Our friends at Biofuelwatch in the UK are organizing an Alternative Biomess Awards Ceremony on April 9th in London. They’re shining a spotlight on the who’s who of companies investing in promoting biomass, a false solution to climate change, along with the biggest pellet makers in the Southern US and Canada that are sending our forests off to the UK to be burned for electricity.
This year Dogwood Alliance will be attending the tri-annual General Assembly in Seville, Spain, marking the 20th anniversary of Forest Stewardship Council’s (FSC) efforts to bring different stakeholders together to find a sustainable future for the world’s forests and the people who inhabit them.
In November of 2011, Enviva, a major corporate wood pellet producer with international sales, began operations at a rebuilt, former Georgia Pacific sawmill in Ahoskie, NC. Residents close to the plant have faced 24/7 extreme noise and lights, dust that coats cars, buildings, and lungs in just a few minutes, along with dangerous heavy truck traffic. While European power plants seek huge shipments of wood pellets as supposedly “greener” fuel than the coal they burned in the past, eastern North Carolina has turned into the Southeast’s latest energy colony.
Executive Director, Danna Smith, is a finalist for the honor Outstanding Conservationist at Wild South’s 6th Annual Roosevelt-Ashe Conservation Awards.
Burning the forests that are supposed to be our best defense against climate change to protect us against climate change has to be one of the most ridiculous ideas I’ve ever heard. Yet over the last few years, Europe has wholeheartedly embraced this false solution to climate change, and we’ve seen a dramatic increase in logging in the Southern US to fuel European demand. Along the way, the US South has become the largest wood pellet export region in the world.
