Power cuts in rural Scotland

Wood burners exist where I live, clearly I wasn't referring to your particular source of pollution.

My post should have been better saying nothing on Mull today 😊 I’m not saying there was never any provision!

Hopefully this will be an ever improving picture as vehicle to load becomes more common - the battery on our electric car holds about 5 days worth of what our house uses and that ratio and the connectivity is likely to improve. I know this feature is tempting even some of the die-hard combustion lovers in rural America too.

If the islands are making more energy than they can use and they can't export it then load balancing with electric cars makes even more sense there than it does nationally.

There was definitely provision on Mull. I know of at least three places in different locations operating as welfare units, providing hot food at no charge (funded by SSEN).

I don’t think any of our rural wood burners are affecting your airways. I’ve no neighbours for three miles. You’d have to drive a mile down a private track to my house. Ban them in town sure but where we live, it’s survival. No fun being cut off by snow and no power and heat. Wood burner keeps us warm.

You get money for it too. We were off for 5 days in Arwen and got £800, plus money for food each day. You can also go to a hotel and they will reimburse costs.

It might be called the National Grid but the Scottish Islands aren't connected. And as a PP said there's no gas grid either. Most houses have oil powered heating or modern houses have ground source heating or small wind turbines. And open fires (cutting peat for personal use is OK, but most people don't bother anymore because it's a lot of work). When I was a child we had a small power station in the main town in Orkney, now the islands produces more wind and wave power than they can use but it can't be exported due to not being connected to the grid so there's a campaign to change that. Orkney has been at the forefront of the development of green energy for decades (the largest wind turbine in Europe was erected in the 80s).

For millennia humans have burnt wood to keep warm and a wood stove is a fairly advanced thing in comparison to the open fires of old. I can appreciate they are problematic in built up areas but I have one neighbour 200m away and the next is two miles down the road. Our smoke has zero / neglible effect on others but stoves can be literally lifesavers in a power cut.

@Corporatepreggolady you had a just problem more than an electric company problem.

"The big recent change that is of huge concern for us is the decommissioning of landlines to fibre. Our mobile phone signal often is affected - and so in the case of this recent power cut (for more than 24 hours, with mobile masts being down, and internet not working because of no electricity) in case of an emergency you would have had to drive over 30 minutes to even be able to phone for help."

Completely agree. This time last year I had no electricity, no landline and no mobile for 3 days. And for some of that time I couldn't drive to find reception because of trees down. It was quite sobering to realise you couldn't get help if needed. It also meant you couldn't find out when your power might come back on or where the hot food trucks were.

Not just the islands, vast areas of Argyll and the Highlands are off the gas grid too.

There was stuff available on Mull, not the food trucks but sse also work with local businesses. Thankfully most of Mull is reconnected now.

@ThisTicklishFatball absolutely.

The other thing is that they're not that bad at all in rural areas. My air is so clean I have lichen growing on the rocks in the garden, and me and all my neighbours burn wood and multifuel stoves in winter. We're pretty spread out.

We often lose power but our gas is still connected to an electricity run boiler so when the electricity is out, we have to rely on oil and wood.

Privilege? Nope. They just stinkt and affect my airways every winter, never mind the pollution.

Either.

one of my friends now have their own generator because of power cuts! It’s not much fun being in the Scottish highlands without hot water and lighting in winter! And it’s things like WiFi and phone signal too, they’re reliant on the WiFi for mobile use as there’s no signal. During the big storm (Arwen?) they had no power for days and the power company was telling people to order takeaways and they could claim to be reimbursed but they had no means of ordering one other than to drive to the nearest town with power!

Unfortunately, power cuts due to storms are common, and in far too many places, even a storm isn't necessary to cause outages. These issues are widespread wherever the infrastructure is poor.

@Icannotthinkofagoodusernamerightnow
Claiming that "wood burners are hideous for the environment" shows a lot of privilege. Many people depend on wood burners for survival, and it feels out of touch to criticize them for environmental harm while privileged individuals contribute to environmental damage through things like using the internet.

I live in a new house in rural England. We have a solid fuel Rayburn that will run the hot water without electricity. A log burner and with practice you can cook a roast dinner on the top of log burner. A very small 900w genny. It’s enough to power the central heating pump so we can fire the Rayburn up enough to cook on it and to keep the WiFi on otherwise we have no phones. We’re on beamed broadband and the nearest base station has 3 days worth of batteries.
It’s all about planning unfortunately

Little gas canisters or big refillable bottles?

Where do you live?

In some modern houses electricity is the only option.

Most people round my way have oil boilers or gas deliveries. Everyone has a wood burner or multifuel stove - you'd freeze to death in a power cut otherwise, no boilers will run without electricity.

I'm not in Scotland but live on the top of a very bleak moor on the border between N Yorks and Cumbria. We get a fair few power cuts and the weather is often dreadful. We usually don't bother with cooking when the power's out and just eat packet food until it comes back.

Gas cannisters are really hard to get hold of where I live, as already stated.

It’s not uncommon. I wouldn’t go 100% electric for this reason. As a resident we have a butane gas backup and we know who has what in our local area and who is vulnerable. As a visitor it must be tricky.