Biomass/Sustainability/Climate Change

NS: “Adventures in biomass” may lead to sustainability dead end
By Staff, Transcontinental Media

Source: The Daily Business Buzz, July 27, 2010

[HALIFAX, NS] — In a recent submission to the Nova Scotia Department of Energy’s Renewable Electricity consultation process, Scotian Carbon Services expressed its concern about the government’s thrust to promote biomass combustion as part of its renewable electricity strategy.

The carbon management consulting firm’s submission explains that most international protocols for greenhouse gas accounting dictate that emissions from biomass combustion is accounted for separately from all other greenhouse gas activities. There is a growing trend among jurisdictions in North America and Europe to exclude biomass from their renewable electricity totals.

“The government of Nova Scotia has gone to a lot of trouble to craft a renewable electricity plan that will help them reach the aggressive emission reduction targets in their Environmental Goals and Sustainable Prosperity Act (EGSPA)”, said Gay Harley, manager of Scotian Carbon Services. “It would be a shame if a significant chunk of their investment could not be accounted for as creditable emission reductions.”

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) dictates that carbon dioxide emissions from biomass be reported separately from all other scopes in official National Inventories. As well, Nova Scotia’s Department of Environment promotes the accounting protocol used by The Climate Registry as their standard for greenhouse gas accounting. The Climate Registry meets the Canadian Standards Association (CSA) criteria for greenhouse gas inventories. In that standard, biomass combustion is reported separately from other forms of electricity generation.

Scotian Carbon Services said it is important that universal standards be developed for carbon accounting, so that reporting can be compared across jurisdictions and so that targets and emission reductions have credibility and result in genuine reductions. Nova Scotia must design its programs and targets to integrate with domestic and international accounting standards.

“With the global practice to exclude biomass accounting from general emission reduction inventory, Nova Scotia may be steering toward a sustainability dead end in their biomass policy. The money invested in promoting electricity from biomass in an effort to meet provincial emission reduction targets may simply be wasted taxpayer resources.”