Biomass Boiler Case Study
Articles
Roundstone Nurseries
The project involved the installation of a 995kW Justsen Woodchip boiler supplied by Core Biomass, along with a Javo International Toploader fuel handling system.
The boiler is located inside the existing glasshouse, while the Javo Toploader was installed outside onto the existing road surface, and included a polytunnel roof bolted to the Javo frame. This eliminated the need for a new fuel store building, and a new concrete floor which often forms a significant cost for biomass projects.
The Toploader provides a “hands free” fuel handling system, where the fuel is delivered in walking floor trucks, and is then scraped up by the large rake within the Javo. There is no need to load or move wood with a telehandler etc.
The boiler is controlled by the greenhouse computer system, and therefore produces only the amount of heat that is required. If the boiler cannot supply sufficient heat in cold weather, the gas boiler pumps are automatically ramped up to provide the heat deficit. Load on the biomass is therefore always optimised, increasing the running hours and therefore the savings on fossil fuel and RHI income from the plant.
The Justsen boiler was chosen because it can burn wood chip with a higher moisture content than most biomass boilers, and is also certified to burn high grade waste wood if required. When ordered with a ceramic lining, the Justsen boiler can burn wood with a moisture content up to 50%.
John Polman, Operations manager for Roundstone nurseries says:
“As a company we made the decision to have a Biomass boiler installed relatively late, this combined with some speculation as to the level of RHI available after this last April, resulted in us having to set Bridge some challenging targets and deadlines. Nevertheless, with only days to spare Bridge managed to commission our complete setup on time and it has been working well ever since.
We went for the Jutsten Boiler as we were of the opinion that this boiler would be robust enough to see us through the next 20 years without too many repairs and would also allow us the opportunity to burn a wide range of wood fuels. In addition to this we decided on a Javo top loader to handle our wood fuel, and along with the Fordingbridge roof it allowed us to place the complete system outside only needing to give up a small amount of valuable inside space to house the boiler.
“Our overall experience working with Bridge has been very positive and we hope that we will be able to repeat this for future projects.”