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TALES FROM THE GLEN

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Highland Life, Renovation


COWBOYS ON THE HIGH RANGE…

December 8, 2023 Richard (admin) 2 Comments

The saga continues. I’ve previously documented the behaviour of MMAXX Ltd, the
numpties (UK coll.: complete fecking idiots) who installed our ground source
heat pump. But more has emerged, for which read on…

Continue reading Cowboys on the High Range… →


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Climate & Environment, Highland Life, Renovation


HEAT PUMPS AND HISTORY

December 6, 2022 Richard (admin) Leave a comment

…or rather, historic houses: between 2009 and 2014 we embarked on a complete
eco-renovation of our house – a Regency-era listed steading in Highland
Perthshire. We took it back to the stonework, insulated it throughout and
installed a ground-source heat pump (GSHP), biomass stove and solar thermal
panels. It wasn’t cheap (our initial budget rapidly became a rounding error) but
we now have a 270m2 (floor area of heated spaces), 200-year-old farmhouse that
is both warm and comfortable – winning UK Renovation of the Year in 2014 was
just a nice piece of validation for our hard work.

So, with now nearly a decade’s hindsight, what difference did it make?

Continue reading Heat Pumps and History →


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Highland Life, Politics, Governance & Brexit


THE ELIZABETHAN AGE – A VIEW FROM THE GLENS

September 9, 2022 Richard Leave a comment

With the bowing out of the second Elizabethan Age, It probably won’t take much
hindsight to see Elizabeth II as possibly the last unifying factor in the life
of the rather nebulous entity we call the United Kingdom. Despite her accident
of birth, she managed to embody a clear commitment to public service, to duty,
decency and integrity, all carried out with unfailing good humour.

Continue reading The Elizabethan Age – A View from the Glens →


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Climate & Environment


HOT AIR VERSUS HEAT PUMPS

October 20, 2021 Richard (admin) Leave a comment

The UK government’s announcement that it will be funding heat pump installations
is counterproductive and will likely prove toxic to our transition to a
carbon-neutral economy.

If we take the government’s fund at face value, the promised £490M is sufficient
to provide grants of £5,000 to 98,000 homes: a drop in the ocean compared to the
27.8M or so households in the UK (the actual number of discrete properties will
of course be lower, as 14.8% of the population live in flats). But to offer to
even partially fund heat pump installations without first tackling the issues of
effective insulation and the cost of resizing of domestic heating systems needed
to make effective use of heat pumps, is a recipe for disaster, huge ongoing
costs and ineffective outcomes.

Continue reading Hot Air versus Heat Pumps →


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Highland Life


HORDES OF THE THINGS…

March 24, 2020 Richard (admin) Leave a comment

We’ve just seen a weekend where, rather than reducing travel and staying at
home, large numbers of people have flocked to the Highlands, treating it more
like a Bank Holiday than a Global Pandemic.

So please, Protect us, Protect yourselves, and go home.





Continue reading Hordes of the Things… →




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Highland Life, Politics, Governance & Brexit


THE SOUND OF CROWING IN THE DARK

January 31, 2020 Richard (admin) Leave a comment

I’ve lived more than six decades cheerfully identifying as English (where I was
born), Scottish (where I was brought up and where I now live), British (when I
couldn’t make up my mind), European (where I’ve spent a deal of my working life
and where my greatest cultural resonance lies) and Human, in all other
circumstances. And, for the most part, that hasn’t mattered a damn. My passport
says I’m a British citizen and – again, mostly – that’s been fine, despite
significant differences of outlook with most governments of my lifetime. 
Continue reading The Sound of Crowing in the Dark →


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Politics, Governance & Brexit


THE WRONG LIZARD

December 13, 2019 Richard (admin) Leave a comment

“It comes from a very ancient democracy, you see. . . .”
“You mean, it comes from a world of lizards?”
“No,” said Ford, “nothing so simple. Nothing anything like so straightforward.
On its world, the people are people. The leaders are lizards. The people hate
the lizards and the lizards rule the people.”
“Odd,” said Arthur, “I thought you said it was a democracy.”
“I did,” said Ford. “It is.”

Continue reading The Wrong Lizard →


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Politics, Governance & Brexit


THE TACTICS OF NOSE-HOLDING

December 6, 2019 Richard (admin) Leave a comment

Given the hubris of opposition parties of all colours in agreeing an election
before Brexit was kicked into touch, we are now faced with The Great
Nose-Holding of 2019, in which we can only set aside judgements based on past
behaviour and focus on the immediate clear and present danger to our way of
life. Continue reading The Tactics of Nose-Holding →


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Highland Life, Politics, Governance & Brexit


READ. THE. MEMO.

September 1, 2019 Richard (admin) Leave a comment

So I did my democratic duty today and rocked up to the “Bollocks to Boris” demo
in Glasgow’s George Square. There was a fairly decent turnout, with a diverse
crowd pretty much filling the square, music at the east end and the speakers to
the west. Lots of EU and Scottish flags at the musical end, whilst the speakers’
end was dominated by what I can only describe as the “Rent-a-Banner” contingent:
The Communist and Socialist Workers’ Parties (bless their pointed little heads),
assorted 1930s-style union showings and, in the midst, some white-bearded bloke
mumbling away into a microphone. Now, I couldn’t actually hear what Corbyn was
saying, but the cohort around was definitely pitching the same tired old mantras
that we’re all familiar with, from any decade: Destroy the Tories; Resist
Racism; Nationalise Everything; Soak The Rich (or whoever they consider “The
Rich” to be at any given moment), not one of which is remotely germane to – and
which in fact get in the way of – the issue facing us here and now. Didn’t they
get the bloody memo?

Continue reading Read. The. Memo. →


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Climate & Environment, Renovation


EASY GAINS: REMOVING VAT ON RETROFIT ENERGY-SAVING

July 15, 2019 Richard (admin) Leave a comment

For all the publicity that the ‘sexy’ side of climate change mitigation gets –
wind, wave and solar power or the shift to electric vehicles – all of which are
necessary and laudable, the biggest difference that we can make is to reduce our
demand for energy in the first place.  Continue reading Easy Gains: Removing VAT
on Retrofit Energy-Saving →


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LIVING AND RENOVATING IN THE SCOTTISH HIGHLANDS

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 * Cowboys on the High Range…
 * Heat Pumps and History
 * The Elizabethan Age – A View from the Glens
 * Hot Air versus Heat Pumps
 * Hordes of the Things…


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