In the last two years across the US, extreme weather linked to climate change has left thousands dead and cost tens of billions of dollars, disproportionately impacting the elderly, children, the poor, and people of color. By all scientific accounts, it’s going to get worse. How much worse depends entirely on the rate and extent to which we are willing to embrace rapid and far-reaching changes across society.
Global leaders are meeting in Poland this week to resume climate negotiations. The 24th Council of the Parties (COP24) comes less than two weeks after the release of the US Government’s Fourth National Climate Assessment — ironically released on Black Friday, a day when American overconsumption is at an all-time high. The report issued some harsh news about the extent to which Americans are already experiencing devastating human, ecological, and economic impacts of climate change, It warns of more devastating health impacts and catastrophic economic losses to come if action is not taken.
The Southeastern region of the US — the world’s largest wood-producing region where logging rates are four times greater than South American rainforests — is expected to be among the hardest hit by climate change in the coming years. Yet, as climate science points to an urgent need to protect more forests, the US forest industry — the largest in the world — and government are promoting more, not less, destructive industrial logging and consumption of wood products.
A mountain of paper waste (left), a clearcut southern forest (right).
In October, an IPCC report was released detailing the latest analysis of what can be done to limit temperature increases to 1.5 degrees by the end of the century and calling for “rapid and far-reaching transitions” across all industrial sectors, including the land sector. Forests, which release carbon when cleared but actively absorb carbon as they grow, have become central in the global conversations about climate solutions. In fact, forests are expected to be a major topic of conversation at COP24 in Poland this month.
Some will debate whether or not forest protection should be used to offset fossil fuel emissions. But that is a red herring. We must both rapidly reduce emissions from fossil fuels AND protect forests. One without the other is a recipe for failure.
With the latest IPCC report underscoring the critical role forests must play as a solution, we can no longer avoid confronting and addressing the climate impacts of the US forest industry. Though US forests often get sidestepped in the global discussion about climate action, it’s vital that the world’s largest wood-producing and consuming nation be held accountable for its climate impacts. It’s as important to transform forest management in the US as it is elsewhere in the world.
The IPCC report sets forth three major strategies that underscore the urgent need to keep vastly more of America’s forests standing:
First, we must drastically cut carbon emissions. Yet, when forests are logged, carbon that would otherwise be stored in the forest is emitted into the atmosphere instead. Though these emissions are significant, they remain largely unreported. Recent scientific reports are shedding a light on this problem, including an Oregon State University analysis documenting that emissions from the forestry sector in their state exceed that of the fossil fuel industry. The US Forest Service has also acknowledged that “timber harvesting, and not land use change or fire, was the largest source of gross emissions from US forests between 2006 and 2010.” The US must account and set targets for reducing emissions from logging.
Second, we must actively remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. The IPCC report highlights significant risks and land impacts associated with Bioenergy Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS) — a technology that relies on burning trees for electricity and capturing the carbon emissions. Attempts to develop this kind of carbon capture and storage technology have thus far been too costly and failed to work effectively. We don’t need this expensive, unproven technology to solve the problem. Instead we can let forests grow, storing carbon currently in the atmosphere back on the land.
Mature wetland forests like this one are best at storing carbon and protecting local communities from flooding.
As forests grow, their capacity to capture and store carbon accelerates. The older a tree, the better job it does at absorbing carbon. Rather than planting new forests, we can remove far more carbon from the atmosphere over the next decade by allowing degraded natural forests to grow older. With a short window to affect change, letting existing natural forests grow must become a top priority. We must both stop the loss of and curtail industrial logging in natural forests.
Due to a combination of forest loss and industrial logging practices that have replaced old, intact forests with a patchwork of industrial pine plantations, clearcuts, and degraded natural forests, US forests currently store only 40% of the carbon they once did. Forest carbon stocks in the Southeastern region are currently among the lowest in the world. However, a new report published in Nature in 2017 documents that this region’s forest carbon stocks could be among the highest in the world if forests were allowed to grow.
Third, by protecting and restoring the connectivity and intactness of natural forests, we can optimize natural flood control, stabilize fresh water supplies, and turn up the Earth’s natural air conditioning system. At a time when floods, droughts, and heat waves are getting more intense, we need to be doing everything we can to restore intactness and connectivity across natural forests to protect human life and mitigate economic losses.
According to recent maps produced by the World Resources Institute, most major watersheds across the coastal plain of the US South are at “high risk” due to “recent forest cover loss.” Satellite imagery analysis conducted by the University of Maryland documents that”intensive forest management” aka logging is driving this forest cover loss.
Too few realize the persistent and pervasive poverty that exists in many of the most heavily logged areas of the US. Logging has not created sustainable or equitable economic conditions in rural communities.
As the IPCC report points out, strategies that focus on restoring degraded forests and the natural benefits they provide are also the most consistent with considering ethics and equity in helping the low income and vulnerable better cope with a changing climate. As we transition the economy to build resilient natural landscapes through forest protection and restoration, we can and must create a more diversified economy that works for more people. Creating equity in the economy improves poor and marginalized communities’ ability to withstand the harsh impacts of climate change.
Instead of embracing innovative transformation, the US continues to deflect attention away from logging as a climate problem, insisting that the biggest threat to forests is “deforestation” — the loss to urban development and agriculture — and that markets for wood help ensure that we “keep forests in forests.” Over a hundred wood product companies, forestry schools, forestry agencies and associations recently joined forces to deliver this decades-old message in a communications effort branded #forestproud. They assert that the production and consumption of wood is not a climate problem but rather a solution, so it’s best for everyone if we keep on consuming more and more wood products.
