Stateline Victoria
April 9, 2010
A five second film of an endangered potaroo could change the way environmental laws are applied to logging operations.
JOSEPHINE CAFAGNA, PRESENTER: The discovery of a Long-footed Potaroo in forest in East Gippsland has thrown Victoria's environmental laws into question and the future of logging operations into doubt.
Endangered species are given special protection whenever and wherever they're found, but angered by what they say is the Government's head-in-the-sand approach, environmental groups are using cameras to prove endangered animals like the Potaroo are living in forests that are due to be logged. Matthew Stanley reports.
MATTHEW STANLEY, REPORTER: These images are taken by a motion-sensing infrared camera. They capture the nocturnal comings and goings of Victoria's forests and are the latest weapon in the ongoing campaign by conservation groups to stop old growth logging.
ANDREW LINCOLN: We're parked here. We'll walk to this point here and then walk to the first camera there, then come over the ridgeline down to the gully there and then follow this old track down here to these two.
MATTHEW STANLEY: 24-year-old Andrew Lincoln's already an experienced hand in the art of the wildlife survey, techniques used to detect rare and endangered animals. Armed with a map and a GPS he spotlights for gliders and owls and searches creeks for native crayfish. But in East Gippsland, the main prize is the Long-footed Potaroo, an endangered species that triggers immediate protection of up to 150 hectares of forest, wherever one is found. The cameras are the perfect tool for finding the notoriously shy animals.
ANDREW LINCOLN: Most animals are nocturnal that we're looking for, so when an animal, we put out some bait and the animal comes to sniff it and sets off a motion sensor and then the infrared cameras so they can take night shots, and, yeah, hopefully we catch 'em on film.
MATTHEW STANLEY: The search focuses on areas due to be logged, in this case deep in thick bushland.
This camera's been in place for a month, silently recording any movement.
This is what they found: two long-footed potaroos, attracted by the smell of honey, oats and pistachio essence, hop in front of the camera. Their presence will throw plans to log this area in the Yalmi Forest into doubt and already has the government agency in charge of logging questioning the video's authenticity.
DAVID POLLARD, CEO, VICFORESTS: The only thing I could add to this dramatic nocturnal footage is that it has to be tested by independent third parties. I mean, if it's evidence, it has to be audited. And elements of the community that want to provide evidence, welcome as that is, need to consent to have their offerings interrogated by independent parties. Otherwise it's not evidence; it's mere assertion.
MATTHEW STANLEY: The latest film plays like a sequel to pictures at the centre of a court case that is testing the way Victoria's environmental protection laws are interpreted and enforced.
Last year a camera captured a Potaroo in the middle of one of the most hotly-contested forests in Victoria. Produced just days before logging was due to start in two stands of old growth forests at Brown Mountain, the five second film was also questioned by Vic Forests.
JILL REDWOOD, ENVIRONMENT EAST GIPPSLAND: The clock was certainly ticking, yes. So when we found the potaroo, we thought, "Right, this is it. They can't ignore this one." And sent the footage through and the report and they ignored it.
MATTHEW STANLEY: Environment East Gippsland then went to the Supreme Court and won a temporary injunction to stop the logging. After a four week hearing, the court's now deliberating on whether the area should be permanently protected.
JILL REDWOOD: The Government decided that it was fair game for logging. They hadn't done any surveys here of course because they didn't want to find the threatened species, which would then prevent them from logging if they'd abide by the law.
MATTHEW STANLEY: Ray Jamieson's both saw miller and logging contractor and was poised to begin logging Brown Mountain when the film of what became known in court as "Potaroo number one" forced a stop.
RAY JAMIESON, SAWMILLER: If the decision goes their way it will then just open up the floodgates, I'd say, and that'd just leave it open for all the other coops that we've got on the what's to do.
MATTHEW STANLEY: Mr Jamieson's had his fair of run-ins with environmental activists during forest blockades going back 20 years, but is scratching his head at the new tactics.
Are you surprised that one photo of one animal could do what it's done?
RAY JAMIESON: Yeah, I didn't realise it'd have such an impact, I s'pose. But - well, you know, see where it goes, I spose. See where it goes.
MATTHEW STANLEY: What started as an argument over evidence has snowballed into a test of how the law designed to protect endangered species, the Flora and Fauna Guarantee Act, is applied to logging operations. Vicforests says it follows the rules set down by the Department of Sustainability and Environment.
MIKE RYAN, FOREST SCIENTIST, VICFORESTS: Look, any of the threatened species are assessed on the basis of already pre-existing identification of where they are in the landscape and on the maps that are provided to us from Department of Sustainability and Environment.
MATTHEW STANLEY: Does Vicforests do any wildlife surveys, any assessments of pre-logging assessments of wildlife and so on?
MIKE RYAN: We don't currently do pre-logging surveys. Again, that falls under the responsibility of the Department of Sustainability and Environment.
MATTHEW STANLEY: The DSE stopped doing pre-logging wildlife surveys in the '90s. Their assessments are now based on what's referred to as desktop analysis, a review of forest types, preferred habitat and existing records.
DAVID POLLARD: They have a very big investment in resourcing field operations for the identification and protection of species. It's an enormous job. It's a very demanding job. I think they do it very professionally. I have enormous confidence in them.
MATTHEW STANLEY: The Department of Sustainability and Environment declined to be interviewed, but it says it's up to Vicforests to decide if pre-logging surveys are needed to comply with the law.
DAVID POLLARD: Only they would know the extent to which field operations would be necessary to establish that.
MATTHEW STANLEY: The DSE sought assurances from Vicforests that its staff would not be subpoenaed as expert witnesses in the Brown Mountain court case. But a DSE discussion paper tendered in evidence states, "The absence of pre-harvest survey process exposes DSE and Vicforests to the prospect of inadvertent damage or destruction of significant species sites, ... negative publicity and accusations of breaches of our own guidelines and possible legal challenges to timber harvesting."
In other words, according to Jill Redwood, you won't find what you don't look for.
JILL REDWOOD: The DSE have been pointing the finger at Vicforests. Vicforests have been pointing the finger back. We're doing work they should be doing.
MATTHEW STANLEY: The argument over just whose job it is has strained relations between DSE and Vicforests. David Pollard says he's hoping the court will decide.
DAVID POLLARD: We are all beginning to realise that the norms that have governed the identification and protection of wildlife could sustain greater clarity.
JILL REDWOOD: I think what's come up in evidence shows they have to do pre-logging surveys. And if nothing else, if that's the only thing that comes out of it, I think that'll be a huge win.
MATTHEW STANLEY: In the meantime activists like Andrew Lincoln continue to search the forests of East Gippsland for endangered animals that might otherwise go undetected and unprotected.
