful as you like.
and
44. We dress our kids for winter nights in unheated bedrooms in several layers - long johns under blanket sleepers. Sweatshirts and sweatpants can be added over those. So even small children who don't reliably keep covers on can be warm at night with minimal or no heat. A nightcap really will keep you considerably warmer.
Well I never knew this was the purpose of four poster beds - of course makes sense! Our bedrooms are small and not a high ceiling anyway. We don't heat our house overnight during winter anyway.
3. Clean and organize your house, and get rid of anything you don't need. Time is at a premium, and will only be more so in the future. For things that you wish to keep for the long term, pack them up and keep lists of where they are. You may need to find things quickly. Make sure emergency supplies, such as medical items, flashlights, etc... are readily available and can be found in the dark and under stress. I'm already the declutter queen, so we're all set there. Of course, now I am not wanting to part with *too* much stuff incase it might be needed as a replacement item that will not be easily accessable later on.
5. Expect if times get hard to consolidate housing with friends and family. Make sure you can live fairly comfortably. Yard and rummage sales are excellent sources of extra blankets, towels, and pillows. Fold up futons, tatami mats, even rolled up carpets make excellent emergency guest beds, and can be stacked and stored pretty easily. It may get crowded, but it doesn't have to be miserable. So true about comfort. We already have a bit of spare bedding and places to sleep (a futon sofa converts to a bed and our couch cushions are removeable and very comfortable. We could also double the kids into our bed if needed as well.
7. Make sure you have a reliable source of non-electric water, whether rainbarrels, a cistern, hand pumps on your well, or a community source, such as a public pump. If you cannot easily create a private such source, consider advocating with your community that public water sites, with either manual pumps or solar powered ones be created at local public centers, such as schools, parks and community centers. Use the examples of extreme weather to emphasize the need to ensure a reliable local water system in a crisis. As previously mentioned, we have a large water tank under our deck that has a feed from rainwater off the roof. It doesn't have a pump, so would need to be collected via a tap outside. We will need to get some water steralisers though despite the council man telling me it was drinkable as is even without boiling??
9. If you decorate for holidays and special occasions, invest in permanent, sustainable sources, or consider making them. Wreath making, for example, is comparatively simple and many of us have access to local evergreens. Decorate your sukkah or for a birthday party with hand knit or sewn "streamers" made in the shape of intertwined tubes or in roughly the style of tibetan prayer flags. Festivals and rituals are important - maintaining them sustainably is equally important. We already own permanent decorations.
12. If you plan to buy a house or land, remember, that an acre is a lot of land. It is easy to get all worried about peak oil and imagine you need 20 acres, but one acre, or half an acre or even a quarter can do an awful lot. As already mentioned, we have a 1/4 acre of which about portion has immediate plans for planting out and putting chooks on (and in reality we could use *a lot* more if required).
13. Take an introduction to permaculture class, or read up on permaculture. Toby Hemenway's book _Gaia's Garden:An Introduction to Home-Scale Permaculture_ is an excellent start. Begin replacing ornamental plants with edibles that are also beautiful. I have read several books, one of which I own: The Permaculture Home Garden by Linda Woodrow.
14. If you are concerned with having to grow much of your food and don't have a lot of space, prioritize root crops, especially potatoes and sweet potatoes (sweet potatoes can be grown in much of the northern half of America), rather than small grains, and beans, instead of meats. The people at Ecology Action, who have done more than almost anyone to figure out how to grow the most food in the least space recommend that 60% of your land be in cover crops, 30% in root crops and 10% in everything else. This is interesting, we do eat a lot of root vegetables, so makes sense here. Especially since I imagine rice, other grains and beans will not be as readily available in the immediate term anyhow.
20. Urine is sterile, and a person's yearly output can provide a good part of the fertility for 1/2 acre. Pee in a bucket, jar or commode, and fertilize your garden with liquid gold, diluted 1 part pee to 10 parts water. Simon was reading this list last night and was keen to contribute to this!
36. Practice doing laundry without power. There are several ways, including long soaking, using a plunger and a bucket and various devices such as hand washers and pressure washers. But make sure you are not dependent for clean clothes upon power. Hopefully 'no power' will not be an issue, however we do have a large plastic tub/container that would be a good size for washing clothes in.
37. If you are troubled by towels and jeans that don't dry as soft on the line as in the dryer you can add vinegar to the rinse to soften them, or use less detergent. Or just get used to it. We don't own a dryer anyway, so a non-issue (maybe I'm just immune to hard clothes haha).
47. Switch to cloth menstrual pads. They can be made from patterns available on the web or purchased. Orconsider a diva cup or keeper. Use rags instead of paper towels, cloth napkins, handkerchiefs instead of kleenex, cloth diapers that you wash yourself instead of disposable. Doing this already.
