Biomass Energy, Forests and Climate Library

A report of two research papers, which demonstrate the climate implications of biomass carbon debt and the accounting gap of reporting carbon from biomass harvesting under LULUCF.

Briefing on potential health impacts of burning wood in power stations which suggests that burning wood produces a wide range of air pollutants, not dissimilar to burning coal.

Analysis of the potential energy production from growing biomass on "spare" land in the European Union, which shows that the data on land is sparse, the area of land available is limited and the overall energy potential from growing dedicated energy crops on such land is very low.

Film examining the environmental and social impacts of the coal-to-biomass conversion of the power station at Gardanne, Provence.

Case study report highlighting the destructive impact of the biomass industry.

Video explaining the health and environment impacts of wood pellet plants on a rural community.

Video summarising the threats to US forests from the biomass energy industry.

Research looking at energy production from woody biomass. The authors argue that generating electricity by burning wood is an extremely inefficient use of land under conditions of sustainable supply of the fuel and conclude that transfer to bio-energy without radical changes in the existing economic system would further aggravate the environmental crisis.

An analysis which shows that intensive biomass harvests could constitute an important source of carbon transfer from forests to the atmosphere, partly neutralizing the role of a carbon sink played by forest soils.

Exploration of the time taken for the substituion of forest bioenergy for fossil fuels to start having a net beneficial impact on atmospheric CO2. This shows that for anything other than forest residues, the time is long and very uncertain.

Case study report highlighting how "sustainable forest management" has no clear definition and is frequently not sustainable as well as pointing out that discussing SFM is a distraction from the bigger issue: If you harvest a tree from a sustainable forest and burn it for energy, it doesn’t mean the energy is either sustainable or climate-neutral. The way biomass a limited resource is used rather than how forests are managed is the key issue here.

Analysis of the land use impacts of different energy sources, which concludes that biofuels would affect the largest area of land - and that energy efficiency is critically important.

An analysis comparing woody biomass and coal energy production which concludes that energy from woody biomass is not carbon neutral and can have negative environmental effects.

A range of scenarios of the possible impact of woody biomass production for energy in North Carolina, which highlights the overlap between areas that are critical for biodiversity with those most likely to be affected by woody biomass production.

Report on forests and climate that concludes that treating forests as an unlimited, renewable, extractable commodity that can support infinite growth in the forest products industry is an outdated business model that must yield to a new way of doing business that values standing forests.