Short-rotation timber crops take off in Europe

Sunday, February 6, 2011

Poor grain returns and peaking fuel prices are making renewable fuel from fast-growing trees more attractive for farmers

by NORMAN DUNN

In Europe, it's been a very slow start for energy production from quick-growing trees. Hardly anything happened in Germany in this respect, for instance, until five years ago.

But since the first hybrid willows and poplars were planted as energy crops, demand from homes with wood-chip or pellet-fired heating, as well as from municipal power stations, has exploded.    "The so-called short-term coppicing has soared from a few hundred to around 3,000 hectares (7,500 acres) in that short time," says farmer Carsten Neumeister. He not only grows this energy crop himself, he represents one of Europe's biggest biomass production co-operatives, Swedish-based Lantmännen Agroenergi.

Agroenergi helps farmers plan their energy plantations, assists with claiming of government grants, supplies cuttings and, where wanted, provides the machinery for fully mechanized planting and harvesting.

"Helping the boom in short-rotation coppicing in Germany has been the emergence of the large energy supply companies on the market. They've got power stations using coal and they want to secure carbon credits by investing in renewable fuels, too," explains Neumeister.

Mind you, this is an energy crop that's been ticking over for years in other parts of Europe. Remember the surge in oil prices back in the 1960s and '70s? Sweden reacted at that time by stepping-up investment in renewable energies and the spotlight turned on trees. High-production hybrids were the aim and nowadays the result is that most of the best lines for energy willows come from that country. Britain also went into breeding willows and poplars for energy, with Bristol University developing a dedicated research center for this purpose. Nowadays, Sweden has between 40,000 and 50,000 acres down to short-rotation coppicing trees. Britain is still behind with an estimated 25,000 acres of willow, poplar and sycamore in plantations by this year, but there's been a sudden surge in U.K. plantings, mainly because the government offered support of up to C$678 per acre. Total establishment costs, however, are about $1,200 an acre. A major expense is stock-proof fencing that, in many cases, is demanded before a grant is handed over.  

Even although at least one power station with biomass capacity is already working in Scotland, a lot of forestry thinnings and other woodland waste are going towards fuelling this. This means that the area of short-rotation trees is not expanding as quickly as hoped there, despite the fact that this part of the U.K. has a published commitment to produce 50 per cent of its energy through renewable resources before 2020.

Government assistance is not quite so generous in other countries. In Sweden, there's a one-time grant at planting equivalent to around $270 an acre. In Germany, the payment depends on the state. In Saxony, for example, farmers get around $375 an acre at planting. "In my experience, this covers around 30 per cent of establishment costs in that part of the country," says Neumeister. .

What can a European farmer earn from growing energy trees? Well, the recent price hikes in all energy costs have affected wood chips, too. In fact, in Germany this year short-rotation coppice harvests have earned more than wheat! And, of course, the trees are usually grown on land that could never grow a decent wheat crop in any case. Wood chips dried down to 20-30 per cent moisture are selling for $133 per tonne this winter.

Harvesting energy willow hybrids takes place every three years on the best plantations and total yield gives 3.25 to five tonnes of 20 per cent moisture content wood chips per acre.

The plantations have a lifetime under such conditions of between 20 and 25 years, which means six to seven harvests. Costings in Germany for 2010 have put the return per acre after all costs at between $215 and $240. Main input is a maximum 30 kilograms of nitrogen fertilizer per year with all P and K usually supplied by the leaves.

Speaking with energy tree growers in all three countries has reflected more than a little optimism for the future of this energy crop. In eastern Germany and in Scotland, there have been a couple of poor grain harvests in the last years with nothing left on the bottom line by the time the crop is in and dried. This has made short-rotation coppicing on the poorest soils of a lot of arable farms very attractive indeed.

Prices are good. In fact, demand is currently well ahead of supply. Still required, though, is more input from supporting industries, such as the suppliers and fitters of household heating. In Scotland, for example, there's a six-month waiting list for supply of some makes of wood-fired systems.

Perhaps the most positive sign for the future of these energy trees on European farms was the machinery line-up at this fall's Bioenergy Decentral farm show in Hanover, Germany, where every major harvesting machinery manufacturer was present with new, specially-designed, self-propelled harvesters for high-throughput cutting and chopping on-the-go. BF

Norman Dunn writes about European agriculture from Germany.