‘Green scheme’ will harness energy from crematorium to heat swimming pool
Heat from a crematorium will be used to warm a leisure centre and swimming pool in Worcestershire in a controversial green scheme expected to be approved tonight.
The Abbey Stadium leisure centre in Redditch will use waste heat from neighbouring Redditch Crematorium to conserve energy and costs. But the proposal, the first of its kind in the UK, has divided opinion and been described as “sick”, “eerie” and “insensitive”.
The Conservative council leader, Carole Gandy, said she expects the proposal will be passed by councillors this evening after its executive committee unanimously recommended going ahead with the project last week. “It has all-party support,” she said. “We estimate this method will provide 42 per cent of heat for the leisure centre, saving an estimated £15,000 a year. The use of waste heat energy is good practice and very innovative.”
Unison called on Redditch council yesterday to reverse its likely decision. Roger McKenzie, a regional secretary for Unison West Midlands, who has described the heating method as “an insult to local residents”, said: “It’s never too late for the council to reconsider its proposals. The big issue that hasn’t been considered is the very sensitive issue of consent: the council needs to explain how they are going to take into account the wishes of families who do not want their cremation to be used in the proposed fashion. Consent hasn’t even entered the public debate.”
I know these people are nauseating and invoke a gag reflex, but this is ridiculous. I didn’t know I’d need a barf bag to read this blog. ;O)
Who wants to sit around brainstorming such ideas??
Why is it such a crazy idea?
They have to cool the exhaust gases downto around 150°C so that contaminants such as mercury can be removed, so why not use that ‘waste’ heat for something instead of letting it go up the chimney.
Far from being a hairbrained ‘green’ scheme, it is the council finding a use for something that would normally be wasted, especially as energy prices in the UK are rising at a frightening rate.
Human Beings (and especially their children) are nothing more than waste heat factories anyway. Isn’t that how the narrative goes?
Human bodies are made mostly of water and require huge amounts of energy to be properly cremated.
Cremation takes up to 3 hours at approx. 1500° C.
Most of the energy used literally goes up the chimney.
All they are doing is recovering some of the heat from the flue gases and using it for another purpose.
I’m sure nobody has ever been concerned as to what happened to the flue gases in the past. Why worry now that they are being put to a good use.
With Manchester city council having just announcd the closure of swimming pools and other amenities as a result of the Government cuts, surely any way to save money and keep facilities open should be applauded.
More Macabre from the culture of death.
More ideas from the Manchester city council. Sequester the CO2 from the crematoria to be used for carbonating beverages at local swimming pools. No point it emitting all of those GHG’s into the atmoshere.
harvest the hair from the corpses to be woven into towels for the local swimming pools; Another good way to sequester Carbon.
Pull the gold teeth… Anyway you get the idea.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grbSQ6O6kbs
For me . . . an extremist is ‘anyone’ who thinks they get to (have a right to) choose for ‘everyone’ . . . .
If this community wants to recycle the heat . . . especially if it would mean less expensive cremations . . . who am I to dictate? Who are they really harming?
. . . except, maybe, someone’s sense of sensibility.
Laurie, I’m not a sentimental person about the body after the soul has left,(they can feed mine to the fish and crawdads of the Neosho when I’m done with it) but as Steven alluded, this sets a potentially sad commentary about what value we place on the human body. I don’t presume to know a better way to live, so I wouldn’t presume to tell people what they can and cannot do. But this is a bit Macabre as Justa points out.
Sure, people die and there is potential use for the remnants. But, I’m not sure we should put people in a position to where it may be beneficial for them if there are more “remnants”.
This story is like a bad horror movie. I am wondering if those who approved this will be happy to be in it? The greens can swim in it and eat those bugs they say we should eat instead of cows.