It’s a nice #SunnyDay outside and it really feels like spring. The #bees are busy making use of the #flowers, while the flowers are busy making use of the bees.
The #UK#ElectricyDemand is currently 32 GW and of that, 25.2% is coming from #SolarEnergy, 17.1% is coming from #WindEnergy, 16.8% is coming from #NuclearEnergy and 9.9% is coming from #Biomass and only 7% is coming from #Gas. There is also a fair amount coming from continental Europe through the various interconnections.
"Drax: UK power station burns wood from rare forests"
Ah yes, Drax, chomping its way through the world's biomass, and belching out carbon dioxide by the tens of millions of tonnes, all the while raking in green subsidies.
DOE to award up to $100M for pilot-scale testing of advanced CO2 removal technologies; funding for projects to produce carbon-negative hydrogen from biomass
SAF is produced through processes like Fischer-Tropsch which converts #biomass to liquid #fuel or hydroprocessing which treats feedstocks with #hydrogen. Recent tests saw #Airbus and #Boeing aircraft complete 100% SAF flights, opening certification for airlines to blend more SAF. #CleanFuel#FlyGreen#ClimateImpact#ZeroCarbon
A new peer-reviewed study quantifies broadly for the first time the air pollution and public health impacts across the United States from both manufacturing wood pellets and burning them for energy.
The study finds that U.S. biomass-burning facilities emit on average 2.8 times the amount of pollution of power plants that burn coal, oil or natural gas.
A good example of biomass use which isn’t as sustainable as the wood pellet industry wants you to believe. Forests are more than simple wood storehouses. They’re ecosystems and they can’t be replaced that easy.
Japan's thirst for biomass is having a harmful impact on Canada's forests
Biomass power stations burn plant material to produce steam to drive a turbine. UK's largest power station, Drax, is a former coal-fired power station converted to burn wood pellets. Drax imports most of its wood pellets, by clearfelling irreplaceable old-growth forests in Canada
UK classifies biomass wood pellets as "renewable" despite biomass releasing 8% more CO2 than coal
RAINFOREST aims to reduce the negative impacts of #food and #biomass value chains on global #biodiversity. Funded by #HorizonEU, the project is tackling environmental degradation and helping to achieve the UN’s #SDGs. #RainforestHorizon
We work with #stakeholders to develop and evaluate #transformative change pathways and interventions that are just, viable, and actionable. Our main objective is contributing to a more sustainable future for our planet.
The scale of tayga logging in #Russia Irkutsk oblast'. This process has been going for years, but apart from Russian environmental activists few people even know about it.
Before, the wood — perfectly healthy whole trees — were largely exported to EU where, thanks to the legal classification of "biomass" as zero-emission fuel they were, again, legally reducing CO2 emissions from coal power plants. Now it goes mostly to China.
As significant part of this logging is illegal even by Russian law, the forest that has not been logged is often set on fire to cover up and pretend it was all lost in an accidental forest fire, thus multiplying the harm to environment and climate.
The idea of biomass burning was based on sound scientific observation that when you grow say wheat, it takes CO2 from the air that is then bound in the straws, so when you later burn it, it has a zero net CO2 balance. This was then turned into a requirement for a minimum percentage of biomass in power plant fuel mix, which, together with the EU ETS emissions certificates, created a huge demand for #biomass.
Since EU actual waste biomass (straws, wood chips etc) was able to satisfy only a fraction of this demand, the industry did what it had to do: started importing it. But lifetime of straws is one year, while this forest has been growing for hundreds of years, which is how science was turned into absurd.
This is how just one Polish power plant ended up importing 7000 tons per year of forest from Komi Republic (Russia) over distance of thousands of kilometers, or German power plants importing coconut shells from Pacific area and planting forest in Africa to be cut and then transported on ships to be burned in Germany...
Handweeding and adding *Lomandra hystrix *plus a few assorted trees into a SE QLD #bushregeneration#riparian trial site, a mix of a #Miyawaki style on #Syntropic rows. All grown from seed in a home nursery, and watered once at planting time. No fertiliser or any amendments in field, soaked in seaweed and worm castings the day of planting. No herbicide will ever be used. The 2m Commersonia bartramia on right of frame of Photo 1+2 is 4 months old.
The resulting tree growth will be thinned to best performers while maintaining species #biodiversity and spacing. Some will be volunteered for #biomass production through #pollard or a form thereof, more often than not the faster-growing pioneer species. You may think the spacing is crazy but if I grow 50 tubes from the same seed batch, there may be 5 great performers, 30 OK, 5 poor, and 10 thinned in nursery. Even where they are planted onsite could be a difference in growth rates.
Photos 3+4 are 3 months old, have had less rainfall, and are at tractor spacing if that was ever required for mowing management. Just a test between closer and wider spacing across the site.
This is part of a 40m wide, 10 row system that is 1.5 years at the oldest. As the system matures, herbs and shade-loving species will be added when the weather is good (maybe after #elnino).
Rather than call it Miyawaki/Syntropic mix, how about something like S.A.P - Successional Accelerated Planting? Something tree-related? Any ideas?