This old narrative comes in the wake of recent data documenting that logging is the single largest driver of forest carbon loss from US forests, releasing five times the annual amount of carbon loss from development or agriculture and fire combined. Yet, industry continues to perpetuate the misleading idea that forests are a “renewable resource” and that as long as we can continue to have forests that produce consumer products (regardless of the condition of the forests), our forests are “sustainable.” A case in point is the emergence of a rapidly expanding new wood pellet export market, guised as “renewable energy.”
Hundreds of scientists have warned that burning wood to generate electricity releases more carbon than coal per unit of electricity generated and further degrades forest carbon sinks, but the expansion of wood pellet production across the Southern US continues. Enviva, the world’s largest wood pellet exporter is currently planning ongoing expansions in poor, rural communities of color in North Carolina. These communities already live among the highest logging rates in the world, suffer some of the highest poverty rates in the nation, and are now suffering from some of the worst flooding from climate change.
A wetland clearcut traced directly to Enviva (left) and Enviva’s wood pellet manufacturing facility in Ahoskie, NC (right).
Meanwhile independent science is increasingly clear. Industrial logging has significantly compromised US forests’ ability to provide critical life-supporting services and to remove carbon from the atmosphere and store it on the land. Policy makers must acknowledge the big financial stake that the US forest industry has in protecting the status quo and must embrace leading-edge, independent forest and climate change science. New policies must be enacted that drive rapid and far-reaching transformation in the forestry sector of the US economy.
We must limit (not expand) the industrial-scale logging of forests so that we can expand forest carbon sinks while restoring natural protections against extreme weather events. While we do need some wood products, we can no longer afford wasteful, one-time use forest products any more than we can afford to continue to consume wasteful, one-time use plastics. Turning forests into fuel is a false solution that must be stopped. While ambitious, if we work together, we can expand the protection and restoration of natural forests in the US.
A growing, diverse movement is calling for forest protection across the US.
The IPCC report warns of challenging times ahead, an immense amount of work to transition industry, and a short 12 year time-frame for achieving results. Transformation is possible, but it cannot happen in the timeframe necessary to avoid catastrophe if the forest industry continues to resist the need to let vastly more of America’s forests grow. But, the good news is that there is a strong, growing and diverse national movement working to protect US forests as a climate solution. From stopping the use of wood pellets for electricity to scaling up the protection of wetland forests for flood control, forest protection is becoming a central part of the climate conversation in the US. Here in the US we can adopt feasible forest-based climate strategies, such as those set forth in a recent Climate Land Ambition Rights Alliance report.
MEDIA RELEASE | For Immediate Release
(November 29, 2018) – There is a new and growing threat to the world’s forests, people and climate: the biomass energy industry, touted as a ‘renewable’ energy. The use of forest biomass as a source of ‘green energy’ is set to increase by a staggering 250% over the next decade, having already doubled in the previous ten years, according to research published today by the Environmental Paper Network (EPN). The growth is being encouraged despite scientists discrediting the climate benefits and civil society raising alarms about the threat it poses to the world’s forests and their inhabitants.
The EPN’s new report “Are Forests the New Coal? A Global Threat Map of Biomass Energy Development” finds that Japan and South Korea are emerging centers for forest biomass energy consumption. They are emulating European policies which subsidize the burning of wood for energy, but fail to count the resulting smokestack carbon emissions.
“Countries at the upcoming UN Climate Conference need to urgently fix the broken policies which escalate logging and the burning of forests. They need to ensure that the Paris Agreement rule book closes the loopholes which allow the huge emissions from wood combustion to go unaccounted,” said Ms. Peg Putt, Coordinator of the EPN’s Working Group on Forests, Climate and Biomass.
Despite the controversies, bioenergy dominates ‘renewable’ energy production in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), dwarfing wind and solar and soaking up subsidies that should be applied to these genuinely low emissions technologies. Although burning wood is more emissive than burning coal per unit of energy produced, flawed carbon accounting methods set the emissions from wood burning at zero in the energy sector. This has spurred massive expansion.
The majority of feedstock for the increasing wood pellet market will come direct from the tropical, temperate and boreal forests of developed and developing countries alike. That is, forests of South-East Asia and Africa, the US, Europe and Australia, plus Russia and Canada. It cannot and will not be predominantly supplied from sawmill residues, as frequently and misleadingly stated.
“Here in the US South, Enviva, the world largest producer of wood pellets, is aggressively attempting to expand at the expense of natural forests and the long-term economic health of our rural communities.” said Rita Frost, Campaigns Manager at Dogwood Alliance. “As the new EPN report details, the US South is already bearing an immense burden from the wood pellet industry. If companies like Enviva are allowed to continue to expand, global efforts to address climate change are put at serious risk.”
“The runaway expansion of wood-fired energy generation is already damaging natural forests, the climate, forest communities and those living near production facilities. We used published statistics and the industry’s own predictions to figure out how much bigger the threat is going to get. The research showed that the scale of the sector’s planned growth is genuinely frightening, expanding to two and a half times as big as it is now over the next ten years,” said Ms. Putt.
“At a time when protecting our forests and their vast stores of carbon is a global necessity, the biomass industry is relentlessly trying to expand. The European Union is embracing flawed policies that mistakenly class forest biomass as carbon neutral, and 22 million tonnes of wood pellets are consumed in the EU each year. The biomass boom has to stop before it’s too late for forests, people, and the climate”, said Katja Garson, Forest and Climate Campaigner at Fern.
The Threat Map report should be read together with ‘The Biomass Delusion”, a position statement by more than 130 non-government groups released last month, which highlights the delusions driving the exponential growth of bioenergy: the idea that forest biomass energy is carbon neutral, and that it can be supplied without tearing down more forests.
“We are witnessing a false solution that increases emissions and puts forests on the chopping block. Even the industry says they’re not sure where all the wood will come from” said Ms. Putt.