ANDREW LINCOLN: At least to know, let alone protect, what we're destroying.
Source
06 July, 2009
LETTER: Getting it all so wrong on water
Lyn Kennedy, Wesburn
Letter to the editor, The Age, 6/7/09
IT MUST be obvious to everyone that State Government water policy is an incoherent mess.
Continuing to allow logging in what remains of our forests has led to progressive drying out of the moisture-retaining regions in the wet forests. Our water catchments are drying out, which also makes them more vulnerable to fire.
Rejecting solutions such as subsidising tanks and recycling waste water looks like plain stupidity but may be no more than pandering to electoral fears of contamination.
Stealing (Goulburn) water from the Murray when that river is on the verge of collapse is irrational and wilfully irresponsible. Privatisation of our water delivery systems leads us further down a dangerous path towards lack of control over our most fundamental resource.
None of the Government's initiatives take appropriate account of the over-arching problem of climate change. Panicked by continuing drought, ministers have tried to take "strong" action to show they are "doing something".
Unfortunately, conflicting responsibilities between unco-ordinated bureaucracies, dominant unions and private lobby groups all reveal deficiencies in the Government's approach. In the end, it is lawyers who are left to argue over the allocation of costs for failed systems.
This Government may not like taking responsibility for the wellbeing of its citizens but that is what it was elected to do.
Letter to the editor, The Age, 6/7/09
IT MUST be obvious to everyone that State Government water policy is an incoherent mess.
Continuing to allow logging in what remains of our forests has led to progressive drying out of the moisture-retaining regions in the wet forests. Our water catchments are drying out, which also makes them more vulnerable to fire.
Rejecting solutions such as subsidising tanks and recycling waste water looks like plain stupidity but may be no more than pandering to electoral fears of contamination.
Stealing (Goulburn) water from the Murray when that river is on the verge of collapse is irrational and wilfully irresponsible. Privatisation of our water delivery systems leads us further down a dangerous path towards lack of control over our most fundamental resource.
None of the Government's initiatives take appropriate account of the over-arching problem of climate change. Panicked by continuing drought, ministers have tried to take "strong" action to show they are "doing something".
Unfortunately, conflicting responsibilities between unco-ordinated bureaucracies, dominant unions and private lobby groups all reveal deficiencies in the Government's approach. In the end, it is lawyers who are left to argue over the allocation of costs for failed systems.
This Government may not like taking responsibility for the wellbeing of its citizens but that is what it was elected to do.
24 June, 2009
LETTER: If a tree falls …
John Hayward, Weegena, Tasmania
Letter to the editor, The Age, 24 June 2009
WE WILL know the world is truly past the climate-change tipping point when we stop seeing letters from foresters claiming that their regrowth plantations are better carbon sinks than mountain ash forests (Letters, 23/6).
Also disappearing at that point will probably be their argument that old-growth forests need harvesting to save them from becoming merely ash, despite their obviously superior fire survival rates.
The last survivors will probably be ministers for forests, tucked safely down the deep pockets of the industry's lobbyists.
Letter to the editor, The Age, 24 June 2009
WE WILL know the world is truly past the climate-change tipping point when we stop seeing letters from foresters claiming that their regrowth plantations are better carbon sinks than mountain ash forests (Letters, 23/6).
Also disappearing at that point will probably be their argument that old-growth forests need harvesting to save them from becoming merely ash, despite their obviously superior fire survival rates.
The last survivors will probably be ministers for forests, tucked safely down the deep pockets of the industry's lobbyists.
23 June, 2009
LETTER: Mountain ash forests do their job well
Michael Ryan, forest scientist, VicForests Melbourne
Letter to the editor, The Age, 23 June 2009.
GAVAN McFadzean (Comment, 22/6) rightly points out that the old-growth mountain ash forests of the Central Highlands are important carbon stores. These are also relatively rare as much of this forest was killed during the 1939 fires. The old-growth forests remaining after 1939 were predominantly in Melbourne's water supply catchments. Unfortunately, they are far from fire resistant and many magnificent stands, including the state's top 10 tallest trees in the Wallaby Creek and O'Shannassy catchments, were killed in the February fires.
The small portion of the mountain ash forests that are harvested for timber production have, almost exclusively, originated from the wildfires of 1939. These regrowth forests form the basis of the Victorian hardwood sawmilling industry. Logs from the Central Highlands that are not suitable for sawing are predominantly used for paper production, creating value-added products and sustainable jobs in regional Victoria.
Sustainable timber production is greenhouse friendly, with harvested forests being regrown and becoming carbon sinks. As the trees grow they continue to take up carbon dioxide from the atmosphere — at a greater rate than old-growth forests.
Letter to the editor, The Age, 23 June 2009.
GAVAN McFadzean (Comment, 22/6) rightly points out that the old-growth mountain ash forests of the Central Highlands are important carbon stores. These are also relatively rare as much of this forest was killed during the 1939 fires. The old-growth forests remaining after 1939 were predominantly in Melbourne's water supply catchments. Unfortunately, they are far from fire resistant and many magnificent stands, including the state's top 10 tallest trees in the Wallaby Creek and O'Shannassy catchments, were killed in the February fires.
The small portion of the mountain ash forests that are harvested for timber production have, almost exclusively, originated from the wildfires of 1939. These regrowth forests form the basis of the Victorian hardwood sawmilling industry. Logs from the Central Highlands that are not suitable for sawing are predominantly used for paper production, creating value-added products and sustainable jobs in regional Victoria.
Sustainable timber production is greenhouse friendly, with harvested forests being regrown and becoming carbon sinks. As the trees grow they continue to take up carbon dioxide from the atmosphere — at a greater rate than old-growth forests.
22 June, 2009
THE AGE: Preserving old-growth forests is vital to saving the planet
Gavan McFadzean, The Wilderness Society
The Age, 22 June 2009
SO WHERE are the world's most carbon-rich forests? Not the tropical rainforests of the Amazon, Borneo or Africa's Congo Basin, according to research by the Australian National University. They are the tall, old-growth mountain ash forests of Victoria's Central Highlands — a 90-minute drive east of Melbourne.
The researchers studied 132 forests from around the world to discover the regions that stored the most carbon. Their findings, published in the US-based Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, one of the world's most-cited scientific serials, is a surprise because conventional wisdom says that tropical forests store the most carbon.
So why our forests? The conditions are perfect. These forests occur at a confluence of environmental conditions that lead to high rates of plant growth and, because they are cooler, decay rates are slower. In short they grow fast but decay slowly. And they are very old — at least 350 years, growing dense heavy wood. That's important because the amount of carbon stored is due to volume and density. Also, these trees have not been subjected to logging.
