Good afternoon. I'm Bill Mawdsley, associate director, Northwest Territories.
During our process of identifying the wood pellet industry as a viable opportunity in sustainable forest management, we did work through FPInnovations and other specialists in Canada on the necessary means for acquiring raw material, methods of making pellets, the quality of the material we have available for making pellets, and whether the pellet industry is economically feasible, given the market conditions that exist in the Northwest Territories.
Insofar as the technology is concerned for making a pellet and making heat out of it, the technology has advanced considerably in the last 20 years since wood pellets first came on the market. We're seeing very great success, especially with institutional systems. The individual is also commenting on the viability of it. In the Northwest Territories we are faced with very high fuel costs, which also translate into very high power costs, so the market and the market offset of the biomass pellets is very high.