Daniel Matthews

Seems you've turned up a web cul de sac and found you're in the wrong place here Daniel Matthews.

 

Surely it's a bit too sweaty and dusty here for your slick global vision, where Chinese peasants are grateful for your patronage and insanely happy Malaysians bask in your waste heaps, gaily scavenging from your detritus.

 

You wont win a lot of arb friends by promoting kiln-dried logs from Turkmenistan / wherever. You sound very friendly while you're trying wipe the floor with Muttley.

 

I was told never to trust a grinning cat.

 

 

"Just saying"

Yes, I'm starting to wonder if i have barked up the wrong tree, so to speak. Still, what is wrong with a bit of healthy debate? Or is that not something Arborists are happy to have ?

Is burning imported timber more environmentally than burning fossil fuels are there figures to prove this when using a new condensing boiler. Using wood to dry wood is not co2 neutral. If you use the wood to heat a home after normal seasoning that would be co2 neutral.

Errr..i believe it is, Steve. As i understand, burning wood can be considered co2 neutral, due to the offset of co2 due to the trees growth. Is there some secret you are not revealing here, Steve ?

By importing products, we create jobs in developing countries, who improve their standard of living and therefore can adopt new technologies which over time will reduce their own environmental impact. We need to think on a global level, not a local.

You reckon that China has reduced its enviromental impact by producing for us. How about the improved standard of living for the poor sods in killed in that collapsed clothing factory so we can have cheap disposable clothes.

China has benefited greatly and it would be tough to argue that their standard of living hasn't improved - it obviously has by a massive amount.

You see, as countries develop, the population becomes more educated which slows population growth, and in some cases decline (eg Japan). This in itself reduces the environmental impact. Couples no longer have to produce 5 children to go out and herd the sheep and knit the village clothing, in order to make a living and put food on the table.

I would argue that if the West had started trading with China 50 years ago on todays scale, their population would be half, probably far less.

Think global, my friend. It's the only way.

You see again you speak assuredly about things like you know all about them. Globilization is Not the only way there's plenty of small things everyone can do. I.never once suggested everybody should live like me, it was you who started to belittle my way of life. I don't comment on how you choose to live in the smog, that's up to you, I don't mind if you continue to live in cloud cuckoo land theorizing that there's plenty of oil to keep guzzling. I merely commented that perhaps if everybody acted a little more responsibly and tried to consume a little less we May not be in this posistion. I would be very interested to know how you think global warming and more importantly peak oil are just a blip that we Will simply overcome. I predict mass starvation and Marshall law as the distant future we are creating. Maybe try to take some responsibility for your part in this and don't just assume that someone else Will solve all the problems you help create. It is you my friend who lives in a bubble, a bubble where everything is fine and there's no need to address your own consumption. And for the record I'd be happy to send you some fleece so you can create your own low impact clothing without the need to herd sheep in your window box

Your outlook is very bleak...i'm not surprised you have run for the hills (are you in the hills there in your pic?).

The solutions will revolve around improvements in technology for things like renewable energy production and efficient modes of transport - including shipping, electric vehicles etc. Guess where the engineers live that develop this technology? In cities. Where? All over the world. How do they share their information - via the internet. Where does the internet come from...engineers working for corporations working in cities....get where I am going with this?

The problems will only be solved quickly if globalization is a key part of it.

By importing products, we create jobs in developing countries, who improve their standard of living and therefore can adopt new technologies which over time will reduce their own environmental impact. We need to think on a global level, not a local.

Don't tar me with your brush and only comment on things you understand. I buy my clothes responsibly too thankyou and yes "jfyi" some are homemade. We keep sheep and use there wool. I ain't a saint and don't claim to be, but my limited intelligence allows me to differenciate between necessary international trade and unecessary international trade. It also allows me to see a slight difference between importing a small pack of ballons for a child's party( BTW there's a ballon manufacturer about 20 miles from me my friend) and filling a container ship up with logs. I don't live in a bubble, I just choose to try and leave as little a footprint on this planet as I can so future generations can enjoy. This option is open to everyone Not just the elite!

Look, Muttley, I'm sure you are a very nice chap and it is admirable that you are following your beliefs and trying to better the world for the greater good. But this goes back to my Real World comment. Do you think it is practical for populations of large cities to live like yourself, everyone having their own little flock of sheep and making their own clothes? NO.

The REALITY is that for mankind to move forwards, we must all specialise and contribute the results with the GLOBAL village. It is far more efficient that way. Sure, there will be challenges along the way, such as global warming, but they will be solved in time - as long as we keep moving forwards. Keeping us all firmly rooted in the past...knitting our own clothes and herding our own sheep is just not practical in this day and age, my good friend.

