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from the I-think-you're-doing-it-wrong dept.
What a surprise: If you subsidize something, you get more of it. In the EU, there are financial incentives for generating energy from renewable sources. Trees are a renewable resource, true enough, but I doubt that the Eurocrats intended to subsidize the massive destruction of forests.
Protected forests are being indiscriminately felled across Europe to meet the EU's renewable energy targets, according to an investigation by the conservation group Birdlife.
Up to 65% of Europe's renewable output currently comes from bioenergy, involving fuels such as wood pellets and chips, rather than wind and solar power.
Bioenergy fuel is supposed to be harvested from residue such as forest waste but, under current legislation, European bioenergy plants do not have to produce evidence that their wood products have been sustainably sourced.
Birdlife found logging taking place in conservation zones such as Poloniny national park in eastern Slovakia and in Italian riverside forests around Emilia-Romagna, where it said it had been falsely presented as flood-risk mitigation.
[...] Jori Sihvonen, the biofuels officer at Transport and Environment, which co-authored the report, said: "It is easy to fall into thinking that all bioenergy is sustainable, but time and again we see some forms of it can be worse for society, the natural environment and, in the case of burning land-based biofuels or whole trees, even the climate.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Zz9zZ on Friday December 02 2016, @07:23PM
Finally a concrete and GOOD example of regulation/subsidization gone wrong. We need a focus on renewable energy, but sadly such subsidy programs are expensive because they require enough oversight to make sure bullshit loopholes like this aren't abused. So, what solutions do you propose? Let me cut off a possible avenue: just scrapping everything and letting the free market figure it out won't lead to better environmental protection unless renewables/nuclear can compete on cost with the fossil fuels.
How do we encourage investment in renewable energy systems while preventing the clear cutting of forests? Oversight? Punishment for rule violation? Or is this perhaps just a money grab and the loophole was inserted without protections specifically to allow these people to profit from clear cutting?
~Tilting at windmills~
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Friday December 02 2016, @07:26PM
So, what solutions do you propose?
Enforce the existing law that says "Bioenergy fuel is supposed to be harvested from residue such as forest waste."
Amend the law to require documentation if that doesn't work.
(Score: 2) by Zz9zZ on Friday December 02 2016, @07:30PM
TOO EASY!!! You fail the test of complicated bureaucracy, now go down to the basement and feed the leopard.
~Tilting at windmills~
(Score: 5, Funny) by DeathMonkey on Friday December 02 2016, @07:57PM
I checked the lavatory, but I couldn't find a leopard. Just some plans about a freeway bypass...
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday December 02 2016, @08:08PM
Let me cut off a possible avenue: just scrapping everything and letting the free market figure it out won't lead to better environmental protection
Well, you didn't double dare me to not go down this avenue. We could always just scrap everything and go free market. But if you want better environmental protection (assuming it actually is environmental protection, which gets pretty tenuous sometimes), then you can always regulate fossil fuel burning just like today.
unless renewables/nuclear can compete on cost with the fossil fuels
If it can't then that's a great reason not to emphasize renewables and nuclear. This market is failed behavior modification. It's not the first time either, there's been like three other examples (for example, here [soylentnews.org] or here [theguardian.com]), I've been aware of as well as the poor design of the market in the first place (hard caps result in great fluctuations as the market transitions from highly elastic to highly inelastic demand as demand exceeds the cap on the market).
My view is that none of it makes sense. There's poor justification not just for the market's various mechanisms, but also for capping greenhouse gases emissions in the first place. And I think it shows in the continuing run of problems with these markets. While I don't think they are all foreseeable, it's pretty obvious that if you don't check that someone is playing by the rules, and it's very profitable to not play by the rules, then you'll get a lot of rule breaking.
