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Volume 11, Number 1 The newsletter of Forests Forever Spring / Summer, 2007
AAss tthhee wwoorrlldd bbuurrnnss::PPoolliittiicciiaannss aarree wwaakkiinngg uupp ttoo gglloobbaall wwaarrmmiinngg
JOHN BERGER: HOW DOES THE FOREST GROW? . . . 7ROADLESS RULE BOUT ENTERS NEXT ROUND . . . 10KENT STROMSMOE PASSES . . . 11
WARMING UP TO GLOBAL WARMING AT LAST . . . 2TAKE ME OUT TO THE BALLGAME . . . 3WATER FROM THE FORESTS . . . 4NEEDED: NEW GUARDIAN FOR GIANT SEQUOIAS . . . 6
Inside The Watershed
The Watershed
After years of pretending that glob-al warming doesn’t exist, politicians inSacramento and Washington, D.C., arefinally trying to do something about it.
Global warming is a real-ity. Higher average temper-atures, rising sea levels,stronger and more frequenthurricanes, melting gla-ciers– the signs that some-thing is changing in theglobal climate are gettingharder to overlook.
And the overwhelmingscientific consensus is thathuman beings and fossilfuels are the cause.
Now there are hearingsin Congress on the changingclimate and the role humanbeings are playing in it.And this spring there hasbeen a flurry of new globalwarming legislation.
Can You Hear Me Now?Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) has
been at the forefront of the issue on thenational level. Boxer, now chair of theSenate Environment and Public WorksCommittee, has begun a series of hear-ings on global warming, and has co-
sponsored legislation that wouldreduce U.S. greenhouse gas emissions.
The witness who caused thebiggest stir at the committee hearings
was undoubtedly former VicePresident Al Gore (see sidebar, p. 9),recent Oscar winner for his globalwarming documentary AnInconvenient Truth. Gore appearedbefore the committee on Mar. 21.
Too little, too late?Global warming legislation is being
introduced as well. Sens. Boxer andBernie Sanders (I-VT) have introduced
the Global Warming PollutionReduction Act (S. 309), one ofthe strongest pieces of climate-change legislation to come outof either house of Congress.
This bill would enforcereductions in greenhousegases, with a goal of ensuringthat global average tempera-tures do not increase by morethan 3.6 degrees F. It wouldlimit the atmospheric concen-tration of carbon dioxide– thegas primarily responsible forglobal warming– to 450 partsper million (the current level is378 parts per million).
S. 309 would do this by lim-iting greenhouse gas emissionsin the United States– from cars,trucks, buses, electric powerplants, and any industry that
pumps these gases into the atmos-phere. The goal of the legislation is toreduce greenhouse gas emissions inthis country by 80 percent below 1990levels by the year 2050.
See “Warming,” p. 9
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Spring / Summer, 2007 2 The Watershed
from the Executive Director
“Doubt is our product, since it is thebest means of competing with the ‘bodyof fact’ that exists in the mind of thegeneral public.”
— Brown and Williamson TobaccoCo. memo, 1960s
The recent scientific revela-tions about global warming mayseem like a new issue. But it’sbeen around a while.
French scientist Jean Fouriercoined the phrase “greenhouseeffect” in 1827 to illustrate howgases in the atmosphere mightaffect Earth’s climate. In 1896Svante Arrhenius, a Swedishchemist, calculated with sur-prising accuracy (compared withtoday’s estimates) that a doubling ofthe CO2 content in the atmospherecould warm the planet by as muchas nine degrees Fahrenheit.
Fans of An Inconvenient Truth, AlGore’s history-making documen-tary, will remember that Harvardprofessor and Scripps researcherRoger Revelle began in the 1950s todocument the relentless increase inatmospheric carbon dioxide.
And some 32 years ago, my col-lege textbook for EnvironmentalPolicy 101 (Living in the Environmentby G. Tyler Miller, Jr., WadsworthPublishing Co., 1975) was scaringthe bejeezus out of some students:
“A 1˚ to 2˚ C change would significantlymodify global climate. It could trigger therelatively rapid melting of the floatingArctic ice pack, which by decreasing thealbedo [reflectivity of the sun’s energy offthe Earth’s surface] could cause furtherwarming through a positive or runawayfeedback mechanism. … Once set inmotion these [and other] self-amplifyingchanges would be irreversible and proba-
bly would last for millions of years . . . ”
But if we have known about thisfor so long, why is this informationjust now hitting the front pages?Why has no effective action againstglobal warming been taken sooner?
Part of the answer lies in the nec-
essarily cautious process of science,which strives always to not drawfirm conclusions until proof isirrefutable. But a fuller answer liesin the arenas of PR and politics.
As Gore puts it, “Science thriveson uncertainty and politics is para-lyzed by it.”
Self-interested and powerfulindustries such as the energy com-panies and automakers have had anoverwhelming influence on bothpolitics and the media during mostof the last century. Like the tobaccocompanies with their “tobacco sci-ence,” the dirty-fuels delegation hasdistorted interpretations of theempirical findings that increasinglypointed toward a human-causedand accelerating greenhouse effect.
These lobbies spent millions toexaggerate minor uncertainties tomake it look as if a real debate aboutglobal warming still roiled the scien-tific community. They have sought,in the words of one of their internalmemos, to “reposition global warm-
ing as theory, rather than fact.”And nowhere has this smoke
and mirrors exhibition been moredespicable than in the White House:Between 2001 and 2004 the GeorgeW. Bush camp altered, buried, orsought to discredit close to a dozen
major scientific reports on climatechange.
