Coordinated Resource Offering Protocol (CROP)

In 2006, the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management undertook a series of CROP pilot projects as a means of addressing the growing fuel load problem within major forest systems and the realized potential for fostering catastrophic wildfires within these systems across the United States. Focused on biomass removal (versus biomass inventory), the CROP model was initially developed in 2003 by Oregon-based Mater Engineering targeting unlevelized, uncoordinated, and erratic resource offerings from public forest lands at landscape scale.

The key tenets of CROP projects are to:

to facilitate coordination of biomass removal between public agencies;
facilitate the use of long-term multi-agency stewardship contracts to achieve biomass removal;
increase the certainty of "levelized" biomass supply offerings from public agencies;
invite investment back into a sustainable forest management landscape; and,
heighten public trust and support for biomass removal from public lands operating within a transparent process.

Map of the United States with CROP pilot project locations circled. From the CROP Project Summary.
CROP pilot project locations.

Since 2006, ten (10) CROP evaluations have been completed on over 30 million acres of public forestlands (see map), and several more are underway. The CROP evaluations were conducted in nine geographic regions where forest restoration and fuel load reduction efforts are a high priority. For each CROP, detailed resource offering maps (ROMs) are provided showing the following biomass removal data for every species to be removed during the next five-year period:

Volume (by mmbf; green/dry tons; ccf ) with conversions
Diameter sizes: less than 4-inches, 4- to 7-inches, 7- to 9-inches, 9- to 12-inches, and greater than 12-inches
Species (every species evaluated for resource flow)
Harvest "type": fuel load reduction, timber sales, pre-commercial thinning ( PCT), or post and pole
Location of resource offering
NEPA phase for each resource offering
Road accessibility for each resource offering

CROP Results

All regions have signed off on the CROP data and mapping where pilots occurred detailing proposed resource removal over the next 5 years. An overall summary of the CROP projects is found below, followed by specific links for each CROP region that provides you with: a) a PowerPoint summary of the CROP results for a given region; b) a summary of the ROMs for that region; and c) a full ROM report for that region.

Coordinated Resource Offering Protocol (CROP) Project Summary, October 2007 (PDF, 1.4 MB) - this summary report provides a condensed overview of the results of the ten (10) CROP pilot projects conducted across the US during 2006-2007.

South Carolina Regions

Investors should be cautious when reviewing the small diameter volume estimate offerings from the National Forests in South Carolina. They are very limited due to: 1. national forests are a small percentage of the land base and forested areas in South Carolina; and, 2. products grow very quickly out of the small diameter class, especially on the coast.