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Creating clean energy hubs in communities across the world.Gogan believes it would be unforgivably unrealistic to think we could simply abandon the existing coal power plant infrastructure.

These plants are the source of reliable electricity for citizens that need it across the world, and maintaining that energy is incredibly important for economic growth in places like Asia, China, India and Africa, as well as being vital for resilience against the climate impacts these areas are already facing..Furthermore, in countries with old coal, including the US, Canada and Europe, entire communities are economically reliant on the coal plants.Shutting them down would cause substantial unemployment and hardship.

In the United States alone there are 260 gigawatts of operating coal.Repowering the existing coal power plants using advanced heat sources presents a key political opportunity to garner bipartisan support for climate action in a way that maintains jobs, socio-economic benefits and tax revenues in those communities.. Another key point to consider is that the majority of the existing, global coal fleet is just fourteen years old, representing a trillion dollars of unrecovered capital.

The prospect of the retirement of that fleet is highly unattractive for most of those owners and investors.

However, if we repower the existing coal power plants with advanced heat sources instead of shutting them down, the plants will likely run at a much higher capacity factor than they do today and at lower cost.To meet increased demand for engineered timber, we need to carefully consider land availability and the impact on ecosystems..

While sustainable forest management (FSC or PEFC) is the best tool available to ensure a reasonable exploitation of timber, these certifications aren’t perfect.Natural forests are complex biodiverse ecosystems that capture carbon, not just in trees but also within soil.

A ‘tree plantation’ unlike a forest, may not enhance biodiversity and may have a reduced capacity to store carbon in the soil.. One major risk related to carbon accounting and forest management is that Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) may not adequately account for the carbon released from decaying root net and from the soil when cutting trees.This can be largely underestimated for most timber products.. We must also acknowledge that sustainable foresting cannot produce enough timber to respond to global construction needs.