Native forests not waste
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Open letter to EPA chairman Barry Buffier.
Native forest is not renewable nor is it “waste”.
The only waste is the $14-16million dollar loss every year that FCNSW incurs - and this will not be alleviated by allowing trees to be logged for burning.
It will allow a multinational corporation, which is wholly Japanese-owned, to continue to make a profit.
Wood waste from native forests was removed from the RET as an eligible renewable energy source in 2011.
This amendment was made to ensure the RET did not provide an incentive for the burning of native forest wood waste for bio-energy, which could lead to unintended outcomes for biodiversity and the destruction of intact carbon stores.
As the trees will primarily be logged to provide for electricity generation, they will not be classed legally as waste.
This amendment will put NSW in conflict with Australia's international obligations.
Lastly I would add the public perception is that the NSW Government is corrupt - whether Labor or Liberal.
This is because the Forestry Corporation is seen as being above the law since the enactment of FNPE Act s40 now Forestry Act s69ZA, which is state-sanctioned.
To amend any legislation or regulation in Forestry’s favour to enable it to continue logging will be seen as not only condoning its illegal behaviour, but encouraging it.
You, as the representatives of the EPA, have a higher duty to the public than a multinational corporation, and must fulfil that duty.
This is particularly so when engaging in an action that will involve expenditure of public monies.
To allow this amendment would be to allow the continuing of FCNSWs million dollar losses every year.
Will you and the board resist or shelve this proposal, or will you support the continuing destruction of NSW citizens’ rights to a cleaner and healthier environment?
Lisa Stone
South East Forest Rescue
Appalling plan
Pleased to read your newspaper's coverage of the latest appalling plans for industrial scale logging of native forests.
Now that companies as well as taxpayers are losing money from woodchipping, why don't they just stop it?
Instead they're dreaming up new ways to cash out nature, at the expense of the animals for whom forests are home.
Here comes dead koala power. Groan.
One thing you can be sure of: none of this will happen without even bigger subsidies than taxpayers, shareholders and consumers are already paying.
Why?
Keith Hughes
Bega
Assault on trees
I came across your article about burning forest "waste" for electricity in the BDN and thought your readers might be interested in another assault on the forests up Eurobodalla way a few years ago, narrowly averted - the Mogo charcoal plant.
The whole idea was based on the argument the charcoal plant would use only genuine forest waste - that is heads, limbs and butts, presently left over from the removal of whole trunks for either timber (10-20 per cent) or woodchips (80-90per cent).
Hard to argue with better utilisation of forest products given the massive losses Forest Corp generates for the taxpayer each year.
However, this turned out to be a lie, one the then Labor government was happy to believe.
Ian Cohen (Greens MLC at the time) successfully gained access to the wood supply agreements via parliamentary processes and guess what?
Whole trees only were to be supplied - no head, no limbs, no butts.
The increase in logging intensity to supply the charcoal plant (and continue to supply local, struggling sawmills and the woodchip plant) would have been catastrophic.
The "rules" around stream buffer and wildlife conservation were already stretched and broken repeatedly to supply existing agreements, let alone to supply a new end user of whole trees.
So, learn from us, Bega Valleyians.
Do not let the worthwhile promise of new ways of utilising our valuable forest resources delude you into believing government or enterprises that have a vested interest.
These forests belong to you.
We fought tooth and nail to protect ours up here - you might have to do the same if this proposal for forest-fuelled electricity is allowed to go ahead.
Hope this helps.
Will Douglas
Moruya
Crash and burn
Let the woodchip industry crash and burn, not the forest waste!
Anne Hamilton-Foster
Tanja
Leave trees standing
For the past four decades, logging in south-eastern Australia has produced a high volume of low quality woodchips.
This has been presented as the "waste" left over from timber production, but statistics show this is 90 per cent of logs taken from forests.
Historically, this method of "seed tree silviculture", or clear-felling, began when the Eden woodchip mill opened.
In recent years, the demand for native forest woodchips has diminished since blue gum plantations have provided a superior source of paper pulp.
In the BDN (19/7), EPA chairman Barry Buffier claims that proposals to burn logging waste for power will be sourced from the material currently being burned in-situ or left on the forest floor.
That is an extremely naive claim, which fails to understand how trees are felled, removed from forests as logs, and the remains burned to promote regeneration.
Clearly it will be so-called "residual logs" that will be burned, not the smashed remains of tree-crowns on the forest floor.
Before a forest is logged, all of the trees provide valuable, ecological functions.
They provide food and habitat for fauna.
Their roots hold the soil together and prevent erosion.
They help maintain climate and atmospheric stability.
The simplest way to resolve the problem of waste is to eliminate it completely by leaving the trees standing.
Tony Hastings
Tathra
Editor’s note: While Tony Hastings works for the BDN on occasion as a casual reporter, he submitted the above letter as a private citizen. His views do not necessarily reflect those of the BDN or its parent company Fairfax.
Proposal a diversion
I am replying to your invitation to comment on the article concerning wood left after logging (BDN, 19/7).
I am very concerned about this proposal.
I'm afraid that it will be used as an excuse to continue logging in our native forests.
I am also worried that proposals like this will divert funds from the solar and wind initiatives.
I believe that wind and solar are the way we must be going.
Our native forests are truly beautiful places.
I hope that we stop logging them soon and that the jobs that are lost from logging would be replaced by the new energy sources being built.
Right now, it seems to me that Mike Kelly has done a great job in helping to get Eden in a position to take advantage of its exceptional location.
I want to see us continue in that direction and move forward.
Lois Katz
Tathra
Support during tragedy
The Wheatley family – Allen, Donna, Tim, Shirley and Nugget, Peter, Suzanne, Tom Ashley and Matt, Philip, Kerry, Madi and Rile, Cale and Leroy Harris – wish to thank all their wonderful friends and families in this beautiful Bega Valley and from further afield – Canberra, the Monaro, Sydney, Adeliade, Brisbane, Moruya, Batemans bay, Bomaderry, Toowoomba, Delegate, Dalgety, Jindabyne, places too numerous to mention – for their support, love and messages of sympathy in the sad and tragic loss of daughter, sister, granddaughter, niece, cousin, friend and partner, Kelly.
They wish to thank everyone for the cards, letters, flowers, the phone calls, the visits and cooking – it has all been gratefully received and quite overwhelming.
The family especially wishes to thank Bega Cheese/Butter Factory, where Allen, Peter, Philip, Donna and Cale are employed, for their generosity and support.
The support given from managerial staff and fellow workers and the factory as a whole has been beyond words – we will be forever grateful.
Thank you, one and all from the bottom of our hearts.
Shirley Wheatley, on behalf of the Wheatley family
Bega