Solid biomass clearly dominates in the structure of renewable energy generation in Poland. Currently, solid agricultural biomass includes mainly cereal and rape straw and agri-food industry waste. However, ultimately, sources of biomass will include perennial energy plants, cultivated on agricultural land as well as willow cultivated in the Eko-Salix system on land unusable for the production of consumption or fodder plants. Willow biomass produced in this system is a valuable feedstock for energy generation with a high calorific value and low moisture, ash and sulphur content. The gasification of chips obtained from 5-year-old willows cultivated in the Eko-Salix system in a prototype gasifier was conducted with no irregularities. The unit cost of generation heat energy from willow chips was around 11.6 (sic)/GJ. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.