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bioweb.sungrant.org » Technical » Biomass Resources » Forest Resources » Other Removals

Other Removals	Printer Friendly

Among the wood resources potentially available from forest areas are “other removals”. Other removals is a broad category of resources that includes the unutilized wood volume from cut or otherwise killed growing stock, wood from cultural operations such as pre-commercial thinning, or wood from timberland conversion to other uses such as to crop land, roads, urban development, etc. (excluding timber volumes removed from the forest inventory due to reclassification of timberland to productive reserved forest land). Other removals data is available through the Timber Product Output database (http://www.fia.fs.fed.us) compiled by the USDA Forest Service Forest Inventory and Analysis Program (FIA) which tracks and reports on the fate of wood harvested from U.S. forests. The FIA collects forest residue data through surveys and questionnaires sent to forest owners and harvesters, and by on-site measurements of the material felled and removed and/or left during harvest operations.    The TPO database provides estimates of county quantities of other removals generated. Data is provided by inventory source (i.e., total and growing stock), by tree species, and by land ownership class in cubic feet and board feet. Estimated other removal quantities for the RPA (Resource Planning Act) survey year 2007 by ownership class and tree class are presented in table 1, and the distribution of other removals generated is shown in figure 1. About 1.66 billion ft3 (~ 24.7 million dry tons) of other removals were generated in RPA survey year 2007 in the 48 contiguous states. Of that quantity, about 26% was from softwood tree species and the remainder from hardwood species. Less than 9% of the material came from National Forests and other public lands. The FIA data form the basis of the estimated available other removal quantities found in several studies such as Perlack, 2005; Southern States Energy Board, 2006; Western Governors’ Association, 2006; Encyclopedia of Southern Bioenergy Resources, 2006; 25x25 Initiative, 2006; and Walsh, 2007.                     The TPO database is limited to historical data and does not project potential quantities of other removals for future time frames. The Forest and Rangeland Renewable Resources Planning Act (RPA) of 1974 directs the Forest Service to conduct a study every 10 years that projects future costs and availability of timber products, evaluates emerging issues, and examines impacts of policy options. A significant portion of the other removal resources comes from the conversion of forest and timberlands to other uses such as urban development. The RPA assessment (Haynes, 2003) projects timberland acres will decline from 503.8 million acres in 1997 to 489 million acres in 2050, mostly as a result of urban development. The greatest decline is projected to be in the Northeast, the Southeast, and the Lake States due to increases in population and income. More recent estimates suggest that the forest acres lost to development could be higher due to the combination of increasing population and an increase in the area of land developed per person (Thompson, 2006). Wood resources removed from these acres could be used for bioenergy and bioproducts, however, it should be noted that there are several issues associated with their use. Quantities may be more unpredictable than other forest operations, and they may not be a sustainable resource. Forest land converted to agricultural uses has the potential to be converted back to forest areas. Land converted to urban development cannot be easily reverted. Also, the economic feasibility of recovery is reduced by the scattered and often unplanned volumes removed from urban areas, or from the non-commercial aspect of removals resulting from the pre-commercial thinning of small trees that are uneconomical to remove from plantations.   Using the USDA Forest Service FIA data, Perlack (2005) estimated that other removal quantities will increase from the current level of 9.2 million dry tons to 17.4 million dry tons by mid-century, but conducted no economic analysis and provided insufficient information to determine how the rate of growth was determined.   Few studies attempt to estimate supply curves (i.e., quantities available as a function of price) for other removals either for current or future time frames.  The Antares Group (1999) estimated the availability 72.2 million green tons of forest residues at prices of less than $4.00/MMBtu, but did not separate the forest resources in their report. Walsh (2000) estimated state forest residue supply curves (including other removals) and summed the state data to obtain total U.S. forest residue quantities at several prices (e.g., 23.7, 34.8, and 44.9 million dry tons available at delivered prices of $30/dt, $40/dt, and $50/dt respectively).   Walsh (2007) estimated other removal collection cost schedules for the years 2007, 2010, 2015, 2020, and 2025 (table 2). The analysis estimates collection costs only--market prices will be higher. Future quantities were estimated by applying projected changes in county housing units to FIA county data. Future changes in county housing starts were estimated as a function of projected state population increases (U.S. Census Bureau) and state average number of occupants per household and apportioned to counties based on the rate of change of county housing starts between 2000 and 2005. Estimated harvest/collection costs are based on a regional distribution of non-growing stock harvest costs obtained from a somewhat updated version of a model originally developed by McQuillan (1988), which includes forest inventory data, logging and chipping costs, wood types, site accessibility, site slope, and equipment operability constraints to estimate nine regional supply schedules for softwood and hardwood chips for the base (1983) and future years. The analysis suffers from the inability to fully update the original economic model to account for changes in technology and to fully account for many factors that will affect local housing growth and/or pre-commercial thinning operations over the time frame of the analysis.

References
Antares Group, Biomass Residue Supply Curves for the United States, June 1999. Encyclopedia of Southern Bioenergy Resources, 2006, U.S.D.A. Forest Service, Southern Research Station, Forest Encyclopedia Network, http://www.forestencyclopedia.net. English, Burton C., Daniel G. De La Torre Ugarte, Kim Jensen, Chad Hellwinckel, Jamey Menard, Brad Wilson, Roland Roberts, and Marie Walsh, November 2006, 25% Renewable Energy for the United States by 2025: Agricultural and Economic Impacts, University of Tennessee, http://www.25x25.org. Haynes, Richard W., An Analysis of the Timber Situation in the United States: 1952 to 2050, USDA Forest Service, General Technical Report PNW-GTR-560, February 2003. McQuillan, A., K. Skog, T. Nagle, and R. Loveless, Marginal Cost Supply Curves for Utilizing Forest Waste Wood in the United States, Unpublished Manuscript, University of Montana, Missoula, February 1988. Perlack, Robert D., Lynn L. Wright, Anthony F. Turhollow, Robin L. Graham, Bryce J. Stokes, and Donald C. Erbach, Biomass as Feedstocks for a Bioenergy and Bioproducts Industry: The Technical Feasibility of A Billion-Ton Annual Supply, April 2005, ORNL/TM-2005/66. Smith, W. Brad, Factors and Equations to Estimate Forest Biomass in the North Central Region, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, North Central Forest Experiment Station, Research Paper NC-268, October 1985. Southern States Energy Board, July 2006, American Energy Security-Building a bridge to energy independence and to a suitainable energy future. Thompson, Jonathan, November 2006, Society’s choices: Land use changes, forest fragmentation, and conservation, U.S.D.A. Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station, Science Findings, Issue 88. USDA Forest Service, Forest Inventory Analysis Timber Product Output Database, www.fia.fs.fed.us Walsh, Marie E., Robert L. Perlack, Anthony Turhollow, Daniel de la Torre Ugarte, Denny A. Becker, Robin L. Graham, Stephen E. Slinsky, and Daryll E. Ray, Biomass Feedstock Availability in the United States, Unpublished Oak Ridge National Laboratory Report, January, 2000. Walsh, Marie E., November 2007, Estimated U.S. Forest Residue Supply--Documentation of Methodology, Unpublished Manuscript. Western Governors’ Association, January 2006, Clean and Diversified Energy Initiative, Biomass Task Force Report, Supply Addendum.