ForestPaths builds next-generation methods and tools which will aid in the quantification of policy pathways. These methods and tools help to better estimate the mitigation potential and biodiversity impact of the European forest-based bioeconomy, including the substitution and carbon storage effect of forest-based material and energy products, with appropriate time dynamics.
To assess the impacts of the different pathways, ForestPaths will perform a dynamic Material Flow Analysis (MFA) of wood use related to the European forest-based sector. It will be linked with EFI-GTM and IMAGE, focusing on the further processing of semi-finished wood products into finished products.
The Temporalis LCA tool will be used with Brightway2 to create an LCA platform and develop a database of spatio-temporal explicit substitution factors for forest products. Targeted wood and wood-based energy products and their fossil-based counterparts will be identified in the policy labs.
ForestPaths will exploit the improved tools to build a database with the product-level substitution and biodiversity factors of targeted forest-based material and energy products that will be used to assess the mitigation potential of the forest-based sector.
The cradle-to-grave biodiversity impact of targeted products will be assessed. Biogenic carbon and biodiversity impact assessment methods will be developed to account for the impact of forest management in LCA. A database of characterisation factors for assessing biogenic carbon and biodiversity impact in LCA will be available.