Paper Excellence in Port Alberni has been awarded a pair of CleanBC Industry Fund grants totalling $145,000 for feasibility studies examining two sustainable business projects. The first grant, for $51,000, will help Port Alberni’s Catalyst Paper division look at offloading and delivery options for its biofuel. This would include improving efficiency in offloading of hogfuel at the plant as well as ways to increase biofuel steam production to reduce natural gas consumption in its No. 4 power boiler and auxiliary boilers. The second grant, for approximately $94,000, will help Catalyst Paper investigate the feasibility of power boiler stack heat recovery. This project would ideally see the paper plant install a heat-recovery system in the power boiler exhaust. Recovered heat would in turn offset the heat generated from fuel combustion. “Both of our projects are designed to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels,” said Keith Ellwood, interim manager at Paper Excellence’s Catalyst Paper plant in Port Alberni.