But who goes through all that effort just to blow off obvious rule breaking strategies? Why politicians who didn't care if the market worked in the first place. Funny how the parties who say they care about global warming continue to act like they don't care about global warming. It's almost like words don't match actions.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Zz9zZ on Friday December 02 2016, @08:16PM
You do realize this is in a different continent right?? The free market has proven over and over that businessman will prioritize profits over environmental protections. Since environmental protection has no short term inherent market values we can not let the free market take care of it. For those of us who want the planet to remain hospitable in the long term this overrides profits and economic success by a wide margin.
it's pretty obvious that if you don't check that someone is playing by the rules, and it's very profitable to not play by the rules, then you'll get a lot of rule breaking.
Huh, would never in a million years thought you would advocate for increased government oversight.
~Tilting at windmills~
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Friday December 02 2016, @10:20PM
Huh, would never in a million years thought you would advocate for increased government oversight.
My belief is that there are things such as pollution and other negative externalities that do need enforced regulation. Where I disagree is normally on two fronts.
First, the size of the externalities. Too many people have this view that any pollution (or equivalent externality) is just as bad as a lot of pollution. For example, we have groups claiming that there is "no safe" level of radiation. That ignores that even if you completely accept the linear no-threshold model [wikipedia.org], it's not hard to get radiation exposures so low that you accumulate more lifetime risk driving to the local grocery store. From here [abc.net.au]:
"As the crisis in Japan goes on, there are an increasing number of sources reporting that 100 mSv (millisieverts) is the lowest dose at which a person is at risk for cancer," says a statement from the organisation.
"Established research disproves this claim," the statement continues. "According to the National Academy of Sciences, there are no safe doses of radiation. Decades of research show clearly that any dose of radiation increases an individual's risk for the development of cancer."
To put that into context, about 30 workers at the plant site are thought to have received radiation exposure of that much and no one in the general public is thought to have received more than a quarter of that (at least according [wikipedia.org] to the Japanese government).
What was worse, was this blurb was quoted by a slashdotter who was arguing about radiation exposure orders of magnitude lower (global increase in background radiation due to Fukushima).
Second, there's the propensity to demand more regulation when regulation isn't enforced. For example, during the huge oil well spill in the Gulf of Mexico (Deepwater Horizon), it was determined after the fact that there had been 200+ safety violations on the well platform. Calls for more regulation, of course, were issued. But what is the point of adding more unenforced regulations?
It's also worth noting that if necessary industries can only operate by violating regulation (and oil wells probably have reached that point incidentally), then the state will be forced to ignore regulation violations and that will make it easier to fail to prevent harmful conditions that those regulations are attempting to prevent.
My view on this particular point is enforce existing regulations first. If there really is a problem of regulatory coverage, then we can add the appropriate regulation to deal with that situation. Most US industry, commerce, and other trades are already heavily regulated. If that regulation isn't working, then someone is doing something wrong.
So here's how I'd summarize my stance on US and developed world regulation in general. Most human activities are already overregulated. If we chose to enforce regulation properly, we would already have prevented most of the externalities we want to prevent (except of course, for externalities and perverse behavior created or incentivized by the regulation itself). So enforce existing regulation and work on making regulation both saner and easier to comply with.
In particular, we need to stop the deluge of regulation creation that goes on in any government. For example, in the US federal government both regulation and legislative law increase faster than one can read it. US environmental regulation continues to be a large portion of that accumulation of new regulation.
(Score: 2) by Zz9zZ on Friday December 02 2016, @10:47PM
Someone hijacked your account Khallow! Sorry, but I'm just shocked at this even keeled approach you're suddenly taking ;)
Couldn't agree more, but more regulatory oversight means funding lots of new employees which is rarely a popular stance. That is probably why most things fail "we need this!" followed immediately by "we're not paying them to do that!"
I have a great plan! Transfer all DEA agents to regulatory oversight! Since we can replace their fancy toys with clipboards we can then allocate their "toy funds" into treatment programs for addicts. Problems at least partway solved.
