New UK rules on biomass upset both industry and environmental campaigners last week, as regulations failed to reassure companies of continuing financial support and simultaneously worried green groups that they would open the door to the use of biomass linked to deforestation in other countries. The proposals put strict limits on how the government would support biomass, setting it at a disadvantage to other forms of generation as some new plants will be excluded from new contracts. Biomass plants will only be considered if they store and reuse heat in a process known as "combined heat and power." Industry representatives have said that such power is only suitable where there are buildings nearby to receive stored heat, and plants are rarely allowed to build near such areas. The plans also upset activists, with a Greenpeace spokesperson saying, "the loopholes in these sustainability standards are big enough to drive a logging truck through . . . the climate isn't going to fall for creative accounting and neither should the public." For the full story, see http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/aug/22/regulations-fresh-row-biomass-power.