BIOMASS TO BURN: Efforts to restrain greenhouse gas emissions in Europe have led to booming demand for Georgia's trees as fuel.
Image: TheSussman / Wikimedia Commons
WAYCROSS, Ga.—Pawn shops, diners, churches and pine trees. Hundreds of thousands of pine trees.
This is the view from U.S. Route 85, which runs from the coast across the Southern ridge of Georgia. In recent years, though, something else has sprouted up: billboards advertising upcoming wood pellet plants. They carry the promise of steady jobs in a recession-racked economy.
In 2008, then-Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue called this region the "bioenergy corridor of the nation." To date, 13 wood pellet plants have opened throughout the southeastern United States. Twelve more are in the planning stage.
While the local pulp and paper industry has been on the wane for years, the demand for wood pellets has recently shot up. These are the result of a process that turns wood chips into pencil-sized cylinders that are chopped up into roughly inch-long pieces.
The resulting product is lighter, drier, more compact and easier to transport than chips or sawdust -- a better option for shipping to Europe, where the demand for them has been created by the European Union's renewable energy mandates. It stems from a 2003 law setting up the E.U. Emissions Trading System and a 2009 renewable energy directive that called for E.U. member states to collectively generate 20 percent of energy from clean energy sources by 2020.
For power plants that burn coal, the quickest way to lower emissions, meet renewable energy goals and get emissions trading benefits is to burn a rising percentage of wood pellets along with the coal. As a result, demand for wood energy in Europe is set to soar by 44 percent in the next decade, according to forests research group RISI.
Waycross, one of the gateways to the Okefenokee swamp, became the home of Georgia Biomass LLC in May. It is the largest wood pellet factory in North America and, arguably, the world. Owned by European utility RWE Energy, the company is ramping up to export up to 750,000 metric tons of wood pellets per year to generate electricity in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands.
Boom times in an American 'wood basket'
"We looked at many sites," said Sam Kang, chief financial officer and chief operating officer of Georgia Biomass, from the company's headquarters in Savannah, Ga. The location in Waycross won out with "a combination of wanting to be in a very good wood basket, with good logistical connections, at the lowest cost possible."
Kang's wood-paneled office overlooks the Port of Savannah, where approximately 5,700 tons of pellets arrive by rail from Waycross every three days. They are stored in two giant domes, are loaded on barges and cross the Atlantic to a biomass-burning plant in Tilbury, England, and a coal-biomass co-firing plant in the Netherlands. About half of the cross-Atlantic pellet trade goes to the Dutch, whose renewable energy goal for 2020 is 14.5 percent.
The European stamp is apparent at Georgia Biomass's plant in Waycross, the red, yellow and black German flag waving alongside the stars and stripes and Georgia's state flag. Kang estimates his export market to lie between $150 million and $200 million annually.
But the European Union -- the entity responsible for helping the success of pellets to date -- is becoming increasingly wary of biomass's green claims. Last month, the European Environment Agency's Scientific Committee, which advises the European Commission, issued a stern opinion on the current assumption that biomass is a zero-emission energy source: It's simply not true.
In the EEA analysis, the competition for land that biomass creates, as well as the lost opportunity of maintaining trees that absorb carbon dioxide, creates an even larger footprint. The EEA seeks to correct an "accounting error" that has, according to the agency, given carte blanche to polluters.
"The opinion was motivated by concerns over correct [greenhouse gas] accounting in current E.U. and international biomass energy policies," said Helmut Haberl, a member of the EEA and one of the authors of the opinion. "Of course we hope that [the European Union] will adopt correct and comprehensive [greenhouse gas] accounting rules."
Green groups worry about 'carbon debt'
Joule for joule, both burning wood and burning coal for energy expel similar levels of carbon dioxide. Woody biomass's low-carbon credentials lie in carbon sequestration. The emissions released in the atmosphere are, over the course of several years, reabsorbed by the world's forests through photosynthesis. In theory, at least, this natural recycling system is much cleaner than burning coal, a fossil fuel that releases CO2 that has been stored in the ground for millions of years.
The lingering debate over burning pellets centers around what is known as the carbon debt -- the delayed sequestration of carbon emissions, thanks to the continuous planting of new trees. Taken into account, the carbon debt allows for biomass to be an efficient source of renewable energy. Once the debt is repaid, emissions reductions could reach up to 91 percent compared to coal, according to a University of Toronto study.
