Posted by: Kim_Hamilton on 04/10/2008 10:07 PM
Updated by: Kim_Hamilton on 04/10/2008 10:08 PM
Expires: 01/01/2013 12:00 AM
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Sierra Logger Swings an Axe at the Climate Report Shows How Massive Clearcutting Contributes to Global Warming~By Josh Bridges of EPFW
San Francisco, CA...International environmental organization ForestEthics (FE) will release Climate of Destruction: Sierra Pacific Industries' Impact on Global Warming, a scathing report on timber giant Sierra Pacific Industries (SPI), exposing their stated intent to methodically convert to plantations up to one million acres in the next half century, potentially exacerbating climate crisis....
An electronic version of the Report is available at http://www.savethesierra.org/climateofdestruction.
See info on speakers, below. Simultaneous press events will take place in Redding, near SPI headquarters, and in San Francisco.
As an alarm is sounded around the globe in recognition of the speed at which human-caused activities are bringing climate crisis closer, a lumbering giant in California has not progressed from the last century, raking in profits while the situation literally heats up. Deforestation is the second most significant cause of greenhouse gas emissions causing climate instability, second only to fossil fuel emissions.
ForestEthic's report compiled dramatic data from California Dept. of Forestry and Fire Protection (CalFIRE), the regulatory agency that oversees private lands logging in California to compare logging methods such as selection logging and clearcutting employed on SPI's 1.7 million acres. The data is publicly available, but has never been compiled and presented in this way. Figures show that from 1997-2006, SPI filed plans for clearcutting and plantation conversion on nearly a quarter of a million acres.
“SPI’s clearcutting, and conversion to plantations, has been known for a long time,” said Susan Robinson, a Forest Watch board member. “However, this report shows for the first time the magnitude of this destruction and their undeniable impact on global warming.”
Despite their 2001 announced intention to reduce clearcutting on their land by 70%, the company has made a dramatic shift away from the more sustainable selection logging to an agenda that averaged seven times more clearcutting and plantation conversion between 1999 and 2006. Not only are plantations devoid of the biological diversity necessary for habitat for forest species, but clearcutting releases significant amounts of carbon dioxide. Scientists have shown that logging-and clear-cutting in particular-removes more carbon from the forest than any other disturbance, including fire.
Clearly, at a time when ice shelves in Antarctica are melting much faster than predicted, and scientists worldwide are urging much stronger mitigation measures, SPI's trajectory toward plantations, sending vast amounts of carbon into the atmosphere, charges headlong in the opposite direction.
California's forward-looking policies are putting the state out in front as a leader in efforts to reduce CO 2 emissions, through landmark legislation like AB 32, California's carbon emission reduction goals, and Atty. General Jerry Brown's directive to local governments to account for climate change in their general plans. Additionally, Assemblywoman Sally Lieber's AB 2926 reforms standards for clearcutting with regards to size and rotation.
“Calaveras County, like all of California, is under the mandate of AB 32 to reduce carbon emissions by 25% in the next 12 years. That will be hard to do under any circumstances, and even harder given the large scale of clearcutting over which the county exercises no control," said Penny Sarvis of the Community Action Project.
ForestEthics is calling on consumers, contractors and building professionals to steer clear of SPI products until their policies are reformed. ForestEthics has released the names of over 525 businesses that have signed a letter calling on SPI to end its destructive clearcutting, including many California-based wood products businesses (available upon request). ForestEthics also points out that becoming certified by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) would be a step toward corporate responsibility for the largest land owner in California, and the second largest private landowner in the U.S. FSC monitors logging practices in order to put sustainably harvested lumber on the market.
SPI's practices have been controversial in the past as well. But, despite SPI president Red Emmerson's 2001 claim that "We want to be good neighbors," when he pledged to reduce clearcutting, actual neighbors of SPI land see firsthand disastrous consequences from their practices. “The common-sense approach to forest management in the face of a changing climate is to restore resiliency to our forests,” said Warren Alford, Community Forestry Coordinator for Sierra Forest Legacy, a 96 member conservation coalition. “Clearcutting diverse forests and replacing them with even-aged plantations takes us in the wrong direction, leaving our forests, and communities, more vulnerable to unwanted fire and pest infestations.”
Speakers at the press conference will include, Penny Sarvis of the Community Action Project, who will discuss how SPI's trajectory compromises her county's carbon emissions goal, Susan Robinson and Addie Jacobson of Ebbetts Pass Forest Watch, and Dale Sanders.
Available press packet materials:
o Business letter to Sierra Pacific Industries, list of businesses signed on
o Video footage at http://stopclearcuttingcalifornia.org/video/B-Roll/
Additional experts available for comment or interviews:
o Mark Harmon, Richardson Chair and Professor, Forest Science, Oregon State University (541) 737-8455; email mark.harmon@oregonstate.edu to set up interview time.
o Dr. Olga Krankina, professor and researcher, Forest Science, Oregon State University, (541) 737-1780; krankinao@fsl.orst.edu
o Assembly Speaker Pro Tem Sally Lieber, author of AB 2926, currently in California Legislature.
(916) 319-2022; chief of staff Corey Jasperson cory.jasperson@asm.ca.gov
Josh Bridges
Outreach Coordinator
Ebbetts Pass Forest Watch
PO Box 73, Avery, Ca 95224
209-795-1093
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