Wood for energy The pros and cons of biomass plants

Humane Humanity wrote:

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In 2003 there were an estimated 1.17 motor vehicles per licensed driver, meaning that there were more vehicles than drivers in the US, with vehicles outnumbering drivers 1.2 to one.
By 2006 the US had 500 million passenger vehicles with 203 million licensed drivers.
Global Warming has been identified as the top environmental issues facing our world.
The US emits nearly half the worlds automotive CO2 emmissions.
Motor vehicles are responsible for almost a quarter of annual US emmissions of CO2.
Roughly half of US CO2 emmissions come from fossil fuel power plants.
If electric cars are to be part of the solution, we must increase reliance on low CO2 emitting base load power sources.
Extracting and utilizing US geological uranium reservers remains the lesser impact on our environment as compared to extracting and utilizing US geological coal reserves.

I just think we need to regulate the language with what we use over global warming and how we produce and use energy. All the producers, distributor and users of energy should have their language regulated. If you are out to influence public perceptions, including politicians, then there are standards that must be met with how you talk to the public a large.

We should regulate the minimum standards of transparency...the intention would be you would have to the tell the whole story including the advantages and disadvantages. We shouldn’t regulate opacity, that there is a minimal level of discloser and you are allowed to hide under regulations.

It should be like our adversarial legal system, with legal and energy experts and scientist as judges...the scientific method ...where language abuse illegality is severely punished and we have the tools to coerce full discloser and truth telling... you we be fined or go to jail if you are not truthful.

If a company continues with a pattern of language abuse...then they should be heavily fined.

They should be regulated like our financial system...this is the mandated level of transparency you need if you selling or influencing public opinion associated with energy. With energy and the altruistic abuse of global warming, it is the wild west of the 1920’s leading to a depression.

Humane Humanity wrote:

Hey Rick, take a chemistry course! CO2 is CO2 is CO2.

My point is that we should be focused on reducing the carbon emissions that we have some ability to influence. Carbon cycles between plants and the atmosphere whether we like it or not. We should tap into the energy that is released through this process (burning or decay)and focus our efforts on reducing carbon released through burning fossil fuel that has been sequestered for millions of years.

So pull your head out of your chemistry book and pick up one on biology. Or better yet, take a break from your computer and go outside and look around. You'd be amazed at what you can learn from the great outdoors.

Mike, if you would like a suggestion on helping to in feed the poor, dare I suggest that we increase clean cheap energy in order to lower the costs of producing food and bringing it to market. Lowering energy costs would also free up household income so that more could be spent of food. Bringing the middle class an business down by driving up energy costs only serves to create more poor people who ultimatly will become dependant on the state for help.

Mike you make a fine argument in your post (42). But how are we to regulate the language / terminology of production, consumption and environmental impact when we have failed so miserably in estaglishing English as our national language?

Rick wrote:

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My point is that we should be focused on reducing the carbon emissions that we have some ability to influence. Carbon cycles between plants and the atmosphere whether we like it or not. We should tap into the energy that is released through this process (burning or decay)and focus our efforts on reducing carbon released through burning fossil fuel that has been sequestered for millions of years.
So pull your head out of your chemistry book and pick up one on biology. Or better yet, take a break from your computer and go outside and look around. You'd be amazed at what you can learn from the great outdoors.

Yes my friend, and perhaps you should pull out your reading glasses and read all of my posts :)

Humane Humanity wrote:

Mike you make a fine argument in your post (42). But how are we to regulate the language / terminology of production, consumption and environmental impact when we have failed so miserably in estaglishing English as our national language?

The standard language of the world is English...as example the standard language in commercial airlines anywhere in the world is English...air traffic control is in English.

Humane Humanity wrote:

Mike, if you would like a suggestion on helping to in feed the poor, dare I suggest that we increase clean cheap energy in order to lower the costs of producing food and bringing it to market. Lowering energy costs would also free up household income so that more could be spent of food. Bringing the middle class an business down by driving up energy costs only serves to create more poor people who ultimatly will become dependant on the state for help.

If the bottom half had twice the income...then we could support every global warming and all the energy initiative...fundamentally this a income problem for the bottom half.

If we just keep driving down the cost of the products we buy...driving down our incomes and dignity...then we are going to lose our country.

mike mulligan wrote:

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The standard language of the world is English...as example the standard language in commercial airlines anywhere in the world is English...air traffic control is in English.

Talk to a teacher in any inner city school Mike

Mike Mulligan wrote:

So where is anyone talking about human dignity...what is a fair income and benefits for a person in the who is working on producing and distributing woods chips.
OH, I understand what is going on, everyone feels threatened when you talk about income, they think their bosses would think they are angling for a higher pay.
Asking or pushing for income today is equivalent to the 1950’s red scare and Joe McCarty...the communist are a higher class of people than anyone saying the bottom line problem of our county is the bottom 60% of population has a severely inadequate income. I saw an idea once in the New Hampshire forum for heating water with compost, have you ever heard of this?

Renewable energy is good.

mike mulligan wrote:

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If the bottom half had twice the income...then we could support every global warming and all the energy initiative...fundamentally this a income problem for the bottom half.
If we just keep driving down the cost of the products we buy...driving down our incomes and dignity...then we are going to lose our country.

Bull, If you take away the wealth of the wealthy, all you have left are: those were and are poor, a dwindling middle class facing job loss, and those who were wealthy and are now poor.
Of course once we bleed the wealth out of this country we could demand that Luxembourg or Qatar hand over their assets to our poor.Ah, but we weren't talking about Luxembourg now were we, so perhaps we could single out and put the good old American squeeze on Qatar and the other 12 OPEC countries? I mean with such wealthy gracious countries like Iran, Iraq, and Venezuela among OPEC's finest,certainly they will invest in feeding American poor?

Composting creates heat. once you add a bit of nitrogen to your organic waste, the waste will heat up as it breaks down. So I geuss the simple answer is yes, you can produce energy with compost. The question is, how much? I also know of a program to convert algea to energy. I think that this is even better offering because compost is a valuable & natural soil amendment. I don't believe in putting down comercial synthetic fertilizers on my lawn or gardens. So compost has a better purpose in my book.

New day wrote:

Wow, the poetry of the comments here. How can I measure up to this standard?
Yes, burning trees isn't carbon neutral unless the forests are also continuing to grow. So you need to calculate the sustainable harvest. If you achieve a steady-state harvest, taking only as much as will be replaced by growth that year, it's carbon neutral. New England forests are currently growing far faster than they're being harvested.
It isn't a question of how long it takes to grow an individual tree - as the gentleman from Mass. is suggesting. It's how long it takes the total forest to add as much new carbon mass as was in the tree removed. That takes months, not even years, if the harvest is right-sized.
Which means there's plenty of wood for Brattleboro. Electrical generation, however, is far better done with wind, solar, hydro and nuclear.
And remember, if you're not in favor of more generation for next year's electric cars, you're assuring we'll be in more wars for oil.

I have heard of new hydro techniques such as siphons that receive water from rivers renewably that can be used to make energy, also water can be heated with compost.

Truthman wrote:

<quoted text> Renewable energy is good.

More income is good also.

i love biomass, my favorite type of biomass is chicken poo
battleboro reformer changed my life and i wwill never forget it
i love you biomass!!!!!!!!!!