ENERGY
increasing the recovery of wood for energy Accordingly, not only in terms of being more fi nancial support and simplifi cation of
from managed woodland and other sources sustainable but also in terms of fi nancials, it planning procedures.
of wood waste products across the UK," as will help if the renewable energy scheme is There are, of course, practical issues to
well as increasing crop supply and the use of a combined heat and power scheme. This is be overcome too. Two of the challenges of
organic waste and slurries. presently an issue for biomass boilers since a heating distribution system are the cost of
there are technical challenges for such boilers the infrastructure along with the heat loss
Security of wood supply
to produce electricity. There are also grants sustained the further away the boiler is from
In many ways, the availability of waste available for renewable energy schemes. the heat user. An ideal customer mix for an
wood for local authorities has been largely onsite renewable energy facility is one that
overlooked. The advantage for local Energy saving report requires energy both during the day and
authorities is that they have waste wood The involvement of local authorities in night. This could be a data centre or a mixture
delivered to household recycling centres and renewable energy schemes was recognised of both public buildings, needing energy
virgin wood from parks and arboricultural in a recent report by the Energy Saving during the day, and residential buildings,
activities. Security of wood supply will Trust (EST) entitled Power in Numbers: the requiring energy during the evening.
become imperative when more biomass benefi ts and potential of distributed energy Again, local authorities have an advantage
boilers come on stream as there will be more generation at the small community scale. in the variety of uses of their buildings, from
competition for wood. The wood supply This report seeks to consider community offi ces to leisure centres, care homes to
will be more viable fi nancially and more schemes, as opposed to individual micro depots.
sustainable if it can be sourced locally. generation at home. It concludes that 18% of One thing on which there can be no doubt
It should be noted that screening the entire UK energy demand could be met is that the array of regulatory requirements in
processes have to be put into place to avoid by such schemes. Obviously, local authorities relation to climate change will not abate. The
contamination, for example, stones and nails. will be pivotal to the creation of this new government's recent report Defi nition of Zero
In terms of planning, the critical issue is industry. However, there are currently Carbon Homes and Non Domestic Buildings
to ensure that suffi cient details relating to the problems that need to be ironed out, such as (published in December 2008 - DCLG)
renewable energy technology are provided the feed-in tariffs and renewable heat tariffs proposes a hierarchical approach for meeting
at the time of submitting the planning mentioned earlier. The EST specifi cally the zero carbon standards proposed.
application for the building itself. One of the highlights the lack of "clear fi nancial drivers This will include energy effi ciency,
challenges is undoubtedly a chimney stack to initiate community energy projects", a lack carbon mitigation on site, and offsite low and
in relation to a boiler. The height of the stack of replicable models and, of zero carbon energy. This process will help
will be impacted by its physical location and course, a lack of available local authorities to look carefully at their
the size of the boiler. If the public building fi nance. They make a building estates and draw up plans for how
is multi-storey, then it will go some way to number of important the standards can be met. There seems little
camoufl aging the stack and, accordingly, recommendations, doubt that biomass will be fi rmly on
assist in planning. Consideration should also including the this agenda.
be given to any neighbouring residential introduction of
sites. a reward-based Stephen Cirell is
Private fi nancing of renewable energy support head of local
facilities for public buildings can be scheme government for
challenging. However, this can be helped by for such Eversheds and
the current electricity initiatives, namely the projects, JP Boutin is a
renewable obligation certifi cates (ROCs) and further senior associate
the impending introduction of feed-in tariffs in the company's
and renewable heat tariffs. commercial
group.
SUSTAINABLE SOLUTIONS April 2009 21
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