Wood Utilization and Environmental Impacts

Abstract

Whether traditional and emerging innovative wood products and their applications are in fact environmentally friendlier than non-wood products has to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. Therefore, Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) as a methodological framework to assess environmental impacts of products is introduced and applied to wood and wood-based products. For investigating not only impacts of single product systems but also consequential effects of changing utilization patterns, combining LCA with Material Flow Analysis (MFA) is a useful approach, which also considers shifts of product flows on a regional level. The inherent properties of wood as a bio-based and renewable material, which lead to some specific considerations in the product category rules, are discussed and exemplified by showcasing the main areas of LCA application along the forest-wood value chains. The provision of traceable information about the forest management practices and the chain-of-custody of the wood based materials as important prerequisites for an environmental assessment are discussed. The environmental aspects and implications of wood usage are illustrated for the relevant wood-based products and utilization schemes, from building products to energy use. The contributions of forests and harvested wood products to climate change mitigation are described. Further, examples for the assessment of wood products by resource efficiency and eco-efficiency analysis are presented, and specific focus is given on end-of-life processes and the evaluation of wood cascading options.