THIS is a rare glimpse inside one of the heavily subsidised businesses at the centre of the botched Renewable Heat Incentive scheme.
The scene showing a row of biomass boilers in a shed in Co Fermanagh is thought to be replicated across the north under the flawed scheme which could cost the public £490 million over the next 20 years.
The picture emerged as a DUP special adviser last night confirmed that his father-in-law runs two green energy boilers under the RHI scheme.
John Robinson, who has denied claims by former minister Jonathan Bell over the introduction of cost controls, said the poultry farmer signed up to the subsidies before he married his daughter and he has never advised anyone to join it or sought to benefit in any way from it.
The businessman behind the Co Fermanagh woodchip-drying operation is saving £3,000 a month on a previous oil-fired system but insists he is not abusing the subsidy.
A visit by The Irish News to the industrial yard last week revealed the shed with an open door and at least four working biomass boilers inside.
When contacted, the owner said the boilers heat the shed and dry woodchips for an “industrial process”.
He said they were installed in 2015 and confirmed that the business is in receipt of RHI but would not reveal how much is being paid.
“We have an industrial process. We produce the pellets ourselves to sell so some of the heat we use here is used in the production of that product. The primary heat use is for an industrial process,” he said.
“Would we consider what we’re doing abuse of the scheme? I would say not. It’s a money-saving exercise for us – our oil bill before we put these in would have been almost £3,000 a month so we eliminated that entirely.
“The boilers are a significant investment and if we weren’t in receipt of the subsidy it would be more cost-efficient to be running on oil. I wouldn’t say we’re abusing it, definitely not.
“The people that would be in question are the people who are heating sheds that they weren’t heating before and have no real use for them.
“There are people sitting with warehouses and no sides on them – that would be ineligible use.”
Failures to cap the generous RHI subsidies mean that businesses can effectively earn money by burning fuel.
The geographical spread of claimants was revealed yesterday, with the greatest concentration in mid-Ulster and north Antrim.
Last night Sinn Féin repeated calls for the names of all those receiving money to be published, saying it is necessary to establish whether there are any political conflicts of interest.