Momentum, at least for now,seems to point toward tougherenvironmental regulations, towardmarket-based approaches, and toconservation and better forestrypractices.
But if the fossil fuel industriesand their spinmeisters did it
before, could they not bend the pub-lic’s opinion back their way? It maynow be too costly even for thesemulti-billion-dollar entities to turnback the tide. But maybe not.
Then where would the planet beheaded? Perhaps toward a runawaygreenhouse that could destroy civi-lization itself and with it most largeanimals such as ourselves.
To face down the global warmingthreat will surely require us to changejust about every aspect of our lives.But we can succeed, even against theobstacles of today: In recent decadeswe have torn down the Berlin Wall,ended apartheid in South Africa, andbegun to repair the ozone layer.
Like those, reversing global warm-ing is another fight we must, can, andwill win. — Paul Hughes
“Science thrives on uncertainty and politics is
paralyzed by it.”— Al Gore
GGlloobbaall wwaarrmmiinngg hheerree aanndd nnoowwWhy has it taken us so long to wake up to it?
Spring / Summer, 2007 The Watershed 3
AA bbrraanndd--nneeww bbaallllggaammeeNow that Richard Pombo’s gone, how will forests fare in Congress?
With a whole new line-up in bothhouses of Congress, for the first time inover a decade forest advocates maylegitimately hope to do more than godown swinging. Let’s take a look at thenew bench:
The RookieIn the U.S. House
of Representatives,wind-power engi-neer and politicalnovice Jerry McNer-ney, a Democrat fromPleasanton, defeatedRichard Pombo (R-Tracy), the pol envi-ros loved to hate– andfor good reasons– inthe general electionon Nov. 7. Runningin California’s District11, McNerney took 53percent of the voteversus Pombo’s 47.
Forests Foreverendorsed McNerneyand took an activerole in the campaignto oust Pombo in2006. We sent pressreleases and email alerts regularly to oursupporters, urging them to supportPombo’s opponents.
Special election bulletins for both theRepublican primary, in which weendorsed Pombo’s opponent, PeteMcCloskey, and for the general electionappeared in our newsletter. KristinLysko, a Forests Forever staff member,played a key role in coordinatingprecinct walks and get-out-the-voteefforts in McNerney’s district.
McNerney’s committee assignmentsare a good fit for his interests and back-ground. His highest priority, he says, isto reduce this country’s dependence onfossil fuels. He sits on the SelectCommittee on Energy Independenceand Global Warming (the high-profilecommittee recently convened by HouseSpeaker Nancy Pelosi) and the
Committee on Science and Technology.
New faces on the committees
Pombo used his three years as chairof the Resources Committee (as it wasthen called) to ensure that few environ-mental bills made it to the House floor.
The new Natural Resources chair, NickRahall (D-WV), is much more likely togive eco-friendly bills a fair shake.
Rahall already has promised touphold, not attack, the NationalEnvironmental Policy Act and work onnatural resource conservation. He has agood record of supporting conserva-tion-minded public lands acquisitions.
The Act to Save America’s Forests (seestory on page 6) has been introduced eachsession since it was first proposed in 1997.This measure would end clearcutting onfederal lands, preserve ancient forests,and protect California’s giant sequoias,among other sound forest policies.
Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-CA) is re-intro-ducing the bill this year. Because of afriendlier Congress and rising publicconcerns about global warming, it has amuch better chance of getting a hearing.
In the SenateSen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) is now
chair of the Environment and PublicWorks Committee. Boxer is holdinghearings on global warming (see articleon pg. 1), and has introduced legislation
to curb greenhousegases.
She was inspiredby the signing lastSeptember of theGlobal Warming Solu-tions Act in a land-mark California cam-paign in which ForestsForever took part.
Boxer also has beena driving force behindwilderness preserva-tion efforts in Cali-fornia. She was instru-mental in adding acresto the Ventana Wilder-ness Area in LosPadres National Forestin 2005 and in helpingin 2006 to pass theNorthern CaliforniaCoastal WildernessAct, which designated275,000 acres of Cali-fornia's North Coast as
wilderness. Her California Wild Heritage Act of
2007, introduced in February as S. 493,would protect some 2.4 million acres offederal lands in California as wilder-ness, and designate more than 280 milesof wild, scenic and recreational rivers.
Waiting in the wingsDespite a friendlier congressional
environment, forest activists can expectsome harmful legislation to be pro-posed, including a threatened “Son ofWalden” salvage logging bill, budgetprovisions to punch roads into roadlessareas, and continued subsidies for tim-ber extraction in the national forests.
Now, with so many more sympa-thetic congresspersons in office, we’recounting on some decent legislation tobe offered– and passed. —M.L.
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Not long ago our hydro technologywas as simple as a well and a bucket.
Now our water supply comes to usthrough a complex system of reser-voirs, pumps, aqueducts, canals,pipelines and filtering stations.
But while the delivery system ismechanized, our water sup-ply still begins its journey,as in ancient times, in leavesand soil.
Forests and waterForests have long been
valued– if not protected– assources of timber. The roleplayed by forests in supply-ing fresh, drinkable waterhas long been recognized,too– although this hasn’t pre-vented the degradation offorested watersheds byclearcutting, pesticides, road-building, and development.
