Peckham Power Post for April-May 2010
Upcoming event: “The Real Thing: Solar Hot Water”
- Wednesday 12 May, 6:30pm
- The Montpelier Pub, 43 Choumert Road, Peckham SE15 4AR (map)
Two different types of solar thermal panels (both photos taken by Johny M)
Three local people with experience of using solar hot water will share their experiences with us on Wednesday 12 May at 6.30pm, in The Montpelier pub, 43 Choumert Road, Peckham SE15 4AR (map). Come along to hear about solar thermal systems from local people who actually have first hand experience living with solar thermal systems, not salespeople. We look forward to seeing you there! Many thanks to Momo, the new manager of The Montpelier, for agreeing to host this event.
Updates
Power Meter project
A quick re-cap: the Peckham Power Meter Project has two broad aims:
- to provide Smart Meters to Peckham Residents to help us to manage our electricity consumption more effectively
- to measure and collect live information about renewable electricity production in the area and to display this on our website and in public spaces
We're currently developing the project and we're thrilled that we’ve now got connections to two local renewable electricity sites and we're successfully collecting live production data. Hooray! Many thanks to Donnachadh McCarthy’s photo-voltaic panels, and the wind turbine at TRUE (Trust for Urban Ecology) at Rotherhithe.
The TRUE wind turbine on the left with Canary Wharf in the background
A close-up of the TRUE wind turbine from which we're now collecting data
The grey box on the right is the communications device that Hugo has installed for us. It collects the production data and sends it over the local cellphone network. Ultimately this data will drive our online graph.
Live production data from the wind turbine. This graph is just a proof of concept. One of our next tasks is to commission a piece of web software which will make more user-friendly graphs.
The next stage is to get this local renewable electricity production information displayed on our website live, and we’re waiting to hear back from a website designer who may be able build the necessary software. If you know someone who could help us display graphs on our website that are updated with live data, please get in touch. We're also exploring the possibility of including 1st Place at Burgess Park, and the CHP (Combined Heat and Power plant) at Sarawak Court, Consort Road, as local renewable electricity sites.
We’ve developed the electricity consumption side of the project sufficiently to mean that we can now start test the equipment in real life situations.
The AlertMe base station
The AlertMe clamp simply hugs the power cable; it doesn't cut into the power cable. The AlertMe clamp communicates wirelessly with the base station.
We will start testing the AlertMe meters in 5 homes within the next couple of weeks. Many thanks to our volunteers for this: Jack, Caswell, Zaria, Magda, and Elsie. The volunteers will be able to keep track of their consumption on the AlertMe website
Jack's energy consumption as shown on the AlertMe website. The tall, thin spikes are the kettle and toaster. The regular bumps along the bottom are the fridge's compressor turning on and off.
Please contact us if you would like to take part in the project and learn about how to reduce your energy use at home as well as learning more about renewable electricity. Or you can learn more about the Power Meter project on our website.
Vote for Renewable Power!
Have you voted for power yet on our website? Even if you feel fed up with elections and voting, we'd really like you to support us in our campaign to get more community-owned renewable power production, so please vote for renewable power on our website.
Report from Green Fair in AREA10 on Saturday 17 April
We had a great time at our green fair with the 150 or so people who attended. The driving simulator, grant advice and demonstration house and loft insulation stall were particularly successful, and the refreshments provided by The Frog on the Green delicious.
The Energy Saving Trust's driving simulator
Dr Bike. Fixing bikes.
The new Peckham Power Energy Efficiency Model House, funded by a Cleaner, Greener, Safer Peckham Community Council award.
Discussing Peckham Power's draught busting project
Thanks go to all our volunteers who helped on the day, especially Daniel, David and André, EST/CENfor supporting the event and their staff team who helped on the day, Laura McCrea from London Borough of Southwark for her assistance in getting us Dr Bike, and supplying all the information on walking and cycling, The Frog on the Green for the catering and Southwark Greenpeace for welcoming people so well.
Website Changes
We’ve updated our website, trying to make it easier to use, with new, short pages on our current andfuture projects, and more photos. We've got other improvements planned, so we’ll keep you informed about these as they happen.
We’re trying out keeping a 10:10 diary on our website, as an example of what it’s really like focusing on reducing your energy use at home. Take a look and comment on the posts. We'd love to include some more 10:10 diaries on the website. If you'd like to share your 10:10 experiences on our website or if you're already keeping a 10:10 blog elsewhere then please let us know.
Goodbye and Thank You…
to Polly Raymond who coordinated and helped us organise all our meetings, a vital and huge task, thank you for all your hard work, especially helping co-ordinate our Low Carbon Communities Challenge bid. Best wishes for your other activities in Peckham – we hope you will be back in the near future.
Peckham Power and the Peckham Experiment
We were asked to give a presentation about our activities and how this related to the principles of the Pioneer Health Centre (also known as the Peckham Experiment), at a seminar on Thursday 22 April. The Pioneer Health Centre was an exploration of what made for people’s health, rather than a study of disease, based in the Peckham area between the 1920’s and 1950’s. It was a really informative event, attended by some very interesting people, and was particularly interesting to learn how many of the principles developed 70 years ago are still really relevant today. Thank you to the Pioneer Health Foundation for inviting us.
You can see the slides of our presentation here
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Contact Us
- You can e-mail us: info [at] peckhampower [dot] org
- Twitter: twitter.com/peckhampower
- Phone: 020 7617 7650
- Or take part in our online discussions: for example, active discussions at present include:
Originally submitted by Jack on Mon, 03/05/2010 - 5:23pm.
Last update on Tue, 04/05/2010 - 11:23am.
