Dear Colleagues,

Demand for wood biomass has consistently increased in recent years worldwide as a response to the new and ambitious renewable energy strategy at global level. Nevertheless, a number of aspects call for a careful evaluation in the supply process. The use of wood for energy should take into account all the possible impacts related both to harvesting and processing operations. Cost effectiveness of wood biomass harvesting is important and can be achieved by integrating it with timber production—but the possible effects on the soil medium (machine traffic, depletion of nutrients, etc.), timber competition. and forest health in the long term should also be considered. How can innovations in the forestry sector help to limit the emissions released by the whole supply chain in every step? How can they improve efficiency in the biomass use? To what extent can the type of forest, harvesting, and storage systems implemented along the chain affect the energetic yield? How does wood biomass quality affect energy performance? What are all the possible sources of wood energy? All these questions are awaiting an answer from the forestry community.

Contributions should cover (but are not restricted to) the following topics:

• Efficiency, costs, and emissions of woody biomass harvest, transformation, and transport;
• Environmental impact of biomass removal from forests;
• Integration of timber and biomass production for increasing overall process efficiency;
• Carbon emissions of bioenergy supply chain (may include the whole process, forest to energy production, or just a specific part, such as harvest or energy conversion);
• Carbon and energy balances of wood-energy systems;
• Biomass quality (e.g., as consequence of work system, transformation means, type of forest);
• Relation between biomass quality and process efficiency, including emissions;
• Biomass sources from forests, agricultural areas (e.g., agroforestry systems), energy crops (e.g., short rotation coppice), and riparian vegetation management.

Dr. Carla Nati
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

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• wood energy
• energy balance
• emissions
• timber harvesting
• forest sustainability
• impacts
• biomass sources
• wood biomass quality