Herb Seeger has a zeal for barbecue wood pellets. When he discusses what the product has meant for Great Lakes Renewable Energy, it’s easy to understand why. Seeger was the spark that led to Biomass Magazine committing an entire issue to the role that coproducts play within the biomass energy sector. Seeger’s enthusiasm was compelling, but ultimately, it was the make-or-break nature of his and GLRE’s story, combined with historically low energy prices, that ultimately hooked our team.

To accompany the page-14 story I wrote about GLRE, “Cooking Up Higher Margins,” we conducted a survey of pellet producers to better understand how many were engaged in the manufacture of coproducts, and what it meant to their operations. The survey revealed that GLRE is not unique because it manufactures coproducts, but that its success might not be as widely enjoyed by its industry peers. For Seeger, coproducts offer everything that pellets for home heating markets do not—a global marketplace, higher margins, year-round demand, and insulation from fluctuations in temperature and the prices of competing commodities. The glaring omission, of course, is volume. During our interview, Seeger admitted that serving the barbecue market required a completely different production and marketing paradigm that other producers may not be ready to fully embrace. Still, the dramatic difference these alternative markets make for GLRE render it impossible to ignore what robust market development activities these categories might be able to do for the pellet industry.

Associate Editor Katie Fletcher’s page-24 feature, “Green Garbage to Black Gold,” explores how the biogas segment is hoping that the development and deployment of a digestate standard will simultaneously bolster marketplace confidence and regulatory acceptance of this important coproduct. Fletcher spoke with Clarke Pauley, vice president of the organics and biogas division at CR&R, who summed it up this way: “We see the success of anaerobic digestion of organic wastes directly tied to the ability to generate usable soil products on the back end.” Directly tied, he said. Not important, and not a contributing factor, but directly tied. With energy prices where they are, it is certainly hard to argue. Beyond that, one of biomass’s greatest values is its zero-waste story. In that way, a digestate standard and efforts to aggressively grow the digestate market should serve as an ongoing reminder of the efficiency of the technology.

This issue is rounded out with stories on biochar and heat exchangers and their role in buttressing the economics of the producers savvy enough to engage in their production or use. Energy revenues alone are not enough right now. The open question is whether or not coproduct markets can grow enough to make the kind of difference they’ve made for Seeger.


Author: Tim Portz
Vice President of Content  & Executive Editor
tportz@bbiinternational.com