{"id":93189,"date":"2021-08-03T07:13:00","date_gmt":"2021-08-03T05:13:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/?p=93189"},"modified":"2021-09-09T21:01:47","modified_gmt":"2021-09-09T19:01:47","slug":"forestry-and-carbon-sinks-damned-if-you-do-damned-if-you-dont","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/forestry-and-carbon-sinks-damned-if-you-do-damned-if-you-dont\/","title":{"rendered":"Forestry and carbon sinks: Damned if you do, damned if you don\u2019t"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n

With its forestry policy, the European Commission will be seeking to balance three objectives: drawing down climate-warming CO2<\/sub> from the atmosphere, preserving natural habitats for biodiversity, and sourcing raw materials to replace fossil fuels used for energy.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf you want to serve three purposes with one tree \u2013 which is biodiversity, carbon sink and bioenergy \u2013 you need three trees,\u201d an EU official said at a press briefing last week. \u201cWe need more trees, to be very blunt.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To achieve just that, the Commission is expected to present an EU Forest Strategy on Wednesday (14 July), which will include \u201ca roadmap for planting at least 3 billion additional trees in the EU by 2030.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cTree planting is particularly beneficial in cities, while in rural areas it can work well with agroforestry, landscape features and increased carbon sequestration,\u201d the EU executive said<\/a> in its biodiversity strategy, presented in May last year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The role of bioenergy is controversial though, because it requires trees to be felled and burned in power plants, where they immediately release CO2<\/sub>. According to environmentalists, this creates a \u201ccarbon debt\u201d that can take decades to pay back as new trees are planted and suck an equivalent amount of CO2<\/sub> from the atmosphere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For others, the cycle of planting and cutting trees is part of sustainable forest management practices which should be regarded as carbon neutral \u2013 or even carbon negative in cases where planted areas are expanding. And with climate change taking its toll on forestry ecosystems, the active management of forests will become all the more necessary, they argue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whichever path the European Commission chooses, it will likely meet with heavy criticism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The \u2018right biomass\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The executive\u2019s climate chief, Frans Timmermans, has already nailed his colours to the mast, saying biomass will be necessary to help Europe meet its renewable energy targets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWithout biomass, we\u2019re not going to make it. We need biomass in the mix, but we need the right biomass in the mix,\u201d he told EURACTIV in a recent interview<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to Timmermans, biomass can be sourced from by-products of the wood industry, using material such as bark, sawdust, and tree tops, which are left on the ground after timber is harvested.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn primal forests, if you maintain them, there\u2019s always a lot of biomass that you can take out \u2013 you even help the forest by doing that. Or, in production forests, you never use 100% of a tree. There\u2019s maybe close to 20% of the tree that you can\u2019t use for construction or other industries,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But there is concern about whether all the biomass used in Europe will fall under the Commission\u2019s definition of what Timmermans calls \u201cthe right biomass.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Only last week, Greenpeace released a report<\/a> criticising Europe\u2019s rules around what type of biomass is counted as contributing towards its renewable energy targets, saying these have led to the destruction and degradation of Estonian forests.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Environmental NGOs are calling for drastic changes to the sustainability criteria for biomass spelled out in the EU\u2019s renewable energy directive, which is coming up for a revision on Wednesday. According to WWF, there needs to be meaningful restrictions on the role of bioenergy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFighting the climate emergency without changing the EU\u2019s biomass rules is like trying to bail out a boat with a hole in the bottom. To plug the gap, we must limit incentives under the renewable energy directive to fast-decaying wastes and residues with no other uses,\u201d said Alex Mason, senior policy officer at WWF.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, the industry argues that the sustainability criteria for biomass under the renewable energy directive are still fit for purpose and should not be changed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reopening it is troublesome for the industry, especially as the current criteria, set up in 2018, is facing delays in being rolled out, said Giulia Laura Cancian, policy director at Bioenergy Europe, a trade organisation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf they remain as they are right now [in leaked draft legislation], they could cause disruptions in the market especially for small operators that will be confronted with impossible red tape and retroactive measures,\u201d she warned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Balancing economy and climate in forestry<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The industry has also voiced concern about the forest strategy, also due to be released on Wednesday, that will decide the future of Europe\u2019s forests.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ideas contained in a leaked draft of the strategy promote a hierarchy that is biased against bioenergy, the industry says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBioenergy was not perceived as one of the pieces of the puzzle that works in synergy with the rest of the forest sector,\u201d Cancian told EURACTIV.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Worries are also being expressed in the European Parliament. In a letter<\/a> to the European Commission, the biggest parliamentary group, the centre-right European People\u2019s Party (EPP), criticised the draft strategy, warning of an imbalance between forestry\u2019s role in tackling climate change and the wider economic function of forests, which provide jobs in rural areas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The draft strategy undermines sustainable forest management, the MEPs warned, adding: \u201cIt focuses disproportionately on the environmental side, promotes passive forestry and risks causing unwanted industrial relocation outside of Europe and therefore loss of competitiveness in the EU.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

NGOs, on the other hand, have welcomed the Commission\u2019s draft forestry strategy. WWF hailed what it described as a robust, Europe-wide framework to monitor the status of forests, and targets for restoring degraded forest ecosystems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe draft EU Forest Strategy is a sign that the European Commission has listened and is taking a crucial step in the right direction,\u201d said Sabien Leemans, senior biodiversity policy officer at WWF European Policy Office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The forest NGO, Fern, has said the draft strategy would be a huge improvement on its predecessor, particularly regarding improved tracking of forests, beyond just old-growth trees, to managed forests.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is an opportunity to actually prove that all of the initiatives under the biodiversity strategy are things that the EU is serious about addressing,\u201d said Fern\u2019s Kelsey Perlman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cGiven the governmental and industry backlash against more transparency and democratic debate, I think that says a lot about how little the industry wants to show off their practices,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With its forestry policy, the European Commission will be seeking to balance three objectives: drawing down climate-warming CO2 from the atmosphere, preserving natural habitats for biodiversity, and sourcing raw materials to replace fossil fuels used for energy. \u201cIf you want to serve three purposes with one tree \u2013 which is biodiversity, carbon sink and bioenergy […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","nova_meta_subtitle":"This article is part of our special report Forestry and climate change. The complex role of forests in regulating the Earth\u2019s climate is set to become one of the most contentious issues in the upcoming revision of Europe\u2019s energy and climate laws.","footnotes":""},"categories":[5572,5571],"tags":[13556,5842,13638,6268],"supplier":[2204,2770],"class_list":["post-93189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bio-based","category-co2-based","tag-bioenergy","tag-biomass","tag-forest","tag-forestry","supplier-greenpeace-international","supplier-world-wildlife-fund-us-wwf"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=93189"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93189\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93189"},{"taxonomy":"supplier","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/supplier?post=93189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}