Sure, but that doesn’t actually follow from the thread you’re replying to. It’s clear from all the likes @Boundegar 's sarcastic and intellectually dishonest comment that I’m best staying out of the thread tbh - especially as that was primarily what I was commenting on, something everyone seems to be missing.
Before I bow out I just want to highlight, as this has been said a few times now. That sustainability is relative. Sustainable wood is still a destructive, energy intensive process, it’s just better than doing it unsustainably. It’s dangerous to think of sustainable practices as ‘guilt free’. But yea, we all need building materials and that’s the best we got. But it’s a means to an end, a necessary evil, it’s not really something to celebrate.
I like that you saw the 18/1900s as folks just doing what they needed to do. ‘Need’ is another term I think we need to address here (I’m sure some shareholder really did need all that unsustainable growth), but it’s getting late and I’ve had too much wine
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I agree that sustainable is not synonymous with guilt-free. Here’s an example. What if all we ever did with wood was burn it? But we always made sure to cut it sustainably. We would still have the industrial age and the modern age polluting the skies with CO2 and everything else wood produces, and we would still be in the same worsening climate predicament. (Albeit, since it’s wood, it would take probably another hundred years to get to where we are today.) So, it could still be a bad decision to log heavily, even if sustainably, depending on what it’s used for and what it replaces or displaces. The real answer is that we need fewer humans on the planet making trouble. And so, how will we figure out which humans to dispose of? I think the solution is clear. All we have to do is keep logging sustainably, keep producing nuclear power “sustainably”, keep having sustainable wars, and the problem will be solved for us by nature itself.
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Theoretically a truly sustainable wood-harvesting plan would sequester carbon through new growth as quickly as it was being released by the burning wood, eventually finding a carbon-neutral equilibrium. It’s not like burning wood creates more carbon atoms.
The big problem with using fossil fuels is that we’re disrupting a carbon cycle that normally takes millions of years instead of tens or hundreds of years. It takes much, much longer for the geosphere to reabsorb carbon than the biosphere.
I think we missed the exit for ‘theoretically’ about 100 years ago…
Hey, just because it hasn’t yet been done doesn’t mean it’s outside the realm of plausibility. We certainly owe it to ourselves (and the rest of the planet) to try.
Bulls-eye.
So much this. I lived through the last of the clear cutting blight, and it is so much better today than thirty/fourty years ago it’s crazy. When done right clear cutting and selective harvesting don’t look that much different. Trees must come down in groups so saplings can get enough light.
I am a proud tree hugger, a proud agriculture enthusiast, a proud wood worker, and a proud steward of land.
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I know you are gonna mock me for this. And I know why. But ima gonna say it anyway >:)
Want to sequester carbon? Cut down trees, plant saplings, and make furniture. When the furniture is past its useful life, bury it.
That plus several billion other small acts will make a difference (oh and stop driving, and get solar panels >:D (and eat the rich))
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Maybe this is old news, but I was just reading about this ‘renewable’ energy lark in Private Eye.
Apparently Obama doesn’t believe this should count towards Britain’s 20% renewable target. I’d say he has a fair point.
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Good grief, did I start all this foofooraw? I really fell down on my obligation to argue on the internet today. Sorry, internet! I’ll make it up when work is slow.
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Gah! This is just carbon shifting 
biomass is neat when fermented to ethanol and burned, but not as straight biomass.
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My problem with the “too many humans!” argument is that it shifts the blame for the world’s environmental problems to those who have lots of kids (mostly poor/third-world populations) rather than blaming those of us who are actually using up most of the resources (mostly rich/first-world populations). The average citizen of the United States or Qatar probably has a bigger impact on the global environment than a whole family in Bangladesh or Timor.
Putting the blame on population instead of lifestyle feels like a cop-out, especially since per-capita resource use in rich countries has been growing FAR faster than the global population of late. If current trends continue we could see peak population by the mid-21st century. Resource use (especially in rich countries) shows no such sign of slowing.
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May I prepare messieur a tournade of Peter Thiel? >:)
(If you are peter Thiel… Are you delicious or should we make soup?)
I don’t understand what you’re talking about. Fires and prescribed burns are generally encouraged to maintain native woods.
In some areas that may be true, but in USFS-controlled areas, the policy is very much anti-burn.
In Florida, at least, state and national parks encourage burns to eradicate invasive species and protect native. I really wonder if there’s such different policy elsewhere.
You think all the monster wildfires in California are random? Bad burn policies.
It’s not the people with lots of kids. It’s the stupid people with lots of kids… aaaand the stupid people with few or no kids.
Too fast!
Much better:
