America’s private forest owners, manufacturers, and the products they produce are green – they are renewable, sustainable, recyclable, and help solve some of our more pressing environmental concerns.  In fact, forest management and forest products were “green” long before the term was coined, and the jobs they create should be recognized as such.

The full editorial is on The Hill’s website.

WASHINGTON, DC – David P. Tenny, President and CEO of the National Alliance of Forest Owners, urged the Senate to help send clear and positive policy signals to the biomass energy community in testimony today before the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry at its hearing today entitled, Empowering Rural Communities, the Status and Future of the Farm Bill’s Energy and Rural Development.

On behalf of America’s private forest owners, Tenny reminded the Committee of the benefits of renewable forest biomass and urged them to support a broad definition of qualifying forest biomass and to urge EPA to modify its GHG Tailoring Rule so that biomass energy is not treated the same as fossil fuel energy, such as oil and coal, in Clean Air Act regulations. Tenny testified:

NAFO’s members are the nation’s forestry leaders. They recognize the fundamental role sustainably managed forests can play in renewable energy policy. They are well positioned to provide a plentiful domestic source of sustainable and carbon beneficial renewable energy.

Our nation has reached a critical point in the debate on renewable energy. We are deciding whether we will embrace our full renewable energy potential or not. If we are truly committed to renewable energy, then our policy will reflect that commitment. We will optimize the potential of each renewable energy source as well as the potential of each region of the country to produce renewable energy. Working forests are well positioned to help achieve that potential.

In order to make these significant contributions, working forests need clear policy signals from Congress and the Administration.
The Farm Bill has helped establish a level playing field among renewable energy sources by providing an inclusive definition of qualifying biomass. This sends the clear message to forest owners that their contributions are both welcome and encouraged.
Yet, notwithstanding the positive signals provided by the Farm Bill, other federal policies are sending a chilling signal to forest owners undoing the forward momentum this committee has tried to establish.

The biomass definition in the Energy Investment and Security Act of 2007 (EISA) constrains biomass utilization on up to 90% of private forests in the U.S. This has softened investments in biofuels from forest biomass at a time when they are needed to commercialize breakthrough technologies.

Similarly, the EPA’s sudden shift in the treatment of carbon emissions from biomass energy in the PSD Tailoring Rule creates significant confusion in the marketplace by treating carbon emissions from biomass energy like fossil fuel emissions. EPA’s ambivalence about how to account for carbon emissions from biomass energy conflicts with well established international conventions, greenhouse gas inventory data, and EPA’s own statements recognizing that biomass energy in countries, like the U.S., where forests are a net carbon sink, does not increase carbon in the atmosphere.

NAFO applauds the Chairman, Ranking Member and other members of this Committee for their recent letter to Administrator Jackson opposing EPA’s position in the Tailoring Rule (PDF).

NAFO also appreciates the commitment made by the Secretary of Agriculture concerning the role USDA will play in the review of the Tailoring Rule. NAFO looks forward to full USDA engagement to establish a strong record supporting the treatment of forest biomass energy as carbon neutral under the Clean Air Act so long as national forest carbon stocks are stable or increasing.

NAFO urges this committee to retake the initiative on forest biomass energy and help correct the policies that have put forest biomass on the back burner.

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NAFO is an organization of private forest owners committed to advancing federal policies that promote the economic and environmental values of privately-owned forests at the national level. NAFO membership encompasses more than 75 million acres of private forestland in 47 states. View NAFO’s interactive map to see the economic impact of America’s working forests.

Dear Editor – your recent editorial Considerations for factoring biomass into clean energy (Monday, July 5) states fairly the objective that using renewable biomass to produce energy should have clear carbon benefits but stops short on the facts supporting the carbon benefits of using wood for energy in the United States.

Forests, unlike fossil fuels, naturally recycle carbon in the atmosphere rather than allowing it to accumulate.  In developing countries where pristine forest is irreversibly cleared for agriculture this carbon cycle is sometimes out of balance.  However, in the United States, total forest acres have remained steady for over a century, and the volume of trees in our forests has increased by 50% in the last half century.  The ongoing increase in forest carbon in the U.S. makes our forests a net carbon sink – a fact recognized by the international community of experts using conventional carbon accounting practices.