The problem is, these very same forest types are being intensively logged for woodchips, mostly bound for Japan. These trees are not only the best at producing carbon; unfortunately for them, they are also some of the best for producing high-quality paper. To add insult to injury, several of Melbourne's water catchments are among those logged.
ANU science shows that for as long as these forests are logged, their carbon-carrying capacity is reduced by up to 60 per cent, not to mention the emissions from logging and post-logging regeneration burns. If we stopped logging all the forests of south-eastern Australia, and we now have enough wood in plantations to do that, we would avoid emissions equal to 24 per cent of the 2005 Australian net greenhouse gas emissions across all sectors.
Ironically, the plantation-based timber industry is under great economic stress, with several major wood plantation growers in receivership. This is the right time for Premier John Brumby to develop an integrated industry rescue and climate package, which creates green jobs in the plantation sector and focuses management of our native forests on emissions reduction.
Another reason why these forests are so carbon dense is because they evolved with fire.
Yes, the Black Saturday fires did pass through some of these forests, but most of the carbon remains in the forest. This is because it is in big old trees and dead trunks, and in the soil. Therefore, the proportion of total carbon lost in the fire is surprisingly small compared with logging. Also, many trees survive fire in less intensely burnt patches, facilitating regeneration. But logging these forests makes them more vulnerable to fire because it fragments and dries out the landscape, replacing fire-resistant tall forests and a wet rainforest understorey with young eucalypts and a much drier understorey.
This research (combined with research released by ANU last year) demonstrates how important it is for the Federal Government to assess how much carbon could be stored in Australia's native forests, how much greenhouse gas could be prevented from entering the atmosphere if we protect them from logging, and what their long-term ability to keep on pulling carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere actually is.
It also suggests that there is a serious new option to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions.
The Federal Government has made provision for complementary measures to be developed to supplement the carbon pollution reduction scheme. Clearly there is scope to develop a package to reduce emissions and protect and restore the carbon stored in our native forests. Such a package could prevent millions of tonnes of carbon dioxide being released.
We need to start recognising the value of these forests to climate change mitigation. The Government should provide incentives so that state governments and private land owners are rewarded for protecting and restoring the carbon stocks found in natural forests under their control.
Everyone is concerned with emissions from logging and tree clearing in developing countries, but the Government needs to ensure that the Copenhagen agreement also provides policies that give incentives to protect and restore carbon stocks in developed nations.
We knew these forests should be protected because they are our water catchments and habitat for endangered species such as the Leadbeater's Possum, Victoria's faunal emblem. Now it turns out they are the world's largest carbon banks and their protection should be a critical part of any response to climate change by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Premier John Brumby.
Will the public interest finally take precedence over that of the woodchippers? Surely these forests have put an irrefutable case for their protection.
Gavan McFadzean is the Wilderness Society Victorian campaigns manager.
Source
The Age, 22 June 2009
SO WHERE are the world's most carbon-rich forests? Not the tropical rainforests of the Amazon, Borneo or Africa's Congo Basin, according to research by the Australian National University. They are the tall, old-growth mountain ash forests of Victoria's Central Highlands — a 90-minute drive east of Melbourne.
The researchers studied 132 forests from around the world to discover the regions that stored the most carbon. Their findings, published in the US-based Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, one of the world's most-cited scientific serials, is a surprise because conventional wisdom says that tropical forests store the most carbon.
So why our forests? The conditions are perfect. These forests occur at a confluence of environmental conditions that lead to high rates of plant growth and, because they are cooler, decay rates are slower. In short they grow fast but decay slowly. And they are very old — at least 350 years, growing dense heavy wood. That's important because the amount of carbon stored is due to volume and density. Also, these trees have not been subjected to logging.
The problem is, these very same forest types are being intensively logged for woodchips, mostly bound for Japan. These trees are not only the best at producing carbon; unfortunately for them, they are also some of the best for producing high-quality paper. To add insult to injury, several of Melbourne's water catchments are among those logged.
ANU science shows that for as long as these forests are logged, their carbon-carrying capacity is reduced by up to 60 per cent, not to mention the emissions from logging and post-logging regeneration burns. If we stopped logging all the forests of south-eastern Australia, and we now have enough wood in plantations to do that, we would avoid emissions equal to 24 per cent of the 2005 Australian net greenhouse gas emissions across all sectors.
Ironically, the plantation-based timber industry is under great economic stress, with several major wood plantation growers in receivership. This is the right time for Premier John Brumby to develop an integrated industry rescue and climate package, which creates green jobs in the plantation sector and focuses management of our native forests on emissions reduction.
Another reason why these forests are so carbon dense is because they evolved with fire.
Yes, the Black Saturday fires did pass through some of these forests, but most of the carbon remains in the forest. This is because it is in big old trees and dead trunks, and in the soil. Therefore, the proportion of total carbon lost in the fire is surprisingly small compared with logging. Also, many trees survive fire in less intensely burnt patches, facilitating regeneration. But logging these forests makes them more vulnerable to fire because it fragments and dries out the landscape, replacing fire-resistant tall forests and a wet rainforest understorey with young eucalypts and a much drier understorey.
This research (combined with research released by ANU last year) demonstrates how important it is for the Federal Government to assess how much carbon could be stored in Australia's native forests, how much greenhouse gas could be prevented from entering the atmosphere if we protect them from logging, and what their long-term ability to keep on pulling carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere actually is.
It also suggests that there is a serious new option to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions.
The Federal Government has made provision for complementary measures to be developed to supplement the carbon pollution reduction scheme. Clearly there is scope to develop a package to reduce emissions and protect and restore the carbon stored in our native forests. Such a package could prevent millions of tonnes of carbon dioxide being released.
We need to start recognising the value of these forests to climate change mitigation. The Government should provide incentives so that state governments and private land owners are rewarded for protecting and restoring the carbon stocks found in natural forests under their control.
Everyone is concerned with emissions from logging and tree clearing in developing countries, but the Government needs to ensure that the Copenhagen agreement also provides policies that give incentives to protect and restore carbon stocks in developed nations.
We knew these forests should be protected because they are our water catchments and habitat for endangered species such as the Leadbeater's Possum, Victoria's faunal emblem. Now it turns out they are the world's largest carbon banks and their protection should be a critical part of any response to climate change by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Premier John Brumby.
Will the public interest finally take precedence over that of the woodchippers? Surely these forests have put an irrefutable case for their protection.
Gavan McFadzean is the Wilderness Society Victorian campaigns manager.
Source
17 June, 2009
LETTER: Would you credit it?
Ken Browne, Wheelers Hill.
The Age, 17/6/09
IT'S good to know that Victoria's mountain ash forests are the best in the world for storing carbon. Does that mean that, sometime in the future, some industrial polluter will gain carbon credits for not chopping them down?
