climate

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.

European Biofuels Vote Delivers 'Desperately Weak Compromise'

- by Karl Mathiesen, September 11, 2013. Source: The Guardian

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"119","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","style":"width: 244px; height: 190px; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px; float: left;"}}]]The European parliament has delivered a "desperately weak compromise" on the future of biofuels in Europe that industry says will "curtail jobs and investment".

In a tight vote on the use of biofuels in transport fuel, the parliament approved a 6% cap on the contribution of biofuels to Europe's renewable transport energy target of 10% by 2020.

The policy of replacing petrol and diesel for cars and other vehicles stems from efforts to reduce carbon emissions from Europe's transport sector. But critics argue that while biofuels can look green, they come with unintended consequences. Growing biofuel crops displaces food crops, pushing up food prices, and some biofuels can actually lead to higher carbon emissions than fossil fuels when changes in land use are fully accounted for.

Biofuels Project Pushing Thousands of People into Hunger in Africa

- September 4, 2013. Source: ActionAid

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"118","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","style":"width: 231px; height: 218px; float: left; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px;"}}]]A biofuels project praised by the European Commission as environmentally and socially responsible is pushing thousands of people into poverty in one of the poorest countries in the world, a new ActionAid report said today.

The report comes as MEPs prepare to take a critical vote on EU biofuel policies next week.

When Addax Bioenergy shortly begins exporting ethanol from a sugar cane plantation in Sierra Leone to the EU to be used in petrol, it will be the first biofuels to be exported from Africa to Europe in commercial quantities.

The EU claims that it does not import biofuels crops from Africa’s poorest countries because of the potential impact that its biofuel policies have on decreasing the amount of land that can be used to grow food and therefore increasing hunger.

Florida Forest Service Report on Forest Sustainability Challenged

- by Bruce Ritchie, September 6, 2013. Source: The Florida Current

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"117","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","style":"width: 333px; height: 240px; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px; float: left;","title":"Photo: Bruce Ritchie"}}]]A Florida Forest Service report required by 2012 legislation found that the state's forests overall are sustainable but there are some counties where some types of trees are being harvested faster than they are being grown.

The report was required by HB 7117, a comprehensive energy bill, amid concerns that proposed new biomass energy plants could increase costs for existing sawmills, pulp mills and others in the forest product industry.

“The study indicates that most counties in Florida have highly sustainable forests that meet or exceed the demands of our forest products industry," Agriculture Commissioner Adam H. Putnam said in a press release issued this week.

Dirty Air for Power We Don't Need

- by Dick Stokes, September 19, 2013. Source: Gainesville-Sun

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"60","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","style":"width: 222px; height: 222px; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px; float: left;"}}]]The “big lie” method involves making a claim so preposterous people assume it must be true.

Gainesville Regional Utilities made the preposterous claim that the air will be cleaner after the biomass incinerator (the Gainesville Renewable Energy Center) starts burning tons of wood daily, or more than 1 million tons annually. According to GRU, much of that wood is currently burned in the open with no pollution controls.

Just don't ask GRU for the hard evidence. State records show only a fraction of the amount claimed is actually burned in the open annually. Good foresters know wood “waste” replenishes the soil for future trees, so they haven't been burning it all away.

Biomass Energy Never Carbon Neutral

-by Karen Orr, Energy Justice Network

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"83","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","height":"282","style":"width: 333px; height: 235px; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px; float: left;","width":"400"}}]]Biomass energy is not carbon neutral and never will be.

For years scientific studies have shown that biomass energy isn't carbon neutral in any useful time frame. A 2012 study from Norway demonstrates that logging forests for bio-energy leads to a permanent increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide. Expansion of industrial scale biomass energy will exacerbate climate change.

Fueling biomass operations adds carbon to the atmosphere at the smokestack. Increased biomass removals escalates stress to forests and soils and reduces long term growth rates, thus also adding to atmospheric carbon levels by absorbing less.

Biomass Industry Fans Flames of Wildfire Hysteria 

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"115","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","height":"270","style":"width: 388px; height: 260px; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px; float: left;","width":"480"}}]]California’s Rim fire, expected to be fully “contained” by October after igniting in Yosemite National Park on August 17, will ultimately benefit the forests it has passed through. While media accounts sensationalize such large wildfires as “catastrophic” and “disastrous,” science demonstrates that, to the contrary, fire is a vital component of western forest ecosystems.

Journalists mischaracterize the ecological function of wildfire as “devastation” or refer to forests that have experienced fire as a “barren wasteland,” exploiting emotions to sell newspapers. Yet media is only an accomplice to one of the masterminds ultimately responsible for fanning the flames of wildfire hysteria: the biomass energy industry.

How Europe can Help Obama Achieve U.S. Climate Targets

- by Glenn Hurowitz, June 28, 2013. Source: Grist

As the global leader of climate action, European governments want to know how President Obama’s major climate speech affects Europe – and particularly whether the actions he outlined can allow the United States to reach its commitment to reduce emissions by 17 percent from 2005 levels (or even exceed that level).

The big picture: Obama’s speech amounted to the first time that President Obama had given voice to the environmental movement’s core narrative at length. Suddenly, he wasn’t just talking about energy security and the economy and “all of the above” – he was talking about protecting the future of life on the planet against very real threat of climate change.  Watching the speech, I felt like I’d just woken up from 12 years of Bush-Cheney, and yesterday was the first day of the Obama administration.

Australia to Reverse Ban on Native Forest Incineration

- by Jenny Weber, Huon Valley Environment Centre  

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"105","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","height":"480","style":"width: 300px; height: 400px; float: left; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px;","title":"Photo: NSW Wires","width":"360"}}]]Australia’s New South Wales (NSW) state government has announced plans to allow native forests to be logged and burnt for electricity generation. Removing a ban on burning native forest wood for electricity would give a green light for the construction of electricity plants powered by native forests, proposals that attempt to prop up the collapsing export wood chipping market. 

The NSW Government has opened a submission period through the Environment Protection Authority for comment on this plan to amend the regulation that currently prohibits use of native forests for bio-energy. The Protection of the Environment Operations (General) Regulation 2009 currently prohibits the use of “native forest bio-materials” to generate electricity. 

The O’Farrell government is proposing to amend this regulation to enable the following vegetation on public or private land to be burnt for electricity generation: areas approved for logging for pulp products; vegetation that has been approved for clearing; offcuts and ‘waste’ from the timber industry. 

This amendment would increase logging and devastate NSW’s remaining native forests. Far-reaching damaging impacts on native wildlife survival, the health of communities and the state’s carbon emissions are likely consequences of the logging industry based in burning native forests for bio-energy.