Biomass Energy, Forests and Climate Library

Welcome to the Biomass Energy, Forests and Climate library. It has been brought together by the Forest, Climate and Biomass Action Network of the Environmental Paper Network. We want activists, communities, scholars – anyone who’s interested in forest biomass issues – to be able to find all the key resources in one place. So we’ve gathered together key resources that present case studies and explain the science behind biomass energy and its impacts on forests and climate.

If you have any suggestions for resources we should have in this library or any comments about it, please contact us. You may also find our Frequently Asked Questions helpful.

Discourses in Finnish forest policy: Cherry-picking or sustainability?

With the rise of the concept of a forest-based bioeconomy over the past decade, sustainability is simultaneously
an underlying assumption and a key expectation. However, can we assume that a bioeconomy is sustainable
simply because it emphasizes the use of forests as a renewable resource? And will a forest-based bioeconomy
indeed lead to a more sustainable – and prosperous – Finnish society?

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Organization: Science Direct

Author: Niina Pietarinen, Teemu Harrinkari, Maria Brockhaus, Natalya Yakusheva

Date: 2023

Location: Europe, Finland

Language: English

Type of resource: Academic article

Topics: Bioeconomy, Forests and Biodiversity, Policy

Modeling climate-smart forest management and wood use for climate mitigation potential in Maryland and Pennsylvania

State and local governments are increasingly interested in understanding the role forests and harvested wood products play in regional carbon sinks and storage, their potential contributions to state-level greenhouse gas (GHG) reductions, and the interactions between GHG reduction goals and potential economic opportunities. We used empirically driven process-based forest carbon dynamics and harvested wood product models in a systems-based approach to project the carbon impacts of various forest management and wood utilization activities in Maryland and Pennsylvania from 2007 to 2100.

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Organization: Frontiers in Forests and Global Change

Author: Chad C. Papa et al

Date: 2023

Location: North America, United States

Language: English

Type of resource: Academic article

Topics: Climate

Carbon balance of forest management and wood production in the boreal forest of Quebec (Canada)

Management of boreal forests can increase terrestrial carbon sinks and reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to the atmosphere. A case study was conducted in the boreal balsam fir forests of Quebec (Canada), a commercially important region for forestry, to identify optimal management and wood production solutions that contribute to reducing GHG emissions to the atmosphere.

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Organization: Frontiers in Forests and Global Change

Author: Louis-Alexandre Giasson et al

Date: 2023

Location: Canada, North America

Language: English

Type of resource: Academic article

Topics: Climate

Accounting for forest condition in Europe based on an international statistical standard

Covering 35% of Europe’s land area, forest ecosystems play a crucial role in safeguarding biodiversity and mitigating climate change. Yet, forest degradation continues to undermine key ecosystem services that forests deliver to society. Here we provide a spatially explicit assessment of the condition of forest ecosystems in Europe following a United Nations global statistical standard on ecosystem accounting, adopted in March 2021.

Assessing the Cumulative Impacts of Forest Management on Forest Age Structure Development and Woodland Caribou Habitat in Boreal Landscapes: A Case Study from Two Canadian Provinces

Canada has long promoted itself globally as a model for protecting one of the country’s most vital natural resources: the world’s largest swath of boreal forest, which is crucial to fighting climate change. But a new study using nearly half a century of data from the provinces of Ontario and Quebec — two of the country’s main commercial logging regions — reveals that harvesting trees has inflicted severe damage on the boreal forest that will be difficult to reverse. Researchers led by a group from Griffith University in Australia found that since 1976 logging in the two provinces has caused the removal of 35.4 million acres of boreal forest, an area roughly the size of New York State.

Sustainable forest bioenergy

Discussion paper by the German biomass research center (DBFZ) on the necessity of pricing CO2 emissions from wood-burning.

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Organization: Deutsches Biomasseforschungszentrum

Author: Harry Schindler, Stefan Majer, Daniela Thrän, Volker Lenz

Date: 2023

Location: Europe, Germany

Language: English

Type of resource: Report

Topics: Policy

Subsidized Deforestation: 10 Years of Biomass Power in South Korea

This report presents our analysis of the outcomes of 10 years of burning biomass in South Korea from both the energy and forest perspectives. Key findings include that Biomass for electricity emitted approximately 11 million tCO2 in 2022 alone, which exceeds all the annual forest carbon sink enhancements the government has committed to achieving by 2050, effectively nullifying the government’s net-zero commitments in the forest sector.

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Organization: Solutions for Our Climate

Author: Hansae Song

Date: 2023

Location: Asia, East Asia, South Korea

Language: English

Type of resource: Report

Topics: Bioeconomy, Climate, Forests and Biodiversity

Banking on Biodiversity Collapse

This report maps commercial financial flows attributable to the forest-risk commodity sectors driving the majority of tropical deforestation. Forests & Finance analyzes 300 of the largest companies operating in the production of beef, palm, oil, pulp and paper, rubber, soy, and timber in the world’s three major tropical forest biomes: Southeast Asia, South America, and Central and West Africa. From January 2016 to September 2023, banks provided at least US$ 307 billion in credit to these operations. In addition, they were supported by institutional investors, which held US$ 38 billion in shares and bonds as of September 2023.

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Organization: Forests and Finance

Author: Forests and Finance

Date: 2023

Location: Africa, Asia, South America

Language: English

Type of resource: Report

Topics: Biomass finance

Bioenergy is Putting Britain’s Energy Security At Risk

New analysis shows that the volume of energy crops the Government would need to import every year by 2050 to
fulfil the requirements of its strategy would require up to 2.4 million hectares of land overseas to grow them. This is equivalent to all the arable land that Denmark has, As well as throwing up important questions for climate justice this reveals why security of supply is such an issue. If global demand for wood pellets increases as other countries seek to develop BECCS in pursuit of their own climate goals, there is a real risk that food production will be squeezed. The UK Government does not appear to have seriously engaged with realities of finite resources and global market dynamics.

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Organization: Cut Carbon not Forests

Author: Cut Carbon not Forests

Date: 2023

Location: Europe, United Kingdom

Language: English

Type of resource: Report

Topics: Policy