As part of my ongoing series on core climate solutions (see links below), let's examine biofuels.
If we are going to avoid catastrophic climate outcomes, we need some 11 "stabilization wedges" from 2015 to 2040. So if you want to be a core climate solution, you need to be able to generate a large fraction of a wedge in a climate-constrained world. And that is a staggering amount of low-carbon energy.
Princeton's Socolow and Pacala describe one wedge of biofuel in their original August 2004 Science article [PDF] on the wedges:
Option 13: Biofuels. Fossil-carbon fuels can also be replaced by biofuels such as ethanol. A wedge of biofuel would be achieved by the production of about 34 million barrels per day of ethanol in 2054 that could displace gasoline, provided the ethanol itself were fossil-carbon free. This ethanol production rate would be about 50 times larger than today's global production rate [actually, now more like 60 times current U.S. biofuels production], almost all of which can be attributed to Brazilian sugarcane and United States corn. An ethanol wedge would require 250 million hectares committed to high-yield (15 dry tons/hectare) plantations by 2054, an area equal to about one-sixth of the world's cropland. An even larger area would be required to the extent that the biofuels require fossil-carbon inputs. Because land suitable for annually harvested biofuels crops is also often suitable for conventional agriculture, biofuels production could compromise agricultural productivity.
Biofuels thus have several problems as a large-scale medium-term climate solution:
First, virtually all crop-based biofuels are worthless from a climate perspective and probably a bad idea from most other perspectives. Second, there is not a single commercial cellulosic ethanol plant in United States yet. Third, I'm not sure there is an agreement in the scientific community about how to do lifecycle analysis needed to determine the net carbon benefit from cellulosic fuels.
Fourth, in a post-2050 world with three billion more people who are losing water from melting glaciers and desertification, arable land and water will be very dear commodities. That means the only biofuels that would make sense to fight global warming would be ones that do not require arable land or much fresh water.
So I think the jury is very much out on whether a wedge-scale contribution from cellulosic biofuels is practical and affordable and a climate-constrained world. It should probably be considered a half-wedge solution until we see major advances in large-scale microalgae-to-biofuels.
If you want to see the entire Princeton discussion on the biofuels wedge with all of their assumptions detailed, go here [PDF].
This post was created for ClimateProgress.org, a project of the Center for American Progress Action Fund.
‘Copenhagen Diagnosis’ offers a grim update to the IPCC’s climate science
Cast your vote for the best climate journalism
Comments
View as Threaded
Jonas Posted 12:07 pm
18 Jul 2008
Let's look at two rather authoritative sources:
James Hansen.
For those who know the debate in Europe, let's look at the wedges presented in the Bellona Foundation's most recent report on mitigating climate change.
=======
James Hansen says: we need to aim for 350ppm. The only feasible way to do this is via biofuels:
-biomass coupled to CCS
-bioenergy coupled to biochar.
James Hansen, Makiko Sato, Pushker Kharecha, David Beerling, Valerie Masson-Delmotte, Mark Pagani, Maureen Raymo, Dana L. Royer, James C. Zachos, "Target Atmospheric CO2: Where Should Humanity Aim?", March 2008.
========
Now let's look at the Bellona Foundation, which aims for an 80% reduction of carbon emissions by 2050.
The Bellona Foundation, so far, is the only organisation taking bio-CCS and bio-CCCS into account. Thus it can be easily considered to be the most up to date on the technologies.
These are its wedges (roughly sketched, more details in the link):
Carbon-negative biofuels: 22%
All other renewables combined: 10%
CCS: 10%
Land use change: 8%
In short, biofuels alone represent twice as large a potential than wind, solar, geothermal, wave, etc... combined.
Graph.
Bellona Foundation: It is fully possible to reduce emissions by 85 percent - June 5, 2008.
The logic is quite straightforward: old school renewables like wind or solar remain carbon-neutral forever. They can never take CO2 out of the atmosphere.
Carbon-negative biofuels, on the contrary, can take huge amounts of CO2 away.
Let's look at the numbers. How much CO2 can each technology reduce or remove? Or, put differently, how much CO2 does the technology yield per Gigawatthour of electricity generated?
Here are the numbers:
-solar PV: +100 ton CO2/GWh
-wind: +30 to 50 ton CO2/GWh
-large hydro: +10 to 20 ton CO2/GWh
-biomass+CCCS: -500 to -800 tons CO2/GWh [that is: minus]
-biomass+CCS: -800 to -1000 tons CO2/GWh [that is: minus]
In short: for each GWh of electricity generated, carbon-negative bioenergy can reduce emissions by up to 10 times compared with wind and solar.
========
Obviously, biofuels are "the" most important technology to mitigate climate change.
There is basically no discussion about this, is there? The numbers speak for themselves: biofuels are the single biggest wedge of the future. (+100tonCO2/GWh versus -1000tonCO2/GWh... add Hansen...).
But apparently, the news still has to cross the pond. If there's anything else we can help our American friends with, let us know!
Permalink
Jonas Posted 12:13 pm
18 Jul 2008
That's the question.
In my view, the answer is: no, they are not. They are excessively costly, not very efficient from an energy point of view (no baseloads, no peakloads, reliance on coal and natural gas, etc...). And worse of all: they don't mitigate climate change all that much.
Permalink
Jonas Posted 12:31 pm
18 Jul 2008
There's a big new synthesis report out. You can find it over at IEA Bioenergy Task 40 (Copernicus Institute authors, reports used by the very FAO for its new framework on food and bioenergy, etc.).
The problem (for Mr Fromm and others) is that it is rather optimistic.
But then, these are scientists. They try to be objective. They're not bloggers.
IEA Bioenergy Task 40.
June 2008
Biomass Assessment: Assessment of global biomass potentials and their links to food, water, biodiversity, energy demand and economy - Main Report [2.653 KB]
Authors: Veronika Dornburg, André Faaij, Hans Langeveld, Gerrie van de Ven, Flip Wester, Herman van Keulen, Kees van Diepen, Jan Ros, Detlef van Vuuren, Gert Jan van den Born , Mark van Oorschot, Fleur Smout, Harry Aiking, Marc Londo, Hamid Mozaffarian, Koen Smekens, Marieke Meeusen, Martin Banse, Erik Lysen, Sander van Egmond. Study performed by Copernicus Institute - Utrecht University, MNP, LEI, WUR-PPS, ECN, IVM and the Utrecht Centre for Energy Research, within the framework of the Netherlands Research Programme on Scientific Assessment and Policy Analysis for Climate Change. Reportno: WAB 500102012, January 2008. Pp. 85 + Appendices.
Biomass Assessment: Assessment of global biomass potentials and their links to food, water, biodiversity, energy demand and economy - Supporting Document. [11.086 KB]
Authors: Veronika Dornburg, André Faaij, Hans Langeveld, Gerrie van de Ven, Flip Wester, Herman van Keulen, Kees van Diepen, Jan Ros, Detlef van Vuuren, Gert Jan van den Born , Mark van Oorschot, Fleur Smout, Harry Aiking, Marc Londo, Hamid Mozaffarian, Koen Smekens, Marieke Meeusen, Martin Banse, Erik Lysen, Sander van Egmond, , Study performed by Copernicus Institute - Utrecht University, MNP, LEI, WUR-PPS, ECN, IVM and the Utrecht Centre for Energy Research, within the framework of the Netherlands Research Programme on Scientific Assessment and Policy Analysis for Climate Change. Reportno: WAB 500102014, January 2008. Pp. 202.
Permalink
gmobus Posted 12:54 pm
18 Jul 2008
But won't you have to first prove CCS viability before you can make claims about the efficacy of biofuels? If capture and sequestration can be shown to be effective (cost and physically) then I'm ready to listen.
The land availability argument also would seem to have a large number of hidden assumptions.
Thanks.
George
George Mobus,
Associate Professor, Institute of Technology,
University of Washington Tacoma,
and Professional Student for Life
Permalink
GreyFlcn Posted 1:06 pm
18 Jul 2008
Would you please quit assuming that
CCS is viable
Carbon fixation for meaningful periods of times MUST involve burning the carbon you're trying to keep from entering the atmosphere.
That there's even enough biomass to go around
That most biofuels reduce emissions at all, once you factor in their land use change "carbon debt", and N2O emissions.
____
Anyways Joseph,
You missed a few things.
One, Algae has problems. At the moment it'd cost about $1200 a barrel to create it.
http://greyfalcon.net/algae4
There's also the problem to do with phosphorus fertilizers, and in general that "raw biomass" which so many people assume we can just burn.
http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2008/2/13/64820/6921
http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2008/7/16/112158/855
Lastly, you forgot to mention that due to the scarcity of biomass (especially climate beneficial biomass), and the nonscarcity of coal.
It's kind of a freaky assumption to make that building a gigantic infrastructure of 30-year-finance-schedule gasification solids-to-liquids plants worldwide. And then very likely not having enough solids to feed them.
Given the inherent will to survive of institutions, you would end up with a gigantic Coal-to-Liquids infrastructure, built on back of a message of "Clean and Green" Fuels.
http://greyfalcon.net/biolimits.png
http://greyfalcon.net/fossilenergy.png
For instance, as Coskata's CEO mentions quite bluntly, "Will this process ever be used to make fuel from coal? I hope so, it would be stupid not to."
(Start from timemark 2:20, I should probably shorten this myself)
http://greyfalcon.net/coskata
http://greyfalcon.net/cellulosics.pdf
And as James Hansen mentions we CAN NOT shift to liquid coal if we want to have a prayer of dealing with this climate crisis.
http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2007/5/29/81931/9476
-David Ahlport
Permalink
tdmeeh Posted 3:00 pm
18 Jul 2008
There are places where agriculture and forestry already produce sizable amounts of "waste" biomass. This biomass decomposes, and about 90% of the carbon is returned to the atmosphere within a few decades. If this same biomass were subjected to pyrolysis on a regional scale, then about 50% of the carbon could be sequestered in soil in the form of charcoal for thousands of years (compared to 10%, above - charcoal is very recalcitrant), another 25% would be returned to the atmosphere right away during pyrolysis, and another 25% would be returned after syngas and bio oil is used to fuel additional work (heating, electricity, transportation).
Given that these "wastes" already exist and are decomposing as we write, you can figure that pyrolysis and biofuel production from these materials will not drive additional greenhouse gas emissions through land use change. Indeed, the application of charcoal to soils has been shown to increase crop yields when soils are low in organic carbon to begin with. This increase in crop yields could theoretically slow down current land conversion for food production.
For a nice summary of the potential of biomass pyrolysis, see this article:
http://agron.scijournals.org/cgi/reprint/100/1/178
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 4:58 pm
18 Jul 2008
The 1/6 of global cropland area is available however, in the ocean. And algae grows in salt water. And doing it that way won't increase GHG like growing it on crop land would.
So if the powers that be, favoring gas guzzling in ICEs want to continue onward, let them float their algae/fuel farms.
Of course renewable electricity in plugin hybrids and electric mass transit will always be much cheaper. Free markets? Well I guess the traditional free marketeers who keep us all guzzling oil only believe in free markets when those markets indicate that their favorite solutions are the correct ones.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 9:39 pm
18 Jul 2008
Amazingdrx, GreyFlcn and a few other characters here will never budge on the issue of the viability of cellulosic ethanol to positively impact climate and energy issues... and that's OK. Because their naive positions in the face of volumes of contrary evidence will not, FOR ONE SECOND, stop the dramatic increase in the use of sustainably-produced biomass for energy.
These folks have not demonstrated any actual experience in working with biomass. They simply have agendas to promote other renewables that, from their limited perspectives, cannot co-exist with potentially competing options. But this won't stop a thing.
In the 2nd quarter, venture capitalists poured funds into cellulosic ethanol development at a rate faster than was put into Internet tech or genetic research companies (http://www.altassets.com/news/arc/2008/nz13769.php).
New CE facilities are being built at an increasingly faster pace to demonstrate both advancements in the technology, as well as commercial viability (http://www.thecesite.com).
Results on the viability of growing switchgrass continue to be more favorable (http://scienceblogs.com/energy/2008/07/life_as_we_know_it ...).
Articles describing the potential of CE in the US show clearly how big a contributor CE can be (http://www.ecoworld.com/home/articles2.cfm?tid=462).
This train won't be stopped. And that's a good thing, because anyone who has ever worked in the sustainable forestry and farming sectors knows the potential for growing and using biomass in harmony with the Earth.
Permalink
Ron Steenblik Posted 11:23 pm
18 Jul 2008
In the 2nd quarter, venture capitalists poured funds into cellulosic ethanol development at a rate faster than was put into Internet tech or genetic research companies. New CE facilities are being built at an increasingly faster pace to demonstrate both advancements in the technology, as well as commercial viability
That's all fine and dandy. But there is something missing from RD Miller's note: economics.
The fact is, government grants, loans and loan guarantees have played a big role in stimulating the investments in cellulosic ethanol so far, as have the mandated volumes (federal, as well as in Pennsylvania and Massachusetts), the expectations of continued protection from imports and, above all, blending and production subsidies -- federal and state.
Let's look at the case of Range Fuels -- Vinod Khosla's much-trumpeted project -- for example.
Range Fuels (formerly Kergy Inc.) of Broomfield, Colorado, will be granted up to $76 million by the federal government for their plant being constructed in Soperton (Treutlen County), Georgia. So a large amount of the capital cost of the plant ($1.55 per annual gallon, based on the original proposal for 40 million gallons of ethanol per year and 9 million gallons per year of methanol) will have been underwritten by the federal government.
In addition, according to an article in the Atlanta Constitution, Treutlen County offered tax abatements and a 97-acre tract in its industrial park worth $350,000. And the state's OneGeorgia Authority, which uses tobacco settlement money for rural economic development, was (in February 2007) likely to approve a $6 million grant for Treutlen County to help Range Fuels buy production equipment. The company has also benefited from a 4 percent sales tax exemption for materials and equipment used to construct biofuel facilities.
Now, let's look at the economic viability of the plant once it is operating. To start off, at the time of his investment, Mr. Khosla knew that the plant would benefit from the federal volumetric ethanol excise tax credit (VEETC), which at the time was 51¢ per gallon. In addition, because during Phase I the plant will produce only about 20 million gallons of ethanol and methanol per year, it will qualify for the additional 10¢ per gallon small ethanol producer tax credit on the first 15 million gallons a year it produces.
Whether at the time he committed to his investment Mr. Khosla knew about plans by Congress to provide an additional 50¢ per gallon tax credit for each gallon of qualified cellulosic fuel production is anybody's guess. But in the latest Farm Bill, that additional subsidy was included, bringing the total volumetric subsidy for cellulosic ethanol to $1.01 per gallon (or $1.50 per gallon of gasoline equivalent).
(The creation of this additional incentive itself begs the question as to why an even larger subsidy was needed when, at the time the grant for the Range Fuels plant was made, in February 2007, when crude oil was selling for $50/barrel less than it was at the time that the Farm Bill was passed. That is to say, if the plant was expecting to make money when the the price of crude was much lower than it is today, why was a doubling of the volumetric subsidy needed?)
The industry wants it both ways: they boast about how production costs for cellulosic ethanol will soon be below $1.00 per gallon, and at the same time push for -- and obtain -- subsidies that suggest that the real cost will be much, much higher. Could it be that the investors know something we don't -- e.g., that assumptions about bountiful, cheap supplies of cellulosic feedstock could have been wrong?
No, Mr. Miller, people are not sceptics of cellulosic ethanol simply because they fear the competition, but because past, exaggerated claims about biofuels have made people justifiably wary. Once bitten, twice shy and all that.
These are only my personal opinions.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 12:01 am
19 Jul 2008
I can appreciate that some wariness exists because of exaggerated or unrealized claims regarding biofuels and many other hoped-for alternative energy solutions.
I certainly can't say for certain that cellulosic ethanol will become a viable reality. No one knows for sure, though the mounting evidence is favorable. But there are a few things we do know about biomass and its potential as an energy source.
First, there is a large volume of available biomass that can be readily accessed immediately, as is noted in the posting here: http://www.ecoworld.com/home/articles2.cfm?tid=462
Second, ongoing developments in the area of dedicated energy plantations show us a path forward to produce very large volumes of new biomass. The question is not whether this will work (we know how to grow trees in large volumes at low cost), but rather just how high the potential tonnage per acre per year figures can go and what the cost will be of this harvested feedstock.
Third, we know what today's prices are for delivered biomass feedstock, because millions of tons (annually) of wood chips and logs are being delivered regularly throughout the US. This material, when compared to oil, for example, can provide energy at less than 20% the cost of oil... far below solar or wind. The feedstock itself will not increase in value very much in the foreseeable future simply because the supply far exceeds demand. What this means for cellulosic ethanol pricing is not entirely clear, but it's certainly a positive sign.
These are facts that are driving the continued high level of funding by VC's into cellulosic ethanol. Whether CE is the best end use for biomass is still uncertain. One needs to take into account not just the obvious economics, but the potential to displace imported oil and all the benefits that provides (in addition to perhaps tens of thousands of new jobs in rural communities). Add to this the potential for a carbon negative contribution and the case looks more and more compelling.
Permalink
Jonas Posted 12:13 am
19 Jul 2008
- Well in the case of CCS not really, because you are working with carbon-neutral, biogenic CO2 (in contrast to the CO2 when derived from fossil fuels).
So any leakage does not add CO2 to the atmosphere.
CCS is in a more advanced stage than CSP, for example.
There are now at least 4 working CCS sites. One of them has been working for over a decade.
- In the case of CCCS, there's not much to prove, we have the archaeological record: carbon from more than 5000 years old stored in soils.
I admit that the estimates of the potential for CCCS differ widely. Lehmann and others think that we can take all CO2 added yearly back out of the atmosphere via CCCS. Others see a smaller potential.
But the mitigation potential of CCCS is far bigger than that of all renewables combined.
The land availability argument also would seem to have a large number of hidden assumptions.
Such as?
I think you mean that the land availability studies by the leading scientists all take into account different scenarios (because several factors, like population growth, can not be predicted exactly; hence, they use projections.)
But this is true for all assessments of the future of technologies.
For example, if it is true that rare earth elements like gallium and indium will be depleted by 2017, then the entire PV industry is doomed. Some say 2017, others don't take it that far.
But even the very low range estimates of the land availability, still show there are several hundred EJ worth producing, under the strict sustainability parameters lined out earlier (no deforestation, 10% conservation, meeting all fiber, fodder, forest products and food needs of growing populations).
Permalink
Jonas Posted 12:24 am
19 Jul 2008
Would you please quit assuming that
1. CCS is viable
2. Carbon fixation for meaningful periods of times MUST involve burning the carbon you're trying to keep from entering the atmosphere.
3. That there's even enough biomass to go around
4. That most biofuels reduce emissions at all, once you factor in their land use change "carbon debt", and N2O emissions.
Greyfalcon, not to be annoying, but from what you write, you show, once again, that you have not understood the basics of carbon-negative bioenergy.
I've been with you over this several times. I'm not going to do the effort again. Please check the earlier comments in which I try to explain the kernel of the concept to you.
Carbon negative bioenergy comes in many forms. Combustion is the single least useful one - and in fact, in many carbon-negative energy concepts, it can't be used at all, because it would precisely ruin the carbon capture option. So clearly, you haven't grasped what we are talking about.
There are many other bioconversion forms.
Google for: "bioconversion".
