These climate change impacts will be further exacerbated by a loss of forest ecosystems due to increasing development pressure in the Sierra Nevada.  Conversion of land from forests to rural residential is occurring at an alarming pace—within thirty years, one-third of all Sierra Nevada forestlands will have been developed. The Pacific Forest Trust estimates that under a “business-as-usual” scenario, California will lose 170,000 acres of forestland between 2008 and 2020, resulting in 37 million metric tons of CO2 emissions.  If we lose our forests to development and other land uses, we take away the earth’s ability to provide the processes we depend on.

SNCC follows a very transparent process for measuring forest carbon:

Step 1: Sierra Business Council does a preliminary assessment of the potential forest carbon project, including assessing project type (avoided conversion or improved forest management on private lands) and the landowner’s commitment to permanence as well as to native forests.

Step 2: We work with a Registered Professional Forester to do a Forest Inventory Assessment (FIA), specifically designed to measure forest carbon and provide a “Nonindustrial Timber Management Plan” (NTMP) as required by the Climate Action Reserve (CAR) protocols.

Step 3: We register the carbon credits with a verified carbon registry, such as CAR.

Step 4: We work with the landowner to verify the carbon credits with a registered third-party organization (trained by CAR).

Step 5: We work with each landowner to define a specific strategy for selling offsets in a manner which provides the greatest benefit to both the buyer and the seller.

Step 6: In the long term, we assist in the annual monitoring and recertification of the carbon credits (periodic verifications every 6 years and re-inventory every 18 years). We also assist in the development of a forest management and monitoring plan (consistent with CAR’s Natural Forest Management Practices).

The Sierra Nevada Carbon Cooperative is a dynamic all-encompassing solution to protecting Sierra Nevada Ecosystems. It incorporates environmental as well as economic benefits. Healthy functioning forestlands provide clean water, cycle nutrients, prevent erosion, purify air and remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Selling carbon credits provides landowners the funds needed to continue stewardship of these forests and to perpetuate forested land as open space into the future.

“The California Biomass Collaborative will hold its seventh annual forum on biomass in conjunction with the UC-Davis Energy Institute and its UC Energy Week 2010, May 10-13. The event will take place on the UC-Davis campus at the new university conference center. The California Renewable Energy Collaborative will also be holding meetings of the wind, solar, and geothermal collaboratives…

The CBC forum sessions will cover: new directives, state mandates, and the Bioenergy Interagency Working Group’s new Bioenergy Action Plan; sustainability standards for agricultural and forest biomass use; and best uses and appropriate policies and definitions for urban-derived biomass and food processing wastes.”

Click here for details of the Forum and UC Energy Week.

(Note: online registration for the forum is closed - on site registration will be available)

According to California’s 2007 Integrated Energy Policy Report various energy sectors account for most of California’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, with electricity production accounting for about 28% and transportation accounting for 39% of emissions. As of 2007, 89% of California’s electricity was still generated from non-renewable sources and large hydroelectric facilities. One AB 32 measure is a renewable energy standard of 33% renewable energy by 2020. Another measure aims to reduce energy use and the cost of energy to consumers. Energy efficiency programs have already saved Californians more than $56 billion since 1978 and are expected to save another $23 billion by 2013. Such programs serve as a least cost option by reducing the need to construct any new power-generating facilities. Check out the Sierra Business Council’s Sierra Nevada Energy Watch initiative for an example of an on-the-ground energy efficiency program.

With transportation accounting for 39% of state greenhouse gases, it is important to reduce this sector’s per capita and overall emissions. AB 32 plans do this by reducing transportation miles, increasing vehicle mileage through cleaner technology (more efficient, electric, etc) and incentivizing the use of fuels which are lower in net carbon emissions (biomass, etc). The Shore Power Program, where ships plug into electricity at port instead of continuing to burn diesel, is one example of an AB 32 early implementation measure using cleaner technology. Other AB 32 measures include reducing tractor-trailer emissions, a reduction of at least 10% of carbon intensity in California’s transportation fuels and tightening fuel economy as well as tailpipe emissions standards. Smart land use is another critical component because better designed communities can reduce vehicle miles traveled and, in turn, the energy demands of the overall transportation sector. One AB 32 measure integrates land use, housing and transportation to support sustainable communities. Smart growth and the preservation of open space is also embodied in the Sierra Business Council’s vision of sustainable, healthy communities in the Sierra Nevada.

Other benefits of AB32 include the unaccounted for benefits of health improvements for Californians and the economic and social benefits of innovation which will spring from this bill. By reducing greenhouse gases, California’s children and the general population will be less susceptible to asthma and lung disease, potentially saving the state and country millions of dollars in health cost. Through cleaner air and water there is an untold potential for health improvements throughout the state and region. These improvements will save money and lives while improving the overall quality of our communities.