LETTER: Look at the evidence
Chris Clement, Carlton
The Age, 17/6/09
ISN'T it time evidence-based policy-making finally found its day in the Victorian Government and someone took note of our own scientists ("Mountain ash best for carbon", The Age, 16/6)?
The ANU is telling the world we have the best forests in the world for storing carbon, so why the heck are we chopping them down? Australia has been asking its neighbours to stop logging their "precious" forests"; well, let's get our own backyard in order before we rain down on those over the fence.
Seriously, we must be able to find alternative jobs among the mature plantations across Victoria to support the small groups that continue to log these essential ecosystems.
Everyone is entitled to a job but our drinking water supply, habitat for so many rare native animals and this vital system to reduce the causes of climate change are worth more than their small timber value. John Brumby, bump up your climate policy and get these forests off the loggers' radar.
16 June, 2009
CANBERRA TIMES: Massive carbon sink in Victoria
Rosslyn Beeby, The Canberra Times
16/06/2009
The world's most carbon-dense forests are not in the tropics, but in a protected mountain catchment that supplies Melbourne's drinking water, new research shows.
A five-year study by the Australian National University of more than 130 forest sites around the world found these wet mountain ash forests just over an hour's drive from the Melbourne Cricket Ground store twice the amount of carbon as a tropical rainforest.
The cool, moist temperate forests of the O'Shannassy catchment, which includes the headwaters of the Yarra River, store just under 2000 tonnes of carbon a hectare in their giant 300-year-old mountain ash eucalypts, lush understorey vegetation such as tree ferns, and in dead wood on the forest floor. But as the trees age, the figure rises, with trees more than 250 years old boosting the carbon sink capacity to just over 2800t a hectare.
The unexpected findings, published online today in a National Academy of Sciences journal in the United States, have critical implications for climate policy in the lead-up to the United Nations climate conference to be held in Copenhagen later this year.
The research paper, by ANU ecologists Heather Keith, Professor Brendan Mackey and Professor David Lindenmayer, over-turns conventional theories on the role of forests in carbon accounting.
Professor Mackey said, ''It identifies a gap in climate change policy that Australia needs to address.
''There has been a lot of talk about the need to address tropical deforestation in developing countries, but these results show we must start by recognising the carbon benefits to be gained from protecting our native forests,'' he said."
16/06/2009
The world's most carbon-dense forests are not in the tropics, but in a protected mountain catchment that supplies Melbourne's drinking water, new research shows.
A five-year study by the Australian National University of more than 130 forest sites around the world found these wet mountain ash forests just over an hour's drive from the Melbourne Cricket Ground store twice the amount of carbon as a tropical rainforest.
The cool, moist temperate forests of the O'Shannassy catchment, which includes the headwaters of the Yarra River, store just under 2000 tonnes of carbon a hectare in their giant 300-year-old mountain ash eucalypts, lush understorey vegetation such as tree ferns, and in dead wood on the forest floor. But as the trees age, the figure rises, with trees more than 250 years old boosting the carbon sink capacity to just over 2800t a hectare.
The unexpected findings, published online today in a National Academy of Sciences journal in the United States, have critical implications for climate policy in the lead-up to the United Nations climate conference to be held in Copenhagen later this year.
The research paper, by ANU ecologists Heather Keith, Professor Brendan Mackey and Professor David Lindenmayer, over-turns conventional theories on the role of forests in carbon accounting.
Professor Mackey said, ''It identifies a gap in climate change policy that Australia needs to address.
''There has been a lot of talk about the need to address tropical deforestation in developing countries, but these results show we must start by recognising the carbon benefits to be gained from protecting our native forests,'' he said."
ABC NEWS: Old growth forests store carbon best
Professor Mackey says the Government needs to provide incentives to stop logging. (ABC News: Fiona Breen)
There are renewed calls to stop logging in old growth forests after new research found they could be the most valuable source of carbon in the world.
Scientists at the Australian National University studied 132 forests around the globe and the surprising results show a forest in central Victoria was the most carbon dense of all.
It has been widely believed that rainforests around the world are the most effective at storing carbon.
But now scientists are questioning that belief after research has shown mountain ash forests in central Victoria hold the most carbon.
The study shows the Victorian forests hold 1,900 tonnes of carbon per hectare, which is up to four times higher than what is found in tropical forests.
Brendan Mackey, a professor of environment science at the Australian National University, says it is an important find.
"The trees in these forests can grow to a very old age - at least 350 years - and they can grow very large, very tall, and they grow very dense, heavy wood," he said.
"Most of the biomass carbon is in big, old trees, and these are large, old, dense trees. These particular stands have not been subject to intensive land use, such as logging, so ... they've been able to grow and reach their natural carbon-carrying capacity.
"And finally, it also reflects the way these forests have evolved and adapted in response to fire."
Some other scientists now say this is proof that logging should be stopped in mountain ash forests in Victoria.
Dr James Watson, from the University of Queensland, says this level of carbon is so significant that it could be a real help in fighting climate change.
"We know that logging actually really does impact the amount of carbon in a forest," he said.
"These forests are incredibly carbon dense. We're talking about 18 tonnes of carbon in a hectare of forest, which is extraordinary. When we log this forest, we lose up to two-thirds of the carbon."
Forest management
Around 9,000 hectares of forests are logged in Victoria each year. Dr Watson says given their significant carbon capacity, they should remain untouched.
But the National Association of Forest Industries chief executive, Allan Hansard, says logging is a tool in total forest management.
"One of the things that does come with the changing climate is the increasing risk of bushfires," he said.
"So if we have an approach where we lock up and leave these forests, what we're actually doing is increasing the risk that these forests will burn down.
"Now, this is important from a climate change perspective, because if you actually have a look at the amount of emissions that come from these fires, it's quite substantial."
Professor Mackey says the Federal Government needs to provide incentives to stop logging in these forests.
"Up until now we really haven't thought about the carbon value of these natural forests," he said.
"People have thought about their timber value, other people have thought about their habitat value for wildlife, but no-one has really given much attention to their carbon value."
Heraldsun: Aussie forests are top carbon hoarders
Herald Sun
June 16, 2009 07:08am
Australian forests are the world's best at storing carbon, a key weapon against climate change, researchers say.
All trees absorb carbon dioxide and store it as they grow, but some forests lock up more carbon than others.
The Australian National University scientists measured 132 forests around the planet and found that mountain ash forests in Victoria's central highlands were the most carbon-dense of all.
Carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere is one of the main causes of climate change.
Victoria's forests were so rich in carbon because they lived in a cool climate, which slowed down the decay of the trees, the researchers said.
The trees were very old - up to 350 years of age - which meant they grew heavy, dense wood, and the forests had not been logged.
