Forests and Trees | US Nature4Climate

3 Ways Federal Investment in Trees and Forests Can Support Economic Growth

This article includes excerpts from a longer article published by World Resources Institute. Read the original article here.

*_{Photo Credit: Kent Mason/The Nature Conservancy}*

To reach the United States’ target of reducing net emissions by 50-52% from 2005 levels by 2030, the federal government and non-federal actors will need to increase the ability of natural and working lands to sequester and store carbon. A recent economy-wide analysis finds that reaching these climate goals will require the United States to enable its lands and forests, or its land carbon sink, to remove at least 913 Mt CO2e annually by 2030, which represents a 13% increase in yearly sequestration over 2019 levels. This increase in sequestration would be equal to the emissions from over 20 million cars every year.

To achieve this, the nation must restore trees to the landscape, increase the adoption of climate-smart agricultural practices and protect landscapes that already store carbon. Federal investment and action from all levels of society can allow the United States to achieve the full potential of these pathways, creating jobs and other economic benefits in the process.

Seizing the United States’ Most Promising Natural Climate Solutions

While action is needed across all land sectors, research shows that three tree-based pathways hold the greatest opportunity for enhancing natural carbon removal in the near-term while supporting jobs and economic vitality. WRI analysis shows that these pathways could offer an attractive return on investment: they require a total federal investment of $126.6 billion over 20 years and would support approximately 3.9 million job-years (or 199,000 jobs each year for 20 years). Put another way, 31.4 jobs would be supported for every million dollars of federal investment. Over 20 years, this investment would also generate $226.8 billion in value added to local economies, including $164.4 billion in employee compensation and $12.2 billion in state, federal and local taxes.

Table 1: Economic Impact of Natural Climate Mitigation Pathways

1. Reforesting and Restocking Trees

Trees are a carbon-removing technology that is ready for deployment today. Although building the infrastructure to plant healthy forests at the necessary scale will require considerable investment and work, there are already professionals working to plant and manage trees and forests every day. Federal investment in reforestation and forest restocking could help to expand employment in these sectors, particularly in rural areas, where 67% of job creation potential exists.

Across federal, state, local and private lands, there is an opportunity to reforest historically forested land that has been cleared, disrupted or burned and has lost the ability to sequester carbon. There is also an opportunity to restock, or increase the density of, existing forests in the eastern and midwestern United States where trees have been lost due to disease or disruption, and where increased forested density would not increase fire risk.

Non-federal lands, which include state, local and private lands, hold the greatest potential for carbon removal and job creation. In these lands, 185.4 million acres are eligible for reforestation and restocking. This could remove 156 MtCO₂e per year by 2030, and up to 312 MtCO₂e per year in 2040 and beyond. Reforestation and restocking on non-federal land could also support 68,100 jobs across multiple sectors annually.

Federal lands offer an additional 18 million acres suitable for reforestation and restocking. Collectively, these lands could sequester an additional 17 MtCO₂e per year by 2030 and up to 35 MtCO₂e per year in 2040 and beyond. Investment in reforestation and restocking on federal land could support 11,700 jobs annually.

Across both federal and non-federal lands, an annual federal investment of $3 billion per year for 20 years could support 79,800 jobs annually, or 26.8 jobs per one million dollars of investment. Missouri, Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin would see the highest total levels of job creation from reforestation and restocking across all land ownership types.

2. Agroforestry

Agroforestry, or the practice of incorporating trees into agricultural systems, could help expand trees and their climate benefits. This would also benefit farmers and ranchers, as agroforestry can improve soil, crop and animal health, and provide added revenue from forest products and timber. Agroforestry practices with notable climate benefits include silvopasture, or integrating trees into animal agriculture; alley cropping, or interspersing row crops with rows of trees; and planting windbreaks, or strategically placed groups of shrubs and trees that prevent soil erosion and protect crops and livestock. There are approximately 110.9 million acres of U.S. cropland and pastureland that may be eligible for agroforestry and could sequester 156 MMT CO2e per year.

Establishing and maintaining agroforestry systems can be labor-intensive and require specialized expertise, which can further support jobs. However, agroforestry systems can be expensive to establish, which can pose a barrier for farmers. Federal investment can help landowners establish agroforestry systems and support jobs in the process. An annual federal investment of $1.8 billion in agroforestry could support 49,500 jobs annually, or 27.4 jobs per million dollars invested, and provide other economic benefits. Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Dakota and Texas would see the highest total levels of job creation from expansion of agroforestry.

3. Wildfire Risk Mitigation

Many forests in the United States, particularly in Western states, are at high risk for severe fire due to widespread tree death from drought, disease and historical fire suppression. Severe fires threaten forest-adjacent communities and permanently damage trees and ecosystems, which can turn forests into a source of emissions. Wildfires also produce pollutants that can increase the risk of respiratory and cardiovascular health problems in people who inhale smoke.

Techniques to reduce severe wildfire risk include removing biomass, strategically thinning out overly dense forests and conducting controlled, low-intensity burns to remove fuels that could feed severe blazes. These kinds of treatments — known as fuel load treatments — do not prevent wildfire from occurring, but they lower the risk of massive fires. Prescribed burning alone could reduce wildfire carbon emissions in the western United States by 18–25% and could increase long-term forest carbon storage by 18 MtCO₂ per year through avoided tree mortality.

The increasing frequency of catastrophic wildfires across the United States highlights the importance of ambitious and immediate investment to increase ecosystem health and reduce the risk of severe wildfire. There are over 86.7 million acres of forest in the nation that could be eligible for fuel load treatments. Federal investment could help mitigate the risk of wildfire in these forests and would directly employ prescribed burn professionals and forestry professionals. Fuel load treatment also generates biomass and timber that can have downstream uses that generate employment.

Accounting for both fuel load treatment jobs and jobs supporting wood and biomass processing, a yearly federal investment of $1.5 billion in fuel load reduction could support 69,600 jobs, or 45.2 jobs per million dollars invested. The states with most potential to support jobs related to wildfire risk mitigation are California, New Mexico, Wyoming, Oregon and Idaho.

