We’re hearing more and more products, processes, events and even entire companies described as ‘carbon neutral,’ and many more striving to become so — but what exactly does that mean?
It's a question that the American Forest & Paper Association (AF&PA) and American Wood Council (AWC) have set out to answer in a new video explaining the concept — from a biomass energy users' perspective — in only 90 seconds.
The AF&PA serves to advance a sustainable U.S. pulp, paper, packaging, and wood products manufacturing industry through fact-based public policy and marketplace advocacy. As the video explains, when trees are harvested for the manufacture of paper and wood products, they are replaced with new trees that continue to absorb CO2. What’s left of the harvested trees — manufacturing residuals such as sawdust, bark, etc — are then turned into biomass used to create more than two-thirds of the energy used to power the manufacturing process. Residuals not used would otherwise decay or be incinerated, releasing greenhouse gases, rather than absorbing them.