Researcher Brendan Mackey said it had been thought that tropical forests were the richest in carbon.
"This is a real surprise ... instead its forests in the temperate region that have the most," Prof Mackey said.
The research is published this week in the US-based Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences."
June 16, 2009 07:08am
Australian forests are the world's best at storing carbon, a key weapon against climate change, researchers say.
All trees absorb carbon dioxide and store it as they grow, but some forests lock up more carbon than others.
The Australian National University scientists measured 132 forests around the planet and found that mountain ash forests in Victoria's central highlands were the most carbon-dense of all.
Carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere is one of the main causes of climate change.
Victoria's forests were so rich in carbon because they lived in a cool climate, which slowed down the decay of the trees, the researchers said.
The trees were very old - up to 350 years of age - which meant they grew heavy, dense wood, and the forests had not been logged.
Researcher Brendan Mackey said it had been thought that tropical forests were the richest in carbon.
"This is a real surprise ... instead its forests in the temperate region that have the most," Prof Mackey said.
The research is published this week in the US-based Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences."
26 May, 2009
LETTER: Better use for old trees
Peter Campbell, Surrey Hills
Letter, The Age, 26/5/09
The continuation of old-growth forest logging after the State Government's commitment to protect them is a worrying failure of government.
It is incredible that cow paddocks may be protected when 500-year-old forest giants such as those in Brown Mountain and Delegate forests are still being killed, mainly for woodchips that nobody now wants to buy.
These forests contain many threatened species such as owls, gliders, quolls and even crayfish. They also provide valuable water for our river systems and communities.
These forests can also provide green jobs for local communities into the future through ecotourism that would attract thousands of local and international visitors.
The time has come for the Brumby Government to protect them immediately.
Source
Letter, The Age, 26/5/09
The continuation of old-growth forest logging after the State Government's commitment to protect them is a worrying failure of government.
It is incredible that cow paddocks may be protected when 500-year-old forest giants such as those in Brown Mountain and Delegate forests are still being killed, mainly for woodchips that nobody now wants to buy.
These forests contain many threatened species such as owls, gliders, quolls and even crayfish. They also provide valuable water for our river systems and communities.
These forests can also provide green jobs for local communities into the future through ecotourism that would attract thousands of local and international visitors.
The time has come for the Brumby Government to protect them immediately.
Source
LETTER: A joke that wears thin
Chris Clement, Carlton
Letter, The Age, 26/5/09
IT'S time we sent VicForests and the State Government to the knacker's yard for this lunacy of fobbed-off promises to protect the precious forests of Victoria, and delivering us only a handful of hay. Someone needs to remind VicForests of the definition of "old growth" and how essential these forests are to curbing climate change and supplying Victoria and Australia with drinking and irrigation water.
Its commitment is a joke, its motives extremely questionable and, with antics like this, my trust in my Government is running thin. Premier John Brumby, please prove your leadership and honour your Government's promise to immediately protect the real old-growth forests of Victoria.
Source
Letter, The Age, 26/5/09
IT'S time we sent VicForests and the State Government to the knacker's yard for this lunacy of fobbed-off promises to protect the precious forests of Victoria, and delivering us only a handful of hay. Someone needs to remind VicForests of the definition of "old growth" and how essential these forests are to curbing climate change and supplying Victoria and Australia with drinking and irrigation water.
Its commitment is a joke, its motives extremely questionable and, with antics like this, my trust in my Government is running thin. Premier John Brumby, please prove your leadership and honour your Government's promise to immediately protect the real old-growth forests of Victoria.
Source
LETTER: The wrong questions
John Tucker, Montmorency
Letter, The Age, 26/5/09
So, Lyall Johnson, we need more surveying to ensure that mapping boundaries protects the "greatest amount of old-growth forest available, while also protecting timber jobs". Then why is the Government continuing to allow logging in contentious areas, knowing that the maps upon which it relies, and which VicForests exploits (undue influence or not), are faulty? Given that such "logging" employs approximately six chaps on bulldozers and one bloke with a match for a few weeks, what jobs are actually being protected by prevaricating?
Perhaps it's time for all sides to remember that governing is meant to be done for the benefit of the people — not for the benefit of companies, in the hope that they will pass on some of this benefit to the people in the form of jobs.
We need an end to the false dichotomies of economy versus environment. We need a recognition that people do need to eat, but that they also need to breathe. We need the courage to ask not "how can we best protect jobs/trees/football?" but to ask "what do we need to do to ensure that we leave the world a better place, given what we know?".
If that means restructuring society or providing free retraining and income support for miners, wilderness society workers or anyone else, then bring it on.
Source
Letter, The Age, 26/5/09
So, Lyall Johnson, we need more surveying to ensure that mapping boundaries protects the "greatest amount of old-growth forest available, while also protecting timber jobs". Then why is the Government continuing to allow logging in contentious areas, knowing that the maps upon which it relies, and which VicForests exploits (undue influence or not), are faulty? Given that such "logging" employs approximately six chaps on bulldozers and one bloke with a match for a few weeks, what jobs are actually being protected by prevaricating?
Perhaps it's time for all sides to remember that governing is meant to be done for the benefit of the people — not for the benefit of companies, in the hope that they will pass on some of this benefit to the people in the form of jobs.
We need an end to the false dichotomies of economy versus environment. We need a recognition that people do need to eat, but that they also need to breathe. We need the courage to ask not "how can we best protect jobs/trees/football?" but to ask "what do we need to do to ensure that we leave the world a better place, given what we know?".
If that means restructuring society or providing free retraining and income support for miners, wilderness society workers or anyone else, then bring it on.
Source
LETTER: Put an end to this forestry folly
Rosemary Glaisher, Axedale
Letter, The Age, 26/5/09
Cutting down 500-year-old trees and selling them to Japan as woodchips is a bit like bulldozing superb, intact medieval castles and crushing their stones to make roads. A bit like, but actually much worse, because destroying these ancient forests kills entire ecosystems, driving threatened species closer to extinction.
Yet this is exactly what our State Government is allowing to happen, despite having promised in 2006 to protect our old-growth forests.
Your article ("Declared forests turn out to be paddocks", The Age, 25/5) raises interesting questions about how an iconic wilderness of forest giants like Brown Mountain in East Gippsland can be annihilated while areas of regrowth and "cow paddocks" can be earmarked for protection.
It does not take a hardened cynic to wonder whether these areas are selected more on the basis of their usefulness or otherwise to the timber industry than on their conservation value.
Source
Letter, The Age, 26/5/09
Cutting down 500-year-old trees and selling them to Japan as woodchips is a bit like bulldozing superb, intact medieval castles and crushing their stones to make roads. A bit like, but actually much worse, because destroying these ancient forests kills entire ecosystems, driving threatened species closer to extinction.
