Some 29 partners involved in the forestry industry are working together in an E.U.-funded project to design a system to limit carbon footprints of forestry products with the help of RFID.

The system they are developing to track raw wood materials will help consumers know the actual carbon footprint of the products they buy.

As part of the so-called Indisputable Key project, partners will attach RFID tags to logs and trace those logs as they move from forests to saw mills and are made into individual wood items. Usually, if carbon emissions are attributed to a certain product, an average value is assigned to the product. With this system under development, consumers can learn the actual carbon emissions since individual logs are tracked with RFID.

The system will also cut down on wasted raw materials, organizers say.