PARIS — The Oxford Hills School District’s $2 million biomass furnace arrived in Paris Wednesday morning.

“It’s pretty exciting. Finally it’s here,” Facilities Director David Marshall said. The biomass furnace has been sitting at Cote Crane Corp. in Auburn for several weeks since it arrived from Austria by ship in Boston Harbor in early March.

The wood-chip-burning furnace, which weighs 2,600 pounds, arrived in two boxes at the back of the high school, where it was set up in a new building built specifically to house the unit.

Two weeks ago, Cote Crane employees arrived at the school with augers, a “rolling” floor, which will bring the wood chips from one room through another and finally into the furnace room, and other parts for the furnace operation that were set up by Thayer Corp. of Auburn employees.

On Wednesday six men from Cote Crane and four from the Thayer Corp. took several hours unloading the crates using three trucks and forklifts to attach the top piece to the bottom piece, which then had to be lined up with the augers and distribution system.

The furnace is expected to be up and running in early April. 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 annually in fuel.

Major construction took place over the last several months to house the biomass furnace, including a 57- by 22-foot concrete floor for a wood chip storage unit in the back of the high school as well as the addition to house the furnace itself.

The furnace is expected to replace about 90 percent of the consumption of No. 2 fuel oil.

In addition, solar panels on the high school roof and LED lighting, also part of the overall energy-conservation project, will help significantly reduce utility consumption at the high school, officials said.

The school’s Board of Directors has also given Marshall the go-ahead to apply for other grant money that may be used in the future to install biomass furnaces in five other schools.

“The aim is to reduce the cost of oil,” Marshall said. The proposed move could save as much as $50,000 a year in fuel, he said.

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