Woodfuel Quality Standards - new course available

Ignite is an innovative training programme of practical seminars and interactive workshops with a focus on woodfuel. 

Ignite is designed for those wanting to know more about woodfuel and to equip new and existing woodfuel businesses with the skills and knowledge required to meet the increasing demand from this growing market. Ignite courses have been developed and are run by RDI Associates Limited, a registered training provider with Lantra Awards and all courses are delivered by experienced and accredited trainers.

Woodfuel Quality Standards

This one day course introduces woodfuel suppliers and users to the full range of standards and quality assurance schemes in use in the supply chain and how to produce and specify the correct type of fuel. 

It looks at how to ensure your woodfuel is compliant with the Timber Standard for Heat and Electricity covering the legal and sustainability criteria and the requirements of the Biomass Suppliers List. 

The course also looks at how woodfuel properties can affect compliance with standards, how to specify and test fuel, and match fuel specifications to combustion systems. 

An introduction to BS EN solid biofuels standards will be provided, as will a review of the various woodfuel quality assurance schemes and the relevance these may have to your business. 

Finally, the course involves a practical sampling demonstration at a working woodfuel supply depot. 

Course attendees will also receive a copy of our Woodfuel Quality Standards Handbook and a Lantra Awards certificate of attendance.

Cost

1 day course - £140+ VAT

A 10% discount is offered to members of the Woodfuel Suppliers Group and Wood Heat Association. Please confirm your membership on booking. Prices include all course materials, refreshments, lunch and course registration and certification fees.

This course is being run in partnership with Forest Advisory Consortium England partners Woodnet and the Kent Downs AONB Woodfuel Pathfinder and the High Weald AONB.

How to book:

Phone : 01765 609355
Email : Erica.spencer@ruraldevelopment.org.uk
Post: Rural Development Initiatives Ltd
Unit 9
Sycamore Business Park
Dishforth Road
Copt Hewick
Ripon
HG4 5DF

Further details from www.ruraldevelopment.org.uk/events

Wood Heat Conference 2015 - Now open for bookings

The 2015 Wood Heat conference is now open for bookings.

Despite degression, the UK renewable heat industry continues to grow thanks to effective support from the Renewable Heat Incentive.

Of all the renewable heat technologies, wood and biomass heat is still outperforming all others.

The UK's dedicated biomass and wood heat industry conference will run three weeks prior to the Government's Comprehensive Spending Review, offering the opportunity to learn from the experiences of UK businesses and those overseas.

The conference has the sub-title “Raising Our Standard”, and speakers will cover subjects including:

• Fraud and compliance under the RHI
• Soft support for the biomass heat sector in Scotland, Austria and the USA
• Biomass CHP deployment in the UK
• Evaluating the in-situ performance of biomass boilers - results from DECC research
• The UK biomass boiler market

The conference will include a host of other subjects for all parts of the wood heat supply chain - installers and fuel producers/suppliers.

The conference will also include speakers from government, the Wood Heat Association and the Renewable Energy Association, enabling delegates to gain a thorough understanding of the opportunities available in the UK's modern wood heat and biomass industry.

The conference will take place on Wednesday 4th and Thursday 5th November 2015 in Bristol.

Full details can be found here.

South East Wood Fuels - Biomass open day

Green heat technologies more affordable with RHI upgrade

The Department for Energy and Climate Change (DECC) has announced changes to the non-domestic (commercial) Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI).

The main changes are as follows:

• Increased financial support for:
• renewable CHP
• large biomass boilers (over 1MW)
• deep geothermal
• ground source heat pumps
• solar-thermal
• biogas combustion

• New technologies added:
• air-water heat pumps
• commercial and industrial energy from waste

• An evolved approach to budget management:
• Improved market intelligence has been used to inform growth rates across the range of renewable heating technologies supported

The updated tariff table is shown below.

These changes are the result of co-operation between industry and Government, and have been welcomed by the Renewable Energy Association (REA) and affiliated trade bodies.

"The RHI is now a truly world-leading renewable energy policy," said the REA's chief executive Dr Nina Skorupska. "Almost all renewable heat applications are now supported under the scheme, offering businesses greater choice than ever before on how to sustainably meet their heating needs.”

The Solar Trades Association provided evidence to Government in support of increasing the 'value for money cap' for renewable energy support programmes, which has enabled support for solar water heating to increase to 10p/kWh (from 9.2 pence/kWh).

Stuart Elmes, chair of the STA Solar Thermal Working Group, said: 

"The extra support for solar heating means that the economics will now stack up for more projects. More swimming pools, sports centres, food factories and hospitals will now be able to afford year-round heating from the sun."

We have also proposed that future improvements should include front-loading RHI payments for solar into the first seven years, as with the domestic scheme, to help businesses get over payback hurdles."

Support for large biomass heat has doubled (to 2p/kWh), but this technology sub-sector still draws the lowest fixed level of subsidy of any low carbon technology.

The newly formed Wood Heat Association (WHA) announced its affiliation to the REA last week. Speaking of these changes to the RHI, the WHA's interim chairman Julian Morgan-Jones said: 

"Under the previous cost-control mechanisms, wood heat was being unnecessarily constrained in order to preserve head room in the budget for heat pumps that was clearly not going to be used. The revised cost control mechanisms more closely match real world deployment and will ensure that wood heat can maximise its contribution to cost-effective emissions savings and renewable energy targets."

The RHI counts towards the UK's 2020 renewable energy target and helps reduce the UK's dependence on polluting fossil fuels. The above changes came into effect on May 28th 2014.

Full details can be found here.