Hot Off the Wire — 9/18/2022

WA Supreme Court: State Not Required to Cut Forests to Maximize Revenue

On July 21, the current state supreme court said unanimously that the state does indeed have a duty to the schools and other beneficiaries, BUT it also, as the constitution says, has a duty to “all the people.”  And the state doesn’t have to cut trees or maximize revenue from state lands. Read more
by Dan Chasan — Post Alley

---

Forest Products Industry Opposes Jefferson County Commissioners’ Efforts to Protect Old Growth Legacy Forests

Legacy growth forests were last logged prior to World War II and the start of industrial clear-cutting.  Jefferson County Commissioners have voiced support for protecting these forests that sequester carbon at remarkable rates.

The Commissioners’ support for protection hasn’t gone unnoticed by the forest products industry, which recently mailed postcards to county residents, asking them to oppose the Commissioners’ efforts.  The mailing came from a well-funded lobbying organization called Healthy Forests, Healthy Communities which has no paid staff, and identifies in its public records just one person as a principal–and that person is also the executive director of a Portland-based group called the American Forest Resource Council, a trade association whose members include the Port of Port Angeles (a major log exporter), Hermann Brothers Logging, and the wood products company Interfor.

Send Commissioners a note to thank them for their efforts and ask them to continue working to preserve our legacy forests. Commissioners’ email address — JeffBoCC@co.jefferson.wa.us

---

Stop burning trees for electricity

Burning forests for electricity – also known as biomass – is dirtier than coal at the smokestack and is destroying some of the most carbon-rich forests in Canada, the U.S. and Europe. 
The lie: we have been told that forest biomass is made with waste wood, tree tops and branches. The truth: whole trees and forests are being logged to burn in the name of ‘clean energy.’ 

Add your name

---

Fireside Chat: Northwest Forests in a Changing Climate

Thanks to all those who made it to the August zoom Fireside Chat with Kirk Hanson, Kai Hoffman-Krull, and other forest landowners and managers from around the PNW. Figuring out how to plant, grow, and steward a climate-adapted forest is a fascinating — and pressing! — topic, and it was great to see so much interest in it. 

For those who weren’t there, here is a recording of the chat. The full playlist of the last five chats is available on NNRG’s youtube channel here.

Below are some of the resources mentioned in the chat. 

• NNRG’s Climate Adaptation webpage:  https://www.nnrg.org/climateadaptation/
• NNRG’s guidebook Climate Adaptation Strategies for Pacific Northwest Forests: View PDF here
• Indians, Fire, and the Land in the Pacific Northwest: This is the book Kai Hoffman-Krull discussed, which includes a chapter by Robert Boyd and Aldo Leopold summarizing a research project by Henry Hansen from OSU on historic species composition in the PNW. It is available for purchase on Amazon, or you can check your local library for a copy.
• Seedlot Selection Tool: Web-based mapping application that can be used to map current or future climates based on different climate change scenarios to inform the selection of seedlings for tree planting as part of reforestation and restoration efforts.  https://seedlotselectiontool.org/sst/

Wednesday, September 21 @ 7:30pm | Topic: Increasing Fire Resilience in the San Juan Islands

Click here to register

The Burn Test

Prescribed burns mimic nature in a way. Indigenous communities in the western United States long carried out prescribed burns, but that was before climate change and decades of fire suppression made fires as fierce and unpredictable as they are now. Read more

by Somini Sengupta — Climate Forward

---

Bull Kelp Urgently Needs Protection

---

Logging makes forests and homes more vulnerable to wildfires

Many of the nation’s top climate scientists and ecologists recently urged Congress to remove the logging subsidies from the Build Back Better bill. Scientists noted that logging now emits about as much carbon dioxide each year as does burning coal. They also noted that logging conducted under the guise of “forest thinning” does not stop large wildfires that are driven mainly by extreme fire weather caused primarily by climate change. Read more

by Chad T. Hanson and Dominique A. Dellasala

---

Longer Rotations and Carbon

It’s no secret that contemporary industrial timber practices fall short of realizing the potential of Pacific Northwest forests to sequester carbon. Whether it’s the allure of quick financial returns, the constraints of high discount rates, or the notion of fiduciary responsibility, most industrial owners west of the Cascades cut their evergreen forests soon after they grow to merchantable size — at 35 to 45 years old, depending on the growing conditions on the site. Read more

by Seth Zuckerman — Northwest Natural Resource Group

---

FEMA Ecosystem
Service Value Updates

A new FEMA report dramatically reevaluates the ecosystem services value of forests, from $554/acre/year in 2014, to $12,589/acre/year in 2021. Our Pacific Northwest forests are clearly even more valuable than this national average! Read more

Protect the Amazon

The Indigenous-led Amazonia for Life 80×2025 initiative has laid out a pathway for protecting the remaining parts of the Amazon. It centers on recognizing territorial rights of native populations and legislating protections for 80% of the remaining rainforest. The initiative has been backed by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and is now gaining traction at the United Nations.

Sign the initiative

---

Tell Vanguard to stop financing environmental destruction!

Asset manager Vanguard is complicit in human rights abuses through direct financing of extractive industries causing irreparable damage to our climate and harming frontline and Indigenous communities.

Petroperú is attempting to drill on Indigenous Achuar and Wampis territories in Peru without the community’s Free, Prior, and Informed Consent. As the oil company seeks financing from banks and asset managers – including Vanguard – now is the moment to demand an end to these irresponsible and damaging investments.

Later this month, Amazon Watch will accompany a delegation of Indigenous and affected communities from Peru to Vanguard’s headquarters in Malvern, Pennsylvania. There we will deliver your signatures demanding an end to Vanguard’s purchasing of toxic bonds from Petroperú.

Add your name

The crown and climate

The new king of Britain, Charles III, has long been outspoken on conservation and climate change. So I want to use today’s newsletter to fill in some context about Charles, the institution he represents, and his country’s efforts to tackle global warming. Read more by Somini Sengupta –Climate Forward

What’s the true cost of an induction stove?

What’s the true cost of a heat pump?

Companies Are Buying Large Numbers of Carbon Offsets That Don’t Cut Emissions

With the boom in renewable energy, many of the credits that trade hands merely represent a transfer of money from one profitable enterprise to another. Read more

by Shane Shifflett — The Wall Street News