“The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is clear that to tackle climate change we have to urgently protect and restore forests. Subsidizing bioenergy increases deforestation and forest degradation and takes money away from low emissions technology like wind and solar. Even if damaged forests are allowed to grow back, it will happen way too late to reduce the climate disaster”, added Ms. Garson.
“To effectively address climate change there is only one solution: go beyond the burning economy,” Ms. Putt concluded.
Contact:
Peg Putt, Environmental Paper Network: +61 418 127 580 / [email protected]
Katja Garson, Forest and Climate Campaigner, Fern: +32 (0)2 894 46 90 / [email protected]
Scot Quaranda, Dogwood Alliance: +1 828 242 3596 / [email protected]
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: November 8, 2018
Hamlet, North Carolina – This evening, the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Air Quality (DAQ) will hold a public hearing to take comments on the proposed expansion of Enviva’s pellet mill in Richmond County. This is the first in a series of expansions that Enviva plans to make at their NC facilities.
Enviva has applied for a modification to their construction permit at the Hamlet facility to increase production by nearly 100,000 tons of wood pellets annually. This significant expansion would require an additional 2,000 acres of forest per year to be cut down to meet Enviva’s demand, bringing the facility total to 15,000 acres per year. 40 environmental and social justice organizations in the state have signed onto a letter urging DAQ to modify Enviva’s permit to reduce production levels and require Enviva to install the pollution controls that the community deserves.
“Enviva has not even finished construction at their Richmond County plant, yet they are already applying to increase production,” said Emily Zucchino of Dogwood Alliance. “The wood pellet industry has been allowed to grow unchecked in North Carolina. We cannot make that mistake again.”
Enviva’s Hamlet facility has a particularly troubling history, with several flawed permits and a denial of the community to participate in a public hearing and comment period during the permitting process for this highly controversial facility. This public hearing represents the first opportunity for North Carolinians to make their voices heard.
A recent report by Environmental Integrity Project shows a shocking pattern of air quality violations or noncompliance at the majority of wood pellet facilities across the South, with Enviva’s North Carolina facilities being the most egregious. The Maryland-based company has attempted to assuage community concerns by including the installation of pollution controls in addition to their proposed expansion. However, emissions testing at Enviva’s facilities show that the facility would still be emitting above the legal limit, which is why environmental groups and community members are calling on DAQ to require Enviva to reduce production levels.
“My community does not benefit from the destruction of our forests and the pollution of our people,” said Debra David, co-chair of Concerned Citizens of Richmond County. “We want economic development solutions that are clean, healthy, and protect the people and the environment.”
The urgency of the climate crisis, which was underscored by a major international report released in October by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, demands that we dramatically scale up forest protection. Burning trees for electricity is worse for the climate than burning coal, and yet industry is exporting North Carolina’s forests and burning their climate and community benefits up in smoke — at a time when we need forests and wetlands more than ever to protect us from flooding and storms like Hurricane Florence.
Recently, Governor Cooper reaffirmed his commitment to the Paris Agreement by signing Executive Order 80, which sets forth aggressive targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and a bold vision for addressing climate change in the state. Increasing forest protection is an essential component of meeting climate goals, and allowing the wood pellet industry to expand in the state stands in direct contradiction with the Governor’s order.
“Time and again, Enviva has mislead the public, government, and investors on their emissions and sourcing practices — repeatedly putting profit over people,” continued Zucchino. “The company’s past actions and missteps make it all the more imperative that they are strongly scrutinized at every step of the way.”
For a brief legal background on Enviva’s permit application, visit: https://www.dogwoodalliance.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Legal-backgrounder-Enviva-Hamlet-expansion-1.pdf
For more information on the public hearing, visit: https://deq.nc.gov/news/press-releases/2018/10/09/public-hearing-draft-permit-enviva-pellets-hamlet-facility-nov-8
For more on the wood pellet industry’s damaging practices, visit: https://stopenviva.com/
# # #
Dogwood Alliance mobilizes diverse voices to defend the unique forests and communities of the Southern U.S. from destruction by industrial forestry. Learn more at www.dogwoodalliance.org or on Twitter – @DogwoodAllianceConcerned Citizens of Richmond County, based in Hamlet, NC, is a local environmental justice group that is an advocate for clean air and water in Richmond County. The group is a chapter of the Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League (BREDL). Learn more here.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: November 7, 2018, 12:01 am
(November 7, 2018) — An international coalition of more than 120 organisations from 40 countries today warns that the rapid global growth of the so-called bioeconomy poses a grave risk to the climate, nature, and human rights.
In addition to publishing an Open Letter,[1] a petition is being launched today to coincide with the International Day of Action on Bioenergy[2] which calls on governments around the world to support proven low carbon technologies, reduce overconsumption, and protect forests and other ecosystems.
In recent years, governments from the UK to Brazil to South Korea have promoted burning forest biomass for energy as a substitute for fossil fuels. Yet a large and growing[3] number of scientific[4] studies show that, far from being the ‘green energy’ climate solution, burning biomass[5] for energy emits no less carbon than burning coal, while also threatening biodiversity,[6] and human rights.[7]
The petition and global day of action come as the bioenergy industry is striving for further expansion and influence.
Today, major figures from the industry and policymakers will gather in San Francisco for an event organised by the Biofuture Platform[8], an initiative supported by 20 countries and backed by organisations including the International Energy Agency (IEA) and the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations (FAO). The Biofuture Platform promotes products made out of bio-materials as well as the wider bioeconomy.
“The BioFuture Platform actively promotes bioenergy and biomass products, which incentivizes more forest destruction. In the Southern US, we are already facing the insatiable appetite of European demand for biomass thanks to well-intentioned policies that have had damaging results. The bioeconomy harms our precious forests, rural communities, and the climate. In the wake of the latest UN IPCC report, it’s clear that forests are our best defense against climate change and we need to keep them standing,” said Rita Frost, campaign manager of Dogwood Alliance[9], which works to protect the Southern forests of the US.
