Modeling the impacts of wood pellet demand on forest dynamics in southeastern United States

Anna S. Duden; Pita A. Verweij; H. Martin Junginger; Robert C. Abt; Jesse D. Henderson; Virginia H. Dale; Keith L. Kline; Derek Karssenberg; Judith A. Verstegen; André P.C. Faaij; Floor van der Hilst

doi:10.1002/bbb.1803

Modeling the impacts of wood pellet demand on forest dynamics in southeastern United States

Anna S. Duden, Pita A. Verweij, H. Martin Junginger, Robert C. Abt, Jesse D. Henderson, Virginia H. Dale, Keith L. Kline, Derek Karssenberg, Judith A. Verstegen, André P.C. Faaij, Floor van der Hilst

Water Resources Science & Engineering

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

43 Scopus citations

Abstract

The export of wood pellets from the southeastern United States (USA) has grown significantly in recent years, following rising demand from Europe. Increased wood pellet demand could lead to spatially variable changes in timberland management and area in the USA. This study presents an assessment of the impacts of increasing wood pellet demand (an additional 11.6 Mt by 2030) on land-use dynamics, taking into account developments in other wood product markets as well as expected changes in other land uses. An economic model for the forest sector of the southeastern USA (SRTS) was linked to a land-use change model (PLUC) to identify potential locations of land-use change following scenarios of demand for pellets and other wood products. Projections show that in the absence of additional demand for wood pellets, natural timberland area is projected to decline by 450–15 000 km² by 2030, mainly through urbanization and pine plantation establishment. Under the high wood pellet demand scenario, more (2000–7500 km²) natural timberland area is retained and more (8000–20 000 km²) pine plantation is established. Shifts from natural timberland to pine plantation occur predominantly in the Atlantic coastal region. Future work will assess the impact of projected transitions in natural timberland and pine plantations on biodiversity and carbon storage. This modeling framework can be applied for multiple scenarios and land-use projections to identify locations of timberland area changes for the whole southeastern USA, thereby informing the debate about potential impacts of wood pellet demand on land-use dynamics and environmental services.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	1007-1029
Number of pages	23
Journal	Biofuels, Bioproducts and Biorefining
Volume	11
Issue number	6
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1002/bbb.1803
State	Published - Nov 1 2017

Funding

Correspondence to: Anna S. Duden, Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development, Department of Energy & Resources, Utrecht University, Heidelberglaan 2, 3584 CS Utrecht, Netherlands. E-mail: [email protected] This manuscript has been authored by UT-Battelle, LLC under Contract No. DE-AC05-00OR22725 with the US Department of Energy. The United States Government retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the United States Government retains a non-exclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, world-wide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this manuscript, or allow others to do so, for United States Government purposes. The Department of Energy will provide public access to these results of federally sponsored research in accordance with the DOE Public Access Plan (http://energy.gov/downloads/doe-public-access-plan).

Keywords

bioenergy
land-use change
modeling
southeastern USA
spatial variation
wood pellets

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10.1002/bbb.1803

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title = "Modeling the impacts of wood pellet demand on forest dynamics in southeastern United States",

abstract = "The export of wood pellets from the southeastern United States (USA) has grown significantly in recent years, following rising demand from Europe. Increased wood pellet demand could lead to spatially variable changes in timberland management and area in the USA. This study presents an assessment of the impacts of increasing wood pellet demand (an additional 11.6 Mt by 2030) on land-use dynamics, taking into account developments in other wood product markets as well as expected changes in other land uses. An economic model for the forest sector of the southeastern USA (SRTS) was linked to a land-use change model (PLUC) to identify potential locations of land-use change following scenarios of demand for pellets and other wood products. Projections show that in the absence of additional demand for wood pellets, natural timberland area is projected to decline by 450–15 000 km2 by 2030, mainly through urbanization and pine plantation establishment. Under the high wood pellet demand scenario, more (2000–7500 km2) natural timberland area is retained and more (8000–20 000 km2) pine plantation is established. Shifts from natural timberland to pine plantation occur predominantly in the Atlantic coastal region. Future work will assess the impact of projected transitions in natural timberland and pine plantations on biodiversity and carbon storage. This modeling framework can be applied for multiple scenarios and land-use projections to identify locations of timberland area changes for the whole southeastern USA, thereby informing the debate about potential impacts of wood pellet demand on land-use dynamics and environmental services.",

keywords = "bioenergy, land-use change, modeling, southeastern USA, spatial variation, wood pellets",

author = "Duden, \{Anna S.\} and Verweij, \{Pita A.\} and Junginger, \{H. Martin\} and Abt, \{Robert C.\} and Henderson, \{Jesse D.\} and Dale, \{Virginia H.\} and Kline, \{Keith L.\} and Derek Karssenberg and Verstegen, \{Judith A.\} and Faaij, \{Andr{\'e} P.C.\} and \{van der Hilst\}, Floor",

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AU - Verweij, Pita A.

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AU - Abt, Robert C.

AU - Henderson, Jesse D.

AU - Dale, Virginia H.

AU - Kline, Keith L.

AU - Karssenberg, Derek

AU - Verstegen, Judith A.

AU - Faaij, André P.C.

AU - van der Hilst, Floor

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AB - The export of wood pellets from the southeastern United States (USA) has grown significantly in recent years, following rising demand from Europe. Increased wood pellet demand could lead to spatially variable changes in timberland management and area in the USA. This study presents an assessment of the impacts of increasing wood pellet demand (an additional 11.6 Mt by 2030) on land-use dynamics, taking into account developments in other wood product markets as well as expected changes in other land uses. An economic model for the forest sector of the southeastern USA (SRTS) was linked to a land-use change model (PLUC) to identify potential locations of land-use change following scenarios of demand for pellets and other wood products. Projections show that in the absence of additional demand for wood pellets, natural timberland area is projected to decline by 450–15 000 km2 by 2030, mainly through urbanization and pine plantation establishment. Under the high wood pellet demand scenario, more (2000–7500 km2) natural timberland area is retained and more (8000–20 000 km2) pine plantation is established. Shifts from natural timberland to pine plantation occur predominantly in the Atlantic coastal region. Future work will assess the impact of projected transitions in natural timberland and pine plantations on biodiversity and carbon storage. This modeling framework can be applied for multiple scenarios and land-use projections to identify locations of timberland area changes for the whole southeastern USA, thereby informing the debate about potential impacts of wood pellet demand on land-use dynamics and environmental services.

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KW - land-use change

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KW - spatial variation

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ER -

Modeling the impacts of wood pellet demand on forest dynamics in southeastern United States

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