Bringing Park Woodlands into Timber and Wood Fuel Production

By Michael Smith (Veshengro)

With the ever increasing demand and need for a carbon neutral energy and heating source wood fuel is one of the answers once again, if not indeed THE answer.

Wood, until the advent of fossil fuels, in the form of coal, and later oil and gas, somewhere around the beginning of the 19th century, or a little before that, was the source for heating and other energy production, including the power for steam engines.

In order to be able to produce enough wood (for fuel) sustainably at home, in our own country, whether as logs, chips or even material to be made into fuel pellets the woods in our parks and open spaces must be brought “on stream”.

While this suggestion of bringing the woodlands and wooded areas of parks and open spaces into the timber production and an anathema to some – in the same way as many just even see the simple cutting down of a tree, any tree, anywhere, as bad and evil – it is something of a necessity that will need to be done.

Another necessity will be actually having more (productive) trees (planted) in parks and open spaces, especially the more countryside-like ones, even if they are in towns and cities, so that they can be harvested in rotation coppice for wood fuel (and other forest/wood products).

While it is true and fact that 50% of woods in England are not (properly) managed, and those do include council-owned woods, timber production for fire wood and wood fuel must also be carried out in park woodlands.

In 2009 British fire wood merchants had to bring in logs from as far afield as Poland, the Ukraine, and the western parts of the Russian Federation in order to fulfill demand for fire wood. This is simply not sustainable and also rather costly. Thus, in order to make wood a sustainable energy and heat source more of it must be produced and sourced locally.

Some municipal parks departments and parks managers are beginning to take steps of bringing fire wood production from the woods in parks and open spaces on stream but it can be hard work educating the public as to the whys and wherefores and that coppice management of woods is good for the trees, plants and other wildlife.

Coppicing, though suited to this are only certain types of trees, is an ancient form and system of woodland management that has a great future. It deals with trees a little like a perennial crop in that they regrow and can be harvest again, though not directly annually. Coppice rotation can be short to long depending for what purpose the area is being managed and times are from between five to twenty-five years.

Conifers, such as pine, spruce, fir, and their cousins, do not coppice at all and also some hardwoods do not react to it too well either while others absolutely thrive from being cut down every number of years. Sweet Chestnut is one of those, as is Sycamore, and another is Hazel, not to speak of Willow; and there are many other varieties still.

Coppicing is and was not only done for fire wood though but for many other forest products. Most chairs, tool handles, wooden tools, etc., used to be derived from coppice woods, as were the wooden implements for kitchens and elsewhere. But I digressed.

When it comes to trees and thus timber in parks and open spaces it is not only for making into wood fuel (or charcoal) that any timber that comes about should be used. If the timber is suitable for other more “noble” uses then that should be considered as a priority as more income can be achieved that way generally. It might even be possible to support hereby some small local operators creating products from any such timber.

Mush of the timber, the wood, that will be occurring in parks and open spaces, and especially under coppice management will be but wood suitable for fire wood and wood fuel, charcoal and some small coppice products such as bean poles and kitchen spatulas, etc.

Even larger trees that fall in storms or for other reasons or that have to be felled because they are diseased will only be suitable for the production of fire wood and other wood fuel.

Fire wood, in the context of this essay, is sawn split logs while wood fuel encompasses those also and in addition and especially other wood fuel components such as chips and/or pellets.

To the absolute great majority wood as fuel equals fire wood, that is to say logs, sawn and split, and that is how they use it in their wood burning stoves and fire places. Wood chips are for boilers, which our American cousins refer to as furnaces, and pellets are also predominately used for such applications.

“Logs” from sawdust and other timber industry residues, produced in a similar process to that of making the pellets, are an alternative wood fuel for use in wood burning stoves in lieu of sawn and split logs. In open fires, aka fire places, they should be, however, mixed with split logs.

While the timber industry waste can produce wood fuel too the predominate source will remain trees and for that very reason we must bring all possible woodlands (back) into production including those in parks and open spaces. It is not going to harm those woodlands in the very least and neither will it harm the flora and fauna in those woods; in fact the opposite is the case.

Any such timber production operation will, obviously, have a visual impact but the proliferation of plants and wild flowers and the self-regeneration of the trees will soon make up for that by already the next spring, resultant from the light that will now be able to penetrate to the woodland floor.

Within a short time the trees will become quite sizeable again in the vigorous regrowth and everything will be returning very much to the way it was. At least until the next harvest time comes around and the cycle of renewal will start again.

© 2011