Because of the continuous threat of a global energy crisis and the need to curb greenhouse gas emissions, renewable energy option not from fossil fuels is a central node of the strategy for sustainable development for all the Alpine and pre-Alpine wooded areas.

The natural forest endowment is the primary resource and locally may:
a) be decisive to give an economic contribution, through proper forest management, innovative and environmentally friendly business initiatives in the energy sector;
b) contribute to the resilience and increase in the value of ecosystem services of soil-forest system, reducing, at the same time, natural hazards;
c) improve the “value chain” of the wood industry.

The project aims to be a first study on the supply chain forest-wood-energy, based on certain physical environmental data, from which get proposals for successive detailed approximations and durable scenarios and solutions for the integrated and full use of the renewable energy sources of territories with a high degree of abandonment and collapse of the slopes.

The project “BES-Lario” is a study that is to be understood as a “pilot project”, based on the preservation of forests’ eco-systemic functions and on sustainable management of the land in the south-western branch of Lake Como.

The specific objectives of the project are:

• optimize the use of Brienno municipality’s forest biomass, that is considered a pilot site, both in the wood industry, both in the energy production, respecting the environment;

• discover if a community that can directly rely only on energy resources from renewable biomass can be energetically self-sufficient, eco-friendly and enviromentally sustainable;

• evaluate the risks associated with the hydro-soil erosion;

• identify the anti-erosion protective functions of terraces, assess their conservation status and types, and hypothesise the feasibility of restoring the agricultural use of the terraced land;

• assess the ecological capacity of Brienno soils in terms of carbon;

• assign correct bases of land use capacity, consistent with actual Land Evaluation techniques;

• provide a comprehensive management model, extrapolated to other similar forest reality of Lario and Lombardy in general.

Centro Interdipartimentale per lo studio dei Rischi Naturali in ambiente Montano e Collinare – NatRisk, Università di Torino, direttore prof. Ermanno Zanini.

Fondazione Cariplo quale ente finanziatore