The Origins of Holz-Energie-Zentrum

Originally the idea to market the service „heat from wood“ was restricted to logs, but then it was extended to fuels such as pellets, wood chips and wood briquettes.

The persons involved soon realized that such a project could only be put into effect when the different local forces cooperated on a basis of mutual trust.

Therefore in 1999, intensive co-operation of forest owners, saw mills, the town Olsberg, industry and trade resulted in a regional joint venture for the production and marketing of the regenerative energy-source wood.

Eight saw mills, the town Olsberg, a producer of stoves together with a company specialised in the installation of heating systems for wood chips, an organisation consisting of forest cooperatives and forest owners, and a disposing business in the same year founded the Holz-Energie-Zentrum Olsberg GmbH.

HEZ has made it its business to provide great amounts of high-quality wood fuel reliably and flexibly, as required by the respective customer.

Logs

Process of production::

After the regionally bought industrial wood (3m/4m long) has been sorted it is automatically sawed and chopped. Per minute one trunk is chopped. The logs are transported by conveyor belt to big latticed boxes and brought to the drying room, where they dry to about 20% humidity.

The dried logs are automatically packed into cardboard-boxes of 12kg. The plant is laid out for 12 000 cubic metres of solid wood or 600 000 boxes per year.

The boxes are delivered to petrol stations, DIY super stores and grocery shops.
The advantages of this in Germany unique packaging lie in easy stacking, guaranteed quality and a degree of humidity of not more than 20%. Insects are killed during the process of drying, and so there won’t be any unpleasant „surprises“ in your sitting room.

A general problem with the humidity of the wood is the term “dry” Often so called dry wood with a grade of humidity of 40% is burned and thereby the image of the wood is decreased.

Wood from the region is marked in boxes as well as in loose form.

Additionally to beech logs, wood briquettes are sold. They consist of pressed untreated shavings without any kind of binder.


Wood chips are delivered to large heating systems (at least 100kW). Depending on the system’s power, the storage-method and the method of burning the system needs suitable fuel. Because of the multitude of firms in our company it has become possible to gurarantee just this individual supply.

At the moment eight large heating systems are supplied with wood chips

In North Rhine-Westfalia pellets are going to become increasingly important.
Pellets are of cylindrical shape and made of dry untreated refuse wood with a diameter of 6mm and a length of 10-30mm.

Since 2001 one of our partners produces pellets. These are marketed in North Rhine-Westfalia, Hesse and Lower Saxony.

From the range of products it becomes clear that the regenerative energy-source wood is professionally commercialised by different branches of the wood industry.

Every partner benefits from the cooperation!

From now on forest enterprises take part in the marketing of their raw material, and they can open up new sales potentials. They flexibly master the task of supplying the region’s population with the fuel wood.

Producers of stoves and heating systems offer a reliable fuel-supply to the customer.

For saw mills a new sales potential opens up for by-products such as wood chips and sawdust.

The town Olsberg has actively taken advantage of the opportunity to support the utilization of regenerative energy. By that it contributes to the region’s business cycle.

The local forestry office initiated and intensively attended the project.