The Digest’s Top 10 Advanced Bioeconomy Markets and Predictions for 2021

5. Energy Wars: The Forest Awakens

Forest Companies are to renewables as the Jedi are to the opening of Star Wars IV: A New Hope. It’s a case of “Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi. You’re my only hope” yet when you look around for forest companies taking an active role of leadership in moving renewables forward and deploying fleets of plants based on advanced technology. Yet, one fears, as Grand Moff Tarkin said to UPM, Borregaard and Stora Enso, “The Jedi are extinct. Their fire has gone out of the universe. You, my friend, are all that’s left of their religion.”

Well, Tarkin probably said it to Darth Vader, but he might as well have said it to UPM, Borregaard and Stora Enso, they’re the companies doing much of the heavy lifting when it comes to deployment. Canfor’s been trying. Where’s Weyerhaeuser? Where’s Georgia-Pacific? West Fraser? Arauco? Resolute? Interfor?

Yet, UPM, Borregaard and Stora Enso have shown that the Forest might be awakening. That a strategy based on using advanced technology to find new markets, higher-margins or to enter into carbon markets is something that can be explained to investors, actioned by management, delivered by science, and welcomed by customers. Watch this space, particularly in Canada as the Clean Fuels Standards takes shape, and in Scandinavia as sustainability continues to draw the focus of those nations.