An Opportunity for Society-Wide Action

While federal action is essential to enhance and protect the land carbon sink, reaching the nation’s climate goals will require states, local governments, the private sector and civil society to push forward their own initiatives to reforest and restock forests and to mitigate wildfire risk. For example:

States can create or expand programs that incentivize climate-friendly land management and restock and reforest state-owned lands, like states participating in the US Climate Alliance’s Natural and Working Lands Challenge are doing. States can also work with the federal government to further improve greenhouse gas inventories. States with fire danger can also increase budgets for thinning and prescribed burning.
Cities and local governments can expand urban forestry efforts to plant trees in parks and open space. For example, Washington, D.C. aims to have 40% of the city covered by a healthy tree canopy by 2032.They can also help community members living in wilderness-urban interface areas to reduce flammable material near structures and build fire-adapted communities.
Businesses can ensure that the agricultural and timber products in their supply chain are sourced from farms and forests that use climate-friendly mitigation practices and increase investments in land-based climate mitigation strategies.
Tribal communities, schools and faith-based groups can plant trees and enhance land management practices to sequester more carbon and mitigate wildfire risk.

Note: Where not otherwise specified, economic impact, acreage potential and carbon removal potential were derived as part of analysis for WRI’s working paper The Economic Benefits of The New Climate Economy in Rural America. Please refer to this paper’s appendices for information on methodology.

Haley Leslie-Bole, is a Research Analyst with WRI’s U.S. Climate Initiative, where she works on landscape-scale solutions for climate mitigation and adaptation in the U.S.

Creating Resilient Forests in the Jemez Mountains

*_{New Mexico’s Rio Grande and its tributaries supply water to more than half of New Mexico’s population. Photo Credit: Alan W. Eckert/The Nature Conservancy}*

Imagine your favorite forested area without big, beautiful pine trees cooling you from the sun or providing fresh air during your hike. That’s what New Mexicans across the Jemez Mountains faced when the region was scorched by the Las Conchas Fire in 2011. The flames burned so hot that thousands of acres were left without trees, or the seed sources for natural forest recovery. Heavy rains that followed the fire sent ash and sediment down the Rio Grande River, the pollution preventing downstream cities from withdrawing water for 40 days.

Water is life and livelihood. Nowhere is that a truer statement than in New Mexico. Each year, large and severe wildfires and post-fire flooding increasingly put our water sources at risk. State and federal agencies spend hundreds of millions of dollars each year responding to these fires. Communities affected by severe wildfire face loss of revenue to local businesses, loss of outdoor cultural opportunities. Without action, New Mexico’s future water security and nature-based culture are at significant risk.

To address this challenge, The Nature Conservancy and a broad network of stakeholders formed the Rio Grande Water Fund (RGWF) to work cooperatively to reduce the risk of megafires, protect precious water supplies and build resilience against climate change threats.

This public-private coalition of 100 signatories – including non-profits, tribes, government agencies, and businesses – are working collaboratively to scale up restoration with a goal of improving the health of 600,000 acres of New Mexico’s forested watersheds to secure water for 1 million people. The RGWF is designed to generate sustainable funding for a 20-year program of large-scale forest restoration treatments which include projects to thin overgrown forests, restore wetlands and streams, engage youth, inform policy makers with our science and generate forestry and wood products jobs.

Surprisingly, thinning forests followed by controlled burns is an important climate solution. On the surface, it seems like a way to lose precious carbon. However, it’s important to understand that fire is a natural process and has always been a part of western forests. Forests need fire to recycle nutrients, reduce competition between trees, and prepare seedbeds for the next generation. Until the early 1900’s Indigenous Peoples used fire to protect their homes, water and cultural traditions. European settlers changed the forest, bringing livestock that ate the grass that carried ground fire and removed large fire resistant trees. In the early and mid-20^th century, fire was considered the enemy of forests, and most fires were suppressed, leaving a backlog of dense small, flammable trees.

Now, hotter and drier temperatures, coupled with our overcrowded forests, encourage fire behavior that is much more intense, releasing huge amounts of carbon into the air all at once. By improving the health of our forests, we’re making them more resilient, stabilizing carbon and increasing carbon capture as healthy trees continue to grow. Healthy forests absorb more carbon dioxide, storing it in large trees, helping cool our planet.

Because the Las Conchas Fire left no seed sources across thousands of acres of scorched land, The Nature Conservancy expanded the Rio Grande Water Fund work to include an innovative reforestation effort supported by many partners.

*_{Photo Credit: Collin Haffey/The Nature Conservancy}*

TNC is working with research scientists to find the most drought resistant “mother trees” for seeds, grow seedlings in a way that makes them more drought hardy , then plant “tree-islands” – small clusters of trees – in the burned areas of the Jemez Mountains. These tree islands will serve as the seed sources for the future. Using new projections of climate change impacts, and our understanding of what trees need to grow, we identify places where trees have a stronger likelihood to survive in the future. Additionally, our local Indigenous partners from the local Pueblo communities add more value to the work by sharing which tree species locations are culturally important. They also lead the planting operation.

Reducing the risk of damaging wildfires – and planting in areas where natural tree regeneration is unlikely – are forest strategies that together help maintain and increase carbon storage on the landscape. Since 2014, RGWF partners have thinned and conducted controlled burns on nearly 150,000 acres to prevent catastrophic wildfires, while planting in tandem to capture carbon, protect water, and create wildlife habitat.

One reason for the RGWF’s success is its collaboration across boundaries and between organizations working at all scales. The USDA Forest Service, the New Mexico Dept. of Game and Fish and the Water Utility Authority for Albuquerque and Bernalillo County are some of our larger Water Fund partners. At a more local scale, we work with the Cerro Negro Forest Council, a collaborative of people from traditional Hispanic villages near Taos, New Mexico. Members thin forest plots to reduce fire risk, and then can sell the wood they produce to provide income for their families. The project is managed by a local “Mayordomo”, a governance system modeled on the centuries-old irrigation management system used by these communities.

