Indonesia’s cofiring program — reducing the amount of coal used in power generation by cutting it with wood pellets — will result in massive deforestation and a net emissions surge, an energy policy think tank warns. Under the government’s 10% biomass cofiring plan, up to 1.05 million hectares (2.59 million acres) of forest could be cleared for acacia and eucalyptus plantations to provide wood pellets. This would result in up to 489 million metric tons of emissions — a vastly greater amount than the 1 million tons in reduced emissions that cofiring is expected to achieve.
The analysis, by Trend Asia, also shows that, if anything, Indonesia’s coal consumption has only increased with higher biomass cofiring, and that this trend is expected to continue through 2030 as more new coal plants are built.
An article about the report in English: https://news.mongabay.com/2022/09/emissions-and-deforestation-set-to-spike-under-indonesias-biomass-transition/
Read More (PDF)Organization: Trend Asia