Forest Flash August 2021

Natural Infrastructure is a Critical Part of Infrastructure Bill

With increasing impacts of drought, fires and floods, there is much greater recognition that repairing and maintaining our natural infrastructure — our forested watersheds, meadows, wetlands and river systems — is as critical to our essential services like water as working on and investing in our built infrastructure. The recent Infrastructure bill passed by the U.S. Senate has begun to recognize this, with major investments in fire risk reduction, forest, and watershed function. These investments also have major benefits for jobs, climate adaptation and water security in a drought-plagued western United States.

PFT was honored to work with Senator Wyden to increase this investment by introducing an amendment to the bill that would fully recognize the water storage function of watersheds. While the Senate stopped hearing amendments early, PFT continues to work on gaining greater investment in watershed restoration and health with leaders like Congressman Huffman and the FUTURE Act. We are enormously grateful to Senator Wyden and Congressman Huffman for their leadership on this issue.

Forest Investments Provide a Significant Step Toward Climate Solution Needed

UNFCC’s recently issued IPCC report on the state of our climate is dire. This rare global scientific consensus represents both the need and opportunity for action in compelling terms. In the midst of this warning, we can take three immediate, effective and cost-efficient actions in our forests which, collectively, can make up almost half the climate solution needed:

We can stop losing our forests

In the United States, we convert some 1.5 million acres every year out of forest! Reducing forest loss in the U.S. would save hundreds of millions of tons of polluting CO2 emissions annually, and keep our forest sinks growing! It’s not just a “tropical forest” issue. We can, and we must, act here at home.

We can grow our forests to an older, more carbon-rich and climate-resilient condition

Managed, older forests store double and triple what young forests store, bringing added benefits like habitat and watershed health, while still yielding timber products. This is the biggest single source of near-term gains of carbon stocks over the next 10 to 30 years. U.S. forests include the most carbon-rich forests globally, and we should be managing for this benefit.

We can reforest where forests have been lost

While young forests may not store much carbon, over many decades they are a powerful contribution to the solution for the future! Providing the right incentives and market signals for landowners to conserve and manage for these climate healing outcomes is key to making them happen. Funding for restoration and conservation pays landowners for the opportunity costs of development and short-term management outcomes. Engaging landowners in solving the climate crisis proactively is essential for all our futures.

Learn more about Pacific Forest Trust’s work to advance climate solutions.

McCloud Soda Springs, near Mt. Shasta—before and after management

Demonstrating More Fire Resilient Forests

Intense, large-scale fires have become the unfortunate norm for much of the West. As Thom Porter, Chief of CAL FIRE notes, the question is not if we are going to have fires every year all across the landscape, it is a question of when and how those fires burn. We know we can make a difference in fire behavior by restoring more natural forest structure, thinning out the massive numbers of young conifers, and favoring the older trees and hardwoods that are more fire resilient and resistant. Doing this takes planning, proactive investments and collaboration across ownerships.

PFT is working hard on the ground, demonstrating how to restore more fire resilient forests such as at our McCloud Soda Springs project and in policy work intended to gain the necessary investments to deploy similar projects at larger scales. Budget efforts led by PFT are making more resources available to landowners in California to make our landscapes and communities more fire-safe.

Our work to demonstrate more fire-resilient forests and advocate for systems-level changes is not possible without support. Please consider a gift to Pacific Forest Trust.