More than half of the drinking water in the U.S. comes from a forest. By making choices that keep our forests as forests, we are keeping our water clean. Learn how forests help keep our water clean and impact your daily life.
Forests play a central role in keeping our earth healthy. But what is a forest?
Heroic strength. Unflappable bravery. A commitment to doing what’s right. Wearing a cape. This is what it takes to be a guardian.
Right?
The Emmerson family got started 70 years ago as a small sawmill operation in California. Today, their company Sierra Pacific Industries owns and manages over 2 million acres of forest across the West, employs 5,2000 people, and has donated over a million dollars a year for the last decade to community non-profit organizations and education scholarships.
Cape or no cape, the Emmerson family is showing the world that sustainable forest management means more than just planting trees. It’s about thinking beyond tomorrow and planning for the future. Not just the future of the land, but the future of these communities, and the future of the men and women who are the heartbeat of Sierra Pacific.
Swap spandex and super powers for guardianship spanning generations and you have true modern day guardians in the Emmerson Family and Sierra Pacific.
Meet the Paper Machine! As long as a football field, this machine is just one of many processes, machines, and people working behind the scenes at Georgia Pacific to create paper and packaging products used in our daily lives.
In 2016, Menominee Tribal Enterprises, the business arm of the Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin, completed a biomass-fueled district combined heat and power (CHP) project in an attempt to create energy independence, and reduce carbon footprint and air emissions.
For more than 150 years, the Menominee people have utilized sustainable forestry practices to preserve a unique ecosystem with a wide variety of species and varied habitats. The result is an award winning sustainable forest located on the Menominee Nation Reservation in central Wisconsin. It’s a forest that is not only economically profitable, but also ecologically healthy. In 2016, an advanced wood energy system was completed at the Menominee Tribal Enterprises sawmill to continue with our practices of preserving resources. The project, driven by the Menominee people’s emphasis on sustainability and environmental protection, evolved from our cultural relationship with the land and greater self-sufficiency as a Nation.
In 2016, we completed a biomass-fueled district combined heat and power (CHP) project in an attempt to create energy independence, reduce our carbon footprint and reduce air emissions thus improving local air quality through the use of renewable resources on the Reservation. Biomass is simply wood chips, collected from waste residues from our sawmill, from low value logs, or from harvesting residues. By moving to a biomass boiler system, we are also protecting the health and well-being of communities and our Tribal School near the mill. It is MTEs responsibility and practice to protect the community health as well as the environment while committing to providing sustainable jobs and a solid economic base for the Menominee Indian Tribe.
This project occurred pretty quickly. In partnership with the USDA Forest Service and their wood energy team, assessments showed that we could replace old, inefficient technology with a new biomass-fueled district combined heat and power (CHP) system to generate steam and electricity using renewable biomass fuel for our forest products operations. The steam heat generated will be used to dry lumber in our kilns and to heat our operations and office space, and electricity generated will provide more than 20 percent of MTE’s energy needs. It strengthens our long-term competiveness and commitment to the Menominee and our customers. Our mission statement reflects this: “Menominee Tribal Enterprises is committed to excellence in the sustainable management of our forest, and the manufacturing of our lumber and forest products providing a consistently superior product while serving the needs of our forest, employees, wood products customers, tribal community, and future generations.”
Our investment in a new wood energy system is providing use of existing, renewable Menominee resources and providing economic and environmental benefits for the long-term sustainability of our forests and people. This provides for our Nation for the next generations and embodies the culture, values, and spirit of the Menominee people.
Shabnam is a bio-chemical engineer from Iran who traded oil and gas for renewable wood. Driven by her desire to improve the world around her and contribute to a more sustainable future, her work creating new materials and products from biomaterials is literally redefining what’s possible with wood.
Meet Shabnam Sanaei and see why her work as a Biomaterials Specialist at Domtar makes her #forestproud.
"The hill that was always known as Bald Hill was totally covered in Juniper." Discover Oregon’s effort to restore habitat for sage grouse and create jobs by harvesting Western Juniper. Collaboration efforts like this one protect Oregon's forests and create rural jobs.
For more information visit: www.WesternJuniper.org
Roseburg, Ore. – Restoring central Oregon’s federal forests is a big important job, requiring a diverse group of stakeholders working together to create science-guided solutions that strive for balance, landscape scale and local economic benefits. Too many small trees crowd the landscape, putting homes and property at risk from intense wildfires. But what to do about it? This six-minute video showcases how stakeholders are working to restore central Oregon’s forests and make them more fire-resilient.
“The forests in central Oregon are adapted to fire,” said Pete Caliguiri, a fire ecologist with The Nature Conservancy. “With 450,000 acres of forest in need of restoration, it is important that we learn how to scale up our efforts. Sound science should continue to guide us.”
Forest restoration is expensive and results in a lot of by-products with varying degrees of commercial value. Finding markets for less valuable by-products from restoration projects, such as small trees and brush, would lower costs and create more local jobs.
“Ideally we’d have markets for the small trees and biomass that result from these treatments,” said Nicole Strong, assistant professor at Oregon State University’s College of Forestry.
“There’s a lot of opportunity to create markets for some of these by-products like firewood, post and poles, pellets and wood chips for heat and power,” said Ed Keith, Deschutes County Forester.
“Forest restoration creates a lot of benefits: reduced fire risk to communities, improved economics and utilization of the by-products and improved forest ecology,” Stowe added. “We’ll never get the forest back to where it was before we mucked it up. But we can get it headed in the right direction, and it will be a better forest for everyone.”
The video was produced by the Oregon Department of Forestry with generous funding provided by the USDA Forest Service.
Who are the people in yellow setting fires in Oregon's dry forests? Wildfire has historically played an important role in the health and structure of Oregon's dry forests. Prescribed fire is a valuable tool used to restore forest health, increase firefighter safety, and better protect nearby human resources in these fire-adapted landscapes. The Northwest Fire Science Consortium's new video showcases the role of prescribed fire.
Forests and forest products capture almost 15% of our carbon emissions each year. Learn more about the importance of forests in mitigating climate change.
