Without starting a point-by-point rebuttal, I think we're talking a bit past each other. Here, there are a couple perspectives to consider: You're a landowner

Without starting a point-by-point rebuttal, I think we're talking a bit past each other. Here, there are a couple perspectives to consider: You're a landowner and need to decide how to use your land (ed: which has already been cleared of native bush). Practically, the usual choices are something like: * Dairy farming * Subdivide and build residential sprawl * Crop farming * Forestry (introduced tree species) Note that all of those can provide wood that's suitable for heating, however only two do it in a way that aren't clearly bad from a greenhouse gas standpoint. A lot of land here isn't suitable for crop farming, and generally crop farms don't have many wind breaks either. Or, you're a homeowner and need to decide how to heat your existing, likely built to a low/nonexistent efficiency standard, house. Your choices are: * Heat pump, usually poorly located/installed * Electrical resistance heaters where needed * Burn wood * Burn coal In the balance, I think wood heat is a pretty good compromise. Currently, our electricity is relatively "clean", but only because previous generations installed a bunch of hydro. At some stage, we'll hopefully have a better mix with wind and PV, and of course those do have costs too, but we're not there yet.