The main event on this trip was a visit to the new tram centre in Le Mans. There, we had an information giving session which the French also found very informative because they knew very little about it either. This was followed by a visit to the workshop seeing trams in bits and the electrical transmission units – the technophiles found this most interesting.
We also visited a farm which was part of a co-operative. One of their main crops was oil seed rape and between them they’d bought a processor. After the crop had been harvested the seeds were put through a press and the oil produced was industrial quality as to improve it to eating quality wasn’t economic. The waste was “minced” and made into cow cake, small cylinders about 1cm long which were used to bulk up the more costly food they had to buy for the cows. It improved the cows skin and provided nourishment. This machine was mobile and could be shared among the co-operative. This particular farmer that we visited, had also (through EDF) installed 140 sq. metres of photo-voltaic panels on the roof of his new barn which produced DC electricity and he converted this to AC and sold it back to EDF at a vast profit – largely because of the government subsidy. He made so much it was better to sell them all he produced and pay for what he used from the grid. The exact figures are unknown he was paid more than double what it cost him to buy and he received extra because he was a farmer and deemed to be diversifying.