Category Archives: Climate Change

Bad news for biomass industry: failed investment marks a sobering conclusion to annual industry event in Florida

Last week the annual International biomass industry conference was held in Orlando, Florida. Industry executives from around the world attended to learn about the latest technologies, discuss biomass “supply chains” and network together. This year’s event featured a special “pellet supply chain summit” where the topic of discussion was the rapidly escalating export of southeastern U.S. forests to Europe, where they are burned in old coal plants or stand-alone biomass electricity facilities.

But even as the conference attendees were out on the golf course making deals, or laying plans for pellet supply chains, Scottish and Southern Energy (SSE) announced they would withdraw financial backing for several major biomass electricity facilities that those supply chains would likely have served. The facilities affected by the decision, owned by Forth Energy, include two 100MW biomass electric facilities in Grangemouth and Rosyth (already approved), and a third in Dundee (not yet approved.) [1]

Scot Quaranda from Dogwood Alliance, a group working to protect forests in the Southern U.S. stated, “The loss of finance for Forth Energy facilities is great news for our forests! European energy companies are setting up shop throughout the Southern U.S., cutting and pelletizing trees and shipping them across the Atlantic to be burned as so-called renewable energy. We even found them targeting remaining pockets of endangered Atlantic coastal forests.”[2]

Rachel Smolker, Codirector of Biofuelwatch, an organization that works on both sides of the Atlantic and worked with community groups opposing the facilities, stated, “Residents in the communities where Forth wants to build biomass facilities are rightly concerned about air pollution. Burning biomass is filthy – resulting in even more particulates and CO2 per unit of energy generated than coal, but nonetheless subsidized as clean, green and renewable.”[3]

Meanwhile, Anne Petermann, from Global Justice Ecology Project added, “The tree biotechnology industry has their sites aimed at supplying massive amounts of wood for energy, including future plantations of genetically engineered (GE) eucalyptus trees across the southern tier of the U.S. But with growing public resistance to GE trees and investor wariness in both the GE trees and biomass industries, their scheme is poised to fail.”

Notes:

[1] Reported by the Dundee Courier here: http://www.thecourier.co.uk/news/local/dundee/dundee-biomass-plant-scrapped-campaigners-hail-great-news-1.288988 and confirmed over the phone by Forth Energy on 27th March 2014.

[2] Dogwood Alliance documented the use of whole trees and destruction of ancient wetland forests in the southern US by pellet supplier Enviva, who export to the UK. Forth Energy had indicated potential to source pellets from this area. For more information see Dogwood Alliance campaign “Our forests aren’t fuel” http://www.dogwoodalliance.org/campaigns/bioenergy/ and Biofuelwatch’s new report “Biomass: the Chain of Destruction” http://www.biofuelwatch.org.uk/2013/chain-of-destruction/

[3] For a list of studies into the carbon impacts of biomass electricity: http://www.biofuelwatch.org.uk/resources-on-biomass/ Also see “Dirtier than coal?” published by RSPB, Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace. http://www.rspb.org.uk/Images/biomass_report_tcm9-326672.pdf

For an overview of health impacts from biomass facility air pollution http://saveamericasforests.org/Forests%20-%20Incinerators%20-%20Biomass/Documents/Briefing/
And statements from medical professionals here: http://www.energyjustice.net/biomass/health

[4] For an overview of tree biotechnology plans for the southern US: http://nogetrees.org
http://globaljusticeecology.org/publications.php?ID=615

Asuncion, Paraguay–On the occasion of International Forest Day, the Global Forest Coalition [1] in collaboration with Critical Information Collective [2] Global Justice Ecology Project [3] and Langelle Photography [4] launched an exhibition [5] that demonstrates the impacts of so-called ‘green land grabbing’ on local communities.

Green land grabbing is a relatively new phenomenon facilitated by forest carbon offset projects and other initiatives (forest carbon projects aim to use trees’ and plants’ ability to absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as a way of compensating for greenhouse gas emissions in industrialized countries).

