Northern CA Cost of Potential Treatments - Biomass Treatment Cost High

This metric represents cost of potential treatments for the Northern California region and is dependent on predefined treatments or silvicultural prescriptions, which are best generated at the local and/or project level. The cost to perform each treatment depends on a defined prescription and should consider an array of factors including the spatial juxtaposition of the resources and infrastructure, as well as the location of the saw timber and biomass processing plants.

Treatment cost calculations take into consideration the multiple costs necessary to move material from the forest harvest site to a processing location (sawmill or biomass facility) and includes the costs of felling, processing, skidding and hauling:

  • costs to move material along different types of roads (i.e., dirt, paved, highways, etc.)

  • across barriers (i.e., water courses)

  • operational costs

  • machine costs

  • speed of moving material across the landscape.

Cost values have been broken down into the costs to move either biomass or sawlogs, and for a high-cost and low-cost scenario (reflecting variation in machine rates). Non-mechanical hand treatments, piling and burning operations, and prescribed fire treatments are not addressed in this data set. We hope to provide cost estimates on those types of treatments later.

Data and Resources

Additional Info

Field Value
Version Version 5.0
Last Updated March 28, 2025, 08:35 (UTC)
Created March 7, 2025, 07:52 (UTC)
category /Economic Diversity/Wood Product Industry/Northern CA Cost of Potential Treatments
collection_name California Landscape Metrics
creation_method The methods are based on the "RMRS Raster Utility and Function Modeling" and the "Delivered Cost Modeling" approaches developed by John Hogland at the Rocky Mountain Research Station. Using a series of sliders that define various rates for multiple harvesting systems and then running the delivered cost model. Within the modeling, the following analyses will be performed: 1. Subset and attribute OSM roads with speed based on criteria in Table 1. 2. Create barrier to offroad motion for off road analysis using a subset of OSM streams, water bodies, interstates, and highways. 3. Estimate potential on road and offroad cost surfaces for each harvesting system using interactive sliders based on the criteria in Table 2. 4. Create felling and processing surfaces and add potential costs. 5. Specify where harvesting systems occur and subset system costs to those locations. 6. Create final spatial representation of the potential cost to treat each raster cell on a dollar per CCF basis. 7. Save raster surfaces. 8. Remove non-forest types (source FVEG 2023) 9. Remove wilderness areas (source [PAD Wilderness](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1EXX5xwUrAV0TYCkhx3dVRJD1iIdTn376/edit#heading=h.3mzq4wv)) 10. Convert units on biomass rasters from $/CCF to $/BDT (bone dry ton) The data has been extracted from open street maps and USFS 3dep and consist of base Raster and Vector datasets that have been used throughout the study area: - Elevation (raster): elevation surface units meters (3dep) - Roads (vector): Open Street Map roads based on Tiger Lines (OSM) - Streams (vector): Open Street Map streams based on NHD (OSM) - Water bodies (vector): OSM water bodies - Sawmills (vector): location of the sawmill - Biomass facilities (vector): location of biomass facilities (USFS) - North Coast RRK study area extent (vector): North Coast RRK study area extent **** **Reference Tables** Table 1: Road segment travel speed by[ OSM highway](https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:highway) class types Table 2: Criteria used to spatially define harvesting systems and treatment costs. Default machine rate of travel, and capacity estimates ("high cost scenario") derived from meetings with Lisa Ball, Jacob Baker (STF), Michal Jow (STF), Brian McCrory, and John Hogland. Machine rates of travel for "low cost scenario" derived from Chang et al. 2023. Chang, H., et al. (2023). "The Cost of Forest Thinning Operations in the Western United States: A Systematic Literature Review and New Thinning Cost Model." Journal of Forestry **121** (2): 193-206.
data_units Dollars per CCF (100 cubic feet) for sawlog layers and Dollars per BDT (bone dry ton) for biomass layers
data_vintage last updated 09/2023
date_updated August 2024
element Wood Product Industry
encoding utf8
file_name NorCal_BiomassTrmntCostHigh_202309_202401_T2_v5
format GeoTiff
harvest_object_id 8c1c2243-b961-49c6-88a5-b47d463ea4cd
harvest_source_id a2637971-af12-457f-ae4a-831d2202a539
harvest_source_title WIFIRE Commons
maximum_value 5490.0
metric_definition_and_relevance This metric represents cost of potential treatments for the Northern California region and is dependent on predefined treatments or silvicultural prescriptions, which are best generated at the local and/or project level. The cost to perform each treatment depends on a defined prescription and should consider an array of factors including the spatial juxtaposition of the resources and infrastructure, as well as the location of the saw timber and biomass processing plants. Treatment cost calculations take into consideration the multiple costs necessary to move material from the forest harvest site to a processing location (sawmill or biomass facility) and includes the costs of felling, processing, skidding and hauling: - costs to move material along different types of roads (i.e., dirt, paved, highways, etc.) - across barriers (i.e., water courses) - operational costs - machine costs - speed of moving material across the landscape. Cost values have been broken down into the costs to move either biomass or sawlogs, and for a high-cost and low-cost scenario (reflecting variation in machine rates). Non-mechanical hand treatments, piling and burning operations, and prescribed fire treatments are not addressed in this data set. We hope to provide cost estimates on those types of treatments later.
minimum_value 142.0
pillar Economic Diversity
spatial {"type": "Polygon", "coordinates": [[[-124.5090833859125, 37.98548142562645], [-121.17629906020476, 37.98548142562645], [-121.17629906020476, 42.10983355898506], [-124.5090833859125, 42.10983355898506], [-124.5090833859125, 37.98548142562645]]]}
sub_element Northern CA Cost of Potential Treatments
tier 2