Siting of panels for solar water heating

"David Hansen" wrote in message

On Wed, 22 Nov 2006 01:36:56 +0000 someone who may be Andy Hall andyh@hall.nospam> wrote this:-
This is complete and utter bullshit.
Excellent, more personal abuse.
Fortnightly bin collections are not acceptable.
Ah, proof by assertion.
As others have said, experience seems to be that switching to collection of residual waste once a fortnight initially causes loud complaints by some, but the silent majority have no problem with it.

I'm happy to be loud.
I HAVE NO PROBLEM WITH FORTNIGHTLY BIN COLLECTIONS!
Mary

-- David Hansen, Edinburgh I will *always* explain revoked encryption keys, unless RIP prevents me http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2000/00023--e.htm#54

"John Beardmore" wrote in message

I'd settle for 3 licensed operators with each having a different collection day on a given street.
OK - by this implies that there will be a licensing process and tendering process to select the three.
More bureaucracy.

And more emissions.
Mary

On 2006-11-25 12:42:53 +0000, John Beardmore said:

In message , Andy Hall writes On 2006-11-25 11:56:52 +0000, David Hansen SENDdavidNOhSPAM@spidacom.co.uk> said: On Sat, 25 Nov 2006 02:41:34 +0000 someone who may be Andy Hall andyh@hall.nospam> :-
Has still to propose, in some detail, something better.
I don't *have* to anything.
There are already plenty of ideas; the most obvious of which is to take the local authorities out of the food chain.
Hardly a detailed proposal for what should replace them.

I didn't set out to provide a detailed proposal - simply an outline of what obviously needs to be done.

On 2006-11-25 12:49:59 +0000, John Beardmore said:

I think you'll find there is more than one solution.
One might be for you to sort your own waste in a responsible way.

That's not necessary or interesting to do. I already pay for a refusal disposal service - I don't therefore expect to have to do half the job myself.

Of course if FoE and others would like to volunteer to go and sift through the stuff at waste transfer stations on Sunday afternoons, I'd have no objection at all.
No doubt you would be willing to exploit them, but I doubt they'd have time to sort through all the waste people like you produce and can't be bothered to sort themselves.

Too busy with more buckets of greenwash?

I might even buy them a packet of biscuits at Christmas.
Good to see such a responsible attitude !

They'll have to separate the packaging themselves, though.

On 2006-11-25 13:31:56 +0000, David Hansen said:

On Sat, 25 Nov 2006 12:27:46 +0000 someone who may be Andy Hall andyh@hall.nospam> wrote this:-
When things are different in different places some people whine about how it should all be standardised to avoid confusion. However, when things are standardised the same people whine about how they are straight jacketed by a centrally imposed system.
Which means that the solution is for everything to go into one collection container and for it to be sorted by those being paid to do it.
That is one solution, though even then there are two options about where the sorting is done.
The first option is the Stalinst one of a central "facility" at which to do the sorting. I assume this is the option you are in favour of. Sorting out compostable and other waste at such a "facility" is a rather dirty operation.

I didn't mention Uncle Joe - you did.
I really don't care whether it's a centralised or decentralised facility. I pay for a disposal service and I expect the supplier of that to deal with these issues. That's what I'm paying them to do.

The second option is to do the sorting at the container, with staff sorting the contents of the container into a multi-compartment vehicle. If one provides a separate bin for compostable waste, which is taken off separately to a composter, then the sorting operation is very much less dirty. One could then provide two containers, to be collected on alternate weeks. One container is the one for residual waste and one for recyclable waste. The second option seems a lot better to me.

I really don't mind what they do. I expect to be able to put out all of the rubbish, each week, and for it all to be collected. I don't expect to do half the job of the refuse collector.
I may wish to use some material from the garden to make compost for the garden, but don't expect to be compelled to do so.

On 2006-11-25 12:51:39 +0000, Huge said:

I do wonder if the State is that marvellous, why it isn't prepared to compete against private enterprise.

Because it knows full well that it can't. The culture and level of competence means that it has to overstaff and to bring in large amounts of outside consulting etc. to achieve the requirements. The inevitable result is overpricing and poor quality. The only way to defend that is not to have any competition so that people have no comparison points.