I also spent a bit of the day randomly working on writing up a list for our Emergency Kit/Peak Oil supplies. I'm sure it will be work in progress, but it's a *huge* step up from having nothing! Slack I know! We should already have had an emergency kit anyway and I have half-heartedly thought about it and bought random things but never committed to it fully. So over the weekend I will go out and buy it all and store it in a big wheelie bin we have.
1. If you live in a place where it gets hot in the summer, consider building a screen room (a room with screened windows all around or almost always around), either attached to your house or seperate. You can put a wood cookstove in the screenroom and use it as a summer kitchen for cooking and canning, avoiding adding heat to your house. You can also sleep in the screenroom when it is too hot to sleep inside, and reducing or eliminating the need for air conditioning. The room can double in the winter as a woodshed. If you cannot build on, freestanding screenrooms are also a possibility. For sleeping even a mesh camping pavilion or tent under the trees will be better than many houses. Well this isn't relevant for us, where we live in this country doesn't get *that* hot, nor *that* cold all year round. We currently have no air-con or central heating anyway. I do like the idea of maybe enclosing a portion of our front porch though for weather protection for storing things that may need to easily accessable instead of having to traipse to the garage. Not high priority though and easy enough to do from recycled marials under our house if the need arises.
2. For those in cold climates, consider a four poster bed. These were once not merely decorative - with heavy coverings for the top and the sides, they could be heated with your body heat, and provided a cozy sleeping space in an era when bedrooms were unheated. A frame can be added to many existing bedframes if you are at all handy, and curtains are easily made. You can also add wall hangings and tapestries as cheap forms of insulation to existing walls. They can be made from old blankets and cheap fabric, or can be as artful as you like.
and
44. We dress our kids for winter nights in unheated bedrooms in several layers - long johns under blanket sleepers. Sweatshirts and sweatpants can be added over those. So even small children who don't reliably keep covers on can be warm at night with minimal or no heat. A nightcap really will keep you considerably warmer.
Well I never knew this was the purpose of four poster beds - of course makes sense! Our bedrooms are small and not a high ceiling anyway. We don't heat our house overnight during winter anyway.
3. Clean and organize your house, and get rid of anything you don't need. Time is at a premium, and will only be more so in the future. For things that you wish to keep for the long term, pack them up and keep lists of where they are. You may need to find things quickly. Make sure emergency supplies, such as medical items, flashlights, etc... are readily available and can be found in the dark and under stress. I'm already the declutter queen, so we're all set there. Of course, now I am not wanting to part with *too* much stuff incase it might be needed as a replacement item that will not be easily accessable later on.
5. Expect if times get hard to consolidate housing with friends and family. Make sure you can live fairly comfortably. Yard and rummage sales are excellent sources of extra blankets, towels, and pillows. Fold up futons, tatami mats, even rolled up carpets make excellent emergency guest beds, and can be stacked and stored pretty easily. It may get crowded, but it doesn't have to be miserable. So true about comfort. We already have a bit of spare bedding and places to sleep (a futon sofa converts to a bed and our couch cushions are removeable and very comfortable. We could also double the kids into our bed if needed as well.
7. Make sure you have a reliable source of non-electric water, whether rainbarrels, a cistern, hand pumps on your well, or a community source, such as a public pump. If you cannot easily create a private such source, consider advocating with your community that public water sites, with either manual pumps or solar powered ones be created at local public centers, such as schools, parks and community centers. Use the examples of extreme weather to emphasize the need to ensure a reliable local water system in a crisis. As previously mentioned, we have a large water tank under our deck that has a feed from rainwater off the roof. It doesn't have a pump, so would need to be collected via a tap outside. We will need to get some water steralisers though despite the council man telling me it was drinkable as is even without boiling??
9. If you decorate for holidays and special occasions, invest in permanent, sustainable sources, or consider making them. Wreath making, for example, is comparatively simple and many of us have access to local evergreens. Decorate your sukkah or for a birthday party with hand knit or sewn "streamers" made in the shape of intertwined tubes or in roughly the style of tibetan prayer flags. Festivals and rituals are important - maintaining them sustainably is equally important. We already own permanent decorations.
12. If you plan to buy a house or land, remember, that an acre is a lot of land. It is easy to get all worried about peak oil and imagine you need 20 acres, but one acre, or half an acre or even a quarter can do an awful lot. As already mentioned, we have a 1/4 acre of which about portion has immediate plans for planting out and putting chooks on (and in reality we could use *a lot* more if required).
13. Take an introduction to permaculture class, or read up on permaculture. Toby Hemenway's book _Gaia's Garden:An Introduction to Home-Scale Permaculture_ is an excellent start. Begin replacing ornamental plants with edibles that are also beautiful. I have read several books, one of which I own: The Permaculture Home Garden by Linda Woodrow.
