Yes, as the name implies, these are chips of wood! They are the cheapest form of biomass fuel suitable for large-scale automation.
Deciding What Wood Chips to Buy
With wood chip biofuel the key issue is quality – you are looking for size and moisture content.
Chips need to be regular and chunky in size, up to 50mm across. Long, thin slivers are not what you want going through your augers. These can cause fuel jams and boilers to go out.
What Specification Should I be Buying?
They also need to be reasonably dry, ideally below 25% moisture content. When a tree is felled it is 40-60% water, and water is not good at burning. The smaller the boiler the drier it likes its chips. The best wood chip is made from timber which has been left to air dry for several months, then chipped with a high quality chipper.
Wood chip fuel is fairly bulky, 200-400kg per cubic metre.
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