Daily Archives: November 8, 2018

Today’s Takeaway

Midterm election results suggest US muscular approach to trade will continue

November 8, 2018
Category: Today's Takeaway

Although trade wasn’t a wedge issue in the US midterm elections, Barrie McKenna says Trump will view the results as a licence to continue his muscular approach, particularly [says CBC] if the Democrats  focus on domestic issues. Elsewhere; KPMG says its too early to estimate the impact on Canada; Washington State rejects ballot question on carbon tax; and green building expert Jerry Judelson sees little change on the climate front.

In other Business news: Export Development Canada predicts China will surpass US as BC’s top timber market; Russia threatens China over illegal logging; labour negotiations in BC are headed for mediation; Western Forest Products reports strong Q3 results; and 84 Lumber moves up on Forbes’ list of private companies.

Finally, a new NASA laser set to launch to the International Space Station will create the world’s first 3D forest carbon map.

–Kelly McCloskey, Tree Frog Editor

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Froggy Foibles

Appetite for the bizarre: more trees ‘swallowing’ strange objects

By Tim the Yowie Man
The Sydney Mornng Herald
November 6, 2018
Category: Froggy Foibles
Region: International

This column’s recent feature on the poplar tree in Commonwealth Park that over a period of 35 years ‘ate’ a garden rake has prompted readers to submit similar accounts of trees partially devouring objects. “Your article reminded me of a friend’s house in Petersham in Sydney, where, out the back, embedded into a massive camphor laurel tree was a concrete clay tennis court roller,” writes Brenda Croft. According to Croft, “whoever had last used the roller had left it leaning against the tree, and decades later much of it had disappeared inside the body of the trunk.” Other readers have uncovered photographic evidence of trees in various states of devouring objects. Here are my top 5.

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Business & Politics

As Trump and a Democratic House face off, the USMCA may be caught in the middle

By Barrie McKenna
The Globe and Mail
November 7, 2018
Category: Business & Politics
Region: Canada, United States

Barrie McKenna

Trade was not a wedge issue in the U.S. midterm elections, but it’s about to become a flashpoint in the new Congress as President Donald Trump squares off against the Democrat-controlled House of Representatives. And that is likely to make ratification of the recently negotiated United States-Mexico-Canada trade agreement (USMCA) an early test of the willingness of Democrats to play ball with the Trump White House. In a tweet Wednesday, Mr. Trump suggested he’s reading the midterm results as an affirmation of his muscular trade policies. …The three countries are expected to sign a final version of the USMCA at the end of this month. Ratification in the United States is unlikely before the incoming Congress takes over in January. …Some experts say getting it done next year may be a long shot.

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Trump’s trade policies could survive Democratic victory

CBC News
November 7, 2018
Category: Business & Politics
Region: Canada, United States

…The Democrats won back control of the House of Representatives, but oh so narrowly. …The ramifications for the president are real. He will face hurdles enacting major goals of his presidency — from building that wall… to ratifying the new North American trade deal. …Former U.S. diplomat Sarah Goldfeder believes Democrats, especially those elected Tuesday for the first time, will be focused on other, domestic issues. …Goldfeder doesn’t expect to see the USMCA brought before Congress until mid- to late next year, even if Trump believes he has the votes to get it through. “If there’s an environment where the administration doesn’t think the package will pass then one of two things happen. Either they don’t put the legislation up and we will live with the old NAFTA or the president — if he really wants to make this an election issue, and he will — will start the process of the United States leaving NAFTA.”

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First of its kind $100,000 endowment for indigenous students pursuing graduate studies in forestry

TimberWest
November 7, 2018
Category: Business & Politics
Region: Canada, Canada West

Vancouver — TimberWest and the Faculty of Forestry, University of British Columbia announced a first-of-its-kind $100,000 endowment program for Indigenous students pursuing a graduate degree in forestry. The endowment established by TimberWest, along with matching funds from the Faculty of Forestry, will award scholarships of $4,000 per year to First Nations, Inuit, or Métis graduate students studying forest resource management or forest sciences who have a demonstrated interest in pursuing their career in British Columbia. …“We want to help ensure that financial barriers do not prevent the many talented and motivated Indigenous students from pursuing a graduate degree in forest sciences,” said Jeff Zweig, President and CEO of TimberWest. …The TimberWest Forestry Award for Indigenous Students will be awarded by the UBC Faculty of Forestry on an annual basis.