As far as N2O emissions are concerned: biochar has been shown to lower N2O emissions by 5 to 10 fold in Australian highly weathered oxisols. That's why its being increasingly recognized as a key to sustainable agriculture.
All carbon-negative biofuels obviously take CO2 out of the atmosphere, else they wouldn't be called that way. No biggie, I think. If you (as in CCCS) sequester 50% of the C of a biomass feedstock, and use the other half to replace fossil fuels, you obviously go negative. In CCS you can use entirely decarbonized fuels and sequester all the C, that is 100%.
Solar, wind, hydro etc... all remain carbon positive. They add CO2 to the atmosphere.
The advantage of CCCS is that not only the 'carbon debt' is cancelled out, it also cancels out the carbon debt of non-energy farming.
But anyways, it seems like the concept remains too complex for you, because you still assume, entirely wrongly, that combustion is the core of carbon-negative energy, while the exact opposite is true.
Permalink
Jonas Posted 12:29 am
19 Jul 2008
Wow, this is news. I think the biochar researchers would be highly interested in seeing this study.
Would you care for a link?
I will forward it at once to the biochar research community, who will be, obviously, shocked if this were to be true.
Thanks.
Permalink
Jonas Posted 12:38 am
19 Jul 2008
Yes Ron, and we all appreciate your work on this.
But when will your study on the subsidies for wind and solar appear?
These subsidies and support measures in Europe (and I'm sure in the US too), have been at least as high as those for bioenergy, if not higher.
In Germany, the leading green in the EU, subsidies for wind are 35% higher than those for biomass; subsidies for solar are 100% higher than those for biomass.
When will your report on these subsidies appear?
Why single out biofuels?
I think I must agree with RDMiller: there are fundamentalists out there, who refuse to be tech-neutral. They either have stocks in solar companies, or they are being paid by the oil industry to do everything to boycott biomass, knowing that biofuels are the biggest threat to oil.
Seriously, the selective rage against biofuels sometimes looks pathological.
-I expect a study on the subsidies for wind and solar, as compared to those for biomass
-I expect a study on the sustainability of wind and solar, including the social sustainability and the indirect social costs of mining key minerals (which would point to the 5 million dead people in Congo, which have fallen for these industries - but this is kept under the carpet, perhaps because these are mere French-speaking black people.)
-I expect a full study showing how the reliance on wind has been pushing up coal use because wind doesn't provide baseloads (there are small studies about this, I now demand a full study, including one covering China, where this link would be very apparent)
That would be most welcome.
Permalink
Jonas Posted 12:41 am
19 Jul 2008
We are not even talking about indirect subsidies, which are once again much, much higher for wind and solar, simply because electricity from these technologies is much much costlier.
The cost of a GWh of electricity from solar PV is still 10 to 20 times higher than a GWh from biomass.
The cost of a GW of heat from wind electricity is up to 10 times higher than a GW from direct biomass heating.
But Ron knows the difference between direct and indirect subsidies better than me, so I'll leave him to work on this.
Looking forward to it.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 1:05 am
19 Jul 2008
There are many horror stories out there about rainforest destruction, old-growth logging, clearing forests for biofuels and such. This has created a certain justifiable wariness about utilizing wood and similar feedstocks for energy. But it says nothing about the potential to utilize biomass on a sustainable basis (something being done every day by countless companies around the world).
As I said, though, it's harder to understand the mechanisms, costs and issues involved in biomass production than solar or wind, so too many simply grab onto any of the horror stories and use those as a basis to form a negative opinion about biomass. But this is not "truth"... it's simply becoming comfortable with ignorance and playing it safe. This serves no one.
As someone who has spent years in the field producing biomass sustainably, I know it can be done and I know what the costs are. I know how vast the resource is and I know how much larger it can become.
When folks have an agenda, they'll take a position on something that they have no direct experience with, rather than saying "I just don't know how to evaluate this." I encourage GreyFln, Amazingdrx and others here to consider this.
Permalink
Ron Steenblik Posted 1:27 am
19 Jul 2008
Regarding subsidies for renewable electricity, my understanding is that your assertion that "These subsidies and support measures [for solar- and wind-based electricity] in Europe (and I'm sure in the US too), have been at least as high as those for bioenergy, if not higher", is true when comparing electricity and heat from biomass, but not liquid fuels from biomass (which is what Joseph Romm is talking about here). Doug Koplow at Earth Track has run these on a per GJ basis.
Why look at subsidies to biofuels? First, because they have become an alternative way for governments to support agriculture. And when there are multilateral trade negotiations going on at the WTO, knowing the size and scope of those subsidies is important.
Second, the subsidies are open-ended, and could balloon to tens of billions of dollars per year in the USA and Europe within a few short years. They are already helping to add tens of billions of dollars to the prices of grains, oilseeds and livestock prices, through competition with food and feed uses.
Third, unlike (or at least to a lesser extent than) solar and wind energy, the subsidies to biofuels are easily capitalized into the value of land. In Iowa, for example, the average price of farmland increased 22% between 2006 and 2007. When that happens, the ability of policy-makers to change course in the light of new information becomes much harder.
Fourth, the way that subsidies to biofuels are being provided largely insulates consumers of those biofuels from the true cost of producing them. That means that, all else equal, drivers do not face the price signals that should be telling them that they need to consume less.
Finally, Jonas, it does not help your arguments to make unfounded claims like the following:
... there are fundamentalists out there, who refuse to be tech-neutral. They either have stocks in solar companies, or they are being paid by the oil industry to do everything to boycott biomass, knowing that biofuels are the biggest threat to oil.
For the record, all my stocks are in mutual funds, and I am not receiving money from the oil industry (or any other industry). I don't see people around here intimating that you own stocks in ADM, Monsanto or Khosla Ventures. So just quit this nonsense, OK?
And, sorry, but biofuels are not "the biggest threat to oil". We have been over this before. Gasoline distributors, for good reason (because the special equipment ethanol requires is expensive) do not particularly like ethanol, at least without a subsidy. But oil companies do like biofuels (and many, like BP and Shell, have invested in them heavily). Since even under the most optimistic assumption, biofuels are going to remain complements to oil for the next several decades, biofuels ensure the maintenance of the status quo: transport based on the internal combustion engine.
No, what makes oil companies break into a sweat is the prospect of electric cars.
These are only my personal opinions.
Permalink
Ron Steenblik Posted 1:45 am
19 Jul 2008
Also, it is not just production costs that matters, but the opportunity costs of the factors used in production. Studies at Iowa State University have shown that cost of growing switchgrass in the corn belt is low. But, as they convincingly argue, farmers in that region will never grow switchgrass if they can grow corn, because the net returns are higher -- i.e., growing corn and soybeans is the highest-value use of that land.
Similarly, it may be cheap to grow trees and turn them into woodchips. But there is a growing demand on wood resources, including for wood-fired electricity, and only so much land available (unless you are advocating encroaching on national parks and other protected areas). I do not think it can be automatically assumed that the price of biomass today is going to remain constant no matter how large a demand is placed on those resources.
These are only my personal opinions.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 1:52 am
19 Jul 2008
Specifically it states that the char doesn't break down, but it promotes the growth of microorganisms that break down existing soil organic matter at an increased rate. Evidently I was wrong, the char itself does persist.
Your false assumption however, that just because energy is derived from biomass it is automatically carbon negative persists too. A much more harmfull false assumption behind the whole biofuel farming craze.
Admit your error Jonas. Rehabilitation of your world view is only a fallacy away.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 2:06 am
19 Jul 2008
The natural carbon cycle is interupted when biomass, grown on land that naturally would sequester that carbon, is turned into fuel and burned.
It's just that simple.
On the other hand, biomass that would emit methane into the atmosphere, like manure, sewage, garbage, green crop waste, and cellulose in wetlands exposed to fertilizer or manure run off, turned into biogas and organic fertilizer offsets GHG release by capturing the methane.
This is a plan that will work, you would be better off getting behind it. Farm, garbage, sewage, biogas/fertilizer production is carbon negative. Liquid fuel farming is not.
The biogas can be converted into methanol, a liquid fuel, with renewable electricy, but why add the extra inefficiency to the system? Methane can now be stored with new nano tech storage media at the same denasity and pressure as gasoline.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 2:07 am
19 Jul 2008
I didn't say cellulosic ethanol is feasible today. I said we're rapidly heading in that direction. But until we get there, subsidies are needed to support research. There are countless examples of this in other areas of energy and elsewhere.
If, instead, we internalized the true costs of burning oil and coal (even nuclear), we probably wouldn't need those subsidies. But this level of intelligence within our government and the powers that be simply doesn't exist.
Whether farmers decide to grow switchgrass, trees or something else instead of food is yet to be seen. Any rational person would hope this doesn't happen. But that's not the point. The point is it's looking like these "crops" can be grown on millions of acres of non-farm land and be profitable. It is this that would be a significant part of the basis for the cellulosic ethanol sector.
While your statement that there is growing demand for woody biomass as a feedstock for energy is true, this demand (today) is only the smallest fraction of supply. One could argue we haven't even dented the supply yet. Of course, it is possible, one day, demand might exceed supply. But this is so far down the road it makes no sense to discuss it now. For the foreseeable future, it is unlikely the cost of delivering energy-grade wood (whether chipped or otherwise) will increase significantly... not when supply exceeds demand by a factor of hundreds (or even thousands... I haven't done the calculation).
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 2:15 am
19 Jul 2008
Stubborn as ever. Why do you continue to make silly statements that demonstrate your ignorance on specific topics you know little about? Why don't you try... just for a change... saying you're not certain and have a question?
Show me evidence that this statement of yours is true when applied to sustainable forest harvesting practiced under the guidelines of the FSC (Forest Stewardship Council)?
"The natural carbon cycle is interrupted when biomass, grown on land that naturally would sequester that carbon, is turned into fuel and burned."
I mean, obviously some kind of natural cycle is interrupted, but I'm assuming you are saying that the effects of the sustainable forestry and energy production process results in a carbon positive problem. Prove this, please.
Permalink
Ron Steenblik Posted 3:30 am
19 Jul 2008
Nobody here is defending subsidies to nuclear power, coal or oil. And everybody here would agree that the externalities associated with using energy -- of all sorts -- needs to be internalized. But even if one charged, say, a carbon tax of $50 per tonne of CO2-eq on gasoline, that would add only around $0.45 per gallon. If cellulosic ethanol reduced life-cycle CO2 emissions by 85%, its carbon tax would then be around $0.07/GGE. That is a $0.38/GGE difference, not $1.50 (not counting the additional state-level subsidies).
Cellulosic ethanol already has $130 per barrel oil as a benchmark. That won't be enough?
These are only my personal opinions.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 3:52 am
19 Jul 2008
The kind of natural cycle? It is the cycle of biomass turned into GHG, CO2, methane (21x GHG effect of CO2), nitrous oxide (296x GHG effect of CO2 and so forth, as that biomass either breaks down slowly from biodigestion in the soil or combustion in fires.
And the uptake of these GHG by photosynthesis in plants, that makes more biomass. In a stable climatic system, the amount of GHG produced and absorbed would be balanced.
In the climate disaster we are now experiencing, human combustion of biomass, in the form of fossil fuels and plant matter and manure, has thrown off the balance. Furthermore, run off of fertilizer and manure caused by human farming practices has resulted in a rapid bacterial breakdown of carbon stored as biomass in soil and wetlands.
Turning biomass into fuel continues to push the imbalance to the excess GHG side.
Turning biomass, that would release GHG in the form of methane, into biogas and capturing that methane, converting it to an energy source, offsets 20 times the CO2 emission from burning that biogas.
Using organic fertilizer from the biodigestion process to replace nitrous oxide emitting, ever more costly, fossil fuel derived and mined chemical fertilizer, curtails a GHG effect equal to 2/3 of the fertilized crop's GHG uptake.
It's the only carbon negative biomass scheme. And it's really effective. Less than 5% of our GHG producing energy coming from biogas derived from waste, would offset the other 95%. That's a zero carbon footprint.
Gore's goal for 10 years hence? It would allow the use of natural gas as a transport fuel.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 4:27 am
19 Jul 2008
Not nearly good enough. I'm not interested in your rantings. I'm interested in independent confirmation of your viewpoint.
Prove to me, from any scientifically validated source, that using biomass as a fuel when the biomass was harvested sustainably, is a significant contributor to GHG problems.
If you can't prove this, stop saying it.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 4:31 am
19 Jul 2008
You seem to be arguing that it's unreasonable to pay substantial subsidies to cellulosic ethanol producers when CE is commercialized and a regular, ongoing production process. I might agree with you, but we're not there yet. Everything happening with CE today is still in the R&D phase, even when we're in the stage of demonstrating that CE is commercially viable. These subsidies are completely appropriate and necessary right now. Down the road, I might well agree with you.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 4:39 am
19 Jul 2008
In a dialogue one usually reponds to the points made. My argument does not rest on an appeal to scientific expertise. Merely on agreement on the nature of the GHG/carbon cycle we are talking about. You either recognize this as a correct description of the carbon cycle or you don't.
If you don't, explain where this concept is flawed in such a way as to somehow render biomass to liquid fuel conversion carbon neutral.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 4:50 am
19 Jul 2008
That is an incredibly weak response, indicating you choose to hold onto an opinion (which you can't back up with documentation) in the face of firm evidence to the contrary.
By DEFINITION, sustainable forestry is sustainable. If you don't understand what this means, read through the hundreds of pages of background info here: http://www.fsc.org
Put simply, if you have an acre with 50 tons of biomass on it and you harvest 10, within 10 years you have 50 tons of biomass there again (because of something called growth). In other words, no contribution of GHG's. More importantly, those who have practiced sustainable forestry know it is quite likely that you'll end up with 55 or 60 tons after ten years, because you've improved the productivity of the forest. Hence, a carbon negative scenario.
There's no argument with this by anyone familiar with sustainable forestry... which is why there's no documentation to support your position.
Permalink
1Eco Posted 5:01 am
19 Jul 2008
RDMiller,
I am interested to hear more about your work.
Please share as you might have time.
Thank you for you insightful posts. Just because there are those here who wish to RAG on BTL, does not mean others buy into their RANTS.
It simply means they have their own agenda and seem almost fearful funding might be lost for their own pet projects.
They may have reason to be afraid, as cost
effective green solutions demand meaningful
numbers as well as facts. National security
and independence is also a factor they somehow seem to MISS.
Ecosystems empowerment for the rural poor.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 5:33 am
19 Jul 2008
Yes, that title (the footer to your post) says a lot. There are few options for rural communities with as much potential as increased use of biomass for energy. Unlike solar and wind (two technologies I fully embrace), biomass-based energy is labor intensive. Unlike coal, oil and natural gas, it is highly decentralized and available in the majority of States. It takes advantage of the kind of skills more common amongst rural people and provides jobs more akin to their lifestyles. It generates and keeps energy dollars local.
Because of historical reasons, the biomass we can take advantage of is already standing in our forests. No need to incur any new costs to plant it; no need to wait for it to grow. The key, though, is to make sure it is harvested sustainably... meaning, remove no more than grows back in a relatively short period of time; create the least disturbance possible; maintain or enhance wildlife and soil quality; and in the case of biomass, remove the diseased, over-crowded and deformed trees. Leave the biggest and best standing.
The volumes available are huge. The cost to extract it is low. And the technologies to use it are varied, giving us heat, electric power or (soon) a replacement for oil which can be used as a transport fuel or to create plastic and many other items typically produced from oil.
Biomass has been competitive with oil for many years... way before solar or wind. But the technology has tended to attract a different crowd of researchers, investors and environmentalists than solar and wind. But that's changing now (though apparently not so for Amazingdrx, GreyFlcn and a few other holdouts here).
I've been working in this sector for about 30 years. I'm happy to answer any specific questions you might have. I maintain a web site (http://www.thecesite.com) to track who is doing what in the cellulosic ethanol sector. The developments are fascinating and hold much promise.
Permalink
Jonas Posted 6:17 am
19 Jul 2008
Please try to read it again, in conjunction with what you know about biochar. You will find that this article proves the effectiveness of biochar, because it demonstrates that char mineralizes organic matter, which is precisely what we want to achieve.
So your earlier statement that biochar itself mineralizes was incorrect, I'm sure you understand that now.
The key to biochar is that it forms a recalcitrant pool of SOM in nutrient-poor soils and frees up the nutrients for plants. Since you sequester biochar in nutrient-poor soils, the stored C is larger than the mineralizable SOM, which gets freed up and made available as nutrients to crops, which is why they tend to grow so much better.
Do you understand this? The recalcitrance of biochar is undisputed (pools of over 5000 years old have been found), your article does not dispute this either.
In short, I thought you were referring to a new article. The one you point to is of key importance to the biochar community, because it confirms what the researchers in that community have painstakingly found in their field trials in nutrient-poor soils.
Permalink
Jonas Posted 6:19 am
19 Jul 2008
All my comments to this post are about biofuels in general, that is, including and most importantly, solid biofuels.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 6:45 am
19 Jul 2008
logical conclusion time. If burning biomass is carbon negative, then if all the biomass went up in a firestorm it would actually send us into an ice age.
The more biomass you burn the less CO2 there is in the air, right? Funny material!!
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 6:47 am
19 Jul 2008
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Jonas Posted 7:54 am
19 Jul 2008
That's why, theoretically, it is not always good to use reforestation as a carbon sink. Because the trees can go up in flames or fall down and rot, becoming CO2 and methane.
It is better to grow biomass, pyrolyse and/or gasify it, decarbonize it, sequester the C, and use the available energy (hydrogen) as a fuel.
Now it is clear that you need some help in understanding carbon-negative bioenergy. Because you like biogas, let's illustrate it with biogas.
Mind you, this is not an optimal route, only for illustrative purposes:
-you know that biogas has a 40 to 30% CO2 content, right? The rest is methane.
-now suppose you were to capture the CO2 so that you only keep pure methane - a 100% methane fuel, made from biomass.
-you capture and sequester the CO2 from the biogas into a geosequestration site.
-so you now have 100% renewable methane to use as fuel, and your carbon has disappeared under the ground.
-you don't have a carbon-negative fuel yet, because you only sequestered 30 to 40% of the fuel as CO2. And when you combust the pure methane, you still release CO2, but this is taken back up by the new crops you have planted. By burning the renewable methane, you displace the CO2 from non-renewable fuels (fossil fuels), so you take that into the balance.
-now if you were to increase the CO2 content of the biogas to 50% or more, and sequester all that CO2, then you come close to a carbon-negative fuel.
Now since methane always contains C, you can not get a strongly carbon-negative fuel.
That's why we only talk about carbon-negative fuels or energy, when the actual fuel used is very hydrogen-rich: either pure hydrogen, as is obtained when biomass is gasified in IGCCs, or biohydrogen made directly via fermentation, or hydrogen-rich syngas that makes up less than 50% of the energy contained in a given biomass feed, with the remainder pyrolysed into C which is then sequestered into soils in a recalcitrant form. An alternative is post-combustion capture of CO2 in traditional biomass fired power plants.
In all these cases, you get a purely carbon-negative fuel (hydrogen) or electricity. And the more you use of it, the more CO2 you remove from the atmosphere.
-Solar, wind, hydro, etc... all add CO2 to the atmosphere over their lifecycle (small amounts in the case of hydro - around 30gKWh; large amounts in the case of solar PV - around 100 to 150 gKWh). Carbon-negative bioenergy can take away up to 1000gKWh. That is: you put a "minus" sign in front of it - "negative emissions".
That's why carbon-negative bioenergy is so radical. It allows you to power societies while at the same time cleaning up the atmosphere.
