UK turkey producer signs large biomass deal

UK biomass technology expert Rural Energy has sealed a deal worth over £4 million with turkey business Bernard Matthews.

The deal follows more than 12 months of planning and cutting-edge renewable technology will now be installed in more than 21 of the turkey group’s farm sites across the east of England.

Rural Energy is supplying the biomass boilers and commissioning them for renewable energy company Lumicity, which put together a specialist consortium to bid for the work that included Armstrong, Baxi Commercial and PPS.

Rural Energy will supply a total of 179 Herz Firematic 150 or 199kW biomass boilers and have already commenced training Armstrong and Baxi to install them across all sites. Each site has an average of eight or nine poultry sheds, with the largest having 34.

The orders highlight the growing demand for biomass solutions within the poultry industry. Bernard Matthews operates turkey-rearing farms across Norfolk, Suffolk and Lincolnshire and rears over seven million birds annually.

The company recognised that biomass solutions will help to cut energy bills as well as provide a significant reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.

Paul Clark, managing director of Rural Energy, said: “The agricultural sector in particular is catching on to the many benefits biomass can bring, especially for energy-intensive farming such as poultry-rearing or commercial greenhouse growing operations.

“The sites are all applicable for the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) and the financial benefits that brings. The Herz boilers we are supplying are market-leading and are some of the first in the UK to be awarded the important RHI emissions certificates from Ofgem.

“The first few orders of boilers have now been received and will be commissioned by Rural Energy the last week in April. The whole project is planned for completion by the middle of October 2014.”