The rate of reabsorption varies according to what is burned, what is grown and the accounting in between. A recent study from the University of Ontario found that in the long term, electricity generation from pellets reduces overall emissions relative to coal. But the recoup of carbon losses was delayed by 16 to 38 years, depending on whether the source of biomass was whole trees, sawmill leftovers or other wood residues.
The EEA's concerns are not new. The burning of biomass for energy has stoked the fires of environmentalists on both sides of the Atlantic for years.
"Over the life cycle, if you leave off smokestack emissions, the equivalent is even worse than coal," asserted Janet Pritchard, director of the Climate and Forests program for ClientEarth, one of several European organizations that have long fought for the European Commission to reconsider the allowance it gives biomass.
The Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC), an environmental advocacy group for the region, has also voiced its concerns. While not "anti-biomass," the group is keeping a close eye on the boom.
"If it expands too much, there's going to be tons of carbon implications," said David Carr, national forest project leader for SELC. Like ClientEarth is doing in Europe, SELC is looking to set standards for low-carbon biomass in nearby North Carolina -- the only state in the region with a renewable energy mandate.
Catching up with Canada and Scandinavia
To Kang of Georgia Biomass, the EEA opinion is a concern, but one that can be refuted.
"We're not cutting down tropical rainforest; it's a crop," he said. "We monitor all those things, and we have to counterbalance them with our own arguments."
Last year, more than 11 million metric tons of wood pellets was consumed in Europe, a 7 percent rise from the previous year. In the past decade, Canada has been the leader in wood pellet production, with the first U.S. pellet plants only joining in around 2008.
But since then, the Southeast has been catching up, fast.
Canada's 33 pellet plants are expected to export 2 million metric tons of pellets this year, according to a report by the U.N. Economic Council for Europe. By the end of the year, the Southeast will be pushing out pellets at a rate of 2.9 million metric tons per year. That production is likely to increase to 4.6 million -- a nearly 60 percent jump -- in the next two years, according to Forisk Forest Consulting. Georgia Biomass alone will produce half of Canada's pellet output from last year.
Biomass is one of the most attractive forms of renewable power on the continent. The infrastructure is far less expensive than for solar panels or wind turbines, there is no dependence on weather conditions, and plant retrofits from coal to pellets are relatively simple.
While Scandinavia has supported much of Europe's wood market to date, recent reports indicate that continent's own forests will soon be unable to keep up. According to a European Commission report, wood resources in Europe could peak by as early as 2015.
Georgia's forests, on the contrary, have more than enough to go around, says the biomass industry. For every cubic foot of wood harvested, there is 28 cubic feet of wood in live trees, according to studies by the state's Forestry Commission. The annual regrowth adds another 1.9 million cubic feet.
"At the end of the day, the supply outstrips the demand, clearly," Kang said. On the drive from Savannah to Waycross, "you see rows clearly growing as crops. It is part of the Georgia economy."
Darren Wolfgang, a forest ecologist with Georgia ForestWatch, is skeptical. The industry has grown at such a speed in less than four years that sustainability might lose out to business interests. "We're worried it's going to create a beast that won't be able to be fed," he said.
Obeying an expanding set of rules
The EEA sets out two rules for biomass to fit the clean energy mold. It must be sourced from "additional carbon" -- leftover sawdust, agricultural waste, manure, wastewater or other residues that would simply decompose if not used for energy.
Or it must be grown so that the land and plants take up more carbon dioxide than in a scenario where the land is devoid of a biomass culture. If a farmer grows switch grass on degraded land, where no other conventional crop can be grown, it would satisfy the definition of additional carbon.
Many of the proposed pellet plants have said they will rely on paper mill waste, timber leftovers and other residual matter. But for Georgia Biomass and Biomass Energy -- a Bumpass, Va. operation that expects to export nearly 350,000 pellets to Europe in the next three years -- that source is regarded as being too iffy.
"You're fairly exposed if you depend on a residual market," said Jacob Blondin, general manager for Biomass Energy. "You're hoping that other people can perform in their business practices." Contamination from a foreign feedstock is also an issue, as are the potentially long distances -- and carbon footprint -- needed to reach the residual wood.
The only way to guarantee a contract with plants, added Blondin, was to use whole logs. Although there may be a surplus of trees in Georgia, ensuring a sustainable, easily renewable source may not be enough under growing scrutiny.
"It may, of course, still be a renewable source of energy," said the EEA's Haberl. "So renewable must not be equated with CO2-free."
In the fiber basket of Georgia, alternatives are puzzling. In a region where more than 90 percent of forests are privately owned, not harvesting the Southeast's forests is not an option many will consider.
