California Forest Carbon Report

Folks, here are a few brief excerpts from a lengthy (552 pages) report, “AB 1504 California Forest Ecosystem and Harvested Wood Product Carbon Inventory: 2017 Reporting Period, FINAL REPORT.” The report was “completed through an agreement between the U.S. Forest Service…, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection…, and the University of Montana.”

http://bof.fire.ca.gov/board_committees/ab_1504_process/

“The 2017 reporting period annual rate of carbon sequestration for just the forest ecosystem pools is 29.2 MMT CO2e per year. This value is down by approximately 2.2 MMT CO2e per year from the 2016 measurement cycle. This reduction in carbon sequestration is the result of several factors including improvements in inventory methodology but is also being driven by two complementary factors; an increased rate of tree mortality and decreased gross growth rate on live trees during the most recent measurement years. Tree mortality regardless of cause, accounted for an additional 2.5 MMT of CO2e converted to dead wood annually. Gross growth on trees measured 10-years earlier declined by 1.2 MMT CO2e annually further reducing the net rate of sequestration.”

“In many forest types, current stocking levels reflect over a century of fire suppression and may not represent stand densities that are resilient to disturbances common to California forests such as fire or pest outbreaks. Additionally, as the forests age in unharvested stands, growth rates slow. Older forests tend to store more carbon, but they might not accumulate new carbon as quickly as younger, fast-growing stands. Consequently, the stocks and flux represented in this report may not be sustainable into the future without forest management given the uncertainty in potential effects from climate change, the current level of forest disturbances from wildfire and pests, and aging of forests on federal lands. From the 2015 reporting cycle, we are already beginning to see drought effects on tree growth and mortality. Forests provide many other services beyond carbon sequestration and storage, so there are many other considerations beyond forest carbon dynamics when developing management actions.”

<<Selected bullet points that reference National Forest lands, from Section 1, Executive summary and key findings:>>

• The national forests account for 35% of the statewide annual flux at a rate of 10.3 ± 2.8 MMT CO2e per year (figure 4.1).
• Only on reserved forest lands managed by the Forest Service is live tree growth not currently estimated to exceed carbon losses from the live tree pool due to tree mortality (Figure 4.4a, Table 4.4a).
• Annual gross growth per acre on live trees is currently exceeding all other carbon losses from the live tree pool due to mortality or harvest on unreserved timberland for all ownerships including lands managed by the Forest Service.
• The Shasta-Trinity National Forest has the highest net annual carbon sequestration rate for all forest pools at approximately 2.7 ± 0.9 MMT CO2e per year (Table 4.6b).
• There are four national forests in California currently experiencing a net loss of carbon based on all pools; San Bernardino (-0.3 ± 0.3 MMT CO2e per year), Los Padres (-0.3 ± 0.4 MMT CO2e per year), Angeles (-0.05 ± 0.2 MMT CO2e per year, and the Lake Tahoe Basin (-0.07 ± 0.2 MMT CO2e per year) (Table 4.6c).

17 thoughts on “California Forest Carbon Report”

  1. Just the carbon footprint of 100,000,000 dead trees in California is probably incredible. Of course, that should also include the more powerful GHG’s coming from the rotting trees. We could have mitigated that disaster by harvesting some of the dead trees but, that opportunity is mostly gone. Those dead trees will now fuel the inevitable future high-severity wildfires way before they rot into soil components. In some areas, the mortality is so severe that there will be no thinning projects in the next 40 years.

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  2. Carbon sequestration is another debate I like to stay out of, but I don’t think national forests can be managed for carbon inconsistent with the regulatory requirement for ecological integrity. Whether carbon is increasing or declining is only relevant in relation to its natural range of variation (which takes into account expected climate conditions).

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    • Jon, I can’t see how the “natural range of variation” can take into account expected climate conditions, which are a) unknown and likely unknowable, and b) most people think of as having some anthropogenic cause, hence becomes in common English “the potential future unnatural range of variation”.

      But I agree, until some Big Funder gets a team of experts with diverse perspectives to review all the different carbon studies and data sets and assumptions, and explain them and why they disagree, to fairly knowledgeable people like Smokey Wire readers, I’m inclined to write them all off.

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  3. For whatever it’s worth, I asked Dr. Chad Hanson his quick take on this study:

    “This is a US Forest Service report and, predictably, it makes numerous scientifically inaccurate statements and assumptions in the course of promoting more logging and, therefore, carbon removal, from federal forests. There are a number of problems with the report, but two that should be addressed immediately are the inaccurate claims that current forests are overly-dense, and the claim that logging will somehow result in increased forest carbon storage.

