WPAC Report Stronger together By Gord Murray, WPAC executive director A nod to the WPAC and Canadian Biomass partnership H appy 10th birthday to Canadian Biomass magazine (CBM)! After having published its first issue in August 2008, CBM has emerged as the go-to source for biomass news and opinion in Canada. I began in my role with the Wood Pellet Association of Canada at about the same time as CBM was estab-lished. It did not take long for our two organizations to develop what has become an enduring, mutually beneficial partnership. Scott Jamieson — CBM’s creator and first editor — convinced me to contribute my first column in the March-April 2009 edi-tion. Since then, I have written a column in every edition and have frequently contributed feature articles to the magazine. Scott has maintained control over CBM, but has since moved up the ranks in Annex Business Media, CBM’s owner, where he is now a group publisher. WPAC is a tiny organization so we rely heavily on our rela-tionship with CBM/Annex. Here are a few of the ways they help WPAC: • Website: CBM/Annex hosts and manages WPAC’s web-site. • E-news: We rely on CBM’s e-news to keep WPAC mem-bers up to date on current issues in the biomass world. Whenever I have important news to share, CBM distrib-utes it through the weekly e-news, which is also shown automatically on WPAC’s website. • Annual conference: Scott and I had breakfast at the Cha-teau Laurier Hotel in Quebec City one morning after a WPAC member meeting in November 2012. It was then we decided that WPAC and CBM/Annex would part-ner in producing an annual national wood pellet con-ference. We have now held conferences in Vancouver (2013 and 2014); Halifax (2015); Harrison Hot Springs (2016); Ottawa (2017); and are back in Vancouver in September 2018. We attract delegates from all over the world to our annual conference. • Other events: Upon the success of our annual confer-ence, WPAC and CBM/Annex have collaborated on three annual safety conferences, several training workshops, combustible dust webinars, a co-firing conference in Edmonton, a wood pellet forum in New Brunswick, and many other events. • Marketing and promotion: Annex helps WPAC with graphic design services, brochures, social media, and other marketing materials. Besides my warm personal relationship with Scott, WPAC Wood Pellet Association of Canada executive director Gordon Murray (left) and Canadian Biomass magazine publisher Scott Jamieson at WPAC’s pre-conference golf tournament in Vancouver in September 2018. would like to recognize other key CBM/Annex personnel in-cluding: Tara Jacobs, our super-organized conference manager who does so much to make our events a great success; Ross Anderson, who in addition to serving as a member of WPAC’s board, handles all the sponsorships and exhibitors; and Maria Church and Tamar Atik, the two editors of CBM who keep all the news up to date and look after WPAC’s website. It is interesting to look back on our industry and how it has changed since 2008. • Global wood pellet production increased almost three-fold, from 11 million tonnes in 2008 to 31 million tonnes in 2018. In the same period, Canadian produc-tion increased from 0.7 million tonnes to 2.9 million tonnes. • Drax Power has emerged as the world’s largest biomass power station and consumer of wood pellets. Yet the SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2018 8 Canadian BIOMASS
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