Category: Blog entry
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Vermont: The Little State that Could?
- by Rachel Smolker, Biofuelwatch nosagbigsign I am fortunate to live in the tiny state of Vermont, a state that has boldly led the way on so many issues it’s hard to list them all. We were the first to pass same-sex marriage and to take serious steps to make health care accessible to all.…
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Are Dirty Energy Opponents NIMBY? Proving Industry Wrong
It’s typical for energy developers facing community resistance to proposed facilities to try to discredit opponents by calling them NIMBY (Not in My Backyard), steering the argument away from health and environmental impacts to simply one of aesthetics. Corporate profiteers argue that local opposition doesn’t have a problem with a given energy technology itself — so long…
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EPA Proposal Classifies Wood Fuel from Construction, Demolition
[Biomass industry pushing for even less regulation of their dirtiest fuel source. ‑Ed.] - by Erin Voegele, March 27, 2014. Source: Biomass Magazine Biomass industry On March 27, the U.S. EPA released a proposed rule to amend its Non-Hazardous Secondary Materials regulation under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act. The NHSM rule was finalized in February…
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Nippon Temporarily Shut Down Because of Biomass Fuel Problems at Power Plant
- by Paul Gottlieb, February 27, 2014. Source: Peninsula Daily News PORT ANGELES — Fuel-system problems with Nippon Paper Industries USA’s newly expanded biomass cogeneration plant have caused a two-week shutdown of the mill, according to a union official. Darrel Reetz, vice president of the Association of Western Pulp & Paper Workers Local 155, said Thursday he…
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Whole Trees 90% of Rothschild, WI Biomass Incinerator Fuel
- by Kevin Murphy, February 26, 2014. Source: Wasau Daily Herald wausaudailyherald The recently built power plant at Domtar paper mill is getting only 10 percent of its fuel from logging waste, which originally was supposed to supply nearly all of the plant’s energy needs. The 50-megawatt, $255 million power plant went online in November to provide steam for Domtar’s paper…
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DTE Energy: Black Soot Irks Residents of Cassville, Wisconsin
- by Jeff Montgomery, March 22, 2014. Source: THOnline.com bloximagesnewyork CASSVILLE, Wis. — Linda Hulst said she began noticing the soot shortly after a nearby biomass plant started operations. For three years, the black, charcoal-like matter has sprinkled her property. “Every fresh snow is covered with it,” she said. “It gets on our deck, on our furniture, on the…
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Some Biofuel Feedstock Estimates ‘Overstating’ Yields
- March 4, 2014. Source: Environmental Leader Estimates for potential biofuel feedstock crop yields from some widely cited research studies may overstate those yields by as much as 100 percent, according to research by the International Council on Clean Transportation. One key factor in developing a sustainable biofuels policy is to realistically estimate the amount of biomass that can…
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Group Descries Logging in Northampton, MA Watershed
- by Rebecca Everett, March 17, 2014. Source: Daily Hampshire Gazette Chris Matera of Northampton said he was driving through Whately to go skiing two weeks ago when he noticed piles of fresh-cut logs at the mouth of a trail into a forest. “I said, ‘Wait, isn’t that the watershed?,’” he recalled recently. Matera, who heads…
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Biomass Industry Needs to Prepare for Water Constraints
- by Phil Ciciora, March 5, 2014. Source: University of Illinois News Office Debates surrounding the sustainability of bioenergy have emerged in recent years relating to water quality and quantity, and those debates will only grow louder as big urban areas in the U.S. start running out of water and environmental groups and the Environmental Protection…