WERC Statewide Wood Energy Team

_{About these maps:  Left figure shows the cluster of poultry farms in West Virginia distributed in the four county area in eastern WV, including Grant, Pendleton, Hardy, and Hampshire counties. There are more than 200 poultry farms in this area most of which are multi-house operations. Woody biomass that could be used as an energy source is abundant in these and neighboring counties. Right figure shows that there are very few natural gas pipelines in this area compared to other parts of WV. This four county area only contains approximately 90 miles of over 2,700 miles of natural gas pipeline is West Virginia.}

West Virginia (WV), the third most heavily forested state in the U.S., has abundant woody biomass in both National Forest System and private lands. Woody biomass can be procured from many sources, such as residues from forest harvesting, stand improvement, fuel load reduction and traditional forest products manufacture, for use as a renewable energy to further diversify the State’s energy production. However, the development of wood energy to take advantage of the renewable resource has, to date, been scarce. To boost the productivity and viability of the wood energy sector in WV, it is critical to strengthen a wood energy team to facilitate the bio-business development in the State. This 17-member team consists of extension experts, engineers, wood energy professionals and industrial representatives across West Virginia University (WVU), state and federal agencies, and commercial companies. The team will analyze the techno-economic feasibility and the engineering of woody biomass heating systems for WV’s large users of liquid propane and heating oil (>500MBTUs per year). We will specifically identify potential conversion opportunities for wood energy in the poultry production sector, the largest agricultural industry of WV, and potential wood energy users in other sectors will be explored as well. A key strength of this project is to develop funding mechanisms to support the conversion projects identified through the project. This project will deliver (1) three workshops/community meetings targeting broad potential users of wood energy, (2) related online wood energy sources and technical releases, (3) three engineering and financial assessments of poultry production with robust, detailed techno-economic analyses on uses of wood energy, and (4) at least one successful installation of the most feasible wood energy system for poultry production. The findings and programs to be developed in this project can be further adapted by other sectors using fossil heating fuels in the Chesapeake Bay area of WV, Virginia, Maryland and Pennsylvania.