Hey Corvus. You want proof?
What sort of proof are you after?
I could offer proof to my argument, but one could argue to discredit the authors of any information I provide as proof.
If someone chooses to do that, then I have no argument left unless I go and find another source of information for someone to discredit.
So I will offer information as I see relevant to support my points.
However, all my proof comes from the perceived "experts" - people that are supposed to know what they are talking about.
The only real proof is retrospective - like if it gets built and it turns into an environmental and financial disaster, there's your proof.
And if it is as clean and green as Gunns might want us to believe, then there will be your proof on the other hand.
So until it is done, there is no hard and fast "proof", only facts and figures and claims by "experts".
OK but first off, let's get something straight.
Value adding to any Tasmanian product
is, generally speaking,
a good idea.The way it is done may not necessarily be so.
1. Pulp mill too big for Tasmania
2. Pulp mill too expensive compared to mills in other places
3. Pulp mill site in the Tamar valley in wrong location.
That will do for now.
1. The amount of timber required to feed the mill is staggering.
Let's do the maths together. And for accuracy, we'll use figures from Gunns.
http://www.gunnspulpmill.com.au/faqs.phpHow much wood will be processed in the proposed pulp mill?
The pulp mill will not require additional intensification of forestry operations. It will instead divert resource that otherwise would have been exported in chip form to the pulp mill for value-added processing. In the initial stages of operation, about 3.2 million green tonnes of pulp wood per year will be processed
3,200,000 divided by 365 = 8767.1 tonnes a day. Let's assume they only run in daylight - on average, 12 hours. Less in winter, more in summer but call it an average 12 hours per day.
730.6 tonnes an hour, 12 hours a day, every day.
Now let's assume a 20 tonne log truck. 36 trucks an hour. Or one every 36 seconds.
Remember, from their own words "initial stages".
And reading that link further,
How much pulp will be produced?
The proposed pulp mill will, in the initial stages, produce about 820,000 air dried tonnes of pulp and will have the capacity to produce up to 1.1 million air dried tonnes of pulp for domestic and international markets.
So assuming the same percentages of raw product are required to produce this increase from "initial stages" to "capacity", we multiply our earlier figure of 730.6 tonnes an hour by 1.341 (take 1.1 million, divide by 820K and we have our multiply figure).
980 tonnes of logs an hour, 12 hours a day, every day.
Even if they run on the roads 24 hours a day, that's a 20 tonne truck every 73 seconds.
You get the idea? Too big for this state.
Oh, but that's right, we needn't fear, as nothing will change, they're doing it already - as already quoted...
The pulp mill will not require additional intensification of forestry operations. It will instead divert resource that otherwise would have been exported in chip form to the pulp mill for value-added processing.
And, don't forget,
The primary wood source for this project will be plantation-grown eucalypts, regrowth forest eucalypts and a small proportion of plantation pine. No old growth logs will be used in the pulp mill.
There in their own admission is that there is no current need for old growth logging, yet still it continues.
The proposed mill will continue to need to be fed in part from sources other than plantation. This means areas of regrowth. Places that have been logged before, but have re-established into what the uninitiated may believe to be an area of original forest.
Ref -
http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/conten ... 039730.htm(That's an interesting and enlightening read, though a little outdated and the latest report seems to be in my
attachment)
At start up the pulp mill is using 80 per cent native forests. Gunns only pays $12 to $15 a tonne for that wood. If Gunns wants to use plantation wood it's going to have to pay $30, $35 a tonne.
So at start-up, 4 out of every 5 trucks on the road will be carrying native forests. Lots of em.
I know how big a log truck is, and one every 73 seconds is a LOT of wood.
And if they do run only 12 hours a day, that's one every 37 seconds.
Thinking about it, it's a pretty serious operation they have at the end that can cope with that much wood.
So what happens when the native forests are harvested and replaced with plantations?
Won't happen?
http://www.echo.net.au/archives/20_12/pdf/p13.pdfThe second vision, the one that Tasmanians are actually getting, is the 2020 Vision which is destroying native forests including old growth and replacing them with plantations.
‘It is a mad rush to actually clear as much land and plant out as much of it as possible, regardless of the consequences.’
2. Too expensive.
My argument for the Tasmanian mill being too expensive compared with mills in other places can be read in the attachment in
this post.
3. Wrong location.
This post has already grown beyond what I initially intended. So I will leave it at that for now. Go read the facts and make your own conclusions. I've made mine.
I feel it a shame that the state is missing out on revenue because of the inability to value-add to this raw product. But at what cost?
There are better ways for the state to make a buck.
As you mentioned, "clever use" of our resources.
One of them would be for Forestry to revise the way they charge Gunns for the forests.
http://www.echo.net.au/archives/20_12/pdf/p13.pdfthe outstanding fact that in one year while supervising the clearing of over 17,000 hectares of public forest, the government through Forestry Tasmania made a profi t of only $3 million. At the same time Gunns [Timber Company] made a profi t of $104 million. Basically Gunns are getting access to Tasmania’s public forest very cheap and the people of Tasmania are earning virtually nothing from it,’
Another might be for the whole package to be considered, not just making pulp for export.
http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/conten ... 039730.htmBut with its Japanese woodchip market in decline, the company is being forced to take a step up the production line to make its own pulp. Unlike every other pulp mill in Australia, it won't run its own paper mill. Instead it will sell its pulp straight onto the world market and therein lies the risk.
I rest my case. For now.