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Pact ensures wood chips for heat at high school |
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Written by Publisher
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Monday, 23 November 2009 |
Photo by Ted Lutz
The Kane Area School District and the U.S. Forest Service have established a stewardship agreement that will ensure the district with a source of wood chips for its biomass heating system at the high school. New Growth Resources of Kane has a contract to provide the chips to the district.
The Kane Area School District has approved a long-awaited “stewardship agreement” with the U.S. Forest Service for a source of wood chips for the innovative biomass heating system at the high school.
Dr. Maryann Anderson, superintendent of Kane schools, said the “win-win” agreement provides a site for wood chips and also helps the Forest Service with reforestation efforts.
“It’s good for everyone,” John Rook said in praising the agreement. Rook is the facilities director for the school district and the driving force behind the biomass project.
The area addressed in the agreement is known as the Brush Hollow Biomass Project off Route 948 in Jones Township. The gross area has 4,486 acres in the Allegheny National Forest. The site is bounded on the east by Forest Road 185 and by Highland Township on the west. The Kane Experimental Forest is just north of the Brush Hollow area.
A severe storm on July 21, 2003 downed many trees within 500 acres of the Brush Hollow site. Tornadoes from this same storm toppled the midsection of the Kinzua Bridge near Mt. Jewett.
According to the Forest Service, the “damaged timber” in Brush Hollow “was not harvested in a timely manner” because of the designation of the area in the 1986 Forest Plan. The plan placed a 30-year moratorium on forest management in the area. “Subsequently, the value and the quality of the down timber has declined significantly and, as such, a normal salvage sale of this material would not produce any positive revenue,” the Forest Service explained in the agreement.
New Growth Resources of Kane has a contract to provide wood chips for the biomass burner. The price is $34.98 per ton. Rook estimates that the school district will need 1,300 tons of wood chips a year for its burner.
Under the agreement, the Brush Hollow site will provide a source for wood chips for wood-burning systems at both the high school and the Elk Regional Health Center in St. Marys.
In addition to serving as a source of wood chips, the objectives of the Brush Hollow “stewardship” project include:
nThe removal of moderate to heavy accumulations of wind-thrown timber to reduce “hazardous fuel loads” and reducing the potential for forest fires.
nPermitting a “full range” of silviculture treatments to promote reforestation.
nProviding increased educational opportunities for students in the forestry curriculum at Kane Area High School. The project will provide a “hands-on” forest management experience for students.
The Forest Service provided a grant of $355,000 for the wood-burning project at Kane High School. The state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) awarded a grant of $250,000 for the project.
The school district dipped into a capital reserve fund for its net share of $503,055. Rook said it would take about eight years to the district to recoup this cost through the savings generated by the switch from natural gas to wood chips as fuel for the hot-water heating system at the high school.
The wood-burning system began operations late last year and was “fired up” again Nov. 11, Rook.
“Within four hours, we had heat to the high school,” Rook said. “It is working great.”
Anderson said the wood-burner at Kane High School is “a model program” for other schools that are looking for ways to cut their heating costs.
Rook said representatives from other school districts have been visiting Kane to tour the biomass facility at the high school. The “stewardship agreement” between the school district and the Forest Service was expected to be in place nearly a year ago. Anderson said Rook “just kept it going” and finally secured the agreement with the federal agency.
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Last Updated ( Thursday, 10 December 2009 )
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