sawmill

Carbon “Czar”, Christina Prestella, project manager of the Sierra Nevada Carbon Cooperative, recently answered a question posed by a reader of the Sierra County Prospect on carbon, biomass, and the future of our Sierra Nevada forests.  Her response:

Woody Biomass Utilization and the Sierra Nevada: A Compromise

By Christina Prestella – Sierra Business Council

So often in America, we find ourselves in dispute over the best way to manage our resources. Shall we protect them and endanger the economy? Or shall we use them and put our environment at risk? Either way, we jeopardize a form of capital, whether it is natural, social, or financial. At the Sierra Business Council, our mission is to pioneer approaches which foster all three of these types of capital, without compromising any of the three. The woody biomass utilization argument mentioned in last week’s edition of the Sierra Prospect is a great illustration of a lack of agreement in response to providing energy to our Sierra Nevada communities. Instead of utilizing the massive overgrowth of woody materials in our own backyards for energy, we depend on foreign sources which poison our air and our economy.

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory reports that for every megawatt of woody biomass power produced, 4.9 jobs are created. Additionally, by increasing use of renewable and alternative fuels, we reduce the use of petroleum-based fuels. The USEPA has presented a lifecycle analysis which shows that the use of woody biomass results in a 90.1% reduction of lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions, relative to the petroleum fuel that is being displaced. Local timber milling and utilization of woody biomass is clearly a less polluting form of energy, and provides good, local jobs, so why is the industry failing?…

Click here to continue reading the article

You’ve heard the buzz words: carbon credits, carbon sequestration, sustainable forestry and forest products, biomass utilization, cogeneration …the list goes on and on.  But while each of these initiatives are important on their own, it’s interesting to step back and look at how they fit together to create the forest carbon cycle.  Balanced in the correct way, there is the potential for a sustainable cycle of carbon sequestration by forests, storage of carbon in sustainably-harvested wood products, and substitution of biomass for fossil fuels in energy production.  The following picture created by Sierra Pacific Industries provides a good visual:

Here’s how it works (in an ideal world):  Let’s start with atmospheric carbon dioxide, the most common greenhouse gas.  Forests, through the process of photosynthesis, absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and store it in their trees’ biomass.  The carbon is continuously stored in wood products made from certified sustainably harvested timber, revitalizing the timber industry that is currently struggling in the Sierra (see our post about the mill closing near Sonora for proof).  Sustainable fuels management operations also produce biomass that is used instead of fossil fuels for energy production.  By removing these fuels, not only are we creating a renewable source of energy, we are also reducing risk of catastrophic wildfire (check out the US Forest Service’s upcoming “Forests With  a Future” that focuses on fuels reduction to prevent forest fires in the Sierra Nevada).  Biomass-fired power plants use combined heat and power technologies to efficiently produce reliable carbon-neutral heat and electricity for surrounding communities while simultaneously creating green jobs.   At the end of their useful life, wood products are recycled for bio-energy, doubling their carbon benefit.  When trees die or their biomass is burned for energy, their stored carbon is released back into the atmosphere, and the cycle begins again as new trees absorb the CO2.  Take a look at this poster from The Forest Foundation for another depiction of the system.

What role do carbon offsets play in this cycle?  A carbon offset is an incentive for forest landowners to take the additional steps to create and maintain the sustainable cycle described above.  By putting a monetary value on the services forests provide, they are creating a new source of revenue for communities that participate and work to make this sustainable vision a reality.  Many barriers exist to creating this idealized system, and there is still a long way to go, but it is something to keep in mind as we work towards mitigating climate change and creating strong, localized communities in the Sierra Nevada.

The Sierra Pacific Industries sawmill near Sonora closed last week, the third SPI sawmill to close in the Sierra Foothills this summer.  What are the implications of this closure?

Listen to Capital Public Radio’s Insight program, which aired on Wednesday, August 12, 2009, to hear from Sierra Business Council’s President, Steve Frisch, Mark Pawlicki from Sierra Pacific Industries,  David Edelson from The Wilderness Society, and District 2 Supervisor, Ray Nutting, as they describe the reactions to the mill closure, the cascading implications the closure will have in the community, and discuss what can replace the work of the mills in the future.

For audio of the program, click here.