The Korea Forest Service (KFS) announced Wednesday that it will position timber as a sustainable alternative to address supply chain disruptions in fossil fuel-based materials caused by recent geopolitical instability in the Middle East, and seize the current crisis as an opportunity to achieve national carbon neutrality.
As the prolonged conflict in the Middle East continues, concerns over unstable supply of fossil fuel-based materials are growing across industries including construction and power generation.
The KFS plans to promote timber utilization, emphasizing that wood is a green asset capable of replacing fossil fuels.
Timber is a carbon-neutral material that stores carbon absorbed during tree growth over extended periods and drives a sustainable green economy as a core element of forest resource cycle management. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), one cubic meter of timber stores approximately 0.9 tons of carbon dioxide, demonstrating a high carbon storage effect. Unlike fossil fuels, timber can be sustainably sourced through a cycle of harvesting and reforestation.
In the construction sector, multiple public agencies — including the KFS, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport (MOLIT), the LH Research Institute, and local governments — are already working to promote timber construction as a replacement for conventional building methods reliant on fossil fuel-based materials such as reinforced concrete.
Eco-friendly timber cities are being developed through landmark timber construction projects such as "timber construction demonstration projects" and "timber observation decks" across the country. Legislation to promote timber construction is also being pursued through a joint effort between the KFS and MOLIT.
In the energy sector, eco-friendly energy sources utilizing timber, such as wood pellets and wood chips, are gaining attention. "Unused forest biomass" — timber that does not meet the grade for use as logs — is a renewable energy source recognized and supported by the European Union.
In particular, utilizing wildfire-damaged timber from last year's major wildfires in the Yeongnam region as an energy source to replace fossil fuels, rather than leaving it unused, is emerging as one method to contribute to domestic energy security and carbon neutrality.
The KFS is building its eighth "Unused Forest Resource Center" nationwide to ensure stable supply of forest biomass, and plans to continue expanding industry connections to increase utilization of wildfire-damaged timber.
The KFS also said it aims to pursue long-term changes in industrial materials. It assessed that converting plastic packaging — whose supply has become unstable due to the Middle East conflict — to pulp and paper products could be an effective response. The agency also plans to strengthen research on replacing fossil fuel-derived substances such as naphtha by utilizing lignin and cellulose, the component materials of timber.
"Our forests already hold an abundant timber resource exceeding one billion cubic meters," KFS Commissioner Park Eun-sik said. "We will make every effort to actively utilize timber to help alleviate public hardship and propel Korea into a full-fledged 'Era of Timber.'"