_{Through cooperative and coordinated burning we are able to burn more acres with prescribed fire due to safe staffing levels. Here the All Hands All Lands Burn Team organizes representatives from 12 different organizations. Photo Credit: Collin Haffey/The Nature Conservancy}

Part of the challenge of large-scale work to mitigate climate impacts is having enough people available and trained to do the needed work. The Rio Grande Water Fund supports the “All Hands All Lands” (AHAL) controlled burning program that builds capacity of forestry workers to use fire well and uses a cooperative burning projects to put more good fire on the ground. Federal fire workers that we depend on to do the burning need to make forests resilient are often called on to fight fires outside New Mexico. Engaging more skilled people to put good fire on the ground is way to help everyone make progress. According to Dave Lasky, the Forest Stewards Guild leader who manages the AHAL Burn Team, “The goal of the AHAL is to get ahead of prescribed fire backlogs on federal, state and tribal lands and support private landowner’s use of prescribed fire.”

Healthy forests lead to healthy livelihoods. Vibrant, resilient forests protect our water, provide wildlife habitat, support the state’s outdoor recreation and forest products economy. Even more importantly – as climate change bears down – healthy forests can store more carbon dioxide to help cool our planet and improve our quality of life.

Portions of this article were adapted from The Rio Grande Water Fund’s 2020 Annual Report

For more information, read about the Rio Grande Water Fund at their website and at Nature.Org.

Anne Bradley is the Forest Program Director at The Nature Conservancy in New Mexico.

Forests: A seemingly simple answer to confronting climate change and biodiversity loss

Nearly every day we’re surrounded by negative news about the accelerating rates of climate change and biodiversity loss.

Today, however, we not only have good news about a path to confronting those twin crises, but we also have a tangible tool to help us navigate that path towards success.

In one sense, it’s a surprisingly simple path – a path of forests.

We’ve always known that forests are a critical part of the climate solution, removing climate-changing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and storing it in their trunks, branches, and roots. When forests are destroyed, that stored carbon not only gets released back into the atmosphere, but the potential for those forests to remove carbon dioxide in future years also disappears. When we lose forests, we lose their climate-protecting powers, forever.

Until now, there was scant data to determine just how much potential for carbon sequestration was lost from deforestation, particularly on small scales at state and municipal levels. And without this data, government agencies, conservation groups, and others lacked information about the value of protecting different lands for carbon sequestration.

The good news is we now have a tool that can provide that data.

Scientists with The Nature Conservancy and Clark University in Massachusetts have worked together to create a forest carbon analysis and online mapping tool that shows the potential of forests across the continental US to capture and store climate-changing carbon emissions for years to come, even on lands as small as one-quarter of an acre.

The carbon potential numbers identified in the analysis are meant to serve as baselines that land managers can use to determine how future actions and disturbances on forests will affect actual carbon sequestration. For example, many forests particularly in the Western US will fall short of their carbon potential because of wildfire or other disturbances. Conversely, ecological thinning and removing competing vegetation can help forests reach their full carbon storage potential.

Numerous states along the East Coast have already heralded the importance of having this data, saying it will help them prioritize landscapes for conservation, improve greenhouse gas accounting, identify opportunities for small landowners to participate in emerging carbon markets, and calculate how forest protection compares to other, sometimes more costly, means of removing and reducing carbon emissions.

*_{The Resilient and Connected Network Mapping Tool from The Nature Conservancy and Clark University identifies forest carbon hotspots.}*

Adding to this good news is the fact that the mapping tool shows that many of the forests with the highest potential to capture and store carbon into the future are also among the most important places for diverse species to find refuge from climate impacts.

These carbon “hotspots” are part of a network of lands that have been identified by The Nature Conservancy as having unique geological and topographical features – such as ravines, steep slopes, and diverse soil types – that create “microclimates” where species can find safe places to live as their habitats are altered or destroyed by climate impacts.

We can now identify forests we can’t afford to lose if we want to tackle climate change and the loss of biodiversity. This could be a game changer.

Lands along the Appalachian Mountains and the Pacific Northwest – including Washington state’s Hoh River, the Altamaha River corridor in Georgia, and the Cumberland Forests that span Kentucky, Tennessee, and Virginia – are among the lands that have been identified to have both high potential for carbon sequestration over the next 30 years, while also providing diverse plant and animal species refuge from floods, drought, and other threats of climate change.

To be sure, forest conservation alone will not stop climate change. The climate emergency requires myriad solutions. We need to dramatically transform the global economy to reduce emissions from all sectors, including energy, transportation, manufacturing, construction, and land use.

Science led by The Nature Conservancy has shown that natural climate solutions – such as conserving forests, improving soil health, protecting grasslands, and restoring coastal wetlands – are an important part of the solution and have the potential to remove 21% of the America’s carbon pollution.

Unfortunately, nearly 1 million acres of forest lands are lost across the continental US each year due to development and other uses. That is equivalent to losing more than 100 acres of forests each hour and, with them, decades of stored carbon as well as their future ability to store more.

This new mapping tool can provide the data we need to stop this trend and allow us to clearly quantify how we can confront two of the greatest threats facing the world today – climate change and biodiversity loss—by taking one seemingly simple yet powerful step: keep our forests as forests.

Dr. Mark Anderson is the Director of The Nature Conservancy’s Center for Resilient Conservation Science.

Climate Resilient Conservation on Atlanta’s West Side

*_{Photo courtesy of HDR 2021 Paul Dingman}*

When many of us think of conservation and Natural Climate Solutions, cities may not be the first places that come to mind. We might imagine vast spaces like national parks, forest preserves, or coastal ecosystems. But conservation is not only the preservation of wilderness – it can also integrate into urban areas through city parks and thoughtful planning of the entire urban landscape. For some communities where green spaces are common, this comes as no surprise. But many neighborhoods, particularly communities of color, lack the benefits of a nearby greenspace. People of color are three times as likely to live somewhere that is nature-deprived than predominantly white communities. This “nature gap” leads to disproportionate health and economic impacts due to poor air quality, urban heat islands, limited exercise and recreation opportunities, and greater risks from severe weather. 

