Consensus Reached on Regional Wood Supply

By The Arizona Daily Sun, Flagstaff

Feb. 13–NAU officials released a report Monday that has a diverse group on 20 “stakeholders” identifying 41 percent of the northern Arizona pine forest as appropriate for thinning and biomass harvesting.

The consensus is important to developers of small-diameter wood products plants and biomass energy facilities, who must have a long-term wood supply to obtain financing for their projects.

The “Wood Supply Analysis” report identifies a potential supply of up to 850 million cubic feet of wood and 8 million tons of biomass from branches and timber residue for such commercial uses as pallets, firewood, poles, lumber, mulch and stove pellets.

A group representing forest wood-product businesses, local government, environmental groups and public land and resource management agencies worked with scientists from NAU to build agreement about the amount and type of wood supply that could be available from the thinning of Arizona’s ponderosa pine forests to promote ecosystem health and reduce the risk of unnaturally severe wildfire.

The stakeholder group included representatives from the USDA Forest Service, Center for Biological Diversity, Grand Canyon Trust, NAU’s Ecological Restoration Institute, Forest Energy/Future Forests, the Greater Flagstaff Forests Partnership and others.

The group evaluated 2.4 million acres of ponderosa pine forest stretching from the South Rim of the Grand Canyon, across the Mogollon Plateau, to the New Mexico state line. The area primarily encompasses the Coconino, Kaibab and Apache-Sitgreaves national forests, a small portion of the Tonto National Forest and some private and state lands.

The group agreed that the identified wood and biomass resources were available from 41 percent of the area studied. They also agreed that 26 percent of the area was not appropriate for thinning for commercial wood byproducts.

Some participants felt that an additional 33 percent of the landscape might be an appropriate source of additional wood byproducts. But because of differing views about thinning versus controlled-burning restoration treatments, and uncertainty about other factors such as road access and archaeological sites, Sisk said, the group remained divided about thinning these lands, which would have increased estimated wood supply by only 16 percent.

The Southwestern Region of the USDA Forest Service funded the study to inform local-level discussions of future thinning projects that will include National Environmental Policy Act analyses and to foster the development of contracts to wood product businesses to accomplish forest restoration.

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