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Canadian Economics After The Midterm Elections

By Melissa MacKenzie
CKPG Today
November 7, 2018
Category: Business & Politics
Region: Canada, Canada West

PRINCE GEORGE — [VIDEO] The polls for the US midterms closed last night with the Democrats winning a majority in the House of Representatives. While this will have some impacts on Canadian economics, Stan Mitchell from KPMG says that it’s too early to tell what the impacts will be, as it’s all dependent on which direction each congressperson sways. “By default, if you could sway enough Democrats, and essentially sway the house, then the Republicans are probably going to have to listen unless there’s a better deal to be cut.” Some of the more prominent areas that could be affected by these election results are the tariffs on steel, aluminum, the softwood lumber agreement and the USMCA trade agreement between the United States, Canada and Mexico.

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Western Forest Products Announces Third Quarter 2018 Results

By Western Forest Products
Stockhouse
November 7, 2018
Category: Business & Politics
Region: Canada, Canada West

VANCOUVER, British Columbia — Western Forest Products Inc. reported adjusted EBITDA of $32.3 million in the third quarter of 2018, compared to adjusted EBITDA of $32.6 million in the third quarter of 2017, and $50.2 million reported in the second quarter of 2018.  …“Well positioned opening log inventory and efficiencies in our supply chain allowed us to partly mitigate the impact of the worst fire season in coastal BC history. Despite harvest challenges and market volatility, our specialty-focused lumber business continues to deliver revenue growth and higher price realizations,” said Don Demens, President and Chief Executive Officer. “Looking ahead, we expect to leverage the investments in our flexible operating platform to overcome challenging market conditions, ongoing lumber duty expense and increased stumpage costs.”

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Export economist predicts China to surpass US as BC’s top timber market

By Derrick Penner
Vancouver Sun
November 8, 2018
Category: Business & Politics
Region: Canada, Canada West

Canada’s key export-support organization boldly predicts China will surpass the United States as British Columbia’s top market for forest products within 12 years, if long-term trends hold. “This is really about differential growth in the markets,” said Peter Hall, chief economist for Export Development Canada. “China has long and strong potential growth and the U.S. is a fully developed economy.” That projection appears to counter a short-term decline in lumber sales to China following the country’s meteoric rise in imports over the last 15 years. After years of a provincial hard-sell in the country, China emerged as a major customer for B.C. forestry exports following the 2008 global recession, surpassing Japan as the province’s No. 2 market for lumber in 2009. …Hall, however, said he is in the camp of economists who believe Canada is in a position to make significant increases in trade with China, not unlike Australia.

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ATCO employees in Fruitvale exempt from job action

By Guy Bertrand
BC Local News
November 7, 2018
Category: Business & Politics
Region: Canada, Canada West

Mediation will be used to bridge an impasse in contract talks between forestry workers and southern interior forestry employers. The announcement came Tuesday from the United Steelworkers bargaining committee stating that talks will go to mediation through the B.C. Labour Relations Board following the inability to agree to a new collective agreement.  …Jeff Bromley, financial secretary for USW Local 1-405, said there are 175 members impacted in the West Kootenay. “We have 140 members in Castlegar at Interfor’s sawmill there. And 35 members at ATCO Wood Products in Fruitvale.” However, employees at ATCO won’t be involved in any job action should mediation fail, explained Bromley. “In terms of ATCO Wood Products, they are under what’s called a ‘Me Too Agreement.’ That means essentially that they’ve signed on to whatever is negotiated by the broader forestry industry pattern bargaining. For lack of a better term, they’re exempted from what’s going on in this process right now.

