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The Bradworthy Wind Turbines
Councillor
Christie's Weblog
From your Torridge District Councillor Peter Christie
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4th January '09
I receive various publications relating to the production of alternative energy and one of these recently carried the headline ‘Environment Agency stifling small river projects’. This referred to micro hydro electric power schemes and the fact they were being killed by ‘burdensome and unnecessary regulation’ stemming from the EA. This was very worrying as several such projects have been suggested in North Devon one of which was linked to proposals to develop a major building at Brunswick Wharf. The idea was to install a micro hydro plant alongside the wharfside to generate power from the tidal flow which would have supplied some of the energy needed by the new building. With suggestions of a possible new development scheme in the offing I hope the idea will be resurrected. Putting such power generation right in the heart of Bideford would be a marvellous showcase – let us hope that the ‘red tape’ I referred to earlier is quickly cleared away. I don’t know if our MP reads my column but here is something useful he could champion.
Torridge received some good news just before Christmas when councillors heard that the Concessionary Bus Fare scheme had seen an underspend for the year of some £50,000. Readers might recall that this scheme gives free bus travel to all pensioners and the fear was that large numbers of tourists coming down to the area would take advantage of the offer – which had to be paid for by local council tax payers. A combination of bad weather and the credit crunch, however, saw a marked drop in tourist numbers in 2008 thus ‘saving’ locals the sum above. Unfortunately before councillors got too excited over possible spending on pet projects here in Bideford (and elsewhere) the Chief Executive pointed out that we were part of a Devon wide group of councils which had got together to support each other where financial problems might have brought disaster to individual councils. Sadly one of the group, namely Exeter, had made a loss of £1 million on these bus fares and so our money would be going to bail them out! Councillors did ask about local bus fares – where increases rapidly followed oil price rises but decreases didn’t seem to kick in as oil prices fell – as they have done precipitately in the last few months.
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