The Alternative Green Energy Thread

Cardew

joefizz wrote: »

is it a viable option for when the price of oil hits 200 odd dollars in the not too distant future...

I assume that is meant to be TIC. If not, given it is currently around $60 and the all time high was $136, please define 'not too distant future'.

GreatApe

Cardew wrote: »

I assume that is meant to be TIC. If not, given it is currently around $60 and the all time high was $136, please define 'not too distant future'.

Oil is unlikely to go that high because at prices of above about $100/barrels not only do harder oil deposits become economic but gas to liquids become economic. Before the oil price crash there was a plan to build the world's biggest gas to oil plant on the USA when oil prices tanked the plants was scrapped.

Oil can get expensive for brief periods but not for long periods of time

joefizz

Cardew wrote: »

I assume that is meant to be TIC. If not, given it is currently around $60 and the all time high was $136, please define 'not too distant future'.

Lifetime of my oil boiler, probably another 5-10 years.
Oil all time high was 145 in 2008 so with 20 years low inflation 200 is on the conservative side (using the boe inflation calculator it would be nearly that now)



Will probably drop a bit in the next year but then start to climb again. The dollar might also turn lower then go up again so makes sense to hedge the future central heating possiblities.
Could get gas replacement when the oil boiler finally goes but thats just replacing FF with FF. Could go the RHI route but that hasnt worked out too well over here plus dont believe in the shipping the pellets in from the US part of it all, which leaves returning to the coal/biomass back boiler. With the changes Ive made with insulation, solar, battery and now heat pump install, it makes it feasible to produce winter heating from low, long burn log fire (well thats the theory, using this winter to find out). My supply is still limited as its the first year of coppicing this year and have to rely on previous years wastage and seasoning but should be enough to go on.

JKenH

joefizz wrote: »

Does anyone here use locally sourced, renewable wood in wood burners at home?
I seem to remember someone mentioning it in the past (JKenH?) about growing their own wood supplies?


I had a notion a couple of years ago of buying woodland (despite living in the more deforested country in europe!) and going down that sustainable route but in reality its proved almost impossible with the scarcity of woodland and in the areas I can buy the distances involved in transporting here would more than negate any benefit.


What I have done in the last 2 years is group together with people to help fund someone locally who is already doing this and Im just about to start using the first crop of seasoned wood this winter. Its a mix of the pine not suitable for harvest as well as more localised woods.


I may have mentioned before that my house was originally coal central heating (living room fire and back boiler) but the back boiler was long since disconnected when the oil was put in but could still be reconnected.


Just wanted to get some views of anyone who is doing this and whilst on paper it is sustainable, particularly on a small scale with local woods, is it a viable option for when the price of oil hits 200 odd dollars in the not too distant future...

Starting a wood is not a short term project but is very worthwhile and a reasonable investment. It is 29 years since I planted my trees but TBH I wish I had started harvesting about 10 years ago as some of the trees are now 40’ tall which makes felling a bit more difficult for an amateur like me. I have a lot of birch which is really quick growing and shoots up 4’ again from the cut down stump in a year. Sycamore is similar but much easier to split. Once they get too old they don’t grow out again. With pine once you cut it down, that’s it. Some of the saplings came from a countryside project but a lot we gathered ourselves when helping the local wildlife trust clear self seeded trees from a heath they were trying to preserve. The woodland now is self seeding and needs thinning.

For our sins we burn the wood on an open fire. We keep thinking of getting a wood burning stove but it would need changes to the hearth and we just have never got round to it.

There are numerous other benefits of having a bit of woodland - wildlife, cool shady places to hide from the sun in summer heat, somewhere for kids to play and camp, physical exercise in chopping wood and the generally good feeling of being outside.

Go for it.

https://www.woodlands.co.uk/buying-a-wood/northern-ireland/

joefizz

JKenH wrote: »

Go for it.

https://www.woodlands.co.uk/buying-a-wood/northern-ireland/

Yeah! Thought about it for far too long and should have done it a few years ago when a woodland close to me came up, at the time was thinking of it from a business point of view but all the other social aspects came in to play.
The woodland I bid on was mostly pine so took advice and as you say would be years before it could be restored to more local broadleaved types so I stopped bidding and have regretted it ever since.



