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The trend towards cleaner sources of heat is stoking up the UK's biomass sector in a big way. With recent rises in the price of electricity from fossil fuels, and legislation to reduce the carbon footprint of new and refurbished buildings, wood-fuel is making a popular come-back as a cheaper and greener source of fuel. The sector is also supported by government grants which make it even easier for customers to favour a boiler fired by wood instead of polluting fossil fuels.

Since generating heat for hot water and space heating is responsible for almost a third of UK emissions of greenhouse gases, biomass can play a vital role in fighting climate change. The UK has a rich supply of wood including 'waste' from tree surgery and from manufacturing, most of which currently goes to landfill, as well as managed forests and coppices.

Wood Energy is one of the leading wood-fuel heating businesses in the UK which has capitalised on this growth of interest in the biomass market and pioneered many developments which are helping the sector to flourish.

To date the company has installed around 100 commercial boilers with a total heat capacity of 28 MW - more than one third of the total wood-heat capacity in the UK. These installations include the National Assembly of Wales, and the first biomass system in a UK prison as well as schools, hospitals, national parks, plant nurseries, local authorities and community developments. In addition, over 100 domestic boilers have been installed.

The boilers used by Wood Energy for larger installations are all high quality Austrian Binder boilers. Their design is high performance with low maintenance requirements. Careful control of the fuel and air supply ensures the wood is burned at high efficiency levels and the boilers are also able to cope with a wide range of moisture content, allowing flexibility in the type and quality of fuel.

About 17,500 tonnes of wood a year are used in the systems installed by Wood Energy, and the company has invested heavily in time and resources to ensure a good supply of sustainable fuel. It has helped set up three local wood-fuel supply businesses in the South West and Wales. They have also supported the setting up of the only accredited wood fuel training course for professionals, IGNITE. These kinds of initiatives are succeeding in removing some of the barriers to the growth of the wood fuel market in the UK.

Phil Cross, Site Manager at Guys Marsh Prison in North Dorset installed a 150kW Binder boiler using locally-sourced woodchip and explains "the workshops had temporary electric heating which was expensive. Switching to a wood chip boiler will be a fraction of the cost of electric heating and we estimate will save over 100 tonnes of CO₂ emissions per year".