Drinking the mountainsIt was in large part due
to their role as collectorsand purifiers of water thatthe national forests werefirst set aside. According toJohn Berger (whose bookForests Forever: Their Ecology,Restoration and Protection iscoming out in September;see story on page 7), “Morethan half of the water sup-plies in the western UnitedStates flow from the nation-al forests.”
The Sierra Nevada is the state’smain water collector. Some 60 percentof the state’s water supply originatesin its mostly forested watersheds.
Most of the precipitation there fallsin the winter and spring– fromDecember to May– and mostly as snow.
The snowpack normally meltsslowly as the temperatures rise in thelate spring and summer, graduallydelivering its meltwater to the streams
and rivers that drain the watersheds.California’s water storage and deliv-ery system is keyed to this gradualdelivery of water– an important pointthat we’ll return to later.
In the SierraMore than half of the forested lands
in California’s watersheds are owned bywater districts or the state and federalgovernments. Water districts, of course,are disposed to manage their forests pri-marily as watersheds, and popular pres-sure can force other governmental forestmanagers to do the same.
But private timber companies ownthe rest. (About 42 percent ofCalifornia’s 39.6 million acres of forestare privately owned; federal, state andmunicipal forests cover about 23 mil-
lion acres, or 58 percent.) “The entire Sierra is very fragment-
ed,” said environmental analyst (andForests Forever Advisory Councilmember) Betsy Herbert. “Because ofthe way the land was deeded to the rail-roads, it has a kind of checkerboard pat-
tern that was typical of thewhole area. It’s private landinterspersed with publicland.”
Clearcutting California’s forests have
been degraded by over 150years of human exploitation.
Logging may well be thesingle most damaging activi-ty for forest watersheds(though population growthwith its attendant develop-ment is becoming more andmore important.)
Logging disturbs the soil,leaving it exposed to erosion.Soil bared by logging runsinto watercourses as sedi-ment, degrading water qual-ity, harming fish, and oftenleading to flooding. Well-shaded forest soils, on theother hand, soak up andpurify water, a function thatdiminishes when the canopyis removed and heavy equip-ment compacts the soil.
And the most damagingkind of logging is clearcutting.
Clearcutting, referred to by its apol-ogists as “even-aged management,” is alogging technique that cuts every treewithin a designated area. (There arevariations, such as the seed tree cut andthe shelterwood cut, that leave a fewtrees to seed new growth before theytoo are felled, but these are effectivelythe same as clearcuts.)
Clearcutting is allowed by the Cali-fornia Forest Practice Rules, and is a fa-vored technique on private timberland.
4 The Watershed Spring / Summer, 2007
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What’s in your watershed?California’s forests keep the state all wet– or not
Snowy forest in the Sierra Nevada. Much of California’s drinkingwater is stored in the range’s snowpack.
Spring / Summer, 2007 The Watershed 5
The largest owner of private timber-land in the state– in fact, the largest land-owner period– is Sierra Pacific In-dustries (SPI).
According to Troubled Waters in theSierra, a 2003report byKerri L.Timmer fromthe Sierra Ne-vada Alliance,SPI plans toclearcut 70percent of itsmillion and ahalf acres,most of whichlie in theS i e r r aNevada.
SPI’s ulti-mate goal forits timber-lands is toclear them oftrees, thenplant the cuts,according tothe report. Such tree farms are planta-tions of fast-growing trees that can begrown in short rotation cycles for futureharvest.
But tree farms do not function likenatural forests. According to RunningPure, a report from the World Bank andthe World Wildlife Foundation, “. . . oldforests may consume less water than thevegetation that establishes itself afterclear-cutting.” Old growth forests–roughly defined as stands of trees withan average age over 200 years– havebeen shown to produce the highestwater quality.
And there is evidence that oldforests produce the greatest quantityof water as well. Younger forests andtree plantations produce less mois-ture-retaining shade, have shallowersoils, and drink up a greater share ofrunoff.
PesticidesTree farms also require large quanti-
ties of pesticides and herbicides to keepaway competing plants and the insectpests that can wreak havoc with suchmonoculture crops. The residue frompesticides washes into nearby streams
and enters the water table, with an obvi-ous negative effect on water quality.
According to Vivian Parker of thePesticide Action Network, “more herbi-cides are applied in California by the
Forest Service than any other nationalforest lands in the nation.”
And the Forest Service uses lesspesticide than the timber industry. Theprivate timber companies are by far thebigger user of herbicides in California.In 2002– the most recent year for whichdata wereavailable– pri-vate industryaccounted foralmost 90 per-cent of herbi-cides appliedin California’s forests.
Salmon: roadkillRoads built to service timber har-
vests degrade water quality as well.Runoff from roads is the main sourceof sediment washing into foreststreams.
Buffer zones are the forested areasalong stream banks not logged orlogged selectively to keep the streamshaded, regulate stream temperature,and to absorb sediment runoff.
The requirements for buffer zonesdiffer greatly from state to state.California requires a fairly broad
zone– but allows logging and road-building, albeit to a lesser degree,inside the buffer.
“We don’t have a no-cut bufferzone in California,” Herbert said.
Some water utilities haveenforced their own no-cut zones toimprove water quality.
Many water utilities have beenpurchasing conservation easementsto prevent forested land from beingdeveloped or roaded even if owner-ship changes.
