LETTERS
We can’t afford to choose between locally sourced wood products and increasing forest carbon storage. About 7 million people live in Massachusetts. We use nearly 360 million cubic feet of wood each year. We need to find climate-smart ways of managing our forests to produce biomaterials like wood, or we’ll just end up using more carbon-intensive steel and concrete and contributing to the cooking of the planet (or asking others to provide our wood while ignoring where it comes from).
There are ways to manage our forests to support ecological health, store carbon, and produce climate-smart wood products. The New England Forestry Foundation’s Exemplary Forestry management standards achieve these goals while recognizing that wildlands are an essential part of the landscape.
The foundation’s research shows that climate-smart forestry across New England, combined with the positive impacts of this approach that would accrue to the building industry, could keep more than 646 million metric tons of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere over the next 30 years, equal to about 30 percent of the emissions reductions needed for New England to reach net-zero emissions by 2050.
The right approaches can store more carbon in our forests while providing renewable wood to build our local bioeconomy and grow more of what we need where we live.
Andrea Colnes
Deputy director and climate fellow
New England Forestry Foundation
Littleton