SCIENCES OF THE 21ST CENTURY – POWER OF WOOD – RESOURCE OF THE FUTURE?

There are around 3 quadrillion trees worldwide, which means approximately 400 trees for every person. But increasingly intensive forms of farming are depleting wooded areas. Global deforestation is occurring so quickly that in 200 years the world's wooded areas might have disappeared altogether. To prevent this from happening, forests have to be managed around the world in a more sustainable, environment-friendly way. And wood as a material and fuel must be used more efficiently. According to the so-called cascading use principle, wood can be reused multiple times over a period of many decades: first of all as beams for house construction, then as boards for furniture, and later as chipboard panels which are then burnt in power plants for energy and heat. But generating energy directly from wood can also be environment-friendly if transport routes to consumers are kept short and efficient ovens are used. So-called wood gasifiers can halve the amount of wood needed to heat a house when combined with solar collectors and heat storage devices. But wood can also be transformed directly into energy and heat if it is converted first into gas by a wood gasifier and later burnt in a block power station.