That's why James Hansen thinks its so important (and he's not an amateur, is he?)
I hope this helps a bit. But if you have more questions, don't hesitate to ask.
As you say: just burning biomass (as would be the case in forest fires) obviously contributes massive amounts of CO2.
Maybe the following short list of papers can help you understand the concept better:
James S. Rhodes and David W. Keith, "Biomass with capture: negative emissions within social and environmental constraints: an editorial comment" [open access], Climatic Change, Volume 87, Numbers 3-4 / April, 2008, page 321-328, doi: 10.1007/s10584-007-9387-4.
http://www.springerlink.com/content/f14824w8v6757nv6/full ...
Peter Read. "Biosphere carbon stock management: addressing the threat of abrupt climate change in the next few decades: an editorial essay", Climatic Change, Volume 87, Numbers 3-4 / April, 2008, page 305-320, doi: 10.1007/s10584-007-9356-y.
http://www.springerlink.com/content/rt798740226381q8/?p=a ...
H. Audus and P. Freund, "Climate Change Mitigation by Biomass Gasificiation Combined with CO2 Capture and Storage", IEA Greenhouse Gas R&D Programme.
http://uregina.ca/ghgt7/PDF/papers/peer/440.pdf
James S. Rhodesa and David W. Keithb, "Engineering economic analysis of biomass IGCC with carbon capture and storage", Biomass and Bioenergy, Volume 29, Issue 6, December 2005, Pages 440-450.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_ ...
Noim Uddin and Leonardo Barreto, "Biomass-fired cogeneration systems with CO2 capture and storage", Renewable Energy, Volume 32, Issue 6, May 2007, Pages 1006-1019, doi:10.1016/j.renene.2006.04.009
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_ ...
Christian Azar, Kristian Lindgren, Eric Larson and Kenneth Möllersten, "Carbon Capture and Storage From Fossil Fuels and Biomass - Costs and Potential Role in Stabilizing the Atmosphere", Climatic Change, Volume 74, Numbers 1-3 / January, 2006, DOI 10.1007/s10584-005-3484-7
http://www.springerlink.com/content/w30h4274h130580u/
Peter Read and Jonathan Lermit, "Bio-Energy with Carbon Storage (BECS): a Sequential Decision Approach to the threat of Abrupt Climate Change", Energy, Volume 30, Issue 14, November 2005, Pages 2654-2671.
http://www.etsap.org/worksh_6_2003/2003P_read.pdf
Stefan Grönkvist, Kenneth Möllersten, Kim Pingoud, "Equal Opportunity for Biomass in Greenhouse Gas Accounting of CO2 Capture and Storage: A Step Towards More Cost-Effective Climate Change Mitigation Regimes", Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, Volume 11, Numbers 5-6 / September, 2006, DOI 10.1007/s11027-006-9034-9
http://www.springerlink.com/content/jpq486888v4767q5/
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 8:10 am
19 Jul 2008
Burn, baby, burn. Cure GHG disaster instantly!
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 8:11 am
19 Jul 2008
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 8:21 am
19 Jul 2008
The only thing amazing about you is your decision to believe only what you want to believe in the face of compelling information otherwise. Your responses continue to border on the absurd. If this is what I am to expect from Gristmill, I'll not come here often. This is amateur play and it's what gives environmentalists a bad reputation. You serve no one with your responses... especially the Earth.
Permalink
Jonas Posted 12:16 am
20 Jul 2008
When a forest burns, it combusts, and leaves behind ash, gas and 1 to 2% char. That's the nature of combustion.
Why else do you think the environmental community is so heavily against the burning of tropical rainforests? Why do you think deforestation through burning is such a big contributor to climate change (20% of all global emissions)?
Biochar exactly halts this phenomenon, because it depends not on wild combustion, but on controlled slow pyrolysis, leaving behind 50% char and gases used to replace fossil fuels.
Now please stop the embarrasing exposure of your ignorance.
Permalink
Jonas Posted 12:18 am
20 Jul 2008
-what's the 'carbon debt' of a reforestation effort?
-and should all reforestation efforts be banned?
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 12:29 am
20 Jul 2008
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 12:57 am
20 Jul 2008
And by using that waste stream biomass to produce biogas and organic fertilizer, more than 20 times more natural gas use can be offset. Making a zero carbon footprint possible much sooner, maybe in the 10 year time frame Gore is proposing.
Pyrolysis does not provide fertilizer, it sends vital organic nutrients up the smoke stack to pollute the atmosphere. It does not offset other combustion related GHG, like biogas can.
Woodgas from pyrolysis burned to produce energy gives off GHG. The addition of the char to soil increases organic matter conversion into GHG, canceling the purported offset activity of char.
Biogas from waste prevents methane and nitrous oxide release now occuring due to human intervention in the natural carbon cycle. Thus offsetting over 20 times the amount of GHG it releases.
Wood gas or biogas or natural gas, it should only be used in solid oxide fuel cell/turbine cogeneration at 70%+ efficiency, that should be an eventual goal. Replacing present ICE, turbine, and steam turbine power sources, for the grid and vehicles with these fuel cells.
Chemical ag to grow biomass to burn, directly or as fuel is a dangerous diversion from real solutions.
Another great Gore interview on "Meet the Press"! Al says it, we have to move all our energy use to renewables and renewable electricity, electric vehicles.
No more fakery from ethanol, biodeisel biofuel farming lobbyists and politicians, bribed by pork barrel industries.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Backcut Posted 1:03 am
20 Jul 2008
But there's good news on the horizon. The 9th Circuit Court judges have made a huge public step away from "judging" the science of the Forest Service. This just might open the door for fuels reduction projects to go forward, instead of being litigated to death.
It's time to stop "denying" that our forests need hands-on management to recover, or even survive.
Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 1:12 am
20 Jul 2008
Are you not aware that Mr. Gore is part of two firms that continue to make substantial investments in cellulosic ethanol? Seems he thinks it's a good idea as well. But you fail to mention this.
Permalink
Ron Steenblik Posted 1:15 am
20 Jul 2008
And in answer to your question, "Is anyone still talking about liquid biofuels, really? I thought that debate was over." Hardly! For one, that is the focus of this string. Second, countries and states such as Louisiana, Massachusetts and Pennsylvania are still enacting mandates for liquid biofuels. The interest groups behind these fuels are still very strong!
These are only my personal opinions.
Permalink
Ron Steenblik Posted 1:37 am
20 Jul 2008
You seem to be arguing that it's unreasonable to pay substantial subsidies to cellulosic ethanol producers when CE is commercialized and a regular, ongoing production process. I might agree with you, but we're not there yet. Everything happening with CE today is still in the R&D phase, even when we're in the stage of demonstrating that CE is commercially viable. These subsidies are completely appropriate and necessary right now. Down the road, I might well agree with you.
First of all, RD, I'm trying to get those who talk up CE to be consistent. At the beginning of this string, you spoke of "the viability of cellulosic ethanol" and about new cellulosic-ethanol facilities "being built at an increasingly faster pace to demonstrate both advancements in the technology, as well as commercial viability."
If one requires large subsidies to build a plant, and then to produce the fuel once the plant is up and running, in my book that is not "demonstrating ... commercial viability." Vinod Khosla talks about cellulosic ethanol as if it will be commercially viable by next year.
Cellulosic ethanol is no different, chemically, than corn ethanol or sugar ethanol, and needs no help from government to show that it can be used as a fuel. (That was demonstrated by Henry Ford a long time ago.) So what, other than meaning price competitive with gasoline, do you all mean by "commercially viable"?
So, basically, what will be demonstrated is that if you throw enough money at a technology, you will produce something. Gee.
I come back to my earlier question: if cellulosic ethanol was viable in February 2007 (when the DOE grants were given for most of the current demonstration plants) at $70 barrel oil and an excise tax credit of $0.51/gallon, why, only a bit more than a year later, when the price of a barrel of crude oil is $130 does it need a subsidy of $1.01/gallon?
Other countries that have provided subsidies for cellulosic ethanol, like Canada, have at least scheduled their subsidy rate to decline over time, have limited the total amount that can be provided over the life of the program, and have included a formula to reduce the per-unit subsidy rate if the price of crude oil rises.
The U.S. federal subsidy for cellulosic ethanol has none of those characteristics. So is $1.01/gallon exactly the right level, in your opinion? If the price of crude oil rises to $200 per barrel will it still be exactly the right level?
And when do you expect the subsidy will no longer be needed?
NB: corn ethanol has continued to be subsidized, without interruption, for 30 years.
These are only my personal opinions.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 1:39 am
20 Jul 2008
It may well turn out that cellulosic ethanol is best used as a replacement for oil in the production of virtually all the products we now get from oil... plastic, in particular. It may well turn out that ultimately, solar and wind are better sources for electricity than direct burning of biomass. And certainly, it will almost never be the case that conversion of rainforests, productive farmland, or even many grasslands over to "energy plantations" is a good thing. But we're not going to get from HERE to THERE in the short term.
In the short term, CE will be used to offset transportation fuels, because it's better to use biomass for this than oil. When cars get converted to electric technology, this use for CE will end.
In the short term, biomass will be directly burned to produce electricity and space heating. When solar, wind and other sources are pervasive throughout the U.S. and can produce electric power for these applications at a cheaper cost, biomass will phase out of this application and be used otherwise.
These are realities, and if folks like Amazingdrx don't understand this, then nothing they say can be taken seriously. Short term alternatives to oil and coal are necessary. Sustainably-harvested biomass is one of those.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 1:45 am
20 Jul 2008
The issue with cellulosic ethanol right now is that there are at least 10 different approaches to producing it, and no one knows for certain which will work and which will work best. This is the primary reasons subsidies are needed. This kind of research needs to take place. Everyone will be ultimately well served by it. But it is very risky (and expensive) for investors. They won't take these risks without help from the government.
Once one or two processes are shown to work well, I believe the subsidies should be (and will be) phased out fairly quickly.
Permalink
Whiskerfish Posted 2:29 am
20 Jul 2008
e.g.
The target of conserving 10% of the planet's surface as 'natural' in order to conserve wild biodiversity (a target set by some conservation organisations many years ago) is nowhere near sufficient to do that job. We need far, far more. ML Rosenzweig and others demonstrated this a long time ago. Before you carry on making asses of yourselves by saying we have enough land to produce biofuels and all the other stuff we need as well as conserve the world's wild species, do yourselves a favour and get a rudimentary understanding of island biogeography, species-area curves and so on into your heads. Hint: Start with figuring out the concept of 'zombie species'. Once you've done that, we can have a sensible discussion.
Have you guys even vaguely thought about the value of crop and timber 'waste' in terms of sustainable agriculture/forestry? Do you have the foggiest clue what it does to soil systems to remove all this stuff from the cycle, or change it's form before putting it back? Again, once you've demonstrated that you do - and you haven't - we can talk further.
Dead, bent, diseased and otherwise 'unhealthy' trees have huge and very important roles to play in just about every ecosystem, and not just because they give certain saprophytic fungi something to do. A study I've seen shows bird diversity dropping by about a third in sample plots in African savannas from which all dead wood was removed. Get beyond Pinchot - he had no real understanding of biodiversity.
Forests are not the only ecosystems that matter. One of the major loopholes in the EU 'sustainability standards' for biofuels is that they play into the public perceptions that ploughing up grasslands and semi-arid areas and so on is OK (unless they've been identified as being special or conserved as national parks - which in many countries will not happen) because you're not knocking down big trees. Many non-forest ecosystems are in bigger trouble than forests.
Think beyond the carbon cycle, please!
Whiskerfish
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 2:57 am
20 Jul 2008
Not sure which mud hole you've been swimming in, but you do realize the positions and statements you have made are in direct opposition to those of every major environmental group in the world, including WWF, Sierra Club, National Wildlife Federation, Greenpeace and others. All of these support the principles and activities of the Forest Stewardship Council (http://www.fsc.org) and the concept of sustainable forestry (NOT the conventional timber industry... there's a huge difference). Either you disagree with those groups and the FSC or you just didn't read through my postings. Which is it?
Permalink
Ron Steenblik Posted 3:27 am
20 Jul 2008
Sorry to keep coming back to this, but you still have not answered my question why, in February 2007, when crude oil was selling at $70 per barrel and the tax credit was $0.51/gallon, these plants went ahaead, but in May 2008, when crude oil was selling at above $120 per barrel, Congress thought it necessary to boost that subsidy by an additional $0.50, to a total of $1.01/gallon.
That is pertinent to your comment that:
Once one or two processes are shown to work well, I believe the subsidies should be (and will be) phased out fairly quickly. [My emphasis]
Where is your evidence to provide us with any degree of confidence that will be the case?
Again, I offer as counter-evidence: corn ethanol has been subsidized for 30 years. In 2006, when the price of oil was $60/barrel, the industry was crowing that it didn't need subsidies and could in fact compete with gasoline at $40/barrel. Now we are at $130/barrel, evidence is everywhere that biofuels are a major, if not the main factor contributing to the rise in the prices of food grains and oilseeds, and at the most Congress was willing to do was reduce the subsidy (starting next year) from $0.51 to $0.46 per gallon, and then only so that it could find money to boost the subsidy for cellulosic ethanol.
With a track record like that, can you blame people for being skeptical?
These are only my personal opinions.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 3:41 am
20 Jul 2008
I hear your frustration with the subsidy situation. Government supports have been all over the place over the years regarding many alternative energy endeavors, as well as other non-energy ventures. I share a lot of your frustration and agree "fairness" and appropriateness don't seem to be part of the equation.
We'll just have to see what happens.
Permalink
justlou Posted 4:18 am
20 Jul 2008
Rapidly escalating prices for production inputs already place corn ethanol in an economic squeeze even with the subsidies. These prices could easily spiral out of control reducing the profitability of corn growers as well as the ethanol plants. Many planned ethanol projects were dropped this year with the rising corn prices as well as higher prices for steel and other construction materials.
Also, we may have dodged a bullet with the midwest floods that have lowered production somewhat. But in the event of a major drought in the Midwest that could greatly lower production then the corn ethanol industry would basically have to shut their doors for at least a year. I imagine Congress would foot the bill for a major bailout should something like this happen.
Corn ethanol will continue to "farm the government" for a long time to come. They have their hat in the ring as a transition to cellulosic and they will hang on this to the end. That giant sucking noise we hear is right out my front window (and I have to admit, in my freaking fuel tanks).
Permalink
Wolverine Posted 5:00 am
20 Jul 2008
All this crap about biofuels being a solution to global warming is just propaganda. Re the transportation aspect of global warming, the only solution is to drive a lot less, ship a lot less, and change the remaining vehicles to electric ones that are powered by solar cells and wind generators. This is again why I and some others have said ad nauseam that without reducing consumption, none of these ecological problems can be solved.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 9:28 am
20 Jul 2008
When cellulosic ethanol from sustainably harvested, locally-managed, forests is available in a couple of years and you get to choose between using that or using imported oil, it's unfortunate to hear you say you'll just keep burning the oil.. cause, heck... it's all the same, as you say. What a brilliant fellow you are.
Permalink
Wolverine Posted 10:29 am
20 Jul 2008
First, I don't own a car, so I don't burn anything, though I realize that the buses and trains I use when I'm not walking or biking consume and burn fossil fuels in some form.
Second, I never said fossil fuels and plant-based fuels were the same. Biofuels are actually WORSE ecologically, unless their source is waste material like kitchen grease. You're claiming that killing trees in order to keep spoiled Americans in their cars is a good thing? Sorry, but you should only kill what you eat, and people don't eat trees. Moreover, there's no such thing as a sustainably managed forest; there are only sustainably managed tree farms, and even those are few and far between. The vast majority of logging is highly ecologically destructive, and I have no doubt that logging for ethanol or any other resource would be no different.
Third, ethanol is a big scam. Its emissions are little better than those of petroleum products, its production is causing far more harm than good, and its subsidies are nothing but tax payer ripoffs in order to benefit agribusiness. And I'll say it one last time: every fuel burned emits carbon dioxide at best. So, how would burning any type of biofuel reduce or eliminate greenhouse gas emissions?
Permalink
1Eco Posted 10:30 am
20 Jul 2008
YES conservation, however even with the current prices consumption is only down 10.5M gals per day. Could that be reduced by 100M gals per day?
Perhaps over time. To be sure it will require better MPG and less travel.
Keep in mind the largest demand comes for our NATIONAL SECURITY DEMANDS WHICH ARE REAL, something I have attempted to point out, however LOST that issue seems to be here.
LF is required regardless and BTL is but one potential attractive solution.
Solar and hydrogen are coming on via HONDA, however I have no idea if that idea will take hold or not because you are talking about major national fueling demands which are also REAL.
With regard to Ethanol. If you may recall the underground storage tanks were leaking and what was the potential danger to the water table, do you remember? The real why and how of ethanol came about because of this most important environmental remediation issue.
What was that cost for UST clean up, any guess?
SOLAR, WIND, Electric cars, fine. BUT What about real horse power needs. And what about mobility demands.
If solar, wind, electric cars can reduce current gasoline use to 200M gals per day, I say great, bring it on. IN FACT what are you waiting for.
Ecosystems empowerment for the rural poor.
Permalink
Backcut Posted 11:21 am
20 Jul 2008
So, are you going to eat the bug guts off the front windshield of the train or bus? Is it better for forests to burn than to be thinned? You want to talk about sustainability?? Mortality exceeds both growth AND harvesting combined on our National Forests. Our forest ecosystems cannot "sustain" that level of mortality
Since most of our National Forests have been logged at one time, those areas you have now designated as "tree farms" should be open to forest management now, eh? Surely you wouldn't stop scientists from prescribing beneficial activities in a tree farm, would you?!?
"The vast majority of logging is highly ecologically destructive..."
This blanket belief is pure ignorant urban legend. Today's loggers can pick and pluck individuals tree out of the forest with surgical precision, removing 100% of the logging slash and chipping what remains, leaving a forest vigorous, resilient and healthy. I'm only talking about American loggers and not advocating clearcutting, old growth removal or rainforest clearing.
Once again, now.... Wildfires are BAD for the environment...always bad! Mowing down the forest for petroleum substitutes is almost as bad.
PS Nice pics on my blog of the wilderness of Idaho. The Lost River Range is very wild and unspoiled country.
Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 1:35 pm
20 Jul 2008
Thank you for showing all of us just how truly ignorant you are.
So you, like one of your friends earlier, also disagree with the position of Sierra Club, Greenpeace, National Wildlife Federation, Friends of the Earth, WWF and most other environmental groups who not only support sustainable forestry but helped found the FSC (http://www.fsc.org) to promote it around the world. But that's right... I believe Earth First! never quite came on board with it. Guess your part of that wing of the environmental movement. That's OK. Like I said, ignorant. But you've got as much right being here as the next person and I'll continue to respect that. It's just few people could consider your positions as being intelligent, let alone respectful of the millions of indigenous and local peoples around the world who understand what it means to work in harmony with the Earth.
Permalink
Backcut Posted 2:11 pm
20 Jul 2008
Besides, wouldn't it be even better for the environment to cut those excess trees and sequester their carbon in the form of durable wood products?
If we can get Jerry Franklin and the 9th Circuit Court judges to change their minds about forest management, why not mainstream "green folks"??!?
Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 2:18 pm
20 Jul 2008
Note that there are some large forests certified to FSC standards in Canada, though still very much the minority.
