OTTAWA — Canada’s Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development Jerry DeMarco tabled a report in the House of Commons last week outlining the challenges of meeting the ambitious objectives for the 2 Billion Trees Program. The report rightly points out that there can be no solution to fighting climate change and terrestrial biodiversity loss that does not involve forests. Canada’s Forest Trust Corporation is proud to be taking on this challenge and to be an innovative and growing part of Canada’s solution. CFT plans to plant 26 million trees between 2023 and 2025 through our comprehensive forestry approach that partners with Indigenous Peoples and communities, youth as the next generation of change-makers, and businesses across Canada. To accomplish this, we are scaling the number of seedlings planted yearly and securing long-term seedling and planting partnerships with some of the leading suppliers in North America.
Following the submission of Canada’s 2023 National Inventory Report of greenhouse gas emissions to the United Nations, the Honourable Steven Guilbeault, Minister of Environment and Climate Change, issued the following statement: “Canada’s latest greenhouse gas emissions data gives an encouraging picture of progress. Canada’s economy, in the face of a strong post-pandemic rebound, continues to show signs of becoming more efficient and less polluting as our journey to net-zero emissions continues. Canada’s emissions are going down—both from 2019 levels and 2005 levels. And the slight emissions rebound after the pandemic is smaller than originally expected. Environment and Climate Change Canada predicted there would be an increase in emissions in 2021 due to 2020’s sudden COVID-19 economic slowdown that caused emissions to drop sharply. But emissions have stayed significantly below pre-pandemic levels. 
Following the submission of Canada’s 2023 National Inventory Report (NIR) of greenhouse gas emissions to the United Nations, Forest Products Association of Canada (FPAC) Vice President, Indigenous Relations and Forestry, Etienne Belanger, issued the following statement: “Canada’s latest greenhouse gas emissions data confirms that while we are making progress as a country in reaching global emissions reduction targets, much more work remains to be done – particularly around mitigating worsening pest outbreaks and wildfires and their related impacts on our environment, human health, and vital community infrastructure. Forestry and forest products are uniquely positioned to accelerate climate action in Canada. Wood is the only renewable building material, it stores carbon, and wood and wood fibre-based products are essential to lowering the carbon footprint of our homes, offices, and towns and cities. …Healthy and resilient forests are critical to the future of Canada’s environment, energy transition, and economy.
Every year, the air in the Bulkley Valley community of Smithers becomes hazardous to human health as thousands of fires known as slash burns are deliberately set at logging sites. The contaminated air can stay trapped in the valley’s airshed for extended periods as the slash piles smoulder, resulting in local residents breathing in fine particulate matter that can damage hearts and lungs. So when a company proposed to build a wood pellet mill in town and claimed the mill would help reduce all that smoke, local residents paid attention. Northern Engineered Wood Products or NewPro claimed that if it got the green light to build a pellet mill on the site of a particleboard plant it had previously operated in town the result would be an immediate and consequential drop in slash-burning operations, which are used to clear branches, stumps and other waste from logging sites. 
VANCOUVER, B.C. – West Fraser Timber Co. Ltd. announced today that the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) has validated its scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions reduction targets. This validation further supports West Fraser’s plan to achieve near-term greenhouse gas reductions across all its operations located in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom and Europe. SBTi helps companies to set and validate emission reduction targets in line with climate science and Paris Agreement goals. It promotes best practice in science-based target setting and independently assesses companies’ targets. To accelerate corporate climate action, SBTi is focused on significant reductions in global emissions before 2030 and achieving net-zero emissions before 2050.
At the current rate of warming, forests may not be able to adapt fast enough to stay healthy, according to the National Academy of Sciences. That has adverse implications for everything from carbon storage to biodiversity. The new study looked at forests in the Western US and found that they are evolving to handle to warmer temperatures — something scientists call “thermophilization” — by becoming increasingly dominated by trees that are better able to tolerate the stress caused by heat and drought. However, the rate of this transformation is “lagging behind climate change by roughly tenfold.” That’s creating a situation where “forest trees are becoming increasingly mismatched with their environment. …New species are not coming into the forests. Instead the change in composition is happening mostly because established species that prefer colder and wetter conditions — e.g., Douglas fir — are dying and or are being weakened and attacked by insects.
Global biofuel mandates are impacting commodities markets across the world. And these laws and regulations will likely shift even more toward renewables in the coming years. …According to the European Commission on Energy, the EU is pushing for a minimum 14% increase within transportation fuels by the goal year of 2030. …The so-called “advanced biofuels” derive fuel feedstocks from substances other than food-based biomass — like oils. This includes plant-based biomass. This push to increase biofuels use represents an immense shift and focus on developing and producing renewable biofuels in the EU. …The US is also on the shortlist for making some major changes in the transition to renewables. According to the EPA, their plan is to progressively raise the requirements for the total amount of renewable fuel mixed with traditional fossil fuels. The 2023 change brings the mandate up 3.4% from the 2022 mandate.