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United Steelworkers forestry workers headed for mediation

By Carloyn Grant
BC Local News in the Castlegar News
November 7, 2018
Category: Business & Politics
Region: Canada, Canada West

At the end of October, United Steelworker members in the southern interior, working in the forestry industry, returned a 98 per cent strike vote. This week, the Steelworkers announced that talks will go to mediation through the B.C. Labour Relations Board following the inability to agree to a new collective agreement. Mediator Dave Schaub has been appointed to mediate talks between the two parties. Those talks are scheduled for November 14, 15 and 16, 2018 in Kelowna. …“Despite reporting record profits in the 3rd quarter of 2018, Canfor has decided to engage in rotating layoffs at their BC operations, angering USW members in what looks more like a bargaining tactic than a reflection of markets,” says a Steelworkers press release. …At the request of the USW Bargaining Committee, job action will be halted prior to and during the mediation process. 

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84 Lumber leaps forward on Forbes’ list

The Observer-Reporter
November 7, 2018
Category: Business & Politics
Region: United States, US West

One of Washington County’s best-known businesses – 84 Lumber Co. – has made a quantum leap on Forbes’ annual list of America’s Largest Private Companies. Eighty Four-based 84 Lumber is ranked 125th among 229 businesses in 2018 – 35 spots higher than it was in 2017. It has made the Forbes list nearly ever year since it was created in 1985. The local company also ranks 14th among 22 firms in the Retailing category. …Founded in 1956, 84 Lumber is the nation’s top privately held supplier of building materials, manufactured components and industry-leading services for single- and multi-family residences and commercial buildings. The company reported that it has 250 locations and 5,500 associates nationwide.

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The Mathis Report: Project Grid is Rayonier Advanced Materials

By Karen Brune Mathis
Jacksonville Daily Record
November 7, 2018
Category: Business & Politics
Region: United States, US East

Rayonier Advanced Materials, which said Oct. 9 it will create 79 positions at its Downtown headquarters by 2022, is the code-named Project Grid that was approved in August for city and state incentives. Jacksonville-based Rayonier Advanced Materials, a specialty chemical company, said it would create the jobs following its acquisition in late 2017 of Canadian forest products company Tembec.  The company said the jobs will be professional and administrative roles to support its international operations and will average $69,520 annually. A news release said the Tembec purchase almost doubled Rayonier Advanced Material’s size to more than $2 billion in annual revenue and added more than 15 operating plants in Canada and Europe.

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Russia can temporarily restrict lumber export to China, natural resources minister warns

TASS Russian News Agency
November 7, 2018
Category: Business & Politics
Region: International

MOSCOW — Russia can temporarily restrict lumber exports to China due to the issues of forest reproduction and destruction, Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Dmitry Kobylkin said during the ‘government hour’ at the Federation Council (upper house of parliament) on Wednesday. “China is the main market of lumber exports (from Russia). I told the (Chinese) minister that if we do not bring matters under control in the near future, particularly from the Chinese side, we will completely suspend lumber exports to China,” he said… answering the question when the problem of illegal logging and export would be solved in Russia. …According to the minister, the construction of seed-production facilities in Russia at China’s expense is one of the ways to solve the problem.

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Wood, Paper & Green Building

Ecological living module is a UN-backed, off-grid tiny home

By Jenna McKnight
Dezeen Magazine
November 7, 2018
Category: Wood, Paper & Green Building
Region: United States

…The Ecological Living Module, or EDM, was conceived by Gray Organschi Architectureand Yale’s Center for Ecosystems in Architecture – both based in New Haven, Connecticut. Commissioned by the UN Environment and UN Habitat programmes, the prototype dwelling is meant to address housing issues from both a social and environmental standpoint. …While rectangular in plan, the dwelling has a sculptural form due to its sharply slanted roof. Engineered wood was used to construct the cabin, with posts made of parallel strand lumber (PSL) and beams formed from laminated veneer lumber (LVL). Wall and roof panels are composed of cross-laminated timber (CLT) with wood-fibre insulation and plywood sheathing. CLT was also used for structural decking, while facades are wrapped in western red cedar.

