Forests should fuel future, not foul air

President Obama and the Democrats who control Congress think America should spew less carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into its skies while getting more of its energy from renewable sources.

We agree on both counts.

But the Democrats’ apparent sincerity for pursuing these worthwhile goals makes all the more puzzling their insistence on defining “renewable” in a narrow way.

In particular we are perplexed by a Democrat-sponsored bill that would make it more likely that publicly owned forests, including hundreds of thousands of acres in Northeastern Oregon, will burn and thus foul the atmosphere with greenhouse gases rather than supply the nation with electricity, heat and clean-burning vehicle fuel.

To put it another way, the bill would do precisely the opposite of what it’s supposed to do.

We don’t expect perfection from Congress, but a modicum of logic seems a reasonable expectation.

The flaw in the House Democrats’ bill is that it, in effect, ignores biomass harvested from federal forests.

Biomass includes the dead trees and fallen limbs that have piled up to dangerous proportions on millions of acres of public forests during the past century. 

The draft version of the Democrats’ bill requires that 25 percent of America’s energy be produced from renewable sources by 2025.

But biomass from federal land doesn’t count.

Rep. Greg Walden, the Republican who represents Baker County and the rest of Oregon’s 2nd Congressional District, has been asking his Democratic colleagues on the House Committee on Energy and Commerce to explain why biomass was omitted from the bill.

So far, Walden says, no one has given him a satisfactory answer.

We’re not surprised.

There is no sensible reason for Congress or President Obama to discourage the harvest of biomass from federal forests.

Yet the bill they are lauding does just that.

Hauling biomass from the woods achieves a rare double play of sorts: It helps the environment by reducing forest fire fuels and using the material to produce renewable energy, and it helps the economy by putting people to work.

Studies show that wildfires in the United States account for 4 percent to 6 percent of the country’s carbon footprint.

Recent technology and markets have created an opportunity for companies to use forest biomass to make chips and wood pellets for heat and electricity, and as a source of fuel.

A 2005 report from the U.S. Forest Service and U.S. Department of Energy estimates that by 2030, biomass on federal land could be made into enough transportation fuel to satisfy more than one-third of America’s thirst.

And we’re talking about clean-burning ethanol, not smog-making gasoline.

Congress could help to fix the mess we’ve made of our forests by making biomass, along with the sun, the wind and the waves, a mainstay of America’s move toward renewable energy sources.

Consider, for instance, what federal subsidies and other support have done for the wind turbine industry.

A similar commitment to biomass from Obama and Congress could revive Northeastern Oregon’s ailing forestry industry.

Yet Democrats in the House act as though biomass were equivalent to coal or oil.

Walden is trying to convince his colleagues to include biomass as a renewable energy source in the pending bill.

We hope he succeeds.

Reducing carbon emissions and creating new sources of energy and jobs by harvesting biomass is a win-win our nation.

If Democrats in Congress continue to leave biomass out of their energy bill, it will be clear that despite their seeming sincerity, they are more interested in playing politics than in playing for those wins.