THE COUNTY CLARE WOOD ENERGY PROJECT

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• THE COUNTY CLARE WOOD ENERGY PROJECT
• THE STORY SO FAR
• October 2005 to December 2006

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Biomass in Context
Globally, biomass use amounts to nearly one
billion tonnes of oil equivalent, a level
comparable to the consumption of natural gas or
coal. This makes it the largest renewable source
in use today (source Renewable Energy World July
2005) - But awareness of biomass is very low (eg
94 never heard of it in Ireland)
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Renewables in Context

Across the EU over 7 of all energy used is from
a range of renewable sources. 51 of Europe's
renewable energy comes from wood (this is over
100 million cubic metres annually) In fact, 96
of all Europe's renewable heat comes from wood.
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Bioenergy Share of Heat Markets
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Biomass in Ireland
Biomass Use in Ireland
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The Projects Being Developed in Clare

• A programme of contacting and developing
  potential wood heat customers is ongoing and to
  date over 25 organisations or companies have been
  contacted and shown interest in the concept of
  wood heating WE WANT TO ATTRACT MORE
• 5 moved to tender in 2006
• Olympus 200kw rated system needing 222 tonnes
  of fuel pa
• Clare Inn 300kw rated system needing 840 tonnes
  of fuel pa
• Cahercalla Nursing Home 300kw rated system
  needing 425 tonnes of fuel pa
• Shannon Leisure Centre 100kw rated system
  needing 150 tonnes of fuel pa
• Spanish Point Secondary School 220kw rated
  system needing 200 tonnes of fuel pa

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Joint Tender Exercise

• Spanish Point, Olympus, Clare Inn, Cahercalla
  Nursing Home and Shannon Leisure Centre all
  participated in the design build tender process.
• A full set of detailed tender documents was
  prepared by the CCWEP. This contained for each of
  the 5 sites
• -Proposed Wood Boiler Installation
• -The Wood Heat Supply Agreement
• 7 formal tender replies to both documents

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The Results of the Tender

• 1.12MW (1120kw) INSTALLED CAPACITY
• 1850 TONNES OF WOOD FUEL PA
• TOTAL INVESTMENT 550,000 EURO
• SAVES 1850t of C02
• PAYBACK RANGES 2.75 8.6 YEARS
• AVERAGE PAYBACK 4.5 YEARS
• INCOME TO SUPPLIERS CIRCA 150,000 EURO PA
• DISPLACES OVER 700,000 LITRES IMPORTED OIL
• PROVES THE FUEL SUPPLY\INSTALLERS ARE THERE

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What we have learnt about the economics in County
Clare the wood heat price
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Oil prices in Ireland 6 cents a kWh for heat
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Installed costs in Clare
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Payback in Clare wood systems replacing oil
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How Can the County Clare Wood Energy Project Help
You?

• Reduce your energy bills
• By pegging your future energy bills to CPI and
  not the fluctuations of fossil fuel prices
• By allowing you to convert to the largest, most
  mature and reliable RE in Europe
• We can
• Help cost and prepare an outline wood heating
  plant design
• Help manage a tender process to install heating
  plant
• Help secure the 30 SEI grant aid and other
  capital funding sources that are planned to come
  on stream.
• Help decide upon suitable fuel and boiler
  maintenance contract.
• Help secure other reliable wood chip fuel supply
  from farmers\foresters and the wood sector.

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Carbon Offset
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Prospects for Growth in Clare?

• Wood fuel already has a 10 share of the EUs
  heat market.
• If this degree of market share was to be achieved
  in County Clare it would result in the
  consumption of about 120,000 tonnes of wood chips
  per year.
• This would require 160 MW of boiler capacity.
• From 2007 to about 2020 about 50 (250KW rated)
  wood boilers need to be installed each year to
  get to the 10 market share.
• This represents an annual capital expenditure of
  8 million Euro per year and 104 million Euro in
  total.

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The Available Wood Energy Technologies

• 1. Log boilers.
• 2. Pellet central heating boilers (generally for
  single buildings but with some potential to serve
  micro-nets).
• 3. Small-medium sized wood-chip boilers, 500kW
  generally for single buildings / users or
  micro-nets or small-scale community heating.
• 4. Medium-large sized wood-chip boilers,
  500-5,000kW providing for a variety of
  applications, including community heating.
• 5. Large-scale wood-chip boilers, gt5,000kW
  generally for large process applications or,
  potentially, large district heating.

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Markets and Prospects
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The Basics
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Where are We Going to Get the Wood Fuel?

• Residues and Short Round Wood
• Co-products from the processing industries
• Recycled timber

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Forest Resource in Clare

• 14.2 of County Clare is forested making it the
  fourth most afforested county in Ireland.
• It contains 6.8 of Irelands total forestry -
  45,000 hectares in total - about half of which is
  privately owned and half in state ownership.
• The most distinctive feature of this forestry is
  that about 70 of it is young conifers.
• This means that over the coming years the vast
  bulk of the timber harvest will be smaller
  diameter logs.
• The overall amount of timber harvested from
  forests must be equal to the amount of annual
  growth. This is known as the annual increment
  SUSTAINABLE

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Timber Markets
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Timber Markets in Clare

• County Clare produces about 160,000 green tonnes
  of wood and the bulk of this wood is exported to
  external markets.
• 60 of the harvest is saw logs and pallet wood
• 40 is pulpwood and stake wood virtually all of
  which is being transported to distant sawmills
  and board mills.
• County Clare has an extremely limited market for
  timber

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The Long Term Resource of Wood in Clare

• The official production forecasts
• 2007\8\9 260,000 green tonnes per annum
• 2010\11\12 210,000 green tonnes per annum
• 2013\14\15 275,000 green tonnes per annum
• 2016\17\18 330,000 green tonnes per annum
• 2019\20\21 365,000 green tonnes per annum
• These figures illustrate that the total amount of
  timber available for harvesting is forecast to
  grow from the current 160,000 green tonnes pa to
  365,000 green tonnes pa.
• This means that over 200,000 green tonnes pa will
  be available over and above the current market
  demand by 2019.

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Application of the Technology

• What makes an attractive wood energy investment
  project?
• Older gas, oil or LPG boilers
• Connected to an existing 'wet' system.
• Energy bills in excess of 30,000 euro per annum.
• A stable heat load
• Key decision makers open to the prospect of
  financial investment
• Willing to commit time to a development process.
• If you have this you will benefit....

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Heat Supply Agreements
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CONCLUSIONS

• WED LIKE TO HELP
• Least cost C02 savings
• Cheaper than oil and gas
• Resource available locally, and
• Job intensive
• Thank you for listening

• Tel [phone]
• Email steveluker_at_hotmail.com