Environment & Energy
Related: About this forumNature Communications: "Europe's 'Renewable Energy' Policy Likely to Destroy It's Forests."
In 1307, Edward I banned the combustion of coal in England, thus enacting the first known air pollution law in history. By the 16th century it was necessary to repeal the law because England had basically run out of wood to burn: Attitudes and Responses Towards Air Pollution in Medieval England (Brimblecomb, Journal of the Air Pollution Control Association, 26:10, 941-945)
As they say, "Plus ça change
" or "Those who forget history..."
The current article is in the scientific journal Nature Communications.
Europes renewable energy directive poised to harm global forests (Searchinger et al. Nature Communications Volume 9, Article number: 3741 (2018))
In January of this year, even as the Parliament of the European Union admirably voted to double Europes 2015 renewable energy levels by 2030, it also voted to allow countries, power plants and factories to claim that cutting down trees just to burn them for energy fully qualifies as low-carbon, renewable energy. It did so against the written advice of almost 800 scientists that this policy would accelerate climate change1. This Renewable Energy Directive (RED) is now finalized...
...Over the last decade, however, due to similar flaws in the 2008 RED, Europe has expanded its use of wood harvested to burn directly for energy, much from U.S. and Canadian forests in the form of wood pellets. Contrary to repeated claims, almost 90% of these wood pellets come from the main stems of trees, mostly of pulpwood quality, or from sawdust otherwise used for wood products5.
Greenhouse gas effects of burning wood
Unlike wood wastes, harvesting additional wood just for burning is likely to increase carbon in the atmosphere for decades to centuries6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16. This effect results from the fact that wood is a carbon-based fuel whose harvest and use are inefficient from a greenhouse gas (GHG) perspective. Typically, around one third or more of each harvested tree is contained in roots and small branches that are properly left in the forest to protect soils but that decompose and release carbon. Wood that reaches a power plant can displace fossil emissions but per kWh of electricity typically emits 1.5x the CO2 of coal and 3x the CO2 of natural gas because of woods carbon bonds, water content (Table 2.2 of ref. 17) and lower burning temperature (and pelletizing wood provides no net advantages)
The full paper is open sourced and you can read it yourself if you care to do so.
Here's another link to the subject from Princeton University: Europes policy to treat wood as low-carbon fuel poised to harm global forests
Don't worry, be happy. Split wood, not atoms! Go green, or um, ash and mud colored anyway...
In case you thought that the United States was the only insane place in the world, I thought I'd offer this.
Have a happy Sunday tomorrow.
eppur_se_muova
(36,247 posts)NNadir
(33,464 posts)This does not apply simply to wood; the situation with respect to metals and concrete in the other "renewable energy" fads - also apparently thought and analysis free - are roughly equivalent.
defacto7
(13,485 posts)Some years ago I procured a set of organ pipes of the '32 musical range, if you know organs. The largest of them is 27' in height. Not being in usable shape and having no history for them I decided to do some semi-professional analysis of their origin. From the style of organ construction they date earlier than the 1890's and are English. From the type of square nails imbedded within, they date early 19th century. But the type of hardening process used on those nails, and the deer hyde and glue used to seal the walls, they date between 1750 and 1800. Here's the catch, they are made from Spruce. A single wall of the largest is 27' of knotless 2 3/4 inch thick by 18 inch wide virgin spruce from England cut down in the 18th century. It could be a thousand or more years old. This tree was alive before the Norman invasion while the Anglo-Saxons ruled and the time of the writing of Beowulf. It predates Edward I in your comment. Then I realized these trees no longer exist. Virgin Spruce in Europe went extinct the end of the 19th century. Why? They were used mostly to burn for fuel... and among other things, to make pipe organs. Perspectives.
NNadir
(33,464 posts)...that one reason that Europeans were interested in colonizing/conquering the Americas was wood.
Thanks for your interesting comment.
eppur_se_muova
(36,247 posts)Very large trees were also reserved for use by the Royal Navy as masts, and marked with the King's mark. For a historical example see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingstree,_South_Carolina.
But yeah, they're all gone now.
"Just as we came to the hills, we met with a Sycamore.....of a most extraordinary size, it measuring three feet from the ground, forty-five feet round, lacking two inches; and not fifty yards from it was another, thirty-one feet round."
George Washington, written while exploring the Great Kanawha River, Nov. 4, 1770
defacto7
(13,485 posts)Actually the dimensions are one of the things that determined their origin. Most old english organs didn't have a 32' stop, they had a pedal board that went down to low F below the C. These are old english open woods, not stopped, with a whale of a large scaling the lowest of which is a low F 21hz. They could move ships.