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Architectus’ award-winning Macquarie University Incubator project features Iron Ash

By Australian Sustainable Hardwoods
Architecture and Design
November 8, 2018
Category: Wood, Paper & Green Building
Region: International

The Macquarie University Incubator project designed by Architectus and constructed by Lipman features timber by Australian Sustainable Hardwoods Australia. Iron Ash by Australian Sustainable Hardwoods was specified for the award-winning prefabricated timber structure built to embody the vibrant ethos of Macquarie University. …A key objective of the prefabricated structure was to enable future dismantling, relocation and reassembly. Though it wasn’t an easy project, the building was erected in just 37 days and the entire project completed within six months. The structure was built using prefabricated timber floor cassettes, supported on screw piles. Iron Ash treated Masslam V-columns support 22 roof glulam and CLT (cross-laminated timber) cassettes, exposing the timber both internally and externally. The building also contains 44 prefabricated facade panels incorporating 118 timber windows.

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Forestry

Federal government must act on national pine beetle problem

By Paul Whittaker, president and CEO of the Alberta Forest Products Association
CBC News
November 8, 2018
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada, Canada West

Paul Whittaker

Alberta is the frontline of a pine beetle epidemic that threatens to decimate forests from coast to coast. If you’ve been to Jasper National Park recently, you have seen the widespread devastation. Large swathes of mature pine in the park are red and dead. If decisive action is not taken soon, this sad scene will be replayed in forests throughout Canada. On Monday, the Alberta legislature unanimously passed a motion, sponsored by Edmonton-Manning MLA Heather Sweet, urging co-operation with the government of Canada to tackle this problem immediately. Co-operation is the right approach. For too many years, pine beetle has been seen as a provincial problem. First it was a B.C. problem. Now it’s an Alberta problem. …it will soon also be a Saskatchewan problem. And with a continuous band of pine throughout Canada’s boreal forest, the epidemic will surely spread beyond Saskatchewan all the way to Canada’s East Coast.

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Nature Trust buys property to protect Caribou

Prince George Citizen
November 7, 2018
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada, Canada West

The Nature Trust of British Columbia says it has purchased privately-owned land near Mackenzie in the name of protecting a herd of Woodland Caribou. From October to January, the herd of about 50 animals typically congregates on the 245-hectare (605-acre) Kennedy Siding property, southeast of the community 186 kilometres north of Prince George,  where they feed on their main food source, terrestrial lichens, until the snow gets too deep. …The property is completely surrounded by Crown land designated as ungulate winter range, adding up to about 2,900 hectares (7,165 acres). …Dr. Dale Seip, a wildlife ecologist at the B.C. Ministry of Environment and Climate Change Strategy said in a statement issued Wednesday, “acquisition of this land, in combination with the surrounding provincial ungulate winter range, now ensures that the entire low elevation winter range of this Threatened caribou herd will be protected and managed as caribou habitat.”

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B.C.’s fierce forest fires kindle haunting photo-poetry

By Douglas Todd
The Vancouver Sun
November 6, 2018
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada, Canada West

A B.C. poet and her husband have captured the terrifying power of our summer forest fires in words and photos. Susan McCaslin and Mark Haddock have created a disturbingly beautiful photo-poem series about the wildfires that have torn through the Cariboo region of B.C., particularly at Young Lake, where their family has long had a cabin.

