Cutting down forests to produce 'green' electricity!!! ROFL!

[johnfm]

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/...

Can you belive it.

Utterly ridiculous state of affairs.

amusingly ironic article said:

Britain is set to plunder the lungs of the world to feed its growing hunger for wood to burn in power stations.

A series of biomass-fired plants are being built in the UK that will trigger a 150 per cent surge in timber imports from 20 million tonnes today to 50 million tonnes by 2015, according to the Forestry Commission.

British power plants are already shipping wood from Canada, Brazil, Scandinavia and South Korea.

Just one of the new biomass plants at Port Talbot, South Wales, will consume three million tonnes of wood per year — equivalent to 30 per cent of the UK’s domestic annual wood harvest of ten million tonnes.


snip


Nevertheless, environmental campaigners have raised concerns about the carbon emissions involved in shipping the wood such large distances, while to meet UK pest control laws the timber will need to be baked before it can be shipped to the UK.

Wood industry officials have warned that British families could face soaring prices for a range of wood-based products, including furniture, wood panels and even wallpaper because of its impact on low-grade timber and wood pulp prices.

“It’s going to push timber prices through the roof,” said Gavin Adkins, chairman of the Wood Panel Industry Federation. He is concerned that large parts of the £1 billion industry that rely on wood as its main raw material will be forced offshore

[Tangent Police]

Autistic think tank perhaps?

[Hugo a Gogo]

a constant cycle of growing wood, cutting it down and burning it, then growing more is 'carbon-neutral' though

edit: except for the 'shipping around the world' part

Edited by Hugo a Gogo on Monday 16th November 09:11

[Tycho]

Hugo a Gogo said:

a constant cycle of growing wood, cutting it down and burning it, then growing more is 'carbon-neutral' though

edit: except for the 'shipping around the world' part

Edited by Hugo a Gogo on Monday 16th November 09:11

And the baking it first part...

[ludo]

Hugo a Gogo said:

a constant cycle of growing wood, cutting it down and burning it, then growing more is 'carbon-neutral' though

edit: except for the 'shipping around the world' part

Edited by Hugo a Gogo on Monday 16th November 09:11

in principle it is a good idea, sourcing the biomass is the problem. Anyone thinking of stating a biomass plant oght to be thinking of making sure they can get a contract securing their long term supply at an economic cost before the build it though!

As Prof. MacKay's book shows, for any "alternative" energy supply you need to make sure that the numbers actually add up correctly. If you can get the supply from locally grown fast growing plants, such as willow coppice, then it probably makes sense; scandinavian or canadian softwood probably makes reasonable sense as well (provided it is sustainable rather than just large scale indiscriminate logging); Brazillian rainforrest is another matter entrely!

[grumbledoak]

Must confess, I find this quite funny. So much of the green lobby's bullst requires you to suspend science and common sense in order to reach their foregone conclusion, and this just takes it full circle. We be back to drilling for oil, next!

[elster]

I worked on the test blank for the wood burning power stations. The initial testing was based on growing willow, due to its speedy growth.

We found you needed too much, so it was deemed a failure and was shelved. Was only seen to be useful on a small scale.

However it is still for sale if anyone wants it, although it will need a new boiler after being left for so long. Possibly a fair few million needed.

[Bing o]

Words fail me at the fkwittery of the eco movement at the moment.

The continuing obfuscation of the real issues is shameful.

[F i F]

Similar fkwittedry in history imo was the burning of massive quantities of North Sea gas in power stations with the dual aim of a) stuffing over the miners and b) pursuing a higher thermal efficiency generation programme carbon footprint ballocks. (Indeed all this carbon foorprint stuff was started by Thatcher to justify the dash for gas according to some commentators.)

Result is we've consumed vast quantities of gas generating electricity and will now rely on imports etc, when imo the clean gas should have been used in lots of small systems, eg home heating and cooking, vehicles maybe, whilst coal should have been used in fewer and more easy to regulate, in terms of emissions, coal fired generation plants and worked on the various clean coal options and concepts even harder.


Don't expect many to agree with me on that, but it's my view fwiw.

[B Oeuf]

johnfm said:

Can you believe it.

