Biomass, energy efficiency and hydroelectric development, if taken together, could save Juneau ratepayers more than half of their energy bill by 2016.
The Alaska Energy Authority recently released its draft Southeast Alaska Integrated Resource Plan, a plan for region-wide energy development. AEA contracted consultants Black and Veatch to complete the draft.
One of the plans more controversial recommendations is to expand the use of biomass fuel to heat homes in southeast Alaska.
Devany Plentovich, AEA Biomass Program Manager, talked about the role biomass could play in a southeast energy paradigm to the House Special Committee on Economic Development, Trade and Tourism on Tuesday.
Three-quarters of the energy costs for Juneau ratepayers comes from space heating, Plentovich said.
Many homeowners and businesses have reacted to volatile fossil fuel prices by replacing diesel heating with electric sources.
This has used up much of the reserve built into southeast’s existing hydro infrastructure, she said.
“So much so that some utilities must burn expensive diesel in winter months,” Plentovich said.
Adopting cord wood, wood chip or wood pellet biomass for space heating could free up current hydro assets and reduce the amount of electricity generation needed in the future.
AEA says it could also save Alaskans money.
To reach the full potential of cost saving, AEA recommends a combination of building new hydroelectric projects, improving the energy efficiency of homes, businesses and public spaces along with adopting biomass heat.
As an example, Plentovich said Angoon residents currently pay $350 each month to their heat homes. Without adopting AEA’s recommendations, that price is expected to rise to $426 by 2016.
With the recommendations, Angoon households will see their bills drop to about $180.
The $225 Juneau residents on average currently pay for heating could drop to $129 per month by 2016, or rise to $312 if nothing changes.
Sealaska Corp. installed a wood pellet biomass boiler in its Juneau office building. Plentovich said savings from the boiler could pay back its cost within four years.
Alaska currently has only small-scale pellet manufacturers, Plentovich said. Sealaska ships wood pellets for its boiler from the Pacific Northwest.
At the source, pellets go for about $150 to $170 per ton.
After shipping Alaskans pay about $240 for that same ton.
However, even though shipping accounts for half the price, wood pellets are competitive with hydro and half the price of diesel.
AEA assumes that Southeast will need to import pellets for some time to come. Increased demand could make a local pellet market feasible, Plentovich said.
• Contact the reporter Russell Stigall at 523-2276 or russell.stigall@juneauempire.com
Comments (30)
Add commentImported Pellets?? Buy Local??
What's the biproduct of clearcut logging--hummm? This proposal doesn't sound like a win-win for Southeast!
Biomass is carbon neutral.
Biomass is carbon neutral. The trees remove as much carbon dioxide from the air as they grow as they release when burned.
Not to rain on the biomass parade -
With a great deal of respect for biomass possibilities, southeast has a moisture problem quite unlike those of our neighbors in Northwest BC. And that translates into an energy problem in and of itself. Over the Coast Mountain range, the climate is comparably arid so they don't have the extreme degree of moisture removal from their wood byproducts. So, there is cost here in Alaska that they don't have in BC.
Despite the lack of the same moisture removal factor, BC has not had an easy go making pellets. About a year ago, it was announced one of the pellet plants had closed there due to a lack of profitability. That wasn't a good omen for our region's possibilities for creating a similar industry. So, the prospects for a wood pellet industry here are probably even more marginal.
There has been some better news on the horizon in BC recently however. Have a look at this link for some better news: http://www.princegeorgecitizen.com/article/20110610/PRINCEGEORGE0101/306...
I guess there are some possibilities for this industry; nonetheless moisture is a significant factor against biomass in our region. So far, no one has proven a pellet production industry can work here. Don't count it out, but perhaps we ought not to put our future in one energy basket. We have other resources within our region. Still excluding them for an unproven one seems premature and ill thought out.
imported pellets as an answer to hydro is snake oil
Hydro built the Southeast region.
Hydro is tried and proven with a 100 + years of reliability, is clean, low cost and is not imported. Comparatively, who is going to guarantee the price of pellets for 20 years? Hydro prices stay relatively flat, pellets go up with demand.
