Description

ANNOTATION: This article discusses the need for a reduction of fuels in forest ecosystems in order to mitigate the risk of catastrophic wildfire and the ability of the biomass industry to play a role in managing this risk. Generally, this article concludes that significant opportunities exist to link forest health treatments and biomass energy production. Several obstacles to this are discussed including the feasibility of biomass fuel delivery, the availability of viable biomass markets to forest managers at a reasonable distance and security assurances for the initial investment in biomass production facilities. The coordination of land management and energy policy is discussed.