On average sort of ground this might get you 30tonnes of dry matter a year if you are a good farmer. Say 150MWhr(t) gross.
This depends on your definition of cost effective, I haven't come across a grower receiving a stumpage payment for a woody biomass crop yet.
Why?
I'll agree it's not as efficient as many fossil fuels in delivering its potential calories into a home.
I'd say some of the less marketable softwood roundwood from a large scale harvesting operation.
AJH
I think you COULD get by with about an acre if done really well..8 sounds a fairly easy run for the money. Theres an 10 acre field out the back here - the framer gets well over 50 tons of grain off that..never mind the straw..
The de facto biomass crop is willow if you have the water. Its extremely rapid growing and can be coppiced to hell and back and still keep sprouting.
A lot depends on what soil and water you have available tho.
I have seen at country shows machinery designed to harvest and prep up wood biomsss for stoves. Cannot remember who sells it though.
It's plenty, I can personally use the wood from around 5 hectares (about
12 acres) per year, the rest of the wood I grow I sell to other people. However the land is very sparsely planted with trees and I'm only taking prunings from the trees as firewood, about 2-3 tonnes per annum.
Soil is clay. Water wouldn't be a problem unless too much is bad ... very waterlogged at the mo. I have multiple streams from which I could abstract (subject to 20m3 a day limit unless I got a license).
Hmmm, it's not that great a wood for burning, too spongy. Olive beats the heck out of it because it regrows extremely quickly, grows well in semi-arid conditions and has an incredible calorific value because of the oil content. It's a non-starter in the Uk though.
Chestnut is a good traditional coppiced wood and it grows very well in the UK. And I've been very impressed with yew both as a wood for burning and for how quickly it grows once it is established. However the reputation of yew is that it is a slow growing conifer. I just wish someone would tell the monster growing in my garden that it is supposed to be slow growing.
See if you can hit a country fair next year...or do some googling. Willow is the thing for soggy clay. Alder also. And hazel and maple will grow pretty fast too. Also poplar.
None are the best burning woods, but with a stove it all works.
The stoves and kit I remember worked on air blasted sawdust. Dries pretty quickly!
They had saw stuff, chipper stuff and furnaces.
The one I planted last year appears to be putting on 6" a year. Not what I would call slow growing.
That is slow, even tha Ash's up here do better than that and they only grow for about 4 months of the year. The Rowan do a good foot, the Silver Birch a little less, the Larch about 2 feet, Scots Pine about 18".
Ahh, you've never grown a Monkey Puzzle. Ours has put on about a foot in 5 years.
:o)
I doubt they'd do that (or even survive) above arctic Alston.
Ah then you'd be wrong! There is quite a large example less than 400 horizontal metres away. How ever it is also 60m+ (200'+) down into the valley, so it is much more sheltered than us. It is pretty much bang on the 360m (1180') contor though.
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