~Tilting at windmills~
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday December 02 2016, @11:09PM
shocked at this even keeled approach
Don't worry. I'll lull some fat ship into range of my cannon and hoist the Jolly Roger! The internet will once again fear my rants! No port is safe!
I respond in kind. If someone is polite, I tend to be. If someone comes in yowling "you're a stupid, evil doodiehead", then I tend to turn up the heat a lot. And sometimes I'm just cranky.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday December 02 2016, @10:16PM
If the regulation only requires that renewable resources be used, but doesn't specify that the resources harvested in a SUSTAINABLE fashion, then the regulation was very poorly considered.
The whole problem with non-renewable resources is that there is no sustainable rate at which to harvest them. Coal and other fossil fuels have absolutely massive reserves, even today, but they have essentially zero replenishment rate.
I wonder if anyone is considering breeder reactors as a renewable energy resource?
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Zz9zZ on Friday December 02 2016, @10:49PM
Lots of people, just not the right ones. Also, the public is very scared of a terrorist taking over the facility and escaping in a helicopter to blow up DC. Nevermind that the FAA would track them and military fighters would be on them in seconds... Yay propaganda making people terrified of the word radiation. I've had to clear up EM radiation / nuclear radiation more times than I care to count.
~Tilting at windmills~
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday December 03 2016, @01:37AM
I'm with you right up to the "fighters would be on them in seconds..." Our fighter bases are actually spread fairly thin, sometimes they would have to respond over 300 miles or more, which they can do in about 20 minutes, but only after they get airborne which can take another 5 to 10 sometimes. Even in Washington D.C., the fighters weren't able to respond in time to stop the Pentagon bound plane...
The real difference in radiation is ionizing vs non-ionizing. Linear accelerators generate ionizing radiation without the use of radioactive materials. I'm not convinced that non-ionizing radiation is as harmless as everyone treats it, but I am definitely convinced that ionizing radiation can be harmful and is not as predictable as the "experts" seem to think it is - I have personally bumped into far too many people who died, of cancer, well before their time after working in a job that had them dealing "safely" with sources of ionizing radiation.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Zz9zZ on Saturday December 03 2016, @04:21AM
I was assuming that there would at least be security alerts when the thieves went in. But you're right, likely they might be able to escape if they planned it perfectly, though I presume security would be designed to give some delay. They always use tight security right? lawl
~Tilting at windmills~
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 05 2016, @02:28PM
We need to define the cycle time for an energy source to be considered renewable. After all, without such limit, even the fossil fuels are renewable!
If an source is not fully replenished to its original state within a year, it cannot be deemed renewable.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Friday December 02 2016, @10:52PM
I also found this statement unbelievable :
Up to 65% of Europe's renewable output currently comes from bioenergy, involving fuels such as wood pellets and chips, rather than wind and solar power.
First, it doesn't jive with all the much touted wind and solar claims over the last few years, and second if they are burning wood to generate energy they are doing it wrong. Its about the dirtiest way to get heat, worse than coal.
There are forest to biofuel projects [alaskaair.com] that MIGHT eventually make a difference, but usually these are way more expensive than the fuel they replace, and not all that practical.
With certain tree species (poplar and similar) that will sprout from their roots and re-grow if you leave even a short 6 inch tall stump, and you can harvest these with machinery every 5 to 10 years and chip them directly into trucks for transfer to rendering plants. Its been done by paper companies for fiber for 40 years in some markets. (The trick is never let them get bigger than you can mow and chip in place without a huge crew of workers - maybe 3-4 inches diameter at ground level).
But even if all these schemes pass some lame sustainability test, they invariably run afoul of CO2 emissions concerns.
If you just PLANT the trees, and let them grow to a large sustainable forest you do more for the environment than cutting them down and burning them.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday December 03 2016, @11:00PM
A standing forest is a giant pulse CO2 emission waiting to happen. Forests burn, it's actually natural and beneficial to many species of larger trees.
🌻🌻 [google.com]