Large areas have been ditched in Sweden during the past 100 years to improve the forest production. Ditching and also maintenance of old ditches are operations having mainly negative effects on water quality, flora and fauna and changing characteristics of soil. The purpose of this study was to suggest a method for inventory of the need for ditching maintenance in old forest ditches that takes biodiversity, water protection and forest production into consideration. Inventory methods from five Swedish and Finnish forest companies, agencies and organisations were compared. Their employees were interviewed about their handling with ditches, forest production and nature conservation.

Many tropical rain forests has been lost or degraded as a result of human activities and environmental factors. Since the level of biodiversity is high in the tropics, maintaining these areas is of great importance. Forests like these are often assumed to benefit from forest restoration and rehabilitation. The INIKEA project area in Eastern Sabah, Malaysian Borneo, aims to improve biodiversity and/or species richness in the degraded forest through enrichment planting with indigenous species. The objective of this thesis was to evaluate how different treatments (liberation, gap-cluster planting and line planting) affect the biodiversity of natural regeneration in different forest types in the Rain forest Restoration Experiment, located in the INIKEA project area.

Data retrieved from airborne laser scanning represents a new source of forest data. Today, the technology has matured so that it can function in an operational environment. The aim of this study was to compile areas of application of laserdata in forestry. Moreover to analyze costs and accessibility of laserdata. The goal was to provide private forest owners information to support assessments of possible benefits of laserdata.

Bioenergy from the forest has been heavily debated in Sweden for several decades due to the interest of society to decrease dependence upon fossil fuels and limit the effects of climate change. The actual use of bioenergy from the forest has shifted over the years but increased during the last decades. Private actors within forest and nature conservation sectors play an important role for the development of bioenergy from the forest as well as for the debate and the implementation of political goals. Forestry in Sweden is characterised by ?freedom under responsibility? for private actors and the perspective of governance is valuable for studying actors and discourses.

Moisture damage in kitchens is an area that many people believe to be irrelevant andnot a subject to concern, however the problems encountered might be larger thananticipated.The purpose of this essay is to get a view of how problematic moisture damagecurrently is as well as what can be done to prevent damage during the constructionand building of new housing.Statistics regarding moisture damage as well as several tools for damage preventionhave been studied and investigated. Industrial regulations have been reviewed tounderstand the requirements construction companies must legally follow during theconstruction and building of new kitchens. Home manufacturers and largerentrepreneurs have been contacted in order to get their point of view regarding theproblems with moisture damages in kitchens.The knowledge of moisture safe constructions is prevalent by home manufacturers,insurance companies and entrepreneurs. Despite this knowledge, the constructioncompanies predominately follow the industries regulations, which normally onlyimplement the minimum requirements.In order to get construction companies to design and build kitchens with increasedmoisture security, stricter industrial regulations might be needed to be implemented.Unlike bathrooms and laundry rooms, kitchens are not defined as a ?wet room? andthe regulations for the construction of kitchens are more lenient.It is difficult to detect water leaks in an early state and the moisture damage is usuallyextensive before it is discovered and repaired if the kitchen lacks moisture securedconstruction and water security.

For a long time the Swedish forests were used by the landowner?s mainly for providing wood to the household itself. The wood was not, to a greater extent, considered a product to be sold. During the 1800s the industrial era led to a demanding need for wood in the industry and thus the use of forest, forest production kicked off. The forest production was not regulated by law, which led to a differentiated forest production over the whole country without consideration of re-growth.

The purpose of this master thesis is to investigate how nearby forests affect the energy production in wind turbines. To reach the purpose a case study is performed on three wind turbines sited on a field in a north-south line at Andersfält in the municipality of Halmstad, Sweden. Approximately 100 meters south of the southern wind turbine a forest is situated. The case study is divided into three sub studies where the difference in energy production, the affect of the forest and a wind meteorology model, WAsP, is studied. The result show that the forest have a significant influence and that the WAsP-model gives an incorrect result of the energy production in wind turbines sited near a forest..

The purpose of this study was to examine and try to understand the physical environment focusing on the fenomena of scribble and damage at a high school. More specifically its aim was to find out how the pupils themselves discribe their physical environment, the reasons why there are scribble and damage at their school and how they are treated by the adults at the school bearing in mind the scribble and damage that occur. The study took place at one high-school in the southern of Sweden and the methods used were six qualitative interviewes, a minor inquiry in six classes, fotographing the physical environment and putting up scribble boards on the pupils' toilets. The physcial environment was quite bare and monoton and the pupils often felt bored by it. There were few places where the pupils liked being at.