"It probably isn't [carbon-neutral]," said Robert Jackson, faculty director at Duke University's Center on Global Change. "But in my view, it's better than coal."
Concerns about clear-cutting
Nevertheless, the risk of clear-cutting is real if pellet prices continue to rise, said Jackson. While several certification schemes exist, private forest owners are not required to adhere to sustainability rules.
"What we don't want is for our forests to be clear-cut for wood pellets," said Jackson, who is also a landowner in the Southeast. "Unless there are safeguards in Europe, there nothing to prevent me or my neighbors from cutting down our own land."
By the end of the year, the European Commission is required to report on sustainability requirements for solid and gas biomass, with a possible decision to revise the reporting criteria under the Emissions Trading System.
Just what the commission will propose is unknown, but Cezary Lewanowicz, a spokesman for the commission, suggested that the wood pellet business won't stop anytime soon. "Under the Renewable Energy Directive, biomass is a renewable energy source," he said. "This will stay unchanged."
Jeroen Brouwers is a spokesman for Essent, another subsidiary of RWE that burns Waycross pellets in a 35 percent mix with coal in a 1250-megawatt plant in Netherlands. Essent hopes to boost its mix to 50 percent pellets and plans to open a bigger co-firing plant in 2013.
International discussions around the issue are important, he noted, and "you cannot bank on one kind of sustainable biomass." But he is confident that his pellets will continue to meet sustainability requirements.
"It doesn't conflict with the food chain; there was already existing forestry; they already provided land for planting new trees," he added. "When you use a fuel, you have to be sure that it's sustainably produced."
The future of the business seems robust. Just weeks after the EEA opinion, the Dutch oil and gas exchange APX-ENDEX announced it would launch a pellet-trading market. The futures price for pellets hovers just under €130 per metric ton. Today, the spot price for a ton of pellets lies between €270 and €290 per metric ton.
On the streets of Waycross, there isn't much concern about the carbon debt. What the pellet jobs are doing is paying off financial debts. From the beat cop in nearby Hoboken, Ga., to the train conductor in Okefenokee Swamp Park, people are excited about the pellet industry.
"It gave us jobs; people are buying the timber," said conductor Bill Smith. "It's a good thing for the economy and surrounding communities."
Reprinted from Climatewire with permission from Environment & Energy Publishing, LLC. www.eenews.net, 202-628-6500
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19 Comments
Add CommentMy god this is evil. I hope everyone realizes that wood is only renewable if it is replanted, grown back to it's original size and uses waste like sewage as a fertilizer. This is 100 doable, but its also completely ineffective. You'll have to grow the pines a minimum of 50 to 100 years to reach the original size. Besides, what is really occuring here is that they are using this promise of "renewables" to chop down real forests that are never replanted; at best, they are turned into farm land (which sucks, half our country is farm land [exagerating, but not that far off]), at worst its abadoned and becomes desertified. Also of note:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thismax energy density of wood = 9,600 Btu/lb
production per acre at best = 1500 lb/year
BTU per year from an acre of wood= 14.4 million BTU/year
1Kwh = 3,412 btu, this implies that
one acre of forest will produce: 4.2MW/h per year
In contrast a square acre of 40% efficient solar cells will produced 4MW instantanious, which is 4MWh per hour, or 96MWh per day, or 35,000 MWh per year.
35,000 MWh per year vs 4.2MWh per year + additional added riskes for cancer, smog, and pollutants... hmmm very tough choice.... BURN BABY BURN... LETS WASTE WHAT WE HAVE WHILE WE STILL HAVE IT!
Correction, forgot to remove 60% due to 40% efficiency:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this14,000 MWh per year vs 4.2MWh per year + additional added riskes for cancer, smog, and pollutants
Boy thats reall a tough choice still, even with bottoom of the barrel cheap 10% efficient solar cells your talking 3,500MWh per year.
And i didn't even reduce the 4.2MWh/year from burning due to inefficiencies in the process... that would be a 75% reduction so, what, 1MWh per year.
Nope, completely uneconomical and not even as profitable as solar. The only possible way it would be more profitable than solar would be if they intend to chop fresh forest and never replant.. leading to an inevitable desert of man. Immediate profit over long term profitability, human health and a health ecosystem... love those power companies!
