News and events

Almost Spring 10

Hope that you are well and that you have successfully endured our cold, but bright, winter.

The Eco Home Centre has been busy preparing for summer by organising a range of talks for anyone interested in installing renewable energy or restoring their solid walled home (typical inner city terraces mainly). These courses will be laid on in the centre in Canton in the evenings so that all you day time workers have a chance to attend.

The courses will be:

Refurbishing Terraced Housing for the Future - this will be a 5 week course running on Wednesday evenings from the 9th June to the 7th July.
Here you will learn about the best way of making these old solid walled houses fit for the 21st century. The course will cover: the necessary background info on the history of the buildings, what they are built from and how they were originally designed; through the changes and materials that have been used in the past to 'improve them', and then onto the practical information you will need to them more airtight, energy and water efficient, damp proof, healthy and finally how they can generate their own energy.

The sessions will be 2 hours long and run from 6pm. Cost will be £ 70 for the five evenings.

Renewable Energy in the City - this will be a series of two hour sessions running in the evening that explore the opportunities for generating electricity and heat in an urban environment. We shall cover: solar thermal; solar PV; micro wind power; the new Feed-in-Tariffs; and the potentially forthcoming Renewable Heat Incentive. The aim is to give you a background to each of these technologies, to explain what each will and won't do and cover payback periods and costs. There will also be stands from reputable and well established renewable energy installers in the centre.

The sessions will be 2 hours long and run from 6pm. Cost per session will be £ 15.

Sessions will run on the following dates:
Tuesday 4th May
Tuesday 1st June
Wednesday 14th July
Thursday 5th August
Tuesday 14th September
Wednesday 20th October

If demand is great enough we shall put on some more dates, since we wish to limit the number of attendees to 12 in order to allow for a question and answer session and also some time to look at individual properties.

If you want to reserve your place please contact: training@rounded-developments.org.uk. in order to ensure a good attendance a 50% deposit will be required to secure your place at least 2 weeks in advance of the course date.

August will see RDE running an Introduction to Straw-Bale course close to Abergavenny as well. One of our friendly contacts is building an extension to his house and is looking to use this as an opportunity to teach people about straw-bale building. There might be a small charge to cover costs, but keep an eye out for more details closer to the summer.

Ian and I both attended EcoBuild this year and we managed to shift through the huge amount of information (and green wash) there to bring you some new ideas on improving your home. Please pop in to see what info we brought back with us.

Ian has also done a short video with a couple of University of Wales students about the Eco Home Centre. He was sat down, had a camera pointed at him and told to speak. 10 minutes later the girls were gone! The results can be found at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tfC9eai64qY

We are working closely with a team bidding for a large site in Cardiff and this has proved to be an eye opening experience for one so used to the voluntary sector. However, our ability to think from the bottom up has paid off, as we have managed to influence the direction and specification of the bid quite dramatically. For example, _IF_ we are the winning bid then the site (in inner city Cardiff) will have a series of self-build plots available so this will be a great opportunity for sustainably minded people to create their custom built homes in a very sustainable urban location. Great news.

Windows, I almost forgot. One of our customers has recently enquired about our ARU Joinery windows. She used the same specification to get a quote for the EcoContract windows from the Green Building Store. The result? We were 50% cheaper! Same spec, same quality, slightly different finish, but 50% off! So if you want some high quality wooden windows pop in for a quote.

On April 18th Ian will be running the first ever Brighton Marathon for charity. He has never run a marathon before and will be running with his father and brother. He has been very busy training (although due to all the biscuits he eats hasn't really lost any weight!!) He will be raising money for a local Brighton special needs school - Downsview school who are attempting to raise £50,000 for specialist equipment. Any help would be greatly appreciated, so if you would like to donate and support Ian please visit: http://www.justgiving.com/FriendsofDownsviewSchool. A massive thanks from Ian and the team at the eco home centre in advance if you can sponsor him for this worthy cause.

Anyway that is enough for now, but remember that if you are looking for great quality eco-paints and finishes then we are the place to come to.

Winter 09/10

What a lovely winter, properly cold and clear blue skies, well as long as you have a nice well insulated house that is. It is a reminder that it is recommended that you have approx. 1 foot of insulation in your loft these days!

The Eco Home Centre is currently enjoying a make-over thanks to the lovely ladies at Pink Hat Interiors. So next time you pop in please do remember that we have a resource room / library upstairs and pay a visit to the newly designed and decorated east-wing!

To further entice you into the upstairs we have recently increased the library and also had a very good sort out of the literature there (thanks to Yvan, one of our trusty volunteers). We are planning on putting in some tea and coffee facilities as well so that you can enjoy a cuppa whilst perusing the books and magazines. Contributions very welcome but no fixed fees for the drinks.

Auro paints have had a major overhaul of their stock aand pricing, which has meant that some prices have fallen and others have increased. The E-Shop is up to date and so please have a look to see what has been happening.

We have struck a good relationship with a local electrical wholesaler and so can now offer the full range of Megaman lighting products. There are even some external floodlights that only use 25w - a marked improvement on the typical 150w ones that you get from conventional builders merchants.