14. If you are concerned with having to grow much of your food and don't have a lot of space, prioritize root crops, especially potatoes and sweet potatoes (sweet potatoes can be grown in much of the northern half of America), rather than small grains, and beans, instead of meats. The people at Ecology Action, who have done more than almost anyone to figure out how to grow the most food in the least space recommend that 60% of your land be in cover crops, 30% in root crops and 10% in everything else. This is interesting, we do eat a lot of root vegetables, so makes sense here. Especially since I imagine rice, other grains and beans will not be as readily available in the immediate term anyhow.
20. Urine is sterile, and a person's yearly output can provide a good part of the fertility for 1/2 acre. Pee in a bucket, jar or commode, and fertilize your garden with liquid gold, diluted 1 part pee to 10 parts water. Simon was reading this list last night and was keen to contribute to this!
36. Practice doing laundry without power. There are several ways, including long soaking, using a plunger and a bucket and various devices such as hand washers and pressure washers. But make sure you are not dependent for clean clothes upon power. Hopefully 'no power' will not be an issue, however we do have a large plastic tub/container that would be a good size for washing clothes in.
37. If you are troubled by towels and jeans that don't dry as soft on the line as in the dryer you can add vinegar to the rinse to soften them, or use less detergent. Or just get used to it. We don't own a dryer anyway, so a non-issue (maybe I'm just immune to hard clothes haha).
47. Switch to cloth menstrual pads. They can be made from patterns available on the web or purchased. Orconsider a diva cup or keeper. Use rags instead of paper towels, cloth napkins, handkerchiefs instead of kleenex, cloth diapers that you wash yourself instead of disposable. Doing this already.
I also spent a bit of the day randomly working on writing up a list for our Emergency Kit/Peak Oil supplies. I'm sure it will be work in progress, but it's a *huge* step up from having nothing! Slack I know! We should already have had an emergency kit anyway and I have half-heartedly thought about it and bought random things but never committed to it fully. So over the weekend I will go out and buy it all and store it in a big wheelie bin we have.
May 24, 2007
100 Things you can do for Peak Oil
After coasting along for a while after having read The Long Emergency and watching End of Suburbia and feeling a bit glum with the state of what it will all possibly mean for us all, I have been on the search for positive action-plan type sites to give help inspire me into action.
I came across this site with a list of things you can do that will help your family towards living a sustainable life yet taking into account the lack of oil to get you places, lack of oil to manufacture things that you might need, lack of oil to import those things to your country etc.
I am grateful for the house and land that we own (well the bank still owns a small portion which I do feel a need to try and eliminate as soon as possible). Our property is a 1/4 acre section - I plan to put our permaculture garden into a 12m x 12m portion of it; there is a large watertank underneath our front porch from the times of no town supply; there is even a bore (this however does need a new pump and also the actual bore assessed); we have a woodburner with cooktop which we would be able to cook on and heat water.
I am going to make a committment to picking at least one item a week to focus on achieving/assessing/purchasing/making so we can get ourselves into a better place to cope with whatever may be thrown at us.
I came across this site with a list of things you can do that will help your family towards living a sustainable life yet taking into account the lack of oil to get you places, lack of oil to manufacture things that you might need, lack of oil to import those things to your country etc.
I am grateful for the house and land that we own (well the bank still owns a small portion which I do feel a need to try and eliminate as soon as possible). Our property is a 1/4 acre section - I plan to put our permaculture garden into a 12m x 12m portion of it; there is a large watertank underneath our front porch from the times of no town supply; there is even a bore (this however does need a new pump and also the actual bore assessed); we have a woodburner with cooktop which we would be able to cook on and heat water.
I am going to make a committment to picking at least one item a week to focus on achieving/assessing/purchasing/making so we can get ourselves into a better place to cope with whatever may be thrown at us.
May 20, 2007
More on energy...
For someone who worked 5yrs for this country's state owned enterprise that manages the National Grid (and in a role that was directly related to maintaining and upgrading assets, new projects and managing the budgets), I'm a bit embarassed to say that I'm fairly clueless about it all. I did my job well, I just didn't take a lot of interest outside of what I needed to do back then.
So, since we're upgrading our hot water cylinder, I thought I'd reassess our energy retailer and have been off doing comparisons and particularly looking at "green" providers.
Once having identified our local company, I was then able to plug in our latest details here, which then gave me the cheapest company to go with - and yay for us, they are the same!
Since energy is pooled, you are not actually buying back "green" units that have been produced by your company, but the aim being that you are paying your $$ to a company that you support and that cares about the future instead of supporting a company that provides "dirty" energy.