“Roads can change the wholehydrological regime of a watershed,”Herbert points out. “They canchange the stream flow. Roads thatare not maintained can actually turninto part of the stream. They becomewatercourses.”
In addition to causing erosion andsedimentation, this diversion ofwater from streambeds means thatthere is less water available to sustainfish populations.
Global Warming and WaterThe acceleration of climate change
will bring about tremendous changesin the watersheds of the SierraNevada. California may never be thesame.
Global warming will not turn offthe tap and dry up the state’s precipita-tion: In fact, there may even be heavier
rainfall thanat present.But warmerwinters meanthat more pre-cipitation willfall as rain,
rather than snow. And the heaviestprecipitation may come at differenttimes of the year than heretofore.
These changes could be devastat-ing for California. Less snow means alessening of the snowpack, the state’sprimary water storage.
What is worse, increased spring rainsfalling on snow could melt more of thatsnowpack at once. The gradual releaseof water from melting snow, mentionedearlier, would be lost, replaced by sud-den floods of silt-laden water. Theresulting runoff could be more than our
See “Watersheds,” p. 11
Finished in 1923, O’Shaughnessy Dam drowned Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite to keep San Francisco supplied with drinking water.
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Logging may well be the single most damaging activity
for forest watersheds.
6 The Watershed Spring / Summer, 2007
Park the Forest ServiceSaving forests from their erstwhile protectors
The national forests were foundedto protect the last big woods and wildwatersheds of this country from rapa-cious logging. But since that begin-ning, getting out the cut has come to bethe watchword of the U.S. ForestService.
The Act to Save America’s Forests,slated to be re-introduced in the newCongress by Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-Atherton), would shift this focus andprotect tens of millions of acres in thenational forests from logging.Importantly, it would also transferGiant Sequoia National Monument(GSNM) from the Forest Service to theNational Park Service.
Turning over the MonumentOn Oct. 19, 2006, Rep. Pete Stark (D-
CA) and 28 other members of the U.S.House of Representatives sent a letter toMike Johanns, Secretary of Agriculture,and Dale Bosworth, Chief of the ForestService, demanding an immediate haltto logging in the GSNM.
“These logging operations aredestroying the natural sequoia forestecosystem of the GSNM,” the letterreads, “in direct violation of the spiritand the letter of the presidential procla-mation creating the GSNM in 2000.”
One of the most egregious exampleof these logging operations was theremoval in 2004 of over 200 of the larg-er trees from the most popular touristattraction in the monument, the Trailof 100 Giants. The logging operation,justified by the Forest Service as “haz-ardous tree removal,” violated theNational Environmental Policy Act.
Several California lawmakerssigned this letter: Barbara Lee (D-Oakland), Tom Lantos (D-San Mateo),Pete Stark (D-Fremont), Anna Eshoo(D-Atherton), Michael Honda (D-Campbell), Jane Harman (D-Venice),and Grace Napolitano (D-Norwalk).
The best of the restThe Act to Save America’s Forests
would prohibit logging and roadbuild-
ing in roadless areas, ancient forestsand riparian areas (the banks ofstreams and rivers).
The measure would ban logging inforests that contain endangeredspecies, rare or endangered ecosys-
tems or key habitats for the recovery ofthreatened or endangered species; rareor underrepresented forest ecosys-tems; migration corridors; areas of out-standing biodiversity; old-growthforests; commercial fisheries; orsources of clean water such as keywatersheds.
Importantly, the act would prohibitany and all clearcutting. This includesall types of “even-aged” management,where all or most of the trees in a standare cut down. The only exception isfor the removal of clearly defined inva-sive trees to permit the restoration ofnative species.
Roadbuilding and logging in allroadless areas greater than 1,000 acreswould be prohibited under the act.(Note that this prohibition includesAlaska’s vast Tongass National Forest.)
All roadless areas and virtually alllate-successional forests in the Sierra
Nevada would be protected under theact. According to the 1996 SierraNevada Ecosystem Project’s FinalReport to Congress: Status of the SierraNevada, areas of “late-successionalemphasis” make up 42 percent of the
national forests in the Sierra Nevada.The act would also protect lands
identified as “potential AquaticDiversity Management Areas”(ADMAs) in the same report. Thesewatersheds are greater than 50 squarekilometers, have a natural hydrologicregime, are dominated by nativespecies, contain a wide representation ofaquatic habitat types, and are in “goodcondition.” The report lists 48 ADMAwatersheds in the Sierra Nevada.
Carl Ross of the Washington, D.C.group Save America’s Forests, has beenworking for a decade to pass this bill,and thinks its time may have come atlast.
“Now that there is a more environ-mentally friendly Congress,” Ross said,“if enough citizens speak out, we canend a century of destructive logging andpass the Act to Save America’s Forestsinto law.” —Matt Rogina
Sugar pine cut down along the Trail of 100 Giants in Giant Sequoia National Monument
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John Berger writes about facts. He writes about energy and the
environment, and about how we canheat our homes, build our houses andfeed ourselves without using up forestsand wildlife or contaminating theatmosphere.
But his development as a nonfictionwriter began in fiction.
As a young man Berger wanted towrite novels. After col-lege (he studied politicalscience and economics atStanford) he went towork as a news writer,first for a local radio sta-tion, and later forAlternative Feature Ser-vice Inc., a national newsservice in Berkeley.
After leaving the newsservice, “I needed to finda way to make a living,”Berger said, “and Ithought it might be possi-ble to write nonfictionbooks, and thereby subsi-dize the writing of novels.