If we are running out of low cost hydropower, explain why the logical answer is not to build more of SE Alaska's most plentiful fuel source: hydropower.
If pellets are the answer then somebody should ask AEA why the State is investing billions into Susitna and not billions for pellets for the Mat Su region? Smells like snake oil?
Logging!!
timeinm--This isn't about pellets; it's a way to make logging acceptable. Harvest the trees make pellets out of the waste.Sealaska's Juneau snake oiler.
Hydro's the answer,with an intertie to BC.Take a ride through northern BC this summer a see what's going on. It's a whole different world. The legislators wasted our money on their trip to Norway last month.
I say no to Bio-mass, we need
I say no to Bio-mass, we need our Forests.
Trees produce the air we need to breath.
Trees are our single most cost-effective way to combat climate change.
We should not allow any logging in our countries LAST remaining Rain Forest - Tongass National Forest, it's our last one.
Hydro dams are a problem
Hydro dams are a problem because of the DAMS. Can you build a Dam without blocking the rivers that are needed for our fisheries? No.
Also, AELP is a Hydro plant and our Fees have only soared.
Where is the population growth that warrants building Hydro plants in SE?
Talk about over kill.
Geo thermal seems perfect for the size and locations of SE towns, why is this not mentioned?
The State of Alaska: Request
The State of Alaska:
Request for public input and comment
on the Southeast Integrated Resource Plan -
Comments must be received by AEA no later than 5:00 p.m. Monday, March 19, 2012.
http://www.akenergyauthority.org/seirp-comments.html
Do you like your Forest? Then
Do you like your Forest? Then be their voice!
you better stand with them and be their voice, because this plan wants them for your fuel.
The Biomass industry must be
The Biomass industry must be required to plant their product and be forced to leave our Forests alone. Biomass Tree Plantations. Leave our Forests alone.
Wrong! Oh so WRONG!
Folks, there are a small group of people who are pushing this bio-mass thing, and they are a Special Interest Group. No way in the energy field are we going back to the future and be successful. I have heard a rumor that the Juneau Assembly is considering a bio-fuel project for Juneau, and it appears that they are trying to soften up the public with these pro-pellet/wood heating articles in the local paper.
There are people around who want to get a paycheck by hauling wood around and disposing of it.
Next thing you know, they will try to tell you that it is carbon neutral and doesn't make smoke.
Sheesh!
Here is a direct link to the
Here is a direct link to the report.
http://www.akenergyauthority.org/SEIRP/12-23-2011_Vol1_SoutheastAlaskaIR...
In Black & Vetch excutive
In Black & Vetch excutive summary 1-40
these folks are saying: "Biomass is a particularly good option given the local and abundant nature of this solution"
I say right now to the people that want to be in the Biomass business/industry start growing your trees and leave our public forests alone.
I heard someone once cut down
I heard someone once cut down a tree. It was a terrible story let me tell you. Biomass is evil. It could give jobs to local people, even though it is better if they all move outside, the losers. It is always better to burn fossil fuel from the middle east for our heat instead of being carbon neutral. All this climate change stuff is fake.
barnardj1 - Biomass is NOT
barnardj1 - Biomass is NOT Carbon Neutral, this is totally false. Carbon dioxide from burning biomass is substantial and trees consume CO2 as they grow so cutting them down is stupid.
If you want to create jobs for loggers & have a timber industry / Biomass business in SE then give loggers a hoe and let them plant pine trees just like they do down south.
But leave our public Forests alone
Spamcan is correct. Temperate
Spamcan is correct. Temperate rainforests store an incredible amount of biomass. In fact, our rainforests here in the Pacific Northwest store more biomass per hectare than ANY OTHER BIOME ON EARTH, including tropical rainforests.
Much of this biomass is made up of dead and decaying matter on the forest floor, not the trees themselves. So when you cut down a forest to make pellets, the trees themselves aren't the only source of carbon that you're reintroducing to the atmosphere; you're also releasing all of the carbon trapped in the detritus you'll find inside the forest. And this is usually hundreds of years worth of carbon, so it's not carbon neutral at all unless we're talking about large timescales.
Pine Tree Plantations are used down south for Biomass industry
It is correct that in the lower 48 the Biomass Industry uses trees from Pine Tree plantations.