We can get all the biomass we need for the purpose of replacing oil, natural gas and coal from forests harvested to FSC standards. I'm not saying there's anywhere near enough certified forest yet in the US, but we can get there.
Permalink
Ron Steenblik Posted 4:24 pm
20 Jul 2008
For example, you may accuse somebody of making a ignorant comment, but not that they themselves are ignorant.
On with the debate.
These are only my personal opinions.
Permalink
Applied Ecotechnics Posted 6:55 pm
20 Jul 2008
Consider that 2/3 of the raw tonnage of material that goes into a landfill is organic.
That represents a huge amount of raw material for organic decomposition for biofuel.
With the growing trend towards mandatory composting and the ability to cooperatively cross couple several types of biofuels production into one overall system the level of fuel and energy production which can be produce from organic waste material already available is massive.
Visit our website or email us for more information as we are actively looking for people to work with to help improve the future of our civilization.
Permalink
Applied Ecotechnics Posted 7:00 pm
20 Jul 2008
Organic wastes from trash, sewage and other sources can produce an immense amount of energy in way that is clean, safe, efficient, profitable and truly renewable.
Consider this: How many millions of tons of sewage are disposed of every year and how many cubic yards of methane (~"natural gas") can be produced per ton?
As long as there are living things there will be organic waste.
Visit our website or email us for more information as we are actively looking for people to work with to help improve the future of our civilization.
Permalink
Backcut Posted 8:39 pm
20 Jul 2008
Why should the taxpayers have to pay for FSC certification? Sounds like blackmail, to me.
Science says that only so many trees of certain sizes can grow on a given piece of land. What is wrong with cutting the excess trees growing on that piece of ground? Is it better that forests burn to reduce that excess amount of trees? People just can't seem to scientifically justify their emotionally-dogmatic forest beliefs, even when top scientists warn them of the dire consequences (sound familiar?!?).
Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 9:29 pm
20 Jul 2008
After using that phrase, I reflected back on a time in my earlier days... I was around 21-22... went I was a Psychology major in college and boarding with a student majoring in Forestry. Coming from an upbringing in which I had had no exposure to logging and forestry work... and seeking to live a "least impact possible, vegetarian, spiritual seeker" lifestyle... I tended to argue with this fellow daily about the merits of cutting trees. To me, it seemed unnecessary, even brutal and barbaric.
Of course, I was ignorant (or my thinking was ignorant... however you want to put it, Ron). I was totally disconnected from the fact that I loved (and depended on) wooden things in my life... furniture, wood flooring, wall paneling, newspapers and books, rayon clothes, cereal boxes, toothpaste, baseball bats, and many of the other 5,000 or so products that come from trees.
I hadn't worked a day in my life in the woods. I had had no exposure to cultures that lived in intimate harmony with forests, using trees to sustain their lives while carefully managing those forests... cultures like the Swedes, Norwegians, and Germans... you know, rather intelligent people.
As fate would have it, after graduating from college, I went out into the deep forests of Vermont to build a community of like-minded people. I wanted to build my own home (a log cabin), completely disconnected from the grid, in the middle of a forest along a beaver pond. I bought a chain saw, determined to do this on my own with a few friends... but knowing nothing about what I was doing. I cut my first tree... and completely fell in love with working in the woods.
The next 30 years were spent learning what it means to work with forests in a sustainable manner... learning what it takes to make sure everyone else who fully enjoys the benefits of using wood in their lives can be sure that someone took the time to harvest those trees with the most respect and care they could.
I also quickly learned that tremendous volumes of trees were being cut every day by others who were in it just for the money... who saw forests as simply a resource to be mined. I saw it could be done differently and set about to provide wood products that were harvested with care and respect.
At a certain point, everyone gets to choose if they're going to live in a cave (which is a fair choice) or out in the world at large. If you're in the modern world, you're using wood. If you care about your impact on the environment, then you need to support those who supply wood products which reduce impact on the environment. It's that simple.
But it's also more complex, because so many of the products we use are dependent on oil... like the plastics that make up your computer (Wolverine). I'd much rather know that this plastic came from a renewable tree harvested sustainably than from another gallon of oil. And soon I'll be able to make that choice.
Fact is, 99% of US forests have been cut at one time or another. There are essentially no "virgin" forests left in the US. Mankind has left its mark on forests everywhere, and in many cases, the harvesting of the past was not done sustainably. We have a chance now to undo some of that damage... to help forests become more productive and more complex, while growing better soil and producing more diverse habitat. And... we can still get the benefits of having large volumes of wood products available for many kinds of important products.
Think about all the things in your life that originate from forests... then think about all the products you use that come from non-renewable sources. Which would you prefer to support?
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 9:43 pm
20 Jul 2008
Here are a few reasons for the FSC. This applies primarily to US forests. There are other critical issues that apply in other regions.
Because despite any regulations you might think are in place by national or local governments, unrestrained clearcutting and high-grading (cutting only the biggest and best trees) still takes place everyday across forests of the U.S. Do you wish to buy wood products that came from these? I don't. Buying products with an FSC label assures you and me that proper care was applied.
Because under standard timber industry guidelines, you can still take a diverse forest of hardwoods and softwoods (with all the biodiversity it contains) and clear it, completely, then replant it to a monoculture of fast-growing softwoods (often applying copious amounts of pesticides) which support a fraction of the original biodiversity. This is where most of our structural housing material comes from. But there's a different, more sustainable, approach that can give us the same building materials... albeit, perhaps with a small price premium (under 5%). I prefer the latter.
Because even in California (which has strict harvesting guidelines), if we open up millions of acres of forests to thinning procedures to reduce fire damage, there aren't adequate safeguards in place to make sure a certain percentage of very mature, high-quality trees won't be removed as part of the thinning process when these trees really could (and should) be left standing. Why is this? Because like I said, different people see forests in different ways. Some want to mine it; some want to work sustainably with it. We've cut enough old growth. I want to know systems are in place to protect the remaining old growth, and the FSC helps to assure that.
Permalink
justlou Posted 9:52 pm
20 Jul 2008
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 9:59 pm
20 Jul 2008
I understand your concerns.
What I suggest you do is visit a sustainably managed forest and decide for yourself once you've actually seen and felt what this means. Restrain judgment until then. I'd be happy to suggest such a forest within reach of you if you wish to visit one. They can be found throughout the US and Canada.
Permalink
justlou Posted 10:39 pm
20 Jul 2008
I don't think we have a chance unless there is a radical transformation of worldviews that humbles man and greatly diminishes his numbers on earth. I don't expect this to happen. We are shuffling the cards in a game called the big fall. Very sad, but most likely true.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 11:07 pm
20 Jul 2008
Now we're getting somewhere. I think we share a common frustration regarding the huge lack of sustainability throughout the world across the board of a wide range of activities. It can certainly seem as though there's little hope in finding a solution to the increasing demands of a rising population and the lack of care so many have about how their lives impact the Earth. It is certainly questionable how much longer we can go on the path we're currently on.
The Menominee Nation is a great example of sustainable forestry, but what they do is not common practice. It should be and it can be, but it isn't. How do we get from where we are to where we need to get to?
There's only so much any one person can do. Environmental activism or work within an environmental business are great and worthy endeavors. But even these, in the end, are no replacement for the "consciousness raising" work we each need to do on our own. Whether or not the overall consciousness of people will rise quickly enough is the question of the day. But I believe it starts with each one of us, and I have found that too many in the environmental community prefer to preach personal agendas to others before doing their own inner work (I'm not speaking about you personally, Justlou).
It all seems overwhelming at times. However, there is still time and there is still hope. And as long as that's the case, I'll do everything I can to create a better world. I trust each of you will do the same.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 11:54 pm
20 Jul 2008
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 12:07 am
21 Jul 2008
That's it ecotech, if manure, crop waste, sewage, garbage, industrial organic waste like wood, paper making, beer making waste (this is in operation in several breweries that convert the biogas to electricity using solid oxode fuel cell cogeneration) is converted to biogas it also yeilds organic fertilizer.
Offsetting over 20 times the GHG produced when it is burned. No other use of biomass can match this carbon offset. So add in 20 times the natural gas for a net zero carbon footprint backup power source for transportation and power generation. Garbage trucks run on landfill gas in a few places already.
Tractors could run on farm biogas saving farms from bankruptcy due to high fuel and fertilizer costs.
(This seems to really annoy some other biofuel advocates, hehey.)
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 12:11 am
21 Jul 2008
I have no argument with what you are saying. Fine. Do it. But it's not nearly enough. That's the point you just don't seem to get.
OK... "your" idea is great. Congratulations. What else can I say? It's just not enough. Do the math.
Permalink
Backcut Posted 12:36 am
21 Jul 2008
The battle against clearcutting was won in the LAST millenium. I haven't installed a clearcut since 1989. Region 5 of the Forest Service voluntarily banned clearcutting and the cutting of 30"+ dbh trees, to keep the California Spotted Owl from becoming listed. Most timber sales also have "diameter limits" which retain all those massive trees. However, in areas where there are an excess of trees in the 18-26" dbh size, shouldn't we be able to take a few of those trees to make sure the sale (along with its embedded non-commercial restoration work) will sell on the open market.
"Because under standard timber industry guidelines, you can still take a diverse forest of hardwoods and softwoods (with all the biodiversity it contains) and clear it, completely, then replant it to a monoculture of fast-growing softwoods (often applying copious amounts of pesticides) which support a fraction of the original biodiversity. This is where most of our structural housing material comes from. But there's a different, more sustainable, approach that can give us the same building materials... albeit, perhaps with a small price premium (under 5%). I prefer the latter."
Once again, we don't do that kind of heavy-handed conversions anymore in the Forest Service. Private timber companies still do, though. Most of our projects involve cutting trees in the 9-18" dbh range. Thinning from below.
"Because even in California (which has strict harvesting guidelines), if we open up millions of acres of forests to thinning procedures to reduce fire damage, there aren't adequate safeguards in place to make sure a certain percentage of very mature, high-quality trees won't be removed as part of the thinning process when these trees really could (and should) be left standing. Why is this? Because like I said, different people see forests in different ways. Some want to mine it; some want to work sustainably with it. We've cut enough old growth. I want to know systems are in place to protect the remaining old growth, and the FSC helps to assure that."
Without harvesting trees in the 18-26" dbh size, no fuels reduction project would ever sell. That is because we always include some non-commercial work, like plantation thinning, whole tree yarding and required road maintenance. Picking and plucking a few of these decidedly mid-sized excess trees makes the rest of the project economical.
Of course, the FSC doesn't care about economics. And the public seems not to care that Forest Service lands aren't FSC certified. The Forest Service doesn't care that they aren't certified, either. I'm not going to say that all timber projects are good for the environment, though. That's where we need public involvement and oversight, so get in the game and see for yourselves!
Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com
Permalink
Whiskerfish Posted 12:47 am
21 Jul 2008
you know you've really got a point when your questions are ducked that profoundly!
RDMiller - I refer you back to my earlier post. Try again! Or confess that you have no idea about extinction rates and how they are tied to area, conservation planning, the land requirements of such etc. Your evocation of the Saintly Orders of Big Conservation is a huge mistake: Having worked for some of them, analysed policy, written on the massive myopia within the FSC guidelines (which, inter alia, have for years given a nearly-free ride to timber plantations established on incredibly fragile non-forest land) I'm not about to be inaccurately told that my views contradict theirs, and not about to make it into a problem if they do.
Stupenduously narrow-minded and unscientific stuff gets churned out by Big Conservation every day by people who know less than nothing about simple diversity - the diversity of species, and the diversity of ecosystems. Fund-raising, not science, is the main driver of much their activity. Your evocation of the decades-out-of-date 10% of the planet for conservation land is proof that you're talking way out of your depth. 10% was a thumbsuck, a marketing tool, long since discredited by even its inventors.
Once you've answered my points -- one by one, carefully, not running away from them -- give me a per-hectare yield of your mythical sustainably forest-derived cellulosic ethanol, tell me how you're going to produce the stuff vaguely efficiently without clear-cutting or wrecking a forest's biodiversity/nutrient cycling over time, and how on earth, if cellulosic e turns out to be genuinely cheap and eco-friendly, you'll deal with runaway demand driving truly astonishing land-use change and wildland destruction (hint: It's called Jevons Paradox, it's not really a paradox, and it's real).
As for Backcut - oh dear! - fires are ALWAYS bad in forests? Again, basic ecological ignorance - nothing more. A single essentialised piece of nonsense like that, unwithdrawn, and we can safely write you off as a serious participant in this conversation.
Whiskerfish
Permalink
Backcut Posted 12:55 am
21 Jul 2008
Free range fire is NOT our friend! Not in our unnaturally overstocked forests!
Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 12:59 am
21 Jul 2008
First of all, one of the main reasons clearcuts are no longer allowed in most US Forest Service forests is because of the FSC and the work of the environmental community. I was there in the midst of that fight in the late 80's and I know this for a fact. Pressure from numerous big wood users who wanted to stop the boycotts led them to help force an end to the mess of that earlier time. But you probably know that.
With respect to my statements about clearcutting and conversion of diverse forests to plantations, I didn't say this a big problem on public lands. But it remains a big problem on private lands, and the great majority of US forests lie in private hands.
With respect to the issue of cutting larger trees in thinning projects, I understand very much the challenge you folks face. It has been hard to do these necessary thinning projects and make them commercially viable without adding in a few big, mature trees here and there. But it is this piece which still causes the tension, because there's too much variability in what one forester might want to include in a stand cut (in terms of how many, and which, mature trees to mark for sale) versus another forester. There's also not enough of a thorough inspection process to make sure the loggers then remove only the designated trees. Until this tension is resolved, many of these (needed) thinnings won't take place.
The solution is to use an INDEPENDENT body, like an FSC certification agent, to oversee the harvest. This gives the environmental community the comfort it needs to support the thinnings.
But something much more important is now taking place, and it's something most foresters just don't quite understand yet. Because of the dramatic increase in the price of energy, the value of trees which should be removed as part of a thinning has now risen DRAMATICALLY... more than enough to offset a reduction in the harvesting of mature timber while still making the harvest very profitable... more profitable than ever before. The problem is, there's still a disconnect between the value of using this wood to offset oil and coal as energy, versus the value of this wood as a conventional forest product. Until that connection is made, this wood will be greatly under-valued, leading to tension and a lack of progress on conducting the necessary thinnings. But it'll be figured out before long, and when it is, I think you'll find resolution to many of the challenges at hand.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 1:31 am
21 Jul 2008
Ir would take a decade or two to get to the zero carbon footprint, but that is understandable with any plan. It will take time. As renewable energy increases and devices like plugin hybrids and ground source heat pumps to use that GHG free electricity, the demand for backup fuel will diminish.
The amount of biogas/natural gas will increase as more and more waste is incorporated in the biodigestion system. The decrease in fuel demand will meet the increase in zero carbon footprint biogas/natural gas fuel. That could happen in as soon as 10 year with a WW 2 war production like natiopnal and global effort.
Now back to the idea of turning biomass into liquid fuel. The plan to convert trees to biodiesel is going forward here in northern Wisconsin with government funding. When these logs come into the plant will the industry make sure these logs are harvested "sustainably" (whatever that means?).
Maybe so. But the current idea of sustainable logging here seems to be to clear cut, leave the flammable brush and dead or twisted wood behind in piles (they used to burn it! Yikes). Then sometimes put a tree farm, in neat rows in it's place. Monoculture vulnerable to drought, disease, and fire, unfriendly to wildlife. Is that "sustainable"?
Like Canis says about the word "sustainable", it has become a foggy term, overused and indefinable. An excuse to feed bottomline profit and tell those of us who point out the forest fire feeding waste wood drying in the sun, that we are tree hugging (ignorant?) hippies who don't understand forest managment.
I am in favor of forestors like backcut who remember older managment practices leading a new version of the old CCC (Civilian conservation Corps), with modern low impact logging/chipping machines, to go into drought and disease devestated forests and harvest the dead wood and brush at great fire risk for fiber for chip board, paper, and biodigestion energy and fertilizer production.
I find the whole concept of "sustainable" fataly flawed. A new term is needed. I like symbiotic better. But the debate continues. My take on the controversey:
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog/_archives/2008/7/14/ ...
The idea of growing crops or trees for biofuel conversion is not carbon neutral or carbon negative, even with biochar. It will always run into that inconvenient carbon cycle, interupting natural carbon sequestration.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 1:49 am
21 Jul 2008
You're way out of your league, so be careful. It's obvious to me you are a "know it all." You are clearly saying you know more than all the folks behind the FSC, the hundreds of thousands of landowners around the world practicing sustainable forestry for decades (and even centuries in some cases), and the dozens of mainstream environmental groups which started the FSC and support it. You really think anyone should take your positions seriously?
As far as specific numbers are concerned, here's a starter for you.
Start with the assumption a typical forest in the US contains 50-100 tons of standing biomass. Keep in mind EVERY ONE of these forests has either been harvested numerous times already or has regrown from open land (which was previously forest)... so we're not talking about any virgin forest and we are assuming much of the original biodiversity is gone.
A so-called "improvement cut" should be limited to about 1/3 of the standing trees (but this is very variable, depending on the forest). If this harvest is focused on thinning out over-crowded, diseased and less desirable trees, the forest left behind will increase in productivity AND health. In other words, 10-20 years down the road there would be MORE biomass there and better quality trees. Let's leave the "word" arguments aside for now (such as whether any given tree is better or worse than another).
If this harvest is done correctly, extra care would be taken to leave a percentage of woody material on the ground to increase soil health and improve habitat. Again, let's not argue on this point because we know, from hundreds of studies, that this can be the case. The Menominee Nation's forests are one example.
Now do the numbers. For the sake of a discussion, let's say we do this on 400 million acres of forests... about half of the forest land in the US. That gives us the potential to sustainably harvest 8 billion tons of biomass (400 million acres x 20 tons per acre). Now we're talking about a one time harvest here. We can discuss what an ongoing level of sustainably-harvested biomass might look like over a period of 100 years in another discussion.
The cellulosic ethanol guys are telling us we're now up to being able to produce around 100 gallons of gasoline per ton of wood. So this 8 billion tons of biomass gives us 800 billion gallons of gasoline... or something like 6 years worth of all the imported gasoline used in the US.
It would take someone with a lot more economic skills than me to figure out the positive economic values we could realize by shutting off all oil imports (for gasoline usage) for a period of six years, PLUS plowing all this money back into rural communities and private (and public) landowners... and employing hundreds of thousands of people to carry this out... and improving forests across the US.
This nice six year window might even give us enough time to bring electric vehicles on board, all the while dramatically reducing the CO2 impact from all the oil not used (because the biomass will all grow back).
Now add to this the ongoing annual regrowth of biomass to sustain this program indefinitely. Then add on the huge amount of biomass we can get from dedicated energy plantations of switchgrass and hybrid poplars and willows grown on marginal lands.
There's your picture, Whiskerfish.
Now I am NOT saying we should use this biomass for cellulosic ethanol to replace oil. A case can be made we're better off burning lots of it for heat and/or electricity, or displacing oil-based products (like plastic) with this cellulosic ethanol. I'm simply demonstrating the potential to grow and harvest forests sustainably and produce biomass to displace oil and coal.
Whiskerfish... if I was to bring you to a typical forest where 1/3 of the biomass was removed in a respectful, careful manner.. and then brought you back ten years later... I believe you'd be impressed with the results. I can bring you to many such forests I have harvested myself anytime you want to pay me a visit in Vermont.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 1:58 am
21 Jul 2008
Your concerns about what is "sustainable forestry" and what isn't is very much a fair and important discussion. And I have no doubt too much of what is happening in Wisconsin is NOT sustainable forestry. And you should be concerned with this.