“Over the past year, reports of an up to 60% decline in animal populations worldwide and an 80% decline in insect populations in several regions have made the headlines, with habitat loss remaining the number one cause of biodiversity loss. Yet the Biofuture Platform and numerous governments are promoting policies which will accelerate habitat loss in favour of vastly more crop and tree monocultures for energy and materials,” said Almuth Ernsting, co-director of Biofuelwatch[10], which campaigns on the impacts of large-scale bioenergy and bio-based products.
“The exponential growth of the bioeconomy is a global threat. Instead of contributing to climate mitigation, bioenergy and ‘bio’ products keep energy generation locked-in to the carbon cycle, decrease the amount of land available for food crops, drive land-grabs, and decimate forests – our most efficient carbon sinks. For a sustainable world, we must protect forests and rely on truly renewable energy sources, such as wind and solar,” said Katja Garson, bioenergy campaigner at forests and rights NGO Fern[11].
“Demand for biofuels, woodchips, pellets, and charcoal is a major driver of forest destruction and land-grabbing across the global South. Realising the plans of the Biofuture Platform would require tens or even hundreds of millions of hectares of new plantations at a devastating cost to forests, indigenous peoples, other forest dependent and traditional communities, and small farmers” said Mary Louise Malig, Campaigns Coordinator of the Global Forest Coalition, based in Bolivia.
Civil society organizations call for an end to support for bioenergy and other short-lived bioproducts. In the era needing urgent action on climate change, the NGOs call for “meaningful and equitable responses to the climate crisis which respect human rights, focus on proven low-carbon technologies, reduce overconsumption and waste, and protect forests and other ecosystems.”
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[1] For an online version: http://environmentalpaper.org/bioeconomy-day-of-action The letter will also be delivered to policymakers at the BioFuture Platform Conference being held in San Francisco, California
[2]https://www.rainforest-rescue.org/petitions/1152[3]http://www.biofuelwatch.org.uk/biomass-resources/resources-on-biomass/[4]https://www.euractiv.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2018/01/Letter-of-Scientists-on-Use-of-Forest-Biomass-for-Bioenergy-January-12-2018.pdf[5]https://fern.org/bioenergy[6]https://e360.yale.edu/features/insect_numbers_declining_why_it_matters[7]http://actionaid.org/sites/files/actionaid/adding_fuel_to_the_flame_actionaid_2013_final.pdf[8]http://biofutureplatform.org/about/[9]https://www.dogwoodalliance.org/about-us/our-story/[10]http://www.biofuelwatch.org.uk/about/[11]https://fern.org/team
Faith and Forests is a special monthly series by Joseph Frankovic. In the series, Joseph will explore how his deep connection to spirituality and faith intersects with our forests and the work of Dogwood Alliance. The views and opinions expressed are those of the author(s) and do not imply endorsement by Dogwood Alliance.
Last month, we met a group of ancient Jewish activists whose outlook on life and deeds to help wayfarers and captive women reminded one eminent Israeli historian of the Galilean miracle worker Jesus. Members of that group were known as men of action.1 Like Jesus, a few of these men of action also had reputations for working miracles.
Allow me to leap forward in time to the modern era and carry the epithet with me, while expanding its scope to include active men and women of more recent faith traditions. Under this wider banner, I will bring together the Catholic saint Mother Teresa of Calcutta, who died in 1997, and the Karachi philanthropist Abdul Sattar Edhi, who died in 2016.2 Both of them made my short list of recommendations for people who may have entered the kingdom of heaven.
Abdul Sattar Edhi holding a sick child. Courtesy of the Edhi Foundation
When describing the vows taken by the Missionaries of Charity, the society that she founded, Mother Teresa once wrote: “[We] give wholehearted free service to the poorest of the poor. By this vow, we bind ourselves to be one of them, to depend solely on divine providence.”3 When being interviewed by Julie McCarthy of National Public Radio, Edhi once said: “I feel happy that God made me different from the others. I helped the most oppressed.“4 These two statements identify three stakeholders whom the kingdom of heaven brings into close contact: benefactors, beneficiaries, and, of course, God, who underwrites the program. Starting with the beneficiaries, I will take another leap in time and return to the first century of the Common Era.
Early in his career as a healer and activist with a prophetic edge, Jesus made a public announcement that revealed his high self-awareness and characterized his movement. He made the announcement one Sabbath in the synagogue of his hometown, in Nazareth, by reading from the Prophet Isaiah.
Ἔχρισέν με εὐαγγελίσασθαι πτωχοῖς, ἀπέσσταλκέν με, κηρύξαι αἰχμαλώτοις ἄφεσιν και τυφλοῖς ἀνάβλεψιν, ἀποστεῖλαι τεθραυσμένους ἐν ἀφέσει
[God] has anointed me to bring good news to the destitute, he has sent me to proclaim release to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free those who are crushed.5
The historical record indicates that Jesus presented his mission as a real benefit for blind, captive, crushed, and destitute people. The message was good news, and it included a proclamation of liberty, restored sight, and freedom.
As interest in his message grew, Jesus started making administrative and organizational decisions. One person could no longer handle the many requests for help and continue to manage the movement’s growth. He deputed, therefore, 12 young men to assist and gave them instructions for spreading the message.
Πορευόμενοι δὲ κηρύσσετε λέγοντες ὅτι Ἤγγικεν ἡ βασιλεία τῶν οὐρανῶν. ἀσθενοῦντας θεραπεύετε, νεκροὺς ἐγείρετε, λεπροὺς καθαρίζετε, δαιμόνια ἐκβάλλετε.