But I think we should be looking at other althernatives like Geo Thermal for Southeast
Spamcan
What about hydroelectric power produced by a water supply above and beyond the levels that salmon can navigate to reproduce? It may be possible to build dams that do not block the salmon. Sure, they would be smaller than dams on large rivers, but so are other means of producing energy, by creating and contributing electrical energy into a system. What if there were twenty or fifty small hydroelectric plants far above the range of migrating salmon, all contributing to an overall energy supply?
Can you build a hydroelectric plant without endangering salmon? Your answer is "No." My answer is "Yes we can."
Um, what's with all the craziness....?
A guy writes an article on maybe using wood to heat homes...and Whoa! Suddenly it's a corporate conspiracy to denude all public forests. What gives? The reactive comments and negativity are so uniform they actually do seem orchestrated. Did you see what your neighbors in Angoon are paying for heat and electricity. Do you even care? If not, the least you can do is shut up and let people discuss options.
Why do 40% or more of the homes in Scandanavian countries heat with pellets? Because they're stupid or they don't like trees? No, they've maxed out their hydro and are paying $8/gallon for fuel....like we will soon be.
Me, I'm all for a sustainable, local alternative.
Biomass??
How about using some of that methane thats being burned off at the dump.That could be used on cars,homes,generators(AELP).etc.These people need to stop thinking of ways to spend other peoples money.Especially when the (consultants) arent even in state.
@Howdy -I am for alternative
@Howdy -
I am for alternative energy but Biomass does produce CO2 which is the main source of our warming climate, so if we are trying "course correct" for future generations and fight our warming climate the alternative energy we pick for Southeast Alaska should not be something that produces more CO2 emissions, wouldn't you agree? Not only does Biomass produce more of the stuff that is causing our climate to warm it also requires us to cut down the single most cost effective way to combat Global Warming and that s our Forests.
There are other alternatives that we should consider.
I am also concerned that this report did not have data on things like Carbon sequestration. which is a really important component of alternative energy. We cant make good decisions if we are not looking at this kind of data.
We need to get this right and we have the time to get it right. We must look at the whole picture, and not just at what is the quickest and cheapest soulution for cheap energy.
This would then be a wasted and very foolish effort.
state should equalize costs until we get at good solutions.
This was not just a guy writing an article about maybe burning some wood at home for heat. AEA is the State of Alaska, Alaska Energy Authority and part of what the "state" is recommending is this Biomass for Southeast.
Its up to the legislature.
I think "until" there are real "good" solutions the state could step in and equalize costs (if thats the right word) for places like Angoon where fuel prices are outragiously high,that I am for.
The last time anyone looked
At manufacturing pellets in southeast they identified several show stoppers.
1. The only way to produce pellets in a economically feasible way was if they were a by-product of some other wood market. And that of course requires logging on a larger scale than a couple of thousand acres, something that cannot be sold to some of our "green" friends regardless of the color of the bow you tie around it.
2. Those good quality pellets that you can buy are made from hardwood because it renders a far higher BTU value per pound of pellets. In southeast the only useable resource is softwood and the BTU value per pound is far lower.
Let's not make ass-u-me-tions
It appears many are jumping to conclusions regarding biomass on and around them Tongass National Forest, which may not be true. We know what the outcome of assume-ing may be. So let's take a pause and try to discern what exactly is being proposed.
It strikes me that we truly don't know what is being proposed, certainly I'm thinking that I don't know, but it appears that it is very easy to jump to a conclusion without even understanding what is being considered. Do any of us commenting understand what is being considered?
I had surmised wood waste from commercial operations was being considered. That many of the former logging sites and present ones were being considered for re-harvesting of waste material, but also perhaps second growth was being considered - you know the stuff that is harvested as pre-commercial thinning.
Maybe what I'm suggesting isn't feasible, but I wasn't considering using valuable second growth as material for pellets, unless it was conventionally thinned as part of the harvest cycle. Perhaps many are thinking second growth is being proposed for pellets, not a chance of that. Second growth wood is much too valuable a commodity to be chopped up for wood pellets.
