[Dottore]

Originally Posted by oldE

Here in the Annapolis Valley of western Nova Scotia, we have been doing the 'trash sort' for years. It helps there is a cardboard recycling plant in the area. The system is far from perfect, but it does help.

I was a while getting on to the grocery bag idea. Finally got enough bags for a 'full load' in each vehicle and return the bags to the vehicle when they are emptied. That way, they are there when one of us realizes we have to pick up something.

29 years ago, we built a house with 6" of insulation in the walls and 80% of the windows facing south. On nice days in the winter it relies on passive solar. I built a solar collector a few years ago to heat a rock 'heat sink' under the floor of the sun room. I usually see temps around 50 degrees C in the air going down to the rocks during the day. The only problem with the system is I failed to put enough insulation around the rocks when I built the heat storage twenty four years ago.
Last winter I installed solar domestic hot water (vacuum tube system which works very nicely even at -20 degrees C) and have been very pleased with its performance. I am in the middle of trying to add a space heating loop to the tank, which might help heat the house through the night if there is some hot water to spare. We'll see,

Does it count I am on my 4th diesel VW? the last two are able to travel 1100 km on a tank in cruise (only about 1000 km on my wife's daily commute).

I have pumpkin cooking at the moment. My wife does the garden ever since the asparagus incident of '95. Most of our potatoes come from our garden, as do the carrots, garlic, onions and seasonal veggies and tomatoes. Apples come from a local producer (can't quite see his farm from my front window, trees in the way), maple syrup comes from my brother in law. No big things, but a lot of things that work for us and help support our community.

Les

That's pretty damn impressive! Well done.