The carbon cycle is ongoing, with no defined beginning or end.  This means that so long as the cycle in U.S. forests remains in balance over time, wood used for energy in this country will not increase carbon in the atmosphere, and it may be used to displace fossil fuel with its emission of carbon stored on a one-time basis geologic ages ago.  This clearly makes wood cleaner than fossil fuels and positions our forests to make a significant contribution toward achieving our nation’s clean, renewable energy goals.

Sincerely,

David P. Tenny
President and CEO
National Alliance of Forest Owners

WASHINGTON, DC – David P. Tenny, President and CEO of the National Alliance of Forest Owners, issued the following statement today on EPA’s Call for Information on Greenhouse Gas Emissions Associated with Bioenergy and Other Biogenic Sources:

“The EPA’s response to the requests of key stakeholders and the admonitions of Congress is welcome. However the announced action is a very modest step forward and does not convey a sense of urgency. We continue to call upon EPA to suspend application of the regulation to greenhouse gas emissions from biomass facilities while developing its policy, as many stakeholders and members of Congress have requested.

“We are at a critical juncture at which both policy makers and the marketplace are considering our nation’s path forward on renewable energy. EPA must act quickly to clarify the treatment of biomass energy under the Tailoring Rule and remove the confusion resulting from their sudden and significant shift in policy. Each moment of delay jeopardizes existing and future investments in low carbon biomass energy that are essential to meeting our national renewable energy goals and reducing our dependence on high carbon emitting fossil fuels.

“References by the EPA to greenhouse gas inventories and international conventions and protocols acknowledged by experts as the most accepted approaches to accounting for carbon emissions from biomass energy is appropriate. These set as a baseline the internationally accepted position that accounting for carbon emissions from forests for all uses, including energy production, is most appropriately done at the national scale rather than through site-by-site analyses that can easily create a distorted picture of the forest carbon cycle.

“NAFO looks forward to contributing to the already significant body of information demonstrating the carbon benefits of biomass energy. NAFO also looks forward to the earnest engagement of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which is well positioned to vigorously represent the contributions of agriculture and forestry to produce renewable energy that significantly reduces overall greenhouse gas emissions. It will be critical for EPA and USDA to work together and to work quickly. Our nation’s renewable energy future is waiting.”

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WASHINGTON, DC – David P. Tenny, President and CEO of the National Alliance of Forest Owners, offered the following comments on the Forest Sustainability in the Development of Wood Bioenergy in the U.S. study released today by the Pinchot Institute for Conservation and H. John Heinz III Center for Science, Economics and the Environment:

Forest biomass is a domestic, sustainable, and carbon-friendly source of renewable energy that is fundamental to our energy security. The Pinchot/Heinz study raises a number of questions that have been common to the ongoing policy discussion on the use of biomass for energy, providing a point of view that will contribute to the national dialogue.

While the Pinchot/Heinz study does not reach any conclusions about biomass, it frames the questions for which a significant body of information is available to inform policy makers. This includes studies that sharpen our understanding of potential demand for biomass, how biomass supply will increase in response to increased demand, existing environmental safeguards for sustainable biomass production and the climate change benefits of forest biomass as a carbon neutral energy source.

Often overlooked in the discussion of how to sustainably produce biomass for future energy needs is the historic relationship between private forests and markets for forest products that forms a cornerstone of the American success story in sustainable forest management and has helped make the United States a world leader in sustainable forestry. Markets provide a powerful conservation tool for sustaining forestland by enabling private forest owners to invest in sustainable forest practices and keep their land in forest rather than being compelled to convert it to non-forest uses.

The results of this relationship speak for themselves. U.S. forests have been stable or increasing for a century and the standing volume of trees in our forests has increased 50 percent over the last 50 years. It is because of strong markets for forest products that our forests today are so well positioned to help meet the growing renewable energy demands of the future and serve as a primary source of climate change mitigation. The advent of new markets for renewable biomass energy simply opens a new chapter in our nation’s ongoing success story of sustainable forest management through strong and diverse forest products markets.

Recent studies (here) answering questions raised in the Pinchot/Heinz report include:

Ecological sustainability – The National Council for Air and Stream Improvement describes how biomass energy harvests are ecologically sustainable under current frameworks in the United States.