Let hear what is being proposed before we rush to judgements for heaven's sake.
Also, decaying wood is contributing to the carbon cycle, it is a slow process, but it is a process that introduces carbon into the atmosphere nonetheless.
And thanks Wally O, I agree. I'm not sure where spamcan thinks there is a river in SE to dam, but nothing of the sort is being considered in our region. Any hydro in SE is going to come from non-fish bearing alpine lakes that have nil impacts on the native anadromous species in our region. It's plainly not an issue here.
Seems we have quite a bit of alder as a hardwood here
Thanks for the comments AH HA. How about our ubiquitous alder tree? It's a hardwood and it definitely grows like a weed. At first blush it seems like a possibility.
The pellet prices cited in this article are way, way off.
And have done the numbers a lot of times over the years hoping they would tun out better than they do...
Current prices for Juneau (since this is the Juneau Empire) and because that is where I reside and where it appears that the numbers cited in the article are supposed to come from, Are:
#2 Fuel Oil: $3.74 delivered on 1/28/12.
High quality pellets: Price per ton, quoted at a local Juneau retail store on 1/30/12: $393.75.
** For those of you who are not experienced pellet users, with pellets you get exactly what you pay for. Cheap pellets are available but almost always burn poorly, provide far less heat and All, I repeat All, pellet stoves are finicky. They will quickly let you know what brand will not pass.
This makes burning pellets equal to burning oil at $3.33 a gallon a savings of $00.41 per gallon not including the cost of converting to pellets from oil. If you burn a thousand gallons a year and you should hope you do not, your savings are at the very most, $410.00 per year.
BTW: I suspect that Alder does have more BTU's available than hemlock and spruce but can you imagine how many acres you would need to cut to supply even ten percent of the homes in southeast with three or four tons of pellets a year? every year?
Worse than that, making pellets is energy intensive.... the moisture content of the wood fiber (sawdust) needs to be lowered a lot and a lot of heat and pressure is required to form the pellets.... Where do we get that energy?
Why pellets
I keep seeing these articles in the Empire about using pellets for biomass and I know it's because Sealaska is pushing the business because they want to be a supplier, that's why they put in their wood pellet boiler. It will also save them on oil, but they also wanted to make it a showpiece so more people would get interested in the idea, put in pellet systems, and then someone (i.e. them from logging on POW island) will need to make pellets for all these people. I don't mind them trying to do this but these articles in the paper sound like wood pellets is the only way to go and it isn't. Also don't forget that the costs of pellets will go up as demand goes up, so it may be cheap now but not if everyone switches to it. Just like electrical and oil, the money follows demand.
But several of the posts here are right, making pellets is energy intensive. You have to use heat and pressure to make the pellets and that energy has to come from somewhere else too. So why use pellets at all? I've toured several biomass boiler facilities in the midwest which included a city swimming pool, a city hazardouse waste building, and a sawmill and they were all using either wet sawdust, chipped up old pallets, and even chipped up tree stumps for fuel to power their boilers. It's all waste wood that would either get dumped or burned anyway.
The boilers do not need to use pellets, so why waste that energy to make them? Sawdust and waste wood boilers have been around for 200+ years, it's not a new technology and works very well. Granted getting wet sawdust to Juneau could get complicated due to shipping issues. Pellets do have the advantage for storage and safe shipping especially for a homeowner, but I just wanted to point out that pellets are not the only answer. In communities that do still have sawmills and cut up trees (you know....it does happen in the real world outside of Juneau so you can still build your nice houses), they could use this waste wood to create steam or electricity and save their community money.
I like the idea of tidal
I like the idea of tidal power.
Stumps
Many many stumps......
Pulp logs lay....
The alder growith over.......
I applaud the idea
Biomass or any other alternative energy source is better than continuing down the same path of installing oil boilers.
Why is there such a double standard applied to biomass/pellets? Nobody flinches or cries foul when a new oil boiler goes into a building... where does that fuel come from? Tar sands from Canada? Some unstable 3rd world dictatorship? We hope it comes from our Alaska pipeline but who knows.
Biomass emits 90% less carbon emissions than fossil fuels, and does not cost us American lives to secure.