Columbia Plywood Amends Permit In NC, Hopes To Add AirBurners FireBox

The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Air Quality (DAQ) is accepting public comment on a draft air quality permit modification for Columbia Plywood Corp.—Columbia Carolina Division, the company’s plywood manufacturing facility in Old Fort, NC.

If approved, the modification would allow Columbia Plywood to install an air curtain incinerator unit from AirBurners at the facility to burn its wood waste for disposal—increasing potential emissions thresholds, thus requiring a Title V air quality permit.

AirBurners incinerators, branded as FireBox, were designed principally as a pollution control device for open burning. The primary objective of an air curtain machine is to reduce the particulate matter, which results from burning clean wood waste. Using a technology called “air curtain,” the smoke particles are trapped and reburned, reducing them to an acceptable limit per EPA guidelines.

Clean wood waste is loaded into the FireBox and an accelerant is used to ignite the pile. The air curtain is not engaged until the fire has grown in strength, usually after 15 to 20 minutes. Once engaged, the air curtain then runs at a steady state throughout the burn operation, and the waste wood is loaded at a rate consistent with the rate of burn. The smallest machine offered by AirBurners burns at a rate of 1-2 tons per hour, with the largest burning in excess of 10 tons per hour.

All public comments made to the DAQ before September 11, 2025 will be considered before a final decision on the proposed permit is made.

Latest news

Astec, Bejac Announce Distribution Agreement

Astec has announced Bejac Corp., a heavy equipment dealer with 10 locations, will represent the Peterson line of forestry and environmental recycling equipment in California and Arizona. Bejac, founded in 1953 operated as an underground pipeline contracting business until 1985 when the company pivoted to the heavy, specialty equipment sector…

read more

Valmet To Convert Coal-Fired Boiler In Finland To Pellet-Fired

Valmet will be converting Helen Ltd.’s coal-fired district heat boiler to bubbling fluidized bed (BFB) combustion to enable wood pellet firing at the Salmisaari ‘A’ power plant in Helsinki, Finland. The conversion promotes the company’s goal of phasing out coal, while at the same time strengthening the construction of a sustainable energy system…

read more

Enviva Announces First Quarter Setback

Enviva, the world’s largest producer of industrial wood pellets, released its quarterly report in early May, and it rippled through the wood-to-energy ranks. “The plans and initiatives underway to improve productivity and costs across Enviva’s current asset platform continue to fall behind expectations,” commented John Keppler, Executive Chairman of the board…

read more

Dieffenbacher Names New Energy Unit Director

Wolfgang Lashofer has been appointed as the new Managing Director of Dieffenbacher Energy GmbH, which was formed at the beginning of the year following the acquisition of BERTSCHenergy, based in Bludenz, Western Austria. As Managing Director of Dieffenbacher Energy, Lashofer takes over the management of the newly established Energy Business Unit…

read more

Find Us On Social

Subscribe to Our Newsletter

Wood Bioenergy News Online hits the inboxes of subscribers in the wood-to-energy sectors.

Subscribe/Renew

Wood Bioenergy is published and delivered worldwide 6 times per year. Free to qualified readers in the U.S. Subscribers outside the U.S. are asked to pay a small fee.

Advertise

Complete the online form so we can direct you to the appropriate Sales Representative.