Vallentuna municipality in Stockholm County, is planning to develop a management plan for a forest area owned by the municipality. The property is an urban forest and the hiking trail Roslagsleden runs through it. Hence the municipality intends to take extra care of the outdoor recreation interests, as well as forest biodiversity, but at the same time use the area for forestry. This study discusses how these three interests, recreation, biodiversity and forestry, differ in their views of how a forest should be managed, where they disagree and how they can coexist in the management of this area. In this study, a vegetation mapping of the area and an assessment of the forest?s conservation values was carried out.

During the twenty-first century the price of forest land in Sweden has increased heavily. Buying forest land has become more common and the stakeholders have grown in number. The countries around Sweden have through the globalization become connected in the market of round wood and wood products. The price of forest land and round wood are also close connected. The goal with this report is to make a comparison of forest land prices between Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland, Estonia and Latvia and to see how the prices have developed in the period 2000-2011. The prime factor in the comparison, except the direct price difference between the countries, is the round wood prices. The round wood prices give information about the economic situation in the countries and play an important role in the return on the forest land. The prices of forest land shifts heavily between the countries.

Assessment of impacts on nature and reindeer husbandry by the considered mountain road between Borgafjäll and Saxnäs- Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institutes method for assessment of damage to heritage assetsThere are plans regarding the building of a new road from Borgafjäll/Båtas to Saxnäs, and two road alternatives have been presented. The road has been localized to an area which is protected as a nature reserve and listed as a Nature 2000 area. This report aims to determine the effects on the Nature 2000 area and reindeer husbandry, and to be a source of knowledge for future environmental impact assessment in that project. In order to assess the impact on nature values and reindeer husbandry a method from the Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute (VTI) has been used. A literature review has been made to prescribe the effects and consequences.

During the past years fire has been identified as an important factor for nature conservation in the forest landscape. To accurately quantify the size of a burnt area is obviously important, but also to quantify the degree of fire damage to the tree canopy. Such data are important for assessing the conservation value, and to support planning and management of the burned area in the future. I have examined how to estimate the status of tree crowns after fire from interpretation of aerial photographs. This is possible because fire changes the structure of tree crowns and this influences the colours in aerial photographs by spectral reflection. Included in the study are four areas, three of which burned in 2005 and one in 2006.

This master thesis has three purposes. The first purpose is to give a theoretical background of how to divide up forest estates and to study how the legal system for these matters works. A literature study has been carried out to give the background and a theoretical model has been made for analysing the law cases. The first purpose also partly touched the decision process in dividing up forest estates from point of view of the law of land parcelling (FBL), point of view. The second purpose is to examine effects of a change of production requirements in 3 cap.7 § FBL as regards dividing up forest estates of private forest owners.

This report is a thesis work for a B.Sc. in Forestry at the School for Forest Engineers, SLU. The aim of the work was to compare two different pricelists with the actual output from a harvester. The results have also been compared with a volume estimate of standing trees done by the Swedish Forest Agency and the ?true? value registered by the Wood Measurement Association. The study confirms that the output calculated by the computer on the harvester is more reliable than the volume of standing trees estimated by Swedish Forest Agency. .

Due to the growing population in Stockholm, some of the urban green areas are beingsubjected to exploitation. Hammarbyskogen is an urban forest in the south of Stockholm andis an example of a green area that is planned to be transformed into an urban environment.This paper investigates key qualities and values of an urban forest of Hammarbyskogenvalued by local inhabitants of the neighbourhoods of Hammarbyhöjden and Björkhagen in thesouth of Stockholm. In addition to that, the study seeks to investigate people?s perception ofthe planned development of the forest as well as investigate how these perceptions andqualities are being incorporated into the process of neighbourhood development.Using text analysis, interviews and discussion forums, findings have been made showing thatthe local inhabitants value the urban forest mostly for its ecological and recreational qualities.Regarding perception of the change, people are either positive or negative to the developmentwhich can be explained by people?s experienced sense of place and place attachment of thearea and the forest itself. The study has also shown that the urban planners rely on localinhabitants? view, as well as on expert knowledge during the process of planning.The results of the study contributes to a better understanding of why and for what purposesurban forests are important for the city dwellers..