So, Blog, what do you make of this hot weather? Global warming or global warming? I am still trudging around in shorts – shorts in October! Never before have I had to expose my legs to my adoring public in the autumn. I suppose I’ll now have to shave them to keep up appearances. The weather does of course, have its compensations. Tuesday I got up early to burn up the tarmac and the weather presented me with an inversion level. The old estate lies in a dip with the river Sherbourne flowing along the bottom of the orchard. Well it would flow along the bottom of the orchard if there was any water in the river bed. Global warming or global warming? An inversion level occurs in nature when the air is trapped in a valley, the warm air is trapped at ground level, the higher air being much much colder sometimes resulting in a mist. This was the situation on Tuesday. Outside the back door through the servant’s quarters, the air was balmingly warm, the air crystal clear affording uninterrupted views down the Lane to the village. At roof top height, a thick mist obscured the chimney pots. The field opposite disappeared in the mist as it rose up to the top meadows. All very dramatic. Unusual. A memory to stack away for future reference. I like to collect memories for future use when the going gets tough .... an example; when the weather is not very nice, the cold and wet enough to put off the most dedicated trudger from trudging, I don’t trudge down the country lanes in the cold, wet and dark, I run along the burning beach in Porta Rica, or race around the Kinneret in the warm winter sunshine. Try stacking up memories, Blog. They can be very useful. One day during the spring holidays, whem a second former at the northern grammar school I attended, along with other form members, we organised ourselves to go for a hike from Settle to climb Penygent, one of the three Yorkshire Peaks. No staff member, just pupils. We left Keighley on a dull dank morning, the bus from Skipton to Settle was taken in the depressing weather. At Settle the weather had improved to a dry, mist enveloping morning. No views of the Dales today was the general consensus. As we climbed out of Settle, the mist hung heavy in the still air. Then it happened. Amazingly we climbed out of the mist into glorious clear sunshine. It was like a stage set with the dry ice sitting quite still, only the top half of the actors visible. There it was the top of the few bare trees poking out of the mist, floating rootless on the gentle waves of white candyfloss. A chimney pot sitting isolated with no visible means of support. The sun was soon to burn the mist away but it didn’t burn away the curious lasting memory.
Last week, slowly trudging past the local reservoirs on the different days I spent in Yorkshire, I got to thinking about the waste of potential energy they offered. The payback time for the solar panel installation which we are all being urged to install, is 25 years. If the bandwagon of energy generation is being driven so desperately by the government as the next best thing after sliced bread, I suspect that ten years down the line, some house owners might be feeling a draught with expensive repairs, unit premiums eroded by inflation and newer cheaper technology coming on stream. Putting my money where my mouth is, I suspect one old form of energy generation with a new twist could be from the reservoirs I had trudged by on my trudges. I took in Pondon, Lower Laithe and Watersheddles on my various outings. Take Watersheddles, for example, as the highest of the three, sitting on the Yorkshire – Lancashire [wash your mouth out with salt water, say three Hail Marys and ask for absolution] border. On its way to the water purification plant, it drops 50 or 60 metres and a further 100 metres before it hits the valley floor, the other two reservoirs have a smaller but steeper drops. Surely the water flow could be harnessed to generate electricity before entering the water pipe system to be consumed by the populace? The payback time for these small generation stations would be relative small. The income generated might even cut our bills. Joke. At a time of rising water prices imposed on us by the Water Companies, would it not be financial prudence to build a small station at each the hundreds of reservoirs scattered around the hills of this country? Micro generation. You heard it first here Blog. The same idea could be extended on a national scale ... the nation being Israel. The Dead Sea water level is dropping, causing mounting concern. Chemical extraction by a joint Israel/Jordon venture being one cause, evaporation being another, the main culprit being irrigation from the River Jordon before the stream enters the Lake. The Dead Sea is 380 metres below sea level. The Dead Sea is about 65 kilometres from the Mediterranean at its nearest point, but to avoid any loss of the West Bank in future negotiations with the Palestinians, an extension of 20 kilometres would ameliorate that situation. If water was piped from the Med to the Dead Sea, the 350 metres drop would, via a series of