Wood pellet mills tend to catch fire. Why do you build in California?

This story originally appeared to Grain and is part of the Climate switch Cooperation.

Design wood pellets are very flammable. The small pieces of compressed wooden residues, such as sawdust, are used in all from the heating at home to grilling. But their combustible nature has led to dangerous working conditions: at least 52 fires have broken out in the facilities since 2010 that produce wood pellets in the United States, according to a database with incidents that have been put together by the Southern Environmental Law Center.

Of the 15 largest wood pellets, at least eight fires or explosions have had at least eight fires or explosions since 2014. after To the environmental integrity project, a non -profit organization founded by a former director of the US environmental protection authority.

At the same time, the world’s largest biomass company Drax trees throughout North America with the promise to sell them as a replacement for fossil fuels. But his track record is also checked with accidents.

In South Shields, Great Britain, wood pellets that are intended for a drax work spontaneously burned While he was stored in the port of Tyne, the extinguishing of a fire started that took 40 firefighters for 12 hours. In Port Allen, Louisiana, a Drax Wood Pellet facility broke up in flames in November 2021.

Although Drax is in the middle of a lawsuit because of accidental fire damage in the midst of right damage, Drax is pushing with a new business proposal. It’s not just about fitting trees to produce wood pellets, but also, as the company argues, also to stop forest fires.

In October 2023, after he bought two plots in California to build two pellet mills, one in Tuolumne County and another in the country County, Drax’s partner organization, Golden State Natural Resources, or GSNR, “A non -profit public advantage,” she met with residents of Tuolumne County, which deals with the manufacturer of forest programs.

Since then, GSNR has advertised his close work with community members. According to Megan Fiske, who teaches rural workers at a local college in the community, the residents who lived near the proposed Pellet Mill locations were not always aware of the plans. “People who were hundreds of meters from the (proposed) pellet plant had no idea about it,” said Fiske.

Both proposed mills are located in forested areas that were threatened by forest fires. When asked about the risks that the production of wood pellets gives up the production of wood pellets, Patrick Blacklock, Executive Director of GSNR, told Grist: “We tried to learn from these incidents.

If district representatives agree to the plan, the timber fallers “dead or dying trees” and “Woody Biomass” may take from 100 miles from the pellet mills within the two counties from the Stanislaus National Forest and the Yosemite National Park.

Fiske said she saw cases that have nothing to do with Drax, where lumberjacks were not properly trained and in the end more wood has taken more than a forest fire resilience scheme. “There is a difference between what the wooden fellers are told and what happens on site,” said Fiske. They have “inexperienced or young people who are underpaid, maybe English is not their mother tongue, so there are many barriers.”