Cities around the United States are addressing this equity issue by listening at the local level, and the Trust for Public Land is helping communities plan for urban green spaces that provide numerous social, environmental, and climate benefits. One such example of urban conservation has taken place in the middle of west Atlanta’s historic Vine City neighborhood. The area has long been home to African American luminaries like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. It sits adjacent to the nation’s oldest and largest association of historically Black colleges. It’s also been a “center of gravity for activism and leadership during the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s,” and has been a “home for generations of Black scholars, business owners, and activists.”

The neighborhood is also in a lower-lying area where Proctor Creek once flowed before it was channelized and buried in the early 1900s. As development expanded, naturally absorbent lands were replaced with pavement and other impervious surfaces that send stormwater into an already stretched stormwater system. All of these factors combined to put the neighborhood at increased risk for flooding during storms. In September 2002, days of heavy rainfall overwhelmed the sewer system and flooded hundreds of homes, many of which became uninhabitable. The cost of rebuilding the homes – and risks of a repeat flooding incident – were deemed too great, and city leaders decided to relocate residents and raze more than 60 properties. 

*_{Photo Credit: Alex Jackson/The Trust for Public Land}*

The Trust for Public Land partnered with the City of Atlanta, the local community, and a network of generous donors, innovative consultants, and experienced contractors to create a space that will make the site and the surrounding community more resilient as storm events continue to become more significant and frequent. This was accomplished by creating a dynamic park that has the ability to collect and manage 9 million gallons of stormwater from the 160 acres adjacent to the site using innovative green infrastructure solutions. Without the park and its specialized green infrastructure, flooding would have continued to wreak havoc on this neighborhood.

This summer, the neighborhood completed this transformation from tragedy to triumph, as Vine City celebrated the opening of Cook Park. It is now a “gleaming new space of trees sprouting and gardens of native grasses and plants filling in their beds. Walking paths wind past new playground and exercise equipment centering a two-acre pond ringed with wildlife-friendly wetlands.”

As with any successful conservation initiative, this project relied on partnerships and community engagement. The opportunity to work with Vine City and English Avenue residents, helping address these topics through the creation of a best-in-class park is a perfect example of how the process can be as important as the outcome. Through community festivals, neighborhood association and church gatherings and formal presentations, residents became vital partners to The Trust for Public Land and the City of Atlanta as we strived together to create a space that, in addition to reducing the risk of dangerous flooding, inspires physical activity, calms nerves and draws people together.

We are excited that the design, planning, and construction of the park positioned it well to become a center-point for outcome-based, health-focused recreation services and planned fitness programming when it finally opened. Over the project’s six-year lifespan so far, we have partnered with a number of small, neighborhood-based or neighborhood-focused organizations to provide health-centric programming. Urban Perform, the Arthur M. Blank YMCA, and Chris 180, to name a few, are poised to use climbing boulders, sport courts, and fitness equipment as soon as social distancing restrictions are lifted. The relationships we have formed with neighborhood groups and individual residents have allowed a more efficient and inclusive transition from design to construction to stewardship. 

Lastly, while not the primary goal, the park can also help mitigate climate change by planting trees. Research by University College London has shown that urban forests can store nearly as much carbon per hectare as tropical rainforests. In the U.S., the top 100 largest U.S. cities alone contain approximately 2 million acres of city park space; collectively these conservation efforts add up to make a big difference. And with Cook Park, Atlanta is one step closer to its goal of putting a great park within a 10-minute walk of every resident.

For more information on Cook Park and the Trust for Public Land:

Large Landscape Conservation: Pine Mountain Wildlands Corridor

_{Pine Mountain – Bad Branch – © Scott Hotaling}

Conservation of large intact landscapes is essential to protecting biodiversity and maintaining ecosystem functions and resilience. “When we look at protecting high biodiversity regions within landscapes that are considered to be climate resilient, there’s an opportunity to take local action that really transcends to global significance,” says Greg Abernathy of the Kentucky Natural Lands Trust (KNLT). Through the Pine Mountain Wildlands Corridor, KNLT is working to connect existing protected areas along Pine Mountain to form a 125-mile contiguous forested migratory corridor in Central Appalachia from Virginia through Kentucky to Tennessee. The project is part a larger continental scale conservation effort known as the Eastern Wildway.

Large forest tracts are important to safeguarding plant and animal populations and are vital to the overall health of the forest itself. Healthy protected forests serve as natural carbon sinks, storing huge amounts of carbon and keeping it out of the atmosphere. The U.S. Forest Service has found that, on average, American forests store 158,000 pounds per acre of carbon (above and belowground), and each tree continues to sequester additional carbon annually throughout its lifespan. With 180,000 total acres in the Pine Mountain Wildlands Corridor, the EPA’s Greenhouse Gas Equivalencies Calculator estimates that this area alone accounts for the emissions from more than 1.7 million homes for one year.

Central Appalachia, including Pine Mountain, is a region considered to be one of the most biologically diverse temperate zone forests on the entire planet. This biodiverse forest is home to thousands of species of plants and animals, species that are foundational to the life support system on planet Earth. The region is also considered to be climate resilient – thus the ecosystems, plants and animals found here are better positioned to adapt and persist in the face of climate change. The forests of this region are a globally significant carbon sink, and their protection is critical to addressing the climate crisis.

*_{American black bear – © Marc Evans, KNLT}*

Central Appalachia has a history of extensive resource extraction, including limestone and coal mining, logging, and natural gas drilling. Forest conversion and fragmentation resulting from these activities impacts overall ecosystem health. The region is also undergoing a generational shift in landowners that is further fragmenting the ownership of these wild places making conservation much more complex. Although free of merchantable coal, extraction remains a threat to Pine Mountain, however, conservation and the resulting public lands are becoming a valued asset as the region transitions to a more diversified and sustainable economy.

Large landscape conservation depends on the power of partnership. Through a public-private partnership, KNLT and its conservation partners have protected over 69,000 acres — nearly 40% of Pine Mountain. The result is a matrix of conservation lands that protect vital habitat and headwater streams while providing outdoor recreation opportunities. The primary conservation tool used on Pine Mountain is direct purchase of land from willing sellers. Acquisition and protection of these wildlands is only possible with funding which has come from a mixture of private philanthropy, foundations, government agencies and mitigation funds.