As you move about, proclaim that the kingdom of heaven has come [to this place]: Heal the infirm, raise the dead, cure lepers, expel demons.6
This passage identifies another quartet of beneficiaries: those suffering from illness, from leprosy, and from spiritual oppression, as well as those who had expired—presumably not long before Jesus’s lieutenants had arrived.
On another occasion, when John the Baptist sent two messengers to ask a question about his mission, Jesus replied:
Πορευθέντες ἀπαγγείλατε Ἰωάννῃ ἅ ἀκούετε καὶ βλέπετε τυφλοὶ ἀναβλέπουσιν καὶ χωλοὶ περιπατοῦσιν, λεπροὶ καθαρίζονται καὶ κωφοὶ ἀκούουσιν, καὶ νεκροὶ ἐγείρονται καὶ πτωχοὶ εὐαγγελίζονται.
Go [and] tell John what you hear and see: The blind see and lame walk, the lepers are cured and deaf hear, and the dead are raised and the poor have good news proclaimed to them.7
Jesus answered by summarizing reports that were circulating and by pointing to results that these messengers could see. And who were the subjects of these reports? People who had been blind, crippled, dead, deaf, and leprous.
A crippled man in ragged clothes walking with two crutches and a wooden leg. Etching by Jan Georg van der Vliet, c. 1632. (Wikimedia Commons)
We now know who benefited from the kingdom of heaven’s growth. I will list the beneficiaries encountered so far, one after the other, in alphabetical order: blind, captive, dead, deaf, lame, leprous, oppressed, poor, and sick men, women, and children. Edhi and Mother Teresa captured the general character of this group with an economy of words. They described the beneficiaries of their labors as the most oppressed and poorest of the poor.
What about the benefactors? Who did Jesus recruit to join his movement? The Gospel of Luke mentions three occasions when Jesus invited people to follow him. Six received invitations; five followed and joined—that is, they entered the kingdom of heaven.
The first occasion is found in a long passage that begins with a description of Jesus using a crowd-control strategy to manage increasing numbers. Teaching along the shoreline of the Sea of Galilee, at the ancient port of Tabgha, near the fishing town of Capernaum, Jesus climbed in an idle boat and sat down. Sitting in it allowed him to address the people while being just a few feet away.
That boat belonged to Simon, who worked with his brother Andrew. These two brothers had formed a partnership with two other young men, James and John, who were also brothers and who also owned a boat. This partnership of two fishing crews had been using trammel nets the previous night to catch tilapia galilea, which tourists know as St. Peter’s fish. In the winter and early spring, warm water associated with the springs of Tabgha attract the tilapia, creating a highly productive fishing ground.8
Simon, Andrew, James, and John were neither deaf nor blind, infirm nor lame, and certainly not dead. They had full and comfortable lives, residing in Capernaum, a prosperous community that had built and maintained a synagogue. Yet after lowering their nets in the water in broad daylight, as Jesus had directed—trammel nets are invisible to tilapia only after dark—and hauling up a huge catch, they responded to his invitation to follow.
Καὶ καταγαγόντες τὰ πλοῖα ἐπὶ τὴν γῆν ἀφέντες πάντα ἠκολούθησαν αὐτῷ.
And bringing their boats ashore, They abandoned everything and followed him.9
These four young men, two pairs of brothers—in the prime of life, able-bodied, and competent—abandoned their fishing partnership and left behind neighbors, friends, and relatives.
Fisherman on the Sea of Galilee (1912) – Wikimedia Commons
The second occasion involved the tax collector Levi. He was sitting at the custom house when Jesus approached him. Jesus’s invitation to join and Levi’s response apparently required little discussion. Perhaps Levi heard reports similar to the ones that John’s messengers had heard.
Καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ, ἀκολούθει μοι. καὶ καταλιπὼν πάντα ἀναστὰς ἠκολούθει αὐτῷ
And [Jesus] said to [Levi], “Follow me.” And leaving everything, he stood up and followed him.10
The invitation and the response may have constituted a remarkable leveling event. Employed as a tax agent, Levi collected plenty of silver and gold for Rome and was permitted to take a cut for himself. To follow Jesus, he walked away from a lucrative career and probably gave away a small fortune, too.
The final occasion is found in another long passage. The story centers on a conversation between Jesus and a rich young man, who may have been a restless soul. He approached Jesus and asked what he should do to inherit eternal life. Jesus recommended that he govern his life in accordance with the Law of Moses. Not entirely content with that answer, the young man apparently pressed Jesus:
Ταῦτα πάντα ἐφύλαξα ἐκ νεότητος.
I have kept all of these [commandments] from my youth.11
In these words, I discern a young man of wealth and privilege seeking to know if there is something more and what it may require. Jesus then replied with an invitation to join him, plus one prerequisite:
Εἰ θέλεις τέλειος εἶναι, ὕπαγε πώλησόν σου τὰ ὑπάρχοντα καὶ δὸς [τοῖς] πτωχοῖς, καὶ ἓξεις θησαυρὸν ἐν οὐρανοῖς, καὶ δεῦρο ἀκολούθει μοι.
If you desire fulfillment, go sell your possessions, and give [the money] to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven, and come [and] follow me.12
The young man became sad. And looking at him, Jesus spoke his famous metaphor of a camel passing through the eye of a needle to illustrate the unlikelihood of a rich person entering the kingdom of heaven (i.e., kingdom of God).13 A wealthy person usually has no interest in entering the kingdom of heaven, but when he or she does—and takes that step to cross over the threshold—the newcomer joins a band of benefactors who have relinquished everything to join the poorest and most oppressed among us.
Now, pause for a moment and again leap forward in time. One of the existential threats that humans must address soon, together, and on a global scale, is climate change. Scientist Johan Rockström, who earned his doctoral degree at Stockholm University, recently presented the TED talk “Five Transformational Policies for a Prosperous and Sustainable World.”14 In his talk, he gave an overview of the Earth-3 model, which aims to meet the United Nation’s 17 sustainable development goals while staying within the 9 planetary boundaries that must be respected to ensure a stable Earth System. The model was developed by a team of scientists to help us create a just and safe world. The team concluded that five policies must be adopted to avoid a grim future.