I have not checked your other figures but you lost me when you claimed 40% efficiency for solar cells. Where can I get them at affordable prices & how do I ship the energy to Europe?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe biggest issue in here is the one that isn't mentioned: Europe is choking on their own spittle having to pay US firms for carbon tax credits.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is a silly idea whose will go the way of Solyndra. It makes no sense when their are trillions of cubic feet of naturl gas avaiable that are massively cleaner and more efficient than wood or coal.
And really, does anybody actually believe the CO2 argument anymore? The hoofbeats of the stampede to the door is deaefening now that BEST's data (uncooked)blows another massive hole in the AGW debacle.
Take the irrational fears and histrionics about CO2 off the table and you have... well...nothing.
And these people can't even agree on whether this project is actually CO2 neutral, but yet their brethren tell us that their computer models encompasing issues massively unbelievably more complex are unassailable.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYeah... right...
Shoshin : Whether you believe the CO2 argument or not is only of interest to you. Just read the conclusions of qualified people based on hard scientific evidence.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisInstead of burning biomass, we should pyrolyse it, to produce hydrogen and biochar. When biochar is mixed into soils, it increases harvests, and sequesters CO2 for thousands of years. Hydrogen can be stored to generate electricity when required. See www.eprida.com
Steve, you mean the qualified conclusions based on hard evidence that AGW was a farce? Or are you referring to the same qualified professionals that thought the sun rotated around the earth? You don't still believe the earth is flat, do you? You're not seriously qualifying 100 years of questionable data on a 100 billion year old planet, are you steve? Really?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd now you green freaks advocate chopping down more trees? The same trees that convert CO2 in the ATM to 02?! Weren't you hippies complaining about killing off the rain forests some time ago? Can't you eco freaks get your stories strait?
Or are you just tossing out more propaganda hoping to rake in more grant money?
Actually eco-steven... Thank you brother! Add regenerative breaking and heat recovery via steam generation (H2 burns hotter than gas)and you are literally talking 800 miles on a 10 gallon take of hydrogen. Very few people are turned on to valid solutions. Take the people above for example, stating they don't understand the numbers nor the science stating its too complicated, or the fellow above who so broadly claimed "And really, does anybody actually believe the CO2 argument anymore?", and that what, less than a week after their colleague the skeptic Richard Muller conceded that the earth is warming... then they claim, ok, it is warming but man isn't the cause, some unseen force is the cause... then they attack their own college saying “There is no scientific basis for saying that warming [continues],”[1]. Nice little brackets in there, gee yeah think? Could it be that there is no scientific data from the immediate future? Gee you think? See how the sentence is manipulated... they refuse to acknowledge that warming has occurred while simultaneously trying to discredit the guy because he can't predict the future. What is it with skeptics and predicting the future... scientists never claimed they could... they simply look at statistical probabilities... But hey, you don't understand statistics, you don't know a hint of chemistry.... therefore 98% of the scientific community is lying too you, even the ones you higher to disprove global warming. It is clear who is afraid, it is clear who is lying and manipulating the argument..."truth is what stands the test of experience" - Albert Einstein.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd I'll end with a few more quotes from the greatest scientific money grubbing liar of all times, Alber Einstein:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"A man should look for what is, and not for what he thinks should be."
-i.e. leave belief and desire out of it, crunch the numbers, determine the significance of error.
"A perfection of means, and confusion of aims, seems to be our main problem."
-i.e. if you desire fossil fuels now... what next and when?
"Anyone who doesn't take truth seriously in small matters cannot be trusted in large ones either."
-self explanatory, I claim GW is true, you refuse to even review the evidence... you say global warming is false, I ask for the evidence... which I have still to this day never received.. 60 years latter
"As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain, and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality."
-i.e. nothing is ever certain, so stop using the absence of certainty as the only justification for your skepticism.
"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."
-keep testing... but 98% of us are convinced, so stop trying to hold us up.
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2011/10/31/climate-scientist-accused-by-colleague-for-hiding-truth/#ixzz1cPMqY1ZJ
Eco-Paul
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Or are you referring to the same qualified professionals that thought the sun rotated around the earth"
-Actually, that was the church remember. Galileo Galilei was forced to recuse his theory that the earth revolved around the sun or would have faced death. Read your history little man, if you should be blaming anyone for the belief the earth was the center of everything it should be the church.. obvious to every one else here I am sure.
"And now you green freaks advocate chopping down more trees? The same trees that convert CO2 in the ATM to 02?! Weren't you hippies complaining about killing off the rain forests some time ago? Can't you eco freaks get your stories strait?
Or are you just tossing out more propaganda hoping to rake in more grant money?"