Science-driven and Community-minded Conservation

*_{Pine Mountain – Blanton Forest – © Gerry James, Explore Kentucky Initiative}*

Pine Mountain Wildlands Corridor project is a great example of KNLT’s science-driven and community-minded conservation. The project serves as a natural climate solution that mitigates both local and regional climate threats while providing additional environmental, social, and economic benefits, all of which are foundational to the pillars that drive KNLT’s work:

Biodiversity: The foundation of life on the Planet is dependent upon intact ecologically functioning natural systems. Pine Mountain has some of the most biodiverse forests in the state and is within Central Appalachia, home to one of the most biodiverse temperate zone forests on Earth. These forests are vital carbon sinks.

Climate Resilience: Central Appalachia, including Pine Mountain, is a geography with an extremely varied landscape that is considered to be climate resilient. The plants, animals and intact natural systems found here are better positioned to adapt and persist in the face of climate change.

Just Transition: Protected wild places are important to cultural, human, and economic health. Conservation lands foster outdoor recreation, tourism, and livability for local communities. Wildlands are vital to communities undergoing economic transition, like what is unfolding throughout Central Appalachia.

Watch this video from Kentucky Natural Lands Trust on Biodiversity and Climate Resilience to learn more.

Kentucky Natural Lands Trust is a nationally accredited nonprofit that has protected over 50,000 acres of wildlands from the mountains of Eastern Kentucky to the sloughs of Western Kentucky. Learn more by visiting: www.KNLT.org

Conservation is Climate Action

For a challenge as great as climate change, there are no silver bullets. Right now, much of the conversation on solutions focuses on curbing greenhouse gas emissions through investment in renewable energy, electric vehicles, and low-carbon construction. These are vital strategies for addressing climate change, but the critical role conservation of natural and working lands plays in mitigating climate change is often left out of this discussion.

There are many benefits associated with land and water conservation. Taking action to protect and restore our forests, grasslands and coastal wetlands provides habitat for wildlife, improves water quality, and makes communities more resilient to extreme weather and storm events – all while creating jobs. At the same time, conservation is an important climate change strategy. Forests, grasslands and coastal wetlands draw in and store carbon from the atmosphere. Conservation actions can increase how much these ecosystems take in and prevent the carbon they already store from being released.

U.S. Nature4Climate is highlighting conservation success stories that illustrate how conservation action is climate action. Conservation is a climate strategy that can take place everywhere – from America’s vast sagebrush steppe to New England’s lush forests. We will highlight the benefits of conserving coastal ecosystems, like salt marshes and forested tidal wetlands. These “blue carbon” ecosystems have the potential to store up to 25 million tons of carbon dioxide a year, while also providing habitat for fish and other marine species, stabilizing shorelines, and supporting recreational and commercial fishing.

Additions to and sustainable management of America’s national parks, forests, monuments, and wildlife refuges are a key part of our conservation and climate action story too. For instance, the Angeles National Forests provides clean water, access to nature, and jobs. At the same time, the area’s shrublands and forests store carbon equivalent to taking 2.5 million cars off the road for a year .

We will also recognize the important role that private landowners can play in our efforts to conserve lands and waters. Farmers and ranchers who sustainably manage their lands provide habitat for wildlife and sequester carbon. For example, rancher John Reed worked with The Nature Conservancy and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to place a conservation easement on his land – protecting important native grassland from development.

We will highlight the leadership provided by Indigenous communities in actualizing the climate benefits of conservation action. For example, the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes of the Flathead Nation implemented a climate change strategy on reservation land that helps protect ecologically important whitebark pine trees. In addition to capturing carbon, these trees provide food sources for grizzly bears and help protect water supplies to surrounding communities. Through a combination of tree planting and controlled burns, the Salish and Kootenai Tribes are helping whitebark pines survive and thrive.

Even urban parks have a role to play and can sequester nearly as much carbon per acre as tropical rainforests. Any individual park’s impact may be small, but with more than 20,000 city parks nationwide, the collective benefits add up. Meanwhile, innovative conservation projects – like Atlanta’s recently completed Cook Park – support urban infrastructure to manage water during storm surges, provide shade to cool urban heat islands, and ensure more equitable access to nature and recreation for millions of people

So yes, conservation is climate action.

Please visit our new Conservation IS Climate Action campaign page, and the U.S. Nature4Climate blog to learn more about the powerful role conservation can play in addressing climate change.

Andy Jackson is a Research & Communications Fellow at U.S. Nature4Climate.

Conserving and Restoring Whitebark Pine

*_{Whitebark Pine. Photo Credit: Quinn Lowrey}*

Whitebark pine is a scraggly tree that few people ever see, given that it only grows upwards of 6,000 feet. But it is one of the most important tree species in the western United States. Grizzly bears, for example, fill up almost exclusively on whitebark pine seeds before going into hibernation. High-elevation trees and plants can’t grow to full size unless there are whitebark pines nearby to block the wind. And the water supply for people in the western U.S. is dependent, in part, on whitebark pine.

Given the value of this tree species, it’s troubling to know there are more dead whitebark pine trees than live ones in this country, according to the U.S. Forest Service. There are so few left that whitebark pine is a candidate species under the U.S. Endangered Species Act and is listed as endangered in Canada.

Many of the forests where the trees once grew are referred to as “ghost forests,” given the large number of standing dead trees.

They have fallen victim to a non-native fungus, white pine blister rust, that prevents the flow of nutrients within the tree. They also have been hit hard by climate change, which has brought longer periods of dry, warm weather — ideal conditions for intense wildfires and an insect, mountain pine beetle, that attacks mature whitebark pines. Under normal conditions, this tree would live for more than 200 years. Some have lived for more than 1,000 years.

Nowhere is the plight of whitebark pine more evident than the Crown of the Continent, the18 million-acre mountainous region that spans northern Montana, as well as Canada’s southern Alberta and British Columbia provinces, and includes Glacier National Park. Only one in 10 whitebark pine trees in this region is untouched by blister rust.

There are five other “Hi5” tree species — so named because they only grow at high elevations and their needles are attached to branches in groups of five — in the western U.S. that are in decline. But whitebark pine is in the most danger and is the canary in the coal mine for other Hi5s.