This is exactly why the FSC was created... and created by (as I've said several times already) leading environmental groups (along with many others). We need independent bodies to certify the kind of forestry taking place. Otherwise, we have nothing to assure it is taking place... and too many in the forest products industry will revert back to "timber mining" and worse.
It's the same as with organic food. We have independent certifiers who MUST certify any claims of "organic". I'm not buying organic food unless I KNOW it is produced organically. The claim of the manufacturer itself isn't good enough for me.
So demand that any biomass used for energy be grown and harvested according to FSC standards. It's the only assurance we have that forests will increase in health... not decline.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 2:10 am
21 Jul 2008
The quality of the forest eco-system and all it's species can't be described simply by the mass of the biomass harvested and produced.
This approach is fatally flawed. In fact it is the same flaw our whole human culture has when dealing with the natural world we live in. It is seen as a numbers game, a quantifiable resource for human exploitation.
We have to get to a value system based on quality of life, all life on the planet, operating in symbiosis, rather than a bottomline, mechanistic, linear, engineering point of view.
These are tools humanity has been given, logical mechanistic thought and perception, not the end all of human ethical, artistic, and spiritual values. If we don't end the hegemony of corporatist political/economic structure driven by this linear/bottomline thinking, it could be the literal end of all life as we know it.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 2:30 am
21 Jul 2008
Man, you are tough to get through to. For some reason, you keep ignoring the deeper sentiment I've clearly put forward... the places where we both connect and share values... and instead focus on stating my position as something I've clearly described otherwise. I give up. Think what you wish.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 2:48 am
21 Jul 2008
I see modern low impact forestry machinery, mainly developing in scandanaivia, as a better technolgy for forest eco-systems and safety for loggers. Logging is even more dangerous than mining.
I would like to see some of the grant money for wood to biodiesel plants diverted to university/industry colaboration on better equipment and biodigestion systems to use wood waste at great fire risk. Use the lumber and pulp wood yes, that sequesters carbon, but use all the "slash" too.
Then return soil ammendment/organic fertilizer from the digestor to help forest soil maintain moisture and increase biomass and fertility. old style hand tree planting replaced with machine planting that places seedlings in a random pattern, rather than in tree farm monocultural fashion.
Seedlings that are sprouted from selected seed from healthy trees, instead of genetically modified forest mono-crops. Each seedling with an injection of soil ammendment around it to hold moisture and improve viability.
Think of all those good forestry jobs, that would really restore the sagging logging country economy. Here in northern Wisconsin and the UP, independent loggers and truckers can't afford to buy the fuel to stay in business.
Why not put these people to work fixing our devestated forests and save their families from bankruptcy? And stimulate the economy and get a good clean, carbon offsetting, backup energy source for a wind and solar and wave powered grid.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 3:01 am
21 Jul 2008
A little humor goes a long way in dispelling that inevitable frustration (invective tends to increase it, hehey). I suspect we would agree out on the trail, viewing different forests we have passed through time and time again.
I run or bike or ski past trees marked for cutting, slash piles, tree farms from the 30s, and trash left by loggers almost daily. But I mainly get to run past natural forest with little trace left of human devestation, I am thankfull for that.
When will it pass the 50% point? Half slash piles and logging trash, half natural forest? With biodiesel from trees that could happen in a few short years. We can both agree that would not be a desirable outcome.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Whiskerfish Posted 3:59 am
21 Jul 2008
you seem to have a fundamental misunderstanding of what the FSC is and who controls it.
It is NOT 'independent', i.e. not independent of the major timber/pulp companies. They are an integral part of it, along with some conservation organisations. There is huge tension within the FSC, as many of the wood corps spend lots of time trying to water its mandate down, and often succeed.
As I and others have documented, the FSC has given its label to millions of hectares of monocultural tree farms that have been established on extremely fragile wildlands in various parts of the world. For example, in South Africa, FSC-certified plantations have wrecked grasslands, contributed to species extinctions, and dried up major rivers that hundreds of thousands of people and much wildlife depend on. If you doubt what I say, read for yourself what Sappi and Mondi have done to the grasslands of the Mpumalanga escarpment, and the rivers that flow down it.
The FSC also certifies paper that is only partly sourced from certified sources, thus giving 'cover' to unsustainably-sourced pulp all over the world. I can buy paper in the store down the road from my house that carries an FSC label yet is almost half made of old-growth or unsustainably harvested forest in the former Soviet Union. The other pulp comes from the aforementioned South African 'green death' tree farms.
The world's forests may (or may not) be better off for the existence of the FSC, but it's a deeply flawed organisation. Your reification of it betrays a major misunderstanding of how it operates and what it is capable of - or perhaps you just work there?
If even a 'respectable' organisation such as the FSC provides cover for so many harmful shenanigans, how on earth do you expect US forests to be safe from abuse once the cellulosic ethanol plants go up?
Whiskerfish
Permalink
Backcut Posted 4:07 am
21 Jul 2008
My idea is to have portable co-gen plants that supply electricity to the grid at strategic spots throughout our National Forests. Minimize the pollution impacts and transportation costs. Create forest maintenance infrastructure so we can sustainably manage forests (I mean tree farms) back into a more natural condition.
Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 4:21 am
21 Jul 2008
I don't think I have any misunderstanding of the FSC, as I am one of the original very small group of founders. I know exactly what it's about and the tensions within it. I should point out I have not been directly associated with the FSC for the past 7-8 years, so this does not reflect any personal ongoing connection I have with it.
The FSC is not perfect... just as you most certainly are not. It is learning as it goes, just as you are. However, the principles of sustainable forestry underlying the FSC are the best we have in the world today, as far as trying to find a balance between protecting forests and the requirements of industry to produce large volume of product at affordable prices. This is a very difficult balance to maintain.
One thing is certain and that is that the presence of the FSC has dramatically shifted the way forest harvesting has been done over the past 17 years toward something much more sustainable than it was. This has resulted in hundreds of millions of acres of forest being harvested in a more respectful, careful manner. This is certainly a good thing.
With respect to the issue of certified paper, I share your concern and have spoken out strongly to the FSC about it. I hope we'll see a change in policy before long.
To describe the FSC as a "deeply flawed organization" is unproductive and silly, and simply shows immaturity on your part. Have you done better or more than the FSC? If so, please tell us of your long list of accomplishments. I'm all ears.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 4:29 am
21 Jul 2008
As usual, California is ahead of the curve. What you're working on sounds great.
But the statement of yours that no one will buy the logging slash because other biomass is available for free, simply means that the powers that be in California, as well as the energy producers in that area, haven't figured out how to connect the value of that waste biomass with the energy needs of local energy users. But I can assure you it is a cheaper source of energy than oil, coal, electric, nuclear and natural gas... and sooner or later, someone will figure that out. Until then, it's a shame to see it truly wasted.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 4:33 am
21 Jul 2008
There's far more in this post of yours that I agree with, than disagree with. We're probably much closer on this topic than our debating might seem to show.
I'm happy to leave it at that.. for now, anyway.
Richard
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 4:35 am
21 Jul 2008
It won't be a commercial enterprise at first anyway, government needs to step in and fund the rehabilitation of the mess that profit based logging has left in it's short sighted wake.
It should be chipped and digested not burned. burning it for energy is scarcely better than forest fire, from a GHG stand point.
Transporting and harvesting the wood waste with diesel fuel will not be a good idea either.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 4:39 am
21 Jul 2008
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 4:40 am
21 Jul 2008
It would be really great to talk about these issues while walking along in our beloved forests. With all the bloggers here present.
Maybe someday. Get on that Grist! A nice forestry conference at bio-d's favorite forest location? Hehey, I know he wouldn't want us trampling in it though.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 4:45 am
21 Jul 2008
"burning it for energy is scarcely better than forest fire, from a GHG stand point."
If you burn it for energy, you MUST factor in the oil or coal that is displaced. This means you're reducing the GHG contribution by roughly 1/2! To say this is "scarcely better" is silly.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 4:55 am
21 Jul 2008
But you are right it is much more than "barely" better than a forest fire, or using coal for backup power. Point taken. Hehey.
Politeness, it rocks.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 5:09 am
21 Jul 2008
How much energy is there in that resource? It's well worth researching. Meanwhile I will try to estimate how much high nitrogen waste could be obtained from the waste stream for biogas production.
Are both of these paths practical? Biodigestion and combustion of waste wood? I would like to look into solid oxide fuel cell/turbine generators for the waste wood, instead of combustion. Hooked up to the grid, maybe portable as backct suggests, moved from forest region to region as crews work on collecting the dead wood.
Very interesting research areas Rich!
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 5:19 am
21 Jul 2008
I would be very interested in learning more about any advanced methods for utilizing biomass that are more energy efficient and better at addressing GHG issues. I've never been stuck on pushing one method over another. Let's go for the best possible way to produce energy and offset non-renewables through biomass utilization... as well as the tightest restrictions on forest harvesting to best assure the health of forests.
Permalink
Whiskerfish Posted 5:47 am
21 Jul 2008
again - you tell me I'm a know-it-all in way beyond my depth - but I'm just repeating your words back to you! My bull-in-a-china-shop approach has led you to underestimate me and overstate your case. This is good - the holes in your underwear are gaping wide, and we're getting a good look at the stuff that matters.
As always, the devil is in the details (especially the details of basic definitions) and if we go into the underpinnings of your ideas things start to look really wobbly...
e.g. 1) You said "The solution is to use an INDEPENDENT body, like an FSC certification agent, to oversee the harvest. This gives the environmental community the comfort it needs to support the thinnings."
2) Then you admit that the FSC is, in fact, not independent of Big Timber. By extension, their certification agents aren't, either, since their job is to ascertain whether people are conforming to the FSC requirements (determined, in part, by Big Timber).
But let's, for fun, take it further:
3) Actually, there are more serious problems with the system than this: The certification agents are worse than not independent - they operate in a competitive market, and thus have a powerful incentive to overlook all sorts of infractions on behalf of their clients. In a typical market there are anywhere upwards of half-a-dozen FSC certification agents vying for business. If you were a less than scrupulous forest or plantation cutter, would you pay the guy who gives you a clean bill of health? Or the one who tells you to buck up, spend money, and comply with the FSC regs? Go figure. And if I'm a journalist that wants to see a certification agent's report on a particular operation? Oops - sorry - it's confidential. So no one who is actually independent can verify a damn thing.
When I (wearing my journalist hat) investigated this system in South Africa I was told by the big certification agents that they kept themselves honest because they represented big companies with big reputations to uphold. They refused to walk me through the certification process (intellectual property reasons, apparently) and refused to tell me how many infractions they had noted in the previous year. In short, they were thoroughly untransparent. I could not stop the word 'Enron' appearing in my dreams.
That's why I say the FSC is a deeply flawed organisation. The mechanism that underpins enforcement is open to abuse and incentivises evasion. Your involvement in its formulation seems to have blinded you to these fundamental flaws. Parents are so often biased towards their children, huh?
If the FSC's the model you're proposing to regulate biomass harvesting, your scheme is in big trouble. This is not a trivial point: You've not addressed the Khazzoom-Brookes Postulate, aka Jevons Paradox. Without effective regulation, your brilliant idea will end up driving the degradation of millions of hectares of forestland.
I repeat: If cellulosic ethanol production from forest-sourced biomass does prove to be cheap and efficient, it will unleash huge energy consumption and runaway demand, ESPECIALLY if the machines that will burn this ethanol are highly efficient. This is already happening with first-gen liquid transport biofuels. Khazzoom-Brookes shows that efficiency drives increased use, not decreased use, given certain circumstances. These circumstances apply to liquid fuel use for the forseeable future.
Efficiently-produced liquid biofuel will drive more, and more unethical, forest destruction - not save forests. It's extremely dangerous to be looking for more excuses to use more biomass and land for more things. You're willing an evil genie out of a very small bottle into which it will not want to return.
Whiskerfish
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 6:14 am
21 Jul 2008
I'll not go into each of your points individually, because you've demonstrated you can't debate a point without distorting what others say.
That said, I've made it unquestionably clear in my last response to you that the FSC is not perfect. In fact, I was one of the loudest critics early on, demanding a higher level of independence for the FSC and its agents, as well as tougher inspections. The FSC still has some growing to do... and it does need to do that rather quickly. Time will tell if it succeeds at this. If not, something better will come along, because those in the marketplace (like yourself) will demand a higher level of quality from any certification brand which seeks to label wood products as "sustainably harvested".
The matter of what the impact could be to forests if, and when, the use of forest biomass for energy substantially increases, is something of great concern to me. So in this respect, I share your warnings and concerns. It could get out of hand... no question about it.
But here's the thing: there's not a lot that can be done to stop the increased use of biomass for energy, because it's available, cheap, distributed and uses known technology (not including cellulosic ethanol, which is not quite proven yet). So rather than sitting on the sidelines complaining about it, I suggest doing something NOW to avoid the worst impacts and create the best.
I am aggressively moving ahead with my own plans to establish a biomass-based energy business I think you would be comfortable with. I'll tell you that the standards my business will use to ensure sustainable forestry will be at the upper end of what the FSC supports. And if the FSC can't get its act together to independently certify what I do... and do so with enough integrity that competitors can't slip by with significantly lower performance... I'll be devoting a good part of my time to creating a competitor to the FSC. Because your concerns are valid, and when energy use drives forest harvesting, the impacts could potentially dwarf what the FSC is currently doing with respect to standard wood products.
We definitely don't want that evil genie to leave the bottle.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 7:56 am
21 Jul 2008
Along the lines of backcut's portable distributed wood waste powered grid generation. Forestry machinery to cut, chip, and haul the recycled wood could run on woodgas produced in the portable power station.
Diesel engines would be easy to convert. It would save using oil for the harvesting energy. Solid oxide fuel cell/turbine generation could provide waste heat to cook the chips to produce the gas and it would run in the machinery and in the fuel cell.
The charcoal would be left over. Perhaps sold for water and air pollution filtration use, that sequesters the carbon too. And it's very green, with decent profits.
Now there's a research project for the UW engineering students.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Whiskerfish Posted 7:26 pm
21 Jul 2008
RDMiller: You claim I distort points, and can't be debated with. Hmmm. The point that I hung you up on was a verbatim quote from an earlier post of yours in this thread, nothing added and nothing deleted.
Perhaps you'd like to show how I distorted what you provided us with?
Perhaps you'd also like to explain how rhetoric like 'healthy forests' (a term of such infinitely variable meaning as to be utterly helpless) and blanket statements such as those Backcut is given to making re fire etc. get us any further here?
I fear you've yet to comprehend how problematic your language is.
I fear you've also not quite comprehended that the problem here is not merely a technical one: It's far more fundamental than that. It's a question of attitudes and how to form them. No amount of good technology is going to help when the people who operate it are stuck in eco-destructive modes of thinking.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions. Heard that somewhere before?
Whiskerfish
Permalink
Applied Ecotechnics Posted 8:07 pm
21 Jul 2008
Actually we need at least three.
Good, non-food based biofuels and integrated comprehensive biofuels programs such as our own ORB system.
We need big increases in efficiency in our industry and daily lives.
We need people to stop thinking of energy as something they can just use and disregard. All energy use has an impact, even the best biolfuels. The bird in a guilded cage mentality just won't cut it or no amount of technological advancement will be able to keep ahead of constantly growing demand.
Visit our website or email us for more information as we are actively looking for people to work with to help improve the future of our civilization.
Permalink
Applied Ecotechnics Posted 8:13 pm
21 Jul 2008
Consider the use of the output fertilizer for growing biodiesel crops and you have further benefit, especially if you do so on the usually poorly reclaimed former strip mines which we have many thousands of acres of here in the US.
The deeper you look the better it gets.
All this being true, we are still having a bear of a time getting investors to commit to building full sized ones even with conservative profit margins of 30% annually.
Visit our website or email us for more information as we are actively looking for people to work with to help improve the future of our civilization.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 8:56 pm
21 Jul 2008
I'm made my points. I'll not play your game of arguing what is meant by specific phrases which have already been defined within the context of a much longer discussion. Your getting off track now and I have better things to do with my time.
If you or anyone else has anything more of substance to add to this rather lengthy thread, I'm happy to respond. Other than that, we're done.
Permalink
Backcut Posted 11:36 pm
21 Jul 2008
When ESA habitats go up in flames, everyone loses. When up to 100 tons of GHG's per acre are spewed from firestorms, everyone loses. When smoke poisons the air for days on end, people DIE! When streams are silted up with sediment from catastrophic wildfires, everyone loses. When old growth trees crown out, everyone loses.
I could go on and on but, wildfires ARE always bad for the environment. Not to say that controlled burning is bad, though. Under carefully controlled condition, prescribed fire does benefit the forests, as long as they remain controlled.
Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com
Permalink
Ron Steenblik Posted 1:53 am
22 Jul 2008
These are only my personal opinions.
Permalink
Wolverine Posted 4:25 am
22 Jul 2008
Backcut and RDMiller are like the Republicans and Democrats, while we are like the Greens (for lack of a better analogy; the Green Party has actually become far more of a red party, with the environment becoming just another issue for them, and not a prominent one at that). The differences between us and them are far greater than the differences between them. As you can see, neither has a clue or concern about the natural world; they see trees as board feet (especially Backcut, who's just an advocate for the timber industry and/or the Forest Disservice), which I consider literally psychotic, but which would describe the average person in this ecocidal society that places money, material goods, and unnecessary comforts and conveniences above the natural world and the lives of other species. Notice that RDMiller did not issue one response to your points about biodiversity or how the FSC certification, to which REAL enviros have always objected as being too lax, allows monocroppping and other harms.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 4:51 am
22 Jul 2008
Here's the thing... no one, outside of a very, very small group of people... takes you seriously when you take this kind of position. People see you using all kinds of wood products and view you as a hypocrite. People who live in and near forests, and have made a living for decades harvesting and caring for forests, see you as out of touch and disrespectful of their lifestyle.
Fact is, wood use is only increasing. Forests continue to be harvested every day. You can yell all you want from the sidelines, but it changes nothing.
Go see the Menominee Nation's forest, then report back here what you experienced. Until then, your view will seen by most as seriously misinformed.
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 4:55 am
22 Jul 2008
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 4:58 am
22 Jul 2008
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 7:14 am
22 Jul 2008
I have a running friend (he nearly always wins our age group) who is a maple syrup farmer in that area, he saved a huge amount of money going from using fuel oil for sap cooking to wood waste. He simply takes dead, dying, or fallen trees.
There are other profit paths for woodlot owners too, like growing mushrooms that thrive on wood waste. Honey bees are a great thing in forests too, with plenty of exotic blossoms and not many chemicals to render the honey non-organic.
Forest land separated from chemical farm land does have advantages as far as organic growing possibilities.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Backcut Posted 8:24 am
22 Jul 2008
Smoke-filled forests aren't exactly the tourist draw that the preservationists said would happen when tree cutting declined. Closed highways and evacuated citizens aren't good for the economies of forest communities.
I'm neither Republican or Democrat and have never voted for anyone named Bush. For the record, Clinton harvested more timber than GWBush ever did. Healthy Forests was never funded and has become almost a total failure. I speak for myself and present my on-the-ground observations. I consider myself very tough on the timber industry when I do my project inspections (They hate it when they have to follow the contract they signed!). Right now, it's pretty damn smoky in this part of California and I'm starting on preparing a fire salvage project.
Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com
Permalink
Wolverine Posted 8:44 am
22 Jul 2008
As to being a hypocrite, you make all sorts of false assumptions about people without knowing anything about them (you also did this with Whiskerfish). The only thing I consume on a regular basis is food, and I can't think of one thing that I bought new within the past 15 years made of wood, nor I can find anything like that around our apartment at all. I also have no children, so you can't complain that my kids will need dead tree products.
If you read my posts, you will see that an ongoing theme is that the root physical causes of all significant environmental and ecological harms are overpopulation and overconsumption, and that without solving both of those, no significant problems will be solved. One of my close friends describes me as a minimalist, though I don't see myself that way. Either way, I'm not a hypocrite because I don't consume what I don't need, try to buy used things instead of new, and don't have kids. The point is that we must simplify our lives and live more naturally, or we will continue destroying ecosystems and causing species extinctions until life as we know it is gone.
Traditional societies all over the world lived without killing trees (or killed so few that you couldn't tell), and Europe is certainly not the place to look for them. Good examples of how to live as humans are in traditional hunter-gatherer societies that still exist in small numbers in tropical rainforests, and even semi-traditional societies right here in the U.S., such as the Dine (Navajo) in northern Arizona. Gathering dead wood once in awhile is one thing, but killing trees is immoral, period.
Jon,
Backcut has said that he's either a logger or part of the Deforest Service, I can't remember which. Either way, his perspective is that of the timber industry/Forest Service. If you think his positions are reasonable, you either don't support protecting and restoring natural forests, or you know nothing about this issue. I fought many people like Backcut when I worked in Earth First! a long time ago, and I didn't make any assumptions about him; I know exactly where he's coming from. It's those of you from mainstream society that don't understand people like Whiskerfish and me, because we're not like most people in that society. (However, when I hang out with my traditional Native American friends, my views are just mainstream.)
Permalink
Backcut Posted 9:17 am
22 Jul 2008
Deniers exist on both sides. Been to Colorado lately??!? Smelled the smoke from California?!? Who will you blame this disaster on?!?! Of course, you'll blame all of it on global warming, and none of it on inaction. We CAN save our forests but the "tipping point" IS here and now.
Are you a part of the problem or a part of the solution?
Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 9:38 am
22 Jul 2008
I hope your positions are serving you well and I wish you the best of luck in bringing about the change you desire. We clearly have different perspectives and different approaches toward creating solutions. If you see yours working, stick with it.
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 12:05 pm
22 Jul 2008
As for whether or not I care about the forests, you can be quite sure that just about all of the people that read or write on this site care about the forests. You might think that the policies we support are bad for the forests -- but then, people can always accuse other people of destroying what they love by supporting the wrong policies. It's part of being human.
I know very little about forests. Besides communing with the Redwoods when I was younger, Central Park in NYC was my main natural habitat for a couple of decades. But while I consider myself very much a city person, I grieve at any news of deforestation -- and I think most people here do.
So, what I try to do is listen to all sides, and try to learn something. Whether Backcut or you or RDMiller or people from Rainforest Action Network know best about forests I really don't know, but I think I've learned quite a bit from all of you, and hopefully I will continue to do so.
Permalink
Applied Ecotechnics Posted 12:12 pm
22 Jul 2008
Their recent pamphlets and publications about the "Myths of Biofuels" is one example. While much of it is true they completely ignored, or were unaware of, non-food based biofuel options such as the ORB system I developed.
In light of that technology, their myths fall short of applying to the entire field, but are still valid for the specific industries they mention.
Visit our website or email us for more information as we are actively looking for people to work with to help improve the future of our civilization.
Permalink
Gar Lipow Posted 12:17 pm
22 Jul 2008
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 12:57 pm
22 Jul 2008
Permalink
Backcut Posted 2:24 pm
22 Jul 2008
Seriously, though, the political and economic inertia of today's world concerning forests is much too great to overcome. Emotion rules the forest over ecosystem science. With both the Bush Administration and the eco-groups all in favor of free range fire scorching our forests, I have little hope left for what is left of our old growth.
We'll surely see more debate on this as the fires escalate near election time. We should also have a new record in acres burned by then, too. It's more about the intensities, which are radically far above the norm. When 400 year old trees burn, that is proof enough for me to see that our forests are highly at risk to catastrophic firestorms.
Do I believe Dr. Jerry Franklin, or do I believe "wolverine"??? (nuff said, eh?)
Marshmallows might be a good investment about now!
Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com
Permalink
Gar Lipow Posted 2:35 pm
22 Jul 2008
Environmentalist have opposed thinning
that doing more than thinning, taking mature trees, and even clear cutting is good for the forest.
Link to that, or link to where you have linked to that, or link to where you have linked to linking to that. You have made lots of assertions over the a period of time. Link to some evidence.
Permalink
Biodiversivist Posted 3:55 pm
22 Jul 2008
Transportation is the killer. Wood biomass is best used on site, at wood and paper mills for power cogeneration. When you have to move it a few hundred miles, you have problems because it is very bulky. Certainly turning it into liquid fuels is far more energy intense than simply releasing its stored energy directly by burning it.
http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2008/3/17/12447/1102
In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 6:14 pm
22 Jul 2008
Trees out your tail pipe, neeehaaawww!
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Backcut Posted 11:00 pm
22 Jul 2008
Also, the eco groups balk at cutting trees of a merchantable size, claiming them to be "mature". Others still claim that a 22" dbh tree is "old growth" when, it is decidedly merely a smaller mid-sized tree. When a stand is overstocked with 20-40" dbh trees (meaning that what is growing there now cannot be supported by the yearly rainfall), what is wrong with thinning those trees that are crowding each other?
Anyway, the bulk of proof must be on the eco's now and how they're going to stop catastrophically-high intensity firestorms from destroying forests in a way never before seen by modern man.
YOU come up with the plan AND the money to implement it and we'll talk about that. The money HAS to come through Congress and you need to tell us how much money and when they are going to appropriate it for this "magic" process which will "save" our forests without cutting any trees. Just leaving it alone and hoping for the best hasn't worked for the last 15 years, folks.
Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com
Permalink
Backcut Posted 11:07 pm
22 Jul 2008
That is surely enough proof for me, as he is THE foremost forest expert and even he finally agrees with me. What is wrong with cutting excess trees, folks? Instead of burning all of them?!?
Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 12:54 am
23 Jul 2008
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 12:59 am
23 Jul 2008
Now, if what Backcut is saying is true, then it might make sense to thin forests just for their protection (not used as an excuse to clearcut, obviously), and then use the biomass that gets cut out. But I think that that would only be enough, at most, to replace some of the oil for industrial feedstocks, not for transporation fuel.
Permalink
Gar Lipow Posted 1:10 am
23 Jul 2008
In terms of Sequoia National - the proposal was not to log up 22 inches, but to log up to 30 inches. A 30 inch tree IS typically more than 200 years old.
>YOU come up with the plan AND the money to implement it
I take this as back door admission that you are NOT in fact advocating for the scientifically best approach but are advocating cutting trees that do NOT need to be cut for fire purposes, in order to pay for those who do.
>Dr Jerry Franklin's stunning turnabout
On this I think I can ask that be a little specific. Did not seem to have undergone this stunning turnaround as of 2006. But could easily have missed something.
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 1:43 am
23 Jul 2008
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 3:10 am
23 Jul 2008
Deregulation has really messed up forestry, too many contractor/GOP friendly personel were put in charge since the Reagen years. The slash and trash I see everyday is evidence of the mess of corruption that needs correcting.
And now commercial interests want to take the best trees to turn into fuel and leave more trash and slash and devestated eco-systems. Forests turned into monocrop GMO pesticide/herbicide poisoned tree farms to enable more decades of gas guzzling as usual.
People like backcut and RD Miller will turn us all into staunch opponents to forestry as usual, as wolvi and whisker are. I would rather see dead wood rot in the woods than agrichem tree farms grown for fuel.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 4:36 am
23 Jul 2008
What I observe with these folks is what I have observed in the 30 years I've worked closely with many who take up the role of environmentalist activists. These are often folks who have done little or no personal inner work. You can always spot these people because they care more about making themselves right than working cooperatively with the diversity of people who make up our world and the diversity of opinions these others have. They have little tolerance for divergent views.
And how could they, when they see their identity as integrally linked to their viewpoints. All the environmental activist work in the world won't help overcome this pattern. But heck, they probably have no idea what I'm talking about anyway. And even if they did, they'd just twist and distort it anyway.
This site has so much potential, but it needs better moderation and regular contributors who can be taken seriously. Until then, I'll spend little time here... and leave with a sour taste in my mouth.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 4:56 am
23 Jul 2008
It did say it on the masthead (somewhere?), "Gloom and Doom with a sense of humor". So some meet perpetual chiding that we are "ignorant" and appeals to experts (who allegedly confirm growing and burning biomass for fuel is carbon neutral), with some comedy. It's better than throwing the insults and fallacious arguments back.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Backcut Posted 10:46 am
23 Jul 2008
Censorship of opposing views regarding forests.
No more observations from this "man in the forests".
Unstoppable firestorms 2000 miles away from most Grist contributors.
No more explanations of Forest Service policy and procedures.
No more inconvenient truths about our forests.
Re-Wilded brushfields for your fun and pleasure.
An offsetting of every CFL and hybrid car in the world by those firestorms spewing mega-tonnage of GHG's directly into our upper atmosphere.
It is obvious that people here don't want to know the truth about our forests. It is also obvious that some of these folks choose to use lies about what I feel and care about, namecalling and character defamation on purpose just to further their scientifically unjustifiable agendas. I choose to let you lie in your overcrowded and unkempt beds, because they'll soon be burning.
Good bye, so long and good riddance of this intolerant, predjudiced, unprogressive and irrational group of posters who can now revel in their ignorance that they drove away the evil tree mass murderer. Meanwhile, I'll continue to practice what I preach out in the woods, saving trees right and left, protecting forests from shoddy logging and educating open-minded people. I tried to garner consensus but science has lost this battle and this war.
8^(
Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com
Permalink
Ron Steenblik Posted 12:11 pm
23 Jul 2008
These are only my personal opinions.
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 1:03 pm
23 Jul 2008
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 2:52 pm
23 Jul 2008
You named yourself "backcut", after the cut that fells the tree, an obvious provocation in the first place. Then proceed to blame liberals for preventing forest managment that supposedly would stop forest fires.
Except that the only way you answer the obvious slash, trash, and erosion damage left by logging that anyone can see that actually spends time in our forests is to haul the slash to the landing and burn it. No serious mention of recycling waste wood or preventing fires by removing dead wood and recycling it.
No notion introduced of how to reform logging/forestry business as usual. Just the same old complaining about liberals. and when others come up with ideas you ignore them to continue your personal attacks.
I am left to conclude from this that you simply want to be left to apply the "backcut" over and over with no interference, leaving the same mess you and your logging friends have made for over a century.
You really enjoy the kill don't you, the sound of a 300 hundred year old tree hitting the ground to be turned into throw away furniture or cardboard boxes in China. It makes you happy, or what passes for happiness in your living ecosystem hating, miserable existence. Your life is your punishment, hell right here on earth.
A tree farm with monocrop GMO fuel farms, like RD admires, is probably yout idea of perfection too? We wouldn't know of course, because you never once have expressed any spiritual or emotional attachment to living forests. That is your punshment. You love your chainsaw and your truck, but not the forest. It's just a convenient tax base and workplace for you.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Ron Steenblik Posted 3:47 pm
23 Jul 2008
The "waste" is going to be used to produce ethanol. I'd genuinely like to know what is normally done with such material? Is it normally put back on the forest floor to decompose? Is it composted and sold as a soil amendment? Is it used to power pulp and paper plants? Surely, without the ethanol plant, it wouldn't just pile up unused. Or wood ... er, I mean, would ... it?
These are only my personal opinions.
Permalink
Ron Steenblik Posted 3:52 pm
23 Jul 2008
You really enjoy the kill don't you, the sound of a 300 hundred year old tree hitting the ground to be turned into throw away furniture or cardboard boxes in China. It makes you happy, or what passes for happiness in your living ecosystem hating, miserable existence. Your life is your punishment, hell right here on earth.
You don't know that, John. It sounds as if you are simply transferring your views on foresters generally to this forester in particular. Such comments are inappropriate, and unfair.
These are only my personal opinions.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 5:30 pm
23 Jul 2008
I guess you are right, it's not him specifically, but he surely matches the attitude of professional forestors who have let all this degradation happen. Talk a holier than you damn liberal tree huggers line, and then go back to the same old style of destruction.
Jonas' insult tactics are endless. RD just joined right in. There is a time to stand up to bullying. These guys are not just talking about "resources", many of us actually care about this living planet beyond measuring quantity of wood and fuel and the tax base.
I can't count the times that discussions that work around to compromise are abandoned only to find them pushing the same old fallacies. Then getting angry when they aren't accepted.
A lot of people here compromise and collaborate, or at least have a sense of humor when their insults are returned with a bit of comedy. Heck, some of us even admit when we are wrong.
With a tree to biodiesel plant going up down the road from me right now, this is a time to stand up and expose the problems with biomass farmed for fuel. Based on logging as it has been going on for as long as I can remember.
I'm seeing none of the improved forest management that tree to fuel advocates are using to justify it. It is obvious that the forest put forth as "sustianable", in fact as a model for this, is going to be used for tree to fuel production too, as it says in the video.
This is further along than we realized. we could face a similar disaster to the ethanol fiasco, but not on already chemically destroyed farm land, in forests relatively unharmed by human sloth. Too lazy to change, they want to keep driving their huge trucks and SUVs using our forests as fuel.
It's bad enough just seeing these behemoths in the woods, tearing up the trails for fun, but actually fueled on the living ecosystem's destruction? That's going too far. I'm with Wolvi and the radical faction on this.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Ron Steenblik Posted 6:07 pm
23 Jul 2008
These are only my personal opinions.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 9:10 pm
23 Jul 2008
Now I see that despite everything I have said about my background, my orientation and my work, John has taken to completely distort who I am and what I do. The fact that this site even TOLERATES this is proof Gristmill is a sham... nothing more than a hate-spewing site for immature boys to vent their frustrations because they are incapable of bringing about meaningful change in the world.
I hope there are a few here that have at least listened to my words and understand that I am deeply passionate about protecting the world's forests. I can guarantee you my passion for trees and forests runs just as deeply as John's and Wolverine's and Whisferfish.
The difference is, I chose years ago to get involved IN the world and figure out what I could do to change the way logging and forestry are typically done. It is a very difficult undertaking. Compromises need to be made along the way toward eventual victory. Intelligent and patient discussions are necessary with people on the other side who would prefer to simply mine the world's forests. My job is to find a way to move them toward sustainability... not distance them further. It requires a certain level of patience and tolerance.... something John and his friends have little of.
John.... I say this man to man. You should be ashamed of yourself. If I was standing in front of you and you could feel my heart, you'd know how terribly wrong your words have been. Same for you, Wolverine and Whiskerfish. Grow up, guys.
Until you do, your dreams for a healthier, more peaceful, world are driven further away by your lies, distortions and hate. We can't afford this any longer. The work begins INSIDE each of us first. The anger and intolerance in folks like John only fuels the outer destruction of our planet we all wish to see come to an end.
When Gristmill puts in place a better system of moderation, this site may actually grow into something that can have a positive impact on the world. Until then, folks like myself... serious people doing serious work... will see it as little more than a playpen for immature boys and girls to throw their toys at others who wander in for a look around.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 12:29 am
24 Jul 2008
That's what I'm asking for. You and backcut may be willing to do that RD. I'll give you that. But then you start touting GMO tree farms turned into fuel to replace all our present oil use? And ask us not to challenge that. It's just a hypothetical eyyh.
But can you ever admit that growing and turning biomass into biodiesel and ethanol is not GHG neutral and can't be hegative? Nope, that's your basic assumption that "experts" all agree on.
Jonas? He doesn't admit any flaw with any plan he backs, like ethanol. He just switched his position with no explanation. To burning biomass and pyrolisis. After insuring all that biomass to ethanol would save the climate and power the developing world.
It's like the nuclear industry.
Before they proceed building more plants, the industry must admit mistakes and correct the situation. Restore the trust of disappointed customers and citizens.
The same with present forest management and proposed tree to fuel projects. Before trees are cut for conversion to liquid fuel for cars, show that the same old mess will not be made of the ecosystem.
Someone who touts GMO tree/fuel farms to replace any amount of forest (all the forest? Then restore them later? That's hypothetically insane)is obviuously not willing to admit and correct the problems with the status quo.
Eliminate 80% of present fuel use with renewable electric mass transit, freight trains, and plugin hybrid drivetrains for cars, bikes, and trucks. Also make cities walkable and bikable. Then no natural carbon sink aquifers, land, soil, and ecosystem needs to be used for agrichem based gas guzzling.
When billions in government funds begin to leak out to rural areas to actually build tree to fuel plants, like the 30 million here, this isn't hypothetical anymore.
One third of the corn crop is going to produce 3% of our gas, in a few short years that happened. Will one third of the forests be turned into 1% of our fuel use sometime soon? That's my best guess.
A horrific event that 99% of us won't even see. Only if you go back in the woods past the road frontage, onto the trails and logging roads do you see the devestation.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 12:46 am
24 Jul 2008
You really don't listen well.
Point out IN MY POSTS where I said we SHOULD embark on a plan to replace all oil with tree farms. You won't be able to do that, because I never said it. I said it is possible... that's all. And I was VERY CLEAR in saying that that was the ONLY point I was making. Stop playing games, John. Grow up.
Point me to two experts (you get to choose them) who have documented we cannot produce cellulosic ethanol on carbon neutral basis. Until you can do this, your statements have no credibility and will dismissed as that of a child throwing a tantrum.
Document that the majority of FSC certifications result in the "same old mess." Do this, or never state it again.
Document that there is any truth to this statement of yours: "Will one third of the forests be turned into 1% of our fuel use sometime soon?" Forget about whether this will happen. Show me how one third of our forests amounts to 1% of our liquid fuel use.
Until you can prove these statements, your rantings are nothing more than what I said earlier: those of a child who can't figure out how to get his way.
I'm really tired of your lies and distortions, John. You've been challenged now. Go to work.
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 1:18 am
24 Jul 2008
However, I got no indication from the video whether the Menominee take this plan seriously. In fact, looking at their website, somewhere I can't find at the moment, they explicitly state that they could all be rich if they cut down all the forest, but that they would prefer to stay relatively poor in order to keep the forest -- and most incredibly, the ecosystem intact, apparently they can do quite a bit of hunting, even though they make their living off the wood.
So, John, I don't think RD Miller was endorsing the nice man's plan -- in fact, it sounds like the Menominee are close to you, you might want to check them out.
On the other hand, RD, it seems clear that lumber companies will pull their normal shenanigans and mine the forest if left to their own devices.
Finally, RD, I for one appreciate your experience and wisdom, but I would appreciate it if you (and John) did not get personal. Thanks.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 1:29 am
24 Jul 2008
I share this same concern: "it seems clear that lumber companies will pull their normal shenanigans and mine the forest if left to their own devices." Wishing it to not happen, though (I'm not saying you're doing that), won't make it so. It'll take hard work, patient discussion, creativity and tolerance.
With respect to the communication between John and I, it will get personal if he continues to twist my words and lie about what I say. No one should settle for their integrity being challenged. It is not acceptable and should not be tolerated on Gristmill.