generators produce enough power to provide a significant percent of the nations needs. Extraction could take place about a mile off the Israeli shore with a safety exclusion zone of 800 metres offering no problem to leisure or shipping activities on or near the coast. The route would need to be considered carefully. A southern route via Beersheba, avoiding the West Bank but encountering the hills of the Negev would be a problem. To avoid extensive drilling and underground tunnelling, surface pipes could be employed, using the principle of siphoning once the pipe work was complete, the principle being similar to that used by the eighteenth century atmospheric train engines in England. It would have to be large diameter multiple pipes to allow for maintenance without interrupting the supply of water. The quality of the chemical content of the Dead Sea would not be impaired by the delivery of thousands of tons of water because most of the extra liquid would be lost at surface level through evaporation. The extra sea salt would be a chemical plus to the chemical extraction companies. Slight rises of water level would be advantages to those chemical factories at the southern tip of the Sea. On the other hand, a northern pipe route via Afula and Bet Shean through the fertile Galilean valley, would offer less engineering challenges, but might pollute the Jordon with excessive salt if the flow was discharged too high upstream from the Dead Sea, causing agricultural difficulties with saline water when the water was extracted for irrigation. Salt resistant crops are already being grown, however. Concerns between the two countries bordering the river about the amount of water extraction would be reduced. The mean flow downstream would be improved considerably ... and the Christian tourists would again be able to be baptised in the River Jordon, an activity curtailed of late. The expense of the power to operate all the area’s desalination plants would evaporate and water [and power] could be exported to neighbouring Arab states; improving relations even? You heard it first here Blog. Or is it just a pipe dream, Blog?
So it is two days to the Coventry Half Marathon in which both daughters are running, one raising money for the children’s charity for disable children, Tiny Tims Children’s Centre. It is ironic that the new organisers appointed by the Coventry Council who barged through a new date, causing so much inconvenience to the local Leamington half marathon which was run on a cool day, are now faced with potential problems caused by this unseasonably hot weather. I only hope for the sake of the joggers that the company organising the race have plenty of water on tap at water stations around the hilly course. Dehydration is a serious problem for those not too fit for the long trek. There will be the inevitable moans about road closures ... but wait. The country lanes around my estate were in an appalling condition until about six years ago, when, for no understandable reason, the local council decided to spent millions resurfacing every single bit of highway, many of these newly tar macadamed lanes were little used by traffic!! The down side was that the company employed by the council took little time to prepare the road surfaces for the new layer of tar, simply laying the new stuff on the old loose pebbly material. OK for a couple of years but then, after a couple of winters, the inevitable happened with the surface breaking up again, in many places reverting to the pre refurbished state. Now, moaners take note. The lanes are in a poor state, Right? The Coventry Half Marathon is going to come down these lanes on Sunday, past the front of the old homestead. Health and Safety is big, Right? The council doesn’t want to be faced with compensation claims from joggers falling over and injuring themselves by tripping over pot holes, do they, Right? This Wednesday morning, guess what happens? Right? A gang of work men come along and repair all the pot holes for miles around!!!!!!!!!!!! Right. So moaners, instead of moaning about the inconvenience of the Half Marathon race in which one of my daughters is raising money for the children’s charity for disable children, Tiny Tims Children’s Centre, plead with the council to re-route the marathon along your street and Hay presto, a newly resurfaced street!! Right! But are the two events just a coincidence; a half marathon race and resurfacing work? When the second Coventry Half Marathon was run about three years ago, the new route took the joggers through a local park, along a rough path. A month before the race, a new wide smooth tarmac path was laid replacing the uneven track!!! A bit naughty really that funds from the North East Development Fund for the deprived part of the city, had its funds diverted from the less privileged area of the city to upgrade the quality of a park in a rather pleasant part of Coventry. Justification for the use of the funds was that the Half Marathon was improving the health of the citizen from the North East of the City who were jogging in the race. Ya, Right! Right.
Colin
