Estimating the Availability of Unused Materials for Woody Biomass Power Generation Using the Forest GIS

Abstract

Estimating the Availability of Unused Materials for Woody Biomass Power Generation Using the Forest GIS. J Jpn For Soc 103: 416-423These researchers acquired the forest GIS for private and public forests from prefectures and national forests from the Forestry Agency of Japan. We then calculated incomes and expenditures such as silvicultural and harvesting as well as stumpage prices on the Japanese cedar, cypress, pine, and larch forests using the silvicultural prescription set based on the regional forest plans and operation system set based on topographic conditions such as slope angles and height differences with GIS. Finally, this study estimated the availability of unused materials for woody biomass power generation plants under operation with FIT at the end of June 2020 as the supply potential from the profitable subcompartments. As a result, supply potentials of used and unused materials were estimated at 65,490,336 m 3 /year and 13,098,067 m 3 /year, respectively whereas those availabilities were estimated at 31,080,672 m 3 /year and 6,216,134 m 3 /year respectively. Therefore, the rate of the availabilities to the supply potentials was 47.5％. Furthermore, the rate of the availabilities to the demands was 71.6％. Considering the subsidy rate of 100％ to secure the reforestations, the availabilities met the demands in Japan as a whole.

Research Trends and Future Direction for Utilization of Woody Biomass in Japan

“…difference [23]. Similarly, the results of Cases 6-9 for the four prefectures in the Kanto region [22] and Cases 20-24 for the five prefectures in the Tohoku region [24] also do not show large fluctuations.…”

“…Cases 1 to 3 and 32 utilized actual measurements from harvesting activities [18,19,28], whereas Cases 4, 5, 8, and 29 did not consider the use of branches and leaves [20,21,26]. Finally, Cases 6 to 23, besides not considering the use of branches and leaves, also account for losses in harvesting activities, resulting in a yield rate of less than 100% [22][23][24].…”

“…In general, the impact of regionality on the supply potential of woody biomass is not very significant. Cases 11 to 18 in Table 1 use the same method to calculate the supply potential of woody biomass in several large regions in Japan, such as Tohoku and Kanto region, and the results range from 1.20 to 1.47 m 3 /year/ha, which does not show a significant difference [23]. Similarly, the results of Cases 6-9 for the four prefectures in the Kanto region [22] and Cases 20-24 for the five prefectures in the Tohoku region [24] also do not show large fluctuations.…”