Dunns Road

Dunns Road is a plantation forestry project located near the rural locality of Bessiebelle, approximately 35km northeast of Portland in the Moyne Shire of Southwest Victoria. Registered in May 2023, the project covers approximately 119 hectares in a region widely recognized as part of the "Green Triangle", one of Australia's premier timber production hubs. The area is characterized by a high-rainfall climate, with annual precipitation often exceeding 650mm, and features fertile soils derived from volcanic basalt plains and sedimentary rises, making it ideal for both intensive grazing and commercial forestry.

The project operates under the Carbon Credits (Carbon Farming Initiative, Plantation Forestry) Methodology Determination 2022. Specifically, it involves the conversion of an existing short-rotation plantation forest, typically grown for woodchips and harvested every 10 to 15 years, into a long-rotation plantation managed for sawlogs or structural timber. By extending the growth period of the trees (often to 25–30 years or more) and managing them for higher-value wood products, the project sequesters additional carbon in the forest biomass and ensures carbon remains stored in long-lived wood products after harvest.

This initiative is managed by Australian Carbon Products Pty Ltd, a proponent that emphasizes farmer-led innovation and the integration of carbon farming with traditional agriculture. The transition to long-rotation forestry not only generates Australian Carbon Credit Units (ACCUs) by increasing the average carbon stock on the land but also diversifies the local timber supply, moving away from purely pulp-based commodities toward structural timber resources.