By KEVIN WALKER
Michigan Correspondent LANSING, Mich. — In order to provide an incentive for the corn-powered heating industry, bills have been introduced in the Michigan House of Represen-tatives that would provide tax credits to corn heating unit makers and to consumers who opt to use corn to heat their homes.
One bill, introduced by Rep. Fulton Sheen (R-Plainwell), would provide a tax credit to corn heating unit makers equal to the cost of manufacturing a corn-burning stove or furnace.
The other bill, introduced by Rep. Neal Nitz (R-Baroda), would provide a tax credit to consumers who buy a corn heating stove or furnace.
The tax credit would be equal to 25 percent of the total amount paid for the purchase and installation of the appliance.
Although neither bill has been scheduled for a hearing, Michigan Corn Growers Assoc. (MCGA) Executive Director Jody Pollok believes the bills will move forward eventually.
“I really think the bills have a great opportunity to move,” Pollok said. “A lot of the hearings so far have been more educational in nature.”
Pollok said the legislature has been focused on resolving the current budget crisis; she believes that once it’s resolved legislators will have a chance to focus on other issues.
In the meantime the MCGA has been working with various stakeholders to put together a website that will serve as a clearinghouse for information on corn heating.
She hopes the website will be up and running within a week or two, and said there will be a link to it on MCGA’s website at www.micorn.org
There is currently quite a bit of information available about heating with corn at Penn State University’s website at www.energy.cas.psu.edu
This site discusses such issues as finding a supplier of shelled corn, disposing of ash, storing corn properly and other issues.
The site also lists more than two dozen manufacturers of corn burning stoves and furnaces, including several in Michigan.
One such manufacturer is Fahrenheit Technologies, Inc. in Holland, Mich. Its president, David Shidler, is optimistic about how things are going with their flagship product, the Endurance biomass furnace.
“We’ve got six or seven dealers already set up in Michigan,” Shidler said.
The company website says its furnace can be used as a stand-alone unit that would take the place of a whole-home furnace, as an add-on furnace or as a stove to heat a small area.
“There’s a little more technology with a pellet stove or corn stove, so they are probably a little more expensive,” Shidler said.
The Endurance furnace can burn corn, wood pellets, grain pellets and beans.
So far it’s only been approved by the Underwriting Laboratories (UL) for corn burning.
While UL approval isn’t essential, Shidler said, its good to have and insurance companies like it.
He said that the product would soon be UL approved to burn the other materials.
He also said that some of the special requirements for burning corn are really not that big of a deal. For example, he said that while corn used in the Endurance furnace should have a 15 percent moisture content, most corn comes that way anyway.
The company also touts its furnace as automatically discharging clinker, the unburned material that could otherwise be a nuisance.
As for the question of how one gets hold of the corn to be burned, Shidler said that businesses specializing in delivery of corn for corn heating units are already being started.
Fahrenheit Technologies is only two years old, and is a spin-off of an automotive-related company.
Shidler said the company saw a need for this new line of heating units, and pursued it.
The company recently showed off its biomass furnace in Reno, Nev. at the Hearth Patio and Barbecue Assoc. Expo, and was a finalist for an award presented by Hearth and Home magazine.
For more information about corn heating as well as a list of manufacturers in Michigan and elsewhere, visit the Penn State University website listed above.
For more information about Fahrenheit Technologies, Inc., visit www.fahrenheit tech.com |
