Trump strips protections for Tongass forest, opening it to logging

[highplainsdem]

Source: The Hill

The Trump administration on Wednesday lifted protections for Alaska's Tongass National Forest, a move that will expand logging in the nation’s largest old-growth forest.

A notice posted in the Federal Register lifts the so-called Roadless Rule for the Tongass, a Clinton-era prohibition on road construction and timber harvesting on many Forest Service lands.

Under the Trump administration’s changes, the nearly 9.4 million acres of inventoried roadless land in Tongass Forest would once again be considered suitable timberlands.

It’s a major blow to environmental efforts to protect one of the world’s largest temperate rainforests--the Forest Service found in 2016 that it stores more carbon than any other forest in the country.

-snip-

Read more: https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/523145-trump-strips-protections-for-tongass-forest-opening-it-to-logging

[onecaliberal]

1. Biden will overturn.

[Botany]

2. Trump is just doing this to be a dick so he can own "the libs"

How much is the wild run salmon who use the Tongass' streams and rivers to spawn are worth.

How many tons of CO2 does that area sequester every year?

[Deuxcents]

3. Scorched earth

He’s got so little time to destroy all our treasures but he’s gonna try.

[mopinko]

4. hopefully none of the logging companies are stupid enough to invest in this.

cuz alllll these eo's and rule changes will get over turned on day 1.

[onetexan]

5. The Con probably got greased by the logging companies. Doing last minute grifting.

[mopinko]

8. that doesnt mean they cant read the writing on the wall, but

i'm guessing they know which tracts actually need clearing.
it is lack of proper thinning by the feds that is making fires worse. no, has nothing to do w raking.

but tsongass, yeah, no. dont fall for that one fellas. that aint happening.
i know they all have hopes and dreams, and even plans in their back pockets. but they would have to get up quite the head of steam to have roads built by jan 21.
if they pick the right spots, good. get it going rfn.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

11. I'm sure there are plenty of small crews who would be happy to get as much as possible ...

,,, out of the forest as they can in three months. Maybe more, if Biden is slow to reverse the order.

"Three Men, a Truck, and a Chainsaw", at your service. "You sell 'em, we fell 'em".

But you're right, no investment. They'll have to cherry-pick the trees close to existing roads. Nobody will create a logging road for a mere three months of work, I hope.

[Illumination]

6. Is nothing sacred with this administration?...

[jeffreyi]

7. No. This is war.

On us, on our environment. Well, another donation to NRDC.

[highplainsdem]

9. Scientist and Senate candidate Merav Ben-David tweets about this:

Link to tweet

[Yeehah]

10. I must be stupid because I thought Congress has something to do with major changes like this

The decision to open the area for logging follows a push by Alaska's Department of Natural Resources, which had asked the U.S. Department of Agriculture to exempt the Tongass from the rule, saying it would "create jobs and prosperity for our rural communities located in the Tongass National Forest."

But Rait pointed to research from Taxpayers for Common Sense that found that in 2019 the Forest Service lost roughly $16 million on its timber program in the Tongass, where there is currently some limited logging.

“It costs more money for taxpayers to have a timber program on the Tongass than the Forest Service receives in receipts for those timber sales,” he said.

Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue is rotten to the core, just like Trump.

[pfitz59]

13. USFS road construction costs have nearly always been more than timber revenue

Tongass is especially hard because of its remoteness, and soil instability. If and when Alaska Cruises resume there will be an uproar if clear-cutting expands.

[LastLiberal in PalmSprings]

12. Each morning he spreads out a map of the entire U.S.in the Oval Office, drops his pants

and takes a dump on some part of it. Then he pisses on California and other blue states.

It's called policy making in the Trump era.

[Karma13612]

14. Please make it stop. Nt