On Mon, 15 Oct 2007 08:00:56 -0400 "Anthony Nekut" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
forest biomass for local space heating, with possible > future > expansion into distributed, small scale CHP for electricity and > heating. It is important to prioritize renewable energy use: electricity for lighting is of no use once we are frozen . So heat comes first, then maybe electricity with what's left of sustainable forest biomass products below timber grade. > New > opportunities for landowners can be made available by developing an > expanded market for low-grade wood in the form of biomass. > Continuous, > sustainable production of low-grade wood along with high-grade > sawtimber > could reverse this downward forest quality trend. Living out here where every hilltop is forested and managing my own woodlot for many years, I am well aware of the generally unsustainable management of private woodland. If your effort could result in policies that reverse that situation as well as provide a little local energy, it is surely worthy of support. The thing to beware of in working with government in our country is its predilection for market-driven solutions, whose track record is so horrendously short-sighted at best and greed-driven at worst that it is what created the sustainability fix we are in the first place. Fox guarding the hen house again. If there are market incentives, they need to be balanced by rules that actually lead to sustainable woodland management instead of a free for all of deforestation. Of course state-level rules created by ignorant time-serving bureaucracies sometimes just make the situation worse. If the state has to be involved (because it usually holds the bigger purse - a la NYSERDA), it should be in partnership with localities. This has worked so well in Switzerland's cantonal power structure that, along with Cuba, it has the some of the best rural land management in the world. The partnership should start with the effort to create the policy framework itself - NYSERDA in this case - an agency which I think is badly flawed because it was a purely top down creation. Then the pilot grant itself should be a collegial effort that seeks as much local involvement as possible in the grant proposal writing itself. So the success of this, or any effort to fix things, I argue, is going to depend heavily in the last analysis on the creation of democratic processes governing the use of resources (economic democracy) that do not now exist. Apart from the obvious question of fairness in power sharing, these processes create checks on backward bureaucrats and learning opportunities at a local level that are necessary for the success of any such project. In academia, what I am talking about goes under the pretentious name, Participatory Action Research (PAR). The strange thing about this movement is that the proponents of its excellent but subversive methods tend to apply them in faraway places like Borneo, and rarely risk attempting projects here at home where the need for them is just as great. > BTW - for local trips I drive an all-electric car and charge the > batteries with 100% green electrons. It has only 25 hp so the > performance is low compared to most cars and its range is under 50 > miles/charge. Maybe you would share with us your life cycle energy accounting of the effects of building such a machine for everyone, and maintaining the roads, as compared to, say, trolley rails, or horse and surrey (with a fringe on top). I hate to sound like a broken record on this score, but it is exasperating to encounter an often unconscious, knee-jerk market fundamentalism at every turn, masquerading as "green growth". Karl _______________________________________________ RSS, archives, subscription & listserv information for: [email protected] http://lists.mutualaid.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainabletompkins free hosting by http://www.mutualaid.org
