C.A.F.E. | Carbon, Aqua, Fire & Eco-resilience Decision Support System

C.A.F.E. | Carbon, Aqua, Fire & Eco-resilience Decision Support System

LIFE RESILIENT FORESTS
C.A.F.E. determines the optimum silvicultural activities to manage multiple products, goods and services such as biomass production, C2 sequestration, fire risk, water provisioning , climatic resilience or biodiversity, for a selected solution.

This tool determines the optimum silvicultural activities to manage multiple products, goods and services such as biomass production, CO2 sequestration, fire risk, water provisioning, climatic resilience or biodiversity, which are simultaneously quantified in time and space for a selected solution. Main advantages include:

  • Changing the mono-objective approach in order to include a group of ecosystem goods and services.
  • Improving the economic performance of low productive areas by quantifying and valorising other resources that could be remunerated attending to the environmental value.
  • Holistic optimization of multiple goods and services out of forest management.
  • Adequacy to the specific characteristics of each site.
  • Multi-scalar results (plot, forest working unit, catchment, etc.).

C.A.F.E. is a tool that combines eco-hydrologic dynamic simulation with many-criteria optimization, where the user can carry out forest management according to more than one product at the same time, and choose the relevance of each objective/product. This software is capable of working under different climatic regions thanks to the previous calibration of the eco-hydrological simulation. Furthermore, it is possible to modify the spatial scale moving from plot to catchment, integrating a strong biophysical unit. In the same way, simulating different climatic scenarios is also possible. The result is a group of possible solutions among which forest manager can decide and apply.

Region of origin
2593113
Origin of wood
Forest
Mobilization Potential
Very positive
Kind of wood concerned
All wood produced in the forest system (trunk, branches, roots).
Sustainability Potential
Improves forests resilience to wildfires, water scarcity, environmental degradation and other effects induced by climate change
Impact on environment & biodiversity
  • Demonstration and replication of a successful, innovative forest management scheme at a watershed scale. At the beginning it will be applied at sub catchment level in Spain (415 hectares), then at catchment level in Germany, Portugal and Spain (7,824 hectares) and finally it will be further expanded up to 350,000 hectares within five years from the project completion.
  • Reinforcement of mechanisms to develop climate change adaptation measures in rural areas and to ensure its socioeconomic sustainability;
  • Increased water reserves of 45-200 l/m²/year and increased water availability downstream, leading to a reduction in energy extraction costs to 5 W/hm;
  • Increased sustainable biomass production for bioenergy uses, between 10 and 15 t/ha year, including both forest and agricultural residues traditionally burned and usually the cause of wildfires.
  • Reduced fire hazards by 30%, protecting rural populations currently residing in risk areas
  • Increased resilience of 25% of forest areas to withstand droughts, pests and disease outbreak.
Ease of implementation
It is not easy to use, but we are developing user guides to make it easier.
Economic impact
The tool is free, so the economic impact is positive as you provide a very powerful management tool at 0 cost.
Job effect
The management that is proposed always generates jobs to carry it out.
Income effect
If the management objective is to maximise productivity, revenues will also be maximised.
Specific knowledge needed
Knowledge of Geographic Information Systems is necessary to be able to prepare the input data for the tool.
Exploitation potential

High, as it is based on mechanistic modelling it can be applied in any climatic region. Furthermore, by including a wide range of ecosystem services, it can meet the needs of different types of forest management.

Key prerequisites

Input data for the chosen mechanistic model.

Decision variables.

Constraints to be applied.

Domain
Forest management, ecosystem, resilience
Forest disturbances, risks
Keywords
Resilience/Networking/Decision support system(DSS)/
Challenge addressed
1.- Improve forest resilience and adaption to climate change
Type of solution
Modelling, simulation, optimization
Digital solution
Yes
Innovation
Yes
Country of origin
Belgium
Germany
Portugal
Spain
Region of origin
2593113
Scale of application
Continental
Start and end year
2019 - 2023
Contact data
Owner or author
Reporter
CESEFOR
Ángela García de Arana
References and Resources
Project reference
The project LIFE RESILIENT FORESTS – Coupling water, fire and climate resilience with biomass production from forestry to adapt watersheds to climate change is co-funded by the LIFE Programme of the European Union under contract number LIFE 17 CCA/ES/000063
Resources
Project under which this factsheet has been created
Rosewood 4.0