“I looked around fora topic to write about–this was in the early sev-enties– and I decided to write a bookabout nuclear power.”
Researching the problems of nuclearpower got him involved in broaderissues of energy. This research in turnled to wider-ranging investigation ofenergy sources and their effects on socie-ty and, crucially, the environment.
Berger began to think about thebest way to power our complex,always growing civilization withoutdestroying the world around it, andwithout using up the very resourceswe depend on for our continued exis-tence. He began to study alternativesources such as solar, wind, geother-mal, and tidal power. And he began tothink about sustainability.
Since then Berger, who now lives in
the San Francisco Bay Area with his wifeand two sons, has gone on to research andwrite six books– about climate change,environmental restoration, forests,nuclear power, and renewable energy.
His latest book, Forests Forever: TheirEcology, Restoration, and Protection, isdue out in September 2007, a co-publi-cation of Forests Forever Foundationand the Center for American Places.
Early on it attracted the backing ofRobin Williams, Peter Coyote, andother influential persons concernedabout protecting the world’s forests.
Only connectBerger’s interests have tended to
connect, one book leading to the next. In his important 1987 book
Restoring the Earth (Doubleday) Bergerfirst examined the idea that it is notenough to protect the natural worldfrom destruction: We must return tohealth what has been damaged.
One of the chapters dealt withreforestation– replanting loggedforests and restoring the complex com-munities of organisms in them to helpre-create complete ecosystems, notmerely tree farms.
In researching the subject Bergerbecame fascinated by the many compo-nents that interact to create a forestecosystem. He noted that currentforestry practices– such as clearcutting–often damage this delicate balance.
This research led to a deeper studyof forestry, and to the writing of Under-standing Forests (Sierra Club Books,1998). This earlier edition, after exten-
sive revisions andadditions, has nowbecome ForestsForever.
The new editioncame about, Bergersays, because he feltthat the subject of for-est ecology was still atimely one– given therecent intensificationof threats to forests–and he saw ways toimprove the originalbook.
Berger has given alot of space in ForestsForever to the radicalchanges brought to 30years of forestry poli-
cy by the current administration. In anew chapter “New Developments inU.S. Forest Policy,” he scrutinizes theregulatory reform initiatives and polit-ical appointments of the Bush adminis-tration, and discusses their potentiallydamaging effects on the nation’sforests.
“The Bush administration has obvi-ously been trying to undermine forestprotection efforts and environmentalregulations across the board in verybrazen, cynical, and short-sightedways,” Berger said.
He pays particular attention to theRoadless Area Conservation Rule, theEndangered Species Act, and thedeceptively titled Healthy ForestsInitiative.
activist profile
EEnneerrggyy ffoorr cchhaannggee::Author John Berger wants forests that keep on giving
John Berger, rafting down Alaska’s Copper River in 2004
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Spring/Summer, 2007 The Watershed 7
While the book has a NorthAmerican emphasis, Berger alsoincludes a chapter covering tropicalrainforests and the special problemsthey face. He also takes a look at morepositive recent developments in forestprotection, such as the CanadianBoreal Initiative, a coalition of 11 con-servation, First Nation, and timberindustry groups that reached an agree-ment to preserve 50 percent of the vastCanadian northern forest and to sus-tainably manage the rest.
Forests Forever will be distributednationally by the University of ChicagoPress. The book has a four-color coverphotograph of a Sitka spruce grovetaken by Northwest photographer BobHerger (see image, this page). Therewill be three photographic galleries,featuring contemporary color photosby some of the most respected names innature photography– Gary Braasch,Daniel Dancer, Herger, and LarryUlrich among them.
First wisdom“As a boy I loved forests,” Berger
said. “I used to wander through theHudson Valley near my home, visual-izing what it was like when the Indianslived there.”
Berger feels that Native Americanlore is not merely historical, but some-thing we should attend to today.
“We need to learn from Native
Americans and their traditional ecologi-cal knowledge,” he said. “They are thetrue masters of sustainable living.”
With so little undamaged forestlandleft, and with the pressures of popula-tion growth and global climate changeand the destructioncaused by ramped-up exploitation sinceWorld War II, Bergersees restorationforestry as not simplya good but a neces-sary thing.
“We need torestrain human pop-ulation growth andreplace the notion ofendless exponentialeconomic growthand its concomitantincreasing demandsfor natural resourcesand energy. Weneed instead to adoptpolicies based on har-monious, steady-state, sustainable useof resources, and thus build sustain-able economies.”
Up in AlaskaBerger, who holds a Master’s
degree in energy and natural resourcesfrom the University of California,Berkeley and a Ph.D. in ecology fromU.C. Davis, now works as writer andconsultant specializing in naturalresources and the environment.
Berger has been visiting Alaska since1975 and has traveled frequently to the
Last Frontier over the past three years. “Many of the forests I saw on the
Kenai Peninsula and the interior of
south-central Alaska were dead ordying from spruce bark beetle infesta-tions,” he said. “As the climate has heat-
ed up in Alaska dueto increasing con-centrations of green-house gases, insectpest populationshave reached epi-demic proportions.”
Like many whoencounter Alaska’sspectacular wildlands, Berger hasseen how, little bylittle, they are beingsacrificed to devel-opment andresource exploita-tion. He wants tohelp preserve thembefore it is too late.
