Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie

Forestry/fuel/farmers

  • 25-03-2014 3:35pm
    #1
    Markcheese
    Registered Users Posts: 8,427 ✭✭✭


    I was just thinking (first mistake right there) , we (as a state) want
    More energy security (home produced fuel)
    Less carbon emissions,
    More rural employment
    Less run off from upland causing flooding
    More forestry

    We already have state agencies involved in all the above quiet often at cross purposes
    Should we encourage farmers to grow more forest fuel, with coilte (or someone else ) acting like Irish sugar did promoting forestry for fire wood and biomass and providing a gaurenteed market...
    We already pay farm and forest subsidies,import gas and home heating oil and spend millions on flood defences ,
    Why have we never linked it all up ?

    Slava ukraini 🇺🇦



Comments

  • #2
    Birdnuts
    Registered Users Posts: 9,624 ✭✭✭Birdnuts


    I don't understand it eitheir - Coillte, Dept OF Ag and Bord na Mona should be active in this space, yet there seems to be very little thought,expertise or knowledge brought to bare on this matter by these state/semi state bodies. This government seems transfixed by windpower despite growing doubts about its reliability and costs in other countries, as highlighted by the collapse of the UK wind energy export deal. This has stiffled the development of more viable alternatives like wood, biogas etc. Probably reflects the general malise in management at many levels of the state sector. I was going to mention "deadwood" but it seemed a bit too obvious a pun:pac:


  • #3
    Markcheese
    Registered Users Posts: 8,427 ✭✭✭Markcheese


    The economics may not stack up by the time the land cost and labour and harvesting/transport are all taken ...

    Slava ukraini 🇺🇦



  • #4
    BrenCooney
    Registered Users Posts: 106 ✭✭BrenCooney


    Economics of biomass to energy just can't compete with existing energy sources. This is further excaberated by having to deal with the end product, either ash from direct burn or sludge from biogas. There is also an awful lot of public resistance against these renewable energy sources with claims of odours, explosive risk, dangerous chemicals, bacteria, unexplained deaths etc. etc.


  • #5
    Birdnuts
    Registered Users Posts: 9,624 ✭✭✭Birdnuts


    BrenCooney wrote: »
    Economics of biomass to energy just can't compete with existing energy sources. This is further excaberated by having to deal with the end product, either ash from direct burn or sludge from biogas. .

    The end products would make excellent fertilizer. Saw a TV doc recently about Ugandan villages getting a supply of gas from farmers who collect cow/camel dung and put it into a simple digester. I don't buy the arguement that such things can't be done here on a bigger scale given the obvious advantages we have in terms of mechanization and access to vast amounts of animal waste via slurry tanks etc. To me there seems no will in this country to pursue such things by the powers that be - as it would benefit ordinary communities as opposed to powerfull vested interests in the energy sector.


  • #6
    Markcheese
    Registered Users Posts: 8,427 ✭✭✭Markcheese


    I don't think that things can't be done , a lot of it is the economics,I'm happy that good arable doesn't get used much for biomass projects ... Farm waste digesters are interesting ,I know of farmers who've investigated them and passed them by.. ( dairy farms only have large volumes of slurry for short periods...
    I suppose I was thinking if the state supports farmers on poor /boggy /hilly areas to produce little,would it be better to pay for copice timber/biomass/or willow as a strategic resource to replace imported oil and gas, and gain environmental benefits along the way...

    Slava ukraini 🇺🇦



  • Advertisement
  • #7
    Oldtree
    Registered Users Posts: 8,104 ✭✭✭Oldtree


    Markcheese wrote: »
    I was just thinking (first mistake right there) , we (as a state) want
    More energy security (home produced fuel)
    Less carbon emissions,
    More rural employment
    Less run off from upland causing flooding
    More forestry

    We already have state agencies involved in all the above quiet often at cross purposes
    Should we encourage farmers to grow more forest fuel, with coilte (or someone else ) acting like Irish sugar did promoting forestry for fire wood and biomass and providing a gaurenteed market...
    We already pay farm and forest subsidies,import gas and home heating oil and spend millions on flood defences ,
    Why have we never linked it all up ?
    A lovely notion but the same economics apply as why do we import 90% of our food.


  • #8
    BrenCooney
    Registered Users Posts: 106 ✭✭BrenCooney


    Hi Birdnuts,
    Yes the end product is a good fertiliser, but it is quite bulky and not that easy to apply correctly. Also needs to be applied as part of an NMP. It can be done but requires more effort in planning applications and cost in moving it from site of production to where it is needed etc etc.
    Markcheese yes economics plays a large part. Poor land is not suitable for willow as the machinery for harvesting and planting would not be able to move over the land when needed.


  • #9
    OssianSmyth
    Closed Accounts Posts: 267 ✭✭OssianSmyth


    Markcheese wrote: »
    ... We already pay farm and forest subsidies,import gas and home heating oil and spend millions on flood defences ,
    Why have we never linked it all up ?

    There was a public consultation on the new Irish forestry policy last year but the final policy has not yet been agreed. The draft is here:
    https://www.agriculture.gov.ie/media/migration/forestry/publicconsultation/forestpolicyreview/ForestPolicyReviewpublicconsult21Jun2013.pdf

    There is some reference to the potential for biomass; for example to co-fire with peat.

    In the UK they have been converting their largest 4GW coal power station to run on wood. However the wood is being sourced from the southern US states and shipped across the sea, which is far from ideal.
    why do we import 90% of our food.
    I think we export about €10bn of food and drink and import about €6.7bn. The numbers for energy are far less healthy (we export €0.8bn and import €6.8bn)

    Biogas should be a much better bet for us. Germany has 5 times our land area but 300 times more biogas plants. BgB7i37CUAI6shD.jpg:large


  • #10
    robp
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,934 ✭✭✭robp


    Markcheese wrote: »
    I was just thinking (first mistake right there) , we (as a state) want
    More energy security (home produced fuel)
    Less carbon emissions,
    More rural employment
    Less run off from upland causing flooding
    More forestry
    I would suspect the typical Irish coniferous forestry operations do little to protect against flooding. Commercial plantations are also implicated in acidification and silting in water courses which is wiping out several species such as the endangered pearl mussel. If you want to reduce flooding halting peat extraction and planting continuous cover native trees are a safer option. Also returns on upland forests are very poor. To my knowledge biomass was using willow or elephant grass rather then typical forestry species.


  • #11
    Greensleeves
    Registered Users Posts: 337 ✭✭Greensleeves


    While not strictly on topic here is an interesting article about Bord na Mona using the methane gas from a landfill site to power Kildare homes.

    http://www.leinsterleader.ie/news/business/news/dump-methane-gas-to-power-kildare-homes-1-5987678


  • Advertisement
Advertisement