In Finland, the increasing the share of energy based on wood is attracting growing attention. In 1995, the Finnish government decided to promote the use of bioenergy by at least 25% by the year 2005. The objectives set for this paper were to determine the potential harvest for wood fuel from logging residues and first thinnings (i.e. energy wood) in Southern Finland for the next 40 years on the basis of four cutting scenarios. The effect on the removals of the production cost of wood-fuels (referred to in Finnish as 'energy wood') was also studied. The calculations were carried out using the MELA program which simulates a finite number of feasible forest management schedules for each forest stand according to given simulation instructions. Energy-wood and industrial-roundwood cutting scenarios were simulated and optimized by using a specific version of the aforementioned forest management planning program, namely Energy-MELA, which enables simultaneous analyses of industrial-roundwood and energy-wood allowable cuts. The annual potential harvest of energy wood at the production cost level of FIM 12.5 GJ(-1) (FIM 45 MWh(-1)) in Southern Finland was 3.6 million m(3) a(-1). At FIM 15.3 GJ(-1) (FIM 55 MWh(-1)), the cut increased to 8.8 million m(3) a(-1).