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Wales' first eco-friendly radio station is to start broadcasting via a hilltop transmitter powered by wind and solar energy.
Preseli FM broadcasts bilingually for a month from Monday on 106.7. It has just two presenters based in a Pembrokeshire church vestry.
It has mains electricity to back up its wind and sun power.
One of its two presenters, Huw Meredydd George said: "It's going to be a challenge, but we think it will work."
Mr George - a baptist minister in the village of Llandysilio - said the station would use the mast on the Preseli Hills to broadcast 24 hours a day to north Pembrokeshire and west Carmarthenshire.
Funding for the 28-day project has come via the European Union's Objective One scheme and from the Welsh Assembly Government.
"We can only broadcast up to 5km from the studio, but using the transmitter near Maenclochog, we should be able to reach as far away as Weston-super-Mare, Cornwall, and even southern Ireland," he said.
"The transmitter was already there, but it was only being used for local taxi signals. It seemed a good idea to try and be a bit eco-friendly."
Community radio
The daily running order of the station has yet to be decided, but its character is already well defined.
Mr George would be the first to admit that the whole project has shades of the TV series, The Vicar of Dibley, about it.
In one episode of the programme, actor Dawn French, who played the vicar, fronted a community radio station with a difference.
"We're not taking things too seriously," Mr George said.
"We haven't even worked out what to put in our programmes yet, and we've only got two presenters - myself and Marc Tierney.
"We're not having the traditional weather forecasts. Instead, we've got a local farmer - Twm Tywy' - coming in.
"Instead of talking about fahrenheit and centigrade, he'll be telling us more important things, like: 'It's nice enough to go to Tenby today', or 'It's ok to mow the grass'." |
