From the AZ Daily Sun: “U.S. Forest Service hopes new minimum rates can help clear forests” — thanks to Nick Smith of Healthy Forests, Healthy Communities for the link. In areas with no-value biomass, paying to have it hauled away may be an option to leaving it in place or burning it.
The U.S. Forest Service in Washington D.C. changed its national policy on the price of selling Forest Service timber in a way they hope will help forestry projects clear cut timber off of its thinning areas.
Across the country, Forest Service officials are now able to sell bundles of logs for a new minimum price that applies to trees regardless of its diameter — 25 cents per CCF. As 5 CCFs can fill a log truck, the new metric means a truck could be carrying a load worth only about $1.25 in areas with low-value lumber. John Crockett, Deputy Director of Forest Management, Range Management and Ecology at the Forest Service in Washington D.C., expects the change will not impact areas where trees are sold at high value, and will only help areas that are struggling to remove unhealthy swaths of trees.
The Four Forest Restoration Initiative (4FRI) works across four national forests and offers timber sales and stewardship contracts to clear unhealthy forests around northern Arizona. The new minimum rate will help 4FRI lower the cost of the wood, in the hopes that a business might be able to save money on the wood and afford the costs of removing it from the site.
I seem to remember Colorado ski areas having to go through many unnecessary timber sale hoops for removing dead trees on ski slopes and ourthinking this needed to be changed in light of the need to remove much low value material. The wheels turn slowly but they are turning, which is good news.