Renewable Energy

Vine House Farm see renewable energy as an important aspect of life. We realise that the world is being raped and we can’t see any way out of it but by reusing, recycling and harnessing natural energy we will slow down the speed that we are raping this world.

I would like to think that the wind turbines show the district that we are serious about renewable energy but soon there will be several wind farms in the area and some of those are erected on the farmers land purely as extra income.

For those of you that are still wondering about renewable energy it might be worth coming to our Renewable Energy Weekend sometime in the middle of April in 2008 to see if you can fit any ways of using some renewable energy in your home or business.

Of course there is far more to the scene than just using renewable energy. We can use less energy by insulating our homes better, we can use low energy light bulbs and making our car journeys more effective. Unfortunately cars are so comfortable even in the most foul weather that many people just go for a ride out in them.

My grandmother lived at the bottom of Dunsby Fen. Most Tuesdays they would take the pony and trap into Spalding, about an hours drive. On arrival the horse would be disconnected from the trap, fed and stabled. The people who came in the trap would get changed before going to do any shopping. The reverse would happen when it was time to go home. In those days journeys were planned far more carefully than they are today. In fact because the vehicles we travel in are so comfortable means we use a lot more fuel than we need to.

Since 1980 Vine House farm house and office has been heated by straw or wood. In the 1990s it was a labour of love, it would have been far cheaper to take the large boiler out and heat by oil but I didn’t as I know that oil will run out one day. You could say that that day is on the horizon. Maybe the rise in the price of oil over the past two years is a good thing as it has certainly made people think about other ways of producing energy.

We should think to the future. If we install solar panels or a wind turbine it may be a long time paying for itself and not be regarded as a paying proposition but it could be regarded as an insurance policy or a pension. As we don’t know what the price of oil will be in the future but we do know that we will have paid for most of it up front.