Wood energy consumption in the sector trade, commerce and services

At the latest, since the shift in German energy policy renewable energy sources became increasingly important. To provide policy with quantitative information on wood energy use, a good database is essential. The project solid biomass use in the sector trade, commerce and services (TCS) aims at improving data availability and quality in this regard.

Background and Objective

The project resource monitoring for wood, led by University of Hamburg in cooperation with Thünen-Institute, provides empirical data on the wood consumption for energetic as well as material use in Germany. The wood energy consumption is analyzed for private households, small-scale wood firing plants with a rated thermal input below 1 MW as well as large-scale wood firing plants with a rated thermal input of at least 1 MW. Information on the wood flows in these three sectors provide valuable information for national and international reporting schemes. In our project this data will be used to improve data quality and a time series of wood consumed for energy in the sector TCS. The sector TCS comprises commercial and public services, trade, agriculture, forestry, fishery as well as companies of the manufacturing sector which employ less than twenty people. The derived information will be further used for international reporting schemes.

Approach

In a first attempt a methodology was developed for calculating the wood energy consumption in the sector TCS (Weimar 2016). To do so the wood energy consumption of all wood firing plants is aggregated. From the total amount of wood used for energy, the amount used by the transformation sector and the industry sector is deducted. The remaining amount of wood for energy constitutes for wood consumed by the sector TCS. In our project we aim at a statistical formalization of this methodology.

In the first part of the project, an overview on studies will be provided concerning the energy use of the sector TCS as well as international reporting schemes that provide wood energy data. In the second part a regressive model will be specified using primary data from the wood resource monitoring project. The specified model will be used to estimate wood energy consumption data for a time series from 2003 to 2016.

Thünen-Contact

• Glasenapp, Sebastian Institute of International Forestry and Forest Economics

Involved Thünen-Partners

• Weimar, Holger Institute of International Forestry and Forest Economics

Funding Body

• Umweltbundesamt (UBA)
  (national, öffentlich)

Duration

1.2017 - 10.2018

More Information

Projekt type:
Project funding number: 37EV16 127 0
Project status: ongoing

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