Ochoco Lumber Co. and three other Eastern Oregon businesses or agencies have been awarded a combined $110,000 in grants for biomass projects, the Oregon Department of Forestry announced Friday.

Headquartered in Prineville, Ochoco Lumber mostly operates around John Day, where it has a sawmill and a pellet plant and where it plans to use the $25,000 grant, according to the Forestry Department.

The company plans to explore the commercial viability of opening a torrefied wood plant in Grant County, according to a news release. In the torrefaction process, slash, undergrowth and other woody material from forest thinning gets heated, resulting in a solid high-grade fuel product that could replace coal for burning in power plants, the news release stated.