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The European Commission expects the use of biomass for energy in the EU to increase significantly between 2010 and 2020 to meet a legally binding target to cover at least 20% of EU's total energy use from renewable sources in 2020. According to estimates made by the member states of the EU, the direct supply of biomass from forests is expected to increase by 45% on a volume basis between 2006 and 2020 in response to increasing demand (Beurskens LWM, Hekkenberg M, Vethman P. Renewable energy projections as published in the national renewable energy action plans of the European Member states. ECN and EEA; 2011. http://https://www.ecn.nl/docs/library/report/2010/e10069.pdf [accessed 25.04.2014]; Dees M, Yousef A, Ermert J. Analysis of the quantitative tables of the national renewable energy action plans prepared by the 27 European Union Member States in 2010. BEE working paper D7.2. Biomass Energy Europe project. FELIS - Department of Remote Sensing and landscape information Systems, University of Freiburg, Germany; 2011). Our aims were to test the hypotheses that European private forest owners' attitudes towards supplying woody biomass for energy (1) can be explained by their responses to changes in prices and markets and (2) are positive so that the forest biomass share of the EU 2020 renewable energy target can be met. Based on survey data collected in 2010 from 800 private forest owners in Sweden, Germany and Portugal our results show that the respondents' attitudes towards supplying woody biomass for energy cannot be explained as direct responses to changes in prices and markets. Our results, furthermore, imply that European private forest owners cannot be expected to supply the requested amounts of woody biomass for energy to meet the forest biomass share of the EU 2020 renewable energy target, at least if stemwood is to play the important role as studies by Verkerk PJ, Anttila P, Eggers J, Lindner M, Asikainen A. The realisable potential supply of woody biomass from forests in the European Union. For Ecol Manag 2011;261: 2007-2015, UNECE and FAO. The European forest sector outlook study II 2010-2030. United Nations, New York and Geneva; 2011 [abbreviated to EFSOS II] and Elbersen B, Staritsky I, Hengeveld G, Schelhaas MJ, Naeff H, Böttcher H. Atlas of EU biomass potentials; 2012. Available from: http://www.biomassfutures.eu [accessed 14.10.2013] suggest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Based on literature and six country studies (Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Netherlands, Sweden, Slovakia) this paper discusses the compatibility of the EU 2020 targets for renewable energy with conservation of biodiversity. We conclude that increased demand for biomass for bioenergy purposes may lead to a continued conversion of valuable habitats into productive lands and to intensification, which both have negative effects on biodiversity. On the other hand, increased demand for biomass also provides opportunities for biodiversity, both within existing productive lands and in abandoned or degraded lands. Perennial crops may lead to increased diversity in crop patterns, lower input uses, and higher landscape structural diversity which may all have positive effects on biodiversity. In production forest opportunities exist to harvest primary wood residues. Removal of these forest residues under strict sustainability conditions may become economically attractive with increased biomass demand. An additional biomass potential is represented by recreation areas, road-side verges, semi-natural and natural areas and lands which have no other use because they have been abandoned, polluted or degraded. Whether effects of cropping of biomass and/or removal of biomass has positive or negative impact on biodiversity depends strongly on specific regional circumstances, the type of land and land use shifts involved and the associated management practices in general. However, it is clear that in the six countries studied certain types of biomass crops are likely to be more sustainable than others. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Miscanthus is one of the top nine potential perennial energy crops. Its high production of biomass is largely due to its efficient C4 photosynthesis pathway and rhizome function, even in cool climates. As a relatively new industrial plant in Europe, it needs the support of both breeding programmes and biotechnology techniques. The paper aimed at synthetic resumption of genetic studies of the energy crop Miscanthus. Phylogenetics, genetic diversity, confirmation of hybridisation origin, genetic structure of natural populations, mapping, transferability of markers, molecular diagnostic and sequencing in genus Miscanthus were reviewed. Perspectives for the application to Miscanthus breeding of such molecular techniques as: hybrid creation with marker-aided selection, genome sequencing and synteny were also discussed. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Reduction of the emissions of greenhouses gases, increasing the share of renewable energy sources (RES) in the energy balance, increasing electricity production from renewable energy sources and decreasing energy dependency represent the main goals of all current strategies in Europe. Biomass co-firing in large coal-based thermal power plants provides a considerable opportunity to increase the share of RES in the primary energy balance and the share of electricity from RES in gross electricity consumption in a country. Biomass-coal co-firing means reducing CO2 and SO2, emissions and it may also reduce NO x emissions, and also represents a near-term, low-risk, low-cost and sustainable energy development. Biomass-coal co-firing is the most effective measure to reduce CO2 emissions, because it substitutes coal, which has the most intensive CO2 emissions per kWh electricity production, by biomass, with a zero net emission of CO2. Biomass co-firing experience worldwide are reviewed in this paper. Biomass co-firing has been successfully demonstrated in over 150 installations worldwide for most combinations of fuels and boiler types in the range of 50–700MWe, although a number of very small plants have also been involved. More than a hundred of these have been in Europe. A key indicator for the assessment of biomass co-firing is intrduced and used to evaluate all available biomass co-firing technologies. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Following the development of large-scale use of biomass energy in the EU, international biofuel trade is a plausible scenario and something that is already taking place in Northern Europe. This paper focuses on Swedish biofuel imports, both direct and indirect imports, the latter which derive from the fact that part of the imported pulpwood and timber end up as fuel. The objective is to describe the biomass import flows, the actors involved and analyse the fundamental drivers for the trade flows.The rapid expansion of biomass energy, that has taken place in district heating since the early 1990s in Sweden, has been met partly by imports. The direct biofuel import was estimated to 18 PJ for 2000, which corresponded to 26% of the biofuel supply in district heating. The total indirect biofuel import was estimated to 9 PJ of which 5.5 PJ is consumed in the district heating sector. Sawmill wood chips, decay-damaged stemwood and pellets are imported from Estonia and Latvia, whereas used wood and solid recovered fuels are imported from Germany and the Netherlands. Tall oil and pellets are imported from North America.Key factors related to the Swedish biofuel import are analysed, both from the view of Swedish demand and from the view of supply in the Baltic countries as well as supply from Germany or the Netherlands. National differences in energy policy are perhaps the most important driving force behind the seemingly strange trade flows. Structures in the different national energy systems are also discussed as well as the transformation process that has taken place in the forest sector in the Baltic countries. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The emission of fine particles (FP) generated by biomass combustion poses a substantial health risk. The immediate emissions from biomass boilers are mainly influenced by the operating parameters. The authors of this article present the results of an experimental identification of the real FP emissions from small biomass boilers and residential stoves in Central Europe. A single method was used in the study to measure the FP emissions from an automatic boiler burning spruce pellets and from a manual stove burning beech logs. The measurement is extended by a thermo-gravimetric analysis of samples of the fuels used, supplemented with an analysis of the emitted particles. The boilers were tested in an operating cycle that included the phases of fuel ignition, steady combustion, and afterburning. The paper presents the concentrations and size distributions observed of the emitted FP ranging from 17 to 544 nm in size. Operating cycles including a "cold start" and "warm start" are compared. The results achieved are summarized by the expression of the nominal FP emission presenting the number and mass emission corresponding to burning 1 kg of fuel. The tested automatic boiler fed by spruce pellets produced a nominal FP emission of 173 mg kg−1 in the size range of 17–544 nm during the testing operation cycle. The tested manual stove, fed by beech logs, produced a nominal emission of 1043 mg kg−1 in the same size range of particles during the similar testing cycle. Image 1 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]