An automatically fed pellet boiler for the average home will cost between £14,000 and £19,000 including installation, flue, fuel store and VAT at 5%. A log boiler on average will cost between £11,000 and £23,000 and an individual pellet stove abound £4,000 – £4,500. Fuel costs may vary dramatically but will generally cost less per kilo depending on the size of the order. So the larger fuel store you have, generally the more you will save over time. A website set up to help biomass system owners find fuel suppliers in their area can be found Big Barn.

Biomass boilers are not cheap and can cost up to three or four times more than a standard fossil fuel boiler. Nonetheless, the total cost of biomass systems varies between types, manufacturers and installers. The table below gives you a rough idea of the costs of buying and installing a biomass boiler system, including parts (boiler, buffer tank, flue) and installation, as well as VAT at 5%.

These costs are for small and medium scale biomass systems for homes and businesses. For example, a standard 3-bedroom home’s energy requirements would be fulfilled by a 15kW system.

Installation costs of larger biomass systems vary massively and can be comparatively much higher than those of smaller systems, especially considering many such systems require some degree of building work. The Carbon Trust website has a number of case studies which detail the total cost for renewable energy installations in a range of organisations. A school in Scotland, for example, installed a 400kW biomass heating system which came to a total cost of around £624,000 (of which £112,000 was spent on the boiler itself).