Wood fuel gets boost

17 April 1997

Wood fuel gets boost

RENEWABLE energy company North Energy Associates of Morpeth, Northumberland, has won a major European contract to promote the use of wood as a fuel in the north-east.

It is heading a £100,000 ALTENER education and promotion project to encourage the use of wood for heating as a substitute for burning polluting fossil fuels. Since the introduction of the landfill tax, producers of waste wood have to pay £17/t to get rid of it in landfill sites, explains Nicola Smith, a director of North Energy Asso-ciates. Instead of causing a tax burden, the wood can become cheap fuel, offsetting the larger, up-front capital costs of wood boilers, she says.

Seminars and visits are planned.