Category Archives: Carbon, Climate & Bioenergy

A sharp rise in wood burning in urban areas could be bringing harmful pollution to greater numbers of people, and shifting the pattern of pollution from poorer to more affluent areas, one of the UK’s leading air pollution experts has warned. Currently, air pollution monitoring focuses on busy roads, which have been the main hotspots for fine particulate matter (known as PM2.5) and other air pollutants, largely from diesel vehicles. That means researchers could be missing the creation of new hotspots from wood-burning stoves… “As a first step people have to understand that the wood smoke could be harming their health. People need to understand that the wood smoke that fills their neighbourhood is as harmful as the air pollution from traffic or industry,” Fuller told the Guardian.

A collaboration between the Confederation of European Paper Industries (Cepi) and the European Heat Pump Association (EHPA) is aiming to save 50% of energy used in paper manufacturing and assist its decarbonisation by implementing heat pumps into existing paper mills. Heat pumps provide around 10% of Europe’s industrial energy demand and help lower the industrial emissions of multiple sectors. Large heat pumps and steam compressors capable of heating up to 200°C have recently become commercially available in a development expected to suit the needs of the pulp and paper industry. …A joint Cepi-EHPA paper has also detailed the ways in which heat pumps could be integrated into paper mills. The companies are now calling upon EU regulators to double down on the electrification of the paper and pulp industry… to align with the EU Green Deal Industry Plan.

France is seeking a waiver to EU bioenergy rules that would allow the forest-covered territory of French Guiana to receive subsidies to produce biofuels for the space industry. Wedged between Brazil and Suriname, the overseas department has little in common with mainland France bar the name. …The loophole would allow French Guiana to receive public financing to produce biofuels “especially for the space sector”. Local lawmakers argue the dispensation is necessary to protect French Guiana’s forestry sector and accelerate its energy transition. But campaigners have warned the exemption risks setting an incentive for increased logging. …Authorities in French Guiana argue the EU’s proposed rules threatened the territory’s goal to move away from fossil fuels, including at the spaceport, which consumes 18% of the electricity produced locally. By 2030, French Guiana wants 25% of its electricity mix to come from woody biomass.

LONDON — An investor group committed to climate change and controlling $11 trillion in assets has banned members from counting carbon removal schemes towards their emissions reduction targets before 2030, amid increasing scrutiny of the fast-growing market for carbon offsets. The Net Zero Asset Owner Alliance said on Tuesday it wanted its members to focus in the first instance on encouraging investee companies to reduce emissions across all sectors, rather than removing carbon that has already been emitted by, for example, planting large numbers of trees. The move reflects broad concerns about the quality of some carbon removal schemes and criticism of companies that buy carbon credits instead of improving their own carbon footprints, however the United Nations has said that carbon removal will be required to slow or stop climate change by 2050. The new policy applies to their members and the companies in which they invest. 

European Parliament’s proposal is amending the Renewable Energy Resources Directive. Although at their core amendments do not mean a full ban on use of biomass as fuel, they do provide for excluding primary forest biomass from all state support plans, renewable energy goal and longevity criteria. The intended amendments, the ministry warns, would mean additional emission quotas for wood chips. This would make bioenergy financially unattractive. …The statement from the ministry mentions this proposal could put at risk EU member states’ ability to ensure energy security using local renewable energy, which may, in turn, undermine EU’s movement towards climate neutrality. The proposal may promote use of fossil fuel and imported energy resources, so that member states are able to supply themselves with necessary energy, especially heating energy. In the event this proposal is passed, bioenergy may lose its advantages.

A new timber industry net zero roadmap aims to accelerate the productivity, sustainability, and innovation of the sector to better meet the needs of a low-carbon world. Commissioned by Timber Development UK (TDUK) in collaboration with eleven UK timber trade associations, the Timber Industry Net Zero Roadmap was developed following a comprehensive effort to map and measure carbon emissions across the whole supply chain. The first step of the roadmap has been to outline the size of the challenge, with 12 months of expert analysis showing the timber supply chain is responsible for 1,575,356 tonnes CO2e territorial emissions – which is about 0.35% of the UK total. While this is very low compared to other manufacturing industries such as UK steel production, which is responsible for 12 million tonnes CO2e (2.7% of UK emissions), and concrete, which is responsible for 7.3 million tonnes CO2e (1.5% of UK emissions), the Roadmap starts from the position that no emissions are acceptable.

