Increasing wood deliveries and environmental quality

In 2006, the Norwegian government developed the strategy for increased annual harvesting of wood in Norwegian forests. Several analyses show that the strategy can be sustainably implemented. The annual growth of Norwegian forests has the last decades been considerably larger than the annual harvest of wood. A number of factors restrains the development of increasingly efficient forest operations: The mature forests that will be harvested in the next decades have a lower average standing volume of wood pe r hectare. The average distance from mature forest to road networks are increasing. A higher percentage of harvesting operations will be difficult terrain. An increasing volume of wood will be harvested on non-frozen ground. The average distance from ma ture forests to industrial facilities is increasing. The mature forests are increasingly located in areas with little interest and traditions for forest management This project will study three main hypotheses: 1. The unit cost of wood delivered road side can be reduced by 20 % by means of better tactical and operational planning and improved routines on the harvesting site. 2. The emissions of greenhouse gases per unit of wood delivered to industry can be reduced more than 30% by means of eco-drivi ng, utilisation of machines with a lower fuel consumption and through better planning of the operations. 3 The environmental quality of harvested forest areas in Norway in terms of abundance and distribution of desired habitats and intactness of the for est floor can be improved even if the annual harvesting is increasing. This can be achieved by selecting the right equipment for each site, by better planning of the forest operation and by utilizing GIS/GPS-technology in planning and execution of harvest ing operations.