Yet this is exactly what our State Government is allowing to happen, despite having promised in 2006 to protect our old-growth forests.
Your article ("Declared forests turn out to be paddocks", The Age, 25/5) raises interesting questions about how an iconic wilderness of forest giants like Brown Mountain in East Gippsland can be annihilated while areas of regrowth and "cow paddocks" can be earmarked for protection.
It does not take a hardened cynic to wonder whether these areas are selected more on the basis of their usefulness or otherwise to the timber industry than on their conservation value.
Source
25 May, 2009
THE AGE: Declared forests turn out to be paddocks
Adam Morton
May 25, 2009
Nearly 40 per cent of old-growth forest earmarked for protection by the State Government since the 2006 election has been found instead to be young regrowth, poor quality vegetation and cleared paddocks.
A survey by green groups found that about 15,000 hectares of Gippsland forest that the Government planned to turn into national park and conservation reserves was of no value to the timber industry and had comparatively little environmental value.
The survey findings come as the Government engages in a protracted haggling exercise with conservationists and state-owned commercial logging agency VicForests over the final location of the protection areas.
A report to be released today claims the Government is "protecting" cleared and previously logged land, while allowing timber harvesting to continue in high-value old-growth forest areas, such as Brown Mountain in far east Gippsland.
This is despite its 2006 election promise to "immediately protect the remaining significant stands of old-growth forest in Victoria".
Victorian National Parks Association executive director Matt Ruchel said the Government's commitment to turn 41,000 hectares into national park and conservation reserves could be an important step, but that the maps it released before the election were based on flawed ecological advice.
The report, designed to pressure the Government to rethink its old-growth protection maps, says 10 of the 25 proposed protection areas in east Gippsland are not old growth forests.
An area cited in the report is at Mt Stewart, which was found to be "grassy dry and shrubby dry forest, including a large weed-infested cleared field, large areas that were prescribed burned in the 1990s and 2007".
Similarly, areas at Breakfast Creek, Boggy Creek and Yellow Waterholes are described as "largely burned areas from the 1980s, cleared land and logging coupe from 2006".
Mr Ruchel said it was unclear if the mapping errors were deliberate or a mistake.
But Wilderness Society forest campaigner Luke Chamberlain accused VicForests and "Government logging bureaucrats" of undermining the election pledge. "Two and a half years on from the election John Brumby must show leadership and honour his Government's commitment."
John Hermans, a forest ecologist who runs his own sawmill at Clifton Creek, said he believed the timber industry recommended forest that was not commercially viable for inclusion in state reserves.
"If more people knew what was happening here in Gippsland there is no way they would get away with it," he said.
The Government promised to protect 33,500 hectares of old growth plus 5000 hectares that link the Snowy River to Errinundra National Park and 2500 hectares of "icon sites" — mainly logged areas that were once battlegrounds between conservationists and the timber industry.
The protection areas are yet to be formalised in legislation, but have been off-limits to loggers since the election.
The State Government did not respond directly to the claims in the green groups' report, which was also backed by the Australian Conservation Foundation.
Instead, a government spokesman said that finalising the park boundaries was still a work in progress.
"This process requires extensive survey and mapping work to ensure that, in line with election promises, the boundaries protect the greatest amount of old-growth forest available, while also protecting timber jobs," spokesman Lyall Johnson said.
VicForests spokesman Cameron McDonald said the agency was just one of several bodies talking to the Government about the old-growth protection maps. "Any suggestion that we exert undue influence is incorrect," he said.
Conflict over the protection areas has been heightened by summer logging at Brown Mountain, which green groups say is home to trees up to 500 years old. One coupe was felled and the remains burned, but further harvesting has been on hold since January, when conservationists claimed they had found threatened glider, owl and crayfish species.
This triggered a State Government investigation, which Mr Johnson said found no evidence of threatened species. But he said the moratorium on harvesting in the remaining Brown Mountain coupes scheduled for logging would continue while the survey results were considered for "further issues"."
May 25, 2009
Nearly 40 per cent of old-growth forest earmarked for protection by the State Government since the 2006 election has been found instead to be young regrowth, poor quality vegetation and cleared paddocks.
A survey by green groups found that about 15,000 hectares of Gippsland forest that the Government planned to turn into national park and conservation reserves was of no value to the timber industry and had comparatively little environmental value.
The survey findings come as the Government engages in a protracted haggling exercise with conservationists and state-owned commercial logging agency VicForests over the final location of the protection areas.
A report to be released today claims the Government is "protecting" cleared and previously logged land, while allowing timber harvesting to continue in high-value old-growth forest areas, such as Brown Mountain in far east Gippsland.
This is despite its 2006 election promise to "immediately protect the remaining significant stands of old-growth forest in Victoria".
Victorian National Parks Association executive director Matt Ruchel said the Government's commitment to turn 41,000 hectares into national park and conservation reserves could be an important step, but that the maps it released before the election were based on flawed ecological advice.
The report, designed to pressure the Government to rethink its old-growth protection maps, says 10 of the 25 proposed protection areas in east Gippsland are not old growth forests.
An area cited in the report is at Mt Stewart, which was found to be "grassy dry and shrubby dry forest, including a large weed-infested cleared field, large areas that were prescribed burned in the 1990s and 2007".
Similarly, areas at Breakfast Creek, Boggy Creek and Yellow Waterholes are described as "largely burned areas from the 1980s, cleared land and logging coupe from 2006".
Mr Ruchel said it was unclear if the mapping errors were deliberate or a mistake.
But Wilderness Society forest campaigner Luke Chamberlain accused VicForests and "Government logging bureaucrats" of undermining the election pledge. "Two and a half years on from the election John Brumby must show leadership and honour his Government's commitment."
John Hermans, a forest ecologist who runs his own sawmill at Clifton Creek, said he believed the timber industry recommended forest that was not commercially viable for inclusion in state reserves.
"If more people knew what was happening here in Gippsland there is no way they would get away with it," he said.
The Government promised to protect 33,500 hectares of old growth plus 5000 hectares that link the Snowy River to Errinundra National Park and 2500 hectares of "icon sites" — mainly logged areas that were once battlegrounds between conservationists and the timber industry.
The protection areas are yet to be formalised in legislation, but have been off-limits to loggers since the election.
The State Government did not respond directly to the claims in the green groups' report, which was also backed by the Australian Conservation Foundation.
Instead, a government spokesman said that finalising the park boundaries was still a work in progress.
"This process requires extensive survey and mapping work to ensure that, in line with election promises, the boundaries protect the greatest amount of old-growth forest available, while also protecting timber jobs," spokesman Lyall Johnson said.
