forests

$10 Million Taxpayer Money to Convert Beetle-Killed Trees to Biofuel

- by Ashley Sanchez, November 6, 2013, Source: ABC Fox Montana

Wood – An Imperfect Biomass

- by Jack Dini, November 12, 2013, Source: Canada Free Press

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"101","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","style":"width: 444px; height: 400px; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px; float: left;"}}]]The largest, so-called renewable fuel used in Europe is not solar power or wind power, but wood. As The Economist reports, “In its various forms, from sticks to pellets to sawdust, wood (or to use its fashionable name, biomass) accounts for about half of Europe’s renewable energy consumption.

In some countries, such as Poland and Finland, wood meets more than 80% of renewable energy demand. Even in Germany, home of the energy transformation which has poured huge subsidies into wind and solar power, 38% of non-fossil fuel consumption comes from the stuff. After years in which European governments have boasted about their high-tech, low-carbon revolution, the main beneficiary seems to be the favored fuel of the pre-industrial societies. The EU wants to get 20% of its energy from renewable sources by 2020; it would miss this target by a country mile if it relied on solar and wind alone.” (1)

Forests Could Face Threat from Biomass Power "Gold Rush"

- by Jamie Doward, The Observer

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"143","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","height":"276","style":"width: 333px; height: 275px; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px; float: left;","title":"Photo: Alamy","width":"460"}}]]Britain's new generation of biomass power stations will have to source millions of tonnes of wood from thousands of miles away if they are to operate near to their full capacity, raising questions about the claims made for the sustainability of the new technology.

Ministers believe biomass technology could provide as much as 11% of the UK's energy by 2020, something that would help it meet its carbon commitments. The Environment Agency estimates that biomass-fired electricity generation, most of which involves burning wood pellets, can cut greenhouse gas emissions by up to 90% compared with coal-fired power stations. Eight biomass power stations, including one in a unit in the giant Drax power station, are operating in the UK and a further seven are in the pipeline. None operates near capacity.

Outsourcing Forests Costs Thousands of Jobs

- by Roy Keene

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"142","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","height":"265","style":"width: 333px; height: 250px; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px; float: left;","width":"400"}}]]Log and chip exports, constituting a third of Oregon’s annual timber harvest, are outsourcing over a billion board feet of wood and thousands of domestic manufacturing jobs. Yet Barnum fails to even mention exports, let alone account for the losses. As director of the Oregon Forest Resources Institute (OFRI), he also fails to disclose his employer’s mission and funding source.

OFRI’s legislated mission is to “Enhance and provide support for Oregon’s forest products industry.” Funded with forest harvest taxes, OFRI benefits from increased logging regardless of whether the logs are processed domestically. Does Barnum’s analysis omit log exports to “enhance” and “support” the region’s largest corporate forest owners?

Typhoons, Climate Negotiations and a Reality Check

- by Rachel Smolker, Biofuelwatch

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"141","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","height":"360","style":"width: 300px; height: 338px; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px; float: left;","title":"Photo: salon.com","width":"480"}}]]The latest round of climate negotiations are opening just as we are hearing the stories and viewing images on the news coverage of the devastation wrought on the Philippines by Typhoon Haiyan (aka Yolanda).  Coincidentally, the last round of climate negotiations, COP 18 in Doha were similarly punctuated by a devastating typhoon, Bhopa (aka Pablo) that also struck the Philippines.  

Climate scientists long warned we would experience more and more extreme weather events. Well, here it is, just as predicted. In the Philippines, thousands of lives have been lost. Bodies are floating in the streets -- mothers, fathers, babies, children. Not just meaningless statistics from some far away unreal place, but real people: loved ones and friends whose lives have been smashed and obliterated, while the world around them -- trees, land, coastlines, and the creatures that inhabit that part of the world -- have been flattened, blown away and drowned.  

