I’m Tom Beels, the newly appointed facilitator for the Glen Lyon Woodfuel Initiative, which was awarded a grant earlier this year by the Climate Challenge Fund (CCF). My role is to see whether it is feasible for the community in Glen Lyon to reduce its dependence on oil as a main heating source, by burning some of the low value timber that surrounds us. It is a subject that is close to my heart, having been lucky enough to work in forestry in Glen Lyon for the past fifteen years.

Glen Lyon, in Highland Perthshire, is a remote community of around 90 residents, strung along 22 miles of single-track road. As well as being one of the most beautiful areas in Scotland it is also heavily wooded. The recent spike in oil prices saw many of the people living here having to pay crippling bills to heat their houses. It is hoped that by reducing reliance on fossil fuels this initiative will help make life in this area more affordable. 

The initiative is also aimed at reducing the community’s carbon footprint and encouraging native woodlands in the area. Glen Lyon has recently been found to have some of the most intact woodland habitats in Scotland. By re-introducing traditional management techniques, such as coppicing, we hope to enhance and complement the wildlife around us.

As you can probably imagine this means that I’ll be very busy over the next few months. We have got to work out: 

• What is the demand for wood fuel in the Glen
• How big the woodland resource is here and how much can be extracted sustainably
• The variety of wood fuel heating systems available and which would suit people best
• How to harvest, extract, process and transport the wood from forest to fireplace, using as little carbon as possible throughout
• How to create as much local employment as possible from the initiative

I’m writing this blog because I think that similar initiatives could well be started throughout Scotland. There are a lot of remote communities out there, struggling to pay expensive fossil fuels bills with low value forestry all around them. We want to share our experience of using our local resources with others along the way.