In afforestation forests in some parts of Europe, logs left after cutting are now sometimes pulled from the ground to provide wood fuel to biomass power plants. The stump is the base of the trunk and attached woody roots. Tree stumps and roots are removed using a hydraulic head on a crawler excavator or using a mechanical head equipped with a special tool for tractors. Stump harvesting is expected to provide an increasing component of the woody material required by the woody biomass energy sector in Europe.

Stump harvesting is not suitable in many soils where removal results in long-term reduction in nutrition or unacceptable carbon loss in the soil. [1] Also, care should be taken to avoid archaeological sites, ecologically sensitive areas, steep slopes, and areas close to streams and rivers. In most cases, removing roots leads to further wood loss resulting in a loss of potential biodiversity due to wood.

Stump harvesting is not a new process. The records of tree stumps extracted for wood fuel from the ground date back hundreds of years in Europe. It was applied in the Swedish forests in the 1970s before its popularity declined, but is now being rethinked there as there is a greater need for firewood. In Britain, some forests are removed from stumps for disease control, particularly in southeastern England. In addition, they are mined where afforestation forest areas are converted to peat bogs for conservation purposes. Recently, small-scale commercial stump harvesting has begun in parts of Scotland to fuel biomass power plants. In Finland, logs were once used to produce tar and charcoal. In the 1970s, a series of trials were conducted in Finland to study the feasibility of stump harvesting for woody biomass, but only in recent years it has grown into a large-scale commercial enterprise.