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Are there really more wildfires nowadays? New Utah study separates fact from fiction

By Spencer Ricks
St George News
November 7, 2018
Category: Forestry
Region: United States, US West

ST. GEORGE — There are far fewer wildfires in Utah and other Western U.S. states nowadays than there once were, and that might not be a good thing, according to a new study. The study …by researchers from Utah State University, puts the blame on public misconceptions and news reports for leaving out historical context when describing the “unprecedented” number of wildfires today. While the number of wildfires in the U.S. has increased since the 1980s, there are significantly fewer wildfires today than before settlers arrived, thanks to advances in firefighting. “News media frequently report on dramatic increases in wildfire in the western U.S., with many headlines claiming wildfire area has reached unprecedented or record levels,” the authors contend in the study. Earlier this year, Gov. Gary Herbert called the 2018 wildfire season“the worst fire season we’ve probably had in memory” after 875 wildfires kept Utah firefighters busy this past summer.

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‘Forest resilience bond’ to mitigate wildfire risk in Tahoe National Park

By Jessica Pothering
ImpactAlpha
November 7, 2018
Category: Forestry
Region: United States, US West

Blue Forest Conservation and World Resources Institute have launched a $4.6 million “forest resilience bond” to restore 15,000 acres of forestland in Tahoe National Forest’s North Yuba River watershed. California is confronting increasingly severe wildfires and recently experienced the largest wildfire in the state’s history. “Without urgent action, wildfires will be even deadlier and costlier in years to come,” the partners said in a statement about the bond. The forest resilience bond originated as a winning concept in the 2015 Kellogg-Morgan Stanley Sustainable Investing Challenge.  If the project succeeds in mitigating wildfire risk, the investors will be repaid by the Yuba Water Agency, which has a stake in water quantity and quality, and California’s state Climate Change Investment program. 

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Thoughts on the ‘Roadless Rule’ from a small timber operator

By Gordon Chew, Tenakee Logging Company
Anchorage Daily News
November 7, 2018
Category: Forestry
Region: United States, US West

Our company, Tenakee Logging, is a small, family-owned and -run business that both works and lives here in the Tongass National Forest. Our business model is based on looking forward and making sure we are leaving a viable land base for the next generation. We do not participate in mass resource extraction, but instead utilize a selective and a therefore sustainable approach to cutting in the national forest. Along with the forest service, we go to great lengths to leave a viable stand of timber in every one of our small cutting units. …We will only support a “no action” alternative to any attempt to roll back Roadless Rule protections, making it easier to harm this fragile ecosystem. Having already lost so much of the best timber in the “high grading” approach to extraction, it is clear that more protections are needed, not less.

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2018 Election: 5 Takeaways for Oregon’s Wildlands and Wildlife

By Arran Robertson
Oregon Wild
November 7, 2018
Category: Forestry
Region: United States, US West

What do the results of the 2018 midterm election mean for Oregon’s wildlands, wildlife, and waters? Here are five takeaways… WHO WIELDS THE GAVEL—Rep. Rob Bishop’s reign as Chairman of the House Natural Resource Committee is coming to an end. …He was supported by fossil fuel money and a staggering network of Koch-funded campaigns to drive anti-conservation policy. STINKY ZINKE—Once EPA Secretary Scott Pruitt left, the title of “most scandal-plagued Cabinet member” fell to Ryan Zinke of the Interior Department. Zinke’s use of “secret calendars” to hide meetings with oil industry executives …has worried conservationists and attracted attention from ranking House Democrats who now wield oversight power. KATE BROWN WINS, TIMBER MONEY LOSES—Governor Kate Brown …has a lot of work to do to make Oregon the “cutting edge of green” state many of its residents believe it to be.

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Climate change causing more severe wildfires, larger insect outbreaks in temperate forests

By Portland State University
Phys.Org
November 8, 2018
Category: Forestry
Region: United States, US West

A warmer, drier climate is expected is increase the likelihood of larger-scale forest disturbances such as wildfires, insect outbreaks, disease and drought, according to a new study co-authored by a Portland State University professor.  The stud … sought to provide a more complete snapshot of disturbances in the world’s temperate forests by quantifying the size, shape and prevalence of disturbances and understanding their drivers. The researchers analyzed 50 protected areas like national parks as well as their immediate surroundings, allowing them to compare disturbances inside protected areas that are more climate-related from those just outside that would also be impacted by human land use. The study found that while many temperate forests are dominated by small-scale disturbance events—driven largely by windstorms and cooler, wetter conditions—there was also a strong link between high disturbance activity and warmer and drier-than-average climate conditions.