VicForests spokesman Cameron McDonald said the agency was just one of several bodies talking to the Government about the old-growth protection maps. "Any suggestion that we exert undue influence is incorrect," he said.
Conflict over the protection areas has been heightened by summer logging at Brown Mountain, which green groups say is home to trees up to 500 years old. One coupe was felled and the remains burned, but further harvesting has been on hold since January, when conservationists claimed they had found threatened glider, owl and crayfish species.
This triggered a State Government investigation, which Mr Johnson said found no evidence of threatened species. But he said the moratorium on harvesting in the remaining Brown Mountain coupes scheduled for logging would continue while the survey results were considered for "further issues"."
22 April, 2009
Politics of forestry
Peter Boyer
The Mercury (article), April 21, 2009 12:45pm
After mature forest has been clearfelled, net carbon loss from the operation is large.
Every now and then, a sharply focused image of a gum seedling or a finely crafted piece of furniture appears on my television screen, a reminder of how good it is to live in this place, at this time.
No one pays good advertising money just to show us nice images of life in Australia. In this case, the message is how lucky we are to have a timber industry, because when it comes to greenhouse emissions, wood is so much better than other materials, such as steel or aluminium.
That message was underscored on local TV news recently when Forestry Tasmania corporate relations manager Ken Jeffries, responding to complaints about smoke haze from forest operations, pointed to the industry's re-seeding program as evidence of its climate-friendly status.
It is true, as the forest industry says, that steel and aluminium are anything but climate-friendly products. A steel furnace consumes copious amounts of coal, and aluminium smelting uses so much electricity (usually coal-fired) it has sometimes been called "congealed electricity". And it is true that the 1997 Kyoto accord allowed special dispensation for forestry as practised here.
But it is disingenuous to claim that today's forest industry presents a sharp contrast to these alternative products; to suggest that because trees absorb carbon dioxide, the industry actually reduces our carbon footprint. That may accord with diplomatic definitions, but we have to get real here.
Human carbon pollution is a physical phenomenon, independent of any political or commercial agenda, and Tasmanian forestry emissions must never be quarantined from a comprehensive carbon accounting process.
I would happily accept the assurances of Mr Jeffries or anyone in the industry, if I could find the scientific evidence behind them, but try as I might, I can't.
I was well into my climate change work when I entered the debate about forest and climate in this column about a year ago.
I drew attention then to what forest science seemed to be telling us about how forests store carbon and what happens to this carbon when the forest is harvested.
I have consulted a wide range of forest science research work, including work done by Forestry Tasmania itself about a decade ago. The science has consistently said that under today's "slash and burn" clearfelling regimes, harvesting native forest in Australia is an emissions-intensive activity.
It says that each hectare of Australian native forest stores hundreds of tonnes of carbon and no matter how vigorous the regrowth after mature forest has been clearfelled, net carbon loss from the operation is so large that recovery would take many times the length of any subsequent
harvesting cycle. Full recovery could take centuries.
SCIENTIFIC studies of forest carbon in Australia and North America have consistently indicated that, of the carbon removed from a forest as a result of clearfell operations (either taken away in logs or lost to the atmosphere in burning or decay), only a tiny proportion is preserved long-term (over 75 years) in a product such as furniture or housing.
Statistics from the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics tell us that in 2008 only 13.4 per cent of harvested "roundwood" (itself only part of the forest carbon that is removed during harvesting) ended up as sawn timber, of which only part is retained in long-term product.
My reading of the science and the ABARE statistics indicates that for every tonne of forest carbon that is saved in long-term product, there is a loss of more than 40 tonnes to the atmosphere as carbon dioxide.
At this rate, Australian forestry as it is practised today is anything, but a greenhouse-friendly activity.
Yet, despite all the contrary scientific evidence -- including evidence from within Tasmanian forestry circles -- the industry continues to cite Australian government figures based on the Kyoto agreement to "prove" that it is carbon-neutral, leading the way to a greener future.
If the forestry industry sincerely believed this, wouldn't it secure solid evidence by means of rigorous, peer-reviewed science?
Surely it would put aside the politically convenient, but illogical, accounting framework of the Kyoto accord and seek a more rational, transparent method of determining our real forestry footprint.
It won't serve anyone if we continue this politically-driven charade. We urgently need to review our greenhouse gas accounting in the AFOLU sector (diplomatic-speak for agriculture, forestry and land use), incorporating existing carbon storage as well as annual flows.
When our forest carbon accounting is based on science and physical reality instead of politics, we can confidently include forestry in a comprehensive national or international carbon regime.
Then, and only then, will we know the real cost of a piece of timber.
Peter Boyer is a Hobart-based science writer and a presenter for Al Gore's Climate Project.
pb@climatetasmania.com.au
Source: The Mercury
See also
The Mercury (article), April 21, 2009 12:45pm
After mature forest has been clearfelled, net carbon loss from the operation is large.
Every now and then, a sharply focused image of a gum seedling or a finely crafted piece of furniture appears on my television screen, a reminder of how good it is to live in this place, at this time.
No one pays good advertising money just to show us nice images of life in Australia. In this case, the message is how lucky we are to have a timber industry, because when it comes to greenhouse emissions, wood is so much better than other materials, such as steel or aluminium.
That message was underscored on local TV news recently when Forestry Tasmania corporate relations manager Ken Jeffries, responding to complaints about smoke haze from forest operations, pointed to the industry's re-seeding program as evidence of its climate-friendly status.
It is true, as the forest industry says, that steel and aluminium are anything but climate-friendly products. A steel furnace consumes copious amounts of coal, and aluminium smelting uses so much electricity (usually coal-fired) it has sometimes been called "congealed electricity". And it is true that the 1997 Kyoto accord allowed special dispensation for forestry as practised here.
But it is disingenuous to claim that today's forest industry presents a sharp contrast to these alternative products; to suggest that because trees absorb carbon dioxide, the industry actually reduces our carbon footprint. That may accord with diplomatic definitions, but we have to get real here.
Human carbon pollution is a physical phenomenon, independent of any political or commercial agenda, and Tasmanian forestry emissions must never be quarantined from a comprehensive carbon accounting process.
I would happily accept the assurances of Mr Jeffries or anyone in the industry, if I could find the scientific evidence behind them, but try as I might, I can't.
I was well into my climate change work when I entered the debate about forest and climate in this column about a year ago.
I drew attention then to what forest science seemed to be telling us about how forests store carbon and what happens to this carbon when the forest is harvested.
I have consulted a wide range of forest science research work, including work done by Forestry Tasmania itself about a decade ago. The science has consistently said that under today's "slash and burn" clearfelling regimes, harvesting native forest in Australia is an emissions-intensive activity.