-No, actually, read my first post, the first post on this article.. check my math... I agree this is propaganda, but it is coming from the freaking Coke Brothers not "hippies"! Idiot.. Richard Muller the life long skeptic was working for grant money... keep shrugging off the results of your colleague without even reading his work. That will convince us! He was working for grant money too... not a single test ever performed has drawn into question the FACT that the earth is warming... All we hear is "I don't understand therefore you are wrong".
Nice eco-Paul, you are certainly not the best of humanity.
"I have not checked your other figures but you lost me when you claimed 40% efficiency for solar cells. Where can I get them at affordable prices & how do I ship the energy to Europe?"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this-Hence, my second post accounting for this. 40% has been achieved but they are expensive and not mass producible yet. 20% is affordable, and actual is more cost efficient than burning oil for electricity (current trends predicts solar cells will pass coal cost efficiency within 5-10 years). 10% is like the solar cells you buy at Walmart, and even then your talking close to a 500 fold increase in energy density just by using light rather than chopping down forests. Just fyi... even 1% efficient solar cells would be a 10 fold increase in chopping and burning.. and again... this doesn't even take into account the costs associated with breathing combustion byproducts, a subject global warming skeptics like to ignore.
The Koch brothers (and their billionaire pals) send their thanks.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisecosteve
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe concept of cap and trade is fundamentally flawed. It is a highly inefficient and expensive means to theoretically reduce CO2 emissions due to the high bureaucratic administrative cost to implement.
Before agreeing to support such a bad idea I suppose people like you were able to address the following:
1. Do you believe that the warming rate is known with a high degree of certainty? What is that rate in your opinion and the margin of error?
2. Do you believe that you KNOW what portion of that warming is attributable to human released CO2?
3. Could you please explain how you came to that conclusion and how you determined any variances in non human CO2 emissions and absorption over time?
4. Do you believe in the outputs of the current GCM’s? Which models do you believe provide accurate results and what characteristics (outputs) of those models can be relied upon within what margin of error over what timeframes? Can you explain the order of magnitude variances in the same models outputs when run multiple times? How many times should each model be run in order to effectively smooth its outputs? Why does it make sense to use the outputs of multiple different models if the relative accuracy of individual models are known?
5. If the IPCCs impact assessments were written based upon the outputs of the current GCMs (per the questions in #4) should these impact assessments be relied upon? If the outputs were/are not reliable how can the impact to different regions of the world (positive and negative) be accurately assessed?
6. Can you provide any reasonable cost benefit analysis of you proposed action plan that takes into points 1-5?
I beleive I am one of those individual that understands the topic fairly well, and the answers to these points are critical BEFORE agreeing to implement a cap and trade scheme
1. Between 1 and 1.5 degrees, which includes margin of error... based on every study ever done, whether the intent was to prove, disprove or remain unbaised. EVERY STUDY EVER!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this2. YES, ALL OF IT. Why you may ask? because seasonal patterns, solar activity, volcanic activity all indicate that a temperature decrease should be occuring. Now let me ask you, what other sources are you proposing? Nothing I would imagine.
3. Quite simple actual. biomass has been reduced globally, vocanic activity has been slow this last century in comparison to previous, solar cycles dictate a cooling effect, yet CO2 has still doubled. Do you have an alternative? Generally, its best to propose alternatives when trying to disprove a theory.
4. It doesn't matter what model you use, they all ppoint to a warming trend. Why use multiple models? Why look at different ways over and over again? Because still, regardless of how we do it the results aren't changing yet people like you still draw them into question without stating anything substantial.
5. What difference does it make to you? You still refuse to achnolege the data or the problem. That being said, we can only predict effects.. it will never be certain. best case, oceans rise a bit, temperature changes and eco systems move slowly to their ideal climit. Worst case senario there is a positive feedback effect and the entire planet becomes unlivable. Realistically, it is somewhere in between. Add the skyrocketing rates of cancer, which is 98% contributed to combustion byproducts, and its a no brainer. Fossil fuels are pure evil. Why risk the planet? Why knowingly kill millions of people every year from pollution? Why make our fisheries contaminated with mercury? What advantage is there to fossil fuel?
6. Cost benfit - hydrogen can be produced at home -ovbious cost savings. Benefits, save 3.5 million lives per year from cancer plus medical expense (steadily rising 3% per decade since the fifties, smoking has dropped from 60 to 20% since then). fuel efficiency has obvious economic benefits and cost analysis is implicit.