The place Im helping out at has a lot of birch and thats primarily what I have piled up for this winter but I think I made a rookie mistake of not splitting it green and have still to do that, any suggestions?

JKenH

I leave mine a couple of years then split it as it is easier to store and move around in 5ft lengths. I would recommend leaving it at least 2 years to dry. I know they say it dries out best if you cut it up and remove the bark but I’m not in any rush. The thicker the trunk, the shorter the lengths i cut it into. Trying to split a 15 inch diameter log that’s 15 inches long is hard work. If it is half that length one good swing will a heavy splitting maul will do it. It took me a while to get the technique. I can’t think of anything more satisfying (but then I have been married for more than 40 years.:))

Cardew

joefizz wrote: »

Lifetime of my oil boiler, probably another 5-10 years.
Oil all time high was 145 in 2008 so with 20 years low inflation 200 is on the conservative side (using the boe inflation calculator it would be nearly that now)



Will probably drop a bit in the next year but then start to climb again. The dollar might also turn lower then go up again so makes sense to hedge the future central heating possiblities.
Could get gas replacement when the oil boiler finally goes but thats just replacing FF with FF. Could go the RHI route but that hasnt worked out too well over here plus dont believe in the shipping the pellets in from the US part of it all, which leaves returning to the coal/biomass back boiler. With the changes Ive made with insulation, solar, battery and now heat pump install, it makes it feasible to produce winter heating from low, long burn log fire (well thats the theory, using this winter to find out). My supply is still limited as its the first year of coppicing this year and have to rely on previous years wastage and seasoning but should be enough to go on.

You cannot pluck out of historical data an oil price($145) and use that as the basis of any inflation prediction. Brent crude was $1.17 in 1946 and $27.67 in 2016. It would be equally wrong to use either of those figures.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-35245133

The oil price is currently around $60. Not that Bank of England inflation measures has ever applied to oil and gas. Shale oil and fracking will prevent oil prices going through the roof.

I can think of at least one person who would be delighted should your prediction of $200 become reality - Nicola Sturgeon of the Scottish Nationalist Party!!

Their financial calculations for the 2014 Independence referendum were a nonsense even with their dwindling North Sea oil stock priced at $100.

GreatApe

Cardew wrote: »

Shale oil and fracking will prevent oil prices going through the roof.

US data out a couple of days ago
Shale oil has expanded to 9.1 mbpd (they also have conventional oil)
And shale gas is the equivalent of 15.2 mbpd
An almost unimaginable bounty and no surprise the US is doing well economically

And yet you still have the conspiracy theory guys here and elsewhere saying it's all a Ponzi because you know if they don't like oil anything oil related is just the lizards using the banking system to make unprofitable industries profitable :rotfl:

joefizz

Cardew wrote: »

You cannot pluck out of historical data an oil price($145) and use that as the basis of any inflation prediction. Brent crude was $1.17 in 1946 and $27.67 in 2016. It would be equally wrong to use either of those figures.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-35245133

And the Russian Central Bank has said it could go as low as 25 dollars next year. I dont get your point as to how that doesnt mean it wont go to 200 at some point in the next 10 years when it was in todays terms close to that 10 years ago? Possibility/probability.

GreatApe

joefizz wrote: »

And the Russian Central Bank has said it could go as low as 25 dollars next year. I dont get your point as to how that doesnt mean it wont go to 200 at some point in the next 10 years when it was in todays terms close to that 10 years ago? Possibility/probability.

The point about the last peak in oil prices is that it was.....a peak....one which was unsustainable

It's better to look at say a rolling average of oil prices over a period of 5 years rather than what some traders in London traded oil at for one hour of one day of one year

$99.67 is the highest yearly average closing price

And the highest rolling average over five years was $92 followed by a crash in oil prices to half of that figure

What this suggests to me is that even $92 is unsustainable because the last time $92 a barrel was sustained for five years the result was new forms of oil came onto the market to make the five years after that just $53

God bless those Americans and especially those Texans saving the UK consumer about $200 billion over the last five years