Latest update from the Abbot's Mill Project

The various projects being undertaken by the people at the Abbot's Mill Project are really beginning to gather momentum.  The following is an update from Jo and Terry who are running the programme.

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Energyshare

As you may know, we are applying to the British Gas Energyshare fund for the water-wheel element of the project. We are working with Pico Energy on this. Pico are micro-hydro specialists (http://www.picoenergy.co.uk/) just a reminder to please sign up (if you haven't already) as a supporter for our application to the Energyshare Fund – and please pass on to all your family and friends and ask them to do the same.

http://www.energyshare.com/abbots-mill-project/followers/

We have until this Friday (30th) to submit our application and we still need as many supporters signed up to our group as possible. Also, if you have time, it would be really helpful if you could add a word or two when you sign up explaining why you are supporting our project and how you would like to get involved.

If you have even more time, it would be really great if you could send a letter of support as I can then upload these with our online application. Please let me know if you can do this and I will send you a postal address.

Funding

We still need to apply for more grant-funding to move the project forward. If you are good at writing funding applications please do get in touch as the more of us working on this element of the project the better!

Canterbury 4 Business meeting

We recently met with the Canterbury 4 Business Environment Group last week. This group is soon to merge with the Canterbury City Partnership Environment Group.We had a really positive meeting and would like to thank everyone for their support. We had several offers of support/funding in kind, which is fantastic. People were really enthusiastic about the project and the meeting has given us a big boost. Thanks to everyone involved.We will keep you informed of developments with these exciting partnerships.

Garden

Steve Matthews (from Emergent Research and Consulting) will be working with Dawn Sahathevan (from the Abbot’s Mill Project) to design and develop the organic permaculture garden. Our aim is to involve lots of local people in this and to open it up as a training opportunity in permaculture and stock-free organic gardening.

Steve and Dawn met this week to discuss ideas and we hope that this part of the project will begin in October. They will be looking for volunteers to help with the work so do please contact us if you are interested.

We will be laying a hedge around the site – this will be a mixture of yew, beech and hawthorn. This is an excellent mixture in terms of attracting native wildlife and will also provide an attractive hedge all year round.

Starting to generate electricity from the sun

We are applying to Canterbury City Council to install 60 solar (photo-voltaic) panels on piece of land north of St Peter’s Lane. These would be temporarily stand alone and would eventually be added to the roof of the new building. In the meantime, if we can start generating clean electricity from the site we can gain an income from the Government’s Feed in Tariff which will then enable us to further develop the project.

We are working on the planning application as we speak and we need to have some more surveys done, including a desk-top archaeological survey. We are speaking with Canterbury Archaeological Trust about this.

Information Board

Our next plan is to add an information board to the north site so that people can see what the project is all about and what we plan to do, and why. Peter Scutt from Whitefriars has kindly offered the services of their PR team to help us with developing some excellent promotional and publicity material. A huge thanks to Peter.

Thank you to Moorespace Architects

A big thank you to Moorespace (our architects) who have already put a lot of work into the project and continue to support and advise us in many ways.

And finally...A big thank you again to all of you who have signed up as supporters and offered your help to the project. We will be in touch with you about how you could be involved.

If you haven’t yet signed up, please do contact us. We really want the whole project to involve, and be run by, the local community so we are looking forward to hearing from you.

All the best, Jo and Terry On behalf of The Abbot’s Mill Project

Jo Kidd
Director
The Abbot's Mill Project Community Interest Company
Tel: 07912 087599