BEING green is good and it makes financial sense – and that is why Farleigh Wallop Estate has installed a biomass boiler system.

Lord Lymington, who took over the running of the 4,000-acre estate, from his father the Earl of Portsmouth in 2009, had been looking at renewable energy to remove the estate’s reliance on oil.

He was aware that the Government’s Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI), which pays a tariff for every kilowatt (kW) hour of energy generated by renewable energy, would help to fund a move away from oil and LPG, so he decided to go for a biomass system designed by Gloucestershire firm Ecovision.

Key in the decision to go for a biomass solution was the estate’s 1,000 acres of managed woodland.

The natural thinning of the trees would provide an environmentally friendly use of the estate’s soft wood as wood chip to fuel the biomass boilers.

Ecovision installed the two biomass boilers, which are capable of providing up to 1MW of energy – more than enough to provide heat and hot water to the 13 properties, including Farleigh House, estate farm cottages and offices as well as a privately let office building.

Greta Iddeson, Farleigh Estate’s manager, said the overall cost for the whole project was approximately £450,000.

“The Government’s RHI was a big driver in our decision to move to renewable energy,” explained Greta.

“The RHI payments, combined with savings against the previous cost of our oil and LPG, mean our biomass installation will pay for itself in around six years, and as the payments will continue for the remaining 14 years, the estate will receive a significant return on its original investment.”

Lord Lymington said: “So far, we are very happy with the biomass system Ecovision has delivered for us.

“We have already given our next-door neighbour a guided tour of our installation and our tenant farmer recently hosted a farm walk for 300 farmers, who were invited to have a look at what we have done.”