More than 550 scientists have signed a letter to the European Commission warning of the deteriorating state of Europe's forests and calling for climate-smart forestry – including timber harvesting for bioenergy – to strengthen their resilience to global warming .
Forests play a vital role in our environment because they store carbon and have the capacity to mitigate climate change while increasing biodiversity. However, changing climate conditions are putting more and more forests at risk, which can only be reduced with good management and use of biomass products to ensure a sustainable bioeconomy and renewable energy production.
“The warm and dry weather in many parts of Europe and the world makes us concerned about the future of our forests,” says the letter, addressed to the presidents of the three main EU institutions – the European Commission, the European Council and the European parliament.
The letter calls for “climate-smart forest management” to strengthen the resilience of Europe's forests and their ability to produce wood and grow carbon at the same time.
“If dry years become more common, we expect forest biomass to decline rather than increase over the next decade, regardless of management and protection,” they warn.
Environmental groups say an easy win is to limit the amount of woody biomass used for energy production, advice that the European Parliament has broadly adopted.
In September, lawmakers voted in favor of plans to end subsidies for biomass burned in power stations and exclude most primary wood burning from EU renewable energy targets.
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Bioenergy has been criticized by environmental groups who say burning wood fuels deforestation, destroys natural habitats and undermines forests that act as carbon sinks in the fight against climate change.
But the letter from the more than 550 scientists disputes those claims, saying that continued forest maintenance — not blanket protection — is critical to ensuring forests continue to provide so-called ecosystem services.
“Wood from sustainably managed forests is carbon neutral in terms of ecosystem processes,” the letter states, saying that selected harvesting removes competition between individual trees and allows forests to recover more quickly from losses caused by natural disasters.
“Without harvests, forest volumes will become saturated. The carbon sink will approach zero, as is visible in the old growth areas in Ukraine's pristine forests,” the scientists write.
From that perspective, the economic exploitation of wood-based wood products should be seen as an inherent part of sustainable forestry practices, including the burning of biomass for electricity generation, they argue.
“Under good forest management, the use of wood for energy is a by-product of harvesting and processing wood for products,” the scientists write, saying that sufficient quantities of by-products such as tree canopies, residues and recycled wood are available to sustain the supply of renewable energy to secure.
“Banning the use of wood for energy from sustainably managed forests and increasing the share of EU forests under protection is not appropriate to support European climate protection policies, has no further benefits for biodiversity and hinders the circular bioeconomy” , the letter says.
Download the letter here:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/fozb4k2hnc3pj2z/Scientist_Letter_climate_smart_forest_management.pdf?dl=0
Source: euractiv.com
