Next winter's renewable heat arrives

The last five tonnes unloading at Cruachan

Twenty five tonnes of firewood arrived this morning in one load shared between three of us, If I had collected my ten tonnes from the Forestry commission at Torlundy it would have involved 1000 km  (600 miles) of haulage and a lot of heavy lifting. Having the logs delivered avoids wear and tear on me, the truck and the trailer.

Heating the house and hot water with wood is an attempt to reduce my carbon footprint. During the last twelve months it must have worked as it's all been done without coal. In winter I cook and bake on the Rayburn too. In a normal summer the central heating goes off in May and stays off until September. because a wood fired range cooker in summer makes the kitchen unbearably hot. This is when my electricity bill is highest for cooking, hot water and the shower.

Then there are the "wood miles" to take in to account, they've been cut by eighty per cent because it only travelled 100 km (60 miles) instead of 1000 km.

Of course it now has to be cut, split and stacked which is mostly manual labour plus a bit of chainsaw fuel.