It is always difficult to predict the economic impacts of a law that spans the vast length of California. There are those who claim AB 32 will result in a loss of 1.1 million jobs because of enormous costs businesses may incur related to compliance with AB 32 measures. This has been largely disputed throughout academia and the general public. These studies fail to include any cost savings of implementing the law including: reduced energy costs, cars with increased fuel economy, market incentive to change behavior to be more cost efficient, and the increase in the technological jobs needed to support this measure.

There will be some changes in what jobs are available to Californians. There will be more jobs in energy technology; building electric cars, harnessing wind as well as solar power, waste-to-energy solutions and energy efficient appliances. There will be fewer jobs in the production of unsustainable energy harvesting, including oil, coal and gas mining. This is a chance to shift the California economy; to base it on innovative and sustainable technology and make it a leading voice in the future world economy.

Innovation could really be the unsung hero of this bill due to the technological and methodological breakthroughs that will emerge to handle greenhouse gas reductions. These new ideas and inventions will come from Silicon Valley, California’s world class universities, private companies and entrepreneurs. The best ideas will flow through the state, the country and then the world; bringing millions of dollars to California’s downtrodden economy.

Check out the AB 32 Timeline

The California Climate Change Center recently posted a white paper on the Impact of Climate Change on California Timberlands (August 2009), which presents some staggering facts about California’s failing timber market.  In the paper, researchers develop models that show how timberlands will be affected by different climate change scenarios, provided with an economic analysis of different harvest and landowner adaptation strategies.  Production of timber is decreasing due to an era of global warming, increased wildfires, and changes in land use.  Climate change is impacting timber production already, and will continue to do so if the future warming projections are accurate.  California has already experienced a 24% decline in timber production from 1991 to 1996, and another 24% since then.   Early implementation of climate-smart forest management strategies is imperative to the survival and prosperity of our region’s timber production industry.

Forests of the Sierra Nevada are expected to experience many detrimental changes, due to changes in the climate.  The paper notes that globally, northern softwood forests will most likely see increased productivity because of warmer temperatures.  This increase in global product will further decrease local timber prices, continuing the downward trajectory of value.  Under likely price scenarios, climate change will result in an overall decline in the value of harvested timber, resulting in losses of up to $8.1 billion by the end of this century.  These decreases in timber value will increase the likelihood of changes in land use, resulting from the disparity in land values.  Timber value changes varied across the state, with strong decreasing timber values in high-growth Sierra Nevada areas where market dynamics already favor non-forest uses (most notably Nevada, Placer, and El Dorado County), providing the highest risk of rapid conversion of privately held timber land.

Not only is timberland productivity altered by economic factors, but can also be heavily influenced by environmental factors.   Environmental changes resulting from a changing climate, for example declining snowpack, will increase the occurrence of drought, eventually increasing the outbreak of wildfires, pests, and pathogens.  Temperature changes will also cause species to shift upslope where ranges will shrink due to the smaller amount of area at upper elevations.  Pest ridden trees, catastrophic wildfire, and shrinking populations will greatly threaten the future productivity potential of our forestlands.

Fortunately, the paper provides some hope through adaptation strategies which could be used to mitigate these effects.   Modeling showed that management options significantly influence the degree of loss of productivity.  Lands  in which the forest owners implemented management strategies that anticipate the effects of climate change and internalized those predictions into rotation and species composition decisions fared better than those who took a naïve approach, maintaining current harvest regimes.

The paper also addresses the impact of a carbon market on the effects of climate change on private forestlands, providing an estimate of the degree to which the presence of the carbon market can mitigate the economic impacts of climate change.   Models showed that the presence of a carbon market indeed lessens the impact of climate change on forests state-wide, but does so most significantly in the Sierra Nevada counties.

These findings provide the basis necessary to consider policy tools that lessen the impact of climate change, especially on land use conversion.  Implementation of a carbon market helps generate income in areas suffering the greatest timber value declines, providing an incentive to keep land in forest.  The paper also mentions other tools that favor timberland retention: tax relief or incentives, land conservation strategies, or actions that draw development to other areas.  SBC has already begun implementing several of these tools through programs aimed to help our region adapt to and mitigate the effects of climate change in the Sierra Nevada.  SBC is doing this by partnering with the Northern Sierra Partnership, consulting and encouraging communities to consider smart-growth land-use planning strategies, and by developing forest carbon projects through the Sierra Nevada Carbon Cooperative.  SBC’s biomass utilization efforts also fall in line with the necessary mitigation and adaptation strategies, providing a tool for healthy forest management which reduces greenhouse gases in a number of ways.

The first steps that need to be taken include outreach to community leaders, decision makers, and forest land owners about adaptation strategies, implications, and policy needs related to forest management. Initiating these conversations and partnerships today will protect the region’s timber industry of tomorrow.

