Teru Talk Newsletter
Volume III, Issue
34, August 26,
2013
Teru Talk by Michael
Theroux (pronounced
"Terú")
Teru's Trash Talk
The
grating sound of chain saws
and a chipping rig
collapsed our morning calm
the other day as our
neighbor's hired crew began
removing low hanging
branches and dead oak trees
from his property. That
sound is going to get a lot
more common for a while,
given the number, size, and
voracity of the US
 western
region's wildfires.
Last night's news said
the Forest Service was
tapped out of money
allocated to fight the
nation's
conflagrations and has
begun drawing down
recreation funds and
any other bucket of
money available.
California's Rim Fire
alone has torched well
over 134 thousand
acres with only 7%
containment, and
crossed over the
northwest boundary
into Yosemite National
Park. Billions of tons
of biomass gone up in
"biogenic carbon"
smoke. Wouldn't it
make sense to lower
the fire risk in the
first
place?
I just
have to wonder what our
lives, our economies, our
air quality would be like
if we took what is now
burning up, and turned it
into heat, electricity,
liquid fuel, and foundation
chemicals. But the story
falls on deaf ears:
proposals for projects
making clean and
economically viable use of
forest biomass are met with
a different kind of
resource drain, that of
never-ending court battles
over the potential loss of
biological diversity, over
the well-orchestrated
public terror of "mining
our forests" to feed the
bottomless maw (jaws or
throat of a voracious
animal) of the Bioenergy
Industry. What do you think
the Rim Fire is doing to
the regional
biodiversity?
We can
measure toxins that come
out of a Biomass Facility
stack, and often, if we can
detect those toxins, the
plant is already in
violation because there is
no known safe amount.
Incomplete combustion of
wood can make some pretty
nasty stuff. Now tell me
what is happening to our
regional and even our
global air quality from the
wildfires that continue to
"manage" the vegetation
(and everything else in
their path) just as Nature
intended. The smoke from
the Rim Fire in California
has already reached
Idaho.
Aren't we
as a People smarter than
that? Apparently not, comes
the obvious answer. Why?
Since
we can count the
toxins coming out of that
stack, our agencies can
make and enforce rules on
stack emissions. We can
figure out how to jump up
and down on the companies
that (heaven forbid) try to
make a buck at their
Bioenergy business; we
cannot fathom the path to
prevention of, or the
impacts that result from a
134,000 acre wood-fueled
furnace. All
we can do is pray, put all
the money we've got into a
pile and throw everything
we can muster at the mess,
then count the damage after
the fact.
While the
fire season continues,
while the smoke and the
obvious loss remains on the
evening news as (pardon the
bad but intentional pun) a
"hot topic", re-think your
position regarding forest
preservation, risk
reduction, resource
utilization, and where we
put our all-to-scarce
public funds. Watch for the
next time somebody wants to
make business out of
Biomass, and consider
countering the constant
outcry by calling up your
representatives and putting
your own voice behind
support for Sane Use of
Forest Biomass. It could be
your forest that is next to
burn.
Hey
Rube!
There
really is such a thing
as "sustainable forest biomass
harvesting" and we really
should demand that this
applies to risk reduction and
forest health vegetation
management …just as long as it
actually gets
done.
September Events
Not one or
even two, but three relevant
events are coming up next
month. Not even Teru can get to
all of them, but they all look
good.
Biomass
Pellets Trade & Power
Summit, Sept 09-12,
2013
The Biomass
Pellets Trade & Power
Summit in Seoul on the 09-12
September, will set the stage
for deep analysis of pellet
trade patterns, feedstock
uncertainties, sourcing
strategy, sustainability
initiatives, and pricing
dynamics in the North East
Asian biomass value
chain.
Waste
Conversion Technology
Conference & Trade Show,
Sept 15-17,
2013
The 6th Annual Waste Conversion
Technology Conference &
Trade Show (formerly the
Waste-to-Fuels Conference) will
be held on September 15-17,
2013 at the Hyatt Regency
Mission Bay Spa & Marina in
San Diego,
California.
8th Annual
California Bioresources
Alliance Symposium, Sept
18-19,
2013
The
eighth annual California
Bioresources Alliance Symposium
will be held on September
18-19, 2013 from 9 a.m.- 5
p.m.at the Cal/EPA Building,
1001 I Street,
Sacramento.
