Summary
¦ CO2Sense is working to stimulate wood supply.
¦ Only half of Yorkshire and Humber’s woodlands are actively managed.
¦ The region sends 500,000 tonnes of waste wood to landfill annually.
¦ CO2Sense has helped councils streamline their wood waste collection.

Woodfuel is good. It’s carbon neutral, because the carbon that it emits when burned has been absorbed by the tree during its lifetime. And it provides a valuable use for wood that might otherwise end up in landfill.

But wood panels are also good and provide a market for recycled waste wood. And it’s a market that’s been around for a long time, while industrial woodfuel is a relatively new market which has been driven by the more recent concerns about the carbon emissions produced by burning fossil fuels.

So, understandably, some people argue that burning wood waste is a bad idea, because it drives up prices for wood that can be used for panel board and other products.

In theory, in an efficient market, any new demand – such as woodfuel – should stimulate the supply, as entrepreneurs step in to take advantage of the new business opportunity. But this isn’t happening, because the woodfuel market is relatively immature and isn’t as efficient as it needs to be. So we at CO2Sense are working hard to address the market’s failure to respond to the natural economic forces of supply and demand. This will benefit all users of virgin and waste wood.

Woodland owners

Some people don’t realise the value of wood. Of the 92,000ha of woods in the Yorkshire and Humber region, just half are actively managed. We work with the Forestry Commission and Forest Partnership organisations to help owners of estates and other woodland to profit by selling the wood that results from woodland management activities.

We also work with wood producers and processors. Many of these companies are small, with limited access to the funds that they need in order to grow their businesses. So we help them with funding and investment to buy the capital equipment that they need to process more wood, more efficiently. These companies are crucial links in the supply chain, and by helping them to grow, we are contributing to a healthy, well-operating supply market.

Waste wood is another big opportunity for us. In Yorkshire and Humber we send around 500,000 tonnes of waste wood to landfill each year, much of which is clean uncontaminated wood from small, hard-to-reach businesses and construction projects, which could be used as woodfuel or recycled. And that doesn’t include the substantial volumes of wood composites, such as MDF and chipboard, which are also landfilled: these, too, could be used as fuel in suitably rated boilers. We are working hard with waste collection companies to start up and grow more local, small collection businesses which can economically access this material.

Segrating waste

We are also helping the wood waste sector to segregate wood waste so that more of it can be diverted from landfill into supply chains.

For example, we have just completed trials with Leeds and York councils, in which we have helped them to streamline their wood waste collection services at their civic amenity sites. As a result, much of the wood that was previously sent to landfill is recycled.

We want to see this activity rolled out to other civic amenity sites. With the average civic amenity site collecting around 70 tonnes of waste wood every month, there is a potential supply of the right grades of waste wood for all areas of the market.

All of this adds up to more wood in the supply chain that would otherwise have been sent to landfill or left in woodlands. And more supply should equal lower costs for everyone. Of course, we are also working hard to develop the demand for woodfuel: and if you’re interested in finding out how using woodfuel to provide heat for your buildings or your process could make you better off, then get in touch.

But only through developing the supply and demand sides of the market, and by intensively targeting any market failures, can we develop a robust, secure and efficient market. There is no doubt that the country is moving towards a low-carbon economy; the support provided by companies such as CO2Sense will help to make the transition a little less painful for all the users of this carbon-neutral, valuable resource.

? CO2Sense helps businesses to prosper in the low-carbon economy and is owned and funded by Yorkshire Forward, the Regional Development Agency for Yorkshire and the Humber. For more information on CO2Sense’s Woodfuel Programme, tel: 0113 237 8400; email: woodfuel@CO2Sense.org or visit www.co2sense.org.uk.