RDE has been inputting a lot of its ideas and knowledge into a range of projects recently, inc. the Construction Sector Plan of the Zero Waste Strategy, Penarth Pavilion, Valleys to Coast Housing Association and also all of the training and education work that we have been doing in partnership with Willmott Dixon.

The CPD sessions will be starting up again very soon and we are also developing a new evening course for local people about refurbishing Victorian houses. This will be a 5-6 week long course of 2 hours per week that will look at the construction of the houses, the issues associated with them and also how to remedy some of the problems that have been foisted upon them over time.

RDE is screening the Age of Stupid film on the 19th of February in the Eco Home Centre at 7pm, so if you haven't seen it yet, please book your place ASAP as places are very limited. Fairtrade refreshments will be available as well.

Please remember that the upstairs room is available for hire in the evenings. So far we have hosted: The Green Party, Canton Carbon Cutters, Cardiff Permaculture Group and the Civic Society, all of whom have found it a very pleasurable venue.

Autumn 2009

If you are stuck for ideas for people for the festive season, why not think about giving a present that saves people money! Not only do they great a lovely present, but they also get long term saving and the knowledge that you are actively trying to save them money. A win, win, win situation surely!

We do not supply the vast choice that many others do that fit into this, but we do have:

EcoKettles (we shall have the Eco Kettle 3 - with 3 different temperature settings to save even more £)
Efergy Energy monitors
LED and CFL lights (especially those which are not available in the mainstream stores)

Interflush and Mecon toilet retrofit water savers
Tapmagic retrofit water savers

All our normal products like paints and wood finishes are also great presents especially for anyone who suffers from allergies, asthma, eczema etc. We can offer a gift pack if required so that you don't have to worry about picking a colour.

To make this even better....

LED bulbs - Reduction in prices

We have just found a supplier of CREE (the best quality) LED GU10 bulbs in either 4 or 5w. These are direct replacements for halogen 35 and 50w bulbs, but have a 50,000 hour life as opposed to 2,000. Combined with a tenth of the power requirement during its life these are a real money saver for areas where the bulbs are on for long periods of time (kitchens / living spaces). It doesn't take many 50w halogens to create a large drain on your electricity bills. The 4w bulbs normally retail at £30 each, but we can now supply them at £23.99 with the 5w at £26.99 (inc VAT).

Other news:

UK Green Maintenance Conference and Exhibition

We are exhibiting at the UK Green Maintenance Conference and Exhibition on Thursday 7th January 2010 in UWIC Llandaff campus in Cardiff, so if you are interested in attending or even exhibiting please see the attached docs. For more info visit: www.ciob.org.uk/events/view/4715

Sustainable Building talks

The programme to date has been very well received. They have been practical, informative and very high quality. Just as we planned! So if you want to come along to some of the remaining ones there are still a few places left, so please let me know. Go to the website for the details on a pdf. See http://www.ecohomecentre.co.uk. Tomorrow is a Natural Building Seminar focusing on lime and hemp building so if you are interested in breathing structures that are really energy efficient then this is a great introduction for you.

'New' training space

With all the sustainable building talks on-going the pressure has been building to improve the upstairs training room and we are pleased to be able to say that we have been. Firstly thanks to a grant from VAC we shall be buying our own projector screen, blinds and also some additional bits and pieces. Also thanks to Cardiff's Freecycle system and some lovely people donating very good quality furniture we have some lovely comfy chairs and 4 wooden tables.

AGM

The AGM will now be on the 8th of December at the Eco Home Centre, so if you want to come along please let me know by the 1st December. It shall be a reasonably brief affair, but we plan on some port and cheese!

Canton Carbon Cutters

Canton Carbon Cutters are a new group of active volunteers who have been borne out of the Transition Town movement in Cardiff. They are providing a free service trying to get people to understand their energy use and providing some solutions towards cutting consumption to a more sustainable level. For more info please pop into the centre to pick up a leaflet.

School work

Ian has been to a couple more schools helping them to cut their energy use by understanding their buildings. This is a fun and interactive session with the kids and has been well received. So much so in fact that Ian is being filmed at Rogiet School in Monmouthshire doing his stuff.

A-Z of Eco Build web

Tantrwm from Aberdare have been in filming some 'chapters' on their forthcoming DVD and webcast 'A to Z of EcoBuilding / Living'. Have a look at http://www.azecobuild.com for an idea of what's coming up soon.

BBC Green Week

The BBC has also been drawing on Rounded Developments knowledge and expertise. So look out for Going Green on the 9th December on BBC1 Wales. Ian was, of course, chosen to head this up with his looks and 'green' fuzzy beard!

Cathays Community Centre

RDE have been working with DW Enterprises to get new designs drawn up for the proposed extension at Cathays Community Centre. We hope that this time the resources will be found to create an excellent resource for the Cathays residents. All is looking good and the business planning should show a viable centre.

Ruth's Durisol Block house is looking good

Ruth is building a new eco-house in Grangetown using the Durisol blocks to create a breathing and energy efficient house. She is nearly up to the roof line in double quick time thanks to the use of the blocks. Ruth's windows (supplied by RDE) will be here for Christmas and so we hope that by early next year the house will be watertight and looking even better with its lime render.

Christmas closing

RDE will be closing the Eco Home Centre over the Christmas period to give staff and volunteers a well earned break, so we shall be closed between the 24th December and the 4th January.