Last comment... He was not supporting cap and trade, nothing he said indicated such. I, however, do, but not in the form proposed under the bush plan. Credits have to be reduced as time progresses to increase the cost of polluting our air.. bush conviently left that part out. In Bush's form, cap and trade does little more than add a few scrubbers where economical as well as increase the cost to consumers. Thanks Bush!
FYI - I'm an engineer, primarily power, primary coal plants... From an personal greedy point of view, from the point of view of the "money grabbing scientists", I gain absolutely nothing from believing the basic chemistry associated with global warming.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI have been deeply entrenched in this debate for 20 years, most of my income comes directly from the largest coal power companies on the planet. I am not after economic benefit, I have all the economic benefits I need from coal. I am after:
1 a healthy population
2 longer life spans for everyone
3 no disgusting tar stains in our cities
4 no mercury in our fish
5 increase vehicle range (300 mpg has been achieved, though that was a funny looking car...150mpg can be achieved for a regular sedan)
6 for all intents and purposes a vaccine to prevent 1/3 of all future cases of cancer... the closest to a cure for cancer we have ever come, is STOP POLLUTING.. starting with air, followed by water.
7 modernization of our crumbling grid.. yes, a large percentage of our coal plants are 50-60 years old, virtually all are at least decades old... many have gone past there design life.
8 reduction is asthma and asthma severity.
9 No more exxon valdez, deep water horizon, and ANY more of the 1000s of spills logged each year.
10 100% eliminate the threat of any possibility of the tiniest man made global warming, and eliminate the threat of a mass extinction event caused by man.
11 maintain the land design by god (or evolution) and given to us as a gift.
12 eventual reduction in energy prices... "eventual"... this is inherent with renewables.
13 Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan, Kawait, Iran, Saudi, Syria and currently the arms race taking place in africa... enough said.
14 no smog
15 no destruction of coral reefs via bleaching.
16 honestly, I miss being able to see the horizon. How many of you remember the 80s when 8/10 days, you could see the farthest clouds on the horizon as clear as Rembrandt painting. Seem like now its far less, like 1/90 days at best... after a major storm or hurricane, the sky is beautiful... cleans out the pollution.
17 I'm bored with saying this over and over again, if your not aware of these concerns or any of the additional ones out there you have no right to be in the debate at this point... GW theory is 60 years old, and is confirmed by simple math, statistics and observations of Venus. Not a single shred of proof to the contrary exists. Prove me wrong, please.
So, how about you? What skin do you have in the game?
Pellets have been a life saver for many southern tree farmer. The value of mature trees has been down for a long time. Hurricane Katrina blew over enough trees to meet the market for a long time. Those went at fire sale prices.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFor the last four years construction has been in a funk. The market for trees has been low.
When the old trees were cut and new ones were planted, the first harvest consisted of the pulpwood. That consisted in removing over half of the trees for pulp for paper. The internet has greatly reduced that market. That is making forestry unsustainable as a way of life. Paper mills are buying far less pulpwood than in the past.
The only way to keep the southern forests viable is to create a market for trees. Southern farmers must feed their families and pay their taxes.
Without a market for trees, many farmers have turned their land back to crops. Since Iowa is turning its corn into alcohol, the south can grow corn and sell corn. It does not need to turn its corn into moonshine to sell it.
"The only way to keep the southern forests viable is to create a market for trees. Southern farmers must feed their families and pay their taxes."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this-I guess that's a difference between me and you, you consider viability equal to immediate profitability and I consider it equal to sustainability, efficiency and practicality. Using trees for power is not just wasteful, its polluting and cancer causing. As stated already, the cheapest solar cells would be multiple orders of magnitude more MWhs than burning trees, and MWhs = cash. Or, alternatively, grow black walnut and you'll make plenty selling for furniture.
-Second, I don't believe many "family farmers" exist anymore, but if they do and your concerned about them, how about doing something about Monsanto, who owns 90% of the markets and keeps the other 10% (real farmers) from success by lawsuits.
Still waiting on that counter-evidence.. A study showing the planet is not warming, a study proposing that man is not the cause with alternatives, something, anything, do the skeptics here have ANYTHING?! So far, the only counter arguement I have heard is:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this1. I don't understand the math therefore you are wrong.
2. Scientists can't predict the future with 100% certainty, therefore they are wrong.
3. People need money to servive, therefore, even if you were right, we refuse to change and refuse to acknowledge that there is more than one way to make a buck.
This is it, this is the skeptic's arguement. Please, give something else.... I'm still waiting... 60 years later.
Still Waiting...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this