Biomass Disposal Methods
The economic utilization of forest biomass is often infeasible due to low or no value of the materials and high transportation cost of delivering it to the market. However, biomass still needs to be removed from the forest, as it attracts insects and creates fuel loads that can contribute to catastrophic wildfire. Air curtain burners are being evaluated as a tool to dispose unusable biomass, in addition to other disposal methods, such as natural decay, pile and burn, and in-woods processing.
Working Paper: Opportunities for Application of Traditional Ecological Knowledge in Restoration of Pinyon-Juniper Ecosystems of the Colorado Plateau
Despite being substantially altered by climate change and human activities, the culturally and ecologically vital pinyon-juniper ecosystems of the Colorado Plateau can be successfully restored through management actions that both recover ecological function and actively engage local Indigenous and traditional communities.
FireBox and CharBoss: An Alternative to Open Burning of Woody Biomass
The traditional practice of openly burning woody biomass (a common byproduct of southwestern US forest restoration) degrades soil and compromises air quality, driving researchers to evaluate alternative air curtain burners like the FireBox and CharBoss® for their efficiency in cleanly disposing of biomass and producing soil-restoring biochar.
Positive drought feedbacks increase tree mortality risk in dry woodlands of the US Southwest
Recurrent droughts in the US Southwest have severely compromised the natural resilience of pinyon–juniper woodlands, triggering widespread mortality and crown dieback between 1998 and 2023 that ultimately heightened the future mortality risk of surviving trees by 28.2%.