{"id":45988,"date":"2022-06-27T09:00:54","date_gmt":"2022-06-27T08:00:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jacothenorth.net\/blog\/?p=45988"},"modified":"2022-06-27T21:16:52","modified_gmt":"2022-06-27T20:16:52","slug":"gilestone-revisited","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jacothenorth.net\/blog\/gilestone-revisited\/","title":{"rendered":"Gilestone Revisited"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>I took a week off last week. It was too hot for blogging. For which we must all blame anthropogenic global warming. Then again, it might just have been normal summer weather.<\/p>\n

It certainly was when the rain arrived. So different to when I was a boy . . .<\/p>\n

Back then, summer started in mid-March, many over the age of 50 were dead from heatstroke and malaria by the time we celebrated the Feast of Saint Blodwen of Cwmrhydyceirw. And we played cricket ‘frae morning sun till dine’.<\/p>\n

Happy days!<\/em><\/p>\n

\u2666<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

BACKGROUND<\/p>\n

To get the background for this story – fast developing into a saga – you’d better read Green Man, Red Herring?<\/a> (20.05.2022) about the purchase, by the self-styled ‘Welsh Government’, for \u00a34.25m, of Gilestone farm<\/a>, just outside Talybont-on-Usk.<\/p>\n

According to the aforementioned ‘Welsh Government’, the farm was bought in order to be leased to the Green Man festival<\/a>. Yet the Green Man<\/a> submitted no business plan, and says it has no intention of leaving its current venue at the Glanusk estate, a few miles down the road.<\/p>\n

For these and other reasons I suggested the Green Man angle was perhaps a distraction. I’ll go further now and suggest that Gilestone itself might not be the thread to follow if we want to know what’s really going on.<\/p>\n

There seem to be two possible ways of explaining it. Both start from the same point.<\/p>\n

\u25ca<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

WATERSHED AGRICULTURAL COUNCIL<\/p>\n

And that point is the visit to Wales in March 2018 by a delegation from the Watershed Agricultural Council<\/a> (WAC), based in the Catskill Mountains of New York State. This trip was organised and hosted by D\u0175r Cymru \/ Welsh Water.<\/p>\n

It was arranged to coincide with the Watersource 18 Conference<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Click to open enlarged in separate tab<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This northern reach of the Appalachian mountain chain supplies New York City with its drinking water, and of course NYC wishes to ensure a supply of good drinking water.<\/p>\n

As the video below explains, legislation introduced in 1990 meant that water for NYC would need to be more rigorously treated, but one option was prohibitively expensive, even for the Big Apple.<\/p>\n

The need to find a cheaper alternative to the $5 – 7bn outlay on a new filtration plant led to the link-up between NYC Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) and Catskill farmers, foresters and others.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/vimeo.com\/148721900<\/a><\/p>\n

Following that visit to Wales in March 2018 for the Watersource conference the next contact was in June 2019, when a party representing D\u0175r Cymru visited the Catskills<\/a>.<\/p>\n

There was another US visit later that year. This time a D\u0175r Cymru representative and some Beacons farmers<\/a> went over. Among those who made this trip were Richard Roderick, who farms across the Usk from Gilestone, and Keri Davies of Crai.<\/p>\n

Representing D\u0175r Cymru was Nigel Elgar, the project manager for DC’s Brecon Beacons Mega Catchment\u00a0scheme<\/a>. So here’s another video!<\/p>\n

(How many more transatlantic trips would there have been without Covid?)<\/p>\n