Wood as an energy source
Beyond the traditional fireplace, chipped wood opens up a wide range of energy applications: automated combustion, heat through fermentation, thermal insulation. An overview of the possibilities, and the central role of chip granulometry in each of them.
Chipped wood — a versatile and local fuel
If the most obvious image when thinking about wood energy is an open fireplace, chipped wood in reality opens up far wider possibilities. Whether it is heat production through combustion, thermal energy recovery through fermentation following the Jean Pain Method, or thermal insulation in construction, wood chips are a versatile material with multiple energy applications.
Across all these applications, one point is decisive: the quality and consistency of the chips. A regular chip, free from sawdust and tailing, guarantees both even drying, controlled combustion in an automatic boiler, and uniform fermentation in a Jean Pain heap.
Heat production through combustion
There are today many ways of heating with wood by burning it. These solutions do not all require the same level of investment, comfort of use, or number of wood-handling operations before combustion.
The oldest way of heating with wood. The open fireplace has significant drawbacks: combustion difficult to control, low efficiency, fire quality highly dependent on the species burned, and uncontrolled particle emissions.
The insert significantly improves efficiency and safety by allowing better control of combustion. Still limited to wood in log form, with all the handling that entails.
The chip boiler optimises combustion: automated feed from a storage silo, regulation of both combustion and fuel input, maximum comfort. It accepts all wood species, including small branches rejected by the log-wood sector.
Same comfort of use as the chip boiler, with higher energy density. But the industrial pellet manufacturing process involves significantly higher cost and a less favourable overall energy balance.
Handling operations by heating method
Number of operations required from cutting to loading the boiler.
| Operation | Log wood traditional |
Chipper — manual feed | Chipper — mechanised feed | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Small boiler | Medium boiler | Small boiler | Medium boiler | ||
| Felling / cutting | |||||
| Delimbing | |||||
| Bucking to 1–2 m lengths | |||||
| Splitting | |||||
| Stacking | |||||
| Loading trailer | |||||
| Chipping | |||||
| Roadside unloading | |||||
| Roadside reloading | |||||
| Transport & customer delivery (1) | |||||
| Drying stack | |||||
| Re-handling & cutting | |||||
| Cutting to 50 cm lengths | |||||
| Final stacking | |||||
| Re-handling for boiler feed | |||||
| Loading boiler | |||||
| Total handling operations | 14 | 7 | 6 | 6 | 5 |
A chip boiler with mechanised feed reduces the number of handling operations from 14 to 5 compared with traditional log wood — three times fewer operations, while making use of all wood types including small branches.
For more on the technical specifics of chip boilers and their granulometry requirements:
Heat through fermentation — the Jean Pain Method
Jean Pain demonstrated a remarkable technique: the possibility of recovering the heat generated during the fermentation of chipped brushwood according to his method. This recovery can extend over a very long period — up to 18 months — without the original material being consumed.
This technique offers an exceptional double benefit: it simultaneously produces usable heat (for space heating or domestic hot water) and a high-value organic soil amendment. The fermenting material is not destroyed — it is transformed.
This technique requires large quantities of chips to build an effective fermentation heap. It is therefore mainly suited to operators with access to sufficient woody material (farmers, foresters, rural authorities), and is only worthwhile, in our view, when combined with the intention to produce fermented chipped wood for soil amendment.
Jean Pain's first experiments in this field are described in detail in his book The Methods of Jean Pain, available as a digital edition in our shop. To go further on the fermentation technique:
The insulating properties of wood — thermal insulation
Beyond being a source of exploitable energy, wood is also an excellent thermal insulator. In construction, it offers insulating properties that concrete or metal simply cannot match.
Two main insulation applications:
- High-performance thermal and acoustic insulation
- Low thermal conductivity
- Renewable, bio-based material
- Compatible with timber-frame construction
- Mix directly usable as wall infill
- Thermal insulation and moisture regulation
- Direct use of chipped wood
- Traditional technique, revived by sustainable construction
For the second application, the consistent Super-Pain chip granulometry is a genuine asset: it guarantees an even mix and constant insulation density, with no air pockets or weak points caused by sawdust or large splinters.
A chipper for every wood energy project
From the homeowner valorising hedge trimmings as boiler fuel, to the forestry professional supplying a biomass installation — there is a Super-Pain for every volume and every application.