The combustion of native forest biomass for energy production at the industrial scale poses serious threat to the climate, and to Australia’s unique forests and forest dependent species. It also hinders the capacity of nature to remove carbon from the atmosphere and the deployment of genuinely clean, renewable energy technologies.
Burning native forest biomass is promoted by its advocates as carbon neutral and simply utilising waste efficiently. In reality this is incorrect and misleading.
Burning forest biomass for electricity production is more emissive of carbon per unit of energy produced than is burning coal. This is scientific fact. These emissions are immediate in their effect on the atmosphere. We need to urgently move away from emissive power sources like coal and other fossil fuels, but should not make the mistake of substituting with an emissive alternative.
