Environmental Groups and Industry at Odds Over Plan to Conserve Old-Growth Forests

Some Wisconsin groups are urging the Biden administration to do more to protect mature and old-growth forests under its proposal to conserve those trees as logging interests are pushing back against changes.

Environmental groups say the U.S. Forest Service has received more than 1 million comments to protect old-growth forests from logging since President Joe Biden issued an executive order to conserve them two years ago. The directive called for reducing the risk of wildfires and developing policies to make the nation’s forests more resilient to climate change.

The U.S. Forest Service released a draft environmental impact statement of its plan to conserve older forests and limit logging, but the agency stopped short of a ban on logging old-growth forests. The Forest Service proposal would revise plans for 122 national forests, including the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest in Wisconsin.

In recent comments, groups like Sierra Club Wisconsin and the Environmental Law and Policy Center, or ELPC, are calling for an end to logging old-growth trees. Cassie Steiner, senior campaign coordinator with Sierra Club, said there’s a very small portion of those forests nationwide.

“The value that these older trees have, and these areas that have a healthy mix of ages of trees are so precious, and the current amendment would allow for harvesting in these areas,” Steiner said.

Environmental groups say the forests are crucial for storing billions of tons of carbon for decades or centuries. An initial inventory identified around 24.7 million acres of old-growth and 68.1 million acres of mature trees on national forest lands. That represents roughly 17 percent and 47 percent of the nation’s forests.