*_{Brian Kittler of American Forests and healthy whitebark pine on the Whitefish Mountain Resort. Photo Credit: Jenny Nichols/American Forests}*

The first-ever whitebark pine restoration plan for the Crown of the Continent is in the final stage of development and already has buy-in from a diverse group that includes tribal members, skiers, federal and state agencies, conservationists (including US Nature4Climate member American Forests), academics and others. The plan will prioritize what parts of the forest need to be restored and the climate-smart practices we need to use to restore them.

A key partner in this undertaking is northern Montana’s Whitefish Mountain Resort, one of the top-rated ski resorts in the country and a popular spot for hiking and mountain biking in the warmer months. The resort might seem like an unusual bedfellow for an endangered forest, but it’s a perfect fit. Scientists, conservationists, U.S Forest Service staff and others use the resort’s chair lifts in the winter to get to the top of the mountain, where they then ski to stands of whitebark pine trees to do their work. In the warmer months, the backcountry roads and trails managed by the resort make it easier for them to drive into the forests.

In 2016, Whitefish was the first resort in the country to become certified by the Whitebark Pine Ecosystem Foundation as a whitebark pine-friendly ski resort. It was recognized for how it helps the U.S. Forest Service and others, as well as what it does to educate the general public about whitebark pine.

“The chairlift is a great opportunity to teach people about whitebark pine,” says former resort Public Relations Manager Riley Polumbus. “They can see it when we are riding up the lift together.”

_{Skiers enjoy the abundant snows that the whitebark pine forest helps to retain. The Whitefish Mountain Resort works with the U.S. Forest Service on whitebark pine restoration. Photo Credit: Morgan Heim/American Forests}

What many people are interested in learning, after hearing about the dire circumstances this tree species faces, is what this means for them. Without whitebark, skiers would be more likely to get lost when skiing in foggy conditions, as whitebark pines — one of the few trees at high elevations — help guide the way. And they would be less likely to quench their thirst, given that whitebark pine holds snow in place in the winter (thanks to its candelabra-shaped wide crown that provides shade, which slows snowmelt) and gradually releases it into rivers in the warmer months. The river water eventually becomes drinking water.

The Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes of the Flathead Nation also is a key player. It manages the 1.3 million-acre Flathead Indian Reservation — 10 percent of which is whitebark pine forest.

The tribal members’ deep and centuries-old connection to the land is what motivates them to invest time and money in caring for the forest.

The tribe created a forest management plan in the 1990s that includes goals for whitebark pine. They have been following the plan ever since it was approved in 2000. But the true relevance and urgency behind the plan did not become apparent until 2013, when people on the reservation started to visibly notice changes in the forest, many of which they attributed to climate change. For example, trees that typically grew at low elevations were moving up the mountain, to cooler climates, where they were outcompeting trees that were already there.

That’s when they decided to create a climate change strategy to supplement the forest management plan.

_{James Lozeau is part of the team working to restore whitebark pine at the Flathead Reservation in Montana. He stores seeds harvested in the mountains of the Flathead reservation.
Photo Credit: Morgan Heim/American Forests.}

The strategy incorporates forestry practices similar to those being used by the U.S. Forest Service, such as caging cones on “plus trees.” Tribal members have collected thousands of seeds from the cones they have caged in the last few years and have already planted more than 2,000 trees from those seeds on 9 acres.

But their work goes beyond planting trees, an approach American Forests refers to as “carbon offense” because the new trees capture carbon. They also play “carbon defense” to prevent forests from degrading and, then, releasing carbon when large and intense wildfires, as well as other events, occur.

For this tribe, the best carbon defense play is purposefully setting fires — called controlled burns — that eliminate trees that naturally would not be in a certain part of the forest. For whitebark pine, a tree that does not grow well in shade, that means removing other types of trees that block the sun. The fires, which are low intensity and only at ground level, also prevent a build-up of vegetation that is essentially fuel for what can become an out of control and intense wildfire.

Controlled burns were common on the reservation until 100 or so years ago, when fire got a bad name and, therefore, suppressing fires became the norm.

“Our elders have been telling us for years to stop putting out fires,” says Tony Incashola, Jr., who oversees the tribe’s forestry agency. “Fire is natural. Back in the day, people did not have tools. Fire was their only tool for managing forests. People knew how to burn, what to burn and when to burn.”

It is forward-thinking forest restoration like this from tribes and companies – as well as others – that will help ensure whitebark pine can provide benefits to people and wildlife well into the future.

Jill Schwartz is the Vice President of Marketing and Communications at American Forests.

How Climate Action Can Reboot Economies in Rural America

*_{Photo Credit: Mark Alexander/iStock}*

Many rural counties in the United States face the dual challenges of lagging economic growth and increasingly severe effects of climate change. While urban areas are not uniformly prosperous and rural areas are not uniformly poor, rural communities on average lag behind their urban counterparts on most key economic indicators — from poverty rates to labor force participation. Rural areas represent 86% of persistent poverty counties in the U.S., while over 50% of rural Black residents live in economically distressed counties.

These challenges have been intensified by economic losses from the COVID-19 pandemic, which has exacerbated existing inequalities and highlighted urgent infrastructure needs. At the same time, catastrophic wildfires, record heatwaves, drought and other severe weather events linked to climate change threaten rural communities and livelihoods.

Addressing both the climate crisis and lagging economic vitality will require federal investment in building a new climate economy for rural America — one that reduces greenhouse gas emissions to net-zero while creating jobs, uplifting economically disadvantaged communities, and enhancing ecosystem services. This opportunity is already being realized in targeted regions (clean energy is a growing economic engine for many rural communities) and federal policymakers now have the opportunity to dramatically expand on this progress.

New WRI analysis finds that an annual federal investment of nearly $15 billion in key areas of the rural new climate economy would create hundreds of thousands of jobs in rural communities, add billions of dollars of value to rural economies, and generate millions in new tax revenues. This investment would help combat the economic stagnation confronting many rural areas and ensure that the benefits of the transition to a net-zero economy are widely distributed.

