Prince George, B.C. - Bioenergy is a developing and exciting industry, but it does face a number of pressing policy issues. A number of speakers at the Bioenergy Conference in Prince George, discussed how different countries and regions were addressing these issues, some with considerable success.

 

Gottfried Lamers, who is from the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, Environment and Water Management in Austria, says Austria has recently been able to stabilize energy demand in the country. A big factor in that stabilization has been the role of renewable energies, including biomass such as wood pellets. At this time, renewable energy in Austria is expanding rapidly and counts for 16% of energy usage.  

 

This increase is in large part due to the use of government subsidies that encourage homeowners and owners of smaller heating systems to convert to wood pellets and other renewable energy sources. In addition, strict standards and norms for emissions have been enacted. Currently, about 11,000 new installations take place every year, mostly in homes. Because of advances in technology, Lamer claims emissions are not a problem in these new installations.

 

Lamers pointed out that providing government subsidies to homeowners and others to use renewable energy is much cheaper and easier to implement than buying and trading carbon credits internationally. He also notes that, just one year after introducing subsidies, the Austrian government is receiving an equal amount back from the new taxes that have been generated by the new installations, equipment, and fuel. 

 

Lamer says a lot of Austria’s success has to do with building up its own home market, which, in turn, has secured the basis for technological development. Austria is now one of the leading countries in the world for biomass technologies.