The local hardware store here in my Maine town says people are "panic buying" pellets. They can't keep enough bags in stock.

I expect he'll have a fire sale in the Spring (as it were).

Pellet manufacturing is not an energy creation process.

Neither is drilling for oil. We still talk about energy return there. I'm particularly curious about how much energy goes into the drying.

the input form the sun counts for free.

And as usual, nature never gets paid. Not for the oil, not for the wood. But even solar energy is not free; it's being diverted from some other use. What was the number from the BBC recently, approx $7T per year "cost" to nature for what we are stripping from the forests? We're living off the built-up, stored concentrations of resources - stored by that solar energy and the forces it drives. It may only be a very small fraction, but we need to start thinking much more holistically.

cfm in Gray, ME

All Swedish forestry and related transports could be run with fishcer-tropsch diesel from gasified biomass from a fraction of the yearly yield of renewable forest resource.

Or partly by train like here in sweden http://www.branschnyheter.se/article23869.php For the people how do not understand swedish, It is a terminal for transporting timber by train and they expect it to be profitable in three to four years.

The rail is electrified so it could be run on almost anything. Will it save energy? Probably not now! where was two sawmills in the small village until just a few years ago but they are both closed now.
But it could be used to produce energy from wood with good eroei, they just have to use it in another way.

I looked seriously about setting up A wood pellet plant 2 years ago using wet wood chip from a log mill. Pulled out about a month before ordering equipment. Due to the supply chain being totaly dependant on fossil fuel and high power requirment to run the Plant. Grinding dry 20mm softwood wood chip to >3mm and pelleting into 6mm takes about 85-100Kwh of electricity. Chipping logs this goes up to 120-140Kwh Drying 50% humidity wood down to 10% using waste wood/bark uses up approx 20-30% of orignal energy in wood. This does not include energy used in loging/forwarding/trucking.
Pelleting ony works as a way for sawmills to get rid of ther waste sawdust if the previously were dumping it.It is a good substatution for oil burners, saves oil for better uses.
Fitting a wood Gassifacation boilet to new house. 91% efficient, air dryed wood (no need for all the processing add can cut the wood myself With chainsaw,an axe if things get bad)