Forestry: Dollars and Sense
As a landowner and tree farmer for 55 years, I offer a brief commentary on biomass' actual potential impact on Massachusetts forests.
Will biomass encourage clear-cutting or mass destruction of our forests?
The answer is a resounding No. With several powerful factors, including tight state regulations against clearcutting and favoring sustainability, trends toward fragmented forest ownership and anti-harvesting attitudes, the most compelling reason is pure economics.
Why would anyone in their right mind take a tree worth a hundred dollars as a saw log and instead chip it up into one dollar's worth of biomass? That would be like driving a nice new Lexus to the scrap yard and collecting $50 for the metal. Biomass will never be a danger to our forests.
Biomass will never pay enough to even tempt clearcutting, but it will pay to clean up the forest environment, make long-term forest ownership more economically viable, generate electricity we all need from renewable sources and reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. How silly do you think foresters, landowners, tree farmers and loggers are, that they would sell their most valuable commodities for pennies on the dollar?
Even if you have no interest in the history, science or regulatory facts of forestry, please at least try to understand the dollars and sense that fundamentally drive the industry.
If good citizens are really concerned about losing our forests, they ought to advocate in favor of biomass removal and other good forestry practices and advocate against commercial development, suburban sprawl and the two-acre minimum building lot. Or here's an even better idea: buy up as much land as possible and grow more trees.
Derrick Mason
Moss Hill Tree Farm, Russell
Vannah: Cheeseburger Connoisseur
Tom Vannah nails the cheeseburger scene ("Cheeseburgers in Paradise," Nov. 26, 2009). Add fried onions at The White Hut.
Charles V. Ryan
via e-mail
