News summary II

News 1: European pellet consumption expected to triple by 2020

The latest report of consumption forecasts for 2020 range from 35 million metric tonnes for Western Europe (Pöyry) to 50 – 80 MMT for the total EU (AEBIOM). German is the largest producer of wood pellets in the EU, which produced 2 million metric tonnes in year 2013. Sweden comes second with total production of 1.35 million metric tonnes in year 2013. The production is expected to remain stagnant in the future years due to "weak investment climate and the limited availability of feedstock supplies".

Canadian wood pellet exports, 2012

News 2: US may cover half share of total European wood pellets imports by 2014
Quoting the new, in 2012, U.S. wood pellets exports were boosted by seventy percent to nearly 1.8 MMT, representing a value of US$ 331 million. That means the report gave a price estimates of $185 per MT.

Note: MMT is million metric tonnes; MT is metric tonne.

News 3: Korea looks to Indonesia for wood pellets
According to data from Korea, Indonesia offers the cheapest pellet, with the cost, insurance and freight (CIF) price of US$ 131 per ton, below Vietnam’s US$ 144 per ton, and Malaysia’s US$ 141 per ton.
Following this news, I checked the quality of the Malaysian wood pellet (because I'm a Malaysian). After a quick google search, I found the specification of wood pellet for this company, TG Quantum Wood Pellet.

TG Quantum Wood Pellet Specification

the gross calorific value is 5299 kcal/kg, or 22.2 MJ/kg. That is at the higher end of dry mass calorific value of woody biomass. My wood pellet from Pinnacle pellet, which has no binder, has a dry mass gross calorific value is 20.3 MJ/kg. I am quite sure they added some extra binders into their wood pellets that causes the gross calorific value to be so high.