Thompsons Plant Hire | Plant, Haulage and Specialist Services

Christmas should be a time to kick back and relax with the family, perhaps chill out with a beer, a glass of wine and watch some TV. Not for Kevin and guys from the biomass-processing department, it’s off to a damp and dreary Ayrshire and North Wales to provide holiday cover at both of the UPM CHP Boilers and paper mill's in Irvine and Shotton for the supply managers UPM Tilhill.

The plant's are powered by green energy, through a biomass-fueled power plant, which uses approximately 80 tons of processed biomass per hour. This is usually trucked in from outside, but over the Christmas period the company’s regular suppliers shut down, leaving Thompsons to step in and fill the gap by chipping and handling on site stocks of biomass.

Maintaining production is no small job and requires not only the monster Morbark 4600XL Track Wood Hog but also a Morbark 5048 Drum Chipper. These machines are quite something to behold s they turn huge logs into wood chips in a matter of seconds. Between them over the Christmas period they managed to chew their way through 10,000 tons of logs, at 25 tons per wagonload that’s 800 wagons.

To most people the Christmas period is a special time, but to Kevin and his team, they are days like any other. They are used to being away from home. Most independent biomass producers don’t have the luxury of bringing the production to them; they go where they are needed to fit in with the needs of their clients. It’s this flexibility that keeps the services of Kevin and his team in demand.