The fourth transformational policy addresses income inequality and the wealth chasm, which are gumming up electoral processes and ruining democratic institutions in the United States and elsewhere. The policy is designed to redistribute wealth by limiting how much the richest ten percent may accumulate. As far left as this proposal may sound—setting limits for wealth accumulation—Jesus required far more of rich people entering the kingdom of heaven. They entered after abandoning their material wealth or distributing it to the poor.
The act of entering the kingdom of heaven reduces inequality through voluntary redistribution and leveling. The rich person who enters becomes like the poor person whom he or she seeks to help. Both benefactor and beneficiary, now in close association, share the same experience and possess the same quality of being poor in spirit—being dependent on divine providence for life’s essentials.
I am reminded of Mary Clarke, who grew up in Beverly Hills with the glamour culture of Hollywood. As an adult, she married twice, raised seven children, and went through two divorces. She also discovered that helping the poor vitalized her. At the age of 50, Clarke, who had renamed herself Mother Antonia, took the final, radical step. She left behind a comfortable lifestyle in suburban Los Angeles, CA, and voluntarily moved into a cell at La Mesa prison in Tijuana, Mexico. In 2005, she was interviewed by host Terry Gross on Fresh Air.15 I will recreate a short segment of the interview:
Gross: So, you put on a habit; you went to the prison in Tijuana, where you had been doing some work already. Clarke: Yes. Gross: And you wanted to move in there that you could literally be with the prisoners, live with the prisoners. Clarke: Yes, be with, being with—
In the audio recording, Mother Antonia clearly disrupted the conversation’s flow to accentuate the point of being with the prisoners.
I am also thinking of Dr. Thomas Catena, whom we met last month. He administers Mother of Mercy Hospital, the only medical facility in the Nuba mountains of Southern Kordofan. “I’m in it with these guys,” explained Catena, “I’m all in.” A former Brown University nose guard who received All-Ivy League and All-American honors, he was explaining his decision to join the Nuban people and care for them in a war zone.16
Dr. Catena walking in a Sudanese village with a colleague. Photo Credit: Paul Jeffrey
In the Synoptic Gospels, the kingdom of heaven conveys two basic meanings. First, it may refer to its constituent parts: benefactors and beneficiaries. People who are poor in spirit populate the kingdom of heaven. Secondly, it may refer to God’s intervention in earthly affairs. When Jesus healed the sick, he referred to the kingdom of heaven as being present. When used with this connotation, it may be regarded as a way of speaking about God’s presence in oblique language.
In an earlier section, I mentioned two messengers who queried Jesus about his mission. John the Baptist had sent them. After they had departed, Jesus addressed the people around him and spoke about John the Baptist and the kingdom of heaven:
ἀπὸ δὲ τῶν ἡμερῶν Ἰωάννου τοῦ βαπτιστοῦ ἕως ἄρτι ἡ βασιλειά τῶν οὐρανῶν βιάζεται [καὶ πᾶς εἰς αὐτὴν βιάζεται].
From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven breaks forth [and everyone breaks forth [with] it].17
This saying bedeviled expositors and preachers for a millennium and a half—until the 17th century, when Edward Pocock, the renowned professor of Arabic and Hebrew at Oxford University, recognized its connection to an earlier passage from the Prophet Micah.18 Lifting the key word from Micah, Jesus had tapped the original imagery of the passage to project a dynamic scene: restless sheep streaming forth from a crowded pen, through a breach in a low stone wall that no longer confines them. It is a tumultuous, glorious event—the kingdom of heaven breaking forth, benefactor and beneficiary being swept forward, in a surge of motion and commotion, with God striding ahead to lead the way.
Flock of sheep moving through Cologne streets on a holiday morning – Turelio via Wikimedia Commons
Notes
On November 8th, nearly 200 people attended a public hearing in Richmond County to learn more about and weigh in on Enviva’s plans to expand production at their Hamlet facility. Enviva, the world’s largest wood pellet manufacturer, cuts down our Southern US forests, turns them into pellets, and ships them to Europe to be burned for electricity. Now Enviva is gearing up for a string of expansions at their North Carolina and Virginia facilities. Together, these expansions could equal 400,000 additional tons of wood pellets each year – requiring 9,600 additional acres of forests to be cut down per year.
In Hamlet, NC, Dogwood Alliance joined local concerned residents and environmental justice advocates from across the state to voice support for clean air and increased forest protection. The hearing represented the first time North Carolinians had meaningful involvement in the permitting process, as the community was denied an opportunity to have a public hearing on the initial permitting decision.
Local residents, environmental justice advocates, air quality experts, and attorneys expressed concern that Enviva’s expansion will create harmful air pollution, exacerbate environmental injustices, hinder forests’ ability to protect communities against the flooding and high winds of natural disasters, and take us backwards, not forwards, on climate change. The comments given at the hearing were bolstered by a letter signed by 40 organizations representing well over 1.5 million North Carolinians, calling on DEQ to deny Enviva’s expansion and halt any future permitting until they complete a study of the cumulative impacts of the wood pellet industry.
They provide us with clean air and water, protection from flooding and storms like Hurricane Florence, and habitat for unique plants and animals. Forests also draw enormous amounts of carbon out of the atmosphere and store it in trees and soil.
The urgency of the climate crisis demands that we dramatically scale up forest protection. North Carolina cannot afford the increased logging and degradation of our forests.
In response to the latest UN IPCC Report that pressed governments around the world to take “rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes” to fight climate change, North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper issued an executive order on climate action, pledging to reduce the state’s greenhouse gas emissions by 40% by 2025.