This Week's Top Story
America
First and Washington County,
Maryland Partner for
Waste-to-Energy
West Virginia
based America First, Inc. (AFI)
presented a proposal to the
Washington County, Maryland,
Board of Commissioners at its
August 6, 2013 meeting that
would transform the County's
landfill into a
waste-to-renewable energy
facility. 0819/2013
The
Week's News
NOTE:
If you are using
IE10 and our website isn't
loading as smoothly as you
would like or the page jumps
when you click on a link to go
to a certain news item, just
change to "compatibility view"
and all will be
fine.
Optinol Can
Produce Non-GMO Bio-Butanol
at Cost Parity with
Ethanol
San Francisco based startup
Optinol has announced
completion of cost parity
feasibility assessments,
concluding that the company's
native-strain fermentation
pathway can produce bio-butanol
from a wide variety of sugars
for the same relative cost as
ethanol fermentation.
08/23/2013
Synagro to
Start Construction on Large
Scale Composting Plant in
Florida
Headquartered in Maryland,
Synagro has announced the
impending start of construction
on a $4.3 million
multi-feedstock composting
facility in
southwest
Florida.
08/23/2013
GCEI
Partners with Nova Renew to
Develop Plastics to Fuel
Pyrolysis
Plant
Global Clean Energy, Inc (GCEI)
has announced a partnering
agreement reached with the
plastics to fuel company Nova
ReNew, Inc for the development
and financing of a plastics to
fuel plant that uses pyrolysis
technology.
08/23/2013
Linde to
Build Waste CO2
Purification and
Liquefaction Plant in Saudi
Arabia
Headquartered in Germany, the
Linde Group has been awarded a
contract to build a massive
facility for recovery,
purification, and liquefaction
of the raw carbon dioxide (CO2)
gaseous by-product of two
ethylene glycol production
facilities.
08/22/2013
DECC
Releases New Biomass
Sustainability Criteria for
Energy
Generation
The United Kingdom's (UK)
Department of Energy &
Climate Change (DECC) has
announced the release of tough
new sustainability criteria for
biomass energy generation.
08/22/2013
NextFuels
Will Focus Liquefaction
Process on Palm Waste to
Green
Crude
California based NextFuels LLC
has announced that it will
initially focus use of its
liquefaction process on
conversion of Malaysian
palm-oil residuals into "green
crude."
08/21/2013
Biofpr
Publishes Review of EU and
US Lignocellulosic Biofuel
Initiatives
Biofuels, Bioproducts and
Biorefining (Biofpr), a journal
of the Society of Chemical
Industry (SCI), has announced
free access to the article
"Review of US and EU
initiatives toward development,
demonstration, and
commercialization of
lignocellulosic biofuels."
08/21/2013
Scotland Is
First Nation to Commit to
Zero-Waste Circular Economy
100
The Government of Scotland has
announced that it is the first
nation to formally join the
Circular Economy 100 (CE100)
programme launched by the Ellen
MacArthur Foundation.
08/21/2013
Covanta
Acquires New Jersey Waste to
Energy Plant from Foster
Wheeler
Covanta Holding Corporation has
announced that it has completed
acquisition of the 1,050 ton
per day Camden Resource
Recovery Facility (CRRF) in the
company's headquarters state of
New Jersey from a subsidiary of
the Swiss engineering company
Foster Wheeler AG.
08/20/2013
EEA
Publishes Assessment of
European Union's Bioenergy
Potential
Based in Denmark, the European
Environmental Agency (EEA) has
announced the availability of a
new report, "EU bioenergy
potential from a
resource-efficiency
perspective."
08/20/2013
Edeniq and
PacificAg Integrate
Cellulosic Processing into
Corn Ethanol
Plants
California
based Edeniq has announced
entering into an exclusive
five-year agreement with Oregon
based PacificAg to help
integrate cellulosic biofuels
processing capacity into
existing corn ethanol
fermentation plants.
0819/2013
WRAP Cymru
Launches Small-Scale
Reprocessing and Re-Use
Grant
Program
WRAP Cymru ,
the Welch arm of the United
Kingdom's Waste & Resources
Action Programme (WRAP), has
announced a newly-funded grant
program to support localization
of recyclate reprocessing. 29
2044 8090. 0819/2013
The Week's Action
Items
Due
09/20/2013: Applications to
BIC for Ontario Bioeconomy
Initiative
Support
The Canadian Biomass Innovation
Centre (BIC) has announced it
is now accepting applications
for support for the Northern
Ontario Bioeconomy Initiatives.
08/20/2013
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