Established a decade ago, Winters Renewables install, service and supply biomass boiler systems and woodchip to commercial businesses north and south of the border. As well as harvesting 130 acres of willow, founder Gavin Winters also operates a new anaerobic digestion plant on his farm, supplying 500kw per hour to the electricity grid. We dropped into his Dromore, County Tyrone base to find out more about his multifaceted, environmentally-friendly operation.
Winters Renewables specialise in providing cost-effective commercial heating solutions. As main agent for Guntamatic biomass systems in both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland, they are experts in specification, installation, fuel supply and maintenance of boiler systems that can offer low heating costs to small-to-medium-sized buildings.
Owner Gavin Winters also supplies businesses with woodchip for their biomass heating systems, the majority of which he grows and harvests himself. The recent addition of an AgriKomp anaerobic system means the Tyrone man is busier than ever providing clean energy to customers all over the island.
Having secured a Degree in Agricultural Engineering from Harper Adams University, Gavin worked at agri contracting for a while before immersing himself in the woodchip / biomass boiler business. He planted 130 acres of willow eleven years ago and has been harvesting and drying willow for use as woodchip fuel in biomass heating systems for the past seven or eight years.
“We were very busy installing the Guntamatic biomass boilers for a number of years and the woodchip supply ties in nicely with that,” the Tyrone man notes. “Unfortunately, the Northern Ireland Renewable Heat Incentive scheme has now stopped, which has had a dramatic effect on demand for the boilers. So now we concentrate on supplying the woodchip and operating the anaerobic digester, while we also still service the boilers we’ve already installed,”
Gavin is ready to provide his expertise south of the border if the talk about a Renewable Heat Incentive scheme for biomass boilers in the Republic of Ireland ever gets past the talking stage and becomes a reality.
Regarding his thriving woodchip supply business, he continues: “I’m supplying up to 500 tonnes of woodchip per year, between what I harvest myself and what I buy in. Two of our biggest customers are The South West College in Omagh and The Omagh Leisure Centre. There are two biomass boilers installed in the college. We supply the woodchip and carry out the maintenance of these boilers. There’s one large boiler in the leisure centre, where we provide the same service. Maintenance and servicing of the boilers is a big thing and we have full expertise in that area”
To this end, Gavin employs his brother, Barry, a fully-qualified plumber, to keep the boilers running at all times. “We installed around 40 boilers between 2013 and the start of this year and we carry out regular servicing on all of those,” he notes. “DETI exceeded their targets with the Renewable Heat Incentive and pulled the plug on it. We are also agents for Guntamatic anywhere in the Republic of Ireland north of Dublin and will be able to step in there once the grant scheme in the South gets the green light.
“We’ve already sold and installed domestic woodchip boilers in the Republic as far down as Portlaoise, Kilkenny, Ashbourne and Monaghan and we’re looking forward to getting into the commercial biomass boiler market there.”
In the meantime, the anaerobic digester – also known as a biogas plant – has become a key part of Winters Renewables’ business. “I built the anaerobic digestion plant on the farm two years ago and rent 400 acres within a five-mile radius of Dromore to grow silage and wholecrop for that,” Gavin explains. “We feed grass silage, wholecrop, maize, chicken litter, milled bread, cattle slurry from local dairy farmers and lactose. It produces methane gas, which is captured, filtered and cleaned and piped into two gas engines to produce 500kw per hour for the NIE grid.
“We also use the waste heat from the engines to dry our woodchip.”
Nothing ever goes to waste at Winters Renewables and it is interesting to note that all the products and services pretty much go full circle, hand in hand, complementing and supplementing one another. All in all, it’s a very efficient operation.
With one man (Mark) on board full time to look after woodchip deliveries and feed the digester, Gavin can concentrate most of his efforts on keeping the digestion plant running seven days per week.
Apart from contracting out the silage cutting and slurry spreading (to Dermot Maguire), the business is completely self-sufficient and fully sustainable in-house. “All the digestate that comes out of digester goes back on the land as fertiliser. I add a bit of nitrogen and give it a bit of a kick,” concludes the forward-thinking Tyrone man, who cuts three cuts of silage per year, weather permitting.
To keep the business running smoothly 24/7, Gavin also owns and operates a great fleet of modern and immaculately-maintained tractors and machinery, including a New Holland T7.235 purchased brand new from Brian Keys this year, a John Deere 6920, two 3500-gallon slurry tankers and a JCB 536-60 loader which, between loading woodchip and filling the digester, never stops.
Indeed, nothing ever stops at Winters Renewables!
Winters Renewables,
17 Shaneragh Road,
Dromore,
Omagh
County Tyrone.
Tel: 0044 28 8289 8414
Mobile: 0044 7901 711092
Email: [email protected]
Taken from Irish Tractor & Agri magazine Vol 4 No 7, September 2016
