Pellet shortage could leave people in the cold

A little wooden pellet could cause big problems for some Miramichi homeowners this winter.

Thanks to a shortage from suppliers, local businesses have started to run out of the pellets many people use to heat their homes.

Kent Home Improvement manager Eddie Dean said they started to notice the shortage about a month or more ago.

"The demand had been much greater this year than it ever has been," he explained.

Pellet stoves burn small pellets made of compressed wood waste, and unlike traditional wood stoves, a motor feeds them into the fire.

A fan blows the warm air away from the stove and gives the homeowner more control over the heat level than other wood stoves.

More people are switching to pellet stoves as a more environmentally friendly option, Dean said. "There's a huge increase in actual sales."

Dean said Kent takes names for a waiting list and sells the pellets they get on a first-come-first-serve basis.

"We're not keeping up with the demand."

Fire destroyed a pellet plant in Quebec and the mill closures in New Brunswick mean there isn't as much waste wood to turn into pellets, he said. "The supply materials aren't there."

Miramichi Feeds manager Robert MacDiarmid said they have been selling pellets for about five or six years and had slight shortages before. "Not this bad."

They placed their pellet order with their supplier around the end of August and just received it Nov. 14.

Miramichi Feeds gets their pellets by the transport load, which is 1680 bags.

The supplier only had enough for half that and it was gone in a day, MacDiarmid said.

"We could probably sell two transport loads back to back if we could get them."

MacDiarmid said the supplier told him a surge in sales and a shortage of raw material are the reasons they can't get him enough pellets.

"Once they get it levelled out they're gonna get it back on track," he said.

Buddy Savoy owns a pellet stove and bought his pellets from Miramichi Feeds earlier in the fall before they ran out.

Last year he went through 120 bags between November and April and bought 125 for this year, he said. "That will last me all winter."

Savoy said he used to own a wood stove, but it was hard work and even though it would get hot, he couldn't control the heat, unlike the pellet stove. "It's a regulated heat."

Anne Goodin also owns a pellet stove, but she hasn't used it yet this winter and hasn't bought any pellets.

"I didn't know there was a problem."

She usually buys them all at once to get her through the winter, but said she hasn't yet because she is waiting to replace a part on her stove. "Usually I have them bought by now."

Goodin said she normally buys about 70 bags because she doesn't run the stove all the time to heat her home.

Because she also uses oil heat, the pellet shortage won't be a problem for her, she said.

"It's not my main source. I'll just go without them until I get them."

Like Savoy, Tom Ettinger switched to a pellet stove this year because his wood stove was too much work.

Ettinger said he can just turn the pellet stove on and forget about it.

"I don't have to get up in the middle of the night and put wood in it."

But he doesn't have all the pellets he needs for the winter because he is waiting for the three tons he ordered in October to arrive.

They are supposed to come in next week, but Ettinger said he doesn't know if they will.

"They've said that for the last several weeks."

Ettinger said he has enough pellets for about a month and still has the wood stove as a backup if he can't get enough pellets for the winter.

"I'll have to come up with something."

Savoy said some people bought the pellet stoves because they were cheaper than heating with other sources, but the price of pellets keeps going up. "What do you shift to next?" Some people in the Miramichi invested in the stoves because they thought there would be a pellet mill built here, he said. "Now there's no pellet factory."

Savoy said when he bought his stove he thought there would be a lot of pellets available at a reasonable price with a factory in the Miramichi. "That was the talk at the time."

Ettinger said a pellet mill seems like a viable industry because there is enough material around the Miramichi.

"I just don't understand why the government doesn't open up a pellet mill."

Dean said the price of a 40-pound bag at Kent just went up again to $6.59 per bag because there was an increase in cost from the company.

"Hopefully it won't go up any more this year."

Last year, the price was about $5 per bag, he said. "It's jumped about $1 a bag over the summer."

Dean said he's had a few customers that are upset because they just bought their stoves. "They're not very happy."

Kent buys their pellets from a supplier in Fredericton and orders a year in advance, he said. "They haven't caught up to what we've ordered."

Dean said he is telling customers they are getting more, it just takes time.

"Everywhere else they call it's the same situation."