The Berkshire forested landscape is the basis of the region's economy; it also appeals to developers hoping to cash in on taxpayer- & ratepayer-financed incentives to burn trees for power. The proposed Dalton/Pittsfield oil refinery would perhaps be the most destructive of several schemes that seek to strip-mine Berkshire forests.
http://www.energyjustice.net/files/biomass/factsheet-biomass.pdf
Current science considers industrial biomass/biofuel burning to be harmful to the earth's climate:
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/326/5952/527.short
There is a clear link between the kinds of pollution generated by biomass/biofuel burning and increased illness, emergency room visits and medication use, as well as with shortened human life-spans:
The New York Times notes that: "Today, the re-growing forests of the Eastern United States are among the most important carbon sponges in the world."
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/01/science/earth/01forest.html?pagewanted=4&_r=1&src=recg
The Dalton/Pittsfield tree-eating oil refinery will not only increase local emissions of carbon and other pollutants but will threaten the region's carbon-sequestering forests. It will burn 6 trees as waste heat for every 4 trees that will be used for power. It's developers, largely out-of state corporations, hope to finance it using money diverted from taxpaying and ratepaying citizens. High-stakes lobbying by industry concerns is shaping laws to benefit speculators: see Effiency Page.