If you take a walk in the woods with a naturalist, she will probably explain the role of nurse logs, fungi, and forest duff in maintaining a healthy ecosystem.
If you read about the woods in a green report, you will discover that all that material is mere "waste" and we must grab it and burn it. In order to save the planet.
Yes. Lies with a purpose. The purpose is to make it possible to claim "renewables" are doing great in Europe. Dorfman and other shills can proclaim they are winning, and keep conning the public into paying for more windmills and solar. The don't disclose that biomass is what is doing it.
This excellent piece gets right to the point - and begs the question: why are the "greens" doing this? It's anything but virtuous. They're practicing damn near everything they pretend to be "against." 🤔 If only there was a word for that....
And don't even get us started on gas booze (corn ethanol). Aside from the impacts on soil carbon/productivity, aquifer depletion, nitrogen loading of waterways, putting corn in gas tanks instead of humans or animals to feed humans, reduced BTU value, etc. it's hammered the Conservation Reserve Program (CPR).
Something on the order of 5-10 MILLION acres of former fallow land left as shelterbelts, wildlife habitat, groundwater recharge, nutrient load reduction to waterways, etc. under conservation leases to farmers has been lost to gas booze. Deer, upland birds and waterfowl, fish, aquifer recharge/water quality, etc. If these impacts were caused by oil/gas operations there would be green outrage. That they result from something portrayed as "green"......well.... to Meredith's excellent point below......
One member of our team lives in a state where Enviva and others are making wood pellets for export to Drax. Sickening.
A nitpick: some forest types *naturally* burn off their carbon. Where I live, the pine straw does not rot. It would just pile up if the city didn't take it away. Back in the day, the Native Americans intentionally set the pine straw on fire in order to allow understory plants to grow and feed the game.
If the Native Americans didn't do it, nature would have burned the piled up carbon from time to time via lightning strikes.
Shipping off wood to Europe from such forests depletes the soil of the minerals that would have been in the ash. It could be a factor driving up the price of lumber and paper as well.
P.S. If you don't thin a young pine forest, the trees grow very slowly. Harvesting part of the young growth to make paper or pellets speeds up the growth of the remaining trees substantially.
Wonderful article and something that isn't discussed very often (I'm in the UK so are 'fortunate' to have Drax which uses a lot your American ancient woodland🤦♂️) Unfortunately our Virtue Seeking Masters aren't interested in logic. I'm resigned to another 10yrs of this torture and am hoping at that point someone will bring some sense to energy policy. Right now here in the UK we are starting to experience electricity 'demand management' whilst paying more than ever before for energy. This, when we have been promised cheap reliable renewable energy for yrs. Nuclear, shale, traditional gas and even coal are the future. Expecting battery development to come along whilst carrying out a live experiment on our grid is like driving on the motorway at 70mph hoping someone will invent brakes before you need to stop.
Not disagreeing that extensive use of trees for fuel is a bad idea, but my understanding is it's misleading to suggest that trees left alone contribute substantially to soil carbon when they die. In many (most) instances biologic decay converts most of the carbon into CO2. A much smaller fraction is retained in soil. It depends of course on the microenvironment. Bogs will do much better. Also, the one upside of biomass is that it helps keep more coal in the ground - potentially permanently sequestered. Photosynthesis can recycle biomass CO2 back into biomass. It seems there is a limited role for biomass. As usual the devil is in the details. This is not to argue against the central point that burning wood for energy is no where near as green as many believe and, with some exceptions, is a poor choice.
If you take a walk in the woods with a naturalist, she will probably explain the role of nurse logs, fungi, and forest duff in maintaining a healthy ecosystem.
If you read about the woods in a green report, you will discover that all that material is mere "waste" and we must grab it and burn it. In order to save the planet.
Great post. Attaboy, BF.
Yes. Lies with a purpose. The purpose is to make it possible to claim "renewables" are doing great in Europe. Dorfman and other shills can proclaim they are winning, and keep conning the public into paying for more windmills and solar. The don't disclose that biomass is what is doing it.
This excellent piece gets right to the point - and begs the question: why are the "greens" doing this? It's anything but virtuous. They're practicing damn near everything they pretend to be "against." 🤔 If only there was a word for that....
Typos:
"From the point of vie..." => "From the point of view..."
"The sooner we figure that out, the more pain and suffering we will cause..."
=> "The sooner we figure that out, the more pain and suffering we will AVOID..."
Super piece, BF.
And don't even get us started on gas booze (corn ethanol). Aside from the impacts on soil carbon/productivity, aquifer depletion, nitrogen loading of waterways, putting corn in gas tanks instead of humans or animals to feed humans, reduced BTU value, etc. it's hammered the Conservation Reserve Program (CPR).
Something on the order of 5-10 MILLION acres of former fallow land left as shelterbelts, wildlife habitat, groundwater recharge, nutrient load reduction to waterways, etc. under conservation leases to farmers has been lost to gas booze. Deer, upland birds and waterfowl, fish, aquifer recharge/water quality, etc. If these impacts were caused by oil/gas operations there would be green outrage. That they result from something portrayed as "green"......well.... to Meredith's excellent point below......
One member of our team lives in a state where Enviva and others are making wood pellets for export to Drax. Sickening.
A nitpick: some forest types *naturally* burn off their carbon. Where I live, the pine straw does not rot. It would just pile up if the city didn't take it away. Back in the day, the Native Americans intentionally set the pine straw on fire in order to allow understory plants to grow and feed the game.
If the Native Americans didn't do it, nature would have burned the piled up carbon from time to time via lightning strikes.
Shipping off wood to Europe from such forests depletes the soil of the minerals that would have been in the ash. It could be a factor driving up the price of lumber and paper as well.
P.S. If you don't thin a young pine forest, the trees grow very slowly. Harvesting part of the young growth to make paper or pellets speeds up the growth of the remaining trees substantially.
Wonderful article and something that isn't discussed very often (I'm in the UK so are 'fortunate' to have Drax which uses a lot your American ancient woodland🤦♂️) Unfortunately our Virtue Seeking Masters aren't interested in logic. I'm resigned to another 10yrs of this torture and am hoping at that point someone will bring some sense to energy policy. Right now here in the UK we are starting to experience electricity 'demand management' whilst paying more than ever before for energy. This, when we have been promised cheap reliable renewable energy for yrs. Nuclear, shale, traditional gas and even coal are the future. Expecting battery development to come along whilst carrying out a live experiment on our grid is like driving on the motorway at 70mph hoping someone will invent brakes before you need to stop.
Not disagreeing that extensive use of trees for fuel is a bad idea, but my understanding is it's misleading to suggest that trees left alone contribute substantially to soil carbon when they die. In many (most) instances biologic decay converts most of the carbon into CO2. A much smaller fraction is retained in soil. It depends of course on the microenvironment. Bogs will do much better. Also, the one upside of biomass is that it helps keep more coal in the ground - potentially permanently sequestered. Photosynthesis can recycle biomass CO2 back into biomass. It seems there is a limited role for biomass. As usual the devil is in the details. This is not to argue against the central point that burning wood for energy is no where near as green as many believe and, with some exceptions, is a poor choice.
Cults gonna cult