Changing the rules to win the game.

Wood qualifies as renewable energy, on the logic that trees ultimately grow back. However, I would argue that while trees can be replanted, it can take generations for a growing forest to reabsorb the carbon dioxide that was emitted by burning the wood.

European nations can count wood power toward their clean-energy targets, the E.U. scientific research agency said last year that burning wood released more carbon dioxide than would have been emitted had that energy come from fossil fuels.

In pine and hardwood forests of the southern United States. There are 23 mills in the region, with a potential output of more than 10 million tons of wood biomass annually. In North Carolina alone, Enviva, the world’s largest wood pellet producer, operates four facilities and may be planning to open a fifth in the region in 2024. Most of the biomass produced heads overseas, and British company Drax is one of Enviva’s biggest customers at its power station in northern England, Drax converted four generating units from coal to biomass, and in 2018, generated 7.4 percent of the United Kingdom’s “renewable” power. In 2020, Drax reportedly earned £832 million (more than $1 billion) in government subsidies, plus an estimated £258 million ($340 million) in tax incentives for biomass production.

I will take Germany as an example here as they are cutting down trees and burning wood pellets as part of their renewable energy in the form of Biomass, Germany has the most wind power in the EU with 132.10 MW however the Germany household electricity price was $0.44 per kilowatt – hour https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/wind-power-by-country the electricity global average price was $0.14 per kilowatt-hour.

“Over one year a mature tree will take up about 22 kilograms of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, and in exchange release oxygen. Each year, 1.3 million trees are estimated to remove more than 2500 tonnes of pollutants from the air.” https://www.eea.europa.eu/articles/forests-health-and-climate-change/key-facts/trees-help-tackle-climate-change

In 2021, biomass contributed to 7.6 percent of the German energy mix, peaking at 7.7 percent in 2020. https://www.statista.com/statistics/737705/energy-mix-biomass-germany/

The drive to “Net Zero” in order to save the World does not make any sense, In 2019 the EU emitted less than 9% of the worldwide CO₂ emissions for that year, so even if the whole of Europe stopped emitting CO₂  all that would change is it would cripple their economies and drive populations into poverty.

If you believe that anthropogenic global warming is going to lead to catastrophic destruction of the Earth then something needs to be done, but unreasoned panic is not the answer. Chopping down trees to burn is unreasonable, against the science and will in fact advance the narrative.