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Abstract
The first objective of this paper was to provide an inventory of developments of certification schemes for sustainable biomass production, following recent EU legislation (both formalized and under development). One main pillar is the EU Timber Regulation for legal harvesting; a second one is the EU’s 2010 recommendations for sustainable woody biomass sourcing for energy; the third one is the EU Waste Directive. The second objective was to benchmark the coverage of this (draft) legislation, when wood product certificates for sustainable forest management (SFM) are used as proof of the related legislative requirements. We studied North America, as it is a major biomass supplier to the EU-28. Together with existing forest legislation in the US and Canada, SFM certificates are actively used to cover the EU’s (draft) legislation. However, North American forests are only partially certified with fibers coming from certified forests; these are referred to as forest management (FM) fibers. Other certified fibers should come from complementary risk assessments downstream in the supply chain (risk based fibers). Our benchmark concludes that: (a) FM fiber certification by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) and the Program for the Endorsement of Forest Certification (PEFC) international standards show the highest level of coverage with EU’s (draft) legislation; (b) There is insufficient coverage for risk based fibers by FSC Controlled Wood (FSC-CW), PEFC Due Diligence (PEFC-DD), or SFI-fiber sourcing (SFI-FS). Other weaknesses identified for elaboration are: (c) Alignment in definitions are needed, such as for primary forest, high carbon stock, and wood waste (cascading); (d) Imperfect mass balance (fiber check downstream) needs to be solved, as non-certified fiber flows are inadequately monitored; (e) Add-on of a GHG calculation tool is needed, as GHG life cycle reporting is not covered by any of the SFM frameworks.
Highlights
The European Union (EU) promotes the use of renewable energy via the Renewable Energy Directive (RED) [1,2]
From the forests to plants in the EU’s energy sector, we evaluated the suitability of major sustainable forest management (SFM) schemes [35], anticipating the EUTR [6] for wood products, as well as the EU’s official communications [9] for solid biomass [36] for energy
Two types of evidence are respectively regarded: one is related to the level of forest management unit (FMU), i.e., certified forest area’s (Evidence A); the other one is related to risk assessments in the upstream supply chain (Evidence B), as regarded from UK’s point of view
Summary
The European Union (EU) promotes the use of renewable energy via the Renewable Energy Directive (RED) [1,2]. The EU-28 Member States have agreed on an average overall share of energy from renewable sources of 20% in gross final energy consumption in 2020. The overall 2011 share of renewable sources was 10%, of which 4.8% was from the use of wood and wood-waste materials [3]. According to projections provided in the National Renewable Energy Action Plans, more than 10% of final energy consumption will be delivered by biomass by 2020 [4], with forest biomass playing a major role [5]. With regards to the sustainable sourcing of solid biomass, the Commission has not yet proposed binding criteria at the EU level. The Commission implied, in its 2010 communications [9], that the wide variety of solid biomass feedstock make it difficult to put forward a harmonized scheme at this stage. Similar to the EU’s framework for liquid biomass [1], solid biomass sourcing could be covered by national schemes and voluntary, EU approved schemes [10]
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