Bioenergy share must be increased, but at a reasonable price
The CEO of Stora Enso, Jouko Karvinen, agrees with Finland’s goal to raise the bioenergy share in total energy production, but he demands that the Finnish decision makers have to make sure that the biomass pricing does not unreasonably escalate at the same time.
There has been a lively discussion lately about the relevance of forest biomass to Finnish energy production. While Finnish government and Minister of Economic Affairs Mauri Pekkarinen in particular, want to increase the share of forest biomass in the energy production by subsidizing it, the pulp industry is worried about how it will affect the supply of pulpwood and its price. “After all, chemical pulping mills are responsible for 70 per cent of renewable energy in Finland,” argues Jouko Karvinen, the CEO of Stora Enso, “and therefore Finnish renewable energy level is multiple times higher than EU average. It must be secured that subsidizing one form of bioenergy does not threaten the already existing production”, he continues. Jouko Karvinen leads 27 000 employees and 88 production facilities company in its mission to use and develop expertise in renewable materials. He sees the challenge of bioenergy being a twofold in nature. While there is a strong necessity to increase the bioenergy share in energy consumption fast, at the same the biomass prices threaten to escalate due to the growing demand. Karvinen suggests that the increase be carried out at a moderate pace and the governments should create the consistent policies and sustainability criteria in particular on bioenergy production and use. “These should be developed with care in order to avoid discriminating important biomass streams by setting unrealistic tracking and reporting requirements on biomass suppliers who often are small farmers and forest owners,” Karvinen says. Karvinen sees the unutilized possibilities in international co-operation in enhancing the competitiveness of bioenergy. He states that the key to any expanded use of biomass is the mobilization of energy biomass at competitive prices.
Tags: