OXFORD — A new biomass furnace for Oxford Hills Comprehensive High School will be delayed more than two months in order to satisfy Department of Homeland Security mandates.

The federal government requires a specific type of container for shipping, Superintendent Rick Colpitts said Tuesday.

The container for the furnace, which is coming from Austria along with two others for the state, must meet certain specifications. Colpitts said he was not sure what the criteria were but he was told there was trouble accessing the correct containers that will be put on a ship to the United States.

“It was supposed to be installed and fired on January 5. Now it looks like March 15,” he said of the latest date he was provided by Siemens Technology, which is contracted with the school district for energy-savings projects.

Major construction got underway in September to house the biomass furnace intended to heat the Oxford Hills Comprehensive High School later this winter. The proposed $2-million-plus conversion project from oil to wood chips was planned to address escalating fuel costs and to make the district more energy independent by reducing the use of foreign oil.

The biomass furnace, which is being paid for, in part, by a $750,000 state Department of Conservation grant, is expected to save the district as much as $120,000 a year in annual fuel savings.

While some work has been ongoing for months to prepare for the arrival of the furnace, major construction began with the pouring of the 57-foot by 22-foot concrete slab for the structure that will house the wood chips, and a new addition to house the furnace.

Two of the three oil burners will remain in place to supplement heat in the shoulder seasons of fall and spring and in case the biomass furnace goes down during the winter, he said.

The third furnace has been taken out and placed in the Agnes Gray School in West Paris.

School officials say the biomass project will result in a number of  “green” benefits including a  reduction in the use of fossil fuels.

The overall project will also add other solar initiatives, LED lighting and sensors in the high school parking lot and equipment to heat water in the locker rooms showers in the summer.

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