Why are Georgia and North Carolina Selling their Forests to Create Energy in Europe and the UK?
The short answer—that overseas utilities are buying the wood to burn in their power plants as a way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions—naturally raises the question of whether that is a good idea or not. As environmentalists try to block the growth of this transatlantic trade in American wood-fuel, others argue that wood-burning, like expanded use of natural gas, can be a temporary alternative to burning oil or coal until new technology allows a shift to zero or near-zero carbon emissions.
The wood-fuel trade, which will soon comprise millions of metric tons of American wood pellets, is driven by European Union (EU) rules mandating that 20% of Europe's energy should come from "renewable" sources as a way to combat climate change. As a form of “biomass,” i.e., material composed of living or recently alive organisms, usually plants, wood is a renewable source because trees can be grown and harvested like crops.
Environmentalists are focused on the effects of the trade on threats to the food supply and on global warming.
Typically, wood-fuel pellets are made from lumber plantation trees that have been thinned-out prior to achieving commercial maturity. Traditionally purchased by the pulp and paper industry, this low value wood is increasingly going to pellets for power stations in the United Kingdom. As demand increases, critics argue that the supply of such wood will be depleted, encouraging forest owners to use land currently planted with food crops or natural forests.
http://www.allgov.com/news/us-and-the-world/why-are-georgia-and-north-carolina-selling-their-forests-to-create-energy-in-europe-and-the-uk-130602?news=850185
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OVERSEAS.
They KNOW we are SELLING OFF our NATURAL RESOURCES. And as we Shift to Fracking and Tar Sands from Canada for EXPORT we also will SHIP COAL to CHINA TO BURN!
Can you say "SCREW UP/GIVE AWAY" and SHOUT LOUDER?
It's DISGUSTING... We SELL OFF WHAT we HERE will have to DEAL WITH in Pollution and Cancer and Disruption while we SELL OFF the last bits of America we GREW UP IN?
But, few care here about this.
