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Sustainable forest management is driving the development of forest decision support systems (DSSs) to include models and methods concerned with climate change, biodiversity and various ecosystem services (ESs). The future development of forest landscapes is very much dependent on how forest owners act and what goes on in the wider world; thus, models are needed that incorporate these aspects. The objective of this study is to assess how nine European state-of-the-art forest DSSs cope with these issues. The assessment focuses on the ability of these DSSs to generate landscape-level scenarios to explore the output of current and alternative forest management models (FMMs) in terms of a range of ESs and the robustness of these FMMs in the face of increased risks and uncertainty. Results show that all DSSs assessed in this study can be used to quantify the impacts of both stand- and landscape-level FMMs on the provision of a range of ESs over a typical planning horizon. DSSs can be used to assess how timber price trends may impact that provision over time. The inclusion of forest owner behavior as reflected by the adoption of specific FMMs seems to be also in the reach of all DSSs. Nevertheless, some DSSs need more data and development of models to estimate the impacts of climate change on biomass production and other ESs. Spatial analysis functionality needs to be further developed for a more accurate assessment of the landscape-level output of ESs from both current and alternative FMMs.

Mountain forests provide a diverse range of ecosystem services (ES). In case of conflicting ES, trade-offs must be considered in forest resource planning. In this study, simulation-based scenario analysis and multi-criteria decision analysis is used to analyse expected utilities and value-based trade-offs in multi-objective forest management related to four key ES (timber production, carbon storage, biodiversity conservation, protection against gravitational hazards) in three European mountain regions. In each case study area a set of management alternatives including no-management were simulated over 100 years and ES quantified using ES indicators. Multifunctional goal scenarios are employed to aggregate partial ES utilities, accumulated RMSE between ES are used to quantify trade-offs. In two analysed case study areas no-management generated highest ES utilities for biodiversity conservation, carbon storage and protection against gravitational hazards. Alternatives based on small-scale silviculture combined timber production and biodiversity conservation very well. In all case study areas increasing goal preferences for timber production or biodiversity and nature conservation result in increasing overall trade-offs with rather decreasing overall utilities. In all case study areas the analysed managements support multiple ES and can thus be considered as multifunctional. Based on the presented analysis management alternatives could be further improved.

Forests provide a multitude of ecosystem services. In Sweden, the goal to replace fossil fuels could induce substantial changes in the current management and use of forests. Therefore, methods and tools are needed to assess synergies and trade-offs between ecosystem services for policy and planning alternatives. The aim of this study was to develop methods for integrated sustainability assessment of forest management strategies for long-term provisioning of various ecosystem services. For this purpose, the Landscape simulation and Ecological Assessment (LEcA) tool was developed to analyse synergies and trade-offs among five ecosystem services: bioenergy feedstock and industrial wood production, forest carbon storage, recreation areas and habitat networks. Forest growth and management were simulated for two scenarios; the EAF-tot scenario dominated by even-aged forestry (EAF), and the CCF-int scenario with a combination of continuous-cover forestry (CCF) and intensified EAF. The results showed trade-offs between industrial wood and bioenergy production on one side and habitat, recreation and carbon storage on the other side. The LEcA tool showed great potential for evaluation of impacts of alternative policies for land zoning and forest management on forest ecosystem services. It can be used to assess the consequences of forest management strategies related to renewable energy and conservation policies.

Forest biomass is a renewable resource that is increasingly utilised for bioenergy purposes in Sweden, which along with the extraction of industrial wood may conflict with biodiversity conservation. The aim of this paper is to present a method for integrated sustainability assessment of forest biomass extraction, particularly from bioenergy and biodiversity perspectives. The landscape simulator LandSim was developed and linked with models for the assessment of biomass yields and habitat networks representing prioritised biodiversity components. It was applied in a case study in Kronoberg County in southern Sweden. Forest growth and management were simulated for the period 2010–2110, following two land zoning scenarios, one applying even-aged forest management on all forest land except for protected areas (EAF-tot), and one applying continuous cover forest management on parts of the forest land, combined with protected areas and an intensified even-aged management on the other parts (CCF-int). The EAF-tot scenario implied higher yields of biomass feedstock for bioenergy, the CCF-int scenario only giving 66% of that yield, while the CCF-int scenario performed substantially better when it came to the habitat network indicators, if habitat suitability was ensured. Conclusively, the case study confirmed that the modelling framework of the LEcA tool, linking the landscape simulator LandSim with the biomass yield assessment and the habitat network model can be used for integrating main policy concerns when assessing renewable energy options.

Under climate change, the importance of biomass resources is likely to increase and new approaches are needed to analyze future material and energy use of biomass globally and locally. Using Sweden as an example, we present an approach that combines global and national land-use and forest models to analyze impacts of climate change mitigation ambitions on forest management and harvesting in a specific country. National forest impact analyses in Sweden have traditionally focused on supply potential with little reference to international market developments. In this study, we use the global greenhouse gas concentration scenarios from the Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change to estimate global biomass demand and assess potential implications on harvesting and biodiversity in Sweden. The results show that the short-term demand for wood is close to the full harvesting potential in Sweden in all scenarios. Under high bioenergy demand, harvest levels are projected to stay high over a longer time and particularly impact the harvest levels of pulpwood. The area of old forest in the managed landscape may decrease. This study highlights the importance of global scenarios when discussing national-level analysis and pinpoints trade-offs that policy making in Sweden may need to tackle in the near future.