Characterization of Forest Harvest Residue from the Great Lakes-St Lawrence Forests of South-eastern Ontario

The use of fossil derived products and the environmental and economic problems associated with them have made a shift to abundant renewable resources such as forest biomass more attractive. However before forest biomass can be used as a resource, its properties must be known. This study determined the physical properties of heterogeneous biomass residues produced during harvesting on two operational forest sites within the Great Lakes-St Lawrence forest of south-eastern Ontario. Properties measured were moisture content, size distribution, bulk density, and wood-to-bark ratio; also thermo-chemical properties including elemental composition, thermal reactivity and energy content were measured. The effects of forest site and harvest type, storage and position in storage pile, on the properties of biomass were also investigated. Results of the study showed that the various heterogeneous forest harvest residues differed more physically than thermo-chemically for the different variables, and this affected biomass procurement more than the potential utilization options.MAS