Burned Screening and Q&A in Amsterdam, 27th July

“Burned – Are Trees the New Coal?” is an award-winning documentary that reveals the destruction of southern US forests for biomass energy, much of it shipped to European power stations, including ones in the Netherlands. It explores the policy loopholes, huge subsidies and the greenwashing of the biomass power industry – and asks how energy companies have succeeded in attracting generous renewable energy subsidies for what is a very high-carbon form of energy.

The film screening is followed by a Q&A and discussion with three international experts in bioenergy:

Rita Frost, based in North Carolina, works with Dogwood Alliance, and NGO that seeks to protect the biodiverse forests of the region from destruction, increasingly for pellet exports. Dogwood Alliance works closely with communities affected by pellet plants and the pollution and forest destruction they cause.

Peg Putt, a long-standing forest campaigner from Tasmania, chairs an international biomass working group of NGOs, hosted by the Environmental Paper Network, a network of over 140 NGOs worldwide.

Almuth Ernsting, based in Scotland, has been working with the UK/US campaigning organisation Biofuelwatch since 2006, carrying out research, campaigning and advocacy in relation to the impacts of different forms of large-scale bioenergy.