B&Q Solar

[Mary Fisher]

...

It would never have occurred to me, I think it says more about your outlook than anythng else :-)

Mary

[Mary Fisher]

Including yours?

[Peter Parry]

On the contrary, I have spent a large part of my life dealing with the consequences of religion - sweeping up the remains of those of the "wrong" religion at the time or cutting the bodies of disbelievers down from trees. The only major religion whose rabid adherents haven't tried to kill me are the Bhuddists - and I ascribe that more to lack of opportunity rather than anything else.

As long as you don't question the religion itself of course. Arguing over how many angels can dance on the head of a pin or whether the sayings of Ali ben Barber really contradict the preaching Of Wally ben Barber don't really constitute "questioning".

"Therefore . . . , invoking the most holy name of our Lord Jesus Christ and of His Most Glorious Mother Mary, We pronounce this Our final sentence: We pronounce, judge, and declare, that you, the said Galileo . . . have rendered yourself vehemently suspected by this Holy Office of heresy, that is, of having believed and held the doctrine (which is false and contrary to the Holy and Divine Scriptures) that the sun is the center of the world, and that it does not move from east to west, and that the earth does move, and is not the center of the world; also, that an opinion can be held and supported as probable, after it has been declared and finally decreed contrary to the Holy Scripture, and, consequently, that you have incurred all the censures and penalties enjoined and promulgated in the sacred canons and other general and particular constituents against delinquents of this description. From which it is Our pleasure that you be absolved, provided that with a sincere heart and unfeigned faith, in Our presence, you abjure, curse, and detest, the said error and heresies, and every other error and heresy contrary to the Catholic and Apostolic Church of Rome."

Astronomy is all very well just so long as it can be twisted to fit a

2,000 year old document.

You haven't however answered the question, which was how can "doing something" which is completely useless help this crusade? How does installing a windmill which in its whole life won't ever produce enough electricity to even cover the cost of manufacturing its packing box much less anything else help save the world?

[Peter Parry]

They came from measurements during a 12 month trial.

Mismanagement of what? Are you suggesting the government should have forced all hot water cylinders fitted in the last few decades to be fitted with "solar coils" just in case at some time in the future a small minority wanted to use solar panels?

No they are an hopelessly unrealistic payback period - and herein lies a major part of the problem. Manufacturers of these devices know perfectly well that the zealots are too few to maintain their profits and they have to move them into the mainstream. They also know that if they are honest about the small savings and real payback period very few people will buy their products. So they talk up their offerings, suggest implausible longevity and make up wholly false payback periods to suit their perception of what people want to hear. "Start making a profit after 5 years" appeals to the punter. "Probably never make a profit" doesn't, even to those of a pale green persuasion. The various greenery organisations equally well know they have to lie to get the public interested so they do so quite happily.

[AJH]

They fitted a panel at "half price" for an old gent here, three people in the house and GBP3.5k bill. Just before he died he admitted there had been no savings in gas for the 2 years with the panel. The new hot water tank had the gas boiler coil directly over the solar coil, effectively meaning that unless the gas was left off the solar panel (which seems good) was never contributing. It kept the water hot enough all summer after the gas was off and only one person in the house.

My take on all this is I still intend to fit my flat panels but costs have to be kept minimal, this means there's no scope for a differential controller costing 400quid. I don't think I can save more than 60 quid/annum on DHW and so I am waiting to "acquire" a second DHW tank as I don't think spending 300 quid on this item is justified. In winter I intend to just use the solar to feed the new tank as a pre heater to the current one and in summer I'll see about putting a second leg between the two to get some circulation. My spend so far has been GBP80 on hoses and connectors to trial the panels.

Apart from double glazing or drylining my solid walls there's not much to be done with this house. My heating bills don't worry me ( most space heating from logs and some grain) and it's only an interest in the subject of renewable energy that makes me want to tinker.

AJH

[Mary Fisher]

There are rogues in every field - even farmers :-(

Mary

[Andy Hall]

Compared with what? If you mean those dreadful CFL things, then for a lot of people they are ruled out as not meeting the basic requirements of providing an acceptable light. Obviously it goes without saying that if something isn't fit for purpose in the first place, then the cost tests are never reached.

That doesn't seem very likely and will remain the case until their are viable alternatives. At the present time, there are not from the usability perspective in the view of many people.

Great, isn't it....

[Andy Hall]

If this were the case, then these things would be sold on the basis of the feel good factor and all monetary arguments would be left out of the equation.

They are not. The major sales strategy is based on false economics and little is made of the feel good factor.

