Logging of short and long-leaf pines in the South has been going on for probably more than a century. It's not unusual to see convoys of logging trucks speeding along the countryside state roads. Any sensible person keeps their distance from these behemoths. It's not common but there are incidents of a truck losing its load of massive trunks onto the road or even unsuspecting motorists. But I don't know what the rest of the country would do for pine lumber or pulpwood for paper products. The site where the trees were harvested looks like a war zone when the harvesting machines are done. The tops of the trees and all the limbs are shot through grinders and left on the ground to rot. This does have a good effect of enriching the otherwise rather poor southern soils. The land may have been planted specifically with this in mind and the trees grown as a rotational crop, in which case the land is replanted immediately with new seedlings. The land may be privately or corporately owned. The land could also be harvested from a private owner who just decided to harvest his forest. This is not usually replanted. But here in the South, the line of succession progresses rapidly from war zone through dominance of various shrubs and pioneer trees, on up to the pines. In drier areas, this is the end of the line. Natural fires keep hardwood seedlings from even starting.
Some by products may be reclaimed during the processing of this valuable resource but a good deal is not. It wasn't too long ago that processing pulp was a smelly, polluting business and could be smelled miles away. The waterways struggled to recycle the waste. But the mills have cleaned up their act considerably. But still a large portion of the wood harvest is wasted. Add to this the waste from small lumber harvest companies and independent contractors who remove problem trees storm damaged trees from private owners and municipalities. Useable lumber is hauled away to sell at the mill while the contractors search for more space to dump the huge piles of ground up waste. I can't see any problem with using this waste or even growing crop trees to feed biomass generators. The piles of unused branches and leafy portions that are deemed 'unusable' will release carbon dioxide as they decompose anyway. These huge piles of unwanted waste won't mar the countryside if there's a good use for them. And the land recycles quickly whether helped by man or not. There may be some negative issues involved here which should be addressed. But I think that the idea as a whole should be approached with a positive attitude and deal with the problems individually rather than the other way around. Gary _______________________________________________ the OrchidGuide Digest (OGD) [email protected] http://orchidguide.com/mailman/listinfo/orchids_orchidguide.com