Forest landowners’ response to energy markets – The University of Georgia and North Carolina State University explain how landowners will likely respond to biomass energy markets, particularly in the U.S. South and Northwest, concluding that new markets will enable forest landowners to invest in forest management practices that will improve forest productivity to sustainably meet increased supply needs.

Likely forest bioenergy demand by 2020 – Forisk Consulting, one of the leading U.S. firms in economic forecasting, has developed a data-driven methodology to predict the amount of announced bioenergy capacity that will likely be in production by 2020. They conclude that approximately 36% of the capacity announced today will result in new bioenergy production in the next ten years.

Carbon benefits – The National Council for Air and Stream Improvement uses the prevailing conclusions of contemporary science to explain why renewable forest biomass energy is beneficial to atmospheric carbon as part of the natural carbon cycle.

Environmental regulation of private forests in the U.S. – The National Alliance of Forest Owners provides a concise summary of existing laws, regulations, and non-regulatory policies at the federal, state and local level that provide the framework for sustainable forest management in the United States and that enable the U.S. to be a world leader in sustainable forest management.

This information is summarized and available on NAFO’s website at www.nafoalliance.org/studies.

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NAFO is an organization of private forest owners committed to advancing federal policies that promote the economic and environmental values of privately-owned forests at the national level. NAFO membership encompasses more than 75 million acres of private forestland in 47 states. View NAFO’s interactive map to see the economic impact of America’s working forests.

“EPA’s action was a sudden shift in direction that appeared to ignore the treatment of biomass energy cited in the draft rule,” said David P. Tenny, President and CEO of the National Alliance of Forest Owners. “We were surprised along with many others that EPA would place renewable biomass, which plays such a fundamental role in moving our nation toward a more reliable supply of domestic, low carbon renewable energy, in the same category as coal, oil and other non-renewable, high carbon fuel sources.”

The letter explains how biogenic carbon emissions, in contrast to fossil fuels, are part of the natural carbon cycle, “Biogenic carbon is part of a relatively rapid natural carbon cycle. Trees and other plants absorb carbon as they grow. Combustion of harvested biomass for energy releases previously stored carbon back into the atmosphere, which the growing biomass re-absorbs. Where national data show stable or increasing carbon stocks in forests and agricultural lands, as in the United States, the result is no net increase of carbon in the atmosphere. . . EPA and other federal agencies have recognized the carbon neutrality of biomass emissions for many years.” The letter also points out that, “EPA’s Renewable Fuel Standard 2 demonstrates there are additional benefits associated with biomass throughout the lifecycle compared to fossil fuels.”

“We have reached an important juncture when our nation is deciding its energy future. An important part of that decision is identifying the energy sources that will make us more independent and sustainable for the long run,” Tenny said. “Now is the time for EPA and others in government to firmly establish biomass as one of the critical paths to the future and work cooperatively with the biomass community to make that future a reality. The confusion created by the EPA’s Tailoring Rule is a significant step backward and puts the biomass community at risk of erroneously being cast as part of the problem rather than part of the solution. The EPA must act quickly so we can resume forward progress rather than unnecessarily spinning our wheels over an already settled area of policy.”

The cosigners remind Jackson that the forest products industry supplies 65% of its own energy needs with renewable biomass and that the, “unprecedented step of equating biomass carbon emissions with fossil fuel carbon emissions. . . threatens to chill investment in varieties of trees, grasses and other plants that could be purpose-grown for energy production. This will frustrate the environmental goals of shifting to renewable energy.” The cosigners also ask Jackson for an expeditious, “public review of biogenic carbon neutrality and its role under the Clean Air Act using as its baseline the long-standing positions of EPA and other federal agencies,” and to, “suspend application of greenhouse gas emission regulation to facilities with biomass combustion until this review has been completed.”

The full letter, including all 163 cosigners, is available on NAFO’s website (PDF).

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NAFO is an organization of private forest owners committed to advancing federal policies that promote the economic and environmental values of privately-owned forests at the national level. NAFO membership encompasses more than 75 million acres of private forestland in 47 states. View NAFO’s interactive map to see the economic impact of America’s working forests.

The carbon benefits and sustainability of energy from renewable forest biomass is documented in recent white papers available on NAFO’s website at www.nafoalliance.org/studies.