Environment & Energy
Related: About this forumBamboo, a solution to many problems in Africa.
from NY Times..
In the district of Asosa, the land is thick with bamboo. People plant it and manage the forests. They rely on its soil-grabbing roots to stabilize steep slopes and riverbanks, cutting erosion. They harvest it to burn for fuel, to make into charcoal sticks to sell to city dwellers and to build furniture.
Asosa is not in China, not even in Asia. It is a district in the west of Ethiopia, on the Sudanese border. To many people, bamboo means China. But its not just panda food mountain gorillas in Rwanda also live on bamboo. About 4 percent of Africas forest cover is bamboo.
Soon it may be much more. Bamboo may provide a solution to a very serious problem: deforestation. In sub-Saharan Africa, 70 percent of the people cook their meals over wood fires. The very poorest cut down trees for cooking fuel; those slightly less poor buy charcoal made from wood in those same forests. Every year Africa loses forest cover equal to the size of Switzerland. Terence Sunderland, a senior scientist at the Indonesia-based Center for International Forestry Research, said that in southern Africa, even trees that can be used for fine carving, such as ebony and rosewood, are being cut down and made into charcoal.
Deforestation starts a vicious circle of drought and environmental decline. Burning wood releases the carbon stored inside. And deforestation accounts for at least a fifth of all carbon emissions globally. As tree cover vanishes, the land dries out and the soil erodes and becomes barren a major reason for Ethiopias periodic famines.
more: http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/13/in-africas-vanishing-forests-the-benefits-of-bamboo/?hp
=======================
Bamboo is an incredible renewable resource.
madokie
(51,076 posts)I really liked working with it when I was installing it. It just felt so good almost like it was too good to put on the floor.
DCBob
(24,689 posts)Its has incredible strength, structural and visual properties.
jeff47
(26,549 posts)So does burning bamboo.
However, neither is a net carbon producer, since that carbon was recently removed from the atmosphere.
Summer Hathaway
(2,770 posts)May I add that bamboo fibers are now being used to produce some of the most luxurious yarns ever seen!
These yarns are incredibly soft, absorb dyes well, and have a natural sheen. Very popular among all needlewomen (and men), especially those who are environmentally aware.
XemaSab
(60,212 posts)It grows fast, and one can build fairly large, flexible buildings out of it. Certainly large and safe enough for families to live in.
It would hold the soil, too.
On the Road
(20,783 posts)but so did the southeast when kudzu was brought in from Japan. I just hope it stays under control in areas where it can do some good.