The exhibition “Defending Community Rights against Green Land Grabbing” shows how forest carbon offset projects in Africa, Asia and Meso-America have triggered violent evictions and caused fear and uncertainty amongst forest-dependent communities, with women and children being particularly impacted.

“By increasing the economic value of forests, forest carbon projects are ramping up land grabbing, especially in forests inhabited by Indigenous Peoples and other marginalized groups whose land tenure rights aren’t recognized” states Ronnie Hall of Critical Information Collective, one of the designers of the exhibition. “By bringing these stories and images together we hope to convey that this is a very real and urgent problem that families and communities around the world are having to deal with.”

The exhibition demonstrates how local communities in industrialized countries – like the community in Richmond, California – can be negatively impacted by these offset projects as well. “By allowing major carbon emitters like Chevron to buy offsets instead of eliminating their pollution – as proposed in California’s cap and trade legislation – some of the most marginalized communities in the North have to continue to suffer the devastating toxic effects of industrial pollution in their neighborhoods,” highlights photographer Orin Langelle, of Global Justice Ecology Project and Critical Information Collective.

There are alternatives to forest carbon projects. “All over the world one can find territories and areas conserved by Indigenous Peoples and local communities (ICCAs) [6], and these are now recognized as playing a key role in forest conservation, including in countries like Mexico and Brazil” said Simone Lovera, executive director of the Global Forest Coalition. “Instead of financializing forests through offset markets, governments should urgently recognize the rights of Indigenous Peoples and local communities regarding their forests, which has proven to be a highly effective strategy for conserving those forests.”

Notes:

[1] The Global Forest Coalition, www.globalforestcoalition.org, is a worldwide coalition of Indigenous Peoples organizations and NGOs from 40 different countries striving for rights-based, socially just and effective forest conservation policies.
[2] Critical Information Collective, www.criticalcollective.org, (CIC) aims to provide social movements, NGOs and local communities with a useful source of incisive, well-researched and accessible political analysis, which focuses on challenging neoliberal economic globalization and promoting alternatives.
[3] http://globaljusticeecology.org/about_us.php
[4] Langelle Photography, http://PhotoLangelle.org, uses the power of photojournalism to expose social and ecological injustice.
[5] The exhibition “Defending Community Rights against Green Land Grabbing” can be visited online at www.criticalcollective.org It will be shown, amongst others, at the upcoming climate talks in Bonn, Germany, in June 2014 and the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity in Pyeongchang, South Korea in October 2014.
[6] Indigenous Peoples’ and Community Conserved Territories and Areas (ICCAs) www.iccaforum.org/

Note: Global Justice Ecology Project campaigner Will Bennington spent an all-too-short amount of time doing water relief work in West Virginia last week.  The West Virginia Clean Water Hub is doing amazing work, distributing water to communities in need and holding those responsible for the water crisis accountable.  Please consider making a donation (be sure to note that it is for water distribution), sending supplies, or volunteering in person.  Check them out here: West Virginia Clean Water Hub

-The GJEP Team

By Will Bennington, January 31, 2014.

Mountains of coal line the Kanawha River leaning into Charleston, WV. MCHM and PPH, chemicals that leaked into the Elk River on January 9, are used to process coal. Photo: Will Bennington for GJEP

It’s been almost a week since I returned from doing  water relief work in West Virginia, and the news keeps getting worse:  Formaldehyde, a known carcinogen at high enough concentrations, might be in the water.  The amount of MCHM and PPH, the toxic chemicals that leaked into the Elk River on January 9, poisoning the water of 300,000 people in nine counties, has been increased to 10,000 gallons.  Most people I spoke with are still reporting water that has a characteristic licorice smell, indicating traces of MCHM which causes chemical burns in the throat and on the skin, vomiting and eye irritation.

State health officials continue to maintain the water is safe, and appear ready to attack anyone who disagrees.  But, it might not matter much what the state has to say at this point.  The one thing that everyone I met in West Virginia had in common, aside from lacking clean water, was a deep mistrust of West Virginia governor Ray Tomblin, state and federal agencies, and the safety of their water supply.

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