The "Woodsure Ready To Burn Scheme"????

[Dan Maynard]

I’ll take advantage of the extension and do small production for next year. If sales are continuing to grow ( certainly a spike with lockdown ) I’ll register and have a go at conforming. If it’s a massive hassle I’ll just stop selling and just produce my own supplies. It’ll then all go for biomass ... counter productive for woodsure no doubt.

If all the tree surgeons who do a few cube stop supplying logs because it's not worth the cost of complying, then this is not counter productive for woodsure - it will drive customers towards their club of members. Exactly what they want.

I'm hoping logs off a job can be sold as "arb waste" rather than firewood, on the basis customer needs to process it so it's clearly not wood for burning.

[nepia]

2 minutes ago, Dan Maynard said:

I'm hoping logs off a job can be sold as "arb waste" rather than firewood, on the basis customer needs to process it so it's clearly not wood for burning.

 

Can't see a problem with that .Clearing arisings from site is part of the job; the lumps aren't firewood for sale ARE THEY!

[openspaceman]

2 hours ago, Justme said:

Sorry it was more of a can YOU not can it be done.

 

Not everyone kilns their own or has kiln close to storage ect.

 

I have big worries re heating a big barn & moisture / mould.

 

If one can dry the wood down below 20% in the summer months and the barn is weather tight they will regain moisture but not to above  20%.

 

I see kiln drying as more of a cash flow mitigation and space saving if you want to keep producing all year round.

 

There's a moderate sized producer, <600m3, by me that has logs stored in temporary tent like structures and roundwood stacks, 600 yards away is about an acre of redundant glass house it's a shame the two don't meet as they could guarantee the logs would dry if under glass by June. That would mean they were stocking about £60k for 6 months with no return.

 

Assuming the sales season is 15 weeks long  with a kiln working on a fast cycle of 7 days (ours took 24 hours and self limited at 16% mc wwb) you have no cash flow worries and convert and deliver at a weeks notice.

 

Finding a sweet spot in between to maximise solar drying and minimising kiln fuel is the aim.

 

I always reckoned on 5% waste so burning this for the kiln is costless apart from paying off kiln capital.

 

 

[openspaceman]

7 minutes ago, Dan Maynard said:

 

 

If all the tree surgeons who do a few cube stop supplying logs because it's not worth the cost of complying, then this is not counter productive for woodsure - it will drive customers towards their club of members. Exactly what they want.

I'm hoping logs off a job can be sold as "arb waste" rather than firewood, on the basis customer needs to process it so it's clearly not wood for burning.

That's an interesting one; sales of green logs over 2m3 will always be exempt under the current rules and there's no way a small company whose core business is arb will justify the woodsure fees just to get rid of arisings but 2m3 of arb arisings will be a problem to measure and will make quite a bit more than 2m3 after processing. I can't see arb arisings actually having any significant value as received back at a yard.

 

For a bigger company with a number of gangs I suspect I'd go for using a bigger chipper on jobs and then getting a firm in to chip stuff over 8" straight into bulkers with the chip all away for biomass unless that market crashes or log prices increase substantially.

 

In the meanwhile I'll continue to scrounge 4 transit loads a year to keep me and my mate in firewood for the cost of our labour.

[lux]

If all the tree surgeons who do a few cube stop supplying logs because it's not worth the cost of complying, then this is not counter productive for woodsure - it will drive customers towards their club of members. Exactly what they want.

I'm hoping logs off a job can be sold as "arb waste" rather than firewood, on the basis customer needs to process it so it's clearly not wood for burning.

It’s counter productive as the take up on the scheme will be tiny in comparison to the amount of people selling logs. It’ll just be ignored because it’s not realistically achievable for air drying small producers. The cost of registration itself is insignificant but the process is flawed.

Woodsure has no bearing on selling unprocessed rounds of wood as waste, but if you have a yard you can sell biomass loads from it will be far less hassle to do it in bulk at your convenience rather than delivering it for peanuts as it’s not seasoned.
If what was firewood gets diverted to biomass that’s questionable as it’s perhaps not quite as eco friendly a process as they make it out to be


If you split it and sell it green firewood as long as it’s over 2 cube and you tell them it needs seasoning you’re fine.

A lot of it is rubbish. Anyone selling unseasoned wet firewood won’t have sales for long. Every wood fire owner loves to tell how ‘expert’ they are at having fires and their firewood. Sell them something damp and they’ll be switching supplier pretty quick. Still can’t educate them on decent softwood or mixed loads though....
Sell them well seasoned thorn and they moan it doesn’t burn well 🤷‍♂️shows how expert they are ...

[Khriss]

Back to building Oast houses then 😉 k

[Justme]

Few arb's will have a vehicle capable of legally delivering 2m3 of fresh cut arising logs/rings/lengths.

So it will be trailer loads needing BE licences pushing up costs / reducing simplicity.

 

As arising take so much extra labor from felling to delivering split logs compared to lengths they are basically worthless until they are processed.

More a liability than an asset.

[devon TWiG]

does the 2m3 have to be in one load ??

 

[Justme]

29 minutes ago, devon TWiG said:

does the 2m3 have to be in one load ??

 

yes I think it says deliveries of over 2m3

[Bustergasket]

We here in Scotland are following suit. When dry, we will have to store in a heated building to keep logs under 15% to 20% look out the window its wet most of the time winter here. Thats going to be some cost. We have 2 Kilns we would have to re dry every bag off logs twice before sale to get them sold, OR sell them right out of the kiln. Its going to be cheaper buying in for the Latvia. Or mix home grown air dried with kiln and blagg it.............

I heard from a mate in scotland and he said he had formed a club, you pay a monthly subscription to join, i guess some free wood follows your subscription that month, i guess they must be thinking that no money changing hands for firewood means no sale and nothing enforceable? not sure quite what they are thinking, i can see vat implications 5% vs 20% and i don’t even know if removing the direct contractual purchase of wood is enough to mitigate anything, interesting though