4 ms·

I see a number of people in this thread include biodiesel and wood burning with other renewable energy sources. While in theory biodiesel and wood burning are c

by SCHiM 9y ago

I see a number of people in this thread include biodiesel and wood burning with other renewable energy sources. While in theory biodiesel and wood burning are carbon neutral, the way they are used in Europe is anything but! I wanted to warn you all that many countries in the EU currently enforce renewable resource quotas. This is what you want, however the incentives are incorrect, and the quotas are met by importing the wood/diesel from somewhere else. The EU does not oversee the reforestation/replanting of the combustible matter that is burned. So there's no guarantee that the wood/biodiesel consumed is actually carbon neutral. For all I know we're burning forests down but not planting them back. Not to mention that the biodiesel is competing with human food...

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
lawlessone 9y ago
You should read about the Ash-for-Cash scandal in Northern Ireland. It was a scheme to get people using renewables for heat but the end result was some people wasting vast amounts of energy heating empty sheds to make a profit... a little like crypto-mining in a way.. https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/northern-ireland/farmer-gets-1m-of-public-cash-to-heat-empty-shed-catastrophic-blunder-threatening-to-drain-hundreds-of-millions-from-northern-irelands-block-grant-34856610.html https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/northern-ireland/far... edit: If they just had proper checks and balances and worked out the reward correctly it could have worked.
jabl 9y ago
Seems to me that the more the topic is researched, the worse it looks for large-scale usage of biomass for energy. Biodiversity loss, nutrient loss from intensive cultivation, long timescales often involved in "carbon neutrality", massive emissions due to land use changes (e.g. draining a swamp to plant a forest), etc. etc. Add in the fact that biomass is probably the worst form of energy we have in terms of W/m^2. Basically, AFAICT calls for large-scale biomass energy usage tend to be greenwashing scams where the real motivation is rural politicians who want short-term $$$ for their constituents, damn the long-term consequences.
fredrik-j 9y ago
Having both a renewable and sustainable sourcing of biofuels is important, and EU actors have a obligation to the world to improve. That said, SCHiM's statements makes it sound like the EU is currently burning the world for the sake of their own green conscience. That's not the full picture. Admittedly when it comes to import of biofuels it appears to be hard to verify and enforce that the source is renewable and sustainable. And the EU probably isn't doing much better than anyone else in that area. On the other hand: EU:s primary source of biofuel is internal production and not imports[0] and there is little deforestation going on in the EU, many European countries even have a slight net positive reforestation[3], despite a huge internal production of biofuels. [0] https://hub.globalccsinstitute.com/publications/renewable-energy-progress-and-biofuels-sustainability/26-eu-biofuel-imports https://hub.globalccsinstitute.com/publications/renewable-en... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deforestation_by_region https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deforestation_by_region [2] https://rainforests.mongabay.com/deforestation/ https://rainforests.mongabay.com/deforestation/ There is also a great interest in increasing the capacity for local sourcing of biofuels to reduce dependency of imports and creating jobs locally. So while there is reason to be mindful of how biofuels are sourced, and that there still are bad actors in the EU (as well as and elsewhere), my impression is that the general trend in the EU is one of increased awareness and positive development.

by SCHiM 9y ago

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

lawlessone 9y ago

You should read about the Ash-for-Cash scandal in Northern Ireland. It was a scheme to get people using renewables for heat but the end result was some people wasting vast amounts of energy heating empty sheds to make a profit... a little like crypto-mining in a way.. https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/northern-ireland/farmer-gets-1m-of-public-cash-to-heat-empty-shed-catastrophic-blunder-threatening-to-drain-hundreds-of-millions-from-northern-irelands-block-grant-34856610.html https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/northern-ireland/far... edit: If they just had proper checks and balances and worked out the reward correctly it could have worked.

jabl 9y ago

Seems to me that the more the topic is researched, the worse it looks for large-scale usage of biomass for energy. Biodiversity loss, nutrient loss from intensive cultivation, long timescales often involved in "carbon neutrality", massive emissions due to land use changes (e.g. draining a swamp to plant a forest), etc. etc. Add in the fact that biomass is probably the worst form of energy we have in terms of W/m^2. Basically, AFAICT calls for large-scale biomass energy usage tend to be greenwashing scams where the real motivation is rural politicians who want short-term $$$ for their constituents, damn the long-term consequences.

fredrik-j 9y ago

Having both a renewable and sustainable sourcing of biofuels is important, and EU actors have a obligation to the world to improve. That said, SCHiM's statements makes it sound like the EU is currently burning the world for the sake of their own green conscience. That's not the full picture. Admittedly when it comes to import of biofuels it appears to be hard to verify and enforce that the source is renewable and sustainable. And the EU probably isn't doing much better than anyone else in that area. On the other hand: EU:s primary source of biofuel is internal production and not imports[0] and there is little deforestation going on in the EU, many European countries even have a slight net positive reforestation[3], despite a huge internal production of biofuels. [0] https://hub.globalccsinstitute.com/publications/renewable-energy-progress-and-biofuels-sustainability/26-eu-biofuel-imports https://hub.globalccsinstitute.com/publications/renewable-en... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deforestation_by_region https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deforestation_by_region [2] https://rainforests.mongabay.com/deforestation/ https://rainforests.mongabay.com/deforestation/ There is also a great interest in increasing the capacity for local sourcing of biofuels to reduce dependency of imports and creating jobs locally. So while there is reason to be mindful of how biofuels are sourced, and that there still are bad actors in the EU (as well as and elsewhere), my impression is that the general trend in the EU is one of increased awareness and positive development.