Adding insult to injury

Colin Smith, St Kilda
The Age, letter, 14 Feb 2012


DAN Caffrey (Letters, 13/2) makes the reasonable point that "use of a waste resource can only be good for everyone, so long as the practice does not encourage harvesting of native timbers for the sole purpose of producing biofuels."

Unfortunately, that is exactly what it does mean. We bought this argument about making good use of sawmill waste when woodchipping began. Some decades later - seeing half the biomass of demolished forests left on the ground to be incinerated, and 90 per cent of the logs that were taken out being chipped rather than sawn - we swore never to fall for that one again. This move is about finding a new excuse for the maceration of our forests, and adding insult to injury by having it blessed as a source of green power.