SEQUESTRATION: NONINDUSTRIAL PRIVATE FOREST OWNER OPINION AND THE MODELED IMPACT ON CELLULOSIC ETHANOL CARBON EMISSIONS

Cellulosic ethanol has long been put forward as a more carbon-neutral fuel source than corn ethanol—trees grown for cellulosic ethanol production sequester carbon from the atmosphere and are less intensive to manage. Limits on the forest’s rate of growth and the limited distance over which forest biomass can be profitably transported mean that forest owners in the vicinity of a woody-biomass biorefinery must be willing to harvest their timber as feedstock. I conducted a survey of 500 nonindustrial private forest, or NIPF, owners in Michigan to understand their management decision-making. The survey found a significant correlation between owners supporting sales of their timber for cellulosic ethanol production and owners desiring to maintain the same forest for carbon sequestration. However, these two ways of using NIPF land to mitigate net carbon emissions are mutually exclusive. I constructed a new computer model, the Cellulosic Ethanol BioRefinery Accounting Model (CEBRAM), which examines this tradeoff of how best to mitigate net carbon emissions using NIPF land. The model was parameterized for current forest species and growth in Michigan. The overall rate of NIPF biomass harvest and provision by NIPF owners to the biorefiner