Biomass Energy, Forests and Climate Library

Burning forests: the wood pellet industry’s framing of sustainability and its shadow places

Woody biomass energy has exponentially grown in the last decade as a renewable energy alternative to fossil fuels. The growing trend of burning trees amid global climate crisis suggests that the wood pellet industry has been grossly successful in positioning itself as a sustainability leader. What communicative frames and strategies has the industry harnessed to communicate sustainability? What do the frames and strategies leave out? To explore those questions, this paper examines the woody biomass industry’s construction of sustainability by focusing on the case of the world’s largest wood pellet company, Enviva.

The Na’onal Strategic Project (PSN) of Food and Energy Development in Merauke Regency, South Papua Province: Viola’ng Human Rights and Worsening Environmental Crisis

The hijackers of energy transition

Research by Trend Asia found that the establishment of energy plantations as a source of wood pellets for biomass co-firing in coal-fired power plants will lead to extensive deforestation. Biomass co-firing, promoted as a 'new' energy source, is still dominated by traditional players in the wood, palm oil, and coal industries—companies already notorious for their deforestation practices, such as APP Group, KORINDO GROUP, Barito Pacific (PT Barito Pacific Tbk) , Wilmar International, PT Jhonlin Group, and Sampoerna Kayoe.

The Rise and Fall of a Green-Energy Superstar

Enviva cashed in on a boom in wood pellets, then a disastrous trade led to bankruptcy; questions about environmental claims

Land Use in NDCs A Guide to High Ambition

Biochar Webinar

Passcode to access webinar: e&=N0K?Z

Accompanies this presentation: https://environmentalpaper.org/biomass-library/biochar-the-quick-and-dirty-way-to-get-cdr-carbon-offsets-while-wasting-wood-and-other-biomass/

A climate and biodiversity loophole: Support for biomass power undermines Global Targets – a South Korea case

Contrary to the latest science, many climate pledges include burning forest biomass for energy as a mitigation option; this is a false solution with demonstrated negative consequences for the climate and biodiversity. Developed countries in particular heavily incentivize the use of biomass, sometimes on greater levels than genuine renewables, such as wind and solar, as exemplified in the case of South Korea.

Unheeded Warnings: Forest Biomass Threats to Tropical Forests in Indonesia and Southeast Asia

Indonesia is home to some of the Earth's most biodiverse and carbon-rich forests, and 50 to 70 million Indigenous people who rely on these intact ecosystems for their survival. Yet burning wood in biomass power or "co-fired" in coal power plants could bring Indonesia’s forests to an "irreversible point" by 2040. Carbon reduction policies that divert public dollars from solar and wind into biomass energy threaten forests and biodiversity across Southeast Asia.

Burning up the biosphere: A global threat map of biomass energy development, 2024 update

This report is the second in a series summarising the scale and global extent of a continually growing threat to the world’s forests, people and climate, posed by the biomass energy industry. A global network of civil society organisations, the Biomass Action Network of EPN International, has collaborated to map out the threat that this industry poses.