It says that each hectare of Australian native forest stores hundreds of tonnes of carbon and no matter how vigorous the regrowth after mature forest has been clearfelled, net carbon loss from the operation is so large that recovery would take many times the length of any subsequent
harvesting cycle. Full recovery could take centuries.
SCIENTIFIC studies of forest carbon in Australia and North America have consistently indicated that, of the carbon removed from a forest as a result of clearfell operations (either taken away in logs or lost to the atmosphere in burning or decay), only a tiny proportion is preserved long-term (over 75 years) in a product such as furniture or housing.
Statistics from the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics tell us that in 2008 only 13.4 per cent of harvested "roundwood" (itself only part of the forest carbon that is removed during harvesting) ended up as sawn timber, of which only part is retained in long-term product.
My reading of the science and the ABARE statistics indicates that for every tonne of forest carbon that is saved in long-term product, there is a loss of more than 40 tonnes to the atmosphere as carbon dioxide.
At this rate, Australian forestry as it is practised today is anything, but a greenhouse-friendly activity.
Yet, despite all the contrary scientific evidence -- including evidence from within Tasmanian forestry circles -- the industry continues to cite Australian government figures based on the Kyoto agreement to "prove" that it is carbon-neutral, leading the way to a greener future.
If the forestry industry sincerely believed this, wouldn't it secure solid evidence by means of rigorous, peer-reviewed science?
Surely it would put aside the politically convenient, but illogical, accounting framework of the Kyoto accord and seek a more rational, transparent method of determining our real forestry footprint.
It won't serve anyone if we continue this politically-driven charade. We urgently need to review our greenhouse gas accounting in the AFOLU sector (diplomatic-speak for agriculture, forestry and land use), incorporating existing carbon storage as well as annual flows.
When our forest carbon accounting is based on science and physical reality instead of politics, we can confidently include forestry in a comprehensive national or international carbon regime.
Then, and only then, will we know the real cost of a piece of timber.
Peter Boyer is a Hobart-based science writer and a presenter for Al Gore's Climate Project.
pb@climatetasmania.com.au
Source: The Mercury
See also
- Green carbon, Greenlivingpedia
17 April, 2009
LETTER: We cannot drink woodchips
Sarah Rees, MyEnvironment Inc, Healesville
Letter to the editor, The Age, 17/4/09
THE Thomson dam drops lower (The Age, 15/4), catchments have been burnt and still the logging machinery rolls into Victoria's last remaining healthy water catchment to woodchip them for as little as $8.50 a tonne. Roads for logging machinery are being cut into Cement Creek Catchment, one of the Yarra tributaries and part of Melbourne's water supply.
In the Thomson catchment, about 70 per cent of the area of highest rainfall is being logged, and the dam has reached epic lows: could there be a link? In 2004 the Government commissioned a four-year investigation and found that the best option for improving catchment water yields was to end all logging by 2009. But this option was omitted from the range of choices presented to the Government because it compromised woodchip arrangements with the now Japanese-owned paper giant Australian Paper.
What will it take to end such barbaric management of our water resources? Perhaps only when the last load of logs enters the pulp mill. Then we will know we cannot drink woodchips.
Source: theage.com.au
Letter to the editor, The Age, 17/4/09
THE Thomson dam drops lower (The Age, 15/4), catchments have been burnt and still the logging machinery rolls into Victoria's last remaining healthy water catchment to woodchip them for as little as $8.50 a tonne. Roads for logging machinery are being cut into Cement Creek Catchment, one of the Yarra tributaries and part of Melbourne's water supply.
In the Thomson catchment, about 70 per cent of the area of highest rainfall is being logged, and the dam has reached epic lows: could there be a link? In 2004 the Government commissioned a four-year investigation and found that the best option for improving catchment water yields was to end all logging by 2009. But this option was omitted from the range of choices presented to the Government because it compromised woodchip arrangements with the now Japanese-owned paper giant Australian Paper.
What will it take to end such barbaric management of our water resources? Perhaps only when the last load of logs enters the pulp mill. Then we will know we cannot drink woodchips.
Source: theage.com.au
13 April, 2009
LETTER: Unwarranted fears
Mark Poynter, Institute of Foresters of Australia, Doncaster East
Letter to the editor, The Age, 13//4/09
Letter to the editor, The Age, 13//4/09
PREDICTABLY, the Victorian Government's consideration of wood-based bioenergy production (The Age, 9/4) generated howls of protest based on inaccurate or ill-informed claims (Letters, 10-11/4).
Fears of "massive deforestation" and "ecological wastelands" are baseless given that regenerating harvested areas is a central tenet of forest management. Less than 10 per cent of Victoria's forests are legally available for timber harvesting. Salvaging of burnt timber is also restricted to these areas.
Aside from periodically available fire salvage material, the vast majority of waste wood that could be used for domestic bio-energy production is material that would otherwise be exported to offshore paper manufacturers.
Around the world, sustainable timber supplies are widely used as a source of carbon-neutral "green" power. Ironically, in Australia, the most passionate advocates of combating climate change tend to be the most strident opponents of one of the more achievable forms of renewable energy.
12 April, 2009
LETTER: Beyond belief
Jill Redwood, Orbost
Letter to the editor, The Age, 12 April 2009
Letter to the editor, The Age, 12 April 2009
Recently, the radio carbon dating of a 10-metre diameter, freshly cut tree stump in East Gippsland showed it to be almost 600 years old.
Last week's story of the Brumby Government selling off these ancient forests for as little as $2.50 a tonne compounds the crime into enormous proportions.
In 2009, we are still watching while the Government destroys ancient forests that were young in the days of Joan of Ark. These are immense carbon stores that we need right now, not in another 600 years. Economically and environmentally, this is an appalling act. So much for the claim of sustainability.
The rain follows the trees Mr Brumby, as sure as public revolt follows the clearfelling of our public forests.
10 April, 2009
Homes for critters
Dr Anna Boin, Castlemaine
The Age (letter), April 10, 2009
"LOWER-quality" logs: they are the ones with the notches and holes, the ones that wildlife call "high-quality" housing. The bushfires have already left lots of critters homeless. And now we are going to burn their last few homes for electricity? Fire is naturally occurring, logging is not. Native forests are not a renewable resource if we interfere by salvaging what's left. They are ecosystems that can take hundreds of years to regenerate. There is nothing clean, green or smart about burning them.
The Age (letter), April 10, 2009
"LOWER-quality" logs: they are the ones with the notches and holes, the ones that wildlife call "high-quality" housing. The bushfires have already left lots of critters homeless. And now we are going to burn their last few homes for electricity? Fire is naturally occurring, logging is not. Native forests are not a renewable resource if we interfere by salvaging what's left. They are ecosystems that can take hundreds of years to regenerate. There is nothing clean, green or smart about burning them.
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