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More than 400 foresters gather in Temple

By Mariel Williams
The Temble Daily Telegram
November 8, 2018
Category: Forestry
Region: United States, US East

More than 400 Texas foresters gathered in Temple Wednesday to share stories and acknowledge each other’s accomplishments. The Texas A&M Forest Service held its annual personnel meeting at the Frank W. Mayborn Civic & Convention Center. …Spokeswoman Linda Moon said she does not believe they have met in Temple before, but the service has historical roots here. “Temple is where forest conservation really started in Texas,” program leader Shane Harrington said. …The one-day forestry event features awards ceremonies and plenty of time for service staff to network and chat.

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The World’s Wilderness Is Nearly Gone

By Michelle Chen
The Nation
November 7, 2018
Category: Forestry
Region: International

Nearly every day’s news cycle seems to bring another harbinger of environmental doom… Now scientists have zoomed out to examine the world’s endangered landscapes on a macro scale, revealing that human society is not only exterminating flora and fauna—it’s literally ripping up the ground beneath them. Just a small fraction of the world’s wilderness lands can be considered relatively free of human interference. And without dramatic policy measures, the remaining wild places will soon be paved, farmed, mined, and polluted into oblivion. Using geospatial mapping data, a research team based at the University of Queensland has depicted the massive hemorrhaging of wilderness over time. Their new study, published ahead of a United Nations biodiversity summit, shows that the remaining vestiges of marine and land habitats relatively untouched by human intervention are facing extinction.

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Violinist Pekka Kuusisto performs in a forest that’s been destroyed for Greenpeace’s latest campaign

By Elizabeth Davis
Classic FM
November 7, 2018
Category: Forestry
Region: International

The Great Northern Forest stretches from Alaska and Canada to Scandinavia and Siberia. But large swathes of the forest have been destroyed by deforestation and forest fires. To highlight the issue Finnish violinist Pekka Kuusisto appears in Greenpeace’s new video and performs Thomas Tallis’ haunting piece ‘Third Tune for Archbishop Parker’s Psalter’ in an area of the Great Northern Forest that has been destroyed. The video, which has the title ‘The Elegy of the Forest’, was filmed in Orivesi in Finland, in an area of forest that was recently cleared. …Greenpeace Nordic’s forest campaigner Ethan Gilbert said: “The boreal forests around the world play a vital role in the global fight against the dangers of climate change. We need to act now if we are to save these forests from deforestation and our planet from becoming even more unstable and unsafe in the future.”

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First monarch butterflies arrive at Mexico wintering area

The Associated Press in the Vancouver Sun
November 7, 2018
Category: Forestry
Region: International

MEXICO CITY — The first monarch butterflies have arrived at their wintering grounds in the mountains of central Mexico almost a week later than usual, Mexico’s Environment Department said Wednesday. Millions of monarchs make the 3,400-mile migration from the United States and Canada each year. …It said the butterflies were delayed because they waited out rainy weather around the U.S.-Mexico border. The monarchs spend the winter clumped together in fir and pine trees. …There have been several rebound years, but each has generally been less than the preceding upswing. Increased use of herbicides in the United States have hurt the prevalence of milkweed, which monarch caterpillars feed on, risking their survival. Loss of tree cover in Mexico due to drought, storms and logging has also affected the butterflies’ population.

