Now that we have baking on a commercial basis (Crumbs Bakery) in the village again, I found myself wondering where the nearest flour mill is. My initial suspicion was that there might not be a single flour mill in Cornwall, but some brief investigation turned up a handful:
The Cornish Mill and Bakehouse (near Newquay)
Cotehele Mill (far end of the county, near Calstock)
Zennor Mill (part of the Wayside Museum at Zennor)
Two of these are operated as part of a ‘heritage’ activity rather than on a purely commercial basis. Does anyone know of any others?
While visiting friends in Norfolk recently, I found myself marvelling at the Autumn Agricultural Review, produced as a quarterly supplement by the Eastern Daily Press. This is clearly aimed at the regular farming community, yet within its 24 pages I found:
- 7 adverts relating to farm-generated renewable energy (3 of them full page)
- 2 articles on electricity generation via anaerobic digesters
- 1 article on biomass-fuelled generation
- 1 article on wind generation
- 1 article explaining FITs
- 1 article about the resurgence of the East Anglian native breed of pig (the Large Black)
- 1 article focusing on the success of a farmer breeding Red Poll cattle (another native East Anglian breed)
What’s going on?
Saturday 24th September saw a gathering of folk in the fields adjacent to Scot’s Quay to mark 45 years of Resurgence magazine and local support for the international 350.org event Moving Planet . In line with Satish Kumar’s famous multi-thousand mile walks in pursuit of peace – Transition Constantine organised a walk from the village down to Scot’s Quay – ably led by children from the school carrying flags they had made earlier in the week. The Gather event included a number of musicians and bands, tree listening, charcoal buying, natural paint making, and dance – all leading up to a session with Satish Kumar being interviewed by Leo Hickman of the Guardian – on Satish’s wide ranging and inspirational thoughts over the last 45 years. During the afternoon everyone took part in creating two large scale human banners for 350.org – shortly to appear on the Moving Planet website.
Last year Constantine school had a successful assembly about home food waste composting, and a number of council-subsidised ‘Green Johanna’ compost bins were bought by village families as a result. This type of compost bin is still available at a subsidised price (£25) from the S.O.F.A. project in Pool:
S.O.F.A., Unit C3, Pool Business Park, Dudnance Lane, Pool, Redruth TR15 3QW
Tel: 01209 719733
As of last week, they still had over 30 in stock – but be prepared to pay in cash.
Other types of compost bin (and other items associated with recycling) are also available to order on-line at subsidised prices from the Cornwall Council Get Composting website.
Al Gore is promoting a worldwide rolling 24 hour event on 17/18th September – tune in to the broadcast coming out of London. One of our local Climate Change scientists based at Tremough will be participating from the LSE. Information here…..
350.org is organising a worldwide event on 24th September to raise the issues related to the continuing rise in emissions of greenhouse gases. 350 ppm is suggested as the level of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere at which a global average temperature rise can be limited go 2C. We are currently at 393 ppm and rising….
Watch this space for announcement of local events related to the activity on 24th September .
Over £20million is reported to be available to fund the installation of Solar PV systems on Community buildings in Cornwall. This funding provides for so-called “free” PV – i.e. the community will benefit if and when it can make use of any electricity being generated by the solar panels. The funders will benefit from the Feed-in-Tariff. However, this is a mechanism to get Community Solar PV systems installed. If anyone responsible for a community building in Constantine wishes to take advantage of this – please make contact with Transition Constantine or with CEP directly. These systems have to be installed by March 2012. Further information here
Ladock and Grampound have both benefitted from the Low Carbon Communities Challenge in November 2009 – we need to keep our eyes open for the next time around…….
The recently formed Community Power Cornwall has completed its recent share issue and now has a total of £80,000 to invest in its early projects. The first of these is the installation of two 55kW wind turbines at Tregerrick Farm, Gorran. One of their projects, closer to Constantine, is a turbine proposed for Bishops Forum – currently held up by a planning objection.