At best this is a failed business model and at worst a dishonest one. Neither are winning propositions.

Wriggle as much as you like, but that's the sad reality.

[meow2222]

diff stats can be made for under a tenner using an opamp, assuming you can solder.

NT

[meow2222]

Seems the same is true in most areas of life. Its ok to question what people question, but question peoples assumptions and youre suddenly on the sharp end of violent hatred and serious stupidity.

NT

[meow2222]

I really wish that were true. Regrettably traditional home grown veg is extortionately expensive (I dont value my time at nothing) and I cant justify it at all. I've had some fine veg before now but the labour input was quite excessive. Low input trad veg doesnt survive or doesnt yield, have tried that before.

I think the solution is permaculture, but even that I have a hard time justifying spending the time on. What little permaculture I've got round to having gives acceptable costs, but I couldnt call it cheap. I'd like to see the day there are fruiting vegging minimal maintenance plants all around here, but I dont think it'll be soon.

NT

[meow2222]

I've seen them grown indoors in pots as miniatures. They looked so good I dont think I could wait for them to be fully ripe though :) They really showed up what you see in the supermarket. =A312 purchase plus tending for 3 oranges a year seems a bit high though.

NT

[AJH]

I'm not very comfortable with electronics but yes I can rig something up if necessary. The point I was trying to make is that the system I saw contained a fairly sophisticated controller that also logged system temperatures and attempted to calculate heat supplied to the tank ( I think it assumed flow from the pump specification). All very well but the *price* of the box would have added years to the payback so any benefit or better optimising it performed was not worthwhile. A simple switch as you suggest makes more sense.

I deal with the back up boiler for a large solar heating system in Streatham, it seems to work but things go wrong, people fiddle and the engineer gets called in from Germany. I think his one visit will be more costly than the value of the heat from the system for a year!

AJH

[dennis]

Does his carbon usage to fix the system exceed what it saves? This is the problem with fitting overly complex environmental systems.. the damage maintenance does exceeds the savings.

If it even needs regular cleaning then it will create more pollution than it saves, unless your window cleaner walks rather than drives.

[Mary Fisher]

Oh for goodness' sake!

Can't you clean your own windows?

[dennis]

I can but there are many that can't.

You still haven't listed the things you do that can save emissions BTW.

I have an interest as I have a couple of 2.4x1m sheets of twin wall polycarbonate and was deciding on what sort of solar heating I should build. Or maybe re-roof the shed?

[Mary Fisher]

You were making an assumption then.

Would you take any notice of anything I said?

[AJH]

I don't know but how does a plane trip from Germany and back compare with 70% of the heat demand for 12 flats with extremely good building insulation?

In fact I don't think he has ever needed to actually fix any hardware but just to reset parameters when someone else has fiddled with them, there were too many systems fitted by separate bodies, fettling them so that changes to one don't affect another needs good integration. A case in point was that he was used to a natural gas backup, probably the most sensible solution in London as the biomass system takes up a fair amount of accommodation. So he programmed his hot water store to signal the woodboiler to switch off when either solar power was online or the buffer was up to temperature. This then stopped the circulation pump in the main hot water header into which the boiler discharged and took its return. As the wood burning in the boiler was a significant mass, say 0.5kg, the heat still being generated was enough to overheat the water in the header and trip the sensors in the boiler. First I heard was that the boiler had packed up but all it needed was to reset the boiler and have the software changed to run the external pumps for

15 minutes after a stop signal was sent.

This was my point but over the next 20 or so years with a bit of luck it will run with little intervention, this is not true of a system that is overloaded with capital cost because the opportunity cost of not having the money can never be made good.

AJH

[David Hansen]

On Wed, 11 Oct 2006 16:15:02 +0100 someone who may be AJH wrote this:-

I suspect that the system was not set up and operated correctly. This is sometimes a problem if people don't understand how things work. There have been reports on this issue that show a range of ability to use what people have installed. Not surprising, people have a range of ability to use other things, like computers.

will sell you one for £75 - £175, depending on the level of sophistication.

[David Hansen]

On Wed, 11 Oct 2006 13:51:38 +0100 someone who may be Peter Parry wrote this:-

Thanks for confirming my point.

I note that you snipped the example I gave. I could give others of people who have questioned a religion and left it, who are still welcomed by adherents of the religion.

While the Roman Catholic Church didn't do itself any favours in that incident, it was rather more complicated than the simplistic version of those events that is put about by those whose religion is science.

Wrong.

Once again you pose a false question and moan when the answer is not one you presumably wish to see. My answer to your question is that the assertion you make about how much a wind turbine generates is false.