Biofuel certification under SBP develops in Russia

On 09 April 2015 Forest certification LLC received an official status of the applicant for accreditation under the SBP system.

The scope of accreditation covers the biomass production and chain of custody, with the geographical scope covering Russia and CIS countries.

The Sustainable Biomass Partnership (SBP) is one of leading sectoral initiatives established in 2013 by largest European energy companies using biofuel (mainly in the form of wood pellets) at large heat and power stations. Heating and power generation where biomass is used as fuel is considered as an important technology by using which the European Union intends to achieve indicators on the development of renewable energetics by 2020.

The EU members adapt their approaches to the use of biofuel on the national level to ensure the legality and eco-efficiency of sources of raw materials. SBP aims at developing instruments required to demonstrate that at least solid fuel used for energy production meets these international requirements. SBP develops standards that allow companies producing and realizing biofuel to demonstrate conformity to applicable normative requirements as well as requirements for forest management sustainability, formation of responsible wood chains of custody, etc.

SBP fully acknowledges and credits existing successful forest certification systems, such as FSC and PEFC and does not aim at competing with or changing them. SBP represents a set of principles, standards and processes required to demonstrate conformity to these requirements. Where possible, SBP widely uses the FSC and PEFC standards as well as processes of other forest certification systems.

Six SBP standards jointly represent a certification scheme, which may be applied by organizations using independent third-party assessment provided by certification bodies. An organization demonstrating sufficient conformity level is eligible to receive a certificate and use SBP claims in relation to wood pellets or bricks produced by it.

The main SBP certification object is a producer of pellets/bricks. If there is no FSC or PEFC certified wood as raw material, the system of legality control as well as of conformity to the ecological and social requirements during harvesting of wood raw material is in place within SBP. By and large, this approach complies with the FSC controlled wood or PEFC chain of custody due diligence system.

At the moment we are developing necessary internal documents (procedures, report templates, etc.), planning training of experts and carrying out of the pilot project on the assessment of one of enterprises (to be witnessed by an SBP representative). After successful completion of all accreditation stages SBP will take a decision whether to accredit our company.

The certification procedure under the SBP standards includes the preliminary and main audits. The duration of audits depends on the scope of certification, mostly the level of providing of the wood pellet producer with FSC/PEFC certified raw material.

To find acknowledge of the applicant status for SBP accreditation please visit the SBP website page http://www.sustainablebiomasspartnership.org/sbp-framework/get-certified