Chaleur Regional Hospital is a pioneer when it comes to operating wood fired boiler systems. Well ahead of their time, the hospital had the foresight to install a biomass fired boiler in the 1980’s in order to heat and cool their facility. With their current load, the existing boiler room had to rely on a mix of biomass and oil fired boilers in order to keep up with the demand. In 2010 the decision was made to replace their existing wood fired boiler with a larger capacity Wellons FEI biomass boiler that could operate at higher pressures. The unit will enable them to operate the facility strictly on biomass and keep their existing oil fired boilers as back-up.
With the higher pressure boiler and the addition of a small single stage turbine, the plant will now be considered as a tri-generation plant. They will be able to produce electricity with the turbine, chilled water for air conditioning with their absorption chillers and also space and process heating all with the use of the steam produced by the Wellons FEI biomass fired boiler.