DNR carbon reduction plan benefits international polluters, hurts WA rural communities
Everyone agrees Washington’s forests are essential to helping the state reach its climate goals. Thanks to the continuous cycle of forestry, which includes the planting, growing, harvesting and manufacturing of wood products, the state’s working forests already achieve net zero carbon emissions. They also support thousands of green jobs and prevent the conversion of forests to non-forests.
In their recent Tri-City Herald May 16 Guest Opinion, Hilary Franz and Jad Daley are correct that international climate experts are pointing to sustainable forestry as a key climate solution. Yet the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change also reminds us to look at the big picture: We lose gains in local carbon sequestration and storage whenever we disrupt the cycle of forestry and outsource our wood products from places that don’t share our commitment to environmental sustainability.
The Washington Department of Natural Resources’ (DNR) new carbon-offset initiative runs this risk because it discourages harvest of Washington-grown wood. This policy effectively promotes wood imports that enlarge our global carbon footprint, and it also encourages greater use of more energy-intensive building materials. It also hurts our rural communities, which shouldn’t have to pay the price for a policy that will have a negligible impact on global greenhouse gas emissions, while providing a fraction of revenues to support local public services.
The DNR manages 2.2 million acres of public working forests known as state trust lands to harvest timber and provide revenues for defined beneficiaries including schools, counties, fire districts, ports, hospitals and other community service providers. Every year, sustainable timber harvests on these working forests generate nearly $200 million annually for public services.
As working forests, these lands are managed under strict and modern forest practice rules and a State Lands Habitat Conservation Plan (HCP) that is supposed to ensure a continuous timber supply, while also providing for clean water, habitat for wildlife, and recreation opportunities. As a result, nearly half of DNR trust lands in western Washington are no longer available for sustainable timber management due to conservation plans and past decisions to protect old and mature trees. All these policies were developed through a public process.
DNR’s carbon project was not developed through a public process. There are many unanswered questions of how it will work, whether it will lead to actual carbon emission reductions, and how it will impact state trust land beneficiaries and the rural communities that are likely to be impacted through reduced jobs, economic activity and access to public services.
Policymakers should be wary of political proposals that pick winners and losers but ultimately fail to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. If not executed properly, a carbon offset initiative may benefit international polluters when it maintains the status quo and allows them to keep polluting and emitting carbon. Meanwhile, it hurts Washington companies that need wood from these working forests to make the only building material that is renewable, requires fewer fossil fuels to produce, and one that stores carbon.
Whether we are producing cross-laminated timber or traditional lumber, Washington state needs a forest sector with viable logging and milling capacity to remain competitive, provide affordable wood products and create family-wage jobs in rural communities. With timber volume on state trust lands already in decline, further reducing timber harvest from a carbon offset initiative puts this industry and the jobs at risk. It also reduces our capacity to thin overstocked stands and reduce the risks of severe wildfires that are turning many forests from carbon sinks to carbon sources.
The DNR carbon offset initiative may seem like a novel approach to climate change, but it fails to see the big picture and ignores solutions that are already working to sequester and store carbon, while providing green jobs as well as economic activity and revenues for public schools and community services.
Nick Smith is Public Affairs Director for the American Forest Resource Council , representing Washington’s forest sector that depends on timber management on DNR state trust lands.
