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Dovetail Commentary I'm Feeling Guilty - and I'm Not Catholic Jeff Howe, May 2005 Last month's article on recycling started me thinking, and I began to look around our office, and evaluate our paper usage. We are a small office, but we seem to recycle a lot of paper. And we try to do all the little things correctly. I mean, we print on both sides, and when we don't, we use the backside of paper as notepaper. And we save everything we can. We reuse envelopes that come in, we save all scraps for notepaper, etc. etc. Heck, even when I have the occasion to be generous enough to buy more than one coffee at the local coffee shop, and require a carrier, I return that cardboard carrier the next time I go in. (You should have seen their faces at the coffee shop the first time I did that! I was obviously the first!). But even with all that being said, we still generate a sizeable box of waste paper to recycle every couple weeks. So I began to do a little self-evaluation. I found that much of my personal foundation as a do-gooder has its basis in my skills at recycling. Because I recycle, I feel less concerned about the volume of paper I use personally and less outraged at the volume of junk pressed upon me through the mail, in packaging, and within the newspaper. I've concluded that, in spite of my smug self-importance as an “environmentalist,” I am probably using more paper today than I did ten years ago. Oops! To read the commentary, click here. Dovetail Reports All reports are available online at: http://www.dovetailinc.org/publications.htm Bio-Energy: Momentum is Building for Large Scale Development Dr. Jim Bowyer After decades of debate about how long the age of petroleum abundance might last, it now appears that the year of peak petroleum production worldwide may be in sight. With the peak now likely to occur within one to three decades, complacency is beginning to be replaced by a sense of urgency. Alternative fuels and energy sources will soon be needed. So, too will alternative sources of chemicals and industrial feedstock now provided as by-products from liquid fuels production. The potential for production of biomass-derived energy is outlined in a recent report issued jointly by the U.S. Department of Energy and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Goals as set forth in this report are based on use of 1.0 billion dry tons of biomass annually: by 2030 biomass will supply 5 percent of the nation’s power, 20 percent of its transportation fuels, and 25 percent of its industrial chemicals and chemical feedstocks. This goal is equivalent to 30 percent of current petroleum consumption. Nonetheless, the potential supply of bio-resources is not unlimited. Production of biomass for energy production will bring non-trivial impacts to producing areas, and caution will be needed to ensure that depletion of one non-renewable resource – petroleum – isn’t simply replaced by depletion of another critical resource – soil. The future will likely require demand-side management in addition to ongoing development of new energy supplies. To read the introduction online and access the full report, click here. Chain-of-Custody Certification: What is It, Why do It, and How? Dr. Jeff Howe Most certification systems are designed to operate as market-based incentive programs that hope to attract customers by communicating something about production processes or the origins of the raw materials in the certified product. Whether it is food produced without synthetic chemicals or paper from recycled fiber, eco-labels try to tell a story. A critical role of certification systems is to assure customers that the story is true. The verification of the story is the role of the chain-of-custody (COC) certification process. The key requirement for COC certified companies is that they have the ability to track materials back to the source and through every step of the supply chain. This degree of rigor is a means of assuring the integrity of the system and of addressing the increasing liability issues related to harvesting and international sourcing. A high quality certification process not only provides a credible, market-based mechanism for addressing customer concerns, it can also help businesses meet their own needs and interests. To read the introduction online and access the full report, click here. To order any of the Dovetail Reports , please contact us at 651-762-4007 or info@dovetailinc.org “The Outlook” is the monthly e-newsletter of Dovetail Partners Inc , a 501c3 non profit corporation. Dovetail Partners is a highly skilled team that collaborates to develop unique concepts, systems, programs and models to foster sustainable forestry and catalyze responsible trade and consumption.
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