New Plan Calls for Wood Chips to Fuel Public Buildings

An Eastern Canada-based company is looking to boost its current operations while both clearing trees from forests and helping those forests to thrive.

PEI Bioheat, operating under the umbrella of Atlantic BioHeat, is proposing to use wood chips harvested through the thinning of Prince Edward Island forests to provide a natural fuel source for a total of 32 publicly-owned sites, including government buildings.

Some of PEI’s forests are currently overly dense, making it difficult for trees to thrive. By thinning the trees, PEI Bioheat would actually boost the long-term health of the forests while creating a renewable and environmentally-friendly fuel source to heat the buildings.

The wood chips would be harvested from areas of the forest on a rotational basis.

According to research conducted by the company, only three per cent of the trees would have to be culled to provide enough wood chips to provide fuel for 32 furnaces for the next 10 to 15 years. That would mean a reduction in oil consumption of roughly four million litres a year, offering immediate environmental benefits.

Furthermore, the energy produced by burning the wood chips would have a minimal environmental impact of their own. The carbon emissions created by burning the wood chips are considered clean as the chips would normally have released a similar amount of carbon due to natural decomposition or by being burned in forest fires.

The impact of such emissions are typically short-lived, so provided the company sticks to its goals and does not overharvest PEI forests, it will provide multiple benefits to the environment.

The company is currently vying for a government tender spanning 20 years. The request for proposal, put out last fall, calls for bidders to provide biomass heating for 22 schools, four manors, three hospitals and the provincial correctional facility.

Atlantic BioHeat is already a player in the biomass energy game, providing heating for two schools.

By Richard Barnes