Most of do not know that we get more energy from burning wood than we do from either solar or wind. Many people feel that we should concentrate more on things like renewable wood. Like playing Chess, you can't win if you are just a "one mover". How does this affect burning wood?
At first glance, burning woods sounds like a good choice. Any carbon dioxide produced by burning the wood was carbon dioxide that the same tree took out of the atmosphere. If a new tree is planted for every tree that is cut, things will stay in balance over time. Sounds like the perfect solution. The problem is that it is not all "gain". It takes a lot of energy to plant, grow the tree and harvest and process it. Even the burning of the wood is not very efficient compare to the carbon dioxide produced compared to other forms of fuel. This leads to the next "chess move".
If we mined more coal equivalent to the wood harvested, we would get more energy and create less carbon dioxide. How can that be? The total cycle of processing coal into energy is much more efficient than the cycle for wood. Further, if we did not cut the tree, it could keep on taking carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. We would be a lot better off harvesting trees for lumber that would not be burned or into paper that can be recycled many times. When paper can no long be processed into more paper, it could be used as mulch in the soil or buried in a land fill were it could not burn and create carbon dioxide.
The real problem is that we want a lot more energy that creates carbon dioxide than wood could produce. That means we need to burn much more coal. What we need to do is to ask "why" we need more energy? It would seem a lot more logical to attack the "cause" rather than apply expensive medicine to the problem. What do you think the "cause" is? It is growth in human population and the demand that we all have a higher standard of living or quality of life. I think that you know that the USA uses more energy per person than any other country in the world. The Bushman in Africa use the least. Can't follow this example? Sorry, but some people can not be helped.
Obama might have it right when he claims that things are not "fair" and that we need to fix the problem. If you agree with Obama, all you need to do is to send 50% of your pay check to those Bushman in Africa so that both you and them have the "same" standard of living and quality of life. You might notice that in the end, you will have to greatly reduce you standard of living and quality of life. All this sounds like the old adage that, "there is no such thing as a free lunch".
