Cost Factors Affecting Harvesting Biomass

Forest processing industries generally display strong economies of scale, but with increased size, wood acquisition costs will also rise due to longer hauling distances.  The recent trend towards decreasing transportation costs is pushing the optimum size towards larger and larger units.  It is impossible to optimize the system by optimizing the individual parts separately.  Optimization must be addressed at the system level.

As the biomass harvesting systems change the associated harvesting, processing, delivery, storage costs change too.  These costs become a function of tract size, tree species, volume of wood, distance to the wood-using facility, terrain and other considerations.  Even within the South there is a tremendous variation in all of these factors and harvesting systems must be designed to meet the constraints on a local level.

The two major cost considerations will be examined in the following sections.

• Factors Affecting Harvesting Costs
• Factors Affecting Transportation and Delivery Costs