New England College Wood Pellet Boiler

In December of 2010, New England College commissioned a 1,000,000 BTU/h wood pellet boiler system on campus adjacent to the Science Building. The wood pellet boiler works in conjunction with one of five solar hot water systems on the New England College campus installed by Granite State Heating and Plumbing commissioned in the Fall of the 2010.  The solar water system preheats the water that is pumped into the wood pellet boiler.  This reduces the total amount of energy required to heat the water in the wood pellet boiler. The wood pellet boiler system was supplied by and the installation contracted through Sandri Energy of Greenfield, MA.  The wood pellet boiler working in conjunction with the solar hot water system provides 100% of the heat for the Science Building, replacing heat from the existing oil-fired boilers.  The installation is part of ongoing efforts by New England College to reduce its overall carbon footprint. It is estimated this project will replace over 20,000 gallons per year of heating oil with wood pellets, a sustainable and local fuel source. 

NEC Wood Pellet Boiler System Details:
•    The pellet boiler has an output capacity of 1,000,000 BTU/h.
•    ASME Pellet Boiler with automatic boiler heat exchanger
     cleaning.
•    Full automated controls with automatic ignition.
•    Automatic Pellet feed from the silo to the burner.
•    Automatic ash removal from the combustion chamber to
     external Ash Storage.
•    Cyclone for fine particle removal.
•    36 ton, 12’ diameter galvanized steel silo.
•    The boiler is housed in a 26’ x 10’ prefabricated insulated  

      building.

Wood Pellet Information:
•    There are approximately 16 million BTUs per ton, or 8000
     BTUs per pound of wood pellets.
•    One ton of wood pellets hold the energy equivalency of about
     120 gallons of heating oil. 
•    Each full silo (36 tons) of pellets used by NEC, offsets 54 tons
     of CO2 emissions.
•    Wood pellets have a fossil energy ratio (net energy
     output/fossil energy used) of 12:1.   (Net Energy Value Study,
     University of Wisconsin Green Bay).