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  • From: "Healing Hawk" <healinghawk@earthlink.net>
  • To: "'permaculture'" <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] Firewood:- Sustainable and Appropriate Energy Source
  • Date: Sun, 7 Oct 2007 21:54:53 -0500

Thanks, Laurence. Good article. My research articles are on some hard
drive long gone, and they don't support Holmgren's 2003 research article's
conclusions by a long shot. Perhaps if everyone who burned wood used the
Bosky combustion stove like Holmgren uses and used all the best practices,
global warming would be much more minimally affected, but that's not likely.
I would love to be wrong about this issue, but my gut still tells me I'm
not.

Holmgren says that wood is the most sustainable and environmentally sound
form of heating AFTER behavior change, conservation strategies, and passive
solar design. It does not say that wood heat is ecologically supported. In
order for that to true, the energy exchange between the biosphere and the
human would have to balance. In other words, the human would have to
contribute something of equal value in perpetuating the biosphere for that
exchange of energy to leave the realm of dominion/parasitic relations and
meet the standards of an ecological ethic which holds that treating the
biosphere fairly is a good to strive for.

I don't understand how "new plantations managed for timber and firewood have
no net carbon dioxide emissions and actually take 0.17kg of CO2 out of the
atmosphere for every KWhr of heat produced" when trees sequester carbon as
they grow then emit that carbon when burned. That isn't saying it doesn't
happen, just that I don't understand it.

Holmgren concludes, "In a more enlightened sustainable and low energy
future, the very real problems of localized air pollution from wood burning
in cities needs to be addressed by better training of firewood users, better
designed wood burning stoves, and most importantly, use of cleaner burning
charcoal produced in sustainably managed forests using modern wood gasifier
technology which recovers the waste heat." So wood burning still pollutes
the air, even in Holmgren's best scenario. To me, this means that the wood
is being wrongly used. Climax ecosystems do not produce waste. Isn't
permanent culture a climax culture?

We also still have going unquestioned the idea of humans colonizing great
chunks of nature in order to sustain themselves at nature's expense. Does
wildlife live in tree plantations? Permanent culture will not occur until
human existence is no longer predicated upon exploiting nature. What we
also have is an admission that wood is only the lowest greenhouse gas
emitter, according to Holmgren's research. It still emits greenhouse
gasses. Less is surely good, but we're still not ecologically benign, let
alone ecologically beneficial, when we burn wood as efficiently as we know
how.

Tommy Tolson
Austin, TX

-----Original Message-----
From: permaculture-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org
[mailto:permaculture-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Laurence
Gaffney
Sent: Sunday, October 07, 2007 5:54 PM
To: permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: [permaculture] Firewood:- Sustainable and Appropriate Energy Source

Tommy Tolson (Healing Hawk) wrote:- (Fri, 5 Oct 2007)

> "Heating and cooking with wood is not ecologically supported."

and

> "I'm saddened when "permaculturalists" don't have control of the basic
systems theory that Bill and David so carefully articulate in their books."

Speaking of David Holmgren here is and article written by him on the topic
of firewood which may be of interest.

http://holmgren.eatthesuburbs.org/DLFiles/PDFs/Firewood%20Web.pdf

Laurence Gaffney
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