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Environmental information systems
Harvested wood products (HWP) contain carbon. In the LULUCF Regulation, which is designed to ensure that greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and removals from land use, land use change and forestry (LULUCF) activities are accurately accounted for, HWP are a specific group in the registration. Three types of wood products are distinguished: sawn wood, panels and paper. At the end of the product's lifetime, and when released into the atmosphere, the carbon that was stored in the wood product is then considered a GHG emission.
Carbon in harvested wood products
When more carbon is stored in wood products than released during wood product combustion, this is considered as a net sink of carbon in the GHG inventory. Combustion takes place at the end of life of wood products. GHG is also released when woody biomass solely used for energy.
Most of EU’s wood consumption comes from wood from EU forests. A decrease in carbon emissions from HWPs can be observed between the 1990’s until 2007, which corresponds to an increase in carbon stored in wood products. This decreasing trends ends when the wood sector suffered from the economic crisis in 2008.
Overall there is an increasing trend in CO2 removals in harvested wood products
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The substitution effect of wood
Material substitution
Wood can replace steel or concrete (high emission) in buildings.
Energy substitution
Wood can be used as bioenergy and replace fossil fuels (high emission).
Logistic substitution
Wood consumed in the EU comes mostly out of EU’s forests.
When wood is used (e.g. as construction material) instead of any other material with higher emissions (e.g. steel or concrete), less carbon is released into the atmosphere. This is called “the substitution effect of wood”. There are three types of substitution, material, energy and logistic. The largest substitution effect occurs in the energy sector, where fossil fuels are replaced by combusting wood products. In general, the substitution effect is diminishing as technological innovations reduce the carbon release from emission-intensive materials.
Forest management affects the development of the forest carbon pool and the HWP carbon pool. From a carbon perspective, intensive forest management could be an advantage as it promotes tree growth in the long term and supplies wood for long-life wood-based products. Nevertheless, it supports less biodiversity and the provision of other ecosystem services, in contrast to extensive forest management where wood production is lower. In this system the net forest sink increases, however, less wood is available which has a negative impact on the forest sector and the carbon in the HWP pool.
Intensive forest management provides constant supply for long-life products that store carbon.
The ecosystem diversity in extensive managed forests fixes more carbon than intensive managed forests.