Nelson-based company biomass fuel company Azwood Energy is building a production facility near Milton to service a burgeoning biomass fuel industry. Azwood Energy general manager Brook Brewerton confirmed that one of its clients will be Danone Nutricia New Zealand, near Clydevale, which is building a biomass boiler. Progress on the new plant was fairly advanced, he said. A Danone spokesman …
The growing market for wood pellets
Discussions are going on about the EU-Commission’s new forest strategy. In the discussions, sawn timber is pointed out as a winner and bioenergy from the forest as a looser. Europe – the largest market for wood pellets The European market accounts for 75 % of the World’s consumption of wood pellets. WRI predicts a strong growth of this market, at …
The current forest biomass controversy
A major political and environmental dispute has been heating up as the forestry industry and governments promote forest biomass — cutting trees, turning them into wood pellets, and burning them to make electricity. They claim the science shows biomass to be sustainable, with the energy produced resulting in zero emissions. Forest advocates and many researchers sit squarely on the other …
Biomass energy from forests can be sustainable
The issue of carbon neutrality for wood-based bioenergy just won’t go away. In recent months, Politico, The New York Times, and CNN all have run high-level stories that take the Europeans to task for using wood pellets from the U.S. South because of concerns that wood-based biomass is not carbon neutral. The problem with all these stories is creating biomass …
Biomaterials paying dividends for forestry giant
The Helsinki-based forest industry company Stora Enso doubled its business result in April-June compared to the same period last year, said the company in a recent press release. The operational earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) of Stora Enso in the second quarter (Q2) was 364 million euros (429.5 million U.S. dollars), compared with 178 million euros in the same …
Another major switch to wood biomass
As Minister for Energy and Resources Hon Dr Megan Woods officially opened Fonterra’s wood pellet boiler at its Te Awamutu plant, the Co-operative announced details for its next site to exit coal – Stirling cheese plant in Otago. Otago’s ‘fantastic little cheese plant’, will be coal free and using wood biomass to fire the site by August next year. This …
Gasified woodchips power first commercial flight
UK-headed Velocys plc, a developer of advanced biofuels gas-to-liquids (GTL) technology has announced that sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) produced from woody biomass residue feedstock using the company’s proprietary technology has been used in a commercial flight by Japan Airlines Co Ltd (JAL). The flight, JL 515 from Tokyo to Sapporo, was completed on June 17, 2021, and is the first …
Biofuel truck use damaging to the environment?
CEAC warns that use of trucks with biodiesel will cause far more damage to environment than using electric trucks, overseas studies have found that production of biofuels for use in diesel truck engines will speed up the climate change, not slow it down as is depicted here from University of Waikato Troy Baisden, Professor (Environmental Sciences), University of Waikato. Growing, …