John has work to do. He's been challenged to defend statements he has made. Let's see what he comes up with.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 2:09 am
24 Jul 2008
Or this level of response: "your rantings are nothing more than what I said earlier: those of a child who can't figure out how to get his way.
I'm really tired of your lies and distortions"
It is not effective or polite.
I'll work on these points RD, but maybe from another frame.
"Point me to two experts (you get to choose them) who have documented we cannot produce cellulosic ethanol on carbon neutral basis"
I can point to at least two studies mentioned here in Gristmill that find cellulosic ethanol increases GHG by 50% over oil (corn ethanol doubled it). This increase did not take into account the loss of continuing carbon sink activity in the soil. Or the nitrous oxide release from chemically fertilized crops, which is equal in GHG effect to 2/3rds the crop's GHG uptake from photosynthesis.
But to prove this negative, "we cannot produce cellulosic ethanol on carbon neutral basis", is a rhetotical trap. I have already said this is possible, but only with algae grown in solar collectors on roofs or in floating algae farms at sea, with the processing done with renewable energy, wind, wave, and solar (this just isn't cost effective compared to reenewable electric transportation).
Taking biomass off of land and out of the soil to do it can't be carbon neutral.
':Document that the majority of FSC certifications result in the "same old mess." Do this, or never state it again.'
This is dictatorial and demanding in tone, opening up the chrage that "your statements have no credibility and will dismissed as that of a child throwing a tantrum." right back at you.
Obviously every area under management has to be examined from a total point of view of the health of the ecosystem. A better way to discover what is happening would be to analyze the flaws in forest management practice that have left forests in the sorry state we see now. Does FSC policy adress this? I don't know. That is your position for you to defend.
I'm willing to visit the forest you say is a model for this system and experience it for myself. But not do a scientific survey of all FSC complient operations and report back to you. This is unreasonable. The burden of proof is on the industry now. Past abuse makes this so.
If you want to do that, fine.
But don't demand others do research at your behest or "never mention it again". I will continue to mention the trash and slash and destruction from professional government forest management that I see everytime I'm in the woods.
"Show me how one third of our forests amounts to 1% of our liquid fuel use."
How efficient is corn ethanol production, in terms of solar energy converted to ethanol? How efficient would wood to liquid fuel production be in terms of solar energy converted to biodiesel or ethanol? I assume it would be much less. maybe I'm wrong.
Thus the question mark. That is an interesting research question though. It needs some examination.
Is it possible or desirable to turn a hypothetical one third of forests into GMO tree farms, the paradigm you based your hypothetical on? I say no. How much fuel would that produce? Hard to estimate.
But how many of us realized that one third of the corn crop would only produce 35 of our fuel use? Before the fact, now that it's too late. Maybe just a few staunch fuel farming opponents.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 2:13 am
24 Jul 2008
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 2:37 am
24 Jul 2008
You said, "I can point to at least two studies mentioned here in Gristmill that find cellulosic ethanol increases GHG by 50% over oil". Go ahead... point to the studies. This is easy, John. Find a study that documents what you say. I can find 10 quick links on the Internet that say burning wood is carbon neutral. But you've said otherwise, so prove it... or don't say it again.
Your second point is at least as weak. Hey man.. at least take responsibility for your own words! You accused ME of supporting this: "the trash and slash and destruction from professional government forest management that I see every time I'm in the woods." I NEVER said I supported that. I said I do all my forest harvesting work in conformity with the FSC... and have for 30 years. And I've sacrificed a great deal along the way to do this. So either apologize for twisting my words or prove that work done in conformity with the FSC generally creates a mess.
And your third point...
"How efficient is corn ethanol production, in terms of solar energy converted to ethanol? How efficient would wood to liquid fuel production be in terms of solar energy converted to biodiesel or ethanol? I assume it would be much less. maybe I'm wrong."....
says nothing about your original statement ("one third of our forests amounts to 1% of our liquid fuel use), except that you have no idea if what you said is true or not.
Then you go on to say:
"Is it possible or desirable to turn a hypothetical one third of forests into GMO tree farms, the paradigm you based your hypothetical on? I say no. How much fuel would that produce? Hard to estimate."
"Possible" and "desirable" are two TOTALLY different points. Come on, you know this! Get real. I said it was POSSIBLE. I certainly did not, AND DO NOT, think it is desirable.
You said, "How much fuel would that produce."
I gave firm numbers. If you believe they are way off, prove it.
John... my statements about you remain true. But even worse, you won't even apologize when you've been taken to task for twisting my words and distorting my integrity.
I am sure others are seeing through you as well. Your credibility is seriously in question.
But you have a way out. It starts by apologizing, and ends by saying something like "I made statements that I can't document as being true. I'll try to be more careful in the future."
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 9:27 am
24 Jul 2008
Sure it gets rough, and people go too far. I'll admit I do it too, and did it here. I already said I would try to reign that in.
But you are I are not the judge in this debate, we are the advocates. i say again, let the community decide.
I think they have said that both sides need to tone it down and stick to the facts. I am willing to do that. But I won't sit still for bullying. Demands about what claims one can make. If the readers and writers here do not believe either of us, then we are judged on our credibility that way.
I'm ok with that. They always let me know when their bullshit alarm goes off on my claims. I didn't look for the studies because I didn't have the time. I will find them for you. But many here read the atrtyicle in which they were mentioned and commented on it already.
You are joining a running event here, we have been all over Khosla and others on this, back and forth. And backcut and others have been back and forth on forest management.
When you enter a community don't dictate behaviour or debate, you try to join in, not rule. This is just basic observation about how these communities work. Frankly I just got tired of the bullying, tried humor, then when it continued anyway. I stood up on my hind legs abnd barked. That's the style of more than a few here.
To parphrase Barack, "We don't do cowering". Hehey.
Anyway, I will apologize to my fellow netizens here, opposition and allies. I couldf have done better by sticking to the facts, instead of resorting to mischaracterizing/guessing at the motivation of you and backcut and Jonas.
But on the facts, no way I'm not backing down!
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 9:41 am
24 Jul 2008
Your tone is modifying somewhat, and I even hear something of an apology in there. It's weak, but I am hearing you say you'll back off on distorting what I (and others) say. Yes, stick to the facts... that would be much better.
But you go on to say, "I'm not backing down on the facts!", as if you have stated any facts that I disagreed with? Please, tell us which facts you're not backing down on. But remember, you'll need to document these statements. Without that, they're not facts... just opinions which may have little or no credibility.
As far as my behavior is concerned, I take pride in listening well and trying hard to understand the positions of others. But when my statements are distorted and my integrity is questioned, I can get much tougher. If you continue to treat me as you have, you'll continue to get the same response. Treat me fairly and state my positions as you hear them, and you'll find me a very civilized, courteous debater.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 1:22 pm
24 Jul 2008
"Two new studies published in the journal Science conclude that growing and burning biofuels actually increases net greenhouse-gas emissions and exacerbates climate change. The new research questions the assumptions of earlier studies, making sure to incorporate the effects of land-use changes into emissions calculations. When land-use changes are taken into account, turns out that plowing up rainforests and grasslands to make way for biofuel crops tips the balance, making biofuels more problematic than helpful. Biofuels proponents, including the powerful U.S. ethanol lobby, have for years cited figures asserting that biofuels made from crops like corn release about 20 percent fewer emissions overall than gasoline and that fuel from switchgrass emits about 70 percent less. One of the new studies, however, found that due to the impact of plowing up new fields, corn-based ethanol nearly doubles greenhouse-gas emissions compared to gasoline and that fuels made from switchgrass increase emissions by about 50 percent. Not all biofuels were net losers, though. The study authors suggested that producing biofuels from waste products still makes sense."
Feeling "tougher" yet? Hehey.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 1:55 pm
24 Jul 2008
It is very hard to predict exactly how much usable fuel can be obtained from woody biomass. No one can determine that unless/until a plant is actually up and opeating.
Your estimates are premature. My guess was based on the lower efficiency of woody biomass conversion of sunlight to biomass than corn.
Your estimate of biomass available from forests was based on GMO tree farm crops. Leaving out most of the details.
This all would have to be specified to get a figure on the potential of fuel quantity from forests.
But since it actually increases GHG by 50% over oil, it should not be done anyway. so why quibble about how much could be produced. Your hypothetical is not a usefull one for any ddiscussion on GHG reduction.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 2:08 pm
24 Jul 2008
Any specific recomendations as to what constutues a "sustainably" managed forest. Is it determined by quantity of biomass grown versus quantity harvested as you have described it here?
Are there standards for tree density, species diversity, planting seedlings after harvest, natural species versus GMO tree crops?
Are plantations considered to be as ecologically valuable as diverse natural forests? This stuff is pretty hard to decipher.
Is there any specification about recycling and usuing slash, waste, and removing dead wood to prevent fires?
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Gar Lipow Posted 2:22 pm
24 Jul 2008
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 2:50 pm
24 Jul 2008
It's just not reverting to a natural state, even after nearly 70 years.
And this is the result of professional management. Just doesn't seem like a good idea to let this go on as usual.
how much will they convert to tree farms given a tree to fuel mandate? We don't know because they don't want us messing with 'their" forests. As the great communicator said, "Trust but verify."
We need some verification. By some scientists we can really trust who are not in bed with the tree to fuel movement.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Gar Lipow Posted 3:09 pm
24 Jul 2008
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 3:17 pm
24 Jul 2008
Can you ask about the state of forest management as he sees it? An expert that doesn't support tree farms would be more trustworthy. What does he think of the FSC tolerance of tree farms?
They seem to imply that tree farming is ok because it saves trees in natural forests. I don't buy that excuse. It made me suspiscious of FSC policy.
The forestors I know scoff at tree huggers. Just a nuiscance to be avoided in their consideration.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 9:00 pm
24 Jul 2008
We'll take your responses one by one. I know you tried to defend your statements, but of course, you continued to twist and distort mine in the process.
Regarding the GHG study you point to... virtually all my discussions have related to the potential to use existing forests, through sustainable forestry, to produce biomass for energy. Your study said nothing about this... absolutely nothing. It refers only to plowing up existing fields to plant biofuels... something I do not support. So you are still challenged to find some study that says using biomass from sustainably managed forests is not carbon neutral. If you can't, you need to state that you were wrong about this.
Your answer regarding the amount of liquid fuel that could come from woody biomass (whether from an energy plantation or a sustainably-managed forest) is incredibly wishy-washy. You just tried to slip away from answering it.
There have been many tests by independent bodies which state what the current conversion rate is of biomass to liquid fuel. Did you bother to look into this? A common figure is 100 gallons per ton. This is a verified figure. Do you need me to point you to such a link? I think you are quite capable of finding this. You see, John... I just don't make up numbers. I state facts or I don't speak.
3. As far as finding details on what constitutes sustainable forestry, you can go here. Smartwood is one of the FSC certifiers:
http://www.rainforest-alliance.org/forestry.cfm?id=certif ...
Once you've looked around, tell me if you have a problem with their overall approach and believe that the forests they certify are generally not sustainable. If you can't, please acknowledge you were mistaken in your statements.
4. With respect to your new comment to Gar, you are talking about established tree farms. I don't believe I've ever mentioned anything about that. What I discussed (at length) refers to the vast majority of current "natural" forests, and how all of these forests originated from cleared land simply left alone to grow back into our forests of today.
To the extent the tree farms you reference have anything to do with "professional forest management", it is a small sliver of what constitutes forestry today (well under 5%). Generally speaking, I do not support monoculture tree farms.
Summary... so far you're striking out, John. You have failed with all three answers so far. If you can't do better, please apologize and state your mistakes. That's all it takes for us to move on.
Richard
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 9:04 pm
24 Jul 2008
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 9:17 pm
24 Jul 2008
The FSC will NOT support any recently-converted tree farm or any that is about to be created from natural forest.
I have been one of those outspoken people who only supports tree farms if the intention is to convert the farm back into more natural forest by leaving a large number of trees standing after the primary harvest has taken place and allowing other native species to re-establish in that forest.
But this gets more complicated in areas like New Zealand (which is often used as the basis for discussion on this complex topic), where they specifically grew large acreage to tree farms to stop ANY harvesting of their incredible natural forests. New Zealand had an active and significant forest products area and decided that in order to keep that afloat AND protect their natural forests, they would establish tree farms (which are actually managed quite well). They have forbidden harvesting in almost all natural forests for quite a long time. Everyone I know who has seen what they've done thinks this plan has worked quite well.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 12:08 am
25 Jul 2008
How do you suggest tree planting be done in cut areas? In rows? At random? Leave a few large trees to reseed the forest?
How do you recommend that tree farms be turned back into natural forest, if this is even possible?
How does removing biomass and burning it for energy, either directly or for fuel conversion, return nutrients to the soil and sequester carbon?
Why would removing biomass from forests to make liquid fuel for ICE vehicles be worth the risk, since transportation with plugin hybrids can be powered by renewable wind, solar, wave, and biogas electricity? Mismanagement of forests is the rule, not the exception.
The risk is that a rush for fuel from trees would further degrade forests. Can any group guarantee they can stop that?
What is left over to use for liquid fuel production after "sustainable" harvest of forests for timber, chips for building material, and paper pulp?
What sort of machinery would be used to harvest trees? Would it be the ones used now? That guzzle diesel fuel and rip up the land and ecosystem? Or with some of the recently developed scandanaivian technology that dioesn't tear up the ground? Powered by renewable electricity.
These are big problems with tree to fuel production plans. The methods of harvest used now are devestating.
Let the readers and writers here decide if it is worth the risk. I believe it is not. And that biogas digestion of waste like manure, sewage, garbage, and biomass at great risk of fire is the only way biomass ought to be used for energy production.
Unless nutrients and biomass are returned to soil and GHG is offset, any scheme to turn biomass to energy is fatally flawed.
What is done with slash and waste under FSC guidelines? Is it chipped up for a use that returns nutrients and carbon to the soil or burned or left in place to feed fires?
Describe the total energy and biomass balance of a "sustainably" managed forest, how much biomass can be removed for fuel production before soil nutrients and carbon are diminished by the process. For instance, how would forest ecosystems fix nitrogen and other nutrients to offset the removal?
Would fertilizer be added? Where would that fetilizer come from and what would be the GHG imbalance from applying it?
Applying chemical fertilizer releases GHG equal to 2/3 of the CO2 absorbed by the plants fertilized in the form of nitrous oxide.
With plugin hybrids powered by solar and other renewable electricity, meddling in natural ecosystems is not necessary. Why use an approach with all this risk, when this safer path would provide all the transportation energy we need in a GHG free fashion?
Wouldn't it be better to leave natural forests to grow and harvest waste wood at fire risk first, before utilizing live trees? With all the trees killed by climate change related drought and disease, why would we need to cut live healthy trees for fiber and construction materials?
If it is just for a forest region tax base or to create jobs, why not get that tax base and jobs from harvesting really renewable energy instead?
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 12:20 am
25 Jul 2008
http://www.grandislandmi.com/
Hopefully I will not awaken for the race on Saturday from a nightmare of forests like this turned into gas guzzler fuel, spewed out the tailpipes of america the greedy, slothful (too lazy to change), and destructive.
But instead a peaceful dream of renewable powered civilization free from GHG spewing machines wielded by hyper stressed humans divorced from nature on a path to global climate disaster.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 12:33 am
25 Jul 2008
"The people producing hybrid energy-grade trees tell us they're heading towards yields of 20 tons per acre per year. The cellulosic ethanol people are already at 100 gallons of liquid fuel per ton. So each acre of ground can produce 2000 gallons of liquid fuel per year."
It makes no sense. Please explain what your aim was in mentioning this?
It shows off the risk I was talking about. What if other tree to fuel advocates use this reasoning to justify GMO tree farm to fuel projects? Will you stop them? Will the FSC stop them?
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 1:05 am
25 Jul 2008
Perhaps I'm going through what I like to call a "dogmatic zeal stage" here, but the Menominee example seems to show forestry at its best. They proudly proclaim that since 1854 they've removed 2 billion board feet of lumber, yet the ecosystem is in such good shape that they regularly go hunting.
Now, it seems indigenous people all over the world have an ethic that greatly values the forest, so I don't know if this model is extendable, but if New Zealand has managed to stop deforestation, then maybe all is not lost.
But it seems that neither John (amazin') or Richard (RDMiller) want monoculture tree farms that replace or in any way damage existing ecosystems, which, again, means that wood biomass will not be the saving grace of Happy Motoring.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 1:24 am
25 Jul 2008
And John... thanks for asking questions! Now we're getting somewhere.
Permalink
314159265 Posted 1:49 am
25 Jul 2008
As it renders nonpretty wood, I guess bark beetled trees are of not much interest to conventional "industry"?
I guess there's more bark beetle wood to harvest than you have conventional use for?
Wouldn't it be a huge energy source?
Permalink
Ron Steenblik Posted 3:24 am
25 Jul 2008
What I'm trying to figure out here is whether I am reading these posts correctly and some of you are indeed talking about doing everything you can to prevent ANY fires in forests.
These are only my personal opinions.
Permalink
Ron Steenblik Posted 3:25 am
25 Jul 2008
These are only my personal opinions.
Permalink
Gar Lipow Posted 3:48 am
25 Jul 2008
So in many forests, we do need clear brush and kindling. This does NOT prevent all fires. But what it does do is ensure that when a fire occurs you don't have kindling that lets it take down all the mature trees. Without kindling, most mature trees survive the fire, and fire acts as a natural brush clearing. In other words we may not have to clear brush forever, but in such areas we do need to thin and clear brush until the inevitabl fire occurs so that fire acts as it would within a natural cycle. This argument applies only to certain ecosystems. But in many forest ecosystem we have intervened for so long in a negative way we now have to intervene in a positive way.
Short of clear cutting all forests and concreting them over we will have forest fires. The key is to try to reverse some of the effects of our past interventions so those fires are at natural levels, not conflagrations.
I will add that the worlds worst fires from a greenhouse viewpoint are when tropical foress burn, and these fires are almost never caused by lighting or other natural causes, but by humans - cigarettes, sparks from logging equipment and so on.
Permalink
Ron Steenblik Posted 7:28 am
25 Jul 2008
These are only my personal opinions.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 8:50 am
25 Jul 2008
You asked:
"Are you repudiating or supporting tree farms?"
I do not support the conversion of healthy natural forests to tree farms. For existing tree farms, I support managing them in a way that reverts them back to a more natural state. How? Answered below.
That said, I believe it is possible to create "energy farms" of fast growing poplars, willows and other species that can be established and managed in as sustainable a manner as any organic food farm.
You asked:
"How do you suggest tree planting be done in cut areas? In rows? At random? Leave a few large trees to reseed the forest?"
I'm not quite sure what you're asking here, as the great majority of forest harvesting does not require any planting be done after the harvest. New growth occurs naturally. Perhaps you are referring to specific types of forests where clearcutting is normally considered the best option. I'm not that familiar with this type of situation, as I've never faced it. But I'd be comfortable with the prescription of foresters like those who are part of the Rainforest Alliance's SmartWood program (I gave a link to before).
You asked:
"How do you recommend that tree farms be turned back into natural forest, if this is even possible?"
It is very possible. I've done it myself before. Just don't harvest all the trees when they reach commercial maturity. Leave enough (the percentage varies with different species) to keep an intact forest, then let other species start taking root (or introduce them when necessary). Over time, it'll revert back to a more natural state... and continue producing wood for conventional and energy purposes.
