Western Australia (WA) is a the largest of the Australian States and has a 20-million-hectare wheatbelt. Most of the grain is exported including a million tonnes of canola to Europe for biofuel. However, it is the recent promotion of lignocellulosic biomass to produce second generation biofuels that is creating significant attention. A principal source of this biomass is to come from endemic dryland mallee eucalyptus species. The 'mallee' once covered much of the wheatbelt and proved to be a challenge when clearing land due to its deep-rooted structure and large below ground root mass. It is, however, this particular organic structure that provides a very helpful characteristic that enables multiple harvesting or more accurately-coppicing. This characteristic was demonstrated over many years by farmers growing the trees for eucalyptus oil and is being exploited today by long term and new operators.
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