Assessment of the energetic potential by hazelnuts pruning in Viterbo’s area

In this work the amount of biomass available by the hazelnuts pruning in the province of Viterbo was investigated. At present, the pruning’s residues are destroyed by farmers directly in the field, at the end of the pruning; in this way a large quantity of biomass, represented by hazelnut’s prunings, is lost; the residues obtained from the hazelnut’s pruning, are an important source of biomass that could be used for thermal energy production. The aim of this work is to realize a map with the estimated energy potential from hazelnut pruning biomass, in the province of Viterbo. In the first phase the amount of biomass obtained from a hectare of hazelnut’s cultivationwas estimated:sampling were carried out in some municipalities of Viterbo while hazelnut pruning was taking place, from January to March.In the field, biomass was weighed and some pieces of wood were collected for laboratory analysis; in particular humidity of biomass, low calorific value, ashand the content of carbon (C), hydrogen (H) and nitrogen (N) were determined. In the calculation of the biomass were considered the age of the plants and the number of plants per hectare. The results show that the amount of biomass obtained from pruning of hazelnuts varies with the age of plants, but even more so by the number of plants per hectare. The average value of biomass obtained from pruning of a hectare of land is just under 0,9 t. Knowing the net calorific value of the hazelnut wood and the number of hectares cultivated for each municipality, a map of thermal potential energy has been realized.