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I wonder what the impact of the production of concrete and steel has on the environments where it takes place. I like the part of the article where they point o

I wonder what the impact of the production of concrete and steel has on the environments where it takes place. I like the part of the article where they point out that mass timber would be better for carbon sequestration. I also think that buildings should mostly be built with a death period in mind because everything in this world requires maintenance and can be upgraded lol. So why not use a building material that literally grows itself? I agree with your point that destroying all the forests to build housing would be a bad idea, but we can and do sustainably log---all you have to do is plant some trees and wait!

dogman144 3y ago
Sustainable logging at its current levels makes the logged-out areas in the West look like it does now (stumps, new growth forests which aren’t 1:1 replacements, etc). To get back to “how it’s supposed to be” as sustainable logging promises, we’re talking 100 yr+ timeframes to even make solid progress, not a full easy replacement. So, the environment is still degraded under that approach. I’ve lived rural and urban coastal, and your view highlights a perspective I started to notice only when I lived rural West, and it’s frustrating: To support pro-environmental needs of the densely populated and often coastal urban centers, the last remaining near/wild environments bear the cost and get carved out under the banner of pragmatic sustainable use - logged out, REM mines, wind farms on mountains, etc. For instance, if every rural wind farm was met with a wind farm in SF Bay or Cape Cod or… I’d be ok with it, but the reality is it’s not done this way, and in fact heavily resisted due to vacation home views and so on. Bitteroots and Bighorn ranges have massive REM deposits discovered. This was spun as a positive env news story vs a massive mining threat to some of the best un-impacted/well managed areas of the Rockies. On and on. So let’s raid our mountains and last wild places to support environmentally unsustainable lifestyles in the dense areas, who get to avoid none of the tradeoffs I describe that the actually wild areas now face. Doesn’t sit well with me. What’s the point of environmentalism if we destroy the last best parts of the environment.
Tiktaalik 3y ago
Concrete is bad for the environment and strongly arguably worse than mass timber, which is a reason why folks are pushing mass timber. Concrete development for buildings produces a lot of CO2 and from that POV mass timber is better. Logging harms animal habitat, but so does gravel mining.
- shortsunblack 3y ago
  Concrete sequesters carbon from air. In its lifetime, it is expected to sequester all the carbon associated with its emissions. And of course, concrete lasts much longer than any timber structure even in idealized conditions for timber. And concrete industry is innovative. R&D is being done how to reduce emissions associated with kilns. Concrete will long be zero carbon before forestry becomes sustainable. We have massive deforestation everywhere to prove that.
  - Tiktaalik 3y ago
    I expect both the Concrete industry amongst every other industry is working hard to find ways to reduce emissions. This does not change the fact that the Concrete industry generates an enormous amount of CO2 emissions right now. https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-46455844 https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-46455844

dogman144 3y ago

Sustainable logging at its current levels makes the logged-out areas in the West look like it does now (stumps, new growth forests which aren’t 1:1 replacements, etc). To get back to “how it’s supposed to be” as sustainable logging promises, we’re talking 100 yr+ timeframes to even make solid progress, not a full easy replacement. So, the environment is still degraded under that approach. I’ve lived rural and urban coastal, and your view highlights a perspective I started to notice only when I lived rural West, and it’s frustrating: To support pro-environmental needs of the densely populated and often coastal urban centers, the last remaining near/wild environments bear the cost and get carved out under the banner of pragmatic sustainable use - logged out, REM mines, wind farms on mountains, etc. For instance, if every rural wind farm was met with a wind farm in SF Bay or Cape Cod or… I’d be ok with it, but the reality is it’s not done this way, and in fact heavily resisted due to vacation home views and so on. Bitteroots and Bighorn ranges have massive REM deposits discovered. This was spun as a positive env news story vs a massive mining threat to some of the best un-impacted/well managed areas of the Rockies. On and on. So let’s raid our mountains and last wild places to support environmentally unsustainable lifestyles in the dense areas, who get to avoid none of the tradeoffs I describe that the actually wild areas now face. Doesn’t sit well with me. What’s the point of environmentalism if we destroy the last best parts of the environment.

Tiktaalik 3y ago

Concrete is bad for the environment and strongly arguably worse than mass timber, which is a reason why folks are pushing mass timber. Concrete development for buildings produces a lot of CO2 and from that POV mass timber is better. Logging harms animal habitat, but so does gravel mining.

shortsunblack 3y ago
Concrete sequesters carbon from air. In its lifetime, it is expected to sequester all the carbon associated with its emissions. And of course, concrete lasts much longer than any timber structure even in idealized conditions for timber. And concrete industry is innovative. R&D is being done how to reduce emissions associated with kilns. Concrete will long be zero carbon before forestry becomes sustainable. We have massive deforestation everywhere to prove that.
- Tiktaalik 3y ago
  I expect both the Concrete industry amongst every other industry is working hard to find ways to reduce emissions. This does not change the fact that the Concrete industry generates an enormous amount of CO2 emissions right now. https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-46455844 https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-46455844