John S. Vissage

A strategic assessment of forest biomass and fuel reduction treatments in Western States

In the 15 western states there are at least 28 million acres of forest that could benefit from some type of mechanical treatment to reduce hazardous fuel loading. It is estimated that about 60 percent of this area could be operationally accessible for treatment with a total biomass treatment volume of 345 million bone dry tons (bdt). Two-thirds of this forest area is on public lands. Most of the volume is in trees 6 inches diameter and greater that have conventional utilization opportunities. Transportation cost and distance to markets, however, may preclude actual recovery. Treatment costs are increased by the need to treat large numbers of low-volume stems less than 4 inches in diameter. Gross costs can range from

Wisconsin's forest resources in 2003

35 to over

Forest statistics for Central Tennessee counties - 1989

1000 per acre depending on type of operation, terrain, and number of trees to be treated. Some areas will likely be prohibitively expensive to treat, although cost estimates presented here may be high because they are based on the use of conventional timber harvesting systems applied to small diameter treatments. Implementation of any significant fuel reduction effort will generate large volumes of biomass and require the development of additional workforce and operations capacity in western forests.

Accessing and extending the utility of United States forest inventory data

Results of the 2002 annual inventory of Wisconsin show about 16.0 million acres of forest land, over 22.2 billion cubic feet of live volume on forest land, and nearly 598 million dry tons of all live aboveground tree biomass on timberland. Gypsy moth, forest tent caterpillar, twolined chestnut borer, bronze birch borer, ash yellows, and white pine blister rust were among the pests of Wisconsin forests.

Forest statistics for West-Central Tennessee counties - 1989

The 1989 survey of the Central Unit of Tennessee revealed the following:Timberland now covers 2,416.3 thousand acres, an increase of 14 percent since 1980.Ninety-five percent of the unit’s timberland is privately owned.Cedar and mixed cedar-hardwood stands occupy 456.1 thousand acres of timberland.Oak-hickory forests account for 79 percent of the unit’s timberland.Area in sawtimber-sized stands increased by 250 thousand acres with most of the increase in oak-hickory forest types.The number of hardwood growing-stock trees fell 17 percent, while softwood numbers increased 26 percent.Hardwood growing-stock volume climbed 55 percent to 2,304.7 million cubic feet and softwood growing-stock volume climbed 74 percent to 138.1 million cubic feet.Softwood sawtimber volumes more than doubled and hardwood sawtimber volumes increased by two-thirds since 1980.Hardwood sawtimber quality declined since 1980.Net growth increased for both growing stock and sawtimber despite a doubling in mortality.Removals increased for both growing stock and sawtimber but were concentrated in the sawtimber portion of the inventory.Growth exceeds removals by roughly 3 to 1.

Fuelwood consumption of midsouth pulpmills, 1987.

The Forest Inventory and Analysis program of the United States Forest Service has been operational since the 1930s. Data collected prior to 1977 is unavailable in electronic format. More recent data is available for downloading from the Internet. Reporting tools such as the forest inventory mapmaker Web-application have been developed to generate population estimates of forest area, numbers of trees, timber volume, growth, removals and mortality for a wide variety of stand and/or tree characteristics. The fuel treatment evaluator (FTE) Web-application links forest inventory data to both fire hazard and socio-economic geo-spatial data. Linking this information aids planners in identifying potential fire hazard hotspots and evaluating alternative fuel treatment options. The FTE program can also generate inputs to systems such as the spatial resource support system and growth and yield programs such as the Forest Vegetation Simulator.

Determining maximum stand density index in mixed species stands for strategic-scale stocking assessments

Tabulated results were derived from data obtained during a recent inventory of 11 counties comprising the West-Central unit of Tennessee (fig. 1). Tables 1-25 were developed to provide compatibility among Forest Inventory and Analysis Projects. Tables 26-40 are supplementary tables and may change from unit to unit or State to State to address specific resource issues.

A strategic assessment of forest biomass and fuel reduction treatments in western states

Results of the first fuelwood canvass of wood-using pulpmills in the Midsouth revealed that 46 pulpmills burned 12.5 million green tons of fuelwood in 1987. Mill residues were the primary form of fuelwood consumed. Bark comprised over half of the total consumption. In addition’to mill residues, over 1 million green tons of roundwood were also burned as fuel. Fuelwood was consumed by pulpmills in all seven States of the region. Alabama alone accounted for one-third of the total consumption. Fuelwood consumption was concentrated in the larger pulpmills. Eleven states supplied fuelwood to the region’s pulpmills. The significance of these national trends led to a regional assessment of fuelwood use in the pulp and paper sector of the wood products industry in the Midsouth. In a complete canvass of all wood-using pulpmills in the Midsouth, individual mills were surveyed as to the quantity, type, and source of fuelwood they consumed in 1987. This canvass was part of the annual survey of pulpwood production conducted by the USDA Forest Service and is the first in a continuing assessment of fuelwood use in the Midsouth’s pulping industry. The results presented here are all from that survey.