The Biden/Harris administration’s latest efforts to protect forests focus on preserving old growth trees on public land. That sounds pretty good – unless you live in the South.
In the South, few of our trees qualify as old growth, and most forests are on private land. So they’re not protected, and they’re being logged at rates rivaling the Amazon rainforest. Our trees are being turned into tiny pellets, shipped to Europe and Asia, and burned to make electricity in a process that emits more carbon than burning coal does.
Credit: Contributed
Credit: Contributed
Taxpayer money is subsidizing the wood pellet energy industry’s growth. This is a huge blank spot on the Biden/Harris administration’s otherwise impressive environmental justice agenda. There’s an easy way to begin righting this wrong: don’t let funding from the Inflation Reduction Act’s clean energy provisions fuel the growth of the woody biomass industry.
Over the next months, the U.S. Department of Energy will sort through applications for generous tax credits, and wood pellet companies are lining up. They claim they’re offering climate-friendly energy. They aren’t. The White House can make sure the DOE heeds the harm the wood pellet industry is doing to Southern communities and the climate.
If you drive from my hometown of Adel to Savannah or Brunswick, you can see the damage the wood pellet industry is doing. Logging trucks enter roads running along miles of clear-cut land. You might pass wood pellet mills, some of which have been fined by the state Environmental Protection Division for violations involving hazardous pollutants. You will see forests and communities are becoming sacrifice zones for multinational biomass companies.
Adel — with a population of 5,500 and a poverty rate of 23% — has a sordid history with the wood industry. Our West Side community, made up predominantly of people of color and lower-income residents, once hosted a lumber yard where utility poles were made. The yard’s been closed for decades, but the creosote-polluted soil still remains in our community without resolve.
So it’s no surprise when a biomass energy company wanted to build a wood pellet mill in our neighborhood, we were concerned about the pollution, dust and noise. We banded together as the Concerned Citizens of Cook County and, with the help of allies like the Southern Environmental Law Center, won an agreement that ensures community air monitoring, air purifiers close to the plant, frequent community meetings and other protections. So far, the wood pellet plant hasn’t been built, and we’ll be happy if it stays that way.
You might think of trees as immediately renewable, and that planting a new tree for every one cut will keep the system in balance. When it comes to climate change, that doesn’t work. Older trees and mature forests lock up more climate-changing carbon than newly planted saplings, and they keep that carbon out of the atmosphere. On top of that, recently logged areas are much more susceptible to flooding. And wood pellet mills — disproportionately built in low-income communities of color – emit toxic pollution, dust and noise the neighbors can’t escape.
So look, President Biden: the last thing we want is for Washington to help the wood pellet industry expand by granting them tax incentives funded by a bill that’s supposed to protect the climate. We need you to fill in this blank spot on your environmental justice agenda. End taxpayer-funded incentives for international corporations that chop down our forests, pollute our air, and generate dirty energy that contributes to climate change. Our Southern forests are much more valuable when they are left alone to thrive and serve our people and planet.
An educator with a doctorate from Valdosta State University, Treva Gear is the founder and chair of Concerned Citizens of Cook County and a U.S. Army veteran.
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