What goes on in Poland on the 14th of August.
The Senate voted against burning wood from Polish forests in power plants
Polish Senate rejected the draft amendment to the act on renewable energy sources (RES). – The change in the definition of energy wood contained in it was to allow the burning of wood from Polish forests in power plant furnaces – says Greenpeace. The government defends the amendment.
The amendment to the law would allow for mass felling, removal and burning in power plant furnaces, the most valuable forests from the point of view of nature protection – dead and dying trees. – This is what happened after the introduction of similar regulations in Slovakia. Meanwhile, trees in such a state are habitats for many legally protected species, such as woodpeckers and owls. They also enrich the soil with minerals and humus, and provide many other 'ecosystem services’ that are of great importance for the functioning of forests. All this is irretrievably lost when the trees are taken out of the forest and burned – says the environmental organization.
During Thursday’s Senate debate on the amendment to the act on renewable energy sources (RES), Małgorzata Golińska, deputy head of the Ministry of Environment, was asked, inter alia, on the financial condition of the State Forests in connection with the coronavirus. Golińska informed that the data obtained from the State Forests show that the revenues of Lasów fell by over PLN 600 million in the first half of the year compared to the planned ones. She explained that this was due to less timber harvesting and sales. – Compared to the plan, we already have over PLN 600 million less and we are talking only about the middle of the year – she said.
The amendment to the RES Act provides for the introduction of a new, temporary definition of energy wood. It says, among other things, that energy wood is, for example, wood that is not sawmill and cut wood, which are logs, sawmill and cut logs, by-products resulting from the processing of wood raw material, etc.
The amendment is to apply from October 1 this year until December 31, 2021. According to the government, the new law is to allow for the management of wood lying in forests, which, due to the coronavirus, has not been picked up by the timber industry. According to the calculations of the Ministry of Environment, it is about 2 million cubic meters of wood. Now the draft amendment to the act rejected by the Senate will be returned to the Sejm.