Biomass Energy, Forests and Climate Library

Visual: How a Carbon Accounting Problem is Driving the Biomass Delusion

A Carbon Bomb in the Heart of Europe: Will the EU biomass loophole give a lifeline to energy giant EPH’s coal power plants?

In the summer of 2022, wildfires raged across European forests “like a carbon bomb exploding”.1 But the carbon dioxide (CO2) released from these wildfires was the same gas, and only about 5% of the volume, as that which is released every year in Europe when forests are logged and burned in a power station. Despite this, the European Union’s (EU) Renewable Energy Directive (RED) considers energy produced from burning wood (“biomass”) as “carbon neutral” (as the trees might regrow), and allows Member States to support it both directly and indirectly, to the tune of at least 22 billion Euros in 2021.

Scientist Letter Regarding Bioenergy Provisions of Fit for 55 Plan June 2022

Scientists urge Member States and Members of the European Parliament to amend the bioenergy provisions of the proposed Fit for 55 legislation to avoid adverse effects on climate and biodiversity.

Greenhouse gas emissions from burning US-sourced woody biomass in the EU and UK

This paper examines one particular source of woody biomass: pellets sourced from the US that are burnt for electricity and combined heat and power in the EU and UK. Accounting for emissions from their combustion, their supply chain, forgone removals of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere due to the harvesting of live trees and emissions from the decay of roots and unused logging residues left in the forest after harvest, it finds that US-sourced wood pellets burnt in the UK were responsible for 13 million–16 million tonnes of CO2 emissions in 2019, equivalent to the emissions from between 6 million and 7 million passenger vehicles.

Abrupt increase in harvested forest area over Europe after 2015

The article discusses the increase/intensification of logging across the EU since 2016.

Impact of deadwood decomposition on soil organic carbon sequestration in Estonian and Polish forests

An article which examines whether deadwood will emit all its carbon through decomposition, an argument often put forward by industry for burning it.

Commentary by the European Academies’ ScienceAdvisory Council (EASAC) on Forest Bioenergy and Carbon Neutrality

Our report (inter alia) analysed current trends to substitute fossil fuels by forest biomass at a large scale, and the relevance of the concept of carbon neutrality to its justification. We highlighted, for example, that carbon emissions per unit of electricity generated from forest biomass are higher than from coal and thus it is inevitable that the initial impact of replacing coal with forest biomass in power stations is to increase atmospheric carbon dioxide levels.

A Statement by Scientists and Economists on BECCS from Forest Biomass

The 87 undersigned scientists and economists submit this letter in response to the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and HM Treasury consultation and call for evidence on greenhouse gas removal (GGR) options. This letter focuses exclusively on the problems associated with a specific GGR technology—bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) as applied to the burning of wood from forests

Forest biomass: Burning the bridge to a renewable future

Brief about the expansion of biomass electricity in South Korea. This brief is intended as an introductory material for the press and companies seeking renewable energy options.