Cumbria ripe for renewables

5:30pm Thursday 13th March 2008

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CUMBRIA'S woodlands, mountains, waterfalls, rivers and lakes are a treasure trove of renewable energy sources and it's high time we started reaping the benefits of the county's unique topography.

That was the urgent message coming from a meeting run by the campaigning group the Cumbria Green Business Forum (CGBF) at the Langdale Hotel in Elterwater, writes Matt Connolly.

An audience of more than 50 people attending the free seminar heard that technology was now so advanced that renewable energy should be more than just a green pipe dream but a viable economic option for local businesses and communities.

John Barwise, chair of CGBF, said: "Rising fuel bills and energy prices are beginning to bite but most of us still don't know much about renewable energy or which systems work best in our area. Wind power, solar power, mini hydro schemes and heat pumps are already being used across Cumbria helping to cut fuel bills and reduce the effects of climate change."

As for planning regulations within the national park, The Lake District National Park Authority (LDNPA), which sponsored the seminar, confirmed that it wanted to do what it could to encourage people who wanted to make use of renewable energy, within national park policies.

The LDNPA's Community Enabler, Clive Wickham, said: "We're not against small-scale renewable energy. In the last five years we've had 22 planning applications for renewable energy. Nearly all of them were approved."

Cumbria Woodlands works with farmers and businesses to help woodlands and forests contribute to a vibrant rural economy. Their speaker at the event, Neville Elstone, said that "cutting down trees is good" and that 70 per cent of Cumbria's woodlands were ripe for the harvesting of wood for fuel - but no one was managing them. Mr Elstone said that in Austria more than 100,000 automatic wood-fired boilers had been installed, yet in Cumbria "you can count them on one hand".

Andy Mason, of Sundog Energy, which specialises in photovoltaic (PV) solar panels and wind turbines, said all the activity at the moment was in charities and public buildings because of the grants available to them to encourage them to generate energy on site. Sundog replaced slate tiles on the roof of Keswick School with a PV system. "Our tile systems do the same job as roof tiles,' said Mr Mason, "but they also create energy, and there's virtually no maintenance."

John Withers, of Geowarmth, said his company's heat pumps - "fridges in reverse", extracting heat from the air, ground or water - could be used for underfloor heating and radiators, as well as for cooling.

He said sometimes clients' unusual demands had to be met. "One Cumbria family we installed ground source heat pumps for had a high domestic hot water demand. They've now got the capacity to run five showers simultaneously even though they've only got three bathrooms."

As for the power of water, Miles Postlethwaite of Turbine Services, which fitted a hydro-electric turbine at Derwentwater Youth Hostel in Borrowdale, said there was huge potential for hydro schemes in the Lake District bearing in mind all the mountains and becks.

The crucial thing, he said, was not just the availability of water but the height - or head' - of the site, and there were lots of good head sites in Cumbria. "There could be literally hundreds of sites here - it's one of the best places in the country."

l For more stories with about green issues, go to thewestmorlandgazette.co.uk/news/kendalgogreen/ .