In this edition:
- Issues with EPA’s new report on fracking and drinking water
- Commentary on the environmental impacts of wood bioenergy
EPA’s Report on Fracking and Drinking Water
Last week, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released a draft study finding “that hydraulic fracturing has no major impact on drinking water.” RFF’s Alan Krupnick and Katrina McLaughlin write that although the report does make important advances in knowledge, it falls short of its claim to advance “the scientific basis for decisions by federal, state, tribal, and local officials, industry, and the public on how best to protect drinking water resources now and in the future.” They explain that the report doesn’t reach that very high bar because it lacks a systematic set of analyses with robust results that really narrows the range of uncertainty.
Wood Emissions
A number of new scientific studies suggest that US companies may be using “the wrong kinds of trees to make [wood] pellets” for European utility companies that often receive subsides to use biomass. According to the research, harvesting whole trees (rather than using discarded or waste wood) “can increase carbon emissions relative to fossil fuels for many decades.”
RFF’s Francisco Aguilar notes that the European Union has significantly increased its use of wood energy and that “In 2013, US wood pellet exports to Europe reached nearly 3 million metric tons.” Assessing related emissions should be based on the lifetime of the wood product writes RFF’s Roger Sedjo: “Forest carbon sequestration associated with increased harvests for bioenergy would be offset by new forest growth given sufficient time.” Sedjo also notes that because climate change is driven by cumulative atmospheric greenhouse gas stocks, lags between carbon emissions from bioenergy-related forest harvests and subsequent regrowth are unimportant if long-term forest sustainability is maintained.
