Biorenewable Resources and What It Entails
So, we all know that biorenewable resources are the way for a greener more sustainable environment, but how do humans specifically use plants as a biorenewable resource? Plants are a necessity in human lives as they take in carbon dioxide and release oxygen via photosynthesis to produce oxygen that we then breath in. Now you make ask, well besides that why else should we care? Well the other big reason is because the way plants grow eventually determines the type of products that can be produced. For example, heartwood is extremely valuable because of its strength and decay resistant properties (lesson 7). Plus, knots found in wood make wood less desirable since it disrupts the homogenous growth (lesson 7). Therefore, plants are more important to society than some may think.
In recent years though there has been an increase in the demand for wood biomass resulting in countries to create “plantation forests” in order to meet this demand. Plantation forests is basically where one species of trees is planted in a pattern to maximize the production of wood. However, there are many controversies over the use of plantation forests. One misconception of plantation forests is that they reduce the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere when in fact they do not. Native forests hold 3x as much CO2 as plantation forests and due to the short life cycle of plantation forests they technically add more CO2 to the atmosphere (Baldwin, 2017). Now you may be thinking well does that mean our native forests area is decreasing due to the creation of plantation forests and the increased demand for wood biomass? Well, you can relax because in the United States the forest area is actually on a slight increase as shown in Figure 1.
Yet, in other countries forest area is declining rapidly. For example, in Brazil the Amazon rainforest is undergoing deforestation due to the lack of government regulations and this lack of regulations has led countries to threaten cutting off supply chain with Brazil if change is not made over the next few months (Gonzales, 2020). However, biomass production also relates to crops so how are we planning to meet that demand? One method that is widely known is genetic modification. While it is another controversial topic, genetic modification poses a lot of benefits. One major benefit is that with genetically modified crops a farmer can create higher yields, more nutritious food, and greatly reduce the use of pesticides. Although there are equal reasons for why genetically modified foods should not be used, GMO’s should but integrated due to the benefits it can provide for our world.
A lot of stuff has been discussed in this blog, but a lot of this information I feel like needs to be more general knowledge. Before I learned about everything, I always thought I knew where we were at with biorenewable resources and the impact wood and crop biomass is having in our world, but I was wrong. I urge those reading, who are interested to definitely research more. However, like my last blog I believe every positive impact will also entail its respected negative impact and its key to find the happy balance between the two.
References:
· Lesson 7 Plant Growth, BBE 1002, UMN
· Image 1: lesson 9 Forest Trends, BBE 1002, UMN
· Plantations Pros and Cons, Pt 1/Pt2, Elizabeth Baldwin, https://hardwoodfloorsmag.com/2017/10/23/plantations-pros-cons-pt-1-cons/
· As Amazon tree loss worsens, political pressure grows, and Brazil hedges: Critics: https://news.mongabay.com/2020/08/as-amazon-tree-loss-worsens-political-pressure-grows-and-brazil-hedges-critics/
