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National Fire Plan Success Story

Woody Biomass Utilization Workshop
Techniques and Considerations for the North Coast of California
Six Rivers National Forest
National Fire Plan - Fuels Reduction / Woody Biomass Utilization
2008

A two-day workshop on Woody Biomass Utilization was held in Eureka, California, on December 6-7, 2007, sponsored by the Center for Forestry at University of California (UC) Berkeley, USDA Forest Service, the California Association of Resource Conservation & Development Councils with additional support from Humboldt State University and Forest Products Society Pacific Southwest Section. This workshop provided a forum to discuss woody biomass utilization issues for the North Coast of California.

The two-day event consisted of a combination of presentations and field trips to local businesses that are using woody biomass. The presentations covered the woody biomass resource base, the economics of treating and removing biomass, the technical challenges of using woody biomass, current markets in the coastal area, potential products (including small-scale heat, liquid fuels and densified fuels) and funding opportunities. The field tours to a lumber mill, biomass power plant, and pulp mill examined some of the methods used by the forest products industry to utilize biomass including biomass harvesting, transportation, feedstock preparation and biomass conversion to heat and power.

This workshop had maximum attendance and was attended by county and local Fire Safe Council members, private and tribal forest resource managers, natural resource professionals, loggers, biomass contractors, and university professors and students (Humboldt State University, UC Berkeley, and UC Davis). Evaluation comments were positive:

"A well rounded line-up of speakers and a good range of content."

"Great workshop. Thought it was great, even with an overload of information-everything worked well together. The field trip was a perfect ending."

This event presented opportunities for promoting the U.S. Forest Service Woody Biomass Utilization Strategy goal of identifying and building partnerships through collaboration. As mentioned in the Strategy, "strong and effective partnerships with diverse stakeholder groups are required to bridge human and fiscal resource gaps and develop the linkages necessary for the successful implementation of this strategy." Future workshops and demonstration projects are being planned to continue this interaction and biomass utilization capacity building.

Contact: Lucy Salazar, Fuels Specialist, lsalazar@fs.fed.us