Green Options

My previous post retraced the precipitous decline in the reputation of biofuels that occurred between 2006 and today.  In this post I’m going to talk about just a few of the activities going on for “second generation” biofuels (beyond corn, soy and palm oil, wheat…).  One of the key features of these initiatives is that they reduce the competition with food crops - something which will only become a more significant issue in the future.  I’ll be talking about several Universities and companies who have hung in there through the ups and downs of oil prices and the “trendiness” and “rejection” of biofuels.  I think that these folks are going to make significant long-term contributions. If you have been soured in the past on the biofuel concept, please consider these alternatives.

Algae

There was a recent Wall Street Journal article about “5 Technologies that could change everything.”  One they included was biofuels from Algae.  People have been working on this for a long time including a very long government effort.  The great thing about algae is that you can grow it in places and with water sources that are completely unsuitable for farming.  Algae can be extremely productive.  The problem is that the low capital investment systems are less productive and the highly productive, “bio-reactor” approach has a huge capital cost.  The good news is that there are enough companies working away on this that sooner or later there might be a break-through.  I won’t pretend to be an expert on how this is going, but I have a hunch it will eventually become significant.

Croatia and Hungary signed an agreement yesterday to protect a major biodiversity area that crosses borders along three rivers. The agreement is being called a “Trans-Boundary UNESCO Biosphere Reserve” and has resulted in the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) awarding the two countries with a “Leaders for a Living Planet” award.

The reserve will preserve several endangered species, among other environmental jewels. There is also the possibility of the reserve expanding several times over into neighboring countries in the future.

Many thousands of Kenyans are enduring a severe drought, caused in part, it is believed, by cutting down ancient forests.

Timberland has announced a new policy agreement with Greenpeace to ensure that leather used in new boots and shoes won’t contribute to deforestation in the Amazon.

The policy will issue a moratorium on purchasing any cattle raised in newly deforested areas within the Amazon Rainforest, and it will force all of its suppliers to do the same.

A new way to treat wood has trees back in the limelight: a hardwood’s reliability that even a rain forest mahogany tree can love.

Check out the world’s first heavy traffic road bridge made from Accoya® wood. The bridge, located in Sneek in the Netherlands, is “the first wooden bridge in the world that can support the heaviest load class of 60 tons”. At this week’s Wall Street Green Trading Summit, a panel on forestation introduced a new way of [...]

“Leave No Trace” has always been an honored credo of the Boy Scouts of America. The trumpeted tenet is supposed to refer to ethical guidelines which preach having a minimal impact on land, nature and wildlife. But according to a recent investigation, the Boy Scouts have been caught logging over 34,000 acres of pristine forest over the last 20 years, including 60 clearcuts and 35 salvage harvests. They’ve literally left no trace– of the forests.

Furthermore, the survey showed that most of the acreage was logged to turn a backdoor profit, and there’s evidence of corruption. A number of Scout councils submitted inaccurate and misleading logging plans, and allegedly disregarded rules and regulations which were in place to protect wildlife and the watershed. Some of the deals even involve cozy relationships with private companies and state regulators.

There are 9,045,389 Swedes, and 55,000 of them are members of the Forestry and Woodworkers Union. That’s a lot of people paying dues to acknowledge their interest in woodlands.

On Wednesday, thousands of Macedonians planted six million trees to reforest their country. Buses took people, including 1000 soldiers, to planting sites.  The tree planting project was organized by opera singer Boris Trajanov, “If Macedonia, a country of two million people, can plant six million trees, we can only imagine how many trees can be planted in other, bigger countries.”

Via: Reuters

Image: MacedonianBoy on Flickr under [...]

Helveta, specializes in supply chain tracking systems that give companies the ability to track any and every item in their supply chain. In forestry, this means that it can link barcodes and radio identifiers to individual trees and map them using GPS and Helveta’s proprietary software.

Using these tags, it allows timber producers to demonstrate that their wood and lumber comes from a legal source. According to Patrick Newton, President of Helveta, this gives an additional level of auditability and supply chain assurance to buyers and watchdog groups:

If it doesn’t have the tag or the audit trail attached to it, they will know it is probably illegal

And, according to an article in the Economist, that’s exactly what is happening in Liberia.

As I mentioned in Introduction to Carbon Credits, there are lots of different ways to offset your carbon dioxide emissions and even get paid for them. Although more and more companies are offsetting their emissions and committing to carbon dioxide reductions by joining the Chicago Climate Exchange or the California Climate Action Registry, I’m going to focus on some tools that individuals can use to offset their carbon dioxide emissions.