Webinar 6: Biomass options for domestic heating

Decarbonising Irelands housing stock is a significant task that needs to be undertaken in the next 15 to 20 years. Current plans call for deep retrofitting 60,000 houses per year for the next 10 years so that these houses reduce their heating demand to a level suitable for heat pumps, or other low heat systems. With Ireland struggling to build 30,000 houses per year for a variety of reasons including labour shortages it is obvious that the plan to deep retrofit 600,000 houses by 2030 can not be achieved. Biomass heating with wood pellet boilers or gasification boilers offer the opportunity to dramatically reduce carbon emissions from houses traditionally using oil and peat, and to do so at much less cost than the deep retrofit / heat pump model. In this webinar we will discuss the costs and practicality of converting houses to biomass, and will discuss with technology providers the options available for householders.
View the live Webinar here and the presentation slides here
Speakers
Ger Crosse - WoodCo Renewable Energy
WoodCo Renewable Energy has become a leading manufacturer and supplier of residential and commercial Biomass Boiler systems. Their manufacturing facility is located in Tipperary, they have supplied over 4,000 boilers worldwide. Installations include pigs, mushroom and poultry farms, care homes, hotels & leisure centres.
In recent years, the company’s Research and Development team have begun to focus on complex waste-to-energy systems and Woodco has won several awards including the prestigious Green Product Award in 2018.

Colm Byrne - Glas Energy
Biomass combustion is a complex process from forest to flue. Often design issues only arise after many years of operation. It was for this reason that in 2005 Glas Energy decided to partner with one of Europe’s industry leaders, HDG Bavaria. Built on a tradition of heating with timber the Bavarian company manufacture a highly reliable efficient range of boilers to manage all wood-based fuels including sawdust, shavings, chip, pellet and solid timber. In this webinar Colm will speak about 15 years of experience with wood Gasification boilers in Ireland. He will highlight the importance of setting expectations, system design and components and the essential role that solid timber can and needs to play as a fuel source for both the rural home, local economy and national targets.

IrBEA Panelist
Noel Gavigan - IrBEA Technical Executive (Chair)