Industry Comment Mapping Success Putting Canada on track for a bioenergy-rich future requires some government action, and a little more co-operation. By Douglas Bradley energy costs, biomass rich-communities, entrepreneurs, sawmills, har- vesters, power companies, and pulp and paper mills have been exploring and implementing new bioenergy projects. The goal is either to bolster a conventional forestry operation or to start up a new, energy-based one. You may not have heard much about it, because the bulk of the projects are small to medium-scale, and attract little press attention. But a look at recent progress in biomass forestry projects in the Maritimes, Ontario, BC, and Quebec shows a hive of activity. Like the rest of the heavily forested parts of the country, a lot of new cogeneration projects are springing up in woody regions of Canada’s Mari- time provinces. Nova Scotia’s Minas Basin Pulp and Power announced a new cogeneration plant requiring 165,000 tonnes of green biomass an- nually. The collapse of Nova Scotia’s lumber industry and resulting fall in sawmill residues has driven the New Page, Neenah and Abitibi-Bowater pulp mills to take up to 150,000 tonnes of round wood for biomass fuel production. New Brunswick’s Irving Paper is increasing consumption of biomass from harvesting debris across all its mills. All this action means the Maritimes are demanding new harvesting THIS and production equipment: at least four industrial, horizontal grinders and chippers were purchased in the last 10 months and at least five more 22 CanadianBIOMASS year, bioenergy projects in Canada are on fast- forward. Fighting a strong loonie, a declining US housing market, rising oil prices, and high fibre and will are expected in the next year. Biomass heat and power projects in Quebec and Ontario are also on the rise. As this article went to print, a new project for a 10-megawatt CHP project was about to be announced for a pulp and paper mill in Northern Ontario, and Hydro Quebec was about to issue a highly anticipated call for 100 megawatts for power using forest biomass. PELLETS GALORE Another hotbed of activity is the growth of the wood pellet industry. Que- bec boasts six pellet plants, but interest from project developers is high and more are expected to come online in the next year. In the Maritimes, Enligna, the new owners of the Mactara pellet plant, have announced a plan to expand production, requiring an extra 100,000 to 200,000 tonnes of biomass per year. Nova Scotia has three plants with at least three more in the works, and two proposals for new pellet plants from major forestry companies. New Brunswick has three pellet plants, with another three under construction, and close to a dozen plants being proposed. Prince Edward Island is about to join the ranks, with plans underway for its fi rst pellet plant. Paul Smallman, a woodlot owner from PEI, recent- ly returned from Sweden’s World Bioenergy 2008, the biggest bioenergy Grinders and bush chippers have been fl ying off the shelves and into a forest near you as the industry adapts to changing market realities. AUGUST 2008
Canadian Biomass August 08: Page 22