So, since we're upgrading our hot water cylinder, I thought I'd reassess our energy retailer and have been off doing comparisons and particularly looking at "green" providers.
Once having identified our local company, I was then able to plug in our latest details here, which then gave me the cheapest company to go with - and yay for us, they are the same!
Since energy is pooled, you are not actually buying back "green" units that have been produced by your company, but the aim being that you are paying your $$ to a company that you support and that cares about the future instead of supporting a company that provides "dirty" energy.
May 15, 2007
Solar vs Electric
Well GRRRRR! Not really a decision I was wanting to make just at the moment.
However, our hot water cylinder decided that after 40+yrs of service that it was time to retire itself. Boohoo!
I had been casually considering upgrading to a solar hot water system sometime in the future, but just not yet. So off researching I went. Another interesting journey lol.
There are a few reasons to consider solar:
* Free heat (after the time that the system has paid itself back)
* Is a sustainable source of energy
* Many companies participate in a government scheme where you can apply for a grant to cover a small part of the cost as well as an interest free loan.
But on further investigation and taking into consideration our situation which includes:
* We are relatively low energy users already (and hot water is only used for short showers, several kids baths a week (at the moment at least!) as well as the odd washing of dishes and face washing in the evening) - no hot water used for washing machine or dishwasher.
* Installing into an existing home comes with extra costs - we will also need some electrical work done (which will be required anyhow for an electric system). A permit will be required.
There are several system types each with their own pros and cons:
* Panels, or
* Glass tubes
After investigating systems available over the last few days we have concluded that spending the dollars required ($6-$7K by the time it will be installed) along with our current low energy use, it will take 7-8yrs for it to pay itself back - a hard decision to make and really only leaves us with the ethical issue of choosing to go with a sustainable source of energy.
So, after all of that, we will choose an electric cylinder that will be compatible at a later stage for a solar heating system.
However, our hot water cylinder decided that after 40+yrs of service that it was time to retire itself. Boohoo!
I had been casually considering upgrading to a solar hot water system sometime in the future, but just not yet. So off researching I went. Another interesting journey lol.
There are a few reasons to consider solar:
* Free heat (after the time that the system has paid itself back)
* Is a sustainable source of energy
* Many companies participate in a government scheme where you can apply for a grant to cover a small part of the cost as well as an interest free loan.
But on further investigation and taking into consideration our situation which includes:
* We are relatively low energy users already (and hot water is only used for short showers, several kids baths a week (at the moment at least!) as well as the odd washing of dishes and face washing in the evening) - no hot water used for washing machine or dishwasher.
* Installing into an existing home comes with extra costs - we will also need some electrical work done (which will be required anyhow for an electric system). A permit will be required.
There are several system types each with their own pros and cons:
* Panels, or
* Glass tubes
After investigating systems available over the last few days we have concluded that spending the dollars required ($6-$7K by the time it will be installed) along with our current low energy use, it will take 7-8yrs for it to pay itself back - a hard decision to make and really only leaves us with the ethical issue of choosing to go with a sustainable source of energy.
So, after all of that, we will choose an electric cylinder that will be compatible at a later stage for a solar heating system.
May 06, 2007
Lopping it off (Part II)
Back to the permaculture garden! I have been such a staller.
Anyhow, what has been holding up the plans is the fact that our rather large unused piece of land at the bottom of our section is completely surrounded by large trees. Which leaves pretty minimal sunlight in. So, after getting my stepfather around this morning to have a look at what we want to do - he and Simon will then be able to tackle the issue.
This pic is taken from my deck to a row of high trees in the mid-point of our section - so it is the middle tree (the dark green one to the left of the golden tree), which on closer inspection is actually 3 trees - that will be completely removed and the surrounding ones pruned back. This will let in afternoon sun from 2pm onwards. It will also reclaim about 3 metres of land this side of the trees that can be used for the kids to play in (after rearranging the dog's run downstairs). Up until now, we have not used our backyard at all for the kids which is SUCH a shame and they are really well and truely needing the space to play now as the front yard just does not suffice any longer. Since the trees are up on a retaining wall area, we may even put a slide down from there into the vege garden area.
Lopping it off (Part I)
Yesterday, while blog-lurking I opened a link from one of my favourite blogs and saw a pic of a lady with a cute hairdo. I thought, "hey, I could have mine like that". There I was having intentionally grown my hair for the past year from it's regular bob-length into long straight locks down to my armpits. So a phonecall to the hairdresser and today here I am straight after the cut.
Here I am after I've washed and tried to do it myself. Not quite so cute and flippy, but I'm still happy with it (my thanks to Nathan for taking the pic!).
Here I am after I've washed and tried to do it myself. Not quite so cute and flippy, but I'm still happy with it (my thanks to Nathan for taking the pic!).
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)