Cutting Wood, Being Green

For the past couple of weeks, I've been cutting up trees to burn as heating fuel next winter. It turns out I'm doing a "good" thing, as far as trendy environmentalism goes. (Not that I was trying to, mind you)

As it turns out, trees are only a temporary solution to carbon dioxide. Sure, they absorb CO2 while alive and growing, but when they die and rot, they give it all back to the atmosphere. All that "green" piety of buying indulgences for your SUV by planting trees, is a crock. Your "carbon offset" is only a loan, at best. It's like saying my family budget is "neutral", but I'm using my credit card to make up for the income I don't have. That pigeon will come home to roost eventually.

Trees do help absorb CO2 while their alive, but dead, they're a liability. This hurts the time-honored "green" mantra of saving old growth forests at all costs. Not that we should then cut them all down. Rather, we need to see that there is give AND take. Dead or nearly dead old growth would (from the greenhouse gases point of view) be better off cut into lumber or burned as fuel.

Actually, burning wood releases less carbon than rotting wood does. Who'd have thought? While I've not found useful figures on the amount of CO2 released by a cord of wood vs 100 gallons of fuel oil, it's a sure bet that burning the oil AND letting the wood rot is a double whammy.

To tell you the truth, I really didn't care about reducing my CO2 "footprint". (such a trendy gimmick) I'm laying up a winter's worth of wood because I can scarcely afford heating oil. I suppose I feel less guilt. Actually, I think I feel a little relieved that the enviro-activists won't be screeching at me when I'm just trying to keep my family marginally warm this winter.