The forest industry must proceed with caution and there must be clear regulations around harvesting to ensure biomass is a sustainable energy source, says the Forest Products Association of Nova Scotia.
"There is a place for biomass harvesting and bioenergy production, but we do have to proceed with caution in terms of how we go about it," executive director Steve Talbot said Tuesday.
"I think it’s a part of the overall movement towards renewable energy in the province, along with wind, solar and tidal," Mr. Talbot said in an interview.
"But we agree with the Ecology Action Centre that guidelines are necessary so that everybody realizes where they stand with respect to harvesting biomass," he said.
Mr. Talbot was responding to the recent controversy surrounding a forest harvest by Northern Pulp Nova Scotia Corporation near Upper Musquodoboit, using whole-tree harvesting and clearcutting.
The Ecology Action Centre released photos last week condemning the harvesting practices and questioning whether biomass harvesting for power generation would leave a trail of devastation in Nova Scotia forests.
A local group called Save Caribou has also condemned the harvesting practices at the site near Caribou Mines and others in Halifax Regional Municipality.
The Ecology Action Centre and other environmental groups are calling on the province to ban whole-tree harvesting, where everything is removed from a forest, including tree stumps and branches, leaving a barren swath of ground.
The province is in the process of creating guidelines for biomass harvesting, but is still consulting with experts, a Department of Natural Resources spokesman told this newspaper last week.
Government and industry are also awaiting the results of a scientific study from the University of New Brunswick that is examining nutrient loss on harvested sites, said Mr. Talbot.
The new guidelines will determine just how harvesting of biomass is handled in the province. "I suspect the provincial guidelines will be based to a certain degree on the finds from that study," he added.
He said he hopes the study is released and harvesting guidelines are in place before next summer’s harvesting operations begin.
Mr. Talbot said he can’t comment on the harvested site near Upper Musquodoboit. "I haven’t had a chance to get out there and actually take a look at the site, so it’s difficult to make any comments or decisions."
But he acknowledged that the site has stirred public debate on the issue of harvesting for biomass.
In most cases, harvesting that leaves the majority of tree tops, branches and deadwood in the forest as nutrients will ensure new forest growth, said Mr. Talbot.
"But I think we’re really going to have to take a look at sites on an individual basis, and low-capability sites that have difficulty in reproducing a new stand, those are the ones we’re going to have to look at leaving tops and branches and so on to maintain a sustainable nutrient level on the site.
"On richer sites, we can look at alternatives on what we need there and what we remove."
The Forest Products Association of Nova Scotia, with 600 members, represents a wide sector of the forest industry, including large forest companies, small woodlot owners, sawmill operators, truckers, Christmas tree producers and harvesting contractors.
Copyright ©2009 The Halifax Herald Limited