“The focus of myresearch has been an effort to help iden-tify a sustainable development path forAlaska that doesn’t amount to environ-mental degradation and loss of wildnesson the installment plan.”
Of useBerger would like to see Forests
Forever used to educate the public aboutthe importance of forests. He’d also liketo see his book used to help train thenext generation of forest activists.
“Throughout my career I’ve beenvery impressed by the power of thecommitted individual to changethings,” he says.
“We need to fight for the protectionand restoration of forests, and theirmanagement according to principles ofecology and conservation biology, notfor narrow, short-term profit at theexpense of sustainable natural systems.
“I’d like to shine a spotlight on theexistence of, and potential of, sustain-able forestry to protect and perpetuatehealthy forests while supportinghuman needs,” Berger says.
“It can be done!” —M.L.
For more information about ForestsForever: Their Ecology, Restoration, andProtection, see the Forests Foreverwebsite at: http://www.forestsforev-er.org/ConciseGuide.html
Spring / Summer, 20078 The Watershed
Continued from previous page
A selected bibliography of John J. BergerNuclear Power: The Unviable Option. A Critical Look at Our Energy Alternatives (Dell,
New York, 1976)
Restoring the Earth: How Americans Are Working to Renew Our Damaged Environment (Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1985; Doubleday Anchor Books, New York, 1987)
Charging Ahead: The Business of Renewable Energy and What It Means for America(Henry Holt and Company, New York, 1997)
Understanding Forests (Sierra Club Books, San Francisco, 1998)
Beating the Heat: Why and How We Must Combat Global Warming (Berkeley Hills Books, Berkeley, Calif., 2000).
Forests Forever: Their Ecology, Restoration and Protection (The Center for American Places, Stauton, Va., and Forests Forever Foundation, San Francisco, 2007).
A Sitka spruce grove graces the cover
The bill also promotes a cap-and-trade system that would set a limit onthe amount of greenhouse gases thatcould be emitted, awards credit topolluters that stay under this limit,and allows them to sell their unusedcredits (see sidebar, p. 12).
The measure encourages develop-ment of new technology to reducegreenhouse gas emissions, such as“geologic sequestration” of carbondioxide (capturing and storing CO2
underground).Sens. John Kerry (D-MA) and
Olympia Snowe (R-ME) haveauthored S. 485, a bill similar toBoxer’s. The Kerry/Snowe bill, how-ever, mandates a 65 percent reductionin global warming pollution emissionsby 2050 based on levels in the year2000– a more lenient standard than theBoxer bill’s. The Kerry/Snowe billwould amend the Clean Air Act tocover greenhouse gas emissions, andwould promote cap-and-trade market-
based approaches.
The Climate Stewardship Act of2007 (H.R. 620), introduced by Rep.John Olver (D-MA), is entirely focusedon promoting market-based solutions
to limiting emissions through a cap-and-trade program of emissions credits.
The bill would establish a registryof greenhouse gas emissions, the
National Greenhouse Gas Database,and would award credits for carbonsequestration, including credits for for-est preservation and reforestation.
Sacramento Warms To ClimateChange
A few years ago, state-level billsaddressing climate change were as thinon the ground as honest politicians.
But when A.B. 32, the GlobalWarming Solutions Act, was signed byGov. Arnold Schwarzenegger lastSeptember, the floodgates opened andglobal warming bills came pouring out.
A quick search on the Californialegislative information website(http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/) turnsup more than 75 bills on the topic.
Fuel me onceBills promoting alternative fuels for
gasoline are a popular item inSacramento this session. Introducedby Sens. Christine Kehoe (D-SanDiego) and Don Perata (D-Oakland),S.B. 494 requires half the cars inCalifornia to be running on alternatefuels by 2020.
Other bills promote solar and wind(S.B. 411, by Sens. Joe Simitian andPerata).
Plugging alternative fuels such asethanol and biodiesel into the gasolinedistribution system seems like a goodidea at first glance, since these fuels
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Barbara Boxer wields the gavel at the Senate hearings on global warming. Sitting beside her is Republican Sen. James Inhofe of Oklahoma, who has called global warming “the biggest hoax perpetrated on mankind.”
Al Gore gets all inconvenient on Congress
Al Gore’s list of things we need to accomplish to avert a global warmingcatastrophe is more radical than anything envisioned in legislative proposalsthus far. In his testimony before theSenate committee on Mar. 21, Gore: • Called for an immediate freeze on CO2
emissions;• Argued that we should cut payroll taxes
(such as the one that pays for Social Security) and substitute these revenue streams with pollutiontaxes, especially carbon dioxide taxes;
• Proposed that we negotiate a new treaty to go beyond the goals of the Kyoto Protocol, to begin in 2010;
• Asked for a moratorium on new coal-fired power plants that are not equipped with carbon scrubbing and sequestration equipment;
• Recommended a ban on incandescent light bulbs;• Proposed building a decentralized electricity grid, an “electranet” structured
like the internet;• Said fuel economy standards for cars and trucks should be raised;• Proposed a “carbon neutral” mortgage association for energy-efficient
housing; and• Called for corporate disclosure of carbon emissions.
Al Gore
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See “Warming,” p. 12
“Warming,” continued from page 1
Spring / Summer, 2007 The Watershed 9
BBuusshh && CCoo.. aappppeeaall rrooaaddlleessss rruullee ddeecciissiioonn
Defeated in court, their attempt tooverturn the popular rule thwarted,the Bush administration and the tim-ber industry nevertheless continue totussle over the 2001 Roadless AreaConservation Rule.
