Transcript Forests and Complexity Opportunity

Our Forests - Disaster or complexity opportunity?
https://www.bced.gov.bc.ca/abed/map.htm
IPCC FAR projected global warming
https://theusindependent.com/oregon-teens-sue-gov-because-of-climate-change-and-won/
1. Dramatic decline in snowpack predicted by 2040
http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/ch11s11-5-3-5.html
2. Increasing area burned annually in Canada
3. Massive shifts in forest composition predicted
Tongli Wang, UBC, Climate WNA
http://cfcg.forestry.ubc.ca/projects/climate-data/climatebc-and-bioclimatic-envelope-modelling/
4. Changed from CO2 sink to source
State of Canada’s Forests, 2007
New study shows declining productivity and carbon
sequestration in Canadian boreal forest
NASA, Dec. 2011
Pan, PNAS, 2012
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Governance
Landscapes
Stands
1. Mitigate with carbon pricing and renewable
energy
2. Reduce harvest
3. Leave legacies behind
4. Reforest with resilient species mixtures
State of BC’s Forests 2010
1. Mitigate with renewable energy
2. Reduce harvest
3. Leave legacies behind
4. Reforest with resilient species mixtures
History of harvesting in British Columbia
Hagerman et al. (2010)
harvest m3/year
AAC (majors)
90,000,000
80,000,000
Nussbaum, 2012
Current AAC 78.3
Province
70,000,000
60,000,000
Interior
50,000,000
40,000,000
30,000,000
Coast
20,000,000
10,000,000
0
2010
2060
2110
year
2160
2210
“From Conflict to Collaboration”, 2009
“B.C. rainforest under threat: environmentalists”, CBC, June 2011
New ownership TimberWest
ENGO’s currently seeking greater protection
Protect at Least 50% Globally, Noss 2011, Cons. Biol. 24: 1-4
Case Study: Great Bear Rainforest
Kennedy Lake, Clayoquot Sound
1. Mitigate with renewable energy
2. Reduce harvest
3. Leave legacies behind
4. Reforest with resilient species mixtures
Beiler et al. (2010)
1. Reduce emissions, substitute renewable energy
2. Reduce disturbance due to harvest
3. Leave legacies behind
4. Reforest with resilient species mixtures
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Climate change is a disaster of epic proportions
Impacts to our iconic forests include reduced
snowpack, increase wildfire, species shifts, and
change in carbon balance
Our forests are being over-harvested, contributing
to the problem
There is great opportunity to make forests part of
the solution
These include increasing the forested area through
reduced harvest, and increasing forest stability
through partial cutting and increased planting of
resilient mixtures