Turning Woody Debris into Electricity

Biomass One initiated operation in the 1980’s. In 1989 Biomass One made significant improvements i to its air quality control system. In total, Biomass One has invested over $50,000,000 to make this plant one of the most efficient and cleanest wood burning power plants in America.

The year 1990 marked a change in the way in which Biomass derived a portion of its fuel, building a $2,000,000 on-site wood processing facility and opening its urban wood debris drop-off site.

In 1993 Biomass One purchased mobile processing equipment to bring Biomass One to your location. This equipment processes large amounts of logging and land clearing debris, collecting 41,000 tons a year. In the past, much of this material would have been deposited in the landfill or burned in place.
For larger volumes of construction debris, tree and shrub trimmings, and other material which the public might not be able to deliver to our site, Biomass One offers a drop box service for debris deposit at less than half the cost of a landfill destined garbage container.

The community benefits of this plant are most easily understood in the context of how life would be without Biomass One. Absent our facility, nearly 355,000 tons of wood debris would inevitably lay in piles, find its way into local landfills, or be open field burned. The U.S. Forest Service, BLM, Oregon Department of Forestry and private industrial timberland managers would lack any economically feasible alternative to burning forest operations slash. The advantages of burning this debris in our facility (controlled combustion) versus open burning is a greater than 500 to 1 reduction in particulate (smoke) emissions.

This recovered wood debris is converted into electricity producing enough power to meet the needs of over 25,000 homes.

Facts & Figures:

• Biomass One is a 30 megawatt wood debris fired power plant.
• Wood debris consumed annually – 335,000 tons. If all the wood were carried in chip trucks, the line would stretch from Medford OR. to Redding CA.
• Public wood debris contribution – 59,000 tons. This is equivalent to 2,460 chip trucks.
• Currently Biomass One recovers 70% of the woody debris generated in Jackson county.
• All electricity produced is sold to Pacific Power.
• Reduction in particulate emissions through burning fuel in the facility – 500 to 1.