Skip to content

Forest

The ‘Clean Energy’ Industry Ravaging Natural Forests To Feed Generators

The port of Longview, Washington has served as a bustling hub of commerce for more than a century. Ships carrying everything from grain to wind turbine parts pass through it every day headed for distant places — but it’s to the timber industry that Longview owes its existence. Located at the confluence of the Columbia and Cowlitz rivers, this town of 38,000 was founded by the Long-Bell Lumber Company in the early 1920s to house workers at its nearby mills. Today the community is at the center of a political debate with immense implications for the region’s forests. Longview is one of at least four locations on the U.S. West Coast where companies hope to begin manufacturing wood pellets — compressed wood used as fuel for power generation or home heating — for export on an industrial scale.

Tropical Forests Are Reaching Their Carbon Dioxide Limit

Humanity has pushed atmospheric carbon dioxide levels almost 50% higher than they were before industrialization. That dramatic number would be even higher without tropical forests, which have been absorbing as much as 17% of CO₂ emissions along the way. Unfortunately, rainforests can’t capture carbon like they used to.
Sign Up To Our Daily Digest

Independent media outlets are being suppressed and dropped by corporations like Google, Facebook and Twitter. Sign up for our daily email digest before it’s too late so you don’t miss the latest movement news.