False Solutions for Forests: Biomass Energy, Sustainable Timber, and Carbon Markets

- by Jeff Conant, Friends of the Earth

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"140","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","height":"200","style":"width: 300px; height: 200px; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px; float: left;","width":"300"}}]]In the landscape of global deforestation, a tension exists between policies and practices aimed at drawing a sharp halt to the exploitation of forests and forest peoples and those designed to stimulate a vaguely promised market shift toward more ‘sustainable’ extraction of an ever-dwindling resource. During the last two weeks, several significant reports have been released that highlight a few of the overarching approaches that we at Friends of the Earth see as ‘false solutions’ to the deforestation problem.

Friends of the Earth Australia released a report this week documenting the failures of “sustainable” timber policy across Asia. The report, called "From Policy to Reality," makes the case that the deforestation of Southeast Asian rainforests and logging-related human rights violations are driven by global over-consumption of tropical timber products and enabled by inadequate laws and purchasing policies.

Yosemite’s Burned Areas Are Alive

- by Chad Hanson, October 3, 2013. Source: Los Angeles Times

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"137","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","style":"width: 333px; height: 266px; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px; float: left;","title":"Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images"}}]]It was entirely predictable. Even before the ashes have cooled on the 257,000-acre Rim fire in and around Yosemite this year, the timber industry and its allies in Congress were using the fire as an excuse for suspending environmental laws and expanding logging operations on federal land.

"The Yosemite Rim fire is a tragedy that has destroyed 400 square miles of our forests," said Rep. Tom McClintock (R-Elk Grove) in announcing a bill he introduced late last month that would expedite massive taxpayer-subsidized clear-cutting on federal public lands in the fire area. "If any good can come of this tragedy, it would be the timely salvage of fire-killed timber that could provide employment to local mills and desperately needed economic activity to mountain communities."

Environmental group kicked off UF campus

- by Jeff Schweers, October 28, 2013. Source: Gainesville Sun

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"135","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","style":"width: 335px; height: 287px; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px; float: left;"}}]]An environmental group that was scheduled to make a presentation on Monday at the University of Florida on genetically engineered trees was kicked off campus over the weekend and its members threatened with arrest and banned for three years.

Organizers with the Global Justice Ecology Project had come to campus Saturday to check out the room they had booked at the McKnight Brain Institute, said Rachel Kijewski, an organizer with Everglades Earth First of Lake Worth and one of several scheduled presenters.

“We just tried to see the room, and within five minutes we had police officers approaching us, saying we were trying to get into a secure facility,” Kijewski said. “We were issued trespass warnings, and all of us presenters were issued three-year bans.”

Anti-Biomass Incineration Campaign - National Conference Call 

Thursday, October 3, 2013 at 6pm EST

TOPIC: "Debunking Wildfire Myths"

RECORDING:

Debunking Wildfire Myths - October 2013

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"111","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","height":"338","style":"color: rgb(73, 73, 73); font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 20px; text-align: center; width: 333px; height: 250px; float: left; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px;","title":"Photo: Doug Bevington","width":"450"}}]]We discuss how we can improve our advocacy about wildfire and forest practices and how those topics are inseparable from biomass incineration. 

What's changing with our Western U.S. forest ecosystems, public budgets, and wood markets? Why does a "one size fits all" type approach fail? How do we reframe the debate to focus on protecting homes, water sources, and soils? Why is it important to look at the whole forest, private and public?

Guest Speaker

Roy Keene, Public Interest Forester and Director of Our Forests

Genetically Engineered “Factory Trees”: Sustainable Way Forward or Dangerous Diversion?

-by Center for Food Safety

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"132","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","style":"width: 288px; height: 291px; float: left; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px;"}}]]Center for Food Safety (CFS) is pleased to offer a new report, Genetically Engineered Trees: The New Frontier of Biotechnology, which explores potential ecological and socioeconomic hazards of genetically engineered (GE) trees.

As you may know, the U.S. Department of Agriculture is considering whether to allow unrestricted planting of the first GE forest tree:  eucalyptus engineered by ArborGen to grow in colder climates.  If approved, this would allow eucalyptus to be grown throughout the Southeast for the first time, where short-rotation plantations would be established to provide pulp for paper and biomass for energy.

A variety of other GE trees are in the research pipeline, suggesting that “factory forests” are on the horizon.