Yeah again you don't know what you speak of. I live in an intentional community with over 30 people. We are fully heated with wood( including hot water) have solar thermal for summer hot water, produce over 60% of our leccy through pv. Source all our wood responsibly and only use gas for cooking. We also all share one washing machine , one cooker etc etc. This equates to around 8 tonne of wood per year per family. So hows about you look in the mirror my friend, if you get a big enough one you May see a magic carbon neutral container ship behind you.

And jfyi (see what I did there) we don't burn damp wood. We air dry it naturally to 20% max.

So do you make your own clothes too? Or if you were to look at the label on your t-shirt would it say Made in China? Where do you think the balloons in that picture of yours were made? Wake up my friend, we live in a global village now - products move all over the world, everywhere, everyday. I am sure it feels good to sit in your eco-bubble and point the finger at everyone else because of your theory on logs, but the reality is that international trade is both necessary and unavoidable.

You live in the real world, and your quite happy to destroy it through irresponsible purchases. There's plenty of wood available to you from a lot closer than loggy the globe trotter you prefer. 5 mins on Google would easily find you 5 better options. FYI some kilns are now heated by wood, but still use electric for other processes. And seen as the kiln drying of logs is completely unnesseccecary then those logs with "0" carbon could have been used for a better purpose. Anyway I'm off to my pretend world now where we care about the future and spend a moment and maybe an extra pound to source things responsibly. While I'm there I think I might use the 70 tonne of logs in our shed to dry out some different logs, as after all they are "0" carbon.

You are entitled to your opinion.

But i can't resist to comment.... 70 tonnes of firewood for personal use a year... i wonder what the sky would look like if everyone in London did the same with all that relatively damp wood. Take a look in the mirror my friend.

:thumbdown:

It's people like you responsible for rape of this beautiful planet we are care takers of. It doesn't belong to us anymore than the bees.

Before you discard the footprint of a container ship, which by the way is massive, you have to ask yourself is it necessary. In this instance the answer is NO.

I buy my firewood(70 tonnes a year for personal use) in cord from a local seller. Cord comes from no more than 60 mile away. If for some reason we get behind in processing we buy processed logs from local dealer who's logs come from woodland around 5 mile away. How's does this compare with your well travelled logs. And don't forget the extra carbon used inthe kiln drying process.

According to your logic we can import everything guilt free and discard footprint because it came on a big ship. Now think about all the related footprints associated with shipping. Like running massive docks and getting all fuel to docks, and actually building the unnecessary ship in the first place.

Your carbon figures are as creative as the governments!

You sound like a very responsible wood burner. Somehow i can't see the 12+ million population of London (where i live) sourcing firewood from Forests within 60 mile radius... i agree it would be wonderful if that were a reality if that were possible...but it's not. We live in the real world here.

Burning imported wood is still more environmentally responsible than burning fossil fuels to heat our homes which have taken millions of years to form - and which a majority of the UK population choose to do. So on that basis alone it's tough to take the moral high-ground.

JFYI - many kilns nowadays are heated by burning wood, so the net CO2 emmissions is nil.

cheers

You haven't really thought about that one mate. If you live next to the docks you may have a point, but your doing the road hauling all the same to deliver to customer. And what about all the road hauling in the country of origin. The trees didn't grow on the ship did they. Imo container ships have a huge carbon footprint, especially when there importing things we can easily supply ourselves.

From distribution to depot to customer is likely to be the same in both cases, on average. From forest to dist depot obviously depends on where the forest and distribution depot are relative to eachother, but all i'm saying is that there may not be much in it, because for the imported case, the shipping leg can be excluded from the equation, since the ships carry something like 10,000 containers, so on a per container basis the carbon footprint is negligible vs the road haulage required in both cases.

im not sure about your last statement - maybe easy but it's expensive...

nowt like getting a free ad with your first post:001_rolleyes:

i don't follow....

How is a kiln dried log @ 20% mc better than air dried @ 20% please (bugs dont count) and what species hardwoods did you supply yourself with ?

 

 

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it's not, but i've found the seasoned/air-dried log deliveries i've had in the past are not reliably less than 20%. With kiln dried it's guaranteed.

Their crates are a mixture of hardwoods but i believe always at least half Birch which seems to burn very hot in our stove. I don’t care about bugs – but I always test the moisture and it has never been above 16%.

For me, it's a no brainer....kiln dried logs are far superior to seasoned logs and a pleasure to burn...and for around the same price. I don't really buy the environmental argument either since most imported wood comes in by container ship which has a fairly low carbon footprint....eg vs hauling long distances via road all across the UK which a lot of the UK-sourced wood suppliers have to do anyway and is no better IMO

I've purchased from The Luxury Wood Company a few times now and been thoroughly impressed. I haven't found anyone cheaper on the web yet and they seem to be the best value for money:

www.luxurywood.co.uk

Check them out. HTH