It's very red & extremely green, eats trees, and keeps us warm. A Grant UK biomass boiler was fitted in the Factorylux & Prelogram HQ in Hebden Bridge in 2012. It was installed under the Government's non-domestic renewable heat incentive (RHI) scheme and is an amazing thing. Although it burns wood, it's self-feeding (through a hopper, archimedes screw and chute) and self-lighting. And because the wood burns away to almost nothing, it requires very little in the way of cleaning and maintenance. Hats off to the manufacturers Grant Boilers. 
The economic benefits of the RHI scheme are unarguable. Before the boiler was installed we used space heaters - a spectacularly ineffective and costly way of not keeping warm in winter. The £17,000 installation cost of the Grant boiler and radiators was a cold financial blast, but everything has been cosy since. The wood pellets which fuel the boiler are from virgin timber harvested from renewable forests in Scotland. The pellets cost around £240 per tonne and arrive in 10KG bags on pallets or are pumped in by tube. The most we've burned over a week is a tonne - in the darkest, coldest depths of a Yorkshire winter. But it's usually much less and, with two shifts, the heating is on for more than 16 hours a day.
The heat-output from the boiler to the radiators is measured (in KiloWatt hours - kWh) and the number submitted online every quarter to the RHI register. The RHI multiplies the kWh by the applicable tariff - 8.8 because of the boiler size and installation date - and transfers the money to our bank. The tariffs have come down since 2012, but once a tariff is set for a system, it's guaranteed for 20 years. We're fixed until 2032. In 2014, we spent around £4,000 on pellets and boiler maintenance and received £7,000 under the RHI. All these people were kept warm and the spend on electric, gas and oil-fired heating was zero. Sometimes it is easy being green.
The economic benefits of the RHI scheme are unarguable. Before the boiler was installed we used space heaters - a spectacularly ineffective and costly way of not keeping warm in winter. The £17,000 installation cost of the Grant boiler and radiators was a cold financial blast, but everything has been cosy since. The wood pellets which fuel the boiler are from virgin timber harvested from renewable forests in Scotland. The pellets cost around £240 per tonne and arrive in 10KG bags on pallets or are pumped in by tube. The most we've burned over a week is a tonne - in the darkest, coldest depths of a Yorkshire winter. But it's usually much less and, with two shifts, the heating is on for more than 16 hours a day.
The heat-output from the boiler to the radiators is measured (in KiloWatt hours - kWh) and the number submitted online every quarter to the RHI register. The RHI multiplies the kWh by the applicable tariff - 8.8 because of the boiler size and installation date - and transfers the money to our bank. The tariffs have come down since 2012, but once a tariff is set for a system, it's guaranteed for 20 years. We're fixed until 2032. In 2014, we spent around £4,000 on pellets and boiler maintenance and received £7,000 under the RHI. All these people were kept warm and the spend on electric, gas and oil-fired heating was zero. Sometimes it is easy being green.
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