Biden administration withdraws old-growth forest plan after getting pushback from industry and GOP

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Billings, Mont. (AP) — The Biden administration on Tuesday abruptly dropped its emerging plan to protect ancient forests after facing pushback from Republicans and the timber industry.

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The move was announced by U.S. Forest Service Chief Randy Moore in a letter to forest supervisors.

It brings an abrupt end to a years-long process to formulate a national plan that will better protect ancient trees that are increasingly under threat from climate change. The effort has been supported by some conservationists as one of the most important forest conservation efforts in decades.

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President Joe Biden launched the initiative with an executive order on Earth Day in April 2022. The proposal underwent extensive public comment periods and internal analysis by government officials and was scheduled to be finalized any day later.

The plan would be limited to logging in old-growth forests, with exceptions to allow logging in some old-growth areas to protect against wildfires.

But those exceptions were not enough for the timber industry and Republicans in Congress, who strongly opposed the administration’s proposal. They said there was no need for that because many forest areas were already protected. They warned it could be devastating for logging companies that rely on access to cheap timber on public lands.

GOP lawmakers introduced legislation while the administration’s plans were still underway to block it from taking effect.

Much has been learned from the first-of-its-kind effort to identify old-growth trees on public lands across the country, Moore said in his letter. But he also acknowledged criticism from those who said management’s approach to ancient forests was flawed because they can vary greatly between different types of ecosystems.

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“There is strong support and expectation for us to continue conserving these forests based on the best scientific information available,” Moore wrote. “There were also comments that there are important place-based differences that we will need to understand in order to conserve old-growth forests.”

Old-growth forests, such as the giant sequoia trees of California, contain layer upon layer of undisturbed trees and plants.

Most of the old growth stands fell to logging as the nation developed. However, there are still pockets of ancient trees, scattered throughout the United States including California, the Pacific Northwest, and the Rocky Mountain regions. Larger areas of old growth still exist in Alaska, such as the Tongass National Forest.

There is widespread consensus on the importance of preserving them, both symbolically as a wonder of nature, and practically because their trunks and branches store large amounts of carbon that can be released when forests burn, increasing climate change.

Wildfires in recent years have destroyed clumps of old-growth forest in states across the western United States and killed thousands of giant sequoia trees.

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Wildfires, insects and diseases have been the main killers of old-growth trees since 2000, accounting for about 1,400 square miles (3,600 square kilometers) of losses, according to government research. Logging on federal lands cuts down about 14 square miles (36 square kilometers) of old-growth forest, and timber industry representatives said that figure shows no need for further restrictions.

The Biden administration’s conservation plan faced a questionable future if completed. During President-elect Donald Trump’s first term, federal officials sought to open huge areas of West Coast forests to potential logging.

Federal wildlife officials under Biden reversed the move in 2021. They found that Trump-era political appointees relied on faulty science to justify dramatic shrinkage of protected forest areas considered critical habitat for the endangered northern spotted owl. The owl has been in decline for decades as ancient forests in Oregon, Washington and California have been cut down.

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