You asked:
"How does removing biomass and burning it for energy, either directly or for fuel conversion, return nutrients to the soil and sequester carbon?"
Please understand that it doesn't matter what you do with the tree after you harvest it. That factor has nothing to do with the soil quality itself and the issue of carbon sequestration. Any sustainable harvest (like those done by the Menominee, for example) maintains soil quality and at a minimum, keeps the volume of biomass per acre at a stable level over time (and can easily increase this level if the management is done well).
So if you have an acre containing 50 tons of biomass and you remove 15 tons, within 10 years or so that acre again contains 50 tons of biomass. This is why burning wood (in temperate forests.... NOT rain forests) is considered carbon neutral. The CO2 from the 15 tons of biomass that went into the air is sequestered back into the ground after the regrowth period occurs.
You asked:
"Why would removing biomass from forests to make liquid fuel for ICE vehicles be worth the risk, since transportation with plugin hybrids can be powered by renewable wind, solar, wave, and biogas electricity?"
Every expert I am aware of believes it will be 15-20 years or so, at best, before we can be done with liquid fuels for transportation. And this time period includes a fairly rapid conversion to electric cars. The earlier conversion to hybrids will still require liquid fuel. You understand this, right? All the solar, wind, etc. can't make this liquid fuel.
You said:
"Mismanagement of forests is the rule, not the exception."
I would tend to agree with this, but we're doing much better today than we were 15-20 years ago. Improvement is about all I can hope for. Continuing pressure from consumers and others will continue to shift the industry toward sustainable forestry.
You asked:
"The risk is that a rush for fuel from trees would further degrade forests. Can any group guarantee they can stop that?"
Guarantees?... you know better than that. All we can do is work as hard as possible to make the entire matter of energy from biomass as sustainable and efficient as possible. There are many forces at work, most beyond our control (such as geopolitical issues, hurricanes, etc.), that will effect this outcome. What I know is that it is POSSIBLE to use biomass in a very positive way, and it carries numerous advantages that solar and wind don't have.
You asked:
"What is left over to use for liquid fuel production after "sustainable" harvest of forests for timber, chips for building material, and paper pulp?"
The woody material that would go to liquid fuel (or plastics or methane or natural gas or chemicals or whatever else comes from the conversion process) is often considered unsuitable for any other application. For example, in Vermont we have no pulp mill or wood panel production company anywhere in the state. So all of this material (the low-grade, over-crowded trees that are often part of an "improvement" harvest) have no market today and could go to energy.
You asked:
"What sort of machinery would be used to harvest trees? Would it be the ones used now? That guzzle diesel fuel and rip up the land and ecosystem? Or with some of the recently developed scandanaivian technology that dioesn't tear up the ground? Powered by renewable electricity."
I've always used the least impactful system. That's what I support. Yes, the Scandinavian approach is quite good. I support using the smallest machines possible that are economically viable. Too many in the forest industry use machines that are not appropriate for sustainable forestry.
You asked:
"What is done with slash and waste under FSC guidelines? Is it chipped up for a use that returns nutrients and carbon to the soil or burned or left in place to feed fires?"
Under FSC rules, soil quality is vital, so residual materials must be handled in a way that assures healthy soils. The way this is done varies, depending on many factors. The issue of reducing fire damage is always factored in.
Please understand that sustainable forestry is no different in terms of goals than organic food farming. The same mentality drives both... protect the Earth while producing products people need.
You asked:
"Describe the total energy and biomass balance of a "sustainably" managed forest, how much biomass can be removed for fuel production before soil nutrients and carbon are diminished by the process. For instance, how would forest ecosystems fix nitrogen and other nutrients to offset the removal?"
I've already answered this question by stating that these issues are always factored into every sustainable forest management plan. For example, the Menominee (and many others) do what you've asked every time they harvest. It's simply a given: maintain, or improve, soil quality. It doesn't matter whether you make a piece of furniture, a wad of paper, or you heat a room with the trees you harvest.
You asked:
"Would fertilizer be added? Where would that fetilizer come from and what would be the GHG imbalance from applying it?"
Fertilizer is never needed in a sustainably managed forest.
You asked:
"With plugin hybrids powered by solar and other renewable electricity, meddling in natural ecosystems is not necessary. Why use an approach with all this risk, when this safer path would provide all the transportation energy we need in a GHG free fashion?"
I already answered this question. There's no escaping the need for liquid fuels for at least another 15 years... not to mention replacements for all the other items we get from oil.
You asked:
"With all the trees killed by climate change related drought and disease, why would we need to cut live healthy trees for fiber and construction materials?"
Because we have plenty of forests... a great abundance... and despite all the lousy forestry still being done, we have increasingly more and more trees (in North America) every day. Many people prefer homes made from wood; furniture and flooring made from wood; paper; and many of the 5,000 other products that come from wood.
Hope that helps answer some of your questions.
Richard
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 8:52 am
25 Jul 2008
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 9:03 am
25 Jul 2008
Permalink
solar greg Posted 12:23 pm
25 Jul 2008
If investors want to keep pumping efforts and money into alternative fuels, go ahead, but not with tax money.
I heard mentioned 2,000 galons of ethanol a year per acre? That's 160Million BTU's.
With one acre of DHW panels you produce that in 4 days.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 9:18 pm
25 Jul 2008
This comparison of yours... relating 2,000 gallons of ethanol per acre per year to being equal in energy output to what you can get from an acre of solar panels in 4 days... is fairly meaningless.
For example, given the cost to install that acre of panels, you could grow dozens (or perhaps hundreds... I haven't done the math) of acres of biomass. So even on a strict dollars-to-energy basis, your comparison says little.
More importantly, though, you can't make plastic or rayon or chemicals or any liquid fuel from that DPW systems, and this was the context of the discussion.
Richard
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 10:02 pm
25 Jul 2008
This is primarily in response to your question.
I'll start off by saying that what I am laying out below is only acceptable to me if the sustainability elements are kept in play. I couldn't support a plan that went beyond this and simply saw production as the primary goal.
Also, I'm not advocating that the best use of this biomass is to replace gasoline for vehicles. This may be so (depending on numerous variables), but it may also be that this biomass is better used for some other product.
And third, this is just to provide some sense of potential. Whether this could be realized or not, I simply don't know.
There are two major components to this. One is utilizing existing forests to produce biomass (to make products relative to this discussion) and the second is utilizing energy plantations.
World oil demand... total demand for oil for all purposes... is around 1.3 trillion gallons per year.
Existing forests in the world total 10 billion acres. Put half of it aside for now... leave it totally out of the equation. On a sustainable basis, it would be safe to say this 5 billion acres of forest is producing 1 ton of new biomass per acre per year, or about 250 gallons of various products that could be used to replace oil. Do the math and it turns out the this 1/2 of the world's forests is producing... simply as new growth without any human help, fertilizer, etc... enough biomass to replace all the worlds production of oil.
From the perspective of dedicated energy plantations (assuming these could be grown in a fashion similar to organic food), if production could reach 20 tons per acre per year, we'd need 1/20th of the above acreage (the 5 billion acres), or 250 million acres. This amount of land is easily available throughout the world. Even if the production was dropped in half to 10 tons per acre per year, 500 million acres could be readily found to grow biomass to replace all the world's production of oil.
Of course, we could use a combination of the above, using sustainable forestry on a portion of our forests to produce biomass, along with a sizable volume of "organically-managed" energy plantations, to replace oil.
I hope this shows why so much money and research is chasing this concept. But again, it needs to be done sustainably to have any lasting value.
Richard
Permalink
solar greg Posted 10:31 pm
25 Jul 2008
And as to your coment about DHW (that is domestic hot water), I only used it to show a comparison of how much energy can be harvested directly from the sun with relatively low cost technology.
I don't know if the 2,000 galons of ethanol are the correct figure? I just used the number on an earlier post.
Here is another one, how about avocado trees. They can produce a lot of oil. Again not for burning.
Permalink
spaceshaper Posted 2:38 am
26 Jul 2008
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
Permalink
spaceshaper Posted 2:44 am
26 Jul 2008
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
Permalink
solar greg Posted 5:24 am
26 Jul 2008
It's obvious we won't be off of our fuel deppendency as soon as we would like regarding transportation.
As far as winter heating, a lot more should be done with solar heating. If properly designed a solar system can take care of all or most of the heating load and ground source heat pumps for backup.
No matter where the fuel comes from it should be a last resource when it comes to home and water heating.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 7:28 am
26 Jul 2008
Richard
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 9:01 am
26 Jul 2008
Your mention of the Menominee has led me to look at their operations, which seem amazing -- to quote from their website When harvested volumes were first recorded in 1865 to 1988, there has been over 2.0 billion board feet of saw timber harvested. Our most recent inventory of volumes indicate that our saw timber stocking still remains at 1.5 billion board feet, after 135 years of harvesting on this same acreage!
I can't find their ton/acre number, but I'll take your word for it that one ton is a good number to use.
It also seems to me that a big advantage of sustainably harvesting from forests is that you don't need fertilizers or pesticides. This is huge, in my opinion, and puts wood up there as the obvious choice for biofuels -- unless prairie-type grasses also don't need them, and you can't grow wood there, and you can grow them sustainably. But the other thing that is good about using forests is that, to look at the Menominee experience, there actually seems to be an advantage to maintaining diversty, whereas I worry that with switchgrass,etc. there would be a temptation to do monoculture.
I will also point out that if you read th Menominee web page I link to above, they do use pesticides in a very restricted way when they need to prepare an area for some types of trees, although they say there is some controversy about the project. Which brings me to a question, those web pages and articles are from the early 1990s, is there anything more recent that you are aware of?
The third major question with wood, besides sustainable yield and biofuel yield, is how much energy goes into cutting the wood, transporting it, and processing it. According to another video on the Menominee site, at one point I think the nice man says that 57% of the energy from forest products goes into transport and processing. So if you figure that half of the energy is used for that, that halves your figures, although they are still considerable.
Even if it's half, that's probably much better than any other biofuel, because wood is so much denser. So even there it makes much more sense than other biofuels (unless of course something happens with algal cellulosic -- I think even "waste" cellulosic still has the problem of transport).
If the transport/processing is energy-intensive, then I would think that we get more into covering the 20% or so of oil use that is not for transportation (5% of oil use is to run refineries, so we don't have to replace that). This includes things like ag and mining and construction machinery, asphalt -- and rail, although that should be electrified -- and might include some air, at least to keep trans-oceanic flying going.
And finally! This also begs another huge question -- what if you used that biomass, not for fuel, but for electrical generation? I'm not sure if I understand the technology correctly, but I assume you would either burn the wood to make steam, or digest it to make methane to burn to make steam. Either way, it could be an important way to kill off coal plants, for instance. Any figures on tons to kwh?
OK, I've loaded you up with alot of questions, that's what you get for being helpful!
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 9:25 am
26 Jul 2008
The concern you share regarding switchgrass is one I also share. I'd tend to want to grow forests whenever possible. But an argument can also be made for growing switchgrass in the same way we grow organic foods... even on a large scale. Why not? If we can do it organically, what's the difference if it's a food crop or any energy crop?
I'm not aware of any more recent information on the Menominee, but there are many other well-documented (and large) sustainable forestry operations in the US. I can provide links, if this would be useful.
The most recent studies done on cellulosic ethanol indicates a 8 to 1 energy-out to energy-in ratio. I'm not sure exactly all that this takes into account, but I believe the balance is very favorable... especially since it will soon be possible to run all the harvesting, transport and processing equipment on some variation of biodiesel.
I'm not at all convinced that the best use of biomass is for liquid fuel. It may be better used for residential heating or even electricity in some locations... or chemicals, plastics, charcoal or many other products. These calculations are complex and depend on many issues. The more important point is that it is possible to produce large volumes of biomass on a sustainable basis to help free us from oil and coal.
As far as the question regarding production of electricity from biomass, that issue is well documented. Burlington Electric (in Vermont) was the first municipal utility in the country to use wood to produce electricity (50 MW), starting in the late 70's. There are many other such facilities now. Wood is commonly used in Europe to produce electricity in many kinds of buildings, from apartment complexes to schools, hospitals and all kinds of businesses. I can provide more detailed data, if you wish.
Richard
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 10:44 am
26 Jul 2008
It uses 76 tons per hour, so if my understanding of electricity is good, that means 76 tons for 50 MW hours, no? If, then, you can sustainably get 1 ton per acre, and you need about .6 tons per MW hour, and the US used 4,000 million MW hours in one year, then you would need 2.4 billion acres of sustainably harvested forests. Since that's a quarter of all world forests...hmmm, maybe my math is wrong, because there's only 73 million acres of woodland in the US, and about 2.2 billion acres of land, period.
OK, with 73 million acres of woodland, you get 73 million tons of sustainably harvested wood, or about 1 million hours in Burlinton Electric's generating plant, or 50 million MW hours, which is only about 1% of electrical generation. Am I missing something?
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 12:11 pm
26 Jul 2008
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 12:52 pm
26 Jul 2008
After much frustration, I found this GAO report which showed that the Forest Service has almost 200 million acres under its purview, which I suppose means forests, so that totals 600 million acres of forests in the US -- although I can't figure out what the rest of the 200 million acres under Federal management is.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 1:17 pm
26 Jul 2008
First, your numbers are still off quite a bit. Total forested acreage in the US is around 750 million acres. I believe you were looking at just non-federal forest land area. So this doubles your figures.
Then, if the intention was simply to focus on growing biomass to produce electricity, the plan would need to include dedicated energy plantations producing 10-20 tons per acre per year. With these figures, it would be possible to produce all the electrical power in the US from something like 1/4 of US acreage.
But I can't see a good reason to focus on producing electricity from wood when we have solar, wind, hydro and other options for that. While there are specific locations now where it makes a lot of sense to create electricity from wood, these would be the exception, not the rule.
The focus for biomass in a sustainable energy economy must be, first and foremost, to displace oil for those key items where solar, wind and hydro have no effect... like plastics, chemicals and liquid fuels... as well as provide heat and even electricity during the interim years (let's say the next 30-40 years) as other renewables get up to steam.
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 1:21 pm
26 Jul 2008
There's a useful chart here of all current US energy production by type:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_use_in_the_United_Sta ...
It's interesting that, even though the installed base of wind power is twice that of wood, biomass produces almost twice as much power as wind.
Permalink
GreyFlcn Posted 5:04 pm
26 Jul 2008
How about this one.
http://greyfalcon.net/biolimits.png
-David Ahlport
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 5:18 pm
26 Jul 2008
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 12:42 am
27 Jul 2008
A video of the actual cutting and mess left behind that follows the logging trucks to the plant. And shows the waste dumping and fuel trucks pulling away would be most effective.
There is as much point in arguing with tree to fuel advocates as there was arguing with Khosla and others. Not many advocates will actually change their minds, like Jonas did. And he only changed his mind from burning biomass into liquid fuel to burning it.
The public is who we need to convince that biomass energy to liquid fuel for gas guzzling is a potential disaster. Chances are that we will have to demonstrate the disaster before a large percentage believes it. I'd say a majority has turned against corn ethanol already.
Small scale disaster areas are being built right now, do let's get out there and document them. Seeing is believing. I think for the small percentage that reads and writes about this stuff, we are winning. Only low information voters are going to buy into biomass to fuel or power.
Advocates will keep insisting that this all can be done "sustainably". We just need to show how it is actually being done. And start passing out bumperstickers, "No trees for gas guzzling, don't send our forests out your tailpipe."
And keep on advocating for plugin hybrids, bikes, bikable/walkable communities, and renewable electric mass transit. Who will an Obama administration listen to on this?
Four more years of McBush will compound the disaster and with the smear campaign against Obama parroted by the mass delusional media, that might just happen.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 12:53 am
27 Jul 2008
Keep on advocating, and please do not drop your harsh aggressive tone. This is helpfull to our side, hehey.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 1:06 am
27 Jul 2008
Comments like this are what most show your personal agenda and lack of maturity. It's all about what YOU want, because you have different interests and beliefs than many others.
What you don't understand or appreciate is that millions of individuals prefer to live and work in an integral way with nature, whether as farmers of the land or stewards of forests. This is true around the world, and it is as valid a choice as any you might have.
What you fail to accept is that millions of people (in fact, most people) enjoy and want all the products we get from forests.
What you cannot accept yet is the realities of the next 10-30 years as we work our way converting from a society driven by fossil fuels to a different one. Wish as you might, compromises will need to be made.
What you have been so far unwilling to answer is how you plan on solving the issue of how to produce the myriad of products that come from oil (not energy products, but all the others)... products that we depend on for so many basic aspects of our lives. Plastics and base chemicals stand out high on that list. Have you done the calculations to understand just how large this volume of oil-replacement product actually is? Where's it going to come from?
You can take all the pictures of bad logging you wish and protest as loudly as you can, but it won't effect the items I've listed above one iota. You may... and hopefully will.. help move forest management towards a more sustainable form. But you won't slow down the use of forests and biomass the slightest, because it's necessary.
I know this frustrates you. I suggest you figure out how to work through this frustration. It's bad for your blood pressure.
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 1:31 am
27 Jul 2008
Roads (asphalt) is about 2% either way, agriculture 2%, mining 1%, construction 2 to 3%, military 1%, rail about 1%.
So let's say you need fuel/feedstocks at 20% the current rate. Now, oil will peak, but you'll probably be able to get that much for a few decades. You also have to understand that the very last oil will be used for feedstocks, because the products that come from those feedstocks is much more expensive than gasoline (think about filling up a tank with viagra pills).
However, all of this calculation aside, our straight-thinking practical business class that can see about 2 inches in front of their nose won't care about any of this if, as usual throughout human history, they think they can make a buck by destroying ecosystems.
So, we need to have good examples like the Menominee and New Zealanders, and expose the eco-destroyers, to make the coming biofuel wave as minimally malignant as possible.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 1:33 am
27 Jul 2008
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 1:52 am
27 Jul 2008
I couldn't agree more with the last paragraph of your previous post.
Permalink
solar greg Posted 2:10 am
27 Jul 2008
Nature gives us wood as an excelent building material. It's also one of natures beautiful carbon sinks. If we start depending on forests for an insatiable hunger for stupidly inneficient energy use, or making plastics, I don't think our problems will be fixed. We've already missused millions of years of stored solar energy in 100 years!
By all means, sustainable forests should be planted and ban logging in natural forests.
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 5:18 am
27 Jul 2008
And I'll add this from solargreg, By all means, sustainable forests should be planted and ban logging in natural forests
subject to what I said above. Aren't discussions fun?
Permalink
RDMiller Posted 6:00 am
27 Jul 2008
Two points:
Sustainable forests are NOT planted!!! Well, perhaps very, very rarely, but NO... sustainable forests are existing forests which are managed sustainably. Forget planting. That's an entirely different discussion.
"Natural" forests, in the sense most people think of this term, do not exist in the U.S., except on about 1-2% of our remaining forest land. ALL our current forests have been either regenerated from cleared land (what WAS once virgin forest... a few hundred years ago) or have been logged over numerous times in the past 100-200 years. The vast majority of pine forests in the entire southeast US are plantations, as are many millions of acres in the west (not necessarily pine out west, but still planted forest).
The point is, we have virtually no untouched natural forest in the US. All our forest products come from managed forests. The question is, are these forests managed sustainably or not. That is the only issue here in the US (aside from protection of the small amount of truly virgin forest we have left).
Richard
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 6:09 am
27 Jul 2008
Permalink