Wood pellet production has surged to meet EU demand, but that comes at a cost to southerners

Birds fly over a pile of wood used to make pellets during a tour of the Drax plant in Gloster, Mississippi, Monday, May 20, 2024. Wood pellet production has exploded in the southern U.S., contributing to European Union efforts over the past decade to replace fossil fuels such as coal with renewable energy. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

GLOSTER, Miss. (AP) — This sprawling wood pellet plant in this south Mississippi town was so close to Shelia Mae Dobbins’ home that she could sometimes hear the company’s loudspeakers. She says her truck has become covered in industrial debris and she no longer enjoys spending time outdoors.

Dobbins believes her life — and health — were better before 2016, when British energy giant Drax opened a plant capable of compressing 450,000 tons of wood chips a year in the mostly black town of Gloucester, Mississippi. To her, it’s no coincidence that federal regulators found that residents were exposed to unwanted airborne particles and suffered from asthma more often than most of the country.

Her asthma and diabetes used to be under control, but since 2017, when she was diagnosed with heart and lung disease, Dobbins has often had to live on a ventilator with an oxygen tank.

“Something is happening. And it’s all around the plant” said the 59-year-old widow who raised two children here. “Nobody asked us if they could move the plant there.”

Wood pellet production has boomed in the southern United States. That has helped meet demand for renewable energy in the European Union as those countries seek to replace fossil fuels like coal. But many residents near the plants — often African Americans from poor, rural areas — say the process makes the air dustier and people sicker.

Billions of dollars are available for these projects under President Joe Biden’s signed climate change law, and the administration is considering whether to open tax breaks to companies that burn wood pellets for energy.

As manufacturers expand westward, environmentalists want the government to stop supporting what they call a misguided attempt to curb carbon emissions that pollutes communities of color while warming the atmosphere.

Despite heavy pollution fines levied against industry players and the recent bankruptcy of a major producer, advocates say the multibillion-dollar market is experiencing growing pains. They see wood pellets as an innovative, long-term solution to the climate crisis that generates the revenue forest owners need to keep their plantations afloat.

Biomass boom

After the European Union classified biomass as renewable energy in 2009, annual wood pellet production capacity in the Southeast rose from about 300,000 tons to more than 7.3 million tons in 2017, according to research by a team from the University of Missouri.

Federal energy statistics show that about three dozen Southern wood pellet plants account for nearly 80% of annual U.S. production capacity. Most of the pellets are used for commercial-scale energy production overseas.

The market brought hope of revitalization to small, underprivileged communities. But interviews with residents of cities with large black populations, from Gaston, N.C., to Uniontown, Alabama, revealed complaints about truck traffic, air pollution and noise from pellet plants.

Gloster has become a symbol of such tensions. In 2020, the Mississippi Environmental Protection Agency fined Drax $2.5 million for violating air emissions limits. Gloster is exposed to more particulate matter than most of the United States, and adults have higher rates of asthma than 80% of the country, according to an Environmental Protection Agency mapping tool. The median household income is about $22,000; the poverty rate is three times the national rate.

Spokeswoman Michelli Martin said Drax had installed pollution control equipment, including incinerators, in 2021 to reduce its carbon dioxide emissions. The environmental consultancy found, “no negative impact on human health” and that “no modeled pollution from the facility was exceeded” acceptable level, Martin said.

The company recently committed to hosting annual town meetings and announced the creation of a $250,000 Gloster Community Fund “improve quality of life.”

But critics aren’t convinced by the corporate goodwill, which they say doesn’t excuse the bad air. Krystal Martin of the Greater Greener Gloster Project returned to her hometown after her 75-year-old mother was diagnosed with lung and heart problems.

“Until most people breathe in and out air pollution for so long that they get sick, you won’t realize you have air pollution.” she said.

Professor Erica Walker, an assistant professor of epidemiology at Brown University, studies the health impact of industrial pollution in Gloucester. Walker said fine particulate matter can penetrate deep into the lungs and reach the bloodstream.

“It can also spread to other parts of our body, causing inflammation throughout the body.” she said.

Subsidies for developing industry

Environmentalists are calling on Biden to stop supporting an industry they say contradicts his green energy goals. At the annual UN climate conference, Dogwood Alliance urged attendees to phase out wood pellets.

Enviva — the world’s largest producer of wood pellets — has already received subsidies under the 2018 farm bill signed by former President Donald Trump, according to Sheila Korth, a former policy analyst at the nonpartisan Taxpayers for Common Sense.

However, Korth said the Biden-era inflation-reduction law provided tax breaks for pellet companies in Europe and Asia.

Elizabeth Woodworth, interim executive director of the U.S. Industrial Pellet Association, said the money is a small portion of the lRA’s allocation and noted that new technologies require government subsidies. The industry argues that replanting trees will eventually absorb the carbon produced by burning pellets.

“We need every technology we can get to mitigate climate change” Woodworth said. “Bioenergy is part of that.”

Scientific studies have shown that burning wood pellets immediately releases more carbon into the atmosphere than burning coal. Pollution from biomass facilities is nearly three times higher than other energy sectors, according to a 2023 article in the journal Renewable Energy.

In a 2018 letter, hundreds of scientists warned the EU that “additional coal load” from burning wood pellets means “permanent damage” including the melting of glaciers.

Expansion plans and more pressing matters?

Drax — which has operations in Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi — is heading west.

The corporation signed a deal in February with Golden State Natural Resources to identify biomass from California forests. The public-private venture hopes to build two plants by the end of the year and produce up to 1 million tons of wood pellets a year. Another Drax project in Washington would produce 500,000 tons a year.

Rita Frost of the Natural Resources Defense Council, which has fought the crop industry in the South, said the deal would threaten poor Latino communities in California just as the crop industry threatens black towns in the South.

“This is an environmental justice issue that should not be repeated in California.” Frost said.

According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, biomass, including wood pellets, accounted for less than 5% of U.S. primary energy consumption in 2022.

But a key federal decision could encourage more companies to burn pellets — not just manufacturing.

The White House is examining whether biomass plants should receive tax credits designed for zero-emission electricity generators. The Treasury Department is considering whether the potential long-term carbon neutrality of biomass is sufficient, even if its production increases emissions in the short term.

Spokesman Michael Martinez said yes “taking into careful consideration public comments” AND “We are working to issue final regulations that will most effectively enhance energy security and clean energy supplies.”

Some environmentalists doubt that alternative energy is ultimately carbon neutral. The Southern Environmental Law Center worries that credits could be the incentive the U.S. needs to join Europe in increasing pellet burning.

“The threat here is really the growth of biomass energy production in the United States itself.” said senior attorney Heather Hillaker. “Which will of course increase the overall carbon emissions and climate damage caused by this industry globally.”

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