Forest Waste Wood Provides Heat
I ran across an article that describes how brush piles from forests are used to heat schools (from ENN.com via Cascadia Scorecard Weblog).
COUNCIL. Idaho — The tiny Council School District used to pour thousands of dollars into outmoded oil and electric heaters. Nearby, the Forest Service burned brush piles on the mountainsides to keep the brush from fueling forest fires in dry summers.Looking for some savings, Council Superintendent Murray Dalgleish developed Idaho's first public school biomass heating system -- a project that's expected to save Council $1 million on fuel over the next 15 years.
"We're surrounded by the Payette National Forest," said Dalgleish. "We're the Saudi Arabia of wood."
This is a great idea. It helps clean up our forests reducing the danger of catastrophic fire. Schools save a "pile" of money - hehehe. We reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. It produces less pollution than fossil fuels. I don't see a downside to this.
Here is the link to the Fuels for Schools website.
