Does wood energy contribute to deforestation and to an intensive silviculture

Whereas wood energy is the first renewable energy source in France, and its role will probably significantly increase in the future, this article notices that to produce more wood energy will not necessarily generate more environmental impacts (silviculture modes are generally sustainable), that wood energy can even contribute to a better forest management, that this sector must be integrated into a global and multifunctional vision of forest management. It outlines that the French forest still provides large resources. It indicates the various sectors of use of wood (branches and trunk) and that energy is only one of them. It presents and comments some data which express the carbon print of the wood-energy sector, and finally notices that, despite support policies, wood-energy is still stagnating in France