    First, existing scientific data are clear that there is currently less biomass and, therefore, less carbon in CA forests than there was historically, in significant part due to decades of logging (McIntyre et al. 2015).

    Second, the science is clear that you cannot keep more carbon in the forests by pulling more carbon out of them through logging (e.g., Campbell et al. 2012). These sorts of deceptive pro-logging arguments are becoming a new and insidious form of climate science denial.”

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    • Of course, if you leave out data, or include private commercial forest lands, Hanson is going to claim such ‘facts’. Generally, we talk about Federal Forests on this blog, and, yes, California National Forests ARE overly-dense with incense cedar and white fir dominating the understory. Additionally, blaming the now-distant past practices should not affect today’s more nuanced and beneficial forest management, including set-asides for owls, goshawks and other protected species. Hanson’s claim of “Our forests need larger and more intense wildfires” isn’t backed up by credible science or by actual Wildlife Biologists (as well as humans who love forests). Hanson’s ‘opinions’ should be taken with the tiniest grains of salt. He is an untrustworthy source of science, period.

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  4. Hanson isn’t quite correct that it is a US Forest Service report. It was commissioned by the California Board of Forestry and Fire Protection and the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, and the affiliations of the nine authors are:

    U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station
    California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, Fire and Resources Assessment Program
    University of Montana Bureau of Business and Economic Research, Forest Industry Research Program
    U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station
    U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, National Technology Development Program

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    • Jeez Steve. If that’s all you got to criticize Dr. Hanson in response to his comment, so be it. It IS a USFS report, written by USFS employees. Sure, other people worked on it too.

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      • Matthew, I disagree with most of what Hanson wrote, but I simply don’t have time to respond. Besides, it’s all been discussed at length here before.

        But, dammit, I can’t resist….

        Hanson writes, “First, existing scientific data are clear that there is currently less biomass and, therefore, less carbon in CA forests than there was historically, in significant part due to decades of logging (McIntyre et al. 2015).”

        But the report states that, “In many forest types, current stocking levels reflect over a century of fire suppression and may not represent stand densities that are resilient to disturbances common to California forests such as fire or pest outbreaks.”

        And the report provides ample data to back that up. FWIW, there are numerous tables and 22 pages of references.

        Hanson is talking about total biomass, but the problem is stand composition and density. The study Hanson cites, McIntyre et al. 2015, found that, “In the forests of California, comparisons of historical and contemporary forests in selected areas of the Sierra Nevada and Transverse mountains suggest that forests have in-filled with small trees and exhibited declines in larger trees since the early 1900s, patterns attributed to fire suppression, forest exploitation, and changes in mortality due to increases in temperature and declines in water available to plants.”

        That’s a problem. What does Hanson say ought to be done about it? Why, nothing, but above all, especially not logging. Wildfire is desirable in his view, since snag forests result are in short supply.

        McIntyre et al found increases in coarse woody debris (CWD) — fuels: “…the relative abundance of oaks versus pines are associated with modeled estimates of increases in CWD since the early part of the 20th century.” They suggest “that rates of change [in the amounts of CWD] will continue to increase. Continued investigation of integrated effects of water balance on vegetation dynamics is critical to predict and manage vegetation responses to global change.”

        “Manage vegetation.” Imagine that.

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  5. Matthew, didn’t you just post something funded by TWS and SELC? I think you and Chad are both helping make my point that people, including scientists, who disagree need to be brought in to public policy science design, production and interpretation. Otherwise we’ll be on for a number of years of needlessly expensive production of weaponized “science.”

    As to Chad’s statement that “if you disagree with some specific carbon accounting thing, you are on your way to becoming a climate science denier” seems kind of like name-calling to me. You can disagree with their conclusions, but they are all equally card carrying scientists who have legitimate disagreements, and those very disagreements are a fundamental part of increasing our mutual understanding of Nature.

    Also, those broad claims he makes about California don’t line up with my own experiences in various parts of California. Could we get more specific references to those two papers?

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    • Given the number of times Dr. Chad Hanson has been torn down and called names on this blog Sharon (which by the way, you did nothing to stop at all), you really are going to claim that Dr. Hanson’s comment equals name-calling? My lord.

      P.S. Anyone care to offer a critique of the substance of Dr. Hanson’s critique of the study?

