Projects

Our vision is to establish and strategise a national Research Forests Network to provide a strategic series of experiments and demonstration sites that will inform industry practice towards climate-smart forestry.

LERN aims to enhance understanding of nature recovery by establishing a national network of experimental woodland creation sites to provide robust evidence supporting policy and practice.

This project aims to identify future temperate rainforest zones and understand species colonisation through modelling and field data collection, to support the expansion and resilience of TRFs in the UK under climate change.

This project will use remote sensing to map structural diversity across English woodlands, complement locally derived woodland condition assessments, and test the impacts of forest management on structural diversity and carbon sequestration. We will also engage with private woodland owners through a Forest Lab project called ‘Living Layers’.

This project aims to improve the inter-annual monitoring of tree growth across England by developing the foundations for a cost-effective, robust and representative national network.

The NCEA TOW map will be used to characterise the setting, distribution and density of TOW features across England and explore the implications of regional variations for key habitats, biodiversity and carbon sequestration.

To finalise and deliver Version 1 of the Woodland Water Code, providing a standardised methodology for the quantification and verification of water quality, flood alleviation and water shading benefits from woodland creation by March 2026.

PEATFLUX+ will provide essential GHG balance quantification for forest-to-bog conversion, allowing the 2nd year of GHG flux measurements for model calibration, LCA analysis, and adding important new evidence on hydrology and soil biodiversity.

This extension to Expanding Agroforestry addresses priority policy evidence needs and delivers tools to support the strategic expansion of UK agroforestry and hedgerows to meet biodiversity and net zero targets, through stakeholder and policy co-design.

This project aims to make better use of existing data on timber and related topics to improve the evidence base on current use and future availability of timber.

This stakeholder co-designed project will explore the ecological and societal significance of Ancient and Long-established Woodland, supporting policy development to protect irreplaceable habitat and aiding acceptance of any adjustment to definitions.

This project will develop a multi-criteria assessment framework to evaluate the benefits, constraints and risks of productive tree species, and collaborate with stakeholders to prioritise species for national deployment to drive diversification and increase resilience.

Project exploring alternatives to conventional plastic tree shelters: their practicality, durability and efficacy.