The Australian company, which operates six sites on the country’s coast, has stated that the initiative should help it cut the Grafton facility’s A$500,000 electricity bill in half.
“We believe that we’ve got an obligation to try to utilise the resource that we use to its absolute maximum and I think the timber industry has been long criticised for not utilising its waste stream as well as it could,” said Big River director Jim Bindon.
“Our view is that generating power is probably the best way to utilise that waste.”
Moreover, the company has said that it wants to set an example to other timber mills and that it expects the rest of the industry to begin using forest waste to generate power in the near future.