Formerly employed in the paper supply industry, George Whiting of Massachusetts spent the past few years shifting his relation to how he brings the benefit of trees to people. Today, he serves as the owner and president of EcoHeat Solutions based out of East Walpole in Norfolk County in offering wood pellet boilers as a more sustainable means of heating homes and offices away from the costly and less environmentally sound options of oil and propane-made heat.
Whiting began his product development in 2008, finally having systems to offer to buyers last autumn.
Rounding Out His Research
His initial curiosity about alternative energy heating methods in a trying economy led him to research approaches spanning successfully throughout Northern Europe. Whiting looked into geothermal heating but realized that its general pricing along with the complication of it not being feasible, oftentimes, in retrofitting other older heating systems, made it a less practical choice for him.
After talking to heating professionals in Sweden by phone time and time again in his continued research to help him decide what route he wanted to take with his slowly shaping endeavor, he eventually elected to put his own wood pellet boiler system on the market in New England.
The How of It
“It works a lot like an oil or propane boiler,” Whiting explained about his setup using wood pellets as a solid fuel. Except with his boiler, a storage bin for the pellets is involved, with a mechanism to carry them up to be dropped into the boiler. The system takes a bit longer to heat up and a while to cool down, once it’s at temperature. But at least in the Eastern U.S., savings using a wood pellet boiler can be 40 to 60 percent cheaper than oil or propane heating costs in a year’s time, Whiting said. He has one built into his EcoHeat Solutions storefront, too.
George Whiting runs EcoHeat Solutions out of East Warpole, Massachusetts.
Sourcing the Pellets
Whiting detailed that a lot of people using wood pellet boilers in their homes or businesses buy their supply online, while others purchase theirs through chain stores like Lowe’s or Home Depot. For those ordering their pellets online, www.woodpellets.com and www.pelletsdirect.com are two of the main sites Whiting noted for specialization in the fueling material.
The pellets usually come in 40 lb. bags, with a ton on a pallet for about $200 to $250. Most people buy at least two or three tons at a time to make out better on the cost of delivery, Whiting said. He estimated that those running wood pellet boilers probably go through five if not 10 tons of the pellets per year. And while it can save hundreds if not a few thousand dollars annually for those who have the boilers, Whiting did point out that it’s not always the best choice for everyone, with an example being older people who might have trouble lifting the bags, moving them into a house and refilling the storage unit about once per week.
The Pellets Themselves
The pellets are made from all different types of trees, different blends of hardwoods and softwoods, depending on where they’re manufactured. An ash is leftover once the pellets are burned, but since the minerals in them don’t disintegrate, those are able to be saved and composted or used as a fertilizer on lawns or for plants which benefit from alkaline-loving soil, like Mockorange shrubs, Locust and Boxelder trees, select Crabapple trees, and certain Viburnum and Japanese Barberry bushes.
“Wood pellets are a carbon-neutral fuel, unlike oil, propane, natural gas and geothermal,” Whiting said.
An Eye into Cost & Possibilities in Pennsylvania
Whiting gave an estimate of cost for installation of a wood pellet boiler around $9,000 to $12,000. “If you need a new chimney, it may be on the higher end—if not, it may cost less.”
This EcoBoiler sits in George Whiting's business office for EcoHeat Solutions.
He traveled to a rural stretch of Berks County, Pennsylvania as a vendor at the Pennsylvania Renewable Energy & Sustainable Living Festival in Kempton last month. “Pennsylvania has more pellet manufacturing plants than any other state in the country, so it supports the regional economy,” Whiting added. He also has installers lined up in Pennsylvania for his wood pellet boiler systems.
His Own Clientele & What Draws Them
Most of those who have reached out to Whiting and purchased his wood pellet boilers are in Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire and New York. “Rural or semi-rural people seem to be adopters of this,” he said about his designed system and its growing popularity since a year ago.
“A lot of people are interested in living sustainably, saving money and supporting the regional economy,” Whiting said, proud to be spending his time developing and now representing an outfit modeled in line with systems seeing success in sustainability in Europe for the last 15 years.
