Three biomass boilers being installed in a shed
Thursday 14th of May 2020 | Posted In: Compliance, Comply

How the BSL helps your RHI accreditation

As part of your ongoing Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) obligations, you must demonstrate that any non-waste wood fuels you are sourcing are sustainable. To do this, you must provide evidence that your fuel meets both the land criteria and the Greenhouse Gas (GHG) threshold. This leaves you with two options:

  • Self-reporting - involves calculating a GHG figure every quarter
  • A Biomass Suppliers List (BSL) application - successful BSL applications will receive a BSL number associated with a specific fuel which can easily be uploaded to the RHI portal every quarter as evidence of sustainability.

BSL accreditation is an option for a large variety of companies and individuals such as:

  • Self-Suppliers: If your boiler is under 1 MW thermal and you are sourcing a wood fuel from your own land, for which you have a felling license or can prove that the fuel is arboricultural arisings, then you fall into this category and can register as a self-supplier as long as you are sourcing the fuel from within 50 miles.
  • Producer Trader: If you or your organisation convert raw material into fuel then you are a producer trader even if you are only providing fuel to yourself. This does not necessarily require additional processing of the fuel.
  • Trader:  If you purchase BSL wood fuel and sell it on to other BSL registered traders or RHI participants but do not perform any additional processing of the fuel then you are a trader.
  • Producer: if you sell fuel exclusively to a trader then you are a producer.

If you are currently self-reporting your sustainability and want to pursue a different option, or if you are currently installing a biomass system and would like to easily report sustainability without the hassle of reporting GHG figures, you should consider the BSL. Having your own BSL number also means that if you were to be subject to an RHI audit, you could easily address any questions Ofgem have regarding sustainability. A common stumbling block for RHI participants.

When there is already so much to consider staying RHI compliant, it may be worth your time to get a BSL number. Therefore, if BSL accreditation is something you would be interested in, then you can call us on 024 7669 8899 to discuss the benefits in more detail. You can also find more information on the website here.