North Carolina residents speaking at the hearing emphasized that allowing Enviva to expand their operations in Hamlet or any other facility sharply contradicts the Governor’s commitment on climate action. The only way to avoid climate disaster is to dramatically scale up forest protection at the same time as we transition to truly clean, carbon-free energy.
“Cutting our forests down and burning them is irresponsible.” – Danna Smith, Executive Director, Dogwood Alliance
North Carolina’s lax oversight in the past has resulted in the unchecked expansion of the wood pellet industry without proper analysis of the industry’s impacts on forests, climate, and communities. Any expansion of Enviva’s facilities will worsen the already dangerous impact of this industry on public health, forests, and the climate. At the November 8th hearing, North Carolinians said: enough is enough. We want healthy forests, clean air, and strong local economies. We won’t stand for any expansion of the wood pellet industry, starting with this Hamlet permit modification.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: OCTOBER 29, 2018 2 PM ESTDogwood Alliance Statement in Response to Governor Cooper’s Executive Order on North Carolina’s Commitment to Address Climate ChangeAsheville, NC – Today, North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper signed an executive order, “Executive Order NO. 80: North Carolina’s Commitment to Address Climate Change and Transition to a Clean Energy Economy,” that set forth aggressive targets and a bold vision for addressing climate change in the state. The order aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 40% from 2012 levels by 2025.
“We applaud the Cooper Administration for their leadership on climate change, and for taking this important first step in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and preparing North Carolina communities for the impacts of a changing climate,” stated Danna Smith, Executive Director of Dogwood Alliance. “We encourage the Cooper Administration to look to forest protection as one of the best solutions we have to protect our state from the negative impacts of a changing climate. Standing forests must be a central component of any climate adaptation plan.”
Executive Order No. 80 comes on the heels of Hurricane Florence and 2017’s Hurricane Matthew that caused major destruction to communities across the state and cost taxpayers billions. It also follows a major report from the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that warns that the world only has a short window to address climate change before catastrophic impacts dramatically increase. The IPCC report places a heavy emphasis on the dual strategy of reducing fossil fuel consumption and protecting forests.
In our recent report, “Seeing the Forest: Nature’s Solution to Climate Change” we found based on the latest science, if we stop deforestation, protect and restore degraded forests, and expand forests, we could reduce annual emissions by 75% in the next fifty years. If we also phase out fossil fuels, we could easily meet the goals of the Paris Agreement and avoid catastrophic climate change. These goals are lofty, but not unattainable, especially if the world unites for a common vision of keeping climate change at just 1.5 degrees Celsius.
The NC order promotes strategies that increase the number of registered emission free vehicles in the state, reduce energy consumption in state buildings, and continue to wean the state from fossil fuel electricity. A bold strategy is needed to protect and restore forests across North Carolina. A vital component of the executive order is climate adaptation and readying the citizens of the state for further damaging storms and impact from a changing climate. Forests are our community’s best defense against flooding and storm surge and are needed to continue to capture and store carbon.
Now is the time to rethink the way we value forests in the state in order to create more resilient and healthier communities, ecosystems and economies. We must accurately and transparently account for carbon emissions from the forestry sector, including the wood pellet industry that is cutting down forests in the state to turn them into pellets to ship to Europe and Asia to burn for electricity. We encourage Governor Cooper to pull the brakes on this industry and instead promote forest protection as a climate adaptation strategy.
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Dogwood Alliance mobilizes diverse voices to defend the unique forests and communities of the Southern U.S. from destruction by industrial forestry. Learn more at www.dogwoodalliance.org or on Twitter – @DogwoodAllianceMedia Contact: Scot Quaranda, 828.242.3596, [email protected]
Governor Roy Cooper outlines a bold new vision delivered today via Executive Order for tackling climate change in the state of North Carolina.
Dogwood Alliance asserts that standing forests are our best defense against a changing climate and hopes they will play a central role in Cooper’s plan.
From a passionate desire to expand the conversation about climate change, environmental artists around the world are striving to harness the transformative power of art to promote awareness, provoke dialogue, and inspire action.
The exhibit features the distinctly different visual voices of environmental photographers, Susan Patrice and Benjamin Dimmitt.
Patrice’s work, The Enveloping Landscape, explores Pisgah National Forest’s lush woodland landscape amidst underpinnings of intimacy, vulnerability, and belonging.
Susan Patrice photograph from The Enveloping Landscape
Dimmitt’s work, An Unflinching Look, portrays the destructive effects of sea level rise on an estuary in his native Florida. A Dialogue in Photographs invites viewers to step into an intimate world where landscape images are revealed not as objects to be admired, but as intimate portraits of a sovereign and alive place waiting to be met, understood, cared for, and loved.
Benjamin Dimmitt photograph from An Unflinching Look
Opening reception:
Friday, November 9, 4:00–6:00 pm Dot Editions at RAMP SOUTH Studio 821 Riverside Drive Asheville, NC 28801
Susan Patrice will be donating 30% of The Enveloping Landscape print sales to Dogwood Alliance.
A Dialogue in Photographs is just one of many extraordinary exhibits and events that will be featured as part of photo+sphere – an art and science event in Asheville, North Carolina November 7-11 that brings attention to how we see the environment and the role humans play in determining the future of our planet. photo+sphere explores the environment through photography and photo-media and includes nationally known speakers and panelists, exhibitions, films, and performances at venues throughout Asheville.
The Southern US contains about 2% of the world’s forests but produces over a fifth of the world’s timber products. Therefore, we have a particularly important charge to protect the forests & communities that depend on them from industrial forest practices.
This map, from Global Forest Watch, displays forest degradation. The Southern US stands out as a clear hotspot in North America.