Yes I can. The Green lobby is quite unable to concede defeat when it comes to a viable energy source. Their way is the right way and they would see our forests decimated rather than allow a nuclear reactor to see the light of day. Luddites the lot of em

[FourWheelDrift]

Hugo a Gogo said:

a constant cycle of growing wood, cutting it down and burning it, then growing more is 'carbon-neutral' though

edit: except for the 'shipping around the world' part

Edited by Hugo a Gogo on Monday 16th November 09:11

Says the timber is coming from Brazil, normally from that unsustainal source, the rain forest which is getting smaller every year.

They aren't replanting either.

[Hugo a Gogo]

FourWheelDrift said:

Hugo a Gogo said:

a constant cycle of growing wood, cutting it down and burning it, then growing more is 'carbon-neutral' though

edit: except for the 'shipping around the world' part

Edited by Hugo a Gogo on Monday 16th November 09:11

Says the timber is coming from Brazil, normally from that unsustainal source, the rain forest which is getting smaller every year.

They aren't replanting either.

I read this bit -
"A spokesman for Prenergy, which is behind the Port Talbot plant, said 90 per cent of its wood supplies would be imported, although he insisted that all of it would be sourced from proven sustainable sources. "
- as meaning it was all replaced

[B Oeuf]

I know Finlands wood resources are actually growing so it may be viable on a small scale. The amount required far any serious contribution would be huge though

[johnfm]

Hugo a Gogo said:

a constant cycle of growing wood, cutting it down and burning it, then growing more is 'carbon-neutral' though

edit: except for the 'shipping around the world' part

Edited by Hugo a Gogo on Monday 16th November 09:11

Yes, but forests are a natural CO2 store. They take CO2 out of the atmosphere and lock it away as cellulose (IIRC) - much much cheaper than storing it underground.

CAVEAT: I don't even think that we need to 'lock away' CO" anyway, as any slight increases in atmospheric CO" as a result of natural climate activity is quite beneficial to plant growth - which may be handy for crop prouction in out over populated times.

[JMGS4]

amusingly ironic article said:

Britain is set to plunder the lungs of the world to feed its growing hunger for wood to burn in power stations.
Just one of the new biomass plants at Port Talbot, South Wales,

Now why didn't they think about the millions of tonnes of free COAL that's just under the surface there instead??? Too simple for the greenslime and their crooks (like Gore) making billions from their new religion....

[Hugo a Gogo]

johnfm said:

Hugo a Gogo said:

a constant cycle of growing wood, cutting it down and burning it, then growing more is 'carbon-neutral' though

edit: except for the 'shipping around the world' part

Edited by Hugo a Gogo on Monday 16th November 09:11

Yes, but forests are a natural CO2 store. They take CO2 out of the atmosphere and lock it away as cellulose (IIRC) - much much cheaper than storing it underground.

CAVEAT: I don't even think that we need to 'lock away' CO" anyway, as any slight increases in atmospheric CO" as a result of natural climate activity is quite beneficial to plant growth - which may be handy for crop prouction in out over populated times.

all trees eventually die and rot away, releasing all that carbon again, so you might as well use the energy in them

they're just a long term store, not a permanent one (very long term if they turn into coal )

[nonegreen]

Tangent Police said:

Autistic think tank perhaps?

Thats an insult to the autistic. It takes a really special kind of idiot to come up with these kind of ideas. They need to be born stupid then have a very expensive education, then go into the civil service to become a professional fkwit and then only the most carefully selected of them are capable of such idiotic nonsense.

[Ali G]

nonegreen said:

Tangent Police said:

Autistic think tank perhaps?

Thats an insult to the autistic. It takes a really special kind of idiot to come up with these kind of ideas. They need to be born stupid then have a very expensive education, then go into the civil service to become a professional fkwit and then only the most carefully selected of them are capable of such idiotic nonsense.

'Upper Class Twit Of The Year' contest springs to mind - unfortunately, this is far beyond the imagination of even Monty Python.

[Jasandjules]

johnfm said:

Can you belive it.

Yes. There is no logic or reason employed in Eco Warrior land.

[Dr.Doofenshmirtz]

So, let me get this right...they cut down the tree, then they heat it up enough to kill any nasties lurking in the wood (I bet it has to be pretty hot too?), then they ship it to the UK and burn it to produce heat
How is it heated/cooked/sanitised at source ffs?