During the event, speakers will discuss the economic hardships Sierra communities are facing in dealing with mill closures, declines in forest health, increasing wildfire intensity and frequency, and other environmental and economic pressures.  Current projects which show how the environment can be protected while stimulating sustainable economic benefits for surrounding communities will also be showcased.  Policy-makers, researchers, academics and funding experts will discuss what they see today, what we might expect tomorrow, funding opportunities and priorities, and what policies might be needed to successfully protect our resources, reduce fire threat and build resiliency into our environment and local economies.   Each regional group will also be asked to weigh in on all information presented, identify common goals, and participate in a moderated discussion.

For more information, including program information, the agenda, regional locations, and participating panel members, click here.  Moderated webposium locations include:

• Visalia
• Quincy
• Bishop
• Oroville
• Susanville
• Cameron Park
• Sutter Creek
• Grass Valley
• And Oakhurst

SBC’s Steve Frisch will be presenting as a panel member during the morning session, and several other SBC representatives will be present to participate in the discussions at the Quincy and Grass Valley locations.  Don’t miss out on this exciting opportunity to join leaders in your community and take part in these imperative discussions.

Woody Biomass Utilization and the Sierra Nevada: A Compromise

By Christina Prestella – Sierra Business Council

So often in America, we find ourselves in dispute over the best way to manage our resources. Shall we protect them and endanger the economy? Or shall we use them and put our environment at risk? Either way, we jeopardize a form of capital, whether it is natural, social, or financial. At the Sierra Business Council, our mission is to pioneer approaches which foster all three of these types of capital, without compromising any of the three. The woody biomass utilization argument mentioned in last week’s edition of the Sierra Prospect is a great illustration of a lack of agreement in response to providing energy to our Sierra Nevada communities. Instead of utilizing the massive overgrowth of woody materials in our own backyards for energy, we depend on foreign sources which poison our air and our economy.

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory reports that for every megawatt of woody biomass power produced, 4.9 jobs are created. Additionally, by increasing use of renewable and alternative fuels, we reduce the use of petroleum-based fuels. The USEPA has presented a lifecycle analysis which shows that the use of woody biomass results in a 90.1% reduction of lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions, relative to the petroleum fuel that is being displaced. Local timber milling and utilization of woody biomass is clearly a less polluting form of energy, and provides good, local jobs, so why is the industry failing?…

Click here to continue reading the article

Here’s how it works (in an ideal world):  Let’s start with atmospheric carbon dioxide, the most common greenhouse gas.  Forests, through the process of photosynthesis, absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and store it in their trees’ biomass.  The carbon is continuously stored in wood products made from certified sustainably harvested timber, revitalizing the timber industry that is currently struggling in the Sierra (see our post about the mill closing near Sonora for proof).  Sustainable fuels management operations also produce biomass that is used instead of fossil fuels for energy production.  By removing these fuels, not only are we creating a renewable source of energy, we are also reducing risk of catastrophic wildfire (check out the US Forest Service’s upcoming “Forests With  a Future” that focuses on fuels reduction to prevent forest fires in the Sierra Nevada).  Biomass-fired power plants use combined heat and power technologies to efficiently produce reliable carbon-neutral heat and electricity for surrounding communities while simultaneously creating green jobs.   At the end of their useful life, wood products are recycled for bio-energy, doubling their carbon benefit.  When trees die or their biomass is burned for energy, their stored carbon is released back into the atmosphere, and the cycle begins again as new trees absorb the CO2.  Take a look at this poster from The Forest Foundation for another depiction of the system.

What role do carbon offsets play in this cycle?  A carbon offset is an incentive for forest landowners to take the additional steps to create and maintain the sustainable cycle described above.  By putting a monetary value on the services forests provide, they are creating a new source of revenue for communities that participate and work to make this sustainable vision a reality.  Many barriers exist to creating this idealized system, and there is still a long way to go, but it is something to keep in mind as we work towards mitigating climate change and creating strong, localized communities in the Sierra Nevada.

Title: Special Climate Action Reserve Board Meeting RE Forest Project Protocol adoption
Location: Room 550 of the California Environmental Protection Agency building at 1001 I St. in Sacramento, CA or webinar
Date: September 1, 2009
Start Time: 10:00 AM PDT
End Time: 1:00 PM PDT
Registration:https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/621892897

The following is a timeline for protocol development moving forward:

• Prior to Sept 1 meeting (around Aug 25^th) – addendum to protocols released with minor technical changes from August 2009 draft
• Sept 1^st – special CAR Board Meeting to approve protocols
• Sept 24-25^th – ARB Board Meeting to endorse protocols
• (tentative) Oct 5-6 – verifier training course held in Los Angeles for Forest Project Protocols and Urban Forest Protocols

For the most recent updates regarding CAR’s Forest Project Protocols, visit their website.