PW06 Life-Cycle Assessment
Exhibit Hall
8:00 AM - Wednesday
(PW065) Ecological Footprint Plus: Regional Resource Flows in the New Zealand Forest Industry.
Nebel, B1, Shepherd, M1, Nielsen, P1, 1 Forest Research, Rotorua, New Zealand
ABSTRACT- The Ecological Footprint Plus Project is a cross sectoral project on sustainability of land-based value chains. It includes the meat, wool, dairy and forestry sectors in New Zealand. Different from the common ecological footprint approach our approach takes into account not only inputs and CO2 assimilation, but also impacts of solid and liquid effluents and air emissions. In this paper the results of relating LCA data to regional data on forest statistics are shown and the linkage of data from Geographic Information System (GIS) to LCA data in order to model specific types of land use in different regions is explored. Data for the forestry sector is based on an existing LCA for Pinus Radiata. This pine species contributes about 90 % of all harvested timber in New Zealand. Plantations are located in different regions which differ considerably in contour, accessibility, fertility and climate. Since forestry practices (methods of planting, pruning, thinnings, harvesting technology) are very similar in the whole country average LCA data can be used as a base. The main differences between the regions lay therefore in an increased amount of transport due to the location of the plantations, the different resource inputs for steep or flat contour plantations, and in the differences in yield due to climate and fertility.
Key words: lca, forestry, ecological footprint, gis