FAQ biomass

1. What is a biomass boiler?

A biomass boiler is a boiler designed to burn solid fuels classed as biomass. Such boilers can be supplied to burn every form of biomass from woodchips, wood pellets or logs to waste agricultural materials such as straw and grain husks, olive kernels, rice and the dust from any of these including sawdust. Boilers need to be designed to burn these specific materials, with any given boiler able to burn a limited range of biomass fuel.

Due to the lower cost of the Biomass fuel, you will save around 50% or more on your heating costs, and as biomass boilers are carbon neutral, you will completely remove your carbon footprint from heat.

As trees grow they absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, then during combustion in a biomass boiler an equivalent amount of CO2 is emitted, these amounts balance out and this is why Biomass is carbon neutral.

Wood pellets require substantially less storage due to their higher bulk density so less space for the fuel store is required also fewer deliveries are required each year. As pellets are made to a uniform standard and are consistent in terms of particle size and moisture, the boiler can be setup to maximise efficiency. Wood pellets will also produce less ash than wood chip. The main benefit of wood chip over pellets is the lower cost for the bulk fuel.

Yes, in much the same manner as any other boiler. However, as many biomass boilers operate at a higher temperature, and hence pressure, than fossil fuelled boilers, with some operating at above 100C, it may be necessary to fit a plate heat exchanger as an interface.

Yes, all but the smallest of biomass systems can be configured to work fully automatically. Typical automated features include time switching, fuel feed, de-ashing and flue cleaning.

Biomass boilers produce only a very small amount of ash. Generally the supplied ash bin will only need to be emptied twice per year.

All of our boilers have a facility to connect to the internet, online monitoring systems that allow us to monitor the boiler performance and condition. This enables us to look at the boiler from our offices and if required dispatch an engineer. Although in most cases we can rectify a number of common issues from the office directly.

In addition, the SMS messaging service offers us a direct alert if at any time the boiler displays a reoccurring fault could. This in most cases will be received by our team before the customer is aware of the fault. We carry a number of spares, ready to response to most common issues. We will although require that any boiler installed does have the appropriate maintenance package in place so that our staff are able to perform rigorous inspections at regular intervals to look for any issues.

Yes. All of our boilers are on the Exempt Appliances List.

As part of the installation and site visit we will schedule the installation at a time that suits you, and during the installation of the new biomass boiler system we will leave your existing heating system connected and operational until all is ready to make the final connection. Typically this means the down time on your heating and hot water will be no more than a few hours.