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Biomass boilers
In terms of carbon emissions, there is no better form of active space heating than a biomass boiler, as during the lifetime of the plant it will absorb as much carbon as it emits when it is burned, this means that biomass boilers are virtually carbon neutral. Whilst there are some associated emissions with processing and transport, according to government figures, the next lowest carbon emitting form of space heating (a ground source heat pump on underfloor heating), emits four times as much carbon as a wood pellet boiler.
Besides the environmental problems the major problems with fossil fuels are those of rising costs and energy security; caused by reliance on a finite resource. Biomass is sustainable as sufficient fuel can be grown annually to replace what is burned.
Biomass is also likely to be a far more stable fuel source than, for example oil, as if there is a war in an oil producing nation it is unlikely have a major effect on the cost wood pellet; if a major gas supplying nation decides to turn the gas off, we can still grow trees.
People are often concerned that in time there will be supply issues with biomass, or that it will compromise agricultural land. In 2005 the Biomass Task Force estimated the total UK availability of all biomass materials to be in excess of 20 million tonnes per annum. Pellet and chip can be produced from the massive resource of waste wood and, if we used all that resource, it was estimated we could grow another 8 million tonnes a year in the UK without any disruption to food supply.