Background Europe is committed to greenhouse gas emission reductions. Part of the reduction will be achieved by a switch to renewable energy. The European Union has a binding target for renewables in energy consumption to increase to 20% in 2020. The heating/cooling sector consumes 49% of final energy in the EU. Most of this thermal energy is produced by burning fossil fuels. In 2004, renewable sources of energy (RES) such as biomass, solar and geothermal energy provided 8.4% of total heat consumption. New sources of renewable energy are needed to contribute to the EU 2020 target. In the French regions of Brittany and Pays de la Loire, biomass is already widely used for heating (wooden logs in detached housing, equivalent to 500 000 tons of oil annually; wooden chips, equivalent to 130 000 tons of oil). This consumption of wood energy is expected to increase, and could double in Brittany and in Pays de la Loire before 2014. In the agricultural sector, stakeholders in the region were interested in using crop residues as an additional energy source. Objectives The GREEN PELLETS project set out to demonstrate in Brittany and Pays de la Loire that certain herbaceous crops (miscanthus, fescus, switchgrass) as a feedstock for solid biomass constitute an effective, sustainable and eco-friendly bioenergy source for heating. This source of energy should contribute significantly and in the near future to reducing greenhouse gas emissions from western France. Green Pellets also aimed to draw up recommendations for the sustainable development of the sector. Results The GREEN PELLETS project worked with stakeholders (i.e. farmers) to carry out a social and economic study to estimate the available surface for energy crops in the project region. It concluded: Energy crops could be planted on 98 000 hectares (2.7% of the utilised agricultural area) without jeopardising food production. This would produce biomass corresponding to 437 000 tons of oil equivalent. Harvesting (mowing) wild grasses could produce biomass corresponding to 200 000 tons of oil equivalent. An environmental assessment of the energy crop showed that heat from the biomass produces 10 times less CO2 than natural gas or fuel. But the herbaceous biofuel is more likely to cause air acidification than gas or wood. The project carried out combustion tests in laboratory and real conditions (on 10 pilot sites) to assess the quality of raw material. The tests allowed boilers to be adapted to the biomass pellets, and to be optimised in order to limit pollutant emissions. The results of the tests were presented to boiler manufacturers and fitters. If adjustments to boilers are made, use of the pellets could reduce emissions of CO2, NOx, SO2 and dusts. Project partner COOPEDOM was able to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 64% by using the energy crops in an adjusted biomass oven. The project demonstrated clear environmental benefits. By using herbaceous pellets instead of wood pellets at the 10 pilot sites, greenhouse gas emissions would be reduced by the equivalent of 13 200 tons of CO2 annually. At regional scale, this would mean a reduction of the equivalent of 1.2 million tons of CO2. But the project identified cost as the main obstacle to the development of the biofuel sectors. The price of herbaceous biofuels is too high if compared to the price of wood. Further information on the project can be found in the project's layman report and After-LIFE Communication Plan (see "Read more" section).