NASF joined a coalition of 163 organizations signing on to a letter to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson urging the agency to correct the final Prevention of Significant Deterioration and Title V Greenhouse Gas Tailoring Rule (Tailoring Rule), which would treat greenhouse gas emissions from the combustion of biomass the same as such emissions from the combustion of fossil fuels.

We write to thank you for your leadership in advancing a sustainable renewable energy policy, responsible land management, and rural America through a broad definition for renewable biomass in energy and climate policy.

Letter to Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee leadership: As Congress considers energy and climate change legislation, we urge you to appropriately include renewable forest biomass as an energy source to meet a renewable electricity standard (RES) should one be adopted. Forest biomass is plentiful, carbon-neutral and essential to meet the RES standard, particularly in areas of the country that are not able to produce energy from other renewable sources, like wind and solar.

Our members have a public trust responsibility for managing and protecting two-thirds of the nation's forestland, which is held in private or non-federal public ownership. We join you in recognizing the flaws found in the current definition for renewable biomass included in the Renewable Fuels Standard (RFS) and support a broadened definition such as the one introduced in the Renewable Biomass Facilitation Act (HR 1190) and its companion bill in the Senate (S 636).