From the Director's Desk: A Look at February Data, Book Your Room for the Pellet Fuels Institute Annual Conference

A Look at February Data

Owing to the new pattern of data releases from the U.S. Energy Information Administration we’ve now got a view of production, sales, and inventory data from February. I’ll remind Pellet Wire, readers, that in our last Pellet Wire, I commented on the January data and the curious production numbers from the West region. As a reminder, the published production numbers for the West last month were 60,420 tons, a notable departure from the steady 35,000 – 42,000 tons we’ve come to expect from that region. I raised the issue with our friends at the EIA and they offered that they would dig into their responses and adjust the numbers when they published the February data. My suspicions were correct and the production number for the West in January has been amended to 35,468 tons, down from the colossal 60,420 initially reported. This impacted the U.S. total as well and the new U.S. total for January was actually 148,084 tons, much closer to the month’s average of 141,033 tons. 

The data drop on Monday appears to align with what wood pellet producers, retailers, and industry observers likely expected. As February drew to a close the PFI Heating Degree Day Index revealed the Northeast was lagging even during the prior heating season’s lackluster accumulated HDDs. Only the sparsely populated northern plains/northern Rockies showed any real positive departure from the HDD’s accumulated in the heating season of 2021-22. Locales in the Northeast had all fallen behind last year as February ended. 

The results were predictable.

Let’s have a look at the February numbers (average):

Sales: 105,629 (126,153)
Production: 161,393 (127,317)
Inventory: 158,129 (183,751 in February of 2022)

This year’s February results were marginally better than last year's but didn’t offer the kind of late-season bounce everyone was hoping to see. 

Book Your Room for the Pellet Fuels Institute Annual Conference

The Pellet Fuels Institute Annual Conference is just one month out. Have you made plans to attend? While registrations for the conference can be completed up to and including the opening day of the event, the hotel room block will expire on Monday, May 15. 

You can make your reservations at the Hyatt here. 

It is worth noting that the conference venue provides a front-row seat to the country’s largest urban bat population. If you are a music fan, there is also a statue of the great Stevie Ray Vaughan nearby as well. 

Booking a conference hotel room sounds like a great Friday afternoon task as you clean up from your week. We hope to see you in Austin. 

—Tim Portz
 Executive Director