The Carbon Premier sees many trees in our future
COMMENT: Hmm, hewers of wood, drawers of water, truckin' down the hydrogen highway. Jaccard's points - should BC be taking credit (ie, an economic benefit) for planting a tree where one would have grown anyway? What guarantee is there that the tree will grow through its maximum carbon-uptake decades, and not be turned into yet another Christmas tree or quick remedy to a fuel shortage for all those new biomass generators we're going to build? On the other hand, we're going to have to get something growing in the interior especially, to replace all those pine. Yikes! What if the pine beetle is just the first in sequential waves of new infestations?
Vaughn Palmer
Vancouver Sun
Thursday, January 31, 2008
VICTORIA - Premier Gordon Campbell was thinking out loud this week about where his government is headed next in the effort to reduce carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases.
"We have to become as well known for planting trees as we are for cutting trees," Campbell told reporters at the wrap-up of a two-day session with the other Canadian premiers.
He spoke of "the opportunity to increase our forests as a means of sequestering carbon" and "recognizing the great ally that they [forests] are in carbon sequestration."
Each tree locks up a tonne of carbon dioxide over its lifetime, Campbell argues. Adding to the stock of "nature's carbon sinks," (the forests) should allow us to accumulate credits in a national or international carbon trading system.
"We have to include our trees as a major carbon sink," he maintained. "We have to ensure that we get full credit for what we're doing in terms of offsets."
As host for the gathering of his provincial counterparts, the B.C. premier spoke of building a national strategy "on forest adaptation." It would include research on existing species, experiments with new ones.
But even as he boosted the national strategy, he sketched out what is likely to happen here in B.C.
"We may plant substantially more trees as we move into the future. We may look at different forms of tenure to encourage that kind of planting in our province."
He took a similar tack in a recent speech to the annual convention of the Truck Loggers Association, asking delegates to view the fight against climate change as an opportunity to redevelop the forests.
"We should be global leaders in husbanding the value of our forests in fighting climate change," the premier said.
"We can restock our land base, protect and restore our watersheds, clean the air and create massive carbon sinks with aggressive new reforestation strategies."
Those aggressive reforestation strategies will likely dovetail with the Pacific Carbon Trust, set for launching later this year.
The trust will be used to fund "valid offset projects with a high degree of environmental integrity in British Columbia."
"These may include projects that enhance energy efficiency, produce new clean energy or support carbon sequestration," according to the terms of reference.
The startup contribution will come from the provincial treasury, offsetting the emissions impact of travel by public servants and politicians.
"For every tonne of greenhouse gases associated with government travel the province will invest $25 in the trust."
The fund will also be open to contributions from business and others seeking to accumulate carbon credits.
"We want people, businesses to be able to invest in the Pacific Carbon Trust or get offsets from that," Campbell said in a Jan. 23 speech to the Conference Board of Canada in Ottawa.
"We'll want people to know that this is a top-quality project, and we're going to make it available up and down the [West] Coast."
Campbell has been pushing this idea of translating tree planting into greenhouse gas reduction credits for some time.
In 2002, he challenged the federal government for trying to "confiscate" the benefits of B.C.'s "forest carbon sink" in establishing national targets for managing and reducing emissions.
"If the federal government is intent on using B.C.'s forests to reduce Canada's overall burden, then credit must be provided to the province."
Last year's throne speech picked up the theme, with a reference to the provincial forests as "nature's carbon sinks."
B.C. faces a unique challenge with regard to reforestation, and one not unrelated to climate change.
The out-of-control pine beetle infestation, in part a product of warmer winters, will eventually necessitate the restoration of most of the pine forests in the Interior.
But for all the good reasons Campbell has for promoting reforestation as part of a plan on climate change, he hasn't overcome the objections from advocates of stronger measures to reduce emissions.
Tree planting doesn't reduce reduce reliance on fossil fuels. It doesn't lead to changes in energy production, transportation, industry, home heating, and other sources of emissions. It may not even sequester carbon in any permanent fashion.
Mark Jaccard, the premier's technical adviser on the climate action plan, framed the concern about reforestation as follows in a recent speech to the C.D. Howe Institute:
"Was the planted tree truly an additional investment in reducing greenhouse gases or would another tree have sprouted eventually in that spot anyway?
"Does the planted tree represent a permanent increase in biosphere sequestration or carbon or will it be cut down in 10 years' time?"
Campbell nevertheless seems bent on making reforestation a key part of his "climate action plan." But he faces an uphill fight gaining credit for it in any recognized carbon-trading system.
© The Vancouver Sun 2008