Good Morning: Carbon Sinking. A view point. Required Payment for Carbon Sinking. I am going to explain how Mandatory Payment for Carbon Sinking can have a positive impact on the economy. We hear lots of talk about the coming “Green Economy” but how can we jump start this idea into green cash? Consider the following: Petroleum and coal are the two largest contributors to CO-2. This industry has not been required to pay for their pollution. CO-2 has become a pollutant because the environment can no longer regulate it on its on. Core definition of pollution is the environment’s inability to recycle a waste product. In short burning petroleum and coal 100 plus years ago did not contribute extra CO-2 for global forest could drink it up. With more than a decade of clearing tropical forest at a rate of 4,500 acres per hour we have cut the planets lung by a notable level removing key parts of the CO-2 storage systems. Couple this with the largest annual consumption of coal and petroleum and you have Global Warming. To date, the Federal Government has born the economic front of global warning via storm clean up. Katrina being the loudest. All of this adds to more Government spending to fix an industry caused problem. Mandatory mitigation of Carbon will require the coal and petroleum industry to pay private and public forest land holders to clean up their pollution. Sustainable forest that are certified as such can calculate their net carbon up take. If mitigation becomes mandatory energy consumers will have to pay forest landowners to sink their CO-2 output. We manage a 300 acre tree farm that has planted 100 acres of former pasture into trees. On average this 100 acres will drink up 4 tons per acre per year in CO-2 over the next 50 years. We hope to market the first thinning to direct green energy creation. IE boiler fuel to steam to electricity or cellulose to liquid fuel. If we do this the green power will be Carbon neutral. Creating this green economy will require building the green fueled power plants. Much of this is being jump started with Federal Dollars. We hope! Requiring payment for storing carbon in tree farms that are privately owned will create cash income streams to rural economies which is private industries paying private sector to clean up their pollution. As this income stream starts up property values will stabilize and start to rise. Not from speculation, but from income earning potential and actuality. IN crease the earning value of timberland, via sustainable forestry, and carbon payment for sinking it the private sector will be moving capital within the United States. Then if carbon mitigation is included in our trade policies, then International Paper and others can no longer dump wood chips from Latin American (mainly the Amazon) on the U.S. pulp market, which has collapsed the stumpage price for pulpwood to a 30 year low. A fact that is directly draining income from conservative thinking landowners. In short a direct backfire of Bush trade policy on his own private sector backers. IN summary, mandatory CO-2 mitigation will pump billions into the general private sector, from private industry, this will have upward pressure on land values, green lumber will foster new construction that is home grown. It will also bring U.S. dollars back into our economy in three ways. One by forcing the Middle east to pay for its pollution. Two, China will not be able to kept buying up global natural resources and converting them into cheap goods as they will have to pay out capital to mitigate their CO-2 output. Third, we the United States have the knowledge base to create environmental restoration projects, to sink carbon. Jobs will be created by the demand for this knowledge and these jobs can and should be international in scope bring energy dollars back into the United States. American tree farmers will directly profit from the Carbon tax, that is money will be transferred directly from industry to private sector people as industry seeks to mitigate carbon outputs. This is the key to my letter. This method of putting the private sector to work in mitigating Carbon will have a direct private sector stimulus on the economy. So in figuring your Carbon Tax program view it as a way to force private industry to pay private landowners to solve their CO-2 pollution and you will be creating policy that Republicans can support. Who says money does not grow on trees. David Ellis President Renewable Resources Editor’s Note: Article came in through email by David Ellis
Be First to Comment