About eight years ago a terrible winter storm encrusted my region with thick sheets ice. In a moment of unexpected foresight, the local administration provided free trees (actually seedlings) to replace the ones destroyed by ice. My little pine seedling took advantage of fair soil and amenable winters to grow. This year it finally matured and made pinecones. It’s ready to participate in the circle of life.
There’s another sobering side to this success story. If I were to cut down my eight year old pine tree, I’d have at best 20 kilograms of wood and needles. The energy content of green wood fuel is about 10 MJ/kg hence in eight years, my patch of land had accumlated 200 MJ of energy. Over the same eight years I used about 316,000 MJ to heat and light my home. The mismatch is striking.