Here in Llanbedr the hall is open most evenings and during the day, and we have a lot of thriving groups in the village covering everything from pilates and karate to Scottish country dancing.There’s even a railway club that comes here with enthusiasts from all over the area and they test the models they have built on a huge track that runs the length of the hall.
Private bookings
The hall has it’s own website http://llanbedrdc.co.uk/
You can book the Village Hall for private use. It has a kitchen facility, toilets, tables and chairs, and plenty of space. Ideal for children’s birthday parties, just bring your own entertainment. To make a booking contact the caretaker, Ron Bell: Tel 07535 898648 email- info@llanbedr.co.uk
Carbon Neutral!
As part of the Carbon Neutral project, Llanbedr Village Hall now proudly boasts:
- Solar PV (electricity generation) panels
- Solar Thermal panels (to heat the hot water)
- Air Source Heat Pump (to run central heating, including new radiators etc)
- Rainwater Harvesting (to flush the toilets)
- New double glazed windows
- Loft insulation
From Ruthin News
There is now a total of 4kW of solar panels on the south facing roof, which are generating electricity. The Feed In Tariff from these will bring an income to the Hall for the next 25 years. During 2011-12 these payments totalled over £1500.
This is what Ruthin News had to say:
A Denbighshire village hall is the most eco-friendly in Wales as it leads the way in the new green revolution – and makes sure it beats rising energy prices to stay open.
The weather outside may be frightful but inside Llanbedr DC village hall, there will always be a warm glow.
That’s thanks to a major £45,000 program instigated by the community council and led by renewables experts Carbon Zero UK of St Asaph.
The hall now boasts air source heating which will be part powered by solar panels and a harvesting system that has been retrofitted to the property supplying free water for toilet flushing all year round.
“We were losing money because our electricity and gas prices were so high and it wasn’t sustainable to keep the hall open” said community counsellors Jennifer Rowlands, chair the Village Hall committee.
We are always looking at ways of making it more viable and making it more environmentally friendly as well.”
Gareth Jones, managing director of Carbon Zero UK, who came up with the scheme, said “Renewable energy is definitely the way to go because there are so many incentives and that to public buildings like village halls as well as to homes and commercial properties.
“We’ve been to meetings in Village Halls where the place is freezing cold because they are so expensive to heat conventionally but here we have an integrated system that takes advantage of natural resources.
“Air source heating takes air from the outside and uses the heat exchanger to extract heat contained in the air naturally and then a compressor which acts like a refrigerator but in reverse raises the temperature from the outside air
It can actually operate when the temperature outside is -20° C and it’s so simple that it’s a fit and forget system because it needs so little maintenance.”
The air source heating is part powered by solar panels on the roof.
Solar panels
The roof is also used to collect rainwater in a large tank which then supplies water for the hall’s toilets to the tune of 50,000 litres of water a year and that adds up to more than 7000 flushes a year or 142 a week. This could be increased to over 16,000 flushes year if low flush toilets were installed.
The whole has also had loft installation and new doors and windows to make it even more efficient to run. Ms Rowlands added “We have been able to access funding from Denbighshire County Council, the Denbighshire Voluntary Services Council and from the Rural Key Fund as well as from the community council.
We’re even going to have an interpretative board at the hall explaining how it all works and we’ve had a lot of interest from other communities.