ENplus A1 Wood Pellets – General Information to Know

Are you a newcomer to the industry of wood pellets? What is ENplus certification?

To put it simply, ENplus A1 is a quality certification for wood pellets that are granted by various of institutions. It is to guarantee the credibility of businesses that deal in the production of wood pellets.

Let's go over in greater depth what the ENplus certification entails and the process to help you obtain one for your company.

How do you guarantee the quality of wood pellets?

A third-party certification agency verifies the quality of wood pellets. Wood pellets are the gold standard. The certification for the quality of wood pellets is limited to the heating supply sector. Quality certification is unnecessary for industrial wood pellets because the supplier and the buyer would do their laboratory testing on samples to ensure the pellets are of the desired standard.

The most well-known quality certification programmes for wood pellets are ENplus and CANplus. Eighty percent of pellets marketed in Europe's heating sector are ENplus certified, which began in 2010. The ENplus programme is overseen by the "European Pellet Council" (EPC), which also grants national pellet associations licences. As with ENplus, CANplus is very similar. Canadian law, rather than European law, governs this certification method for pellet quality.

The requirements and procedure for ENplus/CANplus certification are detailed below. Based on characteristics like ash percentage, moisture percentage, bulk density, pellet diameter, pellet length, and fines percentage, the ENplus categorizes wood pellets into grades A1, A2, and B 3.

The Meaning of ENplus A1

Pellet manufacturers and distributors can benefit from ENplus A1, a quality assurance programme that provides an internationally recognized framework for making quality a priority at every stage of the process. Regarding traceability and ethical production, the ENplus A1 mark for wood pellets is on par with the 'little Red Tractor' for food in the United Kingdom.

To provide quality assurance for wood pellets used in smaller furnaces, the ENplus® scheme was established in 2010. The programme has grown to include more than 1100 accredited businesses.

Wood pellets for home boilers and stoves are produced, stored, bagged, traded, and transported in accordance with ISO 9001 and ISO 17226-1 standards, respectively, in an effort to guarantee a consistently high level of quality.

If you have your ENplus® certification, you'll be good to go for three years. Certification is performed once every three years in addition to annual surveillance inspections.

Advantages of ENplus Certification

If you sell wood pellets and have a quality certification, your customers will have more faith in the pellets they purchase from you. Many people, when they go to buy wood pellets, only look at those that have been approved for use in stoves. When competing in a competitive market, gaining a reputation as a quality provider can help you stand out from the competition. In addition, if the management system you use or the product you sell is certified, you will be in a better position to deal with problems related to traceability and contamination threats.

Certification is required in order to gain access to the market. Pellets that have been granted the ENplus certification currently hold an 80 percent share of the heating market in Europe. Buyers who are interested in the property won't consider anyone who isn't certified. The "Environmental Protection Agency" requires that people in the United States who use pellet stoves only use pellets that have been given the green light. Stoves in Canada may only be fueled with wood pellets that have been given the government's stamp of approval under new restrictions.

Organizations that Certify Wood Pellet Quality

This process involves the participation of three different organizations: inspection, testing, and certification. The inspection agency is responsible for travelling to wood pellet factories and distributors, collecting pellet samples, inspecting the raw materials and manufacturing procedures, and then reporting their findings to the certification agency. The certification agency is responsible for ensuring that the inspection agency is in compliance with all relevant regulations.

The objective of the testing institution is to investigate the wood pellets to determine whether or not they satisfy the prerequisites. Certification bodies, often known as testing bodies, supply evidence to institutions for certification, who then review that evidence and issue certifications based on their findings. All three organisations need to hold the relevant ISO certifications for ENplus/CANplus in order to submit an application for approval by the "European Pellet Council" and the "Wood Pellet Association of Canada."

How Can You Ensure The Quality of Your Wood Pellets?

You can acquire an application for ENplus certification from their respective websites. The next step is to select an inspection institution from the list to perform the on-site inspection, a testing institute from the list to perform the pellet analysis, and finally a certification institute to receive the report.

The following items are required for inspections:

● Obtaining pellet samples for laboratory testing

● Examining the production logs, quality policy, and employee credentials, as well as the quality management system

● Checking out the machinery in action

● Checking the provenance of supplies

● Checking for compliance with WPAC reporting requirements

● Figure out how much of a carbon footprint you're making

● Proving the accuracy of one's introspection

● Observing a ban on all non-approved bag styles

● Checking the accuracy of production and sales numbers

In addition, getting your business certified as ENplus is a two-step process, one for service providers and another for pellet dealers.

ENplus A1 Quality Requirements