February 22, 2022: For the first time in more than two decades, Big Green has decided to take on “big timber” issues on the National Forests, announcing a campaign designed to pressure the Biden Administration to “protect mature trees and forests on Federal lands,” claiming doing so is “critical” to combatting climate change.
The “Climate Forests Campaign” was announced on Tuesday by the Sierra Club, Center for Biological Diversity, Natural Resources Defense Council, and the League of Conservation voters; four groups whose total annual budgets exceed $450 million.
The groups, who are apparently not familiar with the carbon impacts of wildfire, claim that “older forests, store vast amounts of carbon” and that management “releases most of that carbon back into the atmosphere.” Wildfires on National Forest lands in California in 2020 released the C02 equivalent of emissions from about11 million cars. Wildfires in 2018 emitted enough carbon to charge over 17 trillion cell phones.
Fascinatingly, the groups claim that we shouldn’t cut “mature” or “old growth” trees on the National Forest System because standing forests account for “more than 95 percent of forest carbon,” with less than 4 percent of carbon stored in products (like lumber or panels).
“The National Forests have supplied over half a trillion board feet of timber to meet the needs of the American people since 1940. Yet miraculously, these forests, by these groups own account, still store massive amounts of carbon. Seems like a good idea to keep managing them to me,” said FFRC Executive Director Bill Imbergamo.
In what amounts to continued self-parody, the groups claim that older forests provide unique habitat for a variety of species, mentioning the Red Cockaded Woodpecker. The Red Cockaded Woodpecker strongly prefers mature Longleaf or Shortleaf pine forests, and the Forest Service’s timber sale program creates millions of acres of those forests through active management, including the sale of sawtimber. As you can see, Red Cockaded Woodpecker nesting clusters are thriving on the South’s National Forests.
The “green” groups clearly aren’t actually concerned about protecting old or big trees, as these trees have been going up in flames on the National Forests in droves since these groups jawboned the Clinton Administration into crashing the National Forest timber sale program in the early 1990’s. “The objective here is to muddy the waters and throw up one more roadblock to management. Half the National Forest System is off limits to management – either roadless, wilderness, or wild and scenic rivers. Harvest on the rest is strictly limited, and groups like this have ample opportunities to sue if they have site specific concerns,” Imbergamo said. “There’s no accident that they rolled out this strategy just a few weeks after Chief Moore announced an effort to step up management on our fire prone forests.”
“Adopting a ‘mature tree’ conservation policy isn’t meant to conserve big trees. It’s an effort to distract from what everyone knows needs to happen. The Biden Administration would be wise to listen to their own forest scientists and managers, and to keep managing the unreserved National Forests to provide benefits to all Americans.”
For more information, contact Bill Imbergamo, FFRC Executive Director, [email protected]; 703-629-6877