Browsing by Subject "energywood"

Energywood harvesting is increasing strongly due to promotion of renewable energy sources. As a part of the development the use of energywood thinning will increase and become more diverse. Therefore it is important to know the effects of the operation on merchantable yield and on profitability of silviculture. The objective of the study is to detect those effects of mechanised energywood thinning in young stands. For economical calculations the moment for decision making is set to the moment of the thinning. 30 young stands were chosen for the study. For forecasting stand development stand parameters were measured from each stand. The study was limited to mineral soil and to stands where dominat species was pine (Pinus sylvestris) or spruce (Picea abies). The stands were situated in Finland in the regions of Häme-Uusimaa, Kaakkois-Suomi, Etelä-Savo and Keski-Suomi. Stand development was forecasted using MOTTI software developed by Finnish Forest Resource Institute. Future harvesting yields were forecasted separately for each stand and for three different management alternatives. The three alternatives were energywood harvesting in a dense young stand, indutrialwood thinning in a dense young stand, and a management chain according to the finnish silvicultural recommendations. With the predicted harvesting yields, annual yields and net present values were calculated. The effects of harvesting damages were examined by a literature overview. Managing stands according to silvicultural recommendations gave excpectedly the best result. A considerable increase in energywood price would be needed for the alternative of energywood harvesting to be competitive in pine stands. In spruce stands it is an economically viable alternative with relatively low energywood price. This is mainly due to high yields of deciduous trees in dense spruce stands. Energywood harvesting is a good alternative for managing dense young stands that have been left without or with insufficient precommercial thinning. In these cases energywood harvesting generally leads to better yields than an industrialwood thinning. However, with the energywood prices used in this study, industrialwood thinning leads to higher earnings. Differences between the alternatives are low and an increase in energywood price would quickly turn the situation in favor of energywood thinning. Forest type does not have a significant effect on the differences between the management alternatives. According to the inspections of Forestry Development Centre Tapio, there are more harvesting damages in stands managed by energywood thinning than by industrialwood thinning. Losses in growth and wood quality due to harvesting damages are however minor according to literature overview, and therefore have no significant effect on the results of this study.