This month Wakefield BioChar started using blockchain to track inbound wood waste shipments from timber mills that are used to create BioChar, a soil amendment used by farmers that absorbs carbon dioxide. The ForesTrust blockchain is a consortium solution launched by the U.S. Endowment for Forestry and Communities and developed by Chainparency. BioChar uses wood waste that would otherwise go to landfills. The environmental benefit comes from the ability of the soil amendment to absorb CO2 for a very long time. However, it is not without controversy (see later). In this case, the ForesTrust blockchain is used to pilot the tracking of wood waste from lumber mills. …“ForesTrust represents the future of how forest products supply chains can be managed. The network will elevate the entire industry, not only by streamlining and digitizing transactions and auditing, but by displaying the sustainability of forest products through real-time data,” said Pete Madden, CEO at the Endowment.
It might seem tricky to chop down trees with one hand and sell climate absolution with the other, but the dubious logic of carbon offsets makes it possible, at least for now. …nobody in America owns as many trees as Seattle’s Weyerhaeuser Co. Long a bête noire of environmentalists, the company is now using its 10.6 million acres of forest to declare it has so much green credit that it can sell some to other companies, the Wall Street Journal reported this week. …Avoiding a future of runaway global warming will require far more aggressive efforts to reduce carbon emissions. Weyerhaeuser, for example, could do more for the planet by continuing to embrace renewable energy and pursue sustainable, biologically diverse forestry — not just replanting, but rewilding. Suffice to say that offsets may be a profit center for now, but they will do little to absolve any of us of our climate sins.
AUSTRALIA – Spending $1.50 per hectare to prune climbing vines from the world’s selectively logged forests could remove 800 million metric tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere over 30 years, according to new research. University of the Sunshine Coast Professor Jack Putz has called for all countries with tropical forests—including Australia—to include the simple practice in their national carbon policies. “This research shows why we should cut lianas (woody climbing vines) and suggests how government and private landowners can do it, to achieve benefits for the environment and the economy via the timber industry,” said Putz. “Our research found that cutting lianas from a minimal number of trees destined for harvest—just five trees per hectare—would increase carbon sequestration and contribute to timber yields to improve local livelihoods.”
Biomass energy describes energy derived from living things. …Up until the mid-1800s, biomass was the largest source of U.S. energy consumption. Today, it accounts for just 5% of the nation’s energy use, though it remains an important source of energy in many developing nations for heating and cooking. The applications of biomass energy are many and varied. Via a range of conversion methods, it can ultimately be used to heat buildings, fuel vehicles, and generate electricity. Though it is expensive to convert biomass, requires large areas of land, and contributes to some greenhouse gas emissions, biomass energy is often hailed as a greener and cleaner alternative to energy produced using fossil fuels. …Types of Biomass …Biomass Conversion Processes …Biomass Energy by State and Country …Biomass Energy Subsidies …Benefits of Biomass Energy …Drawbacks of Biomass Energy ..Environmental Impact of Biomass Energy …Biomass Energy Policy and Regulation.
AUSTRALIA — The Australian Forest Products Association (AFPA) joins the National Farmers’ Federation (NFF) in welcoming this week’s Net Zero Australia analysis which recognises how forestry and agriculture can help Australia fight climate change, CEO of AFPA Joel Fitzgibbon said. “Reducing emissions is a critical pathway to meeting our greenhouse gas reduction targets but so too is greater emissions capture, both natural and technology based. Australia’s forest products sector can make a major contribution via carbon sequestration through tree growing and the downstream creation of sustainable and renewable products,” Joel Fitzgibbon said. The Net Zero Australia report highlights the important role our production forests and the land sector more generally will play in the carbon sequestration effort, including a focus on afforestation. The Net Zero Australia analysis 
We are going to have to dramatically downsize the dream of a future in which we replace 150-year-old fossil fuel infrastructure with “clean energy” by 2050. That’s the message in a number of recent reports and books… [that] underscore a number of problems with the renewables illusion, including the complexity of the task, the toxicity of rare earth mining and the scarcity of critical minerals. …For largely ideological reasons many greens and “transitionists” have presented the transition to renewables as a smooth road with no potholes. In so doing they have ignored much basic geology, energy physics and even geopolitics. As a consequence many imagine the construction of millions of batteries, wind mills, solar panels, transmission lines and associated technologies, but they downplay the required intensification of mining for copper, nickel, cobalt and rare minerals you’ve probably never heard of such as dysprosium and neodymium.