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Carbon, Climate & Bioenergy

Energy Information Administration updates bioenergy production, capacity forecasts

By Erin Voegele
Biomass Magazine
November 7, 2018
Category: Carbon, Climate & Bioenergy
Region: United States

The U.S. Energy Information Administration has released the November edition of its Short-Term Energy Outlook, predicting that nonhydropower renewables will provided more than 10 percent of electricity generation in 2018, increasing to nearly 11 percent in 2019. According to the EIA, wood biomass is expected to be used to generate 115,000 MWh of electricity per day this year, increasing to 117,000 MWh per day next year. Production from waste biomass, however, is expected to drop slightly, from 59,000 MWh per day this year to 58,000 MWh per day next year. The electric power sector is expected to generate 87,000 MWh per day from biomass this year, including 50,000 MWh per day from waste and 38,000 MWh per day from wood. Next year, the sector is expected to produce 90,000 MWh per day of electricity from biomass, including 49,000 MWh per day from waste and 40,000 MWh per day from wood.

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The more things change, the more they remain the same!

By Jerry Yudelson
Reinventing Green Building Blog
November 8, 2018
Category: Carbon, Climate & Bioenergy
Region: United States

Tuesday’s US national elections changed little, except to put the brakes on further efforts by the Trump Administration to deal with climate change, such as by bailing out failing coal and nuclear plants. In many ways, it just replicated the 2010 election. …What does this mean for climate change politics? The House of Representatives will likely reconstitute a climate change special committee of some sort and that panel will start promoting federal action. More than likely, however, President Trump will be tempted to do what President Obama did… which is to rule by decree (aka “executive order”). …The failure of a carbon tax in the state of Washington by a fairly large margin (56-44 in WA) owing to massive contributions against it by oil companies says to me that carbon tax legislation will only happen at the national level.

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A new hope: GEDI to yield 3D forest carbon map

By NASA / Goddard Space Flight Centeer
EurekAlert
November 7, 2018
Category: Carbon, Climate & Bioenergy
Region: United States

A new NASA laser instrument set to launch to the International Space Station in December will help scientists create the first three-dimensional map of the world’s temperate and tropical forests. The Global Ecosystem Dynamics Investigation, or GEDI, is scheduled to launch on SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket. From the station, GEDI’s advanced laser technology will reveal the three-dimensional structure of forest ecosystems around the globe. …Measurements of the height of foliage, branches, trees and shrubs below its path will yield new insights into how forests are storing or releasing carbon. …GEDI is slated to begin its two-year science mission aboard the station by the end of 2018. …Led by the University of Maryland in collaboration with Goddard, GEDI has the highest resolution and densest sampling of any lidar every put in orbit.

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Washington State Likely Rejects a Historic Carbon Tax

By Robinson Meyer
The Atlantic
November 7, 2018
Category: Carbon, Climate & Bioenergy
Region: United States, US West

If Democrats ever want to fight climate change at the national level, they’ll need help from state-level progressives first. Blue states will need to function as “laboratories of democracy,” trying out creative new climate policies and finding their faults before their debut on the national stage. On Tuesday, Democrats didn’t get that help. Though progressives cruised to victory in Washington State… voters appeared almost certain to reject Initiative 1631, a ballot question that would have established the nation’s first carbon tax. With 64 percent of the vote counted, 56 percent of voters opposed the measure—enough of a rout that The Seattle Times declared it defeated. …With 1631 defeated, California remains the only state in the country with an aggressive climate policy.

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‘Negativity around forestry needs to stop if we want to reach climate targets’- Department

By Claire Fox
Farm Ireland
November 7, 2018
Category: Carbon, Climate & Bioenergy
Region: International

Negative commentary on forestry needs to come to an end if we want to reach climate targets, Secretary General at the Department of Agriculture Brendan Gleeson has said. Mr Gleeson told members of the Oireachtais Committee on Climate Action today that planting of forests will play a significant part in reducing emissions and reaching 2030 climate targets. He said that the negative debate around forestry has to come to an end in order to promote the planting of trees and encourage carbon sequestration. “Forestry is a critical part of this discussion. We need to be planting trees now to provide mitigation for the 2030 onward period. I’m concerned around about the negative narrative around forestry that it might make it more difficult to reach targets, it’s important to encourage planting of trees,” he said.

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