May 1 - McClatchy-Tribune Regional News - Phyllis Jacobs Griekspoor The Wichita Eagle, Kan.

Prairie Fire Bioengery Cooperative will build a biomass processing plant at Healy.

The cooperative, owned by 86 members in nine western Kansas counties, will collect agricultural waste from its owners and process it into pellets for gasification boilers and sold to both commercial and residential operations.

The site will have its own waste-powered gasification Uniconfort boiler that will drive a turbine to generate electricity for the pellet manufacturing operation.

Uniconfort boilers are distributed by Alternative Energy Solutions of Wichita, which has North American rights to the Italian-made boilers.

Prairie Fire hopes to market its products to small- and medium-sized steam users, including ethanol plants, feed mills, packing plants, hospitals and schools.

The cooperative has an agreement with Sunflower Power Corp. at Holcomb to test biomass pellets along with pulverized coal as a fuel for its electrical generation plant.