Earlier this month, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued a report on limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees C. The IPCC, our premier collection of scientists, is telling us in no uncertain terms that humanity’s future depends on slashing greenhouse gas emissions to reach net zero by 2050. Even more, we must halve our current level of emissions by 2030.
Stand4Forests because forests stand for you
The best way to remove carbon from the atmosphere isn’t new technology, but, rather, it’s listening to mother nature. We must let our trees and forests grow old, so they can store carbon and keep the atmosphere in balance. Restoring and protecting forests must become central to decision makers’ climate strategies.
Reducing emissions in the atmosphere to zero requires restoration, reforestation, and halting deforestation and forest degradation
What can we do? We must demand an end to subsidies for biomass. Industry tries to confuse us by calling it “renewable biomass”, but let’s cut to the chase here: it unequivocally means clearcutting forests in the Southern US and burning them. Burning wood actually releases up to 50% more carbon dioxide than burning coal per unit of electricity generated.
That is why Dogwood Alliance is joining a global alliance to proclaim that biomass is a delusion. Large-scale burning of trees for energy harms the climate, forests, people, and inhibits the clean energy transition. We must move beyond burning forests to address climate change.
The US South is ground zero for forest destruction and biomass. As long as we continue to incentivize forest destruction over forest conservation, we will not solve the climate crisis. Enviva destroys tens of thousands of acres of forests every year in order to create wood pellet biomass. For the health of the planet and the safety of our communities, this must stop.
Dogwood Alliance, unlike industrial-forest-destroyers, does not mince words. We’ve just had a big wake-up call, and we, our families, and our communities must respond. Our climate and humanity’s future depend on forest protection.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Monday, October 8CONTACT: Scot Quaranda, 828-242-3596, [email protected]
(October 8, 2018) — A new report from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) forwarded the need to protect and restore forests just two weeks after over 200 organizations, scientists and elected officials released the #Stand4Forests platform in the United States. The newly released platform aligned with the IPCC report in demanding the protection of forests as a vital climate solution and warned against false techno-solutions like bio-energy carbon capture and storage (BECCS).
“Climate science shows that we cannot stop a climate catastrophe without scaling up the protection of forests around the world, including in the United States. Therefore, the US must be a global leader in not only committing to phase out fossil fuel use but also in protecting our forests,” says the platform, which was released in between California’s Global Climate Action Summit and New York’s Climate Week. Signatories include 40 mayors from coast to coast; organizations such as Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation, NRDC and Sierra Club; and leading climate scientists and advocates including Bill McKibben and Michael Mann (see the full list of signatories here.
“The IPCC report confirmed what we have been collectively saying for years, that forests are our best defense against climate change and that we need to join together to keep them standing,” said Danna Smith, Executive Director of Dogwood Alliance, a North Carolina-based forest protection organization and principal organizer of the Platform. “Living forests are our best hope for removing carbon from the atmosphere; and yet the rate of forest destruction from logging in this country is among the highest on Earth. To avoid climate catastrophe, we must take immediate steps to protect our forests.”
The new IPCC report found that a goal of keeping the Earth’s temperature rise 1.5 degrees is vital for protecting the planet, and the goal of 2 degrees set forth in Paris will not go far enough to prevent climate disaster. This year the recorded amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere reached 411 parts per million (ppm) – well beyond the 350 ppm that climate scientists deemed safe for humans.
Nevertheless, the U.S. forest industry is rapidly replacing most of our nation’s original forests with younger forests and commercial tree plantations. Logging rates in the Southeast alone are estimated to be four times that of South American rainforests. These degraded forests are not only far less effective at storing carbon than trees that are 100 years-old or older; but they are also more vulnerable to forest fires and not nearly as helpful in preventing flooding, as we saw with the dire impacts of Hurricane Florence.
“Industrial logging accelerates climate change and exacerbates rural poverty and inequity,” said Reverend Leo Woodberry, pastor of Kingdom Living Temple in Florence, S.C. and nationally recognized environmental justice leader. “We saw with Hurricane Florence and the subsequent flooding how important it is to protect our forests.These beautiful, rural areas need economies that work in harmony with nature.”
The Stand4Forests platform states (in part):
Standing forests in the US provide our communities with clean air, fresh water, carbon storage, home to thousands of unique species of plants and animals, and protection from flooding and drought, making forest protection a national and global priority.
The United States is the world’s largest producer and consumer of wood products, which continues to drive massive extraction and degradation of forests at one of the fastest rates in the world.
Communities living at the frontlines of forest destruction are often the same ones who are most vulnerable to the effects of climate change and face oppressive, polluting, and extractive industries. Communities of color, indigenous communities, low-income, and/or rural populations disproportionately bear the impacts of climate change as well as the health, economic, and social costs associated with industrial practices.
That is why we must:
Other quotes from national Stand4Forests spokespeople:
“We cannot solve the climate crisis without a massive scale-up in the protection of forests. That includes right here in our own backyard.”
“Forests are most valuable left standing, as they provide clean water, medicines, food, recreation, scenery, pollination and regulation of floods, fires, insects and disease. But tragically, short-sighted corporations have stripped the land bare. Humanity needs us to reverse this trend. The Stand4Forests platform provides a common basis for action to do just that.”
“The science is clear that increasing forest protection while moving beyond fossil fuel consumption ensures effective climate change mitigation—but it requires both,” said Dr. Chad Hanson, a research Ecologist with the John Muir Project. “We need to end the logging program on our National Forests and stop subsidizing logging on private lands,” he added.
– Dr. Chad Hanson, co-founder of the John Muir project and author of The Ecological Importance of Mixed-Severity Fires: Nature’s Phoenix
“Legislators across the country are stepping up to champion policies that protect our environment, health, communities, and economy. Protecting forests is good policy – whether they’re protecting communities from storms like Florence, mitigating the threat of climate change, or providing clean jobs in restoration and recreation.”
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