Title:
Innovative System for Medium Rotation Forestry Harvesting
Author(s):
Pari, L., Civitarese, V., Del Giudice, A., Scarfone, A.
Document(s):
Paper
Abstract:
Five years old poplar (Populus spp.) plantation represents an interesting model of productivity. The most attractive characteristics of this energy crop are the handling flexibility, the high yield of biomass per area unit and the good quality of the chips obtainable. The mechanical harvesting of five-years old poplar plantations requires the use of specialized forest machineries such as harvester, feller, forwarder and chipper. Usually, after felling, the working phases consist of extraction, stacking and chipping. Generally, the last one is carried out in a “static phase”, where the product is taken from staked logs by using a hydraulic arm having a gripper that feed the chipping machine. In order to introduce technological innovations for medium rotation forestry harvesting, the Consiglio per la Ricerca e la sperimentazione in Agricoltura, Unità di ricerca per l’Ingegneria agraria (CRA-ING) of Monterotondo (Rome, Italy) has developed a five years poplar cut-windrower and a self-propelled chipper equipped with a pick up head. Both machines have shown good quality of the work performed and the results obtained indicates that the work phases could be simplified in order to reduce both time of use and harvesting costs.
Keywords:
energy crops, harvesting, poplar, short rotation forestry (SRF), chip
Topic:
Biomass resources
Subtopic:
Short rotation forestry and short rotation coppice
Event:
21st European Biomass Conference and Exhibition
Session:
1CO.3.3
Pages:
125 - 128
ISBN:
978-88-89407-53-0
Paper DOI:
10.5071/21stEUBCE2013-1CO.3.3
Price:
FREE
