Thursday 12th April 07

Up early again, and I have to go to Abbey to sort out the problen they're causing for YorkLETS. I was dealt with swiftly this time, and by an efficient person who understood the problem and hopefully managed to sort it out. Although she was able to provide the paperwork which will enable us to open our Co-op account, she wasn't able to give the passbook back or pay the closing balance, and she said that head office had no record of the passbook being sent to them. I'm afraid I will have to write to the Financial Services Authority about their appalling service. I will do this to try to protect other community groups falling foul of the same poor service and inconvenience and waste of volunteer time.

Anyway, left Abbey with some paperwork to pass onto Co-op. I visited another organisation's office about a book I'm writing (sorry this has to remain secret, but it's too sensative an issue to share in a public diary YET... when published though, it will be public!) After this visit I popped into Out of This World to pick up some items left yesterday, and onto Liz from LETS to drop off the Abbey info, but she wasn't in so I just left it for her.

Then I dropped into Miller's Yard where Dylan and Claire were just opening up. We discussed composting and other aspects of life, and I had a coffee mocha which was nice. The healthy living centre cafe sells Belu bottled water, which I met first at last year's Big Green Gathering. the bottles are made of a biodegradable plastic called PLA, I think polymerised lactic acid, which will rot in 'commercial' heaps which stay warm for ages. I am trying to compost one in my Compostumbler, which does get hot for weeks at a time. I won't be taking the Miller's Yard Belu bottles though, but I did offer to see if I could broker a deal between Yorwaste and Dylan, as I'd have thought that Yorwaste would like to do a trial in their big hot heaps.

Got home and took the compostables down to their destination and had lunch. Had a visit from a Freecycler I'm doing a swap with, he (David) had some blue storage jars and wanted some compost to add to soil to grow some salad in. Freecycle is rapidly becoming a social networking tool! He enjoyed the tour of the garden and we had some interesting chats.

I had to prepare some paperwork for tonight's CrUST meeting, and then go to an anti incinerator demonstration organised by YRAIN, York Residents Against Incineration who are lobbying the City of York Council and North Yorkshire County Council not to put in a PFI bid to build a waste incinerator. We stood next to a scaled-down chimney and I had supplied smoke pellets (from my environmental health training days) and the Press took photos. I personally don't want an incinerator built as they burn fossil fuel (plastics) which should be recycled and conserved for future generations and not added to the atmosphere as carbon dioxide. I also think there is more than a chance that human error or mechanical breakdown will allow dioxins to get into the air we all breathe, and we don't need any more carcinogens around us. Finally, having an incinerator alters the economics for recycling, making it less likely that there would be investment in materials recycling. As I'm pro-composting, I feel that putting compostable materials in with the plastics is a waste, and there is still a landfillable proportion left after the incinerator has done its work.

This demo only took 10 minutes, so I bombed off down the Tadcaster Road to pick up more Freecycled stuff, this time some plastic planters from Felicity. They'll be good for tomatoes and other crops.

Got home across the Racecourse, Millennium Bridge and Low Moor for ten to seven, gathered my CrUST stuff together and got to Space 109 on Walmgte for about seven fifteen, just one minute before Tracy who had arranged the venue and had the keys. The meeting went very well, Tracy chaired and there were several new faces and lots of contributions.