Wildlife gardens, river sampling and wildfires
Plus help on heat pumps and celebrating our campaigning readers standing up for nature!
Good morning! I’m Sarah Hartley and this is The Northern Eco weekly update. As you’ve received this newsletter then either you subscribed, or someone forwarded it to you. If the latter, then you can click on this handy little button below.
Before we get into the news round up for the week……..
Regular readers may remember the story of a potential housing development next to Ferryhill Carrs nature reserve which we exclusively revealed in a collaboration with the Ferryhill & Chilton Chapter last month. Well now we can report it has prompted concerned residents to take action.
A spokesperson for the newly formed residents group said: “There were almost 40 attendees along with another dozen who contacted by email but couldn’t make it to the meeting, and it proved that there was a solidarity amongst the residents against the proposals.
“No matter how small they might think it is, nothing is insignificant and everybody’s voice and opinion counts.”
We couldn’t agree more and will bring you updates in due course.
Now to the news of the week which includes:
How technology is being used to map single trees
£Millions to alleviate flooding in North Yorkshire
The threat of wildfires
What sort of heat pump do I need?
If you’re considering a heat pump for your home, this piece of research from Nesta could be invaluable reading. Researchers Liz Gallagher, Roisin Gorman, Aidan Kelly and Seth Caldwell have produced this report identifying the most suitable low-carbon heating technology for neighbourhoods in Great Britain.
Through their work you can discover which parts of Britain are most suitable for different heat pump technologies using the dataset, and how these insights can help aid local energy planning conversations. They say:
“To decarbonise home heating, we will need to find the right heating technology for different homes. The Climate Change Committee is clear that heat pumps will be the most important technology for clean heating, but there are many types of heat pump to choose from and the right choice often depends on the area you live in. Some areas will be more suited to shared low-carbon heating systems such as heat pumps with shared ground loops (SGL) or heat networks (HN), other areas may be suited to individual systems such as air source heat pumps (ASHP) and ground source heat pumps (GSHP), and some areas will require a mix. Sometimes the factors that determine suitability may be simple, for example sparsely populated areas will only be suitable for individual systems. However, in many areas the factors that determine suitability are more complex - something which we will explore further later on in this data story.
“Over the last year, we have been curating an open dataset which allows us to make predictions about heat pump suitability across Great Britain at a neighbourhood level.”
The three most clicked links from last week were:
Peatland burning ban aims to protect wildlife and England’s carbon stores
River news
💦 Campaigners at River Action UK have recruited business woman and Dragon’s Den star Deborah Meaden to call for urgent action to protect rivers by taking part in a critical public consultation. The Independent Water Commission is currently asking the public for their views and experiences. This consultation is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to shape future legislation, the management of the water sector, and the fate of rivers for decades to come. To help complete the consultation they have produced this toolkit. Consultation closes 23rd April.
💦 This report presents the findings of a 12-month CRKC citizen science project carried out to assess the health of Cumbria’s River Kent. The study was conducted within the FreshWater Watch (FWW) framework. Following a pilot study, 246 water samples were collected by 46 volunteers, between 1 September 2023 and 31 August 2024 from 19 locations on the river Kent and it’s tributaries.
Other news
🌳 Trees that grow outside of woodlands have been mapped by satellite and laser for first time revealing they make up 30% of nation’s tree cover. The innovative map went live on Saturday and is now free to download from the Forestry Commission open data download website National Trees Outside Woodland Map. The idea is that by providing a better national picture, the groundbreaking map will allow conservation groups and local authorities to target tree planting efforts more accurately. The map can pinpoint lone trees that could be connected to nearby wooded areas to create better habitat for wildlife in support of the Government’s manifesto commitment to expand nature-rich habitats and help achieve its legal target to increase England’s woodland canopy to 16.5%. (Defra press release)
£9.7m to tackle flooding in York and North Yorkshire
The Mayor of York and North Yorkshire has welcomed £9.7m in funding to protect communities from flooding.
🌿 Yorkshire Wildlife Trust is encouraging gardeners across the county to make a real difference for wildlife on their doorsteps, and collect a prized Wildlife Gardening Award. Alongside the awards, the Trust has also built a free online Wildlife Gardening Hub, which includes an extensive amount of toolkits on how to build various wildlife gardening features in gardens, how to survey wildlife and inspiration for gardeners looking to start out. More on that here.
⛏️ Whitehaven coalmine’s planning application has been withdrawn, bringing an end to a process that could have created the UK’s first deep coalmine in 30 years in Cumbria, reports Helena Horton at The Guardian.
Wider ban on heather burning ‘risks catastrophic wildfires’
Plans announced this week by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) would extend a ban introduced in 2021 to a further 146,000 hectares of deep peat uplands including large swathes of moorland in the Yorkshire Dales, the North York Moors and the Peak District.
🌏 The Great North Fen initiative, spearheaded by Durham Wildlife Trust, focused on rejuvenating 60 hectares of lost wetland recently received a boost from Lockheed Martin Space employees, offering both funding and manpower. Gavin Engelbrecht at The Northern Echo has more.
🌿 Swinton Estate, near Masham, has gained planning approval to create the first habitat bank in Yorkshire - a move which aims to foster development, whilst helping the environment, reports Darren Greenwood at the York Press.
🐄 Renowned animal rights campaigner Heather Mills joined the Animal Justice Project’s (AJP) protest outside Lowfields Farm in Northallerton on Saturday.The protest took place in the wake of Arla suspending a farmer after an AJP investigation found cows on the farm had been punched and kicked. The Yorkshire Post’s Jonathan Pritchard has more.
Thank you for reading edition number 129 of The Northern Eco. If you feel having this independent, free unless you want to pay and ad-free newsletter is worth a few of your hard-earned £, now’s the perfect join our paying subscribers. The main newsletter is sent out at 7am every Tuesday and can’t exist without paying subscribers. 🙏