It is already possible to renovate an installation without any initial payment, through an energy services company.
Biomass is becoming the most efficient solution in large populations, where the houses are grouped in blocks of many neighbors who share community expenses and where the most frequent expense is usually heating and hot water (ACS).
There are hundreds of neighboring communities that have already switched to biomass for reasons of efficiency, savings, facilities and comfort. Currently there are two forms of implementation.
The first, the classic one, in which the owners of the farm make the investment and install a new biomass boiler to provide service to the entire community, which will contract the installation of the equipment, the subsequent supply of biomass and the maintenance, charge of passing on the proportional cost of consumption and expenses among neighbors. There are numerous grants and subsidies from local and regional administrations that usually collaborate in the financing of biomass equipment in order to improve the energy efficiency of buildings.
The second, the most innovative, is the contracting of an Energy Services Company (ESE) to supply heating to all residents without the need to make an initial investment and without worries. The ESE buys and installs the boiler, performs the maintenance and supply of biofuel and the community of neighbors only has to pay the bill for the heat consumed.
Why do Energy Services work so well?
As users, we increasingly demand a greater degree of satisfaction, we require adjusted costs and if it is possible that emissions do not affect climate change, as gas or diesel does, which also has to be imported from countries to thousands of kilometers impoverishing our economy. The ESCOs that choose biomass as an energy resource manage to guarantee their clients energy and economic savings, greater customer comfort and environmental sustainability.
AVEBIOM's project director, Jorge Herrero, explains some of the advantages offered by ESEs that use biomass as an energy source. "The economic savings from the first day, the comfort (since the company takes care of everything in a professional way), the stability of the price in the short and long term, not having to make any initial investment (since the ESE does it) , the guarantee of supply and a long etcetera, which is already demonstrated in thousands of real installations that have contracted an ESE with biomass in communities of neighbors, industries and buildings such as hotels, schools and hospitals ".
Energy efficiency guarantee
When an ESE assumes an installation, it is responsible for the correct adaptation between the fuel and the equipment, to provide the necessary heat at the moment that the neighbors require it.
Currently, ESE professionals provide the knowledge and experience necessary to install, operate and maintain any biomass heating installation. This ensures optimal energy performance, because they know perfectly the available technologies, the most efficient, and especially those that comply with all regulations, which allows energy to be managed on demand by the client.
The ESE ensure a good energy performance thanks to the correct dimensioning of the installation, they have the highest quality equipment, use biomass of standardized quality and perform a correct maintenance, since it controls and telemanages the installation at all times.
Comfort and zero worries
The neighbors that have communal boilers are looking for a solution to avoid an increase in the community quota or to reduce the hours of service of the heating, before the volatility of the price of diesel and the proposals to raise taxes on fossil fuels (gas oil and gas) that pollute so much
Many of the community boilers are obsolete, more than amortized and with problems: they are very inefficient and very polluting.
Arranging the heating service with an energy services company (ESE) allows to establish a guaranteed savings contract by changing the diesel fuel for biomass, without the need to make any initial payment.
Thanks to the contract signed with the ESE, a price is established for the service based on consumption, which is based on guaranteed savings for the user and a degree of efficiency that ensures the supply of heat and the maintenance of the equipment.
This heat sale contract is signed between the ESE and the neighborhood community for a period, which usually ranges between eight and 15 years, depending on the interests of both parties.
The ESE buys and installs the boiler, performs the maintenance and supply of biofuel. For its part, the community of neighbors only has to pay the bill for the heat consumed. And it is each one of the neighbors who assumes the cost of its consumption according to the register of the independent accountant of each house.
Initial savings of 15%
After the change of a diesel oil heating, for example, to biomass, it is usual to generate savings of approximately 15% with respect to the previous expense.
And when the first contract established with the ESE expires, the saving is much greater, since the cost of the new boiler has been amortized and at that moment the installation becomes property of the community of neighbors, who can choose to renew the contract with ESE (with a substantial improvement) or even managing it independently.
"Bringing comfort and zero worries at the best price is the key to the success of the ESE so that more and more neighborhood communities renew their old facility with a new, much more efficient biomass", explained Jorge Herrero. It is a formula in which both parties win, but still has a large presence in Spain.
"We are on time," adds Herrero, "to achieve an important improvement and achieve the sustainability objectives set by the European Union; and also, saving money. In some cities, such as Salamanca, Madrid or León, the development of these business models are being much more demanded, mainly due to the involvement of companies such as Bioenergy Barbero, Calordom, Erbi, Foresa, Gebio and Veolia as they exposed in the past edition of EXPOBIOMASA ".