Understanding Rural Economic Opportunity by Area and Geography

In this new paper, we analyzed the impact of $55 billion per year in federal investment in seven areas of the new climate economy over at least five years. These include investments in renewable energy; energy efficiency; transmission, distribution, and storage (TDS); environmental remediation of abandoned fossil fuel infrastructure; tree restoration on federal and non-federal lands; and wildfire risk management. An estimated $14.9 billion of that investment (27%) would be directed to rural America.

That investment would support nearly 260,000 direct, indirect and induced jobs for at least five years in rural counties (a total of 1.3 million job-years) and 740,000 jobs for five years in the country as a whole (a total of 3.7 million job-years). This equates to 17.5 jobs per $1 million invested in rural counties.

The results also indicate that new climate economy federal investment in rural areas would offer an attractive return on investment by adding $21.7 billion per year to rural economies for the first five years — $1.46 for every dollar invested. This includes $12.9 billion in employee compensation and $1.6 billion in federal, state and local tax revenues. The figure below shows the distribution of economic benefits across the seven investment areas.

Rural Economic Impacts by Investment Area (each year for first five years)

* Results in the table are for rural counties only. For the purposes of this analysis, we use Rural-Urban Continuum Codes developed by the USDA Economic Research Service to delineate rural areas. This geographic-economic classification scheme distinguishes between two broad types of regions: metropolitan counties (codes 1-3) and non-metropolitan counties (codes 4-9). This analysis considers all non-metropolitan counties to be rural. Source: The Economic Benefits of New Climate Economy in Rural America, 2021

Job creation benefits would be widely dispersed across the country’s rural areas and vary by sector depending on regional economic factors. The top five states seeing the most significant impacts in terms of job creation relative to the size of local rural economies would be California, Massachusetts, New Mexico, Wyoming and Nevada.

California, New Mexico and Nevada would benefit most substantially from wildfire risk management investment. Massachusetts and Nevada, by contrast, would benefit largely from investments in renewable energy, energy efficiency, and grid transmission and distribution.

The analysis shows the geographic distribution of rural job creation potential (measured as jobs created in a rural county per 1,000 private sector workers, aggregated at the state level) from federal investment in each of the seven areas analyzed. Different investment areas naturally impact regions differently depending on local economic factors and where opportunities are located.

For instance, Massachusetts, California, Nevada, Maryland and Illinois would see the most job creation benefits from federal investments in renewable energy, while rural counties in Pennsylvania, Kansas, West Virginia, Kentucky and Wyoming would benefit most from investments in environmental remediation of orphaned oil and gas wells and abandoned coal mines. The latter is particularly important given that these are the same regions that have seen significant job losses due to the phasing out of coal generation. Investment in these regions can therefore help ensure a more just economic transition.

Rural counties in Utah, Colorado, Wyoming, Idaho and New Mexico are expected to see the highest levels of job creation from investment in tree restoration on federal lands, while those in Missouri, Ohio, South Dakota, Michigan and Wisconsin would benefit most from investment in tree restoration, including agroforestry, on state, local and private lands.

Direct and Indirect Benefits of Rural Investment in the New Climate Economy

Federal investments in the rural new climate economy would also provide benefits beyond job creation. Wind energy can help farmers and landowners earn money, providing additional income support and enhancing financial stability during lean times. Energy efficiency projects can help reduce energy bills for rural households by as much as 25%, representing more than $400 in annual household savings.

Investments in wildfire risk mitigation can help reduce the danger that catastrophic wildfires pose to rural communities and forests — an important point given that western wildfires are becoming more frequent and more destructive. In 2018 alone, wildfires in California cost the U.S. economy 0.7% of the nation’s annual GDP, highlighting the need to invest in measures that can help mitigate fire risks.

Local tax payments generated from these projects also provide much-needed revenue to rural communities for investing in new and improved infrastructure including roads, bridges and schools. In some cases, when a renewable energy project comes to a rural area, it is the largest single taxpayer in the county and accounts for a large share of the county’s budget.

Potential Impact on Economically Disadvantaged Rural Communities

To enable a new climate economy that supports economic wellbeing in all communities, federal investment in the seven areas described above must support the nation’s most economically disadvantaged rural communities.

The new climate economy opportunities described previously could create more than 118,000 jobs for at least five years (a total of 590,000 job-years) in these counties, resulting in over $9.8 billion added to these rural economies annually, including $5.9 billion in employee compensation and $685 million in total taxes.

Economically disadvantaged rural counties in California, Texas, New Mexico, Missouri and Kentucky stand to benefit the most in terms of total jobs supported by federal investment in the seven focus areas of this analysis.

Federal Investment in the New Climate Economy Could Significantly Benefit Economically Disadvantaged Rural Counties

While this job creation is significant, representing approximately 45% of job creation potential from investment in the seven areas of the new climate economy, more needs to be done to ensure economic benefits reach the areas where they are most needed.

Actions on this front could include: workforce training programs in the energy and land sectors with employment guarantees; measures to make clean energy affordable for low-income households; grant programs to support local businesses and nonprofit organizations; and requirements that new program designs be collaborative, inclusive and accessible to all workers.

Federal Policies Can Support a Rural New Climate Economy

The federal government has an opportunity to enact and expand policies that will drive investments in the new climate economy, creating jobs and bolstering rural economies in the process. Fully activating the opportunities analyzed in each of the seven areas would require a suite of federal policies, which could support a larger federal plan for rebuilding infrastructure and mitigating climate change.

The current push by Congress and the Biden administration to invest in the country’s ailing infrastructure and tackle the climate crisis represents the most promising political moment in years to support a new climate economy in rural America.

The proposed American Jobs Plan, representing the administration’s basis for negotiations with Congress on infrastructure, would provide historic levels of federal funding for places that have faced declining economic opportunities.

Several policy provisions of the American Jobs Plan — including investments in transmission lines, rural electric cooperatives to advance low-cost clean energy in rural communities, plugging orphan wells and cleaning up abandoned coal mines, and forest restoration — have the potential to create jobs and spur broad-based economic growth

The investments considered in our analysis, however, will likely not be sufficient on their own to recruit and train the workforce necessary to implement new climate economy pathways.