Nest and Cushon, two UK pension schemes with combined assets of more than £26bn, are in a joint search for asset management partners to develop new forestry investment strategies to address climate change pressures. Both pension schemes believe that allocating money to forestry projects will offset environmentally damaging emissions from other investments. …The schemes have set aside an initial £600mn for a joint investment mandate and, by combining forces, aim to secure lower fees with third party managers. Nest presently manages about £25bn and expects to invest some 2% of its assets into forestry. …Cushon, which expects to have assets of around £1.7bn, could grow its allocation to 5% of its assets over time, including controversial carbon credits. …Both say they will avoid forestry projects where logging contributes to deforestation.

In July 2022, the European Union responded to the war in Ukraine by banning the import of Russian woody biomass used to make energy. At roughly the same time, South Korea drastically upped its Russian woody biomass imports, becoming the sole official importer of Russian wood pellets for industrial energy use. The EU has reportedly replaced its Russian supplies of woody biomass by importing wood pellets from the U.S. and Eastern Europe. But others say that trade data and paper trails indicate a violation of the EU ban, with laundered Russian wood pellets possibly flowing through Turkey, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan to multiple EU nations. EU pellet imports from Turkey grew from 2,200 tons monthly last spring to 16,000 tons in September. Imports from Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan reportedly rose too, even though neither has a forest industry. A large body of scientific evidence shows that woody biomass adds significantly to climate change and biodiversity loss.

UK — Greenpeace has accused the government of misrepresenting its stance on burning trees for electricity, giving a minister the impression of public support for the highly controversial practice in meetings with the power company Drax. Greenpeace is firmly opposed to most forms of biomass burning for power generation, and suspicious of claims that the resulting carbon dioxide can be captured. …Doug Parr, the chief scientist at Greenpeace UK, said Greenpeace opposes biomass burning for power, except in special circumstances, for several reasons: burning wood releases carbon dioxide now, but regrowing trees to reabsorb the carbon can take decades; growing trees for power generation takes up land that could be better used; cutting down trees destroys wildlife; and there are few safeguards to ensure that wood for burning comes from well-managed sources. 

The forest carbon offsets approved by the world’s leading provider and used by Disney, Shell, Gucci and other big corporations are largely worthless and could make global heating worse, according to a new investigation. The research into Verra, the world’s leading carbon standard for the rapidly growing $2bn (£1.6bn) voluntary offsets market, has found that, based on analysis of a significant percentage of the projects, more than 90% of their rainforest offset credits – among the most commonly used by companies – are likely to be “phantom credits” and do not represent genuine carbon reductions. The analysis raises questions over the credits bought by a number of internationally renowned companies. …However, Verra strongly disputed the studies’ conclusions and said the methods the scientists used cannot capture the true impact on the ground, which explains the difference between the credits it approves and the emission reductions estimated by scientists.

“To limit warming to 2C or lower, we need to accelerate emissions reductions. But the findings of this report are clear: we also need to increase carbon removal too,” says lead author Dr Steve Smith from Oxford University. “Many new methods are emerging with potential.” …This new report titled “The State of Carbon Dioxide Removal” says that to restrict and reduce global temperatures in the future there needs to be investment in developing technological solutions now. …One, known as BECCS, involves incorporating CO2 capture into biomass-based electricity-generation, in which organic matter such as crops and wood pellets are burned to produce power. Other options include: huge facilities where the carbon is extracted from the air before being stored in the ground; the use of specially treated charcoal (biochar) that locks in carbon; and “enhanced rock weathering” – loosely based on the carbon removal that occurs with natural erosion.

Petteri Orpo & Riikka Purra

SCIENTISTS at Natural Resources Institute Finland (Luke) have expressed their surprise at comments from policy makers that question the credibility of their latest carbon sink calculations.  Petteri Orpo, the chairperson of the National Coalition, hinted last week during an election debate that the calculations may not be on a sound footing by drawing attention to what he described as “incomprehensible” variation.  …Luke in December unveiled calculations that confirm that the land-use sector has turned from a carbon sink to a source of emissions for the first time ever in 2021, in part due to record-high logging volumes and in part due to the slowing growth of pine forests.  ….Raisa Mäkipää, a research professor at Luke, told Helsingin Sanomat that she is surprised and disappointment with the comments of policy makers. Luke, she reminded, has a statutory obligation to make the calculations and does so in a peer-reviewed fashion with internationally approved methods.