And in this particualr case, there's no reason whatsoever why the local Council shouldn't sell a "Home Care" package that people could choose to buy or not, as they wish.

Absolutely.

On 2006-11-25 13:34:39 +0000, David Hansen said:

On Sat, 25 Nov 2006 12:03:30 +0000 someone who may be Andy Hall andyh@hall.nospam> wrote this:-
Of course people can arrange their own waste collection agreements in exactly the same way that they buy food, gas, electricity, telecommunication and most other commodities.
People tend not to consider these things too carefully. Rather they stick with what they know. The number of people who have not switched gas and electricity suppliers is a case in point. Many people have better things to do with their lives than switch suppliers.

Agreed. It's something that I spend ten minutes on max. once a year.
If local authorities wished to license themselves as one of the options, then that would be fine, so long as it's an optional service and the customer can choose to by elsewhere and not pay for the council product.

On 2006-11-25 13:02:59 +0000, John Beardmore said:

In message , Andy Hall writes On 2006-11-25 11:02:44 +0000, John Beardmore said: In message , Andy Hall writes On 2006-11-25 01:44:09 +0000, John Beardmore said: In message , Andy Hall writes On 2006-11-25 00:52:39 +0000, John Beardmore said:
Why can't I opt out of the payments if I don't want to buy the service, but choose my own while still complying with the EPA (above)? Same reason you can't opt out of buying Trident but keep a few grenades under the kitchen sink I guess. Different issue I think. A parallel one I think.
Not really.
Well - no doubt anybody reading this will understand the analogy and recognise the extent of its limitations.

That's good, because there's little to compare between domestic refuse collection and the defence of the nation.

Perhaps there is another clause saying that the local authority or its representative is the only "authorised person" No - it's to do with having waste transfer licenses. Fine, so no need for a restriction. Well - you seem keen to have three players selected to provide the service. That's hardly unfettered capitalism. There will certainly be people kept out of what you claim is a very lucrative market.
Three was a number chosen as being sufficient to have competition. It could be ten, or an unlimited number.
The economic equation is smple enough Today, I pay �X to the local authority of which an amount goes for rubbish collection. The local authority subcontracts to a private firm to do the work but in addition employs a large department of people who are supposed to be administering it, but in practice do very little of any value. The private firm still makes a profit or it would not be doing the work. If the unnecessary overhead of the local authority is taken out of the loop, the firm can do more for the same money or deliver the same for less money.
Unless the LA have a useful QA function. Depends how much you trust the private contractors to do it right if unpoliced.

That could be done by a very small number of people or could also be outsourced to an independent private organisation.

The only people to lose out would be the bureaucrats in the local authority who aren't adding any value in the first place. They should view it as an opportunity to find something gainful to do. That would be a benefit to them as well as to the population as a whole.
Maybe in some instances, but I'm not convinced it's true in the general case.

You haven't met many local authority employees, have you....?

Perhaps the authority chooses not to use multiple contractors and to offer the customer a choice. It might have discretion to do that. I'm still not convinced it would result in better service or greater efficiency. Competition almost always results in the customer getting what they want at the right price. I want an electron microscope for 50p. Almost...
Check out your local Aldi. They are bound to have a Christmas offer on one. Just for you. Just today.
I doubt it.

So try Lidl - they may have

On 2006-11-25 13:37:53 +0000, David Hansen said:

On Sat, 25 Nov 2006 12:17:03 +0000 someone who may be Andy Hall andyh@hall.nospam> wrote this:-
No it isn't. The comment was about the statement being complete and utter bullshit, not the person who made it. Of course if you wish to feel inadequate because you made it, that's your affair.
Excellent, mind reading as well.

How you arrive at that conclusion from what I wrote, I have no idea......

Don't take up mind reading for a living, you aren't very good at it.

I have no intention of doing so, so the matter doesn't arise.

As others have said, experience seems to be that switching to collection of residual waste once a fortnight initially causes loud complaints by some, but the silent majority have no problem with it.
It may be where you live.
Ah, another attempt at personalisation.

I wasn't writing about you, I was writing about where you live.