In September 2006 U.S. DistrictCourt Judge Elizabeth Laporte declaredthe administration’s repeal of the 2001roadless rule to be illegal.
The Department of Agriculturefiled an appeal of Laporte’s decisionon Apr. 9, submitting a three-pagenotice that gave no grounds for or rea-soning behind theappeal.
Silver Creek TimberCo. of Merlin, Ore.,which had intervened inthe case to protect itsinterests in the BiscuitFire salvage-loggingproject (part of whichlies in the SouthKalmiopsis RoadlessArea) has also appealed,even though the Biscuitprojects have alreadybeen logged.
Thrown outIn her initial deci-
sion Laporte ruled thatthe U.S. Forest Service, inrepealing the original roadless rule,failed to conduct an environmentalreview as required by the National En-vironmental Policy Act, and failed toconsult with the U.S. Fish and WildlifeService and the National MarineFisheries Service, as required underthe Endangered Species Act.
She reinstated the original rule(with the exception of the Tongassamendment, which exempted TongassNational Forest in Alaska from the pro-visions of the 2001 rule), and issued afinal injunction on Feb. 7, 2007, retroac-tive to Jan. 12, 2001.
Written briefs from all parties to thesuit are due to the court sometime inJuly 2007.
Wyoming strikes out in courtMeanwhile, the State of Wyoming
asked the court to revive its lawsuitagainst the original roadless rule. Thestate’s original lawsuit became mootwhen the Bush administrationrepealed the roadless rule in May 2005.
Earthjustice, representing environ-mental groups in the case, argued forthe original roadless rule. (Earthjusticeis the environmental law firm that rep-resented 20 environmental groups,including Forests Forever Foundation,in the lawsuit that overturned the Bush
repeal.) Judge Clarence Brimmer of the 10th
District Court heard the case on May25. On June 7, Brimmer refused toreinstate Wyoming’s suit. This meansthat, for now, the original roadless ruleis in force.
Attorneys for both sides, however,predicted that the court battle will con-tinue.
Petitions for Idaho, Utah, ColoradoEven though their attempt to
replace the national coverage of theoriginal roadless rule with a state-by-state petition process has been thrownout by the court, the Department ofAgriculture is still accepting petitionsfrom state governors under the Ad-
ministrative Procedure Act. The department intends to issue
state-specific rulemakings for roadlessarea protections– or, as is more likely,the removal of such protections.
Although the governors ofColorado and Utah are planning to filepetitions, only Idaho’s petition hasbeen accepted so far. This is the firsttime the Department of Agriculturehas considered a governor’s petitionfor a state-specific rulemaking.
The governor’s petition wouldredefine 525,000 acres of Idaho road-
less forest as “generalforest,” removingthem from the pro-tection of the road-less rule.
Idaho has moreroadless forest out-side of parks and pre-serves than any statein the lower 48– morethan 9.3 millionacres. These acrescontain some of thelast unspoiled wildforest in the West.
“Losing theseroadless forests tologging, oil and gasdrilling, roadbuild-ing and ski resortdevelopment would
be a loss not just to Idaho, but to thecountry as a whole,” said ForestsForever executive director PaulHughes.
The Forest Service announced a 30-day public comment period on theIdaho petition’s plan for the state’sroadless areas.
Thirty-seven conservation groupsfrom across the country (includingForests Forever) sent a letter to theForest Service asking to have the com-ment period extended to 90 days.
The Forest Service, however,denied this request on May 14, sayingthat it “did not see a need to extendthe comment period.”
—M.L.
Part of the 335-acre Mike's Gulch Timber Sale in the South KalmiopsisRoadless Area, Oregon
10 The Watershed Spring / Summer, 2007
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present system of reservoirs, levees, anddams could control, resulting in wide-spread disastrous flooding, as well asincreased costs for treatment.
Paradoxically, this excess of watercould be followed by extreme drought.There would be less water in reser-voirs, and less runoff from snowmeltover the course of the summer.
Herbert points out that the forestmanagement techniques that are usedto improve water quality– minimizingsoil disturbance, no clearcutting, few orno roads, preserving old forest– alsoresult in a forest with more ability tosequester carbon. What’s good forclean water also fights global warming.
Managing forests for water qualitySince passage of the federal Safe
Drinking Water Act in 1996 there has
been a renewed emphasis on preserv-ing forest watersheds to ensure waterquality.
By ensuring that a forest watershedcan continue to provide its gatheringand filtering functions without beingdamaged by development, water dis-tricts are saving themselves– and theircustomers– millions of dollars thatwould otherwise have to be spent onmaintaining reservoirs and building fil-tration facilities.
Forests are beautiful. But they areuseful, even essential, to our urban civ-ilization as well, and not merely as sup-pliers of lumber. Clean drinking waterand an adequate supply of water forirrigation are also gifts of the forests.
“There’s a great value, economically,in preserving forests, because of these nat-ural services that they perform,” saidHerbert. “They do it for nothing.”
—M.L.
