Biofuel from regeneration forest, immature and final harvesting

Management and use of biomass from non-traditional forest operations has today a low priority, partly because the work is expensive and partly because a rational and economic exploitation, for example for bioenergy, is not facilitated. The result is regen eration, while the challenge should be local exploitation for energy purposes. This main goal is to utilize the biomass and maintain the landscape in a sustainable way. The landscape includes regeneration forest (preservation of cultivated landscape, roa ds and projected roads, infield/edges of cultivated land/tree care/garden refuse), immature forest and final harvesting. The project has two sub-projects, and in each sub-project a PhD student will be employed. 1. Competitive biofuel deliveries from culti vated landscapes and late clearing/early thinning 2. Biomass from regenerating forest/immature forest as chips and raw material for pellet production (1) Professor Rolf Björnheden at The University of Växjö will be scientific advisor in sub-project 1 and Dr. Juha Nurmi at The Finnish Forest Research Institute will be scientific advisor in sub-project 2. In addition the project will have a consultative group.