Economic analyses of use of forest and forest products in Norway to reduce the atmospheric concentration of greenhouse gases, utenlandsstip.

Forest and forest products contribute today in two ways to the reduction of atmospheric content of greenhouse gases. First, while growing, forest absorbs CO2, which is stored in the wood. An old tree may be a pure storage of carbon. But later, the tree wi ll decompose and emit CO2 until most of the CO2 once absorbed is emitted. Secondly, forest products may contribute to reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, directly or indirectly, by replacing other products which emit greenhouse gases from fossil fuels. Clearly, there is a trade-off between use of forest products to replace other goods and utilisation of forest as a carbon sink / storage since a tree cannot be used for the both purposes at the same time. The usage of forest and forest products has thus to be analysed together in a common framework. Since wood fibre is a raw material for several products, the forest industry has to be included in these analyses to make optimisation of production and use of forest and forest productsas bioenergy, paper an d sawn wood possible. This is not yet done in Norway. There are models developed for forest management analyses and for forest industry but these models operate separately. In the United States, the FASOM model, which predicts forest management/production , forest industry and land use and land use changes, with the respective greenhouse gas fluctuations, was developed in the 90s by researcher at the Oregon State University, among others. The objective of the project is learn the American FASOM in order to make a Norwegian version of the forest sector part of the model, so the model can be a consistent tool for studying production and use of forest and forest products in a greenhouse gas perspective in Norway. The stay in Oregon is planned for learning abo ut the model and implementing it for Norway. Prof. Darius Adams, a keyperson in development of FASOM, receives me. Taking course given by some of the top professors in relevant fields is also a priority.