My comment has nothing to do with where I live, rather it relates to a couple of postings by others in this thread.

That's OK then - so basically a couple of postings in a newsgroup takes us to the inevitable conclusion that the silent majority have no problem with poor service?
This must mean that since a cow is a four legged animal, all four legged animals must be cows....

In message , Andy Hall writes

On 2006-11-25 12:42:53 +0000, John Beardmore said: In message , Andy Hall writes On 2006-11-25 11:56:52 +0000, David Hansen SENDdavidNOhSPAM@spidacom.co.uk> said: On Sat, 25 Nov 2006 02:41:34 +0000 someone who may be Andy Hall andyh@hall.nospam> :-
Has still to propose, in some detail, something better. I don't *have* to anything. There are already plenty of ideas; the most obvious of which is to take the local authorities out of the food chain. Hardly a detailed proposal for what should replace them.
I didn't set out to provide a detailed proposal -

Indeed.

simply an outline of what obviously needs to be done.

Yes - it is an outline, but until the details are known, it's not obviously better than the situation we have now.
Cheers, J/. -- John Beardmore

In message , Mary Fisher writes

"John Beardmore" wrote in message
How much energy is used raising a moderate amount of water to say 55 degrees, (and the tail end of the washing up water will probably do !), as opposed to melting glass ?
55C ???? That's VERY hot for washing up - unnecessarily so.
But with a solar water heat very little energy need be used to get water hot enough for washing up.
Yes - I'm inclined to agree, but people do get very up tight about Legionella.
They do, without considering that Legionella has to get into the system to be a problem.

I understand it's fairly ubiquitous, but normally prevented from building up or killed by copper concentration, lack of nutrients, and being washed through the system.

This concern has a huge energy cost.
Some cooks seem keen to have washing up water hot enough to blister skin too...
I know. And then wear gloves to protect their hands from it.
Daft I call it.

:) As an IOSH member I couldn't possibly comment !
Cheers, J/. -- John Beardmore

In message , Andy Hall writes

On 2006-11-25 12:49:59 +0000, John Beardmore said:
I think you'll find there is more than one solution. One might be for you to sort your own waste in a responsible way.
That's not necessary

Not necessary in the same sense as eating or breathing.
Perhaps necessary in the same sense as not cutting down all the trees.

or interesting to do.

Many things that we need to do to survive are not hugely interesting.

I already pay for a refusal disposal service - I don't therefore expect to have to do half the job myself.

The requirement has changed a lot in the last 20 years.
Would you rather
1) sort it your self
2) waste a lot of it
or
3) pay to have somebody else do a more difficult and expensive separation and bill you for it ?
You seem unwilling to consider option 1 and by default do option 2. If in the end option 3 is imposed on you, I shan't grieve.

Of course if FoE and others would like to volunteer to go and sift through the stuff at waste transfer stations on Sunday afternoons, I'd have no objection at all. No doubt you would be willing to exploit them, but I doubt they'd have time to sort through all the waste people like you produce and can't be bothered to sort themselves.
Too busy with more buckets of greenwash?

Even FoE zealots need time off.

I might even buy them a packet of biscuits at Christmas. Good to see such a responsible attitude !
They'll have to separate the packaging themselves, though.

I'm sure they can manage that.
Cheers, J/. -- John Beardmore

In message , Mary Fisher writes

I HAVE NO PROBLEM WITH FORTNIGHTLY BIN COLLECTIONS!

Can we all play ?
Cheers, J/. -- John Beardmore

Andy Hall wrote:

There still is 20p deposit on Barr's Irn-Bru bottles. I have about �4's worth under the sink as Emergency Savings. I don't seem to see them here - only plastic bottles. Perhaps only the sugary version is in glass, or do they do the non sugary one in glass as well?

Perhaps they only do the glass bottles in Scotland.
It's hard to imagine a non-sugary version of the product.
Owain

Mary Fisher wrote:

And more emissions.

Not necessarily. They could combine it with other service, eg home shopping delivery. Swap a box of shopping with a box of clean recyclable waste, and a sealed plastic bag for smelly non-recyclables. Perfectly hygienic.
I acquire almost all my rubbish from Tesco; they might as well take it away again.
Owain