Forests and tackling climate change: Kielder Forest - a case study

Mar 20 2008 By The Journal

KIELDER Forest Park is the largest forest in England and one of the largest planted forests in Europe. It covers an area of 60, 000 hectares (230 square miles) and is a public forest, owned by the people of Britain and managed by the Forestry Commission.

The Forestry Commission manages the forest to be attractive as well as productive, useful to the community and a recreational resource for both local people and visitors, rich in wildlife both plant and animal, where the natural and cultural heritage is safely conserved.

Together with the reservoir, Kielder Water and Forest Park is rapidly becoming one of the North East’s “must visit” tourism destinations.

Kielder Forest has become a powerhouse of timber production, producing a sustained yield of over 50 lorry loads of timber per day, representing 5% of UK timber production, independently certified as being from well managed forest under the UK Woodland Assurance Standard.

The 150 million trees in Kielder Forest contain over three million tonnes of carbon, and as they grow, lock up in their stem-wood some 82,000 tonnes of carbon annually.

The management of the forest, including the harvesting machines and timber lorries, results in the release of less than 2,000 tonnes of carbon.

Some of the sequestered carbon is released when the trees are harvested, for example for wood-fuel, but a large proportion continues to be locked up for many years in sawn timber products and chipboard.

Where timber substitutes for other high embodied energy materials such as concrete, steel or aluminium, and where wood-fuel replaces fossil fuels, there are substantially greater carbon savings.

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Case study: Bearl Farm, Stocksfield

ALLENDALE Estates has recently developed redundant and underused properties at Bearl Farm, Stocksfield, to provide modern offices for businesses.

Allendale Estates produces large quantities of timber from 1,000 hectares of woodland. A proportion of this timber supplied low value small roundwood markets. It was recognised that the same timber had the potential to produce wood chip for wood fuel heating. This could add value to an otherwise low value product. Wood chips also provide potential to utilise unmarketable timber products from the woodlands.

During the redevelopment process, a 110 kW wood fuel boiler was installed on site. This uses timber from the estate as its fuel source. It has been successfully implemented and now heats all properties on the development, which includes over 15,000 square feet of office
space.

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Confidence in buying the best A Timberwolf chipper in action at Chopwell Woods.

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