A publication of Forests Forever, Inc. and the Forests Forever Foundation
The Watershed© 2007
All rights reserved
Printed on 100% post-consumer recycled paper
The Watershed
FORESTS FOREVER
50 First St., Suite 401San Francisco, CA 94105
phone (415) 974-3636fax (415) 974-3664
Board of Directors:
Mark A. Fletcher, Ph.D.President
Ken SmithSecretary
James NewmanTreasurer
Advisory Council:
Carla Cloer
Janet Santos Cobb
Daniel Edelstein
Karen Erickson
Dan Hamburg
Betsy Herbert, Ph.D.
Addie Jacobson
Martin Litton
Jill Ratner
“Restore,Reinhabit,
Re-enchant”
Paul HughesExecutive Editor
Marc LecardEditor
Gary Bentrup Flag Artwork
FORESTS FOREVER FOUNDATION
Board of Directors:
Paul HughesExecutive Director
Mark A. Fletcher, Ph.D.President
Ken SmithSecretary
James NewmanTreasurer
“Watersheds,” continued from page 5
Kent Stromsmoe1953 - 2007
The forests of California have lost one of their strongest champions. Longtime Forests Forever board member Kent Stromsmoe passed away on
May 31, leaving many California forest-protection advocates stunned.“Kent was an amazing man,” said Mark Fletcher, president of the Forests
Forever board of directors. “He was incredibly intelligent, knowledgeableand hardworking. He shunned the spotlight and waved off recognition forhis tireless work.”
A retired firefighter and businessman who made his home in Martinez,Stromsmoe began his association with Forests Forever as an advisory councilmember in 1999. He became a board member in 2001.
Over the years he regularly attended meetings of the California Board ofForestry and became one of that agency’s most relentless gadflies, at the same timeearning respect that put him on a first-name basis with many of his adversaries.
Said Fletcher: “Kent knew the fine details of California forest practicerules like few professionals. He dedicated much of his life to volunteer workto protect the old-growth forests and wildlife of the state.”
In a future issue of The Watershed we plan to do an article on the life andmany contributions of Kent Stromsmoe. — P. H.
produce less carbon dioxide. But crit-ics point out that the amount of energythat goes into creating ethanol– fertil-izing, harvesting, transporting andprocessing it– is almost equal to thepotential energy it contains.
This situation, and the likely dis-ruption of food markets if more corn isdevoted to fuel, may well keep ethanolfrom becoming more than a small partof the future energy picture.
Turn your lamp down lowIf biofuels won’t scale up, and
nukes are too dangerous and expen-sive, and coal is too polluting, what’s awanna-be-green elected official to do?
Conservation is probably the quick-est and most effective way to addressgreenhouse gas emissions and ourenergy problems. While not as popu-lar as biofuels or cap-and-tradeschemes, conservation-oriented billshave the advantage of costing little tonothing but potentially having a bigeffect on fossil-fuel emissions.
Assemblyman Lloyd Levine’s (D-Van Nuys) A.B. 722, the “How ManyLegislators Does It Take to Change aLight Bulb Act,” would ban incandes-cent bulbs in the state by 2012.Replacing a 75-watt incandescent lightbulb with a 20-watt compact fluores-cent, according to the Rocky MountainInstitute, would provide the sameamount of light but would save 1,300pounds of carbon dioxide and save
customers $55 over the life of the bulb.Meanwhile, incandescent bulbs use750 kilowatt-hours over 10,000 hours,while compact fluorescents use only180 kWh.
Better late than neverA recent U.S. Supreme Court deci-
sion that carbon dioxide may be con-sidered a pollutant under the CleanAir Act cleared the way for California
and other states to regulate green-house gas emissions. This ruling maymark a turning point in the fight tohalt global warming.
In the coming world of changingclimate and more expensive, harder-to-find conventional energy sources,legislation like that beginning toemerge from California and Congressis more than overdue.
—M.L.
FORESTS FOREVER50 First St. #401 San Francisco, CA 94105
Address Service Requested
If you do not wish toreceive The Watershedsend this along with themailing panel at right to:
Forests Forever50 First St. #401San Francisco, CA94105
Thank you.
Please remove me from the newslettermailing list.
“Warming,” continued from page 9
NONPROFIT ORG.
U.S. POSTAGE
PAIDSan Francisco, CAPermit No. 3573
Cap ‘N Trade“Cap-and-trade” is a market-based approach to controlling pollution emis-
sions. In a global warming regulatory framework a cap-and-trade systemwould place an upper limit on the amount of greenhouse gases a businesswould be allowed to emit.
Credits, essentially licenses to pollute a given amount, are given to pollutingbusinesses, allowing them to generate emissions up to the cap. Businesses stay-ing under their limit could sell any unused credits to businesses that exceededtheir emissions limits.
In theory, over time the economic pressures embodied in cap-and-tradewould create innovation and competition to pollute less. Moreover, the capscould be steadily lowered in future years.
This approach is quite popular with the business community and someenvironmental groups. Other environmentalists, however, argue that cap-and-trade is likely to encourage greenhouse gas production rather than lower it, orat very least allow emissions to continue unabated.
One problem that could stymie the program is “credit inflation,” in which thegovernment distributes too many permits, causing them to lose market value,thus making them less attractive to polluting industries. This was a problem inthe first phase of the European Union’s carbon-trading plan.
Also of concern to environmentalists: Would already existing forests be eli-gible for carbon credits? Would tree plantations earn credits for their owners?
Critics of cap-and-trade and market-based approaches to emissions reduc-tion would generally rather see regulations imposing hard and fast limits ongreenhouse gas emissions, and assessing fines and penalties for failure to
meet these standards. —M.L
