I think I’m right (open to correction anyway) in saying its difficulties didn’t arise from the composition of its digestate, but from the tariff support its gas didn’t receive.
That said, there was a labour cost to sorting food waste that wouldn’t be there with cut grass.
It would be a saving of 2.6m tons of CO2e according to MACC. Which in the context of Ag’s underperformance is not nothing. But still … there’s the whole land/food/fuel wrestlemania.
If only we had a published (and not muzzled) Land Use Strategy.
It’s a good opportunity for Gas Networks Ireland to rebrand their fossil fuel as Sustainable Gas.
The AD in Nurney mixes pig slurry with much of Tesco’s food waste, no grass as far as I remember. Packaging all turned into plastic fencing, furniture etc. Has a feeling of genuine circularity to it.
That was the theme of a programme i made last week bsky.app/profile/phil...
Our target for Anaerobic Digesters still implies using the grass of 120,000ha of farmland to make 10% of the gas in the pipes “sustainable”. That’s 3,500 farms. While we import 5m tons of feed.
This one makes my head hurt.
Everyone is guilty of thinking that the consequences of supply shocks in the carbon economy are only felt at the petrol pump. That’s mostly a failure of us lot in media to explain how oil seeps into everything. Nostra culpa
There are renewable powered alternatives to much of this. But only if other heavy users like Data Centres aren’t prioritised. Production of bio-fuels from feedstuff will have to be re-examined too. We are burning the equivalent of 15 million loaves of bread a day in Europe.
Landlocked Malawi gets 52% of its fertiliser from the gulf. 11 out of 28 districts have declared a state of disaster. When I was there three years ago farmers told me there was only one response to fertiliser price increases - plant less food
The Persian Gulf is deeply embedded in food distribution as well as fertiliser and agri- chemical production. Cost increases arising from the war will in the short term push an additional 45m people into acute hunger according to the UN.
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docs.wfp.org/api/document...
At 3.3% food inflation is already running ahead of general inflation in the economy. The Food & Drink Federation in the UK is forecasting that, even if the straits reopen permanently now, food inflation will be triple that rate by the end of the year.
www.fdf.org.uk/fdf/news-med...
15% of fossil fuels extracted each year are used to make fertiliser, run farms, process foods and transport them. In a very real sense our food is made from oil and gas.
We are about to feel a very painful food shock.
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First we convinced ourselves it wouldn’t be THAT bad.
Then we said it wouldn’t happen again.
Then we said it would eventually return to normal.
It wouldn’t.
There you go, you’re all caught up.
Schrödinger’s Strait. It’s both open and closed simultaneously until you try to sail it.
And a reminder that it takes the LNG equivalent of 6 barrels of oil to make a ton of urea. But we have more and more farmers successfully finding a way to zero synthetic fertiliser use. And zero fertiliser bills. #RTECountrywide
5/5
Listen: 👉 www.rte.ie/radio/radio1...
All across the EU govts are devising schemes to allow experimentation with electrification of farm vehicles. With the diesel bill of a typical 100 cow farm now being €10,000pa it’s timely. Ireland isn’t doing anything in this space.
#RTECountrywide
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Listen: 👉 www.rte.ie/radio/radio1...
The 400hp battery tractor that will put in an 18 hour day ploughing doesn’t exist yet. But the Chinese have hybrid ones already in use on farms in Germany, Poland and Australia. And they save 30% on diesel.
#RTECountrywide
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Listen: 👉 www.rte.ie/radio/radio1...
The battery tractors that could do the same amount of work as diesel ones around the farm yard exist. But … they are ridiculously expensive and need subsidy. The grid also needs 3 phase connections to farms to support charging. #RTECountrywide
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Listen: 👉 www.rte.ie/radio/radio1...
Oil companies are making $30m an hour in windfall profits. The Irish taxpayer is supporting oil exposed businesses with 3/4 of a billion € to avert disaster for just four months.
How do we avert future crises completely?
#RTECountrywide
Listen: 👉 www.rte.ie/radio/radio1...
1/5
This 100%. So much of this coffee house debate is actually delay. There are shovel ready projects and policy changes that only require political or corporate will to initiate them. They will not benefit from further ideological scrutiny.
Yes, I’m still waiting on an answer to the question, “How many farms have 3 phase supply?”. Everything else is moot without it.
I get your hesitancy. I share it. But I’d ask the farmers in Germany, Poland, Hungary and Australia using the hybrid tractors before I’d ask an AI chatbot
You can do it sideways now. It’s called fracking. None of this is cheap innuendo. Or is it?
The suggestion that Ireland should reverse the ban on drilling for oil and gas has popped up again.
I made a programme looking at this from every imaginable angle.
Listen: 👉 www.rte.ie/radio/radio1...
Spoiler alert: The arguments for drilling don’t add up.
History is repeating itself. A chance in this energy crisis to copy the choices made in 1970s crises by the countries now almost fossil fuel free.
Full documentary series free to stream here: youtu.be/F8vI5_gN90g?...
If this week is all proving a bit too much can I suggest you spend just a few minutes in the company of human tonic, Roger Corrigan.
#RTECountrywide
#LifeGoals
#SkydivingOctogenarians
Listen: 👉 www.rte.ie/radio/radio1...
The IFA president has said he will invite protest leaders to attend negotiations with government, meeting one of their early key demands. Francie Gorman did not ask for any easing of blockades in return. #RTECountrywide
Listen: 👉 www.rte.ie/radio/radio1...
Continued blockage of animal feeds leaving Foynes and Ringaskiddy raises fears of an increase in an often fatal metabolic condition called grass tetany.
#RTECountrywide
Listen: 👉 www.rte.ie/radio/radio1...
But only because you go there, surely?
We can probably just wait for Russia to come to us.
Price comparison websites suggest there’s only 2 cents between Ireland and Portugal.
Outrage is being manufactured.
