FT calls for recognition of wood products in carbon trading

Forestry Tasmania today called for wood products to be explicitly recognised in emissions trading networks during its appearance before a Senate Select Committee hearing in Hobart.

Executive General Manager Dr Hans Drielsma said the contribution that managed forests make towards increased carbon storage and reduced carbon emissions is well recognised by scientists around the world.

“The carbon benefits that forests provide are created by three factors: the storage of carbon in forests, the storage of carbon in wood products, and the emissions that are avoided by substituting wood for more energy-intensive products, such as aluminium, concrete or fossil fuel.

“The Australia’s State of the Forests Report 2008 tells us that Australia’s working forests currently offset some 10% of the nation’s carbon emissions.

“However, the important role that forest products play in mitigating climate change is currently not reflected in international protocols.”

Dr Drielsma said Forestry Tasmania had adopted a pro-active carbon management policy, and had conducted modelling that indicated a 17% increase in carbon stores on state forest over the next 50 years.

“We recognise that forest management and harvesting creates carbon emissions, as do all other human activities and industries.

“However, unlike other industry sectors, forestry’s production processes include the maintenance and regeneration of large areas of forest. When managed on a long-term sustainable basis, as is the case in Tasmania, these areas continuously capture carbon to balance that emitted in harvesting.”

Dr Drielsma outlined three areas in which Forestry Tasmania was working to reduce carbon emissions and improve the carbon contribution of Tasmania’s state forests.

“The first of these is the use of forest residues for biomass energy, which offset emissions from energy generated from fossil fuels.

“Forestry Tasmania has development approval to construct a biomass energy plant at the investment-ready Huon Wood Centre. However, it is important that the Mandatory Renewable Energy Target (MRET) scheme is based on science to ensure that we can successfully attract a suitable investor.

“The second area is the development of plantations on cleared land. Forestry Tasmania will partner with private landowners to establish plantations on farmland currently affected by noxious weeds, such as gorse, with a sharing of the profits at harvest.

“This program promises to improve store carbon and diversify farm income streams, while not conflicting with other areas of agricultural productivity.

“The third area in which we have been working pro-actively is the development of downstream processing opportunities in Tasmania, which deliver higher value, longer-life wood products while creating new jobs in regional areas.

“In recent years we have successfully developed the Huon and Circular Head Wood Centres, which have seen the establishment of two new rotary veneer mills.

“These mills have ensured that 300,000 tonnes of wood has been diverted from the export woodchip market into the manufacture of plywood for flooring, which has significantly increased the carbon storage in these products.”


ENDS

23 April 2009



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