Biomass clarity

It is not very clear whether your editorial (29 June) headed "Green energy boasts hit unintended threat" is calling for the combustion of biomass as a major renewable energy source.

The term "biomass" includes fossil fuels and includes any organic matter produced as a result of photosynthesis since prehistoric times.

The current environmental crisis and the resultant economic crisis are consequences of the political notion that human progress involves never-ending population explosion and economic growth. Since economic growth is the cause of the problem, it cannot be the soloution.

Global warming is associated with the loss of the equilibrium between photosynthesis asociated with carbon fixation, and carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere by human activity - from respiration, accidental fires and the widespread combustion of biomass as an energy source. This is only one aspect of the overall global problem of population explosion predicted by Malthis at the beginning of the industrial revolution.

A range of environmental pollution problems, involving irreversible dispersal of the limited reserves of metals on which we depend, is also involved.

(DR) DAVID PURVES

Strathalmond Road

Edinburgh