Week 47 & 48
A couple of weeks
This was in the Guardian last Sunday - ahead of UN conference/talks
The world will be “unable to cope” with the sheer volume of plastic waste a decade from now unless countries agree to curbs on production, the co-chair of a coalition of key countries has warned ahead of crunch talks on curbing global plastic pollution.
Speaking before the final, critical round of UN talks on the first global treaty to end plastic waste, in Busan, South Korea, this week, Norway’s minister for international development, Anne Beathe Tvinnereim, acknowledged the split that had developed between plastic-producing countries and others. She represents more than 60 “high ambition” nations, led by Rwanda and Norway, who want plastic pollution tackled over its full life cycle. Crucially, this means clamping down heavily on production.
Almost €700 million worth of bicycles were reported stolen in the Netherlands last year, up €230 million on 2021, according to figures from national statistics agency CBS.
In total, 980,000 bikes were taken, and e-bikes are increasingly in demand, the agency said.
While the average price of a stolen bike was around €350, the most expensive was worth €800, and that is a rise of €110 on two years ago.
The Cost of Water
Dutch residents can expect a significant increase in how much they will spend on their water bills for 2025. Many water companies in the Netherlands including Vitens, the largest local water board (waterschap) in the country, have announced plans to implement price increases for water in different regions.
Our own supplier is Vitens. I record the bills each month. At the moment we're paying for current water use, current (estimated) treatment and last year's (actual) treatment. They make it very clear in the bills with monthly payments recorded as "3 of 10", for example.
Vitens raising water rates in 2025
As the local water supplier for the provinces of Utrecht, Gelderland, Overijssel, Flevoland and Friesland, Vitens' water price hike will impact around 6 million households in the Dutch cities it serves. From January 1, 2025, houses that have water supplied by Vitens will see the price per cubic metre (1.000 litres) increase by 0,21 euros from 1,04 to 1,25 euros.
This works out to around 23 euros more per year for a two-person household and 43 euros extra annually for a four-person household. The higher rates will go towards investments that will ensure that the company can continue to provide clean drinking water. “This includes replacing and installing (new) pipes, looking for new locations to pump up groundwater and building new production locations where we purify groundwater and surface water into fresh and clean drinking water,” said chairman of Vitens, Tjeerd Roozendal in a statement.
Around the Farm
Typically, not much happening at this time of the year. We've finished our insulation works for the time being. Tjeerd spends almost a full week doing the Christmas decorations...
We've put the outdoor furniture away and turned off the outside water (to avoid freezing pipes).
Quite a few storms recently...all the leaves are well and truly blown off the trees...and lots of water!
Some "boatie" friends in England have their boat moored at Heerenveen - due to illness, they have not been able to attend to a leaking wheelhouse...they had a quote, but the supplier wouldn't do the work unless someone signed for it - so a bit of a dilemma..
Tjeerd and I will go down on Monday and try to rig an old tarpaulin over it as at least a temporary fix...nice to be asked and even nicer to help out if we can...The name of the boat is "Kabouter" (dwarf). It is actually quite big but when they took delivery they felt dwarfed in a lock with big ships... hence the name.
And today off to Amsterdam to pick Ben up and then on to Schiphol to pick daughter Cheryl up...looking forward to a couple of lovely weeks :-)
Just on Ben.... he does freelance work and is currently employed "freelance" by the Government - working from home and Den Hague- but with the new government they are tightening up on the rules about freelance - if it looks too much like "real" employment then it has to be offered as such...it won't suit Ben to be tied down, so he may be out of that particular job. It will have an even more dramatic effect in the building industry where it suits both employer and employee to have the freelance arrangement...interesting to see what happens.
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