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    • FWIW: The authors of the report “Examining residents’ perceptions and use of Southern Appalachian Region Wilderness Areas” are clearly listed in the report (which I linked to). They report authors are:

      Kyle M. Woosnam, Ph.D.
      Associate Professor
      Parks, Recreation and Tourism Management
      Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources
      University of Georgia

      Samuel J. Keith, M.S.
      Doctoral Research Assistant
      Parks, Recreation and Tourism Management
      Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources
      University of Georgia

      B. Bynum Boley, Ph.D.
      Assistant Professor
      Parks, Recreation and Tourism Management
      Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources
      University of Georgia

      Gary T. Green, Ed.D.
      Assistant Dean of Academic Affairs and Professor
      Parks, Recreation and Tourism Management
      Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources
      University of Georgia

      P.S. I have no idea who funded the report, or if that was even listed within the actual report.

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  6. For whatever reason, I have higher standards for (against?) name calling for us scientists, as we are supposed to be open to different ideas. Name- calling can discourage people from the very questioning and alternative ideas and approaches that makes the scientific enterprise valuable.

    Yes, I’m willing to critique the substance of Hanson’s critique if I can get the citations to those papers.

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    • Great Sharon, Glad you have “higher standards for (against) name calling for us scientists.” Nobody has been called names and dragged through the mud during the history of your blog than Dr. Chad Hanson…and I can’t think of a single time when you said anything to put an end to it.

      For the record, this statement made by Dr. Hanson doesn’t even come close to “name-calling:”

      “These sorts of deceptive pro-logging arguments are becoming a new and insidious form of climate science denial.”

      But sure, let’s keep focusing on this. I’ll go pop some popcorn.

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  7. Thanks Steve! I think you did a better job than I could have done. I got stuck way back on
    “First, existing scientific data are clear that there is currently less biomass and, therefore, less carbon in CA forests than there was historically, in significant part due to decades of logging (McIntyre et al. 2015).”
    But then I looked at that paper, and “historically” to them was the 30’s.. let me quote from Leiburg published in 1902..https://pubs.usgs.gov/pp/0008/report.pdf on the Northern Sierra Nevada.

    DESTRUCTIVE AGENCIES.
    The forces of destruction at work in the forest are in part due to climatic conditions, in part to ravages of fungi and insects, and, lastly, to human agencies. Only those caused by the latter are here considered. The methods employed by man in destroying the forest in this region are chiefly of four kinds, namely, cutting, fire, grazing, and mining, enumerated in the order of their importance and effectiveness. Before lumbering operations began, fire was the principal instrument of destruction and grazing the second, but in recent times cutting has risen to the chief rank.

    Fuelwood cutting
    It is impossible to segregate the tracts cut over for this purpose in the forested areas from those where the cutting has been for mill timber. Hence no estimate is possible as to the quantity of cordwood removed from these tracts. It must, however, have been very large, as a strip about 4- miles wide, from Truckee to Colfax, paralleling the Southern Pacific Railroad, is said to have :-; said to have yielded up it forest chiefly to supply the locomotive: in addition to great quantities cut at different points farther away from the line. In the woodland practically the entire area of 364,000 acres has been culled, chiefly for fuel. The cut has not been very great except on areas contiguous to the Sacramento Valley, where a strip of woodland about 10 miles wide and running the full length of the region, has yielded 50 per cent of its timber for fuel purposes. In addition to that cut from the tracts mentioned above, considerable timber has been cut for fuel
    during the last fifty years; by settlers and miners throughout the entire region.

    CUTTING FOR MILL TIMBER
    There have been cut over and culled for mill-timber purpose:,;, including timber used in the rough for mines, 1,022,890 acres. lncluding the woodland in this estimate, as some of the cutting there has been for domestic purposes other than firewood, we have a total of 1,386,890 acres, on which systematic cutting has been carried on within the last fifty-two years. Most of the cutting outside the woodland tracts has been in the yellow-pine type. “

    But that perhaps is just a fascinating aside (a strip four miles wide!) and I ‘m still missing how the amounts of biomass and carbon of the past are relevant to today’s management of forests and carbon.

    “First, existing scientific data are clear that there is currently less biomass and, therefore, less carbon in CA forests than there was historically, in significant part due to decades of logging (McIntyre et al. 2015).” (???)

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    • US forests are a major carbon sink — they sequester more CO2 than they release, and this is true even after a century of “industrial” harvesting. How much CO2 would be in the air if we had used steel and concrete instead of wood to build homes, apartment buildings, furniture, etc.?

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