The policies recommended here will also need to include mechanisms to ensure that jobs created provide minimal barriers to entry, are well-paid, offer opportunities for stable employment and benefits, and support unionization. These components will help ensure that the new climate economy will not just create jobs, but sustain worker and community well-being and create equitable opportunities for all.

Federal policy opportunities by investment area

Renewable energy	Extend investment tax credits and production tax credits for renewable energy Reauthorize tax incentives for clean energy manufacturing facilities through section 48C of the tax code Expand grant and loan programs that help rural communities finance renewable energy, including the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Rural Energy for America Program (REAP)
Energy efficiency	Extend tax incentives for efficiency upgrades in homes and residential buildings, including the existing homes tax credit (tax code sec. 25C) and new homes tax credit (sec. 45L) Extend tax incentives for efficiency upgrades in new and existing commercial buildings (sec. 179D) Boost funding level for block grant programs that channel money directly to state and local agencies for efficiency upgrades, including the Weatherization Assistance Program, State Energy Program, and Energy Efficiency Conservation Block Grants program, and create a comparable program for industrial facilities Expand grant and loan programs targeted at rural communities, including the USDA REAP program, Energy Efficiency Conservation Loan Program, and Rural Energy Savings Program
Transmission, distribution, and storage	Create tax credits to incentivize the build out of transmission projects that are regionally significant and can enable renewable energy integration on the grid and stand-alone energy storage technologies Reauthorize tax credits to incentivize domestic clean energy manufacturing facilities (sec. 48C) Reauthorize the Department of Energy’s Smart Grid Investment Grant program to promote investments in smart grid technologies Authorize the Department of Transportation to make transmission infrastructure projects, especially those that emphasize the integration of renewable energy, eligible under the Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act loan guarantee program Expand loans and loan guarantees through USDA Electric Infrastructure Loan & Loan Guarantee to help finance transmission and distribution systems in rural areas Create a program to provide grants and technical assistance to rural electric cooperatives to deploy energy storage and microgrid technologies
Environmental remediation of abandoned fossil fuel infrastructure	Increase federal funding to clean up abandoned coal mine sites Create a new program for plugging and remediation at orphaned oil and gas well sites
Tree restoration on federal lands	Remove the funding cap on the Reforestation Trust Fund Increase appropriations for programs that fund restoration projects on federal land
Tree restoration on non-federal lands	Implement a refundable or transferable tax credit for natural carbon sequestration Enhance USDA conservation programs to incentivize natural carbon sequestration and reduce transaction costs for landowners, especially underserved landowners Provide additional funding through state and local grants and the State and Private Forestry programs of the U.S. Forest Service (USFS)

_{Source: The Economic Benefits of New Climate Economy in Rural America, 2021}

Rural America’s Crucial Role in U.S. Climate Change Policies

Rural America will be indispensable in enabling the country to reach net-zero emissions: rural farmers, ranchers, and forest owners manage large segments of lands that hold enormous opportunities for climate mitigation. Rural areas are also crucial for clean energy development: 99% of all onshore wind capacity in the country is located in rural areas, as is the majority of utility-scale solar capacity.

U.S. climate policy, informed by the unique needs and context of rural America, can not only harness the power of rural communities to address climate change but also generate significant economic opportunities for these communities. This approach will be essential to helping the nation meet ambitious decarbonization goals while creating millions of good jobs across the country.

This article was originally published by the World Resources Institute.

In the Wake of IPCC Report, U.S. Nature4Climate Supports Bold Climate Action to Address Climate Change

On August 9^th, 2021, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its 6^th report on climate change, summarizing the most up-to-date science on the impacts of human-caused greenhouse gas emissions. This report serves as a dire warning to humanity should we fail to take immediate action to reduce these emissions. We are already experiencing the consequences of climate change, with record heat, wildfires, historic drought and flooding impacting nearly every part of the United States. As the IPCC report states, these climate-related disasters will only become more common as the planet continues to warm.

According to Katharine Hayhoe, Chief Scientist for The Nature Conservancy, “Scientists have predicted the likelihood of accelerating climate change for more than a century now – yet too often their warnings have been disregarded. My hope is that the rigor, transparency, and unprecedented urgency of this latest IPCC report will make it simply impossible to ignore.”

In order to avoid subjecting future generations to the catastrophic impacts of unabated climate change, we must pursue every mitigation strategy at our disposal. This necessarily begins with massive and sustained investment in renewable energy and carbon-free transportation. It is impossible to stop climate change without first taking action to reduce, and ultimately end, the release of immense quantities of carbon dioxide, methane and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

The U.S. Nature4Climate coalition supports efforts to decarbonize our energy and transportation sectors and eliminate our dependence on fossil fuels. We also believe that America’s natural and working lands can play an important role in helping to achieve our long-term climate goals. Natural Climate Solutions are a critical compliment to economy-wide action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions – not a substitute for these efforts.

The science is clear – climate-smart management of America’s public lands, as well as privately owned farms, forests and ranches, can help remove millions of tons of carbon from the atmosphere. As Lucy Almond, the Chair of the Global Nature4Climate coalition states, “If we rapidly reduce emissions in line with the most ambitious IPCC pathways, natural carbon sinks and reduction of sources can do a lot to help take us the rest of the way to net zero.”

Over the past year, U.S. Nature4Climate has worked to highlight the many cross-cutting benefits of these climate-smart land management strategies. In addition to naturally removing carbon from the atmosphere, Natural Climate Solutions create jobs, enhance wildlife habitat and make our coastlines, forests, farms and cities more resilient to fire, flooding and drought. While these solutions are practical, relatively low cost, and available now, widescale adaptation will require both public and private investment in workforce development, training, technical assistance and mechanisms to incentivize action by private landowners.

My hope is that IPCC’s recent report spurs every jurisdiction, company, organization and individual to invest as much as possible in a just, equitable and comprehensive set of strategies for avoiding the worst impacts of climate change. Let’s get to work.

Catherine Macdonald is the North